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Actor, writer, producer, and Inclusion Rider co-author Fanshen Cox joins Becky and Faith to talk about representation in Hollywood, why individual-led and policy-led DEI efforts keep collapsing into lip service, and how she's returned to building community and centering storytellers through Sister Brunch and her production company, TruJuLo (Truth, Justice, Love).

In this conversation:

• 01:32 Movies that made us feel seen
• 07:19 Discovering the power of storytelling and the meaning behind the name "Fanshen"
• 10:44 Raising socially conscious kids: the burden, and the need to keep them safe
• 15:25 Black women's hair, personal choice, and not becoming the oppressor
• 22:26 Theater vs. film/TV acting and the power of casting directors
• 26:44 #OscarsSoWhite, going back for an MFA, and the one-woman show One Drop of Love
• 28:35 Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Project Greenlight, and co-authoring the Inclusion Rider
• 32:12 Moving into development and writing DEIA policy at the California Film Commission
• 35:08 Empowering storytellers: Sister Brunch and TruJuLo
• 39:39 The Black Panther Party legacy, communal upbringing, and fear of retaliation
• 42:39 Capitalism, homeownership, and what happens when anyone gets too much power
• 46:52 Not canceling ourselves, and the limits of shaming
• 52:18 Hollywood as a system: finding agency and community
• 56:29 A decade after #OscarsSoWhite: backsliding on representation

Resources mentioned:

• Sista Brunch podcast: https://www.sistabrunch.com/
• TruJuLo Productions: https://www.trujulo.com/
• KweliTV: https://www.kweli.tv/
• "Fanshen" by William Hinton: https://link.amazon/B0cTyzF9y
• "We Will Not Cancel Us" by adrienne maree brown: https://link.amazon/B044X1c8X

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Get "Liberate Your Business" by Becky Mollenkamp at https://liberateyourbusiness.com/

FIND ALL OF OUR CONVERSATIONS AT https://YesAndOtherwise.com

Most boundary advice is about rules: what to say and where to draw the line. Trauma therapist turned boundary coach Judy Hu, author of "The Boundary Revolution," says that's the last step.

Becky and Faith talk with Judy about healing boundaries at the root, which means coming back to "same-size" with everyone else, treating discomfort as ancestral information, and asking whether what we call personality is really an adaptation to trauma.

They also cover raising teens in a culture that tells girls what they're worth, why safety in empire often just means survival, what the Cornell case shows about domination and moral injury, and how to hold people accountable without repeating the harm.

00:41 From trauma therapist to boundary coach, and seeing collective trauma everywhere
02:18 Icebreaker: favorite childhood TV shows
05:27 The story on repeat: teen daughters, unsupervised parties, and messages about worth
10:31 Judy's earliest memory: growing up in an immigrant family in a mostly white community
12:10 Encouraging defiance while keeping kids safe
18:50 Pleasing someone outside vs. inside; decolonization as reclaiming the body
21:09 Cornell, body sovereignty, and why this hurts in our bones
23:30 Healed boundaries: the felt circles and "same-sizedness"
30:11 Healing in community and reparenting the wounded child and adaptive teen
34:01 "I am the dream of my ancestors": healing backward and forward
37:19 Healed boundaries vs. boundary "rules"
42:18 Cornell as microcosm: empathy without excusing harm
47:01 Directing rage at the system; conflict as a path to authentic connection
50:18 Yes and Otherwise: asking for help and tolerating receiving it

Resources Mentioned
• The Boundary Revolution: Decolonize Your Relationships and Discover a New Path to Joy by Judy Hu (book and audiobook)
• Judy Hu: theboundaryrevolution.com
• My Grandmother's Hands by Resmaa Menakem
• Kinstead, an intentional community in the Hudson Valley, NY
• Nonviolent Communication (Marshall Rosenberg)

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If you tensed up when you heard "math," this episode is for you. Becky and Faith talk with Dr. Geillan Aly, mathematician, educator, and author of Compassionate Math, about math trauma. They get into where it comes from, why math shame hits harder than shame in other subjects, and how school systems decide who gets to be "a math person." Geillan shares how she went from publishing to a math PhD program, where she was told she wasn't smart enough, and later left the tenure track over how faculty talked about their students. The conversation covers stereotype threat, "show your work," the inequities built into schooling, and how math trauma follows adults into boardrooms. It ends on a simple way to start healing: play.

01:05 Icebreaker: AI proving theorems, cozy fall recipes, and queer Black art
07:06 Catastrophizing, past experiences, and why the stakes feel so high
09:40 Vulnerability in math class, and why math shame cuts deeper
11:02 The "three Rs," standardized testing, and the fear of reading aloud
12:39 Geillan's path from history major and New York publishing to a math PhD program
16:40 The equity problems, and faculty attitudes like "make the first exam hard so they drop"
18:05 Leaving the tenure track and founding Compassionate Math
18:50 Becky's school equity advocacy: AP enrollment, no Black teachers, and Nikole Hannah-Jones' essay
21:28 Faith on the education system as colonizer, and Claude Steele's research on stereotype threat
26:23 "Show your work": knowing the answer but not being able to explain it
32:35 Faith builds mathematical literacy while homeschooling. What is math even for?
36:41 How math shapes life outcomes, Original Sins, and a system working as designed
38:27 Math trauma in adults: perimenopausal women, a rock star still mad about algebra, and KPI-heavy meetings
42:11 How to heal: separating your stories from your skills
48:09 Geillan's wish: a math trauma Netflix special
50:03 Yes and: being more open and celebrating life on purpose
51:44 Where to find Geillan

Resources Mentioned:
• "Compassionate Math" by Geillan Aly: https://www.619wreath.com/store/p42/compassionate-math.html
• Geillan Aly on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/geillan-aly/
• "Original Sins" by Eve L. Ewing: https://link.amazon/B0364VKbX
• Nikole Hannah-Jones' New York Times Magazine essay: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/20/magazine/ny-public-schools-black-students-segregation.html
• Claude Steele's research on stereotype threat: https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1996-12938-001
• Cuisenaire rods: https://link.amazon/B0fHS56gA
• Faith Clarke's Decolonizing Work series: https://www.faithclarke.com/listen-to-decolonize-work

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