Meet The Filmmaker Capturing A More Diverse & Inclusive Outdoor Industry

In honor and recognition of Women's History Month, this March we're highlighting the voices of leading women in the well-being space. Each week, look out for the latest Follow Her Lead installments, where you'll find inspiring stories, ways you can help, and of course, new faces of women worth following.

I grew up at summer camps: My parents met working at a summer camp, and they were educators, so they had summers off to go work there. I spent a lot of time at mainly one summer camp in upstate New York that was for underserved kids from New York City. Being up close and personal with so many Black and Latinx kids, and seeing what kind of media was available to them and what kind of stories they were consuming about themselves, felt really limiting and narrow to me.

Growing up, I've had so much access to educational opportunities. I ended up getting a scholarship to a preparatory boarding school in high school, then I went on to an Ivy League college. It wasn't until I was in those difficult-to-access places that I felt like I was getting access to the best resources from Black and Latina writers, which helped me as a Black biracial woman

I thought, "All this is building me up so much as an individual—and how is it ever going to get to my kids?" I wondered why it took getting to the most exclusive place to finally have access to the type of literature and art and film that could have helped my confidence.

Conservation organizations have done an incredible amount of good work. They've also done work that has made a lot of people feel that there's no place for them outdoors. After all, our national parks were created on stolen land that Native people were pushed out of. That's a lot of conflicting information to try to hold.

For a very long time, I tried to do things by myself. The first two films I tried to make, I was making by myself. I was shooting them; I was editing them; I was coming up with the ideas. And I didn't finish either of them. They're still on hard drives. It's not that I don't think they were good, but I couldn't do it by myself. It was too much. So I think my No. 1 advice is, don't do it alone! Look for thought partners who are as excited as you are, are hardworking, and are going to have your back.

There's a difference between performing self-care and actually caring for yourself. For me, self-care is very much related to movement.

At the beginning of the pandemic, I was so concerned about running from a community care perspective. I saw people complaining about runners via social media, and it really stopped me in my tracks. It wasn't until recently that I realized it's OK not to have running be my primary identity. Now, I can go whatever small distance at whatever pace I want and not feel pressured to share it or to wear a watch or compete in races. It can just be something I do to be in my head and in my body in a different way. I also try to change a lot of my Zoom meetings to phone calls, so I can take walks during them.

I also started doing this practice of tech Shabbat on Fridays and Saturdays, which was coined by a woman named Tiffany Shlain. I used to attend a Messianic Jewish community, so I did a Friday Sabbath. I'm not practicing the Sabbath anymore, but I still like this idea of having no screens Friday night through Saturday evening. I try to go from 6 p.m. to 6 p.m. without watching TV, going on the computer, or spending time on my phone. That's been really helpful. It also reminds me how much people do text you with work questions or expect you to send emails on a Saturday. I hope that by protecting my own space, I'm also helping other people protect theirs.

We released our first season of The Trail Ahead podcast last year and then took some time off to fundraise. But podcast Episode 13 launches on March 15, and I'm super excited about it. With each of our episodes, we also do a one-minute video profile with the guest. I'm heading off to film a few different people in March and April. Then we're filming the fourth video in the "Who Is a Runner" series with Brooks that will come out in April or May. And then—I'm going to take some vacation!