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- Hello, hello, hey there, hey there,
welcome into another edition of Between the Lines,
where we take you inside the pages of SUCCESS,
I'm Josh Ellis, editor-in-chief of SUCCESS magazine,
and I'm joined today by our returning champion
Cecilia Meis, Cici, how are you today?
- I'm doing great Josh, thanks for having me.
- Cici writes the How To article in each issue of SUCCESS
and the latest for the July/August issue,
is How To Give Purposefully.
It fits perfect in our lifestyle section of the issue.
And it's about finding a cause that fits for you,
which is more complicated potentially
than one might think, right Cici?
- Yeah, I think a lot goes into our mindset about it,
of if we think that we're not gonna be able to move the
needle, if we're not writing large checks to big charity
organizations or large national nonprofits,
and that's just not necessarily true.
A lot of what goes on in our local communities can really
have great impacts.
- One thing we know about our readers,
is that they are purpose-driven, right?
So they want to be able to positively affect their
communities or the world through the businesses that they
operate or the work that they do.
And, if they're not able to do that through their work,
then they especially want to, we hear this over and over,
give back in some way or another,
whether it's helping younger people, or donating their time
or some money or energy, but there are,
as we all know, a lot of charitable organizations
that don't maximize every dollar that they receive,
or that maybe aren't doing
the greatest possible good for their cause,
and so finding something that you identify with
can be a challenge for some people.
- Yeah, I think the thing that goes along with that too,
is that we're just looking at dollar signs of checks that
we're writing every month to these nonprofits,
and we're not thinking about how it aligns with our business
values and our personal values,
and I think that that could have such a more meaningful
impact of who we are and who we represent as
entrepreneurs and business owners,
and to be kind of thinking on a smaller scale of what kinds
of people do we want to help lift up with our time,
our dollars, our expertise?
- Tell me about some of the case studies that
you spoke to for this story and the ways that,
these are business owners themselves,
but the ways that they are aligning purpose
with what they're contributing.
- Yeah, so I spoke with a couple
based in Carlsbad, California,
and they own a sustainable company,
there on a mission to eliminate plastic from shopping.
That's already something that is a big deal in California
and has already been eliminated on
a lot of the big cities over there.
And I think what struck me most about them is,
everything that they do about their business is in
the form of giving back.
They've created a business on the platform of what's
important to them, and so it's not to them,
just an element of their business,
but actually what they built their business on.
They constructed it on what's valuable to them and what will
help make the world a better place after they're gone.
So that was really cool, the other guy talked to.
- Let me jump, you're speaking there of Jennifer
and Farzen Dehmoubed
They're the co-founders. - Yes.
- Of Lotus Sustainables in Carlsbad, California,
and you also spoke to John Manison,
he's the CEO of Apex Tutors and president
of Sailfish Swim Club based in LA.
- Yeah, I loved what John was saying
about what it takes to move the needle
and to kind of expand our mindset about that.
Anyone can be philanthropic.
You could buy lunch for a homeless person who's living in
your community, or you could donate a million dollars
to a notable cause, both of those things have the power
to impact, and so as your business grows,
and as an entrepreneur,
he believes we have a responsibility to give back,
it's not just something that we should be doing or makes us
feel better, but with the wealth that we're building comes a
responsibility to create a society that all of us,
our grandchildren want to be a part of in the future.
- I wanna make one last point about the point of all this,
and because there may be some people who read it or hear us
talking right now who are like, I can do this easily,
and it's not hard to find worthy causes out there,
no, of course it's not.
But the point is to really align yourself, your vision,
what you believe in and what your values are, with the areas
that need you, and need your contributions
because to go back to the law of attraction,
which is nothing new in personal development,
it's, essentially the idea that if you give of yourself to
something that you really believe in,
you will attract people who will help you.
And so these entrepreneurs that we've been talking about,
John Manison, Jennifer and Farzan Dehmoubed,
the work that they do is for a greater good,
and it brings in people to work with them,
customers who perhaps wanna buy from them, because they see
such value and these people as individuals,
but what they're doing for the world,
and so, when we talk about giving purposefully,
running purpose-driven businesses,
that's what it's all about because there's greater room
for success when you do just that
and I know that you've been writing for SUCCESS
and editing for SUCCESS a long time,
and that's probably a pretty common theme that you've seen
in a lot of the sources that you've talked to.
- Yeah, there's been a lot of studies done on us,
but people don't follow a leader who has a great business
idea, or a great product, or a great business model,
even they follow the person, they follow the vision
that that person represents
and that they live out every day,
and so when you present yourself and say
these are the things I believe in,
these are the values that I live by,
your business better reflect that
because the people that are gonna follow you,
are following you for that reason.
And so just from a perspective of a business owner,
it's smart business move, and also it's something
at the end of the day, you're gonna create
a better environment for everyone around you.
- And you could definitely be proud of your work, Cici,
thanks for the time, thanks for all that you do for SUCCESS
we'll see you again soon.
- Thanks Josh.
- We'll see all of you next week
we have another edition of Between the Lines,
so long everybody.
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