The Kindness Matters Podcast
So. Much. Division. Let's talk about how to change that. Re-engage as neighbors, friends, co-workers and family. Let's set out to change the world. Strike that. Change A World. One person at a time, make someone's life a little better and then do it again tomorrow and the day after that, through kindness.
Kindness is a Super-Power that each of us has within us. It is so powerful it has the potential to change not only your life but those around you, too. Let's talk about kindness.
The Kindness Matters Podcast
When your heart is full of gratitude, there's no room for blame
What happens when five retirees decide over a cup of coffee to tackle poverty in Mexico? The answer is Vamos!, a remarkable grassroots organization that has transformed thousands of lives over nearly four decades through a radical approach: actually listening to what people need.
Sean Dougherty, Executive Director of Vamos, takes us on a journey that began with his parents and friends being moved by the poverty they witnessed in Mexico back in 1986. Their first effort failed spectacularly when money sent for a sewing cooperative disappeared. But rather than giving up, they doubled down. Two founders moved to Cuernavaca, Mexico to "walk with the poor" and understand their actual needs.
The results are extraordinary. What started with providing portable toilets for street vendors has evolved into ten community centers serving 150,000 meals annually, providing free medical, dental, and psychological care, education from preschool through college scholarships, and interest-free loans that empower women to start businesses. Most remarkably, Vamos maintains a commitment that 100% of donations go directly to programs, with board members covering all administrative costs.
This conversation goes beyond charity to explore dignity - not as something given, but as something reflected back to people society often overlooks. As one Mexican woman told Dougherty, "When your heart is full of gratitude, there's no room for blame."
At a time when many feel overwhelmed by global challenges, this episode offers a powerful reminder that individual actions matter. As Dougherty says, "Don't hunker down when things get tough. Do your bit, do your little piece, and the more people that do their little bits, it turns into something really great and beautiful." Listen now to be inspired by what genuine kindness can accomplish.
This podcast is a proud member of the Mayday Media Network. If you have an idea for a podcast and need some production assistance or have a podcast and are looking for a supportive network to join, check out maydaymedianetwork.com.
Like what you hear on the podcast? Follow our social media for more uplifting, inspirational and feel-good content.
It's one thing to highlight the kindness that we see in the world, but it's another to, as I put in many of my social media posts, #bethechange. I am donating all of my royalties from the sale of my book, Change A World; In Order to Change The World to local and national non-profits. Your help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!
Well, hello there and welcome. You are listening to the Kindness Matters podcast and I am your host, mike Rathbun. What is this podcast all about? It's about kindness. It's a pushback against everything negative that we see in the news and on social media today, and it's a way to highlight people, organizations, that are simply striving to make their little corner of the world a little better place. If you want to join in on the conversation, feel free, Go ahead and follow us on all of your social media feeds. We're on Facebook, instagram, tiktok. We're even on LinkedIn under Mike Rathbun. Check us out. We're even on LinkedIn under Mike Rathbun. Check us out and, in the meantime, so sit back, relax, enjoy and we'll get into the Kindness Matters podcast.
Speaker 1:Hey everybody, welcome to the Kindness Matters podcast. I am your host, mike Rathbun. As always, as I say on every show, if you hear something in this podcast that moves you or inspires you or motivates you to do some more kindness in the world, think about sharing this podcast with your friends, family, coworkers, strangers on the street, whoever you happen to meet, and let them know that you found a podcast that made you feel pretty good, and I would appreciate it so much. I appreciate you tuning in to listen to our show for half an hour this week and hope to see you back again next, again, next time. Okay, so I have a great show for you guys today.
Speaker 1:My guest today is Sean Dougherty, and he's an experienced is executive director with a demonstrated history of working in the media production industry. He has a BA from Temple and worked as the director of operations for HopeWorks in Camden, new Jersey, which is another non-profit, but since 2013, he is the executive director of the small yet powerful non-profit Vamos. I feel like I have to say that with emphasis because I know you guys have that exclamation mark that works with the poor in Mexico. Welcome to the show, sean. I appreciate you being here.
Speaker 1:Mike thanks a lot for having me yeah, this is um vamos now, and there's two meanings for that right. In Mexican that means let's go.
Speaker 2:Yep.
Speaker 1:Right, but it's also a, and I'm not going to think of the name of the word, it's an acronym. Thank you.
Speaker 2:Okay, yeah, so we use it as an acronym for our official incorporated name, which is Vermont Associates for Mexican Opportunity and Support, vamos.
Speaker 1:Perfect. Oh, you know what? I think I was saying that without the S at the end. Vamos. I think I said it Vamo. Anyway, I apologize. Um. So now, this all started back in what? 1986, ish yep, yep um, when a group of people went down to mexico on a. Was it a vacation or was it?
Speaker 2:so my yeah, our story is that, um, my dad was an educator and he retired at the age of 55 and moved up to the town of Weston, vermont. So Weston, vermont, one of the things it's known for. It has maybe less than 500 people live in town, but there is a Benedictine priory. There are monks there who have a kind of a farm and a priory there and they invite the public in. So my parents were active participants there, as were many, many people, and the brothers had a relationship with sisters, catholic nuns in Cuernavaca, mexico, and so the nuns would offer retreats, so where, if you wanted to, as a church group or as individuals, go and kind of experience a time of contemplation and reflection led by the sisters. So my parents, dick and Agnes Dougherty, and another couple who lived in town with them, bill and Patty Coleman, and another guy named Ike Patch who was a retired diplomat, bill and Patty and my parents went on the retreat. Ike Patch, meanwhile, went to visit the migrating butterflies, the monarch butterflies who spend the winter right outside of Mexico City.
Speaker 2:Butterflies, the monarch butterflies who spend the winter right outside of Mexico City. Oh, okay, and they got back to their home and over a cup of coffee in somebody's kitchen, they talked about their experience and hey, did they have a good time? Yes, we enjoyed ourselves. But all of them also mentioned the poverty that they saw there so and remarked how it was perhaps different than the poverty here. They saw there so and remarked how it was perhaps different than the poverty here in the States. There were dirt floors and crippled people and children, you know, asking for money on the streets, and so they said, hey, we'd like to do something about this. So what can we do?
Speaker 2:So they were in their late 50s, early 60s. They said, right then, and there we can do something, let's do something. So they called a friend to help them form a 501c3, a charitable organization. They talked about what they could do. They asked some friends to help them and they were introduced to a contact there who was running a sewing co-op for women, and so he needed help buying sewing machines and supporting these women. So my parents and the group got some money together, sent it down to them.
Speaker 2:After six or nine months or so, bill and Patty went down to visit and lo and behold, there were no sewing machines, there was no co-op. So, right off the bat, failure and embarrassment. And what to do next? So, after a lot of discernment, bill and Patty, who ran a small publishing house, actually decided to move to Cuernavaca. So they gave up their life here. They moved there in order to what they called walk with the poor and listen to the Poor and see what the poor needed, and then, with the resources that they had and they could get, we could maybe help them reach some of their goals. So that was the idea.
Speaker 1:Okay, and that's really important. First of all, I love the thought of creating a nonprofit over a cup of coffee in somebody's kitchen table. That's always where the best helping hand ideas come from. I think it's just people getting together and going, yeah, this sucks, let's do something about it yeah, and so often you know mike people, the conversation ends with this sucks.
Speaker 2:So here though, this is a great story, just normal people saying this sucks. I wonder if we can help. Well, what if we do this and what if we do that? What if we ask others to help us? And the story is, if you fast forward to the end, we are now an organization that runs 10 community centers, so kind of like after school programs here in the States.
Speaker 2:We feed, we serve 150,000 meals a year. We have classes from preschool through high school. We also have a lot of adult classes for women. We have computer classes, english classes. We have a dentist on staff to provide free dental help, a doctor on staff to provide free medical help and a psychologist on staff, and this is so important. To do both individual counseling and group counseling and to have free mental health care for the poor here in the United States is unheard of, and certainly in Mexico it is as well, so we're so proud of that. We have computer classes, we have music classes, we have art classes. That we have computer classes, we have music classes, we have art classes. We work with another group who allows us to loan women. We loan them $100 and it can make all the difference in the world to them. They pay it back when they can, and now we have combined with another organization. We're offering scholarships so college scholarships and elementary and secondary scholarships to some of the poorest kids around. So that's really making a huge difference in their lives.
Speaker 1:Wow yeah, because that could have all ended. I mean, none of that could have happened if it had ended with this sucks.
Speaker 2:Right right.
Speaker 1:You know, and as it so oftentimes does, um, but I mean all of that didn't exist when, when they when bill and patty first moved down there, right, I mean you sent all this money down there to buy sewing machines and you went go down and it's like, hey, where's the sewing machines? They're not here, um. So I just I really love the idea that they took the opportunity, cause they they talked to the poor people down there, right, and they said you know they, they worked with them, they live among them.
Speaker 1:and they said what do you? Need Right and they said you know, they worked with them, they live among them. And they said what do you need?
Speaker 2:Right. So Bill and Patty had had experienced smart people and right from the start they decided, hey, we're not going to go down there as North Americans and say, hey, we know what you need. We know that you need to start a farm co-op or a sewing co-op, right, we, we know that we can build you playgrounds or build you houses. What Bill and Patty did was hang around. They hung around the main Zocalo, the central plaza in Cuernavaca, where there's lots of people from the small towns selling crafts, and they hung around some of the outskirts of town, some of the poor neighborhoods, and they listened and they and people welcomed them and invited them in. And so, after maybe six or nine months, they got a group of mostly women who were selling on the streets and said, hey, what, what can we do for you? What dreams do you have? What's your future? And the women were, you know, shy and almost couldn't articulate a future, because their future was tomorrow, their future was they probably never considered, even being asked that.
Speaker 2:Right, right. And so when their first response was hey, you know what we could use? We could use a bathroom. We sell on the streets. The store owners won't let us in, we have no place to go to the bathroom, and so, hey, we could do that. We rented some porta potties, we talked to a church downtown who let us put them behind the church and, you know, hey, check that off the box. We solved a problem, um, but in addition to that, the women said you know, we come from these small towns and our children are here with us and they don't go to school, and they don't know how to read and write and we don't
Speaker 2:know how to read and write. So patty and bill thought about that at the same time. They said you know, if we don't know how to read and write? So Patty and Bill thought about that At the same time. They said you know, if we don't sell enough, we don't have money to buy food. And one woman talked about going to bed with their children being hungry and how that made her feel, as a mother, that she couldn't provide for her children. So we, patty and Bill, said okay, we rented a room, we asked some women for help, we bought food, we served a meal in the afternoon, you know, a dozen people came, two dozen people came, 40, 50. So it started to grow, patty and Bill knew no Spanish when they moved down there, so they were learning how to read Spanish.
Speaker 2:The people mostly spoke an indigenous language called Nahuatl there, so they began to learn together how to read and write Spanish, and it just continued to grow. People in other neighborhoods began to come and say, hey, can you help us too? And as we worked with them for a period of time and formed a partnership and said, yes, we can come there. But the partnership would be we need a place to operate, we need where, can we do this? And so they would have some land. So maybe Vamos would buy the cinder blocks and they would raise the walls and we'd have. Now we'd have a place and now we could start serving there once a week, or whatever it might be.
Speaker 2:So yes listening to the poor. And the other thing I'll quickly mention is you know, failure at the beginning is not a completely bad thing. It refocuses you and for us. We were so embarrassed by asking people for help and having nothing to show for it that, as a board, everyone decided that we would pay for all the expenses, we would pay for printing and travel and things like that, and that any money that people donated would go directly to help the poor. And so, 38 years later, we're still doing that. Any money that people donate goes directly to buy food, to pay for teachers, to pay for cooks, to serve the people that we're working with.
Speaker 1:Oh, wow, and this thing has really ballooned for you guys. Just the types of okay, so now you've got, after first starting up down there, you've got bathrooms. So the women selling their wares're I'm guessing it's jewelry and and whatnot um, in the streets don't have to go, I mean, they don't have to hold it right or, or or duck around a building or something yeah so they did that, and then you started a school, and it it's just kind of ballooned, hasn't it?
Speaker 1:You're teaching jobs and skills and you're giving employment, not giving. You're employing people to work down there.
Speaker 2:Yep, and so you know you mentioned that bathroom thing, which is kind of an important little anecdote in our story also, because when you're poor and maybe you're indigenous, you don't have a lot of dignity or you're treated without respect you can, it's easy to lose your dignity when you have no place to go to the bathroom, for God's sake. So that is at the found. That's the foundation of what we do. So kids and moms come, they get a meal, they get a couple hours of class, but they're also loved and they're treated with respect and they're treated with dignity. And we say, hey, if you come once a week and just have a meal and leave, we love you, have a meal and leave, we love you. If you come every day and stay for classes and eat, then we still love you. It doesn't matter. We just we're here to support you and again know that you are an important person, that you have a value.
Speaker 2:And even so, I mentioned our loan program. We loan $100, 2,000 pesos more or less at the exchange rate today. Nobody gets rich off of it. But what the women do is they buy. We've taught them how to make jewelry, we've taught them how to weave purses and weave baskets. So now they buy the raw materials, they create the baskets, the purses, the embroidery, the jewelry and they set a table up at their market and now they sell it. So it again they're not getting rich, but they are providing for their family, they're feeling good about themselves and the number one piece of feedback that we get back from the women is thank you for having the confidence in me to loan me money. Nobody would loan me money, yeah, you know. And again, sometimes people you borrow money off the street, you know you pay a thousand percent interest every month. This is a loan with no interest. Pay back when, when, you can, and the women pay back back. You know we have like a 97 percent um you know payback rate. So it's really, really a remarkable thing, that's so cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was the other thing I was thinking about was was the dignity that you give these people. You know, um, it's here in the states that would. I mean. The opposite of that would be giving an unhoused person some money and saying don't buy drugs with it, you know, because that's you're not giving dignity that way, right, right, and you guys are exactly the opposite of that. And it's so important, having gone 38 years now is um the schools must have produced. I mean you, you've probably seen I don't know if you have a standard, you know k through 12 system there, but have you seen the results of that education come back? So some of them must have graduated and gone off into the world and done something.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, and so I just wanted a little bit about language. We don't give. Obviously we don't give them dignity. We reflect back their dignity. We help them to see it and experience and believe in themselves.
Speaker 2:And I think back to what you're saying. We have had some of the students. So we don't offer a degree or a diploma. We're supplemental to public education. So we've had several students complete their public education and come back and we've hired them as teachers because they completed their college education as teachers as well. So we've hired them to do that. Some of the children of our cooks have gone on to culinary school. We have, I think, when we hire somebody and pay them legally, according to all their rights, their vacation pay, their social security. When a family now has a steady income, a stable income, it allows their children not to start to go to work when they're 12 years old. So the kids of our teachers, the kids of our cooks, are now graduating. One is just graduated as a dentist, she's a dentist, another as a physical therapist. So now you're changing lives for generations and generations.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was going to say. None of that would have been possible had it not been for your organization.
Speaker 2:Right. No, it's so exciting. People you know. You talk so much about poverty or you look at the poor and you say, oh, they don't have jobs, this, they don't have nice clothes, they don't have a nice house. But after getting to know and working so long with these folks in Mexico, you come to understand that they really have an abundance of things. They have an abundance of resilience, they have abundance of creativity, they have abundance of work ethic. So they work hard, they think outside the box, they need to survive, and that is all what we can tap into and set free when you give them an education, when you provide a steady, stable work environment for the parents, and that lets people really, really blossom. People really, really blossom.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure. That's so cool, I think, as we're what you guys are doing I mean, with the current state of the US as it is now and how we seem to be pulling back governmentally aid for some of the poorer countries in the world I think that just makes you guys shine all that much brighter because you're still doing this and you're caring and you're reaching out and you're helping those that, had it not been for you, probably would not be able to live the life that you've given them. And it's not like you give them anything. I'm not saying you give them, but you're giving them the ability, the means to do that, to create their own lives.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, when we first started, you know we come from the United States, we come from North America and we're in Mexico and we're working with poor communities and people there are incredibly thankful, incredibly grateful, and they realize that, hey, this is part of the story of the United States, the beacon on the hill, the shining example, and we help others who don't have. So we were part of that. Now things have changed a bit, so we've pulled back. The government has pulled back. You know almost everything. There are stories, sad, sad stories about people dying of AIDS who used to get care, or cholera, even who to get health care from, uh, us organizations or organizations that were funded by usaid. So now we're kind of the exception to the rule in mexico and you know it can make you angry that when you talk to the moms that we work with down there they're worried are you going to leave us? Are his mom was going to close? Are you leaving? And so, to add, more worry and more concern for a poor mother.
Speaker 2:That's not what the United States my United States is all about.
Speaker 1:Right, I never even considered that that they might think that you were leaving Right.
Speaker 2:They don't know the difference. You know we accept no government money from Mexico or the United States. We've always sown an independent road as far as funding goes.
Speaker 1:That's so incredible. And speaking of funding, see how I did, see what I did there.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:No, let's talk about nonprofit funding for a minute, because and there are a lot of, and I'm not complaining I should make that clear. But the reality is that there are a lot of nonprofits who had their funding cut in the country. In the country I've spoken to executive directors of food shelves, for example, who depended on funding that's not there anymore. The executive director of a shelter for people who were living in domestic violence. Their funding that they had relied on, that they had planned on, is not there anymore. How does that? Now? You guys don't take any government funding, so this really shouldn't affect you. How do nonprofits, where does their funding come from? I don't understand that world. I don't live in that world.
Speaker 2:I don't understand that world. I don't live in that world. So I'm curious where're working for the United States government, when you are helping AIDS in Africa or when you're helping flood victims somewhere? There are organizations nonprofit organizations that get funding from the United States. So when their funding is cut off, a the work that they're doing is going to end. They can't meet payroll, they can't buy supplies, they can't transport their supplies overseas, so that ends up. And there's no I don't know the exact number, but we're talking billions of dollars from USAID. That money is not going to be replaceable. People can go back out these organizations and raise more money, but to replace that much money is not in the cards. When you get down to this next level of organizations, it may take some government money, but they're more like Vamos. So we get funding from corporations. So corporations often help in the areas that they work in the area, in the, in the sort of the business area that they work in. If they're food producers, maybe they help with food.
Speaker 1:If they're pharmaceuticals, maybe they help with cargo for right and they help in those areas.
Speaker 2:So corporate grants, and there's nobody more generous. There's no country more generous than the United States, both its corporations and its people. Individuals are next. Individuals give so much money. There are family foundations that give money to Vamos, church groups and churches and religious orders give money. Groups and churches and religious orders give money. So that's where we get basically our money from Some small corporate grants, family foundations, but so much from individuals. So you need to be trusted and you need to build relationships with people and then show them where their money goes, show them what they are actually doing. And that's really helps vamos, when we can tell you that every dollar you donate goes to help the women and children in mexico oh yeah, that's huge, that's absolutely enormous.
Speaker 1:Um, and yeah, what you're and, and you had done some of this before you came to vamos, right, yep, yep, years ago in my world.
Speaker 2:I was a film and video producer. Then I worked for a nonprofit called Hope Works. We worked with youth in a really poor town here called Camden, new Jersey, right outside of Philadelphia. Great organization as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I mean so that you obviously had contacts from your work with HopeWorks.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:And so that must have been valuable when you brought your skills to Vamos.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, yeah, no, the skills in looking for funding and how to write grants and how to tailor your grants towards a specific organization really came from my time at BOMOS. I mean my time at HopeWorks, I'm sorry. I knew what you meant.
Speaker 1:So that's so cool. What you guys are doing is absolutely amazing, Sean, Because giving dignity well, reinforcing dignity, but you're giving opportunities that these people probably never would have had to sustain their lives and improve their lives.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and.
Speaker 1:I think that's just incredible.
Speaker 2:It is. I think that so many of us feel that way, and maybe now more than other times. But now I think there's a feeling in the world and a feeling in this country of what can I do? Things are so overwhelming, things are out of control, things are not how I like them, and what can I do? I better hunker down, I better take care of myself.
Speaker 2:But here in the States, people first of all. I want to say that we can't do that. We can't just stick to ourselves. So when things are tough, we need to double down and to work harder with the women and children that we work with over. You're overwhelmed. I think the best thing to do is to do something, to volunteer somewhere to um, to help out somewhere, to donate somewhere, like to ovamos or to the cancer society, the red cross or whoever it may be. But don't just. This is not the time to sit back and let others uh control things. You can do your bit, you can do your little piece, and then the more people that do their little bits, it turns out into something really great and really beautiful.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and I think if there's anything that this podcast strives for with every episode is to inspire and motivate. Have you know somebody listens to this podcast? They go well. Maybe I can't help the working poor in mexico, but I can volunteer down at my food shelf right, right you know, maybe I I can't make a $100 donation to Vamos.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:But I can, you know, volunteer somewhere else. Yeah, I can give my time if I don't have money.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's what I go for every episode, and I think stories like yours absolutely inspire and motivate people to do that in their own lives, and I appreciate you for that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thanks, mike, thanks. It reminds me of a woman that I met. We were sitting outside of her little shack. She was boiling some potatoes on the fire. She invited me to sit down on a on a you know bucket that was turned over. That's the best chair she could have. We talked about how hard her life was, what led her there, and, as the conversation's unfolding, I think why am I not hearing bitching and complaining and blame? Why am I not Instead? So I asked her about this and she said you know, um, her line was when your heart is full of gratitude, there's no room for blame. And so that's all of our hearts like, and that's what I think your show tries to pull out of people. All of our hearts should be full of gratitude and, uh, and when they're full of gratitude, it's hard to hate, it's hard to point fingers we all do it but it's a little bit harder when you can really be thankful for what you have and try and reach out and share that with others.
Speaker 1:I absolutely love that. When your heart is full of gratitude, there's no room. How'd she say it?
Speaker 2:there's no room to blame to blame.
Speaker 1:I love that. I love that, sean. Thank you so much for taking no room to blame, to blame. Yeah, I love that. I love that, sean. Thank you so much for taking the time today. I really, really appreciate it. You're doing some amazing work and thank you.
Speaker 2:Mike, we need more shows like this. We need more. You know light in this world, so it's better to light a candle than to curse the darkness right. So you are a great, wonderful candle here on the World Wide Web.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for that. I appreciate it and we will talk to you soon.
Speaker 2:Okay, thanks a lot, mike.
Speaker 1:I want to thank you for taking this time to listen to this episode with my guest, sean Daugherty. I hope you're able to take something positive from the time you spent with me. Maybe you'll be inspired, maybe you'll be motivated, maybe you'll even be moved. If you've experienced any of those positive feelings, please consider sharing this podcast with your friends and family. I'm always striving to offer you a better podcast, so give me some feedback. Let me know how you think I'm doing. Email me, leave me a message on my socials. It would mean the world Also. Feel free to follow us on our social media like Facebook, instagram, linkedin and TikTok. Like Facebook, instagram, linkedin and TikTok.
Speaker 1:This podcast is part of the Mayday Media Network. If you have an idea for a podcast and need some production assistance, or if you already have a podcast and are looking for a supportive network to join, check out maydaymedianetworkcom and check out the many different shows, like Afrocentric Spoil, my Movie Generation Mixtape In a Pickle Radio Show, wake Up and Dream with D Anthony Palin, staxo, pax and the Time Pals. We'll be back again next week with a new episode and we would be honored if you would join us. You've been listening to the Kindness Matters Podcast. I'm your host, mike Rathbun. Have a fantastic week.
