Trish Ellis (Aunt) and Evelyn Wallace (Niece)
Evelyn Wallace lives in rural Eastern Oregon and is in the final stages of earning a master’s degree from Howard University School of Social Work (remote program). Her participation in one of Josh’s early Sustainability Leadership workshops led her to experience a profound mindset shift, and she has been incorporating this distinctive approach to her life—and life’s work—ever since.
Evelyn now leads/ co-leads Sustainability Simplified workshops (under Josh’s tutelage) and continually strategizes how to help others experience the life-changing magic of The Spodek Method. Her particular passion is finding the overlap between sustainability/ sustainability leadership and: social work, Hip Hop, rural communities, spirituality and wellness.
Patricia Ellis is currently the Director of International Communications and Curriculum Development for Attitudinal Healing International (AHI). After eighteen years in the high-tech world, she refocused her career in a more service-oriented direction and joined the staff of the Center for Attitudinal Healing in Tiburon, California in 1986. (The center was founded by Dr. Gerald Jampolsky and offered the first support groups for children with cancer.)
For 38 years, Trish has served in numerous roles within the AHI global community. She has designed social-emotional learning (SEL) and leadership programs for youth and incarcerated adults, trained more than a thousand facilitators worldwide, and assisted in the development of Attitudinal Healing centers and programs around the world.
Trish grew up in New Mexico and has been a resident of Hawaii Island for 25 years. She was introduced to the Spodek method through her niece, Evelyn Wallace and her sister, Beth Bailey. Through this powerful program, Trish has deepened her appreciation for the boundless gifts within nature and has expanded her understanding of each individual’s important role in protecting and sustaining our natural world. She enjoys exploring ways to share Josh’s clear and profound message with others.
Trish holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Excelsior College in New York.
768: Trish and Evelyn, part 2: The birth of sustainability awards
Trish and Evelyn took the workshop, and neither seriously acted on sustainability before it, so one thing to listen for in this conversation is what people who look at personally living more sustainably sound like. I think it’s safe to say we have fun. Partly we express exasperation at the depravity of our polluting and depleting culture. We also share the experience of our eyes opening to those things. Trish, for example, shares how she doesn’t want to take cruises, despite anticipating enjoying them and her friends not seeing their pollution. I share how our culture turned preserving fruit from a way to conserve to a way to waste.
We also talk about our vision to create sustainability awards. A few of them exist, often won by companies on the forefront of sustainability like Coca-Cola and DuPont </sarcasm>. We want to make meaningful, authentic ones. Since some would be for contributing to sustainability and others would be to highlight greenwashing and other nefarious, deceptive anti-sustainable practices, we want a name that can suggest positive and negative. Listen to hear what we came up with. In a few years they’ll become the go-to sustainability awards.
754: (Aunt) Trish Ellis and (Niece) Evelyn Wallace, part 1: Not Even Cancer Holds Her Back
“What I do doesn’t matter” may be the most poignant sentiment of our time.
A similar rationalization not to act: “I have faith that younger people will solve our environmental problems. After all they will be affected more.”
People say these things to avoid acting, avoiding personal responsibility. Well, if anyone can say she deserves to relax and not have to work on problems, nobody would tell someone with incurable cancer she can’t spend her time how she wants. Trish has incurable cancer. She worked her whole life to enjoy her retirement. She didn’t grow up planning to act on sustainability. She didn’t plan to take my sustainability leadership workshops, but her niece, Evelyn, and sister, Beth, told her about taking the workshop so she did.
In this episode, you’ll hear Trish sharing why acting on sustainability and leading others is spending her remaining time how she wants. She once envisioned flying around in her retirement. She could and no one would judge her. But having learned that she can make a difference from the workshop, she’s acting on sustainability. Living by your values and helping others live by theirs isn’t deprivation or sacrifice.
The above is my read of Trish’s situation and motivations. Listen to the episode to hear her describe why someone who could do anything she wants and doesn’t have to care about people far away or younger finds helping future generations and people far away she’ll never meet the best way to spend her precious time. Then sign up for a workshop to create as much meaning in your life.