Imagine being nearly killed in a hit and run accident and then emerging with more fire than ever to pursue your passion. This is Kat Pattillo’s journey and she shares it with Worth Knowing. From her life-threatening experience in 2019 to becoming a leader in education reform, Kat’s perspective on life and career goals changed after her brush with death. Kat shares insights on resilience, long-term thinking, and advice for overcoming challenges, highlighting how her near-death experience shaped her approach to taking risks and making a positive impact in the field of education.
Kathlyn (Kat) Pattillo believes that we need to pay attention not only to well-known education ‘success stories’ in places like Finland, Singapore, and Canada, but also learn from systems change bright spots such as Brazil, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Indonesia. As a researcher, she writes stories and produces tools about how leaders in the Global South created education innovation and reforms. And as a facilitator, she designs experiences for leaders to learn from those examples about how to strengthen schools. Kat also speaks, advises, and teaches about how leaders transform Global South education systems – through pathways such as coalition and movement-building, collective impact, networks of proximate leaders, and large-scale systems change with government.
She is the Founder of Global Graduate School of Education, which runs field trips for education leaders to learn from Global South education systems. Their first program is the Coalition for System Reform, which strengthens foundational learning coalitions and runs cross-country immersion trips for government policymakers across Brazil, South Africa, Kenya, and India. Alongside this, Kat writes the EdWell newsletter and is writing a book about how to improve education (with examples from seven of the world’s largest countries).
Outside of work, you can find her rowing, going to yoga, cooking, swimming and finding peace in nature – in the mountain town of Asheville.
Follow her at:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kat-pattillo-25923111/
Substack: edwell.substack.com
Instagram: @katpattillo
Website: kathlynpattillo.com
Resources
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Follow Bonnie on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bonnie-habyan/
Go to the Worth Knowing website: https://www.worthknowing.show
Check out The Agile Brand Guide website with articles, insights, and Martechipedia, the wiki for marketing technology: https://www.agilebrandguide.com
The Agile Brand is produced by Missing Link—a Latina-owned strategy-driven, creatively fueled production co-op. From ideation to creation, they craft human connections through intelligent, engaging and informative content. https://www.missinglink.company
Transcript
Bonnie Habyan:
Today, I’m speaking with Kat Pattillo, a woman who not only survived a harrowing hit and run boating accident that nearly took her life, but has recovered and is now a beacon of inspiration for others. Kat’s journey from near-death experience to transformative leader in education is a testament to the power of the human spirit. Now, this is a very interesting story for me, so I’m going to dive right in. I’m not going to, you know, wait at all. I just want to kind of hear a little bit about Kat. And Kat, first of all, thanks so much for coming on. You know, I know before we taped and before we decided to tape, I kind of said, Hey, listen, I want to make sure that you’re okay with talking about some of these things. And she assured me that she has kind of worked through them all. So we’re going to have a real and raw conversation here. And I want to have you take us back a little bit to your background, kind of, you know, what happened. Before we get there, where you kind of were before the incident in 2019, give me a flavor of who you are and what you’re all about.
Kat Pattillo: Thanks, Bonnie, and I’m so happy to be here. I think before the accident, I think there were two key things that defined my life. I think one was that I was always someone who was interested in the world outside of where I lived. So I grew up in Atlanta, essentially in the suburbs, in a very white Christian community. And I always had this sense from a young age that there was so much to the world outside of that bubble. And I tried to find whatever opportunities I could to kind of get out of that and explore. And so, you know, from age 16, I went on a volunteer program that I found in rural Panama. I was an organizer for the Obama campaign in a bunch of neighborhoods around Atlanta. And then I went on to intern in India for a summer and intern in Uganda for a summer. And I studied in undergrad politics and economics and history because I was always just really interested in the world and these kind of big problems that face the world and social justice and how we help make the world a better place. So that was really a theme and I continued to pursue that. I studied abroad in South Africa in college and ended up moving there and living there for four years, working as a teacher at a Pan-African Leadership Academy. And I moved to Kenya on a Fulbright scholarship to research education reform there. Wow. And so I kept kind of making these decisions to explore and learn. And I just really had this thirst and curiosity for the world and seeing all the amazing things that are around. And I think alongside that, the sort of second factor was that I think I was really searching for something, searching for how to thrive, how to find happiness, how to really just have more well-being in my life. quite a young age, like I really struggled with depression and just really not thriving as a person. And so alongside those experiences of taking risks and learning and taking on these interesting work opportunities in education, I also really went on a journey to learn about spirituality. I was raised Presbyterian and Christian, but in college really turned away from that. And in 2016, I really went through this year-long experience of studying different religions, particularly Buddhism and Taoism. I went on a 10-day meditation retreat. I did psilocybin mushrooms a few times. I went to a really great therapist for a year. And that was really a year of kind of working on myself and investing in myself and learning about how I could have more well-being and really find happiness as a person. So all of that really then led up to when the accident happened and I really went through a big shit.
Bonnie Habyan: Okay. So, so let me, a lot, a lot going on there. Right. So, you know, it’s interesting because I think a lot of the issues that you’re talking about, many women, many women deal with, some of them aren’t open about it. And you know, we all go through different things, motherhood, um, our, our, our hormones, whatever. Right. But did you, as a very young girl, have a very, it sounds like, you know, from the moment you can remember, have this desire to see and learn more. I would think you’re just really an avid learner. I mean, I know that about myself, but you’re always interested in finding other ways and how other people do things.
Kat Pattillo: Yeah, I think that’s true. I just really always loved, I mean, some of my earliest memories are going to the library every week and picking out new books and just spending many hours reading alone. That was my favorite activity to do. So I just always loved reading, always loved learning. was always curious.
Bonnie Habyan: Did you play teacher? Did you play teacher as a kid?
Kat Pattillo: I wouldn’t say I played teacher, but I always was interested in opportunities to lead. Like the program I did in Panama, we basically were organizing communities and supporting local leaders to create change in their villages. So I did from, you know, really as a teenager started to have this identity of of really supporting others and having this passion and this strong sense of purpose to really support other leaders to thrive and grow. So I do think that was there from a young age. I think I was very shaped by my parents. Okay. All right. So that’s interesting. My mom was chair of the Atlanta Public School Board, and so I saw her for eight years. She was on the school board. And so from a young age, I was exposed to watching her lead and her commitment to really help improve government and public education systems. And then my father did a lot of work. He was in real estate, but he shifted his career to focus on social impact. And he did a lot of investing in microfinance and education companies. And so watching that and him having more impact in the private sector and investing, both of them kind of really shaped this identity of social justice that I have. And, and that came out, I think, from a young age and was always a passion.
Bonnie Habyan: Okay, so let’s let’s kind of you’ve given us a little flavor of who you are, what kind of lights your fire, you get to this time in 2019, you were around 29 at the time, I think I was, okay, yep, I was 29. So kind of take us to that day life at that point, you were a Fulbright scholar, you’re, you know, you’ve got all of these great things behind you, were you living in South Africa at that time.
Kat Pattillo: I have been in Kenya before. So I basically, after doing the Fulbright research, based on the research that I did, my co-founder and her interests as well, my friend and I co-founded this organization, Metis, that’s a network for Kenyan educational leaders and entrepreneurs to support the local education ecosystem. So I had led that organization, I was a board member, had been part of that, but really hit this point of a bit of burnout and just seeing, I had transitioned from leading it to be a consultant and work with lots of organizations, but I really had this sense that I wanted a different chapter and really needed to move into a different chapter. So I decided to move from Kenya This was, I think, July when I officially moved and my plan was to spend a year consulting remotely and working on a book and living in a bunch of countries researching a book. And so I was back in Atlanta, and I went up to my mom’s cabin on a lake about two hours north of Atlanta in Georgia. By yourself? Had like a week by myself. I was sort of doing this retreat and just having some quiet, reflective time before I embarked on this journey. And I was supposed to leave for India three days later. And my flight was booked. I had my Airbnb. I had this whole trip set up. I was going to be in India and a bunch of other countries for a year. And so then three days before I was supposed to leave was when I was at the cabin and I was swimming along the edge of the lake. By yourself? At the end of the day, by myself. By yourself swimming, just chilling. Yeah, but there were no boats out. It was The end of August, a lot of the people that have houses there are not up there after school starts. So there was really no one there because the school year had started. And I just said, oh, let me just go on a little swim along the edge. No big deal. Something you’ve done probably many times. Yeah, I’ve done that a bunch of times. And especially when there’s no boats out, just swim a little. I was about 10 feet off of the edge of the lake. Usually, boats are in the middle of the lake. It’s not like I was swimming in the middle of the lake. I was swimming right along the edge. And basically what I, the last thing I remember from that was I was swimming freestyle, and then suddenly, and then I blacked out and there’s a whole piece of memory that’s just gone probably from the, you know, the trauma of it, just like repressed or something that I woke up in the water and just suddenly felt that there was like blood running down my head and I could feel like a bit of my skull fractured and brain kind of exposed and my arms would be hanging from a small piece of flesh. Okay so you’re you’re swimming you don’t you don’t hear anything you don’t you just I remember hearing a sound that sounded like a I remember thinking why is there a washing machine in the water that’s the last thing I remember so but when I woke up there was no one there so basically whoever ran me over either didn’t realize and they just thought it was a log or they did and maybe they thought they’d killed me and they just didn’t want to deal with it. But we still actually don’t know what happened because there was an investigation by the local police and they never figured it out. Who knows what happened? I’ve just accepted at this point, I’ll probably never know. But yeah, as a result, I just woke up there and you know, could feel all the blood running down my face and couldn’t see out of my eye. And my arm was basically hanging by about, it was like very severely, almost completely severed. So I was hanging by about this much flesh, my like lower arm.
Bonnie Habyan: Okay, hold on. I need to ask, when you say you woke up, you woke up I mean, you’re in water, so you… Yeah, I was in water. I just sort of, like, came to… Yeah, and you somehow had the wherewithal, even through this trauma, that you’re treading water.
Kat Pattillo: You know, your body is… My legs were fine. So, yeah, there must have been some sort of… I mean, that whole period is, you know, quite fuzzy in my mind, but I was definitely treading water, like, to stay up somehow. And I somehow, I don’t remember it being really a conscious thought, but something, you know, must have just said, okay, you got to get back to your top, which was about, like, a football length. distance away was sort of where our dock was along the edge. And so I basically like laid on my back and held the arm that was about severed, almost severed, and like kicked to try to get back to the dock. And I kept stopping and starting because I just would get really tired and overwhelmed.
Bonnie Habyan: How long did that take you? You don’t recall?
Kat Pattillo: I don’t know. Do not recall. I mean, and so I just basically, you know, vaguely recall like that waking up in the water the sort of swimming part and then I made it to the dock but I couldn’t get up the ladder so I basically was hanging on the ladder for who knows how long and that’s the part when you know I didn’t have a conscious thought but like that was really when you know that I that could have been it for me I mean there were many moments when that could have been it you know just because the injury was a skull fracture and the propeller almost, you know, was like a millimeter from my brain and was like a millimeter from my eye.
Bonnie Habyan: You would never know. You look beautiful. You would never, I would never know from looking at you.
Kat Pattillo: The scar itself has healed. You can’t even really see it. So yeah, there could have been many moments when I could have just easily died. But then one of them was when I was hanging on the ladder and couldn’t get up, I guess, because I just didn’t have the strength to pull with one arm. And so I was just sort of hanging there, thinking that might be it. It was starting to get dark, and I just couldn’t do anything. And I remember kind of going in and out of consciousness there, waiting. And then what’s the craziest thing is then suddenly I heard, I think my eyes were closed and I was just kind of out of it. But I remember hearing someone say, this boat coming up and hearing someone say, do you need help? And I just said, yes. And that’s when my sister’s friend from high school and her mom, who live on the other end of the lake, about a 20 minute boat ride away, they were the ones, they happened to be driving at that end of the lake, just looking at houses. And they heard this moaning, and they were like, oh, that sounds like it’s from the Potillos dock. Maybe we should go check that out. So they were the ones who basically found me there. And they’re really the reason that I’m alive. Carolina, Virginia, Ellis are their names. And they were the ones who then got me off the ladder, pulled me on the dock. They called 911. The EMTs came and they basically took me up the road on a truck to a helicopter, and I was helicoptered to the hospital. And then I had an amazing brain surgeon who was able to get the piece of skull that was in my brain and put a plate over the fracture. She did an amazing job. I had an amazing plastic surgeon who was able to sew up my arm and repair a lot of it. And you have full use, right? Full use? I wouldn’t say full use. I have, like, I would say mostly full use. I basically have limited motion in my fingers and my wrist and my elbow, like all the muscles around there are a little bit limited. But I’ve had a bunch of surgeries since the accident on my arm to try and repair it. And it’s gotten to a point now where I can I can do a lot of things like I with the most recent surgery I had in February. It got me a lot more motion in like my fingers and my wrist. So yeah, I can do most things, but it’s a little bit limited. So I couldn’t type. I typed with one hand since 2019. I’ve typed with one hand and done all my work with one hand.
Bonnie Habyan: So this is where the grit, grace, and gumption comes in. now you’re on this recovery mode. Again, I’m, you know, I’m, I’m for the sake of just kind of time and not putting you through too, too many more of these memories. You’re on this recovery road. Where, where during that time do you feel like, you know what, I was supposed to go to India in three days, right? Yeah. This is now sidetracked me. What do I do? And so kind of about that mental shift that this is what, you know, I want to hear about that, that drove you to where you are now.
Kat Pattillo: It was really hard. It was very difficult, I would say, for about a year after that because, you know, essentially because of the health issues, obviously I put my whole trip on hold and I moved back in with my mom in Atlanta and had to be in Atlanta to do check-ins with my doctors and did another hand surgery and do physical therapy. And I really, I mean, first of all, recovering from the brain injury was a really long process because I basically spent the first six weeks with a patch on my eye and laying in the dark most of the time and sleeping like 13 to 15 hours a night to try and help repair my brain injury. And so that was just, you know, kind of depressing and I just felt really tired all the time and had a lot of post-concussive symptoms. And then I had symptoms of PTSD and trauma stuff. Of course. And then I was just generally, I think, just kind of depressed because I felt like I was 29 years old and moved back in with my mother and my entire life was on hold. Absolutely. I felt like I had really gotten to this great place in life and suddenly it was all on hold. Right. I mean, you’re a world traveler. I knew I probably would need to spend a year there. That’s what my doctor said. So that’s kind of what I was working with. But yeah, it was a dark time. I think the things that really helped me, first of all, I had an amazing psychologist who I went to for treatment. And we did a thing called EMDR, a treatment called EMDR, that some people might be familiar with. And that was incredibly helpful and really helped me shift from, you know, not being able to fall asleep and having flashbacks to the accident and just generally a lot of anxiety. The EMDR process really helped me to release a lot of that trauma and just really feel more positive and able to kind of move forward without a lot of those symptoms. So that was really helpful. It also was helpful that I had really great support from my mom. And then my sister also moved back from New York. to be with me during that time. And luckily, I mean, not luckily, because COVID was bad for a lot of people, but you know, the silver lining was that she could work remotely and work from Atlanta. Yeah, so you have the one-two punch there. I had my mom, my sister in the house with me and their support. And then I had friends checking in from, you know, my friends around the world also checking in virtually. And so I think all of those things helped support me. And then I think I just always had this underlying grit that I would move through it and figure it out. And I just, you know, was taking it one step at a time. And so I kind of knew I had had in the back of my mind, maybe I would apply to grad school one day. I wasn’t really that sold on the idea at that point, but I decided, OK, well, grad school will probably be easier than going back to work full time. So let me just apply to grad school and I’ll, you know, see what happens and maybe I’ll do it. So I applied to one school to Oxford. which was basically my dream school for grad school because they have a lot of education research happening there. And so I remember sitting in October of that year with the patch on my eye and my arm in a sling. And not able to type. Yeah, able to type with one hand really slowly because I wasn’t that used to it at that point. And I just remember sitting there trying to do my application and it took so long.
Bonnie Habyan: I know, right? And that frustration emotionally, mentally, physically is tough.
Kat Pattillo: It’s tough. But I think I was like, I’m going to do it. Like, I just always had this sense, like, I will, you know what, I’m going to get this. That’s it. That’s a long time. Absolutely. And I think that’s the kind of grit that I’ve always had, you know, that I’ve drawn on in various times. You know, even being an entrepreneur in Kenya, you know, it’s very challenging starting a new organization and all of the different obstacles that can come along with that. But I think throughout the process, I just really had this sense of, OK, we’re going to figure it out. We’re going to move through. We’re going to find a way. and we’re going to pivot and adapt. I feel like that same sense of grittiness so many of the times when I’ve gone to live in new countries or moved to new places, like moving to South Africa and Kenya, I just always really had this belief that I would figure it out. I’m just not that really scared at all. I just always have this belief, like I remember when I went to India for a summer, I didn’t know anyone there. I had found this organization online and emailed them basically saying, do you think I could come intern with you? They said, yeah, come on, you know, we’ll, we’ll pick you up at the airport and then we can help you figure everything out. And so that’s literally all I had. It sounds good. Mom, by the way. And I knew they were doing amazing work as community organizers and informal settlements in Ahmedabad, but that’s all I knew. And I just sort of had this faith, I’ll figure it out. So I think that’s always been my kind of MO, is that faith that I’ll figure it out.
Bonnie Habyan: Let’s get to Oxford. So then you were getting to the point of that, did you get accepted?
Kat Pattillo: I did get accepted, which was great, because if I didn’t, I don’t know really what I would have done. I know. I was hoping you were going to say that.
Bonnie Habyan: I was very lucky. That’s a huge, but isn’t that a huge look forward moment?
Kat Pattillo: And so I think then once I got in, which I think was in March or April, I think, of 2021, I had this sense of, okay, I have a next step, I have a plan, like there’s an end in sight basically, and I can sort of make it through the spirit of health issues. You need that, but we need that. So yeah, I think having that next step was really helpful. But it was still a long time before I really started to feel like myself again. I would say probably like two years after the accident was when I started to really feel more normal.
Bonnie Habyan: Normal in the sense of everything.
Kat Pattillo: Yeah, normal in the sense of just not feeling tired all the time, having energy to do things. feeling like I had ideas and visions of things I wanted to pursue. I feel like I had to sort of regain my confidence in myself. And particularly my first year at Oxford, I was working part-time as a research assistant to a professor. And it was kind of felt like starting from scratch again. I had led an organization, I had been a teacher, I had done all these things for a decade. And then to suddenly be in school with a lot of the other people in my program, which was a master’s degree, we’re straight out of undergrad. So it was like kind of starting fresh again. And I’m like, what am I doing? You know, sometimes I really wondered, what is the purpose of this? You know, I think it was the right thing at the time. And it was really the right thing to do. But it was strange to go from, you know, being a leader in the world and doing work to then suddenly being back in school and being a research assistant, you know, supporting other people.
Bonnie Habyan: But you have turned that. And if we look about five short years later, Let’s talk about some of the things you’re, you’re doing, because I want, you know, I always try and give the folks listening, we are going to eventually get to a couple of like big aha moments, three sort of ways that you you know, kind of what you use to get yourself forward through that bad moment. So share with us, you know, a little bit of what you’re doing. You told me about the Bill Gates Foundation. You’ve told me some very interesting concepts, but if you could kind of do an elevator pitch of what it is that you’re doing now and the change you’re bringing, I’d love to hear it.
Kat Pattillo: Yeah. Yeah. I think coming out of grad school, I became really interested in, and this has been a thread for many years, but how do we identify places in the global South? So in Latin America, Africa, South Asia, Southeast Asia, where people are successfully improving their education systems and really amplify those examples as places for people to learn from and leaders to learn. I had done a lot of work in Kenya and in South Africa. And then for my thesis research for my master’s, I did research on coalitions in India and Brazil. And I started to see the patterns of, wow, there are these really amazing bright spots happening, but these people aren’t connected enough to each other. You know, across the world, so many people for education are looking to Finland, they’re looking to Singapore, they’re looking to Canada, these success stories. But what about these places that are some of the biggest countries in the world where there are these successes happening and we’re not paying enough attention to them? Yeah, and you want to bring them all together. Opening that dialogue. Yeah, was enabling that cross-country learning. And I think that if we think about three of the things that were key, I think one of them was that coming out of grad school, I really had this sense of this idea in the back of my mind for this book and wanting to do more writing and put that book out there and made the decision coming out of grad school that instead of finding a traditional job, I would just keep consulting and really go on this journey to research the book that I had put on pause for the health issues. And so basically coming out of grad school, I went and I worked in Brazil for three months. I was in India for two months, in Pakistan for six weeks, in Indonesia for two months. Then I basically spent 10 months on the road researching the book and doing some consulting work, supporting a toolkit around government advocacy methods. And so I think that the lesson there was really that I had this sense that I had really gotten a second chance at life and that there was no sense in not pursuing the things that I knew I really wanted to do. Like, I really had this sense of, we just don’t know when our time will come. You know, that could have been my time to die. Like, that could have been the end for me. And for some reason, it wasn’t. And I think as a result, I kind of felt this freedom, okay, I don’t know when my time will come. And I need to just, if researching this book and going on this journey is what I really want to do, I need to just make it happen. And if that means living in Airbnbs that are pretty cheap and eating cheap food and really living cheaply to be able to afford this kind of travel, funded by the consulting work, you know, I’ll make it happen. But I just, I think I could have taken a much safer path, you know, in getting a full-time job and education instead of going on that trip. And I just had this sense of, you know, we have to just pursue our dreams and pursue the ideas we have because we don’t know when our time to die will come. We just, you know, we just don’t know.
Bonnie Habyan: If you had had that accident, do you think you’d have that same, you would have gone for that full-time job?
Kat Pattillo: I think I still would have probably been a risk taker, but I think that what’s interesting is watching how, you know, it was a blessing in disguise in the sense that I think the trip that I took after grad school and then the work I’ve ended up doing after looks very different than what it would have looked like if I had gone. in 2019, you know, before the accident happened. Like I think because of all the research I did in grad school, because of the connections I had, because of then the consulting work I was able to get, I just have access to so many senior level leaders and people are willing to meet with me and be interviewed by me and They’re excited for me to write about them because they know the platform that I have. And I also have worked to support so many different initiatives and organizations. So part of my work in grad school was helping come up with the idea and start this new South-South program to support education leaders from Kenya and Pakistan to learn from Brazil about how to build coalitions. So that work alongside the toolkit for advocacy methods that I did, they helped give me credibility and they helped me also just have a stronger understanding of what actually needs to be in this book and what kind of skills do leaders actually need. So the format itself has ultimately changed a lot. Originally, I envisioned writing this book that was a series of profiles of different leaders and their change. And what it’s emerged into now is more of a handbook for how do you create change in education with a bunch of different pathways of types of ways to do it and examples with role models. And so that whole format, you know, would have happened if the hacks hadn’t happened. But I think, you know, the course of our lives is just shaped by what happens to us and then things happen as a result.
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Bonnie Habyan: I think being resilient, I’ve learned at a later point in my life, is probably one of the greatest life skills you can have. I mean, being hit over the head with something that’s life changing, but still being able to get up and function and push through to the other side is really kind of that maker or break time or place. You, having said, kind of giving me a little background of how you are, definitely you’re much stronger than you think, because at that point, you are probably the definition of resilience. Would you agree that’s something that you have learned about yourself?
Kat Pattillo: Yeah, I definitely think I am resilient, and I think I have this grittiness to just keep going. But I would say a lot, I mean, I think part of that is, you know, who I am, my personality, but I also think I’m really lucky to have an amazing support system. I have an amazing family, amazing friends. have had so many opportunities that have shaped my sense of possibility in the world and my sense of belief in what’s possible that so many people don’t have that. And I think that’s part of why I’m so passionate about education because I really want for every kid for them to have access to a school and teachers who support them to develop that resiliency and character. to really pursue their dreams and pursue everything that they desire in life. And so a lot of the education models that I love to amplify and promote are doing that. So for example, I’m writing about in my book, in Delhi, there’s a minister of education for the state of Delhi, essentially, that has created a happiness curriculum. and I got to go see it in action in a school. And you have kids from the most marginalized families, you know, these are kids going to the government schools whose parents really can’t afford private options for them, who are now, as a result of this curriculum, getting meditation class every day, and a whole sequence that’s helping them learn how to find happiness and find thriving and well-being. And I just think that’s so cool and amazing what the government there is doing. So I think that I think that’s part of why I care about it so much, because I think I’ve just been so lucky with the kind of opportunities and privilege I’ve had. And I think if only every kid had access to that, that could then develop their resiliency. I’m definitely more a believer in nurture, and I think there’s only a small part of us that has nature in it. So I think I’ve been shaped by a lot of the opportunities I’ve had and the people that I’ve been lucky to have in my life.
Bonnie Habyan: Well, I think that goes to what I’m hearing a lot in the theme of the women I speak with. And I love the saying, find your tribe. And I think that’s very important. You need to be around those people who are going to lift you up, support you. And, you know, the women that I’ve spoken with as well, when they’ve gone for something big, So, my question would be like, how did you do that? Well, I had a really great … My husband was supportive. My mom was supportive. My grandma was supportive. They helped. And I do see that silver lining. To have that support system is really critical because that also could have made or broken you during that very difficult time period.
Kat Pattillo: Yeah. I think those human relationships are really what you know, enable us to continue and survive. And I think that’s true for social change as well. You know, all of the, like everything I do now and this Coalition for System Reform that I’m leading and helped start, you know, is really all based on the belief that we are stronger working together and stronger supporting movements of people to change systems and work together. Because we can just do so much more as a group than any one person can do alone. So I think we have to have that mindset of, you know, building that community of changemakers and those outliers who are committed to really improving systems, who then together can work collectively to really bring about a better future, and who have that shared belief and that shared vision of what’s possible. And I think, I mean, what’s cool is we have amazing examples of those movements you know, to learn from the past, and that’s a lot of what I’ve studied, you know, and written about over the years, like the civil rights movement and the independence movement in India or the women’s suffrage movement in the U.S. I just saw an amazing article about that.
Bonnie Habyan: Oh gosh, that’s so interesting. I really am fascinated by that movement. I really am.
Kat Pattillo: Yeah, and there’s so many of these movements, you know, where people or the movement to end slavery, you know, there’s so many examples of moments in history where people were confronted with these huge systemic problems and systemic oppression and issues like apartheid in South Africa, that if you really look at those and face them, it sort of can feel like, oh, it can never end. It’s too big for us to actually make a change in some of these issues. But, you know, there was a group of people who believed that change was possible and they worked together to make it happen. And they took step after step and slowly grew their movement for change despite all those obstacles. And so I think, you know, it really is possible, but we just have to grow those movements and coalitions to work together. And a lot of what I do now, you know, my role is kind of a behind the scenes orchestrator supporting coalitions in countries like Brazil and India and Kenya and South Africa, these movements locally that are creating change, my role is really to support them. I think the other thing that’s key that I haven’t mentioned, and I know we’re wrapping up, is that I think part of what’s important to me and part of what I learned in my experience in Panama in high school was the traditional model of development is just so flawed. We often are sending Americans abroad to go help people, quote unquote. We really believe that the US and countries in Europe know what works and need to just export it to other places. And I just think there’s so many problems with that paradigm and the white savior complex. And I think part of what I really believe is that the role of any outsiders is to really help identify who are those leaders in an existing community who are committed to improving and changing it, because there are always people there who are trying to make things better. And how do you really help support them and develop their skills and develop the community of people that they’re a part of so they have the connections and relationships to create change and resources? And that’s how I really see my role as a white American outsider who’s doing work in other countries, that I’m really there to be behind the scenes helping identify and empower local leaders to change things and really help support this whole model of development that’s really more locally rooted and enabling people who are there as opposed to the typical kind of USAID or big development model of coming in and posing with solutions. So I think that’s kind of like another factor that’s really important to me.
Bonnie Habyan: Yeah, no. I think, you know, anytime that we are trying to do something that is aligned with who we are and what our dreams are, it’s very, very important. And so, what I’d like to kind of leave our listeners with, you know, what are a few of the teachable things or the guidance you would provide to say, you know what, how to go after something after something adverse happens. What are the three sort of mantras? I mean, I know one of them you had mentioned to me when we had a conversation, but I want them to hear it from you. What are like three mantras that you would kind of encourage people to embrace when they’ve had traumas or adversity?
Kat Pattillo: Yeah. The first one would be to really find support and tools to prioritize your own healing and well-being. For me, I found an amazing psychologist who helped me with EMDR. I had an amazing therapist in Nairobi as well who helped me And I also have explored a lot of different modalities, you know, such as yoga and meditation groups and journaling and morning pages. I mean, there’s just so many different things that I’ve, tools that I’ve learned about to really help me feel like I can, you know, just have day-to-day peace and be a happy person. So I think that well-being comes first. So the number one would be like, find the tools and support to really thrive. second would be to just pursue your ideas and vision and don’t be afraid to take the risk because you’ll regret it more if you don’t actually take that step. And for me, sometimes that was doing these big things like helping co-found a new organization or deciding to go on this 10-month trip around the world to research this book or reach out to potential consulting clients and try to do work with them who I had met before, or go to new countries and intern and learn and work with organizations like the amazing community organizers in India that I learned from when I was interning there. Push those limits. Yeah, I think it’s just like don’t be afraid to take that risk because I think often people let their fear stop them and they come up with all these reasons why it’s not going to work or why they’re too afraid when I just think life is too short to have, you know, let those fears limit you. And I think, you know, there’s so many possibilities and most of the time it does turn out all right, you know, and I just think, you know, even as I’ve gone to places that other people would say are very dangerous, you know, and there’s a lot of crime or that as a woman, you know, a single woman, I should be afraid to do these things or go to these places. It’s like, I just think generally in the world, people are very kind and welcoming and supportive no matter where you go. And so I don’t think we should have… I think we should release that fear that we might have to do new things and take those risks or go to places where we’ve never been before. Okay. So that would be the third.
Bonnie Habyan: Well, that was the second. I think we had… Or that was the second. Yeah, so what’s the third?
Kat Pattillo: I would maybe frame it as like have humility and always be open to building new relationships with people and learning from them and drawing on their wisdom. Yeah. Because I think that is the mindset I’ve always had is that I don’t really know, you know, I don’t always know what’s right. And there are amazing people out in the world who have so much wisdom and expertise about how to do things much more than I would ever have about it. And so I think, and that the name of the organization I co-founded, Metis, actually relates to this. It’s a Latin concept that means knowledge from lived experience. And I really believe that we need to seek out and find those people who have that knowledge. And I think part of what I’ve always done is just been happy to befriend and get to know people who are really different from me and from different places in the world and from different communities of all different types. And so I think that being able to just go out and say, hey, I actually don’t know. Let me go out and meet someone who will know more about it. Let me read a book about it. Let me go read about it online. Let me talk to people. Having that mindset of a growth mindset, basically, that we can always learn and grow and evolve and change is important because there’s just so much in the world for us to build on in addition to what we already know.
Bonnie Habyan: Growth mindset is a great mindset. So I really want to take a moment to thank you. Thank you so much for for joining the show, for sharing your very poignant story with us, but more importantly, for giving us your little bits of wisdom that I think many people can relate to, but also be able to practice right away. So thank you again, and you can all learn more about CAT by following the links in the show notes. Thank you for joining us on this episode of Worth Knowing. If you’d like to learn more about our guest story or connect with them, you’ll find their details in the show notes. Remember, the path to worth knowing is paved with courage and insight. Stay inspired, keep striving and continue to make a difference. Then you must make sure to share it with others. Until next time, keep chasing those aha moments, my friends, you know, the ones that deliver results and motivate and teach the world. Worth Knowing is produced by Missing Link, a Latina-owned, strategy-driven, creatively-fueled production co-op. From ideation to creation, they craft human connections through intelligent, engaging, and informative content.
