Revolutionary Leadership: Creating Change Through Community

That's an interesting question and I appreciate it. You know, I would say probably you're delighted and excited to share me with your audience because you and I are massive nerds about community. I absolutely love and we'll never forget our first conversation sitting by my lake and just you being flexible with me to sit out by the lake.

Salve. Yeah.

Yeah. Right? Like that to me is community in its purest and most beautiful form is allowing, the allowing of people to be in a deeper connection with one another around something that they're interested in. Right? And having that consistent connection moving forward. And so I think that's why you're delighted because I've had about 23 years experience of building communities.

Really inviting brands, companies to really come from full heart first and becoming in some, as one of my clients, Kajabi says, obsessed with their Kajabi heroes, the people that they serve their members of their community. I love creating that level of engagement between leaders and holding that those containers and that space of community and those experiences for the people they're serving.

Yeah, that's exactly it. Yeah, do you wanna tell us a little bit about some of the communities you're really excited about today?

Sure, sure. I'd love to. Oh, so I'm working on quite a few communities right now. The one I'm the most excited about is the one that I'm actually finally building for myself, like for my own brand, my own company which you and I are now a part of and expanding in.

And if you're interested, I could tell you about that one?

The one you should talk about.

Do you think so? Okay, okay, okay. So that, I mean, I'll be honest, Lucas, like, to me that has been the most fun community I've ever built the most for multiple reasons. So I guess we should say what the community is. So the community is called the revolutionaries.

I get that.

Yeah, that it was just who I was wanting to be and how I wanted to hold that container wasn't going to be appreciated in a way that felt aligned with my values. Right? And so there was a moment about five years ago where I sat with that and said, you know, I can't change everybody, but what I can do is I would love to imagine a world where those of us who see massive expansion in terms of culture shift.

Start shifting the narrative of how business is done. Simply because we're in the same room. And I remember five years ago when that dropped for me. I was like, okay, nice to know you vision, but I have no idea how to do that. And that is not in the Maruxa's cards.

Like, I've got three babies. I'm, what are we? What the heck are you thinking? Right? I mean, three years ago, my oldest was 9, my middle was probably, she's 10 now, so she was 5, and my youngest was 3. So this vision was not, I did not know how to hold that space with little bitties under my care.

And so at that point, there was a three month period where I literally. Because the pandemic closed all of my colleagues or your colleagues, our ability to have live events. And so many of my colleagues built their entire business models around live events. So I just started doing tons of workshops and sessions and just saying, whatever you wanna know, like I'm opening the kimono to how you build communities real deeply and how you begin to do this virtually.

And so at that point were just like, let's just trust. So in that trust, what started to show up we're the right people? As it as it always does, right? So from there I ended up working with a friend Andy Hussong, who had this gorgeous company called Webinar. It still has this gorgeous company called Webinar Confidential or Webinar Con.

Webinar Con was a live event happened the week before the world shut down. And it was one of those sparks that really started like an entire like, a fire, right? It was incredible. People loved it. People that were able to go to that live event, so they didn't want to lose that momentum. They came to me and they were like, Maruxa, we just acquired this community.

At the same time, this is a whole new industry that nobody, I mean, I've been doing it forever, but not a lot of people really saw the value of community until we were in the middle of a pandemic, which meant everyone wanted to get more innovative. We wanted to get more aligned into what else is possible.

So as I start to over these last three years, I'm starting to like pick things up where things are dropping and seeing like what level of the conversations. You know, I built a metaverse, I grew my first 1 million person community. I'm expanding a $2 billion company with Kajabi, with the way in which we're designing out their models moving forward.

And so now I started and this community is the most exciting because it really is designed for those of us who are, the community mavens of the world, the people who have designed experiences. And communities that are really starting to shift conversation.

These are individuals that are ready for the shift in conversation. They're willing to see something from a different perspective than they've ever seen it before. Many of the community minded folks in the room are, have come from models that never created revenue, right? They've built beautiful communities, but have no idea how to create revenue, more so profit.

Like we're calling in this extraordinary league of community mavens of innovators of those who zig when everyone's zagging. Like it is a wild house, if you will. In a good way, in a good way.

And because there's such love and respect. And such level of care and honor for each one of us in the room. It has become the space of upleveling each and every one of us consistently and finding ways to do that. So it's my favorite community right now because I'm starting to see that all of this, like the history up till this point has led to here, and the people that are showing up for the conversation are ready.

You know what I mean? And Lucas, you're in the room and everything you've accomplished, you know what I'm saying? And that's just four out of the 25. So it's a beautiful community and for me to be able to hold that container to be a participant. And the hostess is a gift. And I'm gaining so much value personally from the learnings already, those community is giving me back.

So that is exciting and it's a long story of it, but it's short of it. And that's why it exists to this day and I look forward to seeing what else is gonna happen in its next iterations. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. That's a good one. Yep.

And it seems like the revolutionaries is something you probably tried to do both to. You probably tried to forget, you probably tried to give it away and you couldn't.

It was meant for me. You know, I'm a very spiritual person and I pay attention to signs and what shows up and how it shows up. And in that, you know, one of the most, one of my favorite characters in the Bible, I grew up in a Christian home. One of my favorite characters was the Esther in the Bible.

And I tell you, I learned that story when I was a young girl, and over these years in these very, very crucial moments of my life, somehow or another, that story keeps popping through. And I think all of us have that, right? We're all made for such a time as this right now. We're on this planet for such a time as this, and when things pop through for each of us.

We're having this conversation.

Yeah, it's very intentional. But when we find ourselves in a beautiful opportunity where we can meet the elevated version of ourselves, our higher and best self in a conversation. And not just conversation, but conversation within ourselves, but then show up as that person in the world, that's when you're able to really, fully align into your such a time as this. You know, that's true powerful leadership.

And I realized these last three years in the pandemic for me, has been an a reclamation of that for me. It's been, and the opportunity to embrace my own leadership and those visions are here for a reason, right?

Oh wow. Accept the gifts and live your best life.

There you go. Yes.

And sometimes, it's that simple.

That's right, that's right. Yes.

Very cool. I love it. And I love being a part of this with you.

I love that you're a part of it. It's so wonderful. Your insights are so phenomenal. Every time you open your mouth for those who are, you know, with us here, I love Lucas's Energy because he'll sit back and you'll observe all of it.

And then when you open your mouth, it is because you're in the observing. I know that when you open your mouth and when you share, it's gonna be gold. So I so appreciate that about you. How intentional you are when you speak.

There are a lot of words in the world, I get to have mine be intentional.

I love that.

Right.

How do you make sure that the revolutionaries and the other communities that you are building are utilizing those elements? Which ones are showing up powerfully for you to use? The words of my good friend Maruxa, which ones are sparking for you?

I love that. You know, it's interesting. When I was reviewing, so you and I had talked about it before we recorded like how fun it is to be in this conversation with a peer, right? Because oftentimes I'm the one coming into a conversation like this is how to build community.

And so when I was experiencing your elements and learning about them, I was like, oh, this one fits here in this part of my process. Oh, this one fits here in this part. Right? So for me, sparking for sure is the recognition that your experience is very aligned in to how I build community as well. Right? The model I use is called the Transformed Community Paradigm. And it looks a little bit different. But the truth is, you know, it's in so many ways similar the thing in terms of the actual elements.

We work, if you look at how businesses are run, we're often run on a project management system and things are projects, they're not relationships. So when you started to think through or when you were introducing the idea of common language to me, it's helping the members of the community, create members of the community and also the visionaries of the community start to put dimension to the way in which we are actually going from a group to people interacting with one another and how we identify.

Right? In my world, I call it experiential value. It's part of what I call experiential value and the idea of creating a space where we have common identity and common sense of identity in partnership with belonging, the energy of belonging.

To me that is so interesting, right? Because I think that oftentimes, and I see this so many times with communities, is that people forget that value and or the term I love actually love the word profit. But the word value. Yeah. Is just it's so more than money, it's more than money.

So hearing it from that perspective, and I actually really love the word profit because it's helping those of us who have created communities that have made $0 or very few dollars to realize that the profit is way more than just the financial experience of that it is the value that is given what kind of love and level of respect and honor has been given into us as community members. What do we gain from that? That it couldn't have happened outside of this container.

And so that really sparked for me as you started talking it through. I'm like, dang, this is good. Like, we need more of that right now. Yeah.

I love it. Yeah. Another piece that I think people miss is everybody is focal point focused.

Yeah.

Focal point focused. So we think of the sharing of value from the hub and spoke model where value comes to a central point and then gets shared out of the central point. But that's not actually how community works. It may be how a pay single source of profit works, but it's not how community works. So when we get together in the revolutionaries, it'll be true community. When somebody else other than you notices that I'm not there and says, wait, where's Lucas?

But that's true. You're absolutely right. Right? We are greater because we are together and when a member is missing, you feel it, it's just like in the body. When you have, if you have a major body part malfunction or you have a major, you know cut on your leg, you feel that cut it is present, that is missing.

And when I build community, I think of it is what is our, we are one being what does it look like to be one being all in action together. Working and functioning as an integrated experience, as a whole experience. And so we are really thinking, we need to be thinking from that perspective when we build community.

The health of the group is everything. Right? And the wealth, meaning W-E-L-L-T-H and e W-E-A-L-T-H gets to show up because it is one moving being and body.

I love that. I really like the idea of adding a TH to Well.

I have to say one of my dearest financial mentors, Christina Wise taught me that her company's called Wealthy, Wealthy, W-E-L-L, and then, you know, W-E-A-L. And it's always stuck with me ever since then, she's just, you know, just having that like reminder that there's that both end that needs to be in the same conversation.

I agree because money is worthless without health.

Yeah, they either work together or they don't work.

Or they don't work. That's it, that's it. You're right.

Wow fun that this deep dive into profit, it's a conversation. I think people need to have more.

Yeah, I agree.

Profit and value.

Oh yeah. You know, it's one that gets people stuck a lot. I find that when we are building, for those of us who have been community building before we realize there's profitability, it is a hard construct to recognize oftentimes because I've heard from many of my colleagues, well, if I'm focused on profitability, well then I'm not focused on the actual true essence of the community.

Is that necessary to make it a profitable endeavor? No. Maybe my profit and to your point, my profit is the relationships I'm building with those incredible beings, right? So,

And the conversations that you're having.

That's it. So it's like recognizing in how do we be more intentional with what the profit looks like, right?

No, because it can play together well. It can. And when we come from a place and we come from our heart space, when we come from a place of full service, what shows up from that? Is we are allowing ourselves to receive back from the community as well. And I'm talking to visionaries right now, right?

It's not just, okay, it's necessary.

Oh, of course. Yeah, you're right. It is absolutely necessary. It's part how the world works today. Yeah.

I mean, if we think about it from the other perspective, your community wants you to be able to continue serving.

That's right.

They're not there by accident and they didn't stick around for no reason at all. They stuck around because the service you're providing them is of value. It's bringing profit into their life that they consider to be valuable, and they want you to keep doing it.

Yeah.

And you can't keep doing it if it's not profitable for you as well.

I don't even know cars very well, but you know what I mean? Like, it's not about that. If that's the reason you think you're, you know, you shouldn't receive money, is because you're gonna be looked upon like that, like. You get to use your money however you wish, you wanna use your money, you know, so point being is like just giving yourself that permission to just keep receiving, you know?

I think it's just a critical piece of the process.

Yeah. Thank you.

Yeah.

Thank you for diving into that and thank you for letting people hear us talk about that.

Of course. My pleasure. It's uncomfortable many times, but worth it.

That's true, that's true. Yeah. I've been building out this process called the return on impact and return on impact is really, well, there's actually what I call the new ROI. It's return on impact and then return on community. And it measures multiple different things and we're playing right now.

That's kind of what I'm doing in my laboratory, if you will, is playing around those concepts as a way to really start to measure, like numerically measure how those hugs impact the space. How those deep conversations in the corner of the ballroom if you're in a live event right has impacted the experience of the community and then also of the individual going out into the world. Right?

You know, now Kajabi and multiple different other, you know, companies. And he also with the rest of us community, crazy people are like, how do we get our minds and our hearts wrapped around telling the story about the power of community, right? So I've taken that on as my laboratory, you know, my own experimentation at this point of like, what does that look like?

And what I'm starting to recognize is if we can start measuring. And right now it's really a measurement more so of you know, self-reflection, but measuring on a scale like whatever, like one, let's say 1-10 scale where are we at the beginning based on what outcomes we're wanting.

And so it's been pretty exciting to start working that model in these larger companies and seeing what kinds of results they're getting so that we can all learn that and then we can all potentially implement that in our own companies and our own models as well.

So, I'm ready. Next time if you want me to be on again, we can dive into that nerdiness and what those results are looking like versus having that in the past, you know?

Yeah. Awesome. That's exciting. Wow.

Thank you.

That's right.

I don't want it to be a squishy word. I want, when everybody says the word community, I want them to mean what you, and I mean when we say it.

Right, exactly. And can you imagine, I mean, that's the whole point of the revolutionaries, right? Like. We, me, you have amazing clients as well that you're serving and you're building, you're deepening these relationships with, as do the other members of the community. We all start to really start to ground into these models that are like bringing more life and light into the world.

And that's fine.

Yes, that's it.

Yeah.

I like to wrap up my podcast with three questions. The first is, I can't imagine anyone not being inspired by you. So where do they go find you?

Oh, thank you. RevolutionaryCommunities.com. Super simple. When they go there, they're gonna be invited into the community, what I call the Revolutionary Insiders Club. Revolutionary Insiders Club is a newsletter that is going out weekly for everybody that's subscribed to it, and it goes out in an email.

If you wanna have like more conversation with me, I think LinkedIn is a great place for that. And so definitely friend me. Let me know who you are and that you found me here through Lucas and we can definitely have more conversation. I can send you my calendar if something feels aligned for you and based on what we were talking about.

And we can have a conversation moving into that next phase.

Second question is my big curve ball. Is there any question that you wish I had asked you but I have not?

My mind went to something super random and silly. Like, what is your favorite ice cream? Yeah. I mean, that's what showed up for me. So there you go. My favorite ice cream.

What do you mean about silly, huh?

Super random and so maybe I'm like creating ice cream at whatever, 10 in the morning my time. But so thank you for asking. Thank you for asking.

No kidding.

Yeah.

Huh? I am a coffee man all the way. I drink coffee in the morning. I would eat coffee ice cream at night. I would coffee glaze my steak every day if it was easy.

Wow. I had no idea. That's super interesting. I love that I asked that question that I wish you had asked me. I didn't know that about you.

Yep. So cool. Thank you Maruxa. Thank you for showing up and for being amazing.

Oh, thank you as well. I really appreciate who you are. Thank you, Lucas.

Do you have any parting thoughts?

Don't lean from an energy of fear, but from an energy of love. And from that, that can take you so far and create some revolutionary experiences in your own life, and maybe that's part of that is building a community. We'll see.

You were made for such a time as this.

That's right.

Thanks for joining us this week on Elements of Community.

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