Leaving a Legacy: How Smart Planning Fuels Nonprofit Futures with Ben Weakley
Mona Reza (00:07)
Welcome to Not Your Lawyer. I am Mona Reza and I am your host today. I am here with Ben Weekly. He is the director of programming for Mission Belonging, formerly Community Building Artworks. He is an accomplished poet and a U.S. Army veteran. I am so happy to have you here with me, Ben. Welcome.
Ben Weakley (00:30)
Thanks so much Mona, it's so wonderful to be here.
Mona Reza (00:33)
So Ben, I start by asking everybody, ⁓ you know, I only knew you as a poet. I start by asking everybody, ⁓ what did you think you were gonna be when you were growing up?
Ben Weakley (00:45)
That's so that's a really wild story. ⁓ I went to I went to university at 17 and and we talked to the kids about this a lot now ⁓ how we ⁓ we all got pushed into you know, figure your path out, figure your major, figure out what your career is going to be at 17 or 18 and ⁓ gosh, you're you're your little brains not.
not done knitting itself together till at least 25. ⁓ So a lot of life decisions get made ⁓ before then. And I started out, ⁓ I think I wanted to be a journalist and then I wanted to write and I might have wanted to be a lawyer at some point. ⁓ And then I wanted to go into the army. was one of those folks that saw 9-11 and
Mona Reza (01:18)
Right?
Ben Weakley (01:41)
I was in college and didn't know whether I was going to enlist or stay in college. stayed in college and did the ROTC thing and became an officer. ⁓ But I wound up majoring in Latin American studies. ⁓ I was taking a Portuguese class and it wound up being the fastest path to a degree. ⁓ I just wanted to get done and not do as much math as I wanted to avoid math.
⁓ That was my biggest thing. ⁓ So fast forward to graduation, commissioned as an Army officer. And what did the Army, in its infinite wisdom, decide that I should be? But an engineer officer. ⁓ So I got plenty of spreadsheets, plenty of math, and lots of science and other fun stuff ⁓ from that Latin American Studies degree.
Mona Reza (02:37)
Absolutely.
When did you pivot to poetry? Where did poetry come in?
Ben Weakley (02:44)
So that's
an interesting story too. I took a couple of creative writing classes in college and it was never really a thing I thought I would do as a vocation. I wound up struggling really hard at about maybe the 12 or 13 year mark of my army career.
started struggling with some physical stuff and some of the mental fallout of deployments. ⁓ And as I was getting help with PTSD and traumatic brain injury and things like that, I was lucky enough to get exposed to some really holistic treatment ⁓ at a place called the... ⁓
the National Intrepid Center of Excellence, the NICO at Fort Bulbor. If you can imagine this really like uptight, ⁓ I called myself ⁓ in hindsight, this really wound type ball of rage and pain. If you imagine this really ⁓ uptight army officer ⁓ going and getting acupuncture, ⁓ going and laying on the table and.
Yeah, this is BS. don't buy this, know, ⁓ pills and science. That's what works for me. you ⁓ know, went in and there's the lady had studied extensively at a very legit Chinese medicine ⁓ institute in San Francisco and
really newer stuff and stuck that needle right here in my ear and just everything kind of changed. So all that to say, ⁓ in part of that process, ⁓ one of my therapists recommended me to a poetry workshop for veterans and other service members kind of going through it at a place called the Torpedo Factory. ⁓
in Alexandria, Virginia. And that's where I met Community Building Artworks at the time, Mission Belonging Now. And I was there with a bunch of other service members. it was a bunch of people like me in a sense, but not like me. So men, women, Air Force, Army, Navy, Marine.
⁓ some people were combat vets. Some people were not combat vets. ⁓ some people were officers and people were enlisted. ⁓ but we weren't, you know, we weren't in uniform and we were first name only and we were, you know, just people for an hour. And we got to write what we wanted to write and kind of say the thing that we couldn't otherwise say, ⁓ at home with our families or with our other friends or.
⁓ and that's was the first time I kind of reconnected to poetry. ⁓ that was with, you know, workshop led by your sister, Seema. And, and I just started writing then, ⁓ it became a thing that I needed to do. ⁓ it's how I, it's how I kind of figured myself out as a, as I was transitioning from army officer to what I was going to be next in the world. And.
That's the story, yeah.
Mona Reza (06:43)
When did you know that you're actually really good at this?
Ben Weakley (06:46)
⁓ I don't know that I'm really good at ⁓ it. ⁓ I think I knew it was something I had to do because I took it seriously. I think that was, ⁓ I started entering some contests ⁓ and putting my poetry up for publication just on a lark.
⁓ And I won something ⁓ right as I was retiring and we were moving to Tennessee. And I remember getting a check in the mail and ⁓ it's poetry. it's not much. We're talking about like a hundred dollars. But it was, yeah, it was validation. was like somebody likes this enough to pay for it. And ⁓ that kind of made it different.
Mona Reza (07:33)
But that's validating, right?
Ben Weakley (07:45)
You know, it's not something I'm scratching in a journal. It's something that ⁓ has worth in the world. Not to say that if you don't get paid for it, it's not worthwhile. ⁓ I actually don't really publish a lot anymore and ⁓ don't certainly don't get paid much ⁓ for that part of my life. But ⁓ I think that was the part that was the point when I started taking it seriously. And we tell people in workshops.
You know, really that, you know, that this is, you know, this is a practice for you, right? ⁓ so I hope people, I people realize that whether they're paid for it or not, it's accessible and it's something that, you know, you don't need to show the world, in order to take seriously, ⁓ whether it's a craft thing or just something you're doing to explore yourself, what you really contain and what you really have to say to the world.
even if it never sees the light of day.
Mona Reza (08:47)
So I went to, ⁓ I'm embarrassed to say, like my sister is the founder of Mission Belonging and Community Building Artworks. I went to my second event, which was the Day of Belonging, ⁓ a few weeks ago, like was it a couple, a few weeks ago now. And I accidentally walked into a room where Y-Told was running a session with musical instruments and. ⁓
Ben Weakley (08:57)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, yeah.
It's the ukuleles.
Mona Reza (09:12)
ukuleles and I
did not realize like I knew it I guess but I never thought about the fact that I have paid for so many music lessons and I bought violins and cellos and guitars and I've driven people and I've sat through concerts I've never picked up an instrument in my life you know I grew up with my mom you know and I know like they were busy they were working I signed up for drum lessons and she said no you have no talents don't worry about it you're not doing that and so you know and and I accepted that
And it was fine. did other things, but I was like, I think I'm in the wrong room. And why I told said, no, no, you're in the right room. Sit down. And I picked up a ukulele and honestly, it never clicked for me how
transformative it is to make art, to do something ⁓ outside of your comfort zone. Right. I never I've never thought of myself as a creative, but just tapping into that that other part of ⁓ what you're capable of and what you hear that part of your brain to get it thinking about that. It was really, ⁓ really incredible. And for me, it
Ben Weakley (10:08)
Hmm.
yeah.
Mona Reza (10:29)
drove home the work that you do at Mission Belonging, how valuable it is and how important it is. So tell me a little bit about when you went from being a participant to your current role at Mission Belonging. ⁓
Ben Weakley (10:40)
⁓
Yeah, so ⁓ at some point, ⁓ I forget exactly when it might have been early 2021. ⁓ SEMA asked me to host a workshop to facilitate a workshop. It was the Cohen Veteran Network workshop. So Cohen Veterans Network is a Stephen A Cohen military family clinic. There's a
a whole network of them across the country. They've been excellent partners of ours, particularly the clinic at Easterseals in Maryland. And ⁓ we partner, we at the time had just started partnering with them to host a virtual workshop. And SEMA asked if I would be the first facilitator ⁓ and give it a shot.
⁓ she had liked some of my writing and thought, I might make a decent facilitator and we tried it out. And it was, ⁓ it was wonderful. It's the most fun part of my job. ⁓ honestly, and I'm just like really reflecting. I want to reflect on, on what you had to say about your experience at day of belonging. Cause that's, I'm really glad you had that experience.
It's really profound. tell, like in a writing context, in the poetry sense, ⁓ we often say to participants in the room, a lot of our work is to undo what your worst high school English teacher did to you around poetry, right? ⁓ Because it is accessible in music and visual art. And ⁓
I think it really is about having something that you do that isn't for money or for payoff or for return or even for somebody else. ⁓ tell in my personal life, I tell my kids this all the time, like how important it is as an adult that you have a thing you do for no purpose other than just you enjoy it and it doesn't pay you money.
It doesn't make your, you know, doesn't make your partner like you more. It doesn't make your friends think you're cool. You don't even have to tell anybody about it. You just do it and it doesn't even have to make sense. You just do it because you like it. Um, and that can be visual art and it could be bad visual art. Doesn't, doesn't even matter. It can be music. You can sing in the shower and it can be completely tone deaf, but you get joy from it. Um, and like to your point.
you access a different part of yourself and it does, you you need that creativity as a lawyer. I'm sure you tap into that throughout your week. It makes you a better lawyer, a better parent, a better partner, a better friend, a better sibling. It enhances every part of your life just to work the muscle of creativity. Yeah.
Mona Reza (13:57)
And the stress relief, right? I think specifically
as a veteran serving organization, you know, lot of what you had talked about, I was at a conference in LA and it started with this opera singer leading us in this exercise where you kind of sing through, know, kind of find your voice and you sing and her.
I guess what she put forward to us was that there's no good singing and bad singing. This is a gift. We've all been given this voice and this ability to hum and to sing because it calms our nerves and it has this value beyond selling records or ⁓ being pleasant for other people to listen to. And so there is that importance of when you're very stressed out and it's kind of my private practice when nobody has to hear me sing to just, you know, it's very stressful. Just take a moment.
Ben Weakley (14:26)
Yeah.
Hmm.
Yes.
Mona Reza (14:50)
and you know hum or sing or and it really calms your nerves that it does something for your limbic system and you know and you guys have have tapped into that so exceptionally well your director role you are involved in planned giving you're involved in fundraising for ⁓ mission belonging how have the cuts to ⁓ grants for the arts have the impacted mission belonging
Ben Weakley (14:58)
I love that. Yeah.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
So they have, and our story around that is ⁓ certainly one that is parallel to a lot of organizations this year and also different, candidly. So we have lost some federal funding ⁓ and we've retained some federal funding. We're also really, really fortunate that
I think going into this year, it's been one of our desires, like a lot of nonprofits, to diversify our funding streams. So we've always had that intention. ⁓ We're still a fairly young nonprofit. ⁓ We haven't hit the 10-year mark. We're still growing. ⁓ So there's a lot of...
a lot of work to be done around diversifying funding streams and not being just dependent on government funding. ⁓ But that this year really was a shock to the system ⁓ in that respect. And I can say one of the things, you know, we can never really get away from government funding. It's always going to be there. It's always going to be a need. But
We're so grateful for a lot of our major donors and a lot of our individual donors. Our supporters really are a community. And I think one of the things we've gotten right is relationships. So having the relationships that we have and building them with our donors. And I say donors, I...
I kind of hesitate to even use that word because they're not donors to us. They're community members. ⁓ Donors sort of implies you write a check and that's sort of your role. somebody puts a thank you note in the mail and I'll talk to you next year when it's time to get you to open the checkbook again. I don't think we see it that way.
It's a lot more of a community where there is this whole person. We knew we were vulnerable to losing federal funding. And when it happened, we were able to turn to our network and say, not just, you know, we need additional funding to close the gap, but there are lots of needs here in this circumstance.
who can help and how and let's start a conversation. And the response has been overwhelming. ⁓ So some of our some of our closest supporters stepped up with you know, ⁓ much increased funding from from last year. ⁓ Some of our closest supporters have also gotten into conversations with us about hey,
we probably need to start talking to some of the other people in our network about your work. Who do we know? Let's have a conversation about who we know that also needs to hear about mission belonging. And that's been incredibly helpful. ⁓ Just getting more exposure to more people that need to be invited in who want to support this work. Because it's really more ⁓
It's more than a commercial transaction to receive, to ask for and receive philanthropic support from someone. ⁓ It's really like an exchange of values. ⁓ You're really forming that kind of relationship. It's not transactional. ⁓ You are saying, I affirm the work ⁓ that this organization is doing and we're opening ⁓
kind we're opening ourselves up and being vulnerable to receive the help ⁓ because we do need external support and we're inviting them in. it's, you know.
Mona Reza (19:46)
Absolutely.
And you know, and now mission belonging has gone beyond the military community, but really did start with veterans. And ⁓ I think we talk about that support and supporting it financially when you say thank you for your service. Right. And we are all so grateful. Right. We say thank you for your service. How do you put your money where your mouth is? Because when people come back.
there is a gap, know, no matter how hard we try or what the VA does, they do good work, but there's a gap. And how do we ⁓
as citizens who have not served. How do we fill that gap? How do we step up and help our fellow, you know, brothers and sisters who did serve and, know, and we say it, we thank you. How do we thank you? How do we put our money where our mouths are? ⁓ We talk about tax. There's this I say loose because it's, you know, people love to say deductible. Everything's not deductible. But there is this kind of overarching idea that.
Ben Weakley (20:24)
Hmm. Hmm.
Mona Reza (20:48)
I make donations so I don't have to pay taxes.
But if you think of it in that way, right, what you are donating to, that's where your tax dollars are going because you're not paying the tax money. But the reason you get the deduction, the thinking behind it is you are benefiting the country. You're donating towards something that's providing a public good. So now the government doesn't have to fund that because these dollars that would have been tax dollars are now donation dollars. And after the Tax Cut and Jobs Act of 2017,
Ben Weakley (21:00)
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Mona Reza (21:23)
I think one of the things a lot of small organizations saw when people realized that if you ⁓
If you are a filer who takes the standard deduction, meaning you're not itemizing, you no longer have those over the line deductions. you're $20, you're $40, it's not going to be deductible. One of the opportunities I think for both for donors and for nonprofits in the coming year in 2026 is the, you know, one big beautiful bill, the OBBA brings back that over the line deduction.
Ben Weakley (21:40)
sure.
Mona Reza (22:00)
a huge amount. It's like a thousand dollars for single filers, two thousand for a married couple, but it's something right. That two thousand dollars is money that you can deduct and not have to pay in taxes, you know, or it reduces your tax. And then same for corporations. There are opportunities there that you can, you can decide where you want your hard-earned money to go to a greater extent than we've been able to since 2017.
Ben Weakley (22:13)
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Yes. Yeah. And I think that's a, it's a wonderful opportunity, I think, to, to educate the, the giving public. I think a lot of, a lot of people who were donors at a certain level, stayed donors, even after tax cutting jobs. But we do know, I mean, the trends are clear, dollars up, donors down, right?
The philanthropic giving has been increasingly concentrated in the hands of fewer and fewer individuals. So the giving at lower levels, at that thousand and $2,000 per year level, those households are giving at smaller rates, or those households are giving less frequently.
um, since tax cuts and jobs, um, especially since the, uh, I think it was what the 600 and the, the 1200, um, emergency kind of measure in COVID, especially since that went away. Um, I, so I think it's a, it's a really wonderful opportunity, uh, to encourage, um, you know, average American households to get back in the game.
I think a lot of households didn't leave ⁓ because they were connected emotionally and morally and value wise with a nonprofit or more than one nonprofit. A lot of that ⁓ is community, a lot of that is church, a lot of that shows up in different ways for different people. But I think for nonprofits,
On the nonprofit side, we've got to understand that ⁓ when you start from a place of connection and relationship, ⁓ everything builds from there and you're resilient to changes in tax code. But on the flip side of that, ⁓ we've also got to do a better job of talking to our community members and talking to the people who want to support us and let them know
what the most efficient ways are to support us and how they can benefit ⁓ from supporting us, especially with changes in tax code coming up. ⁓ And I do want to you know, $1,000 ⁓ in the game of nonprofit ⁓ support, in the game of development.
Sometimes we get wrapped up in this term of major giving and I use it too. It's the term of art. What is a major gift? we, especially in like university context, sometimes we start thinking 25,000, 50,000. For an organization like Mission Belonging, $1,000 is a major donation. ⁓ So if you sign, you get on the line for a recurring donation of $83 a month.
That's a really big deal for an organization our size that runs on, you know, about $600,000 of revenue a year. A few more thousand dollar donors, a few more $2,000 donors is game changing for what we do. So not every nonprofit also is the size of Wounded Warrior Project or
American Red Cross where a thousand dollar donation, you know, is one in a sea of many. And so that's, you know, that's that's kind of a point to be understood too, is, you know, for those who want to make a difference, you can make a little difference in a very large organization. ⁓ Sometimes I think you can make a very outsized difference
in a smaller organization and that connection is there. You can really meet and see and know the people you're serving, ⁓ not only the staff, but really connect to the participants, the beneficiaries of your support.
Mona Reza (27:06)
Absolutely. And you know, you've talked about if there's a hundred thousand dollar funding gap from a grant that's been lost, 50 families at 2000 each who maybe are discrete new donors who haven't been donating, but want to take advantage of the deduction can fill that gap at one fundraiser, one event at someone's home saying, guys, love this organization.
Ben Weakley (27:20)
Mm-hmm.
Mona Reza (27:31)
Please donate and itemized. mean, you know, you can go beyond that.
Ben Weakley (27:33)
Absolutely.
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, not to, I guess we could get kind of geeky on this, but if you, if you take the 2000 and let's say what you're at 20, 21 % as is the tax bracket is at 21 or 22. What does that wind up being? What does that wind up being? That winds up saving you.
Mona Reza (27:57)
For what?
you're getting in the weeds.
Ben Weakley (28:08)
I mean, you're basically, I mean, you're
basically only paying something like $1,600 for that donation. If you want to look at it that way.
Mona Reza (28:19)
Yeah, can you explain that a little bit? What do you mean by that?
Ben Weakley (28:22)
So if you want to look at like what you're going to get on the tax break, right? ⁓ And this may be a part you want to edit out too. I don't know. Cause this is nerd stuff. ⁓ But one way, I I look at it sometimes this way when in my own giving, in household stuff, like in that COVID era, if I give $600 and ⁓ I can write that off.
Mona Reza (28:25)
Yeah.
Because it's not advice.
Right.
Ben Weakley (28:52)
If I'm going to pay taxes on my income at a 20 % tax bracket, I forget which bracket I wind up in, but I do 20 % of that 600 that I'm going to take off of my income, I'm foregoing having to pay 20 % on that 600. So that amount of savings means that instead of paying 600, I actually only paid 600.
Mona Reza (28:57)
Right.
Go.
Ben Weakley (29:21)
less the 20 % in taxes that I saved.
Mona Reza (29:26)
Yeah. And I think that's important, right? It's not a credit, it's a deduction. And so you go through that and go through that exercise, but it's a lot better than going to your accountant with all your receipts and he or she's saying to you, none of that matters. You don't itemize. You know, it just feels better. I think more than the money, the idea that this is where these dollars are going and not everybody has some.
Ben Weakley (29:30)
Yeah, yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Absolutely, yeah.
Mona Reza (29:54)
some ⁓ disagreement with some of ways our money is spent by our federal government and our state government. And but it's never an excuse to not pay your taxes. You got to pay those taxes, whether you like the reason what they're doing with your money or not. This is the government giving you back a little bit of autonomy over what you're going to do with that money. And so why not take advantage of that opportunity and put that money towards causes that are close to your heart and things that mean a lot to you?
Ben Weakley (29:59)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Absolutely, absolutely. again, you can, it's hard to see a government program sometimes. ⁓ It's very hard to see. I we all understand that when you get on the interstate, I know my federal tax dollars pay for the upkeep of that interstate. I think we all, it's easy to take that for granted. ⁓
And it's a big federal budget. know, we, it's very hard to see my dollar go pass through that. It's a lot easier to see my dollar, ⁓ pass through a local nonprofit that is, you know, providing arts to the community. ⁓ it's providing mental health services to the community that's providing substance abuse and addiction services to the community.
⁓ It's very easy to see where your philanthropic dollar is going. And ⁓ the other part of that is the, you know, the staff, the volunteers, the, you know, the development professionals are accessible. They'll, you know, you'll be able to connect ⁓ to what you're doing. You'll be able to volunteer. ⁓ And this is all, there's good science.
behind what happens to us ⁓ chemically, neurologically, in our bodies and brains when we give, when we do good things for other human beings. ⁓ So, yeah, so ⁓ we know that when we give, ⁓ whether it's
Mona Reza (32:02)
Talk about that a little bit, Ben.
Ben Weakley (32:13)
you know, volunteering, whether it's giving money to a cause we enjoy, ⁓ we know that it makes us happier. ⁓ So it's, it's sparking those ⁓ oxytocin and serotonin and dopamine. It's hitting those chemicals, those brain chemicals ⁓ that we, that we know produce a happier, better regulated state.
in our in our brain, right? ⁓ And that's, you know, that's, ⁓ it's good for us to do now, not in a I wrote a check ⁓ to make you go away sense. But again, relationship and connection, right? I know my dollar is going to help someone that I need to see help, I want to see help.
Mona Reza (32:45)
Yeah.
Right.
Ben Weakley (33:10)
⁓ cause that matters to me. So for example, you know, I'm a veteran and I want to help other veterans or, my father's a veteran and I want to honor, you know, his service by helping other veterans. That emotional connection will make me feel good ⁓ when I take the action of supporting my veterans organization.
⁓ Take that a little bit further. You've mentioned plan giving earlier. ⁓ The parts of our brain, there's a whole bunch of ⁓ research done by Dr. Russell James, think it's at Texas Tech. And we can link to this too. ⁓ It's all kind of publicly available.
whole bunch of research that basically, and I'm paraphrasing here, it says that when you get somebody ⁓ thinking about legacy and what happens after I'm gone, and having those kinds of conversations ⁓ with their estate, with their ⁓ giving after I'm gone, it activates the same parts of
of our brain that it does when we're hearing a story, when we're hearing kind of like a kind of that hero's journey. Right. So if you think about it that way, donors who are ⁓ people who are givers that are thinking about legacy giving, that are thinking about planned giving are really like telling a story about themselves in future tense. ⁓
Mona Reza (35:04)
Yeah.
Ben Weakley (35:08)
And so, you know, there's a sense in which we're, you know, we're able as a community of professionals to kind of help people, you know, at whatever stage they are of that kind of planning ⁓ to really look through what that journey looks like and think about, ⁓ you know, how do I feel good about what I leave behind, but have that feeling now before the end.
Mona Reza (35:37)
Absolutely.
And so, you know, one of the other things we had talked about was in my profession, right, with estate planning, business planning, all of it. There's a place where people get stuck. There's two places. One is guardianship of your children. Everyone's stuck. It's hard to agree because you just your brain doesn't want to go there. And the other is something called takers of last resort. And that means if. Everyone.
Ben Weakley (36:02)
Hmm.
Mona Reza (36:07)
Everyone is your, your spouse, your children, your grandchildren, all your descendants are out. Same accident, know, your common disaster. Who would you want to inherit? And people really struggle with this. And I think the same thing you don't, your brain doesn't want to go there. And so you start, you know, some options are half to my nieces and nephews, half to my husband's nieces and nephews, to my siblings and their descendants.
Ben Weakley (36:16)
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Mona Reza (36:35)
And even as you can imagine with that, there's a lot of disagreement.
Ben Weakley (36:38)
Mm-hmm.
Mona Reza (36:41)
charities, charities are a great taker of last resort. And sometimes they do benefit from that. Right. ⁓ I had a nonprofit who received a donation from someone that had never interacted with them that they did not know at all. It was a small organization that received a million dollar donation and then a continuing gift for the next 20 years from a complete stranger.
Ben Weakley (37:03)
Hmm.
Mmm.
Mona Reza (37:09)
You
know, and what an amazing gift that their organization, something about it must have resonated with them. And they put this in there and they were in a situation where they were the ultimate beneficiary. And so, yeah, yes, the organization may never see that money, but
One of the things you had said to me before is we would love to know even if we never see that money, we would love to know that you thought of us when you were doing your estate planning. Talk about that a little bit.
Ben Weakley (37:37)
Yes.
Yeah.
Yeah. So, I mean, that's, it's, it's a couple of different lenses on that, right? Like one is, one is, I think there's a, there's a piece of this that's almost like morale and, and almost like spiritual, right? Like I, we run a Slack channel. We're a very virtual organization. So we talk all day in real time on Slack. And sometimes
It's not the gift. It's not the money itself coming in. It's what the donor says. It's what it means, right? Like ⁓ that I can say to the rest of the team and it boosts everyone. know, people who aren't interfacing with our donors love hearing
Hey, this person thought of you, even if it's like a $10 thing, but it came with a statement, you know, sometimes the statement lifts everybody on the staff up more than, you know, the money may be non nominal, right? ⁓ So even if, you know, even if it is ⁓ a very conditional item in an estate and the nonprofit.
doesn't see it, that nonprofit may really benefit just from knowing that their work impacts someone that much. Nonprofits are tough, tough work. ⁓ This is a place where there are dark days sometimes, and you got to dig deep to find the motivation to keep going. ⁓
And so some days it's a matter of you just, the universe sends you somebody that gives you an atta boy and atta girl. And that's what you needed to hear to keep going that week. So from that end, please tell your nonprofit that you supported them that way, even if it's not about the money, even if it's a, you know,
taker of last resort situation and it may not actually benefit them. ⁓ They'll want to hear it. They'll appreciate it. I promise. ⁓ The other piece is, ⁓ you know, don't wait until you're gone. there's a... thinking through this is, you know, it's not just... Oftentimes, I think we get hung up on the death part.
right? The big scary D word. ⁓ And the more productive, and I think this is really where it gets it, like the spiritual part of these conversations and where being an estate planner or a financial planner or a philanthropic planner can be really spiritual work sometimes is shepherding somebody through the conversation beyond like, okay, you're going to die where your assets going to go.
Mona Reza (40:59)
Absolutely.
Ben Weakley (41:08)
But really to more like, okay, where your assets go says something about your values. What did your life stand for? And if a little bit of your life stood for this cause, do you want to wait till the end to see it? Do you want to wait? Maybe, ⁓ and maybe it doesn't even have to be a financial thing. Maybe if you naming that
cause, the taker of last resort, ⁓ sparks something in you. And it's that case where you, you know, it's the cause and you're not really even familiar with the nonprofit. Maybe that's the first step you'd like to go volunteer ⁓ and find out a little bit more about the, you know, the real work being done. Yeah. ⁓
Mona Reza (41:59)
or your beneficiaries, right? They see that and they think,
well, this meant a lot to dad. Let's find out more about this.
Ben Weakley (42:03)
Absolutely.
And it can be an education part, you know, intergenerationally, right? It can be about establishing and passing down what did we stand for as a family? What are our values? It can start all of these beautiful conversations about what is it that we stand for in the world? What do we want to have meant? What do we want to mean now?
And what do we want to bring into the world that's not here? ⁓ It can be a really beautiful, transformative thing. And it all starts with these kind of conversations around, OK, when I'm gone, where does this stuff go? ⁓ It's a little sneaky like that sometimes, but ⁓ it can reveal, ⁓ I have a... And often it's narrative, too, right?
I may have a story around I grew up a certain way, you know, there's maybe a rags to riches story or my, you know, my parents suffered some kind of injustice and I want to see that injustice reversed. Like there's all kinds of different ways into this, but it's very personal to each of us. ⁓ but I think
I think, it can be a very beautiful way to get into legacy conversation and have that now. Yeah.
Mona Reza (43:34)
Absolutely. I think,
yeah, and I think with the state planning generally, right? Like there's this this fear around it and it seems so transactional and it really should not be. You're absolutely right. The time is it's, you know, people ask me, ⁓ my sister mainly that, you know, do you really read the will? Like, is there going to be like you call everybody and you read it out? I've never done that ever. And it should not be that kind of a surprise. Like it all of that is fictionalized.
Ben Weakley (43:44)
No, no
Mm-hmm
Mona Reza (44:04)
But what really should not be the case is that everything is this huge surprise. This is a family decision. These are family things that are going to happen. And if we can, as advisors can facilitate having those discussions in a way that is ⁓ productive and beneficial and the biggest value, it's not tax savings. It's not any of that. It's that if we can minimize
Ben Weakley (44:09)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Mona Reza (44:31)
the hurt feelings and misunderstandings when you're not there to smooth it over by having those discussions now. That's the real value, right? That's the real legacy is that your kids will still be sitting around the table together at Thanksgiving years from now because there aren't all of these hurt feelings around things that they had no idea were going to happen.
Ben Weakley (44:33)
Yeah.
Yes.
Yes, yes, I couldn't agree with that more. yeah, and I think, you know, you're exactly right. Having the conversation now and having it among the family, right? Having it among the people closest to you. And if you're gonna name a nonprofit in the estate, having the conversation with the nonprofit as well and introducing that.
to your family introducing that as part of the plan ⁓ is always best. think I read somewhere ⁓ something like only 50 % of nonprofits that are beneficiaries in estate plans ⁓ are made aware of it during the life of the estate plan. Or I forget exactly how to say that, but basically before death. ⁓
So the upside, I mean, from a nonprofit perspective, of course, we want to know because, you know, it helps us plan for if we get this large, you know, injection of capital, what are we going to do with it? And, you know, are there conditions, you know, does the person want it to go to a certain program?
help develop that. ⁓ But really, ⁓ think a lot of it has the benefit on the individual side. A lot of it has to do with that piece right there is setting expectations, having instead of a complicated conversation when you're not there. ⁓
And it's a bad time to begin with. Feelings are already high. And complication is the last thing you want. Surprises are the last thing you want when grief is the order of the day. ⁓ But instead, looking at it as an opportunity to let your family know this part about you. Let them know this piece of you.
⁓ and introduce your family to that aspect of you. It can be a really beautiful benefit and bring everybody closer together.
Mona Reza (47:31)
I think so. think so. ⁓ Any, any last thoughts on any of it? Charitable giving, ⁓ mission belonging. You want to tell us anything that's coming up? Do you have any events, any fundraising drives coming up?
Ben Weakley (47:45)
⁓ So we will be a couple of big things. ⁓ we are, I didn't get to mention earlier, one, we ⁓ are really, really excited ⁓ in unveiling some research that we've been doing. One, ⁓ we have long kind of been very interested in this connection between loneliness
and mental health, loneliness and veteran suicide. ⁓ So we were very fortunate to get a Parker Fox grant from the VA to run one of our programs. And through that, we've been very, very fortunate to get some research assistance from Kennesaw State University and the Uniform Services ⁓ University of Health Sciences.
So we've been able to do, you know, IRB quality, IRB approved, you know, rigorous research on our program's mental health outcomes. And we're really excited to say that our programs have shown a statistically significant reduction in suicidality among participants. That got announced
at Day of Belonging ⁓ and we're seeking more support to continue the research ⁓ and really build that out so we can continue discovering, you know, why is it that what we're doing, bringing people together in community around art and expression, why is it that that makes people less lonely and reduces suicidality and how we can do it better?
and then how we can spread that to other communities of practice ⁓ so we can ultimately make the world a little less lonely and a little better place. So that's one thing. And yes, at the end of year, will ⁓ be ⁓ seeking our kind end of year fundraiser. ⁓ We ⁓ do it every year ⁓ and we'll be looking ⁓ this year to do
⁓ a fundraising drive ⁓ around. We always have a very generous donor who puts up a $50,000 matching fund. So we're seeking a $50,000 match, not a single $50,000 match. We're seeking ⁓ donations to come in. We'll be launching that in November. ⁓ Always seeking support. You can find us on our social media.
Sign up for our newsletter and find out more about us and learn how you can support ⁓ our drive and get your support matched two to one. ⁓ And that'll be running November and December.
Mona Reza (50:50)
Absolutely.
Great. And if you could send me the links, we'll link all of it, all of those different things for people who want to dig a little deeper and see the research on all of it, because I think it's fascinating. think a lot of people would agree. So we'd love to see it. Thank you so much, Ben. I appreciate your time and I look forward to seeing what's next for Mission Belonging.
Ben Weakley (51:14)
Well, thanks so much, Mona. I really appreciate it. It's been a wonderful conversation. Love to do it again sometime.
Mona Reza (51:20)
Absolutely.
