Why lived experience matters when everyone online sounds like an expert
The internet makes it easy to find homeschooling advice. It makes it much harder to determine whether that advice has stood the test of time.
In this episode of Find Your Freaks, Tonya Kubo builds on her conversation with Jen Mackinnon and shares how it came full circle when she unexpectedly began homeschooling her 12-year-old. Returning to the homeschool world revealed a flood of confident experts offering simple solutions. But many haven’t yet navigated the resistant child, the curriculum that stops working, burnout, adolescence, or the transition into adulthood.
Through personal stories and lessons from veteran homeschoolers, Tonya explores why real expertise often sounds less certain than internet authority. Experienced people ask questions. They consider context. They say “it depends” because they understand that no curriculum, routine, or philosophy works for every family.
That realization inspired Been There, Homeschooled That, a free online summit connecting newer homeschool families with veteran homeschoolers who have made mistakes, changed methods, survived the hard years, and successfully launched their children into the world.
Episode Highlights
[01:15] How Tonya unexpectedly found herself homeschooling again
[03:00] Who do you trust when everyone online sounds like an expert?
[03:50] Why the internet rewards confidence more than experience
[08:40] What experienced people mean when they say “it depends”
[13:30] The conversation that inspired a summit for homeschool “dinosaurs”
[16:35] Why there is no single right way to homeschool
[22:30] Why newer homeschoolers need guidance from people who have survived the hard years
[26:30] The story and purpose behind Been There, Homeschooled That
The Internet Rewards Confidence, Not Experience
The internet is an incredible place to find ideas. Type a question into a search engine or AI assistant, and you can receive dozens of possible answers in seconds.
But those tools aren’t very good at telling you which ideas have held up for five, 15, or 50 years.
Algorithms associate authority with specific signals. They reward certainty, named frameworks, simple language, and quick wins. Content that attracts immediate engagement spreads further than thoughtful advice that takes time to understand.
None of those signals prove that someone’s advice has worked in the real world.
A person can sound completely confident without having navigated the circumstances you’re facing. Meanwhile, the people with the most experience may be less visible because they’re busy doing the work instead of building personal brands around it.
Tonya has often been told she uses too much couching language and needs to speak with more certainty.
But her careful language doesn’t come from a lack of confidence. It comes from knowing that advice can be valid without being right for every person or useful in every situation.
Experienced people understand how much context matters. Instead of declaring one universal answer, they ask questions:
What is your goal?
What are you building toward?
How old are your children?
What does your work schedule require?
How much parental involvement can you realistically provide?
What has already worked or failed for your family?
Veterans also say things like, “I used to think this, but then I learned that.” They’re confident enough to admit when experience changed their minds.
The problem with inexperienced advice usually isn’t intelligence or access to information. It’s time.
You can’t know whether your homeschool approach prepares a child for middle school until you reach middle school. You can’t know whether it prevents burnout until you’ve sustained it through difficult seasons. You can’t know whether it prepares a student for adulthood until that student begins exploring college, technical education, or the workforce.
Perspective comes through accumulated experience.
That doesn’t mean newer homeschoolers have nothing valuable to contribute. It means their perspective is naturally limited to what they have encountered so far.
Veteran homeschoolers have tried curriculum that looked perfect and fell apart. They’ve taught children with different interests and abilities. They’ve changed routines, adjusted expectations, navigated burnout, and discovered that what worked at age seven didn’t necessarily work at 13.
Those experiences allow them to offer more than information. They can offer perspective.
One lesson Tonya has carried from her conversations with Jen is that there is no single right way to homeschool.
A curriculum that works beautifully for a parent who can sit beside a child throughout every lesson may be impossible for a parent working full-time. A math program that fits one child may frustrate another. A routine that works in elementary school may collapse during the middle school years.
Jen built the Working Homeschool Mom Club around the belief that families need systems that fit their actual lives rather than copied versions of someone else’s approach.
Tonya experienced this herself. The curriculum and routines she used with her oldest daughter can’t simply be repeated with her youngest. Her children have different strengths, interests, and learning needs. Homeschooling successfully requires responding to the child in front of you, not following an influencer’s formula.
Working homeschool parents often feel as if they don’t fully belong anywhere.
Traditional homeschool communities may assume that educating children is the parent’s only major responsibility. Advice for working parents usually assumes their children attend school outside the home.
Each community recognizes one part of their life while overlooking the other.
That’s why spaces like the Working Homeschool Mom Club matter. Members don’t have to explain why work meetings, client responsibilities, lesson plans, and family needs all compete for space on the same calendar. The entire context of their lives is understood.
None of us can fully realize our potential when only half of our identity is being served. The right community doesn’t require you to divide yourself into acceptable pieces before participating.
Tonya isn’t creating a homeschool summit because she considers herself a veteran homeschooler.
She’s creating it because she’s a veteran community builder.
She knows how to find remarkable people, vet real experience, facilitate meaningful conversations, and create judgment-free spaces where different perspectives can coexist. Her role isn’t to offer one perfect homeschool philosophy. It’s to bring together experienced people who can help newer families ask better questions.
Every speaker at Been There, Homeschooled That has launched at least one homeschooled child into adulthood. They have navigated changing seasons, difficult curriculum decisions, burnout, neurodivergence, work, adolescence, and the long process of raising independent learners.
The free summit is designed for families in their first three years of homeschooling who want practical guidance without being told there is only one correct path.
Live sessions take place September 1–3, 2026, and free recordings will remain available through September 8.
Sometimes your people aren’t the ones standing beside you at the same stage of the journey.
Sometimes they’re 20 years ahead of you and generous enough to turn around.
They can’t give you an exact formula for your family. But they can share what worked, what failed, what they would change, and which problems weren’t as permanent as they once seemed.
Been There, Homeschooled That isn’t about gathering people who claim to have every answer. It’s about connecting newer homeschoolers with people whose experience can help them recognize the right answers for themselves.
Am I trusting someone because of their experience or because they sound confident?
Where might I need more context before following someone else’s advice?
Who has already traveled the road I’m on and can help me ask better questions?
Meet Your Host
Tonya Kubo is a community strategist, writer, and rebel with a cause: helping people find the place where they truly belong. She’s spent nearly two decades building online spaces that feel more like chosen family than comment sections, and she’s not afraid to call out the fluff in favor of real connection. As the founder of Find Your Freaks, Tonya brings together unconventional thinkers, builders, and bridge-makers who believe that “normal” was never the point. When she’s not hosting the show, she’s raising two daughters, leading client communities, and making meaning out of the mess.
If Find Your Freaks matters to you, help us keep it ad-free by sharing the episode, leaving a review, or sending it to someone who has been searching for their people.
Next time, Tonya talks with clergy coach and author Margaret Marcuson about sustainable ministry, clergy burnout, and what happens when the people holding communities together can no longer hold themselves together.
Why belonging should never require you to split yourself in two
Working moms are often told they cannot give enough to their children. Homeschool moms are often told they should give everything to their children.
So what happens when you are both?
For years, working homeschool moms have lived in the space between two communities that were never designed to overlap. When they talk about struggling at work, they are told to quit. When they talk about struggling with homeschooling, they are told to put their children in school. The advice may be well-intentioned, but the underlying message is clear: You cannot keep both.
In this episode of Find Your Freaks, Tonya Kubo sits down with Jen Mackinnon, founder of Practical by Default and the Working Homeschool Mom Club, to talk about what it takes to build a life that does not fit neatly into one category.
Jen began homeschooling reluctantly because it was the right fit for her oldest child. When financial circumstances required her to return to work outside the home, she found herself surrounded by people who could understand one part of her life but not the other. She did not need someone to tell her which responsibility to abandon. She needed people who understood what it meant to carry both.
That search eventually led her to create a community that now supports more than 30,000 working homeschool moms around the world.
Together, Tonya and Jen explore the judgment these moms face, the practical systems that make an unconventional life more sustainable, and why belonging does not require you to divide yourself into pieces other people find easier to understand.
Episode Highlights
[01:30] Meet Jen Mackinnon and the working homeschool moms who are her kind of freaks
[09:50] Why judgment doubles when moms work and homeschool
[15:50] Realizing this was not just one mom’s problem
[20:00] What makes a system practical and sustainable
[24:50] The buffer block and why leaving space in your week matters
[30:50] Rethinking what community can look like for working moms
[38:00] Why making mistakes does not mean you are failing your children
When Your Identities Are Not Supposed to Overlap
Jen did not set out to become a homeschooling advocate. She was a reluctant homeschooler who made the choice because it was right for her oldest child. She later returned to full-time work outside the home because her family needed the income.
Neither choice felt optional, and neither community seemed to understand that.
When Jen shared a difficult day at work with homeschooling friends, their solution was to quit her job. When she shared a homeschooling struggle with coworkers, their solution was to put her children on the bus. She could find people who understood working motherhood and people who understood homeschooling, but few who understood what it meant to do both.
This is what happens when communities are organized around only one part of a person’s identity. People are welcomed as long as they fit the established story. The moment their life becomes more complicated than that story allows, they are treated like the complication is the problem.
Jen did not need to choose which part of her life mattered more. She needed a community where both parts could exist at the same time.
Most people offering advice believe they are being helpful. They see someone struggling, identify what appears to be the most obvious source of stress, and suggest removing it.
The problem is that the obvious solution may require someone to abandon a choice they made intentionally. A mom may work because her family needs the income, because she loves her career, or both. She may homeschool because it is the best fit for her child, even if it makes life more complicated.
Telling her to give up either one does not solve the problem she brought to you. It changes the subject entirely.
As Tonya points out in the conversation, advice feels like judgment when it asks someone to go against their values. A more supportive response begins with curiosity. Instead of assuming work or homeschooling is the problem, listen for the actual point of friction. It may be a lack of time, childcare, space, support, or a system that no longer fits.
Sometimes the most useful thing you can say is simply, “That sounds really difficult.” Listening without judgment may not provide an instant solution, but it gives the other person room to identify what kind of help would actually make a difference.
Jen’s business is called Practical by Default because she believes tools and systems should make real life easier. A planner may look beautiful, but it is not useful if it does not have room for your work, homeschool responsibilities, appointments, and family life. A meal plan is only effective if it accounts for your schedule, energy, budget, and dietary needs.
The goal is not to follow someone else’s system perfectly. It is to create a framework that supports the life you actually have.
One of the systems Jen taught Tonya is the buffer block: a portion of the week intentionally left open. It might be a full day, half a day, one hour, or even 30 minutes. When an appointment changes, a child gets sick, or a deadline moves, the buffer block gives you somewhere to put what no longer fits.
If everything goes according to plan, that time can become rest, connection, or space to catch up without panic.
This kind of structure does not take away freedom. It creates freedom by reducing the energy spent wondering what has been forgotten or how everything will fit. A strong system provides enough structure to hold your responsibilities without packing your life so tightly that one unexpected event causes the entire week to collapse.
Traditional mom communities are often built around gathering in person during the day. There are park dates, homeschool co-ops, coffee meetups, and activities where children play while parents connect.
Those options are not always available to working homeschool moms. Jen and Tonya both experienced homeschool activities scheduled during standing work meetings or prime working hours. Participating would have required them to neglect one responsibility to support the other.
For working moms, community often requires more flexibility and creativity. It may look like a quick coffee date, a Zoom call with someone in another time zone, voice messages exchanged through Voxer, or a WhatsApp conversation that pauses for several days before picking up exactly where it left off.
These connections may not resemble traditional community, but they are not less meaningful. They work because the people involved stop measuring connection by frequency or format and start building around what their lives can realistically hold.
The question is not whether you are connecting in the “right” way. It is whether you have people who understand your life and are willing to meet you inside it.
Working homeschool moms carry a tremendous amount of pressure to get everything right. When a child struggles with a subject or the schedule falls apart, it is easy to treat the difficult moment as evidence that the entire decision is failing.
Jen offers a different perspective. Making mistakes and learning alongside your children is part of the process. Her own family went through multiple math programs before finding one that helped her daughter understand fractions. That same child, who once hated math, now works in cash balancing and loves her job.
One difficult lesson does not predict a child’s future. One exhausting week does not mean the family made the wrong choice.
The goal of home education is not to know everything or execute every lesson perfectly. It is to help children understand how they learn, how to find information, and how to keep going when the first approach does not work.
That lesson matters for adults too. You can change the curriculum, adjust the routine, move the buffer block, or ask someone else to teach fractions. Adaptation is not failure. It is part of building something that works.
Each episode ends with five quick questions. Here’s how Jen flies her flag:
You’re my kind of freak if… You make the choice that is right for you and your family, whether that means homeschooling, public school, or something else entirely.
Something you love that your friends just don’t get: Making sourdough. Buying it from the store is not the same.
A community you would infiltrate just to understand it better: The homesteading community.
A tool, ritual, or practice that helps you stay connected to your people: A daily routine of checking in with her communities, beginning with her morning coffee and Facebook group before moving to Voxer and other platforms.
Someone doing freakishly good work who deserves a bigger stage: Lisa from The Canadian Homeschooler, who helps Canadian families find homeschool resources created for their educational systems, currency, and experiences.
Meet Our Guest
Jen Mackinnon is the founder of Practical by Default, where she helps working homeschool moms balance their careers, their children’s education, and everyday life with confidence. After struggling to find advice that did not tell her to quit working or stop homeschooling, Jen created the Working Homeschool Mom Club to connect with other moms making both work.
What began as a small Facebook group has grown into a worldwide community of more than 30,000 members. Through practical resources, flexible planning tools, and honest conversations, Jen helps working homeschool moms create systems that support their real lives.
Meet Your Host
Tonya Kubo is a community strategist, writer, and rebel with a cause: helping people find the place where they truly belong. She’s spent nearly two decades building online spaces that feel more like chosen family than comment sections, and she’s not afraid to call out the fluff in favor of real connection.
As the founder of Find Your Freaks, Tonya brings together unconventional thinkers, builders, and bridge-makers who believe that “normal” was never the point. When she’s not hosting the show, she’s raising two daughters, leading client communities, and making meaning out of the mess.
Since recording this conversation with Jen, Tonya has started homeschooling her twelve-year-old again, this time with more experience and a different perspective. Next episode, she explores a question that keeps becoming more important online: When everyone sounds like an expert, who do you trust?
Why belonging is built through alignment, not proximity
Loneliness is often treated like a numbers problem. Make more friends. Attend more events. Fill your calendar, and the loneliness will disappear. But what if being surrounded by people isn’t the same as belonging?
In this episode of Find Your Freaks, Tonya Kubo builds on her conversation with Alicia Shidler to explore a different perspective: belonging isn’t about proximity—it’s about alignment. Through Alicia’s journey from California to rural Michigan, Tonya examines what happens when you stop measuring connection by how many people are around you and start measuring it by how deeply you’re understood.
Through personal stories, reflections on intentional living, and practical lessons from both online and in-person communities, Tonya challenges listeners to rethink what it means to find their people. Because the communities where we truly belong aren’t always the ones closest to us. They’re the ones where we can finally stop pretending to fit in.
Episode Highlights
[01:12] Why loneliness isn’t simply a numbers problem
[04:05] Alicia’s move to Michigan and how alignment replaced proximity
[07:50] What Tonya’s front yard garden revealed about other people’s assumptions
[11:40] Why intentional living often makes others uncomfortable
[15:05] Online communities aren’t a consolation prize—they’re often where belonging begins
[18:45] What healthy communities do differently to create trust and safety
[22:15] Why silent community members may be paying the closest attention
[25:20] Finding your people by living authentically
Belonging Isn’t About Being Surrounded by People
One of the biggest misconceptions about loneliness is that it can be solved by simply adding more people to your life. More invitations. More conversations. More social activity.
But as Tonya explains, loneliness isn’t created by physical distance. It’s created when we don’t feel understood.
Alicia’s story illustrates this perfectly. Although she lived near family and lifelong friends for years, she often felt disconnected because the life she wanted—homesteading, growing food, and making intentional choices for her family—wasn’t something the people around her truly understood. It wasn’t until she built a life aligned with her values that she found the kind of belonging she’d been searching for.
Choosing a life that’s different from what’s expected often invites questions, criticism, or confusion.
Tonya shares her own experience of converting her suburban front yard into a community garden with her daughter. Rather than celebrating the vision behind the project, many people immediately focused on what might go wrong. Their reactions weren’t really about the garden—they reflected their own assumptions and fears.
That’s one of the quiet challenges of intentional living. Sometimes simply choosing a different path becomes a mirror for the people around you.
But as Alicia demonstrated, belonging doesn’t come from convincing everyone to understand your choices. It comes from finding people who already share your values.
There’s a persistent belief that online communities are somehow less meaningful than in-person ones.
Tonya challenges that assumption.
For Alicia, online communities became the place where she found practical advice, encouragement, and people who understood the journey she was beginning long before she ever moved across the country. Meanwhile, her local community became invaluable for the hands-on support that only neighbors could provide.
Rather than competing with each other, online and in-person communities often serve different purposes. One provides specialized knowledge and shared identity. The other offers practical support and local connection.
Belonging isn’t determined by where people are located. It’s determined by whether they understand who you are.
Drawing from both Alicia’s experiences and her own work as a community strategist, Tonya explores what separates thriving communities from overwhelming crowds.
The healthiest communities share several characteristics:
Clear purpose
Consistent moderation
Searchable resources
Shared expectations
Psychological safety
When leaders consistently protect those values, members learn they can participate without fear. When rules are applied inconsistently or harmful behavior goes unchecked, trust quickly erodes.
Community isn’t created by gathering people together. It’s created by cultivating an environment where people feel safe enough to stay.
One of the most powerful insights from this episode is that participation isn’t the only measure of engagement.
Many people join communities quietly. They observe. They search. They read conversations before ever introducing themselves. They’re deciding whether the space feels safe enough to invest their time and energy.
That means every interaction matters.
Leaders aren’t simply communicating with the people who comment. They’re communicating with everyone who’s watching.
Consistency, integrity, and follow-through tell silent members whether the community truly lives up to what it promises.
The thread connecting Alicia’s story, Tonya’s reflections, and every community discussed in this episode is surprisingly simple.
You find your people by becoming more yourself—not less.
Authenticity won’t guarantee everyone understands you. In fact, it may make some people uncomfortable. But it also makes it possible for the right people to recognize you.
Belonging isn’t something another person hands you.
It’s something you create by living in alignment with your values and allowing the people who share them to find you.
Where am I confusing proximity with genuine belonging?
What values am I building my life around, and do my relationships reflect them?
How can I create spaces where people feel safe enough to be fully themselves?
Meet Your Host
Tonya Kubo is a community strategist, writer, and rebel with a cause: helping people find the place where they truly belong. She’s spent nearly two decades building online spaces that feel more like chosen family than comment sections, and she’s not afraid to call out the fluff in favor of real connection. As the founder of Find Your Freaks, Tonya brings together unconventional thinkers, builders, and bridge-makers who believe that “normal” was never the point. When she’s not hosting the show, she’s raising two daughters, leading client communities, and making meaning out of the mess.
If Find Your Freaks matters to you, help us keep it ad-free by sharing the episode, leaving a review, or sending it to someone who has been searching for their people.
Next time, Tonya sits down with Jen Mackinnon to explore what it means to belong in two worlds at once. Together, they unpack the unique challenges of balancing career and homeschooling, building community at the intersection of both, and why choosing a practical path doesn’t mean settling for less—it means creating a life that works for your family.
Why living with intention sometimes means choosing a path few people understand
There is a subtle pressure to do life the “normal” way. Buy the convenient option. Follow the crowd. Trust that if everyone else is doing it, it must be the right choice.
But what happens when you begin asking questions?
In this episode of Find Your Freaks, Tonya Kubo sits down with Alicia Shidler to explore what happens after you stop accepting “normal” as the default. From reading ingredient labels and making homemade products to raising food, building community, and navigating relationships with people who don’t understand your choices, Alicia shares what she’s learned about living intentionally in a world that often mistakes different for wrong.
Their conversation isn’t about convincing anyone to homestead or abandon modern conveniences. It’s about having the courage to examine your own values, make thoughtful decisions, and resist the pressure to conform simply because “that’s how it’s always been done.”
If you’ve ever felt like the odd one out because of the choices you make for your health, your family, your work, or your life, this episode is a reminder that belonging isn’t about blending in. It’s about living authentically enough to make room for others to do the same.
Episode Highlights
[00:00] The unexpected question that started Alicia’s journey toward intentional living
[04:30] Raising a family across very different seasons of life
[11:45] Why lasting change happens one decision at a time
[19:10] Learning through online communities before ever joining the conversation
[26:00] What moderating large Facebook groups taught Alicia about community
[35:35] Belonging when your choices don’t look like everyone else’s
[39:50] Why you can’t force people to change—you can only model another way
Curiosity Is More Powerful Than Fear
One of the most refreshing parts of this conversation is that Alicia never presents intentional living as an all-or-nothing lifestyle.
Her journey didn’t begin with chickens, homemade body care, or baking gluten-free sourdough. It began with curiosity. One question led to another. One small change made room for the next. Instead of trying to overhaul her entire life overnight, she simply kept asking whether there might be a better way.
That mindset matters because so many people abandon change before they ever begin. They assume they have to do everything perfectly or not at all. Alicia’s story offers another perspective. Sustainable change happens gradually, and curiosity creates far more lasting momentum than fear ever could.
Click to Tweet:
“You don’t have to question everything at once. One thoughtful choice can change everything.”
Living Differently Doesn’t Mean Living Defensively
As Alicia’s values changed, so did the way her life looked.
Some of those choices made perfect sense to her. Others seemed confusing—or even extreme—to the people around her. Reading every ingredient label, cooking with tallow, avoiding seed oils, and making homemade products weren’t decisions everyone understood.
Rather than trying to convince everyone else to agree with her, Alicia learned something even more valuable.
You can’t force people to change.
You can answer questions. You can share your experiences. You can quietly live your values. But ultimately, people have to become curious on their own.
That approach removes the pressure to defend every decision and replaces it with the freedom to simply live consistently.
Click to Tweet:
“You can’t force someone to change. You can only show them another way.”
Community Looks Different When You’re the “Weird One”
One of the themes woven throughout Find Your Freaks is belonging, and this episode explores what happens when your lifestyle choices make you feel like the outsider.
Alicia talks honestly about being the person whose food looks different, whose routines seem unusual, or whose priorities don’t match the cultural norm. Those moments can feel isolating, especially when people assume different automatically means judgmental.
The conversation also highlights the role online communities can play in helping people feel less alone. Alicia describes herself as someone who quietly observes before participating, joining groups not to speak immediately but to learn.
That reminder is especially meaningful for community leaders.
Not everyone belongs by speaking first.
Sometimes belonging begins by simply feeling safe enough to watch, learn, and listen.
Click to Tweet:
“Belonging doesn’t always begin with speaking up. Sometimes it begins with quietly paying attention.”
One Thing at a Time
Perhaps the biggest takeaway from this episode is how Alicia approaches change.
When people discover healthier products, cleaner ingredients, or different ways of living, it’s easy to become overwhelmed. Suddenly everything feels questionable, and the temptation is to replace everything immediately.
Alicia offers a gentler path.
One thing at a time.
One habit. One product. One decision.
Not because the work isn’t important, but because lasting change is built through consistency, not panic.
That philosophy extends beyond food or homesteading. It applies to parenting, business, relationships, and community building as well. Lasting transformation rarely happens through dramatic overnight change. More often, it’s the result of hundreds of intentional choices made over time.
Click to Tweet:
“Intentional living isn’t about perfection. It’s about making one thoughtful choice after another.”
Three Questions I’m Sitting With
Where am I choosing “normal” simply because it’s familiar?
What small change have I been afraid to make because it feels different?
How can I create space for people whose choices don’t look like mine?
Meet Your Guest
Alicia Shidler is the founder of Shidler Goods, a Michigan-based small business specializing in handcrafted tallow body care products. Passionate about intentional living, Alicia enjoys baking gluten-free sourdough, caring for livestock, reading ingredient labels, and continually learning how small, thoughtful choices can lead to a healthier and more purposeful life. Through her business and everyday life, she encourages others to question what “normal” means and embrace the practices that align with their values.
Meet Your Host
Tonya Kubo is a community strategist, writer, and rebel with a cause: helping people find the place where they truly belong. She’s spent nearly two decades building online spaces that feel more like chosen family than comment sections, and she’s not afraid to call out the fluff in favor of real connection. As the founder of Find Your Freaks, Tonya brings together unconventional thinkers, builders, and bridge-makers who believe that “normal” was never the point. When she’s not hosting the show, she’s raising two daughters, leading client communities, and making meaning out of the mess.
If Find Your Freaks matters to you, help us keep it ad-free by buying us a coffee (or two!). Every dollar goes to production so more weirdos can find their people.
Next time, Tonya explores why communities often mistake “the right way” for “the only way”—and how belonging begins when we make room for people whose paths look different from our own.
Why reducing cognitive load creates communities where more people can participate, connect, and thrive
Accessibility is often treated like a technical requirement. Add captions. Upload a transcript. Check the compliance box and move on. But what if accessibility is actually one of the clearest ways we communicate care?
In this episode of Find Your Freaks, Tonya Kubo builds on her conversation with Dr. Catrina Mitchum to explore a bigger idea: accessibility is not just about helping people get in the door. It is about making it possible for them to fully participate once they arrive. Whether you’re leading an online community, creating a course, facilitating a workshop, or hosting an in-person event, every design choice either lowers barriers or quietly creates new ones.
Through stories, practical examples, and a fresh perspective on cognitive load, Tonya challenges listeners to think beyond compliance and toward belonging. Because when people feel considered, they feel connected. And when they feel connected, communities become places where everyone has the opportunity to contribute and thrive.
Episode Highlights
[01:10] Why accessibility is about removing friction, not checking boxes
[05:00] How cognitive load shapes the way people learn and participate
[09:30] Why transcripts, captions, and multiple learning formats benefit everyone
[13:50] The problem with putting accessibility behind a paywall
[17:45] Three questions every course creator and community leader should ask
[21:20] How offering multiple ways to participate strengthens belonging
[25:00] Why accessibility is ultimately an act of care
Accessibility Is More Than Compliance
Most conversations about accessibility begin with technology. We think about captions, transcripts, alt text, or screen readers. Those tools matter, but Tonya argues they’re only part of the story.
Real accessibility is about reducing unnecessary friction. It’s asking whether someone can easily understand, participate in, and apply what they’re learning rather than simply asking whether they can technically access the information.
A workshop activity, an online lesson, or even a room full of chairs can unintentionally create barriers that make people spend more energy navigating the experience than engaging with it. Every extra decision, every confusing instruction, and every unnecessary obstacle adds cognitive load that pulls people away from learning and connection.
Designing for the Experience You Want People to Have
One of the biggest takeaways from this episode is that accessibility starts long before someone arrives.
Rather than beginning with content, Tonya encourages leaders to start with intention. What is the goal of this lesson, event, or activity? What does success actually look like for the participant? Once those answers are clear, every design decision becomes easier to evaluate.
She offers three simple questions that can transform the way we build communities and educational experiences:
What is the goal?
Who might be left out?
What small change could make this easier for everyone?
Those questions shift accessibility from a reactive checklist to a proactive mindset, creating experiences that serve a wider range of people without sacrificing quality.
Throughout the episode, Tonya returns to one idea over and over again: making something easier for one person almost always makes it better for everyone else.
Captions help someone watching in a noisy coffee shop. Transcripts help someone who processes information by reading. Explaining the purpose behind an exercise helps neurodivergent learners, but it also helps every participant understand expectations and take action with confidence.
Offering multiple ways to engage, whether that’s writing, recording a voice note, drawing a picture, or joining a discussion, creates more entry points for learning instead of forcing everyone into the same experience.
Accessibility is not about creating special accommodations for a select few. It is about recognizing that people learn, process, and participate differently and designing with that reality in mind.
Tonya also addresses a practice that continues to surface in online education: putting accessibility behind a paywall.
Charging extra for transcripts, captions, or other basic access tools sends an unintended message that some people have to pay more simply to receive the same experience as everyone else. While technology has made accessibility easier and more affordable than ever, some creators still treat it as a premium feature instead of a baseline expectation.
The conversation moves beyond legality or compliance and into community values. If belonging is truly the goal, then access cannot be reserved for those who can afford an upgrade.
Communities become stronger when people are invited to participate fully from the beginning, not when they have to purchase their way into an equivalent experience.
The most powerful idea in this episode is also the simplest.
Accessibility is an expression of care.
It’s choosing chairs that welcome more bodies. It’s explaining why an activity matters before asking people to invest their time. It’s providing multiple ways to learn and participate. It’s thinking about someone’s experience before they ever enter the room.
Those choices communicate something bigger than convenience. They tell people, “I was thinking about you.”
And when people feel considered, they are more likely to feel connected. They stay longer, contribute more freely, and help create communities where others feel welcome too.
Belonging doesn’t happen by accident. It grows through countless intentional decisions that make participation easier and connection more possible.
Where am I unintentionally creating barriers for the people I want to serve?
What small change could make participation easier for everyone?
How can I design my communities and experiences with care instead of assumption?
Meet Your Host
Tonya Kubo is a community strategist, writer, and rebel with a cause: helping people find the place where they truly belong. She’s spent nearly two decades building online spaces that feel more like chosen family than comment sections, and she’s not afraid to call out the fluff in favor of real connection. As the founder of Find Your Freaks, Tonya brings together unconventional thinkers, builders, and bridge-makers who believe that “normal” was never the point. When she’s not hosting the show, she’s raising two daughters, leading client communities, and making meaning out of the mess.
If Find Your Freaks matters to you, help us keep it ad-free by sharing the episode, leaving a review, or sending it to someone who has been searching for their people.
Next time, Tonya sits down with Alicia Shidler to explore what it means to live with radical intention. Together, they unpack choosing purpose over expectations, building a life anchored in what matters most, and why being a good parent doesn’t mean losing yourself along the way.
What if accessibility isn’t about compliance at all, but about removing barriers so more people can fully participate?
We talk a lot about community on Find Your Freaks. We talk about connection, belonging, and what it means to create spaces where people feel seen and valued. But there’s an important piece of that conversation that often gets overlooked.
People can’t belong to spaces they can’t access.
And yet, accessibility is often treated as a separate conversation. It’s discussed as a legal requirement, a technical checklist, or something organizations think about only when someone asks for an accommodation. Rarely do we talk about accessibility as a core ingredient of belonging itself.
In this episode, Tonya Kubo sits down with learning experience designer and online education expert Dr. Catrina Mitchum to challenge that perspective. Drawing from nearly two decades of experience teaching adults online, Catrina offers a broader and more human-centered view of accessibility—one that has implications far beyond online courses.
Because accessibility isn’t just about whether someone can get through the door. It’s about whether they can participate once they’re inside.
Episode Highlights
[03:15] Why accessibility is really about belonging
[08:20] Expanding accessibility beyond captions, ramps, and compliance
[19:30] The role cognitive load plays in learning and participation
[24:40] Why learners need to understand the purpose behind what they’re doing
[30:15] How accessibility strengthens communities and invites diverse expertise
[44:15] The simple question that can make any space more welcoming: “What would make this a pleasant experience?”
Accessibility Is Bigger Than Most People Think
When most people hear the word accessibility, they immediately think about accommodations for people with disabilities. That’s understandable because those conversations matter and deserve attention. But one of the most interesting parts of this discussion is how quickly Catrina expands the definition beyond what many of us expect.
Accessibility isn’t only about whether someone can technically access information. It’s about whether they can meaningfully participate in the experience you’ve created.
Think about all the different ways people arrive in our communities, courses, workshops, and events. Some are navigating disabilities. Others are balancing caregiving responsibilities, language barriers, unfamiliar technology, cultural differences, financial constraints, or simply a lack of prior experience with the topic at hand. Even something as simple as never having attached a file to an email before can become a barrier when everyone else assumes it’s common knowledge.
The challenge for community builders isn’t anticipating every possible circumstance. That’s impossible. The challenge is recognizing that our own experience isn’t universal.
As Catrina points out, people don’t arrive through the same door. They bring different histories, different assumptions, and different ways of making sense of the world. When we design only for people who think, learn, and participate the way we do, we’re unintentionally making participation harder for everyone else.
That’s why accessibility matters so much in community building. It invites us to stop asking, “Can people get in?” and start asking, “Can people fully participate once they’re here?”
One of the ideas that stood out most in this conversation is the concept of cognitive load.
Learning is inherently challenging. By definition, learning requires us to engage with something unfamiliar. But what often makes learning frustrating isn’t the material itself. It’s all the extra obstacles surrounding it.
Maybe the instructions aren’t clear. Maybe the activity feels disconnected from the outcome. Maybe the technology is confusing. Maybe participants are spending so much energy figuring out what they’re supposed to do that they don’t have any energy left to actually learn.
Catrina argues that many accessibility challenges are really friction challenges. People aren’t failing because they’re incapable. They’re struggling because the experience asks them to carry too many things at once.
That’s an important distinction because it shifts our focus away from fixing people and toward improving environments.
The best educators, facilitators, and community leaders understand that reducing unnecessary friction benefits everyone. Clear instructions help everyone. Thoughtful organization helps everyone. Providing context helps everyone. Explaining why something matters helps everyone.
Accessibility isn’t always about adding more resources or creating elaborate accommodations. Sometimes it’s about removing obstacles that never needed to be there in the first place.
The Best Communities Remove Obstacles to Participation
One of the moments in this conversation that feels especially relevant to community builders is when Catrina talks about expertise.
When you’re building a community, you’re not supposed to be the only expert in the room.
In fact, if you’re the only expert in the room, something may be missing.
Healthy communities thrive because people bring different experiences, perspectives, and knowledge. The value isn’t created by a single leader. It’s created by the collective wisdom of the group. But that only works when people feel able to participate.
If barriers exist—whether they’re technological, cultural, emotional, or logistical—then valuable voices often remain unheard.
What makes this perspective so powerful is that it reframes accessibility as an investment in the community itself. When more people can engage, contribute, and succeed, the community becomes stronger. New ideas emerge. Different perspectives surface. Members learn from one another rather than relying entirely on the person leading the room.
That doesn’t happen by accident. It happens because someone intentionally designed an environment where participation feels possible.
Community leaders often focus on attracting people into a space. Accessibility reminds us that getting people into the room is only the first step. The real work is creating conditions where they can fully contribute once they arrive.
One of the reasons accessibility can feel overwhelming is because there’s no finish line.
There will always be another perspective to consider, another barrier to remove, another improvement to make. For perfectionists, that realization can feel discouraging. If you’ll never get it completely right, why start?
But Catrina offers a different perspective.
The goal isn’t perfection. The goal is progress.
You don’t need to anticipate every need before you begin. You don’t need to redesign everything overnight. You don’t need a perfect solution before taking the next step.
What you do need is curiosity.
Throughout the conversation, Catrina returns to a surprisingly simple idea: ask people what they need.
That sounds obvious, but many of us skip that step. We assume. We guess. We try to solve problems on behalf of people without inviting them into the conversation.
One of her favorite questions is: “What would make this a pleasant experience?”
It’s such a simple question, but it communicates something powerful. It tells people their experience matters. It invites participation instead of making assumptions. And often, it reveals needs that would have otherwise remained invisible.
At its heart, accessibility is an act of care. It’s the willingness to recognize that other people experience the world differently than we do and to create space for those differences rather than expecting everyone to adapt.
That’s also what belonging requires.
Because belonging isn’t created when everyone fits into the same mold. Belonging is created when people can show up as they are and still participate fully.
What makes this conversation so compelling is that it’s ultimately about much more than courses, transcripts, or technology.
It’s about how we treat people.
It’s about whether we create environments that expect people to work around barriers or environments that actively remove them. It’s about whether we see accessibility as a burden or as an opportunity to invite more people into the conversation.
And perhaps most importantly, it’s about recognizing that belonging doesn’t happen automatically.
Belonging requires access.
The more intentional we become about reducing friction, increasing participation, and listening to the needs of others, the more likely we are to create communities where people don’t just show up—they truly feel like they belong.
Each episode ends with five quick questions. Here’s how Catrina flies her flag:
You’re my kind of freak if… you’ve won a trophy for reading.
Something you love that friends don’t get: spreadsheets.
Community you’d infiltrate: a community representing the full spectrum of neurodiversity.
Practice that keeps you connected: writing every morning with a cup of coffee nearby.
Someone doing freakishly good work who deserves a bigger stage: people helping others navigate life transitions without abandoning parts of themselves in the process.
Meet Our Guest
Dr. Catrina Mitchum is on a mission to revolutionize the online course creation space. A recovering academic who has been teaching adults online since 2009, she combines her expertise in learning experience design, instructional strategy, and accessibility to help overwhelmed small business owners create courses that actually support learner success. Through her work, Catrina helps aspiring course creators build engaging, accessible learning experiences that prioritize people over perfection.
Meet Your Host
Tonya Kubo is a community strategist, writer, and rebel with a cause: helping people find the place where they truly belong. She’s spent nearly two decades building online spaces that feel more like chosen family than comment sections, and she’s not afraid to call out the fluff in favor of real connection. As the founder of Find Your Freaks, Tonya brings together unconventional thinkers, builders, and bridge-makers who believe that “normal” was never the point. When she’s not hosting the show, she’s raising two daughters, leading client communities, and making meaning out of the mess.
If Find Your Freaks matters to you, help us keep it ad-free by buying us a coffee (or two!). Every dollar goes to production so more weirdos can find their people.
In the next episode, Tonya builds on her conversation with Dr. Catrina Mitchum by exploring how accessibility extends far beyond compliance. She unpacks what it means to remove barriers, reduce friction, and create communities where more people can truly belong.
Why some communities become collaborative while others turn territorial, and what that reveals about belonging.
Some communities feel expansive. People share resources freely, celebrate each other’s wins, and welcome newcomers like there is enough room for everyone. Other spaces feel guarded. Information gets hoarded, collaboration feels performative, and every new voice quietly registers as competition.
In this episode of Find Your Freaks, Tonya Kubo explores why that difference is rarely about whether people are “good” or “bad.” More often, it comes down to structure. The systems inside a community quietly teach people whether they are supposed to collaborate, compete, share, protect themselves, or stay quiet.
Drawing on examples from fiction writing communities, nonfiction publishing, online business spaces, and personal development ecosystems, Tonya unpacks the emotional architecture behind belonging. Why do some spaces naturally create generosity while others create defensiveness? Why does scarcity change how people treat each other? And what happens when a community rewards visibility, curiosity, and shared discovery instead of exclusivity?
At its core, this episode is not really about publishing. It is about what happens to people when they feel safe enough to connect instead of protect themselves.
Episode Highlights
[01:15] The difference between communities that feel like potlucks versus cage matches
[07:10] How nonfiction spaces tie trust to authority and identity
[10:45] Why self-help and business communities often become more territorial
[14:20] The role scarcity plays in shaping community behavior
[17:05] Why plagiarism fears feel more personal in nonfiction spaces
[20:10] How communities teach members what behaviors are rewarded
[23:15] The connection between psychological safety and generosity
[26:00] Why belonging grows when people stop treating each other like threats
[28:05] The question every community leader should ask about their space
Communities Teach People How to Behave
One of the biggest ideas in this episode is that communities are constantly training people, whether leaders realize it or not.
People pay attention to what gets rewarded. They notice who receives praise, whose voices are amplified, and what kinds of behavior seem safest in the space. Over time, that creates culture. Not through mission statements or community guidelines, but through repetition.
Tonya points out that some communities naturally encourage openness. People share resources freely, celebrate each other’s wins, and act like someone else succeeding expands the room for everybody. Other spaces quietly reward scarcity. Information becomes currency. Visibility feels risky. Collaboration starts to feel performative instead of genuine.
The important thing is that neither outcome happens by accident. Communities shape behavior through what they consistently reinforce.
Why Fiction Communities Often Feel More Collaborative
One of the more interesting observations in this episode is the difference between fiction and nonfiction spaces.
In fiction communities, success tends to be additive. Readers rarely commit themselves to only one mystery writer, one fantasy author, or one romance series forever. Loving one story usually leads readers to discover more stories, more writers, and more worlds. One author succeeding often benefits the genre as a whole.
But nonfiction operates differently, especially in business and self-help spaces. Those books are often tied directly to the author’s methodology, expertise, or lived experience. The framework itself becomes the product. That creates a very different emotional dynamic because success can start to feel mutually exclusive.
When people feel like there can only be one trusted expert, collaboration naturally becomes harder.
Tonya explores how this difference changes not only business strategy, but community culture itself. Fiction communities often become bridges between creators. Nonfiction spaces can become much more territorial because identity, credibility, and income are all tied together.
Scarcity Changes the Way People Relate to Each Other
A recurring thread throughout this episode is the way scarcity reshapes human behavior.
When people believe there is not enough room, enough recognition, enough opportunity, or enough safety, they stop focusing on connection and start focusing on protection. Knowledge gets hoarded. Other people’s success begins to feel threatening. Collaboration becomes cautious and transactional.
Tonya is careful not to frame this as a character flaw. In many cases, scarcity is being reinforced by the structure of the industry itself. Business communities, online creator spaces, and personal development ecosystems often encourage people to position themselves as the one trusted authority. That pressure changes how people show up.
And when fear becomes the emotional baseline of a community, generosity becomes much harder to sustain.
What makes this conversation compelling is that it is not really about authors or publishing at all. It is about recognizing how quickly humans adapt to environments that feel unsafe.
Tonya spends a significant portion of the episode talking about psychological safety, though not in the corporate buzzword sense people often use online.
She is talking about the feeling that you can let your guard down. The sense that you do not need to constantly protect your status, defend your expertise, or calculate what sharing might cost you.
When people feel safe, they become more generous. They recommend resources. They celebrate each other openly. They contribute because they genuinely want the space to thrive, not because they are trying to secure their own position within it.
That shift matters because it changes the emotional temperature of the community entirely. Instead of people feeling like they need to compete for visibility, they start acting like collaborators.
And according to Tonya, that transformation almost always begins with structure. Communities become more collaborative when leaders intentionally reward contribution, curiosity, and shared success.
Toward the end of the episode, Tonya leaves listeners with a deceptively simple question: What behaviors does your community reward?
Not what behaviors the guidelines claim to value. Not what the welcome email says. What behaviors are actually reinforced every day?
Does the space reward generosity or exclusivity? Shared discovery or gatekeeping? Participation or perfectionism? Are people encouraged to help each other, or are they subtly taught to protect their position?
Because communities are always teaching people how to behave.
And if a space consistently rewards fear, performance, or scarcity, people eventually stop bringing their full selves into the room.
What Tonya ultimately argues is that belonging is not built through clever engagement strategies. It grows when people feel safe enough to stop treating each other like threats.
What behaviors are being rewarded in the communities I participate in most?
Where have I mistaken scarcity for leadership?
What would change if collaboration felt safer than competition?
Meet Your Host
Tonya Kubo is a community strategist, writer, and rebel with a cause: helping people find the place where they truly belong. She’s spent nearly two decades building online spaces that feel more like chosen family than comment sections, and she’s not afraid to call out the fluff in favor of real connection. As the founder of Find Your Freaks, Tonya brings together unconventional thinkers, builders, and bridge-makers who believe that “normal” was never the point. When she’s not hosting the show, she’s raising two daughters, leading client communities, and making meaning out of the mess.
If Find Your Freaks matters to you, help us keep it ad-free by sharing the episode, leaving a review, or sending it to someone who has been searching for their people.
Next time, Tonya Kubo sits down with Dr. Catrina Mitchum to explore why accessibility is not just a compliance issue — it’s the foundation of belonging. Together, they unpack what it really means to create online spaces where people can fully participate, connect, and thrive.
What if the way people connect inside a community has less to do with personality… and more to do with whether success feels scarce or shared?
There’s something fascinating that happens in communities where success feels expansive instead of limited.
People recommend each other freely. They celebrate wins without quietly comparing them to their own. Opportunities get shared instead of guarded. And perhaps most importantly, connection starts to feel safer because people aren’t constantly calculating where they stand.
In this episode of Find Your Freaks, Tonya Kubo sits down with bestselling thriller author M.M. Chouinard to explore the surprisingly collaborative culture of the mystery writing world and what it reveals about human behavior, belonging, and community design.
Because while many creative industries are shaped by competition and scarcity, Michelle describes a world where readers don’t just want one great author. They want many. Writers support each other. Fans introduce people to new creators constantly. Success becomes additive instead of mutually exclusive.
And once you notice that dynamic, it becomes difficult not to ask a bigger question:
How much of the way people behave in community is actually shaped by the environment around them?
Episode Highlights
[03:45] Michelle’s journey from psychology professor to bestselling thriller author
[09:20] Why mystery readers rarely stop at just one author
[15:10] How abundance thinking changes the culture inside creative communities
[22:35] The emotional difference between collaborative and competitive spaces
[29:40] Why fandom creates connection faster than traditional networking
[36:15] The hidden pressures creators feel when success seems limited
[42:05] What community builders misunderstand about scarcity and behavior
[47:10] Why belonging grows faster in spaces where people openly share opportunities
When Success Feels Additive Instead of Competitive
One of the most interesting parts of this conversation is how differently people behave when success doesn’t feel finite.
Michelle talks about the mystery reader community almost like an ecosystem built on enthusiasm. Readers don’t guard their favorite authors. They recommend them. Authors celebrate each other’s launches because another successful thriller doesn’t threaten their career. If anything, it expands the appetite for the genre as a whole.
That dynamic changes everything.
Because when people stop seeing success as something they have to fight over, generosity becomes easier. Collaboration becomes easier. Even belonging becomes easier because people are no longer entering spaces bracing for comparison.
And honestly? Many community leaders underestimate how much emotional energy people spend trying to figure out whether they’re safe, valued, or quietly competing for limited attention.
A lot of conversations about community behavior become moral conversations very quickly.
People are cliquey. Territorial. Competitive. Ungenerous.
But this episode pushes against the idea that these behaviors exist in a vacuum.
Because when people believe there’s only enough visibility, money, opportunity, or recognition for a handful of people, protecting yourself becomes logical. Scarcity changes how people share. It changes trust. It changes whether collaboration feels safe or risky.
That doesn’t necessarily make people bad. It makes them adaptive.
And that’s an important distinction for anyone building communities, leading memberships, or trying to create environments where people genuinely connect instead of quietly performing connection.
Fandom Creates Connection Faster Than Networking Ever Could
Another thread running through this conversation is the role fandom plays in belonging.
There’s something uniquely powerful about discovering people who love the same strange, specific things you do. Whether it’s mystery novels, Halloween aesthetics, true crime discussions, or niche creative interests, shared enthusiasm creates connection faster than polished networking ever will.
Because fandom skips small talk.
It gives people immediate language, shared references, emotional investment, and a reason to engage beyond status or professional gain. And in many ways, that’s why communities built around genuine enthusiasm often feel more alive than spaces built purely around strategy or visibility.
People relax when they no longer feel like they’re auditioning for relevance.
If you lead communities, this episode lands a little differently.
Because it challenges the assumption that connection problems are always interpersonal problems.
Sometimes people are guarded because the environment trained them to be. Sometimes collaboration struggles because the ecosystem rewards competition. Sometimes communities feel performative because everyone inside them is trying to secure belonging instead of experiencing it.
That means culture matters more than many leaders realize.
Not just the stated values, but the emotional experience people have when they enter the room. Do opportunities get shared openly? Do people celebrate each other publicly? Does success feel expansive or limited? Do people feel like they can contribute without losing position?
People are constantly reading those signals, whether consciously or not.
And over time, those signals determine whether a community becomes collaborative, territorial, generous, or exhausting.
At its core, this conversation is really about belonging.
Not belonging as branding. Not belonging as audience retention. Actual human belonging.
The kind that happens when people stop feeling like they have to protect every opportunity, guard every idea, or compete for every ounce of visibility.
Because when people believe there’s room for everyone, something shifts. Curiosity grows. Generosity grows. Relationships deepen. Community starts to feel less transactional and more human.
And maybe that’s the real lesson here.
The healthiest communities aren’t necessarily the ones with the most structure or the biggest audience. They’re often the ones where people feel safe enough to stop treating each other like threats.
Each episode ends with five quick questions. Here’s how Michelle flies her flag:
You’re my kind of freak if… you love getting lost in stories and obsessing over the details most people overlook.
Something you love that friends don’t get: amateur genealogy, Halloween everything, and caffeine in basically every form.
Community you’d infiltrate: any room full of passionate readers swapping book recommendations faster than anyone can write them down.
Practice that keeps you connected: writing stories that explore the messy, complicated parts of being human.
Someone doing freakishly good work who deserves a bigger stage: independent authors and creators building deeply loyal reader communities one connection at a time.
Meet Our Guest
M.M. Chouinard is an Edgar Award–nominated bestselling author known for weaving psychology, suspense, and human complexity into gripping thrillers. She is the author of The Serial-Killer Guide to San Francisco series, the Detective Jo Fournier thriller series, and the standalone psychological thriller The Vacation. Before becoming a full-time author, Michelle earned a Ph.D. in developmental psychology from Stanford University and served as a founding faculty member at University of California, Merced. When she’s not writing dark and twisty stories, she enjoys caffeine in all forms, amateur genealogy, crafting, baking, and anything related to Halloween.
Meet Your Host
Tonya Kubo is a community strategist, writer, and rebel with a cause: helping people find the place where they truly belong. She’s spent nearly two decades building online spaces that feel more like chosen family than comment sections, and she’s not afraid to call out the fluff in favor of real connection. As the founder of Find Your Freaks, Tonya brings together unconventional thinkers, builders, and bridge-makers who believe that “normal” was never the point. When she’s not hosting the show, she’s raising two daughters, leading client communities, and making meaning out of the mess.
If Find Your Freaks matters to you, help keep it ad-free by buying us a coffee. Every dollar helps more weirdos find their people. Merch available through Abilities and Attitudes.
In the next episode, Tonya explores why some communities naturally foster collaboration while others create competition and territorial behavior. Drawing from this conversation with Michelle, she unpacks how scarcity shapes the way people connect, share opportunities, and decide whether it feels safe to truly belong.
Why people don’t stop hiding because they want to, but because it finally feels safe to be seen.
What does it actually take for someone to tell the truth?
Not the polite version. Not the version that’s been softened or edited to be more acceptable. The kind of truth that feels a little risky to say out loud. The kind that makes you pause afterward and wonder if you said too much.
We tend to think that moment comes from asking the right question or creating the right environment. That if we just get better at facilitating conversation, people will open up.
But that’s not usually what’s happening.
More often, that moment comes when something shifts. Not externally, but internally. When, for just long enough, it feels safer to be seen than to stay hidden.
In this episode of Find Your Freaks, Tonya Kubo explores what it actually feels like when the mask comes off and why that moment has less to do with courage and more to do with safety.
Episode Highlights
[01:40] The realization that Tonya had been wearing a mask without noticing
[03:50] Why we hold back when something doesn’t feel “worth the effort”
[06:30] The difference between fitting in and actually being seen
[08:45] The shift that happened after discovering Ellie Trier’s work
[11:10] The story of a friend whose honesty revealed something deeper
[13:50] What happens when someone doesn’t try to fix or reframe your truth
[16:20] Why you can’t force someone to remove their mask
[18:30] How safety changes the cost of being honest
[20:40] What it looks like to model real acceptance
[22:10] The invitation to show up fully so others can do the same
The Masks We Don’t Realize We’re Wearing
When we talk about masks, it’s easy to imagine something intentional. Something performative. A version of ourselves we consciously put on in order to be perceived a certain way.
But the masks Tonya is talking about here are much quieter than that.
They show up in the moments where we decide not to push back. When we let something slide because it feels like it will take too much energy to explain. When we nod along, not because we agree, but because it doesn’t feel worth the effort to say otherwise.
There’s nothing dramatic about those moments. In fact, that’s what makes them so easy to overlook. But over time, they accumulate. And what starts as a series of small decisions becomes a pattern of self-editing.
Tonya shares how, for years, she found herself doing exactly that in conversations about community building. Not because she lacked conviction, but because it felt like speaking up wouldn’t change anything. So she stopped pushing back. Not intentionally. Just gradually.
There’s a belief, especially in online spaces, that connection can be engineered. That if you ask better questions, create more opportunities for engagement, or design better systems, people will naturally feel safe enough to open up.
But that’s not how belonging works.
Tonya reflects on her conversation with Ellie Trier and what makes her spaces feel different. It’s not that Ellie is asking better questions or using better prompts. It’s that she shows up differently.
She shows up without a script. Without an agenda. Without trying to control the outcome of the conversation.
And that kind of presence does something that strategy can’t. It removes the pressure to perform.
Because when someone else is fully present and unguarded, it becomes a little easier to let your own guard down too.
There’s a moment in every meaningful interaction where something shifts.
It’s not always obvious. It doesn’t always look dramatic. But you can feel it when it happens.
It’s the moment where someone decides to say what they’ve been holding back.
Tonya describes this as a kind of internal calculation. Not something we consciously walk through, but something we feel.
Is it safer to keep the mask on? Or safer to take it off?
And what makes that moment powerful is that it doesn’t come from being pushed. It comes from the absence of pressure.
She shares the story of a close friend who, in a quiet moment, admitted she was deeply lonely. Not because she had been asked directly. Not because someone guided her there. But because, in that moment, there was enough space for the truth to surface.
No one rushed to fix it. No one reframed it. No one told her she should feel differently.
One of the most important ideas in this episode is also one of the simplest.
You cannot force someone to be honest.
You can’t ask the perfect question. You can’t create the perfect prompt. You can’t pry the mask off.
That decision has to come from them.
What you can do is influence the environment they’re making that decision in. You can create a space where it feels just a little bit safer to tell the truth than to keep holding it in.
And when that happens, honesty doesn’t need to be extracted. It shows up on its own.
When someone feels safe enough, they do not need to be prompted. The truth comes on its own.
What Changes When Someone Goes First
When the mask comes off, something shifts. Not just for the person who said the thing, but for everyone else in the room.
There’s relief in it. Recognition. That quiet exhale of realizing you’re not the only one.
But there’s also something else. Permission.
When one person chooses to show up fully, it changes what feels possible for everyone else. It resets the baseline of what’s allowed.
And that’s where belonging begins. Not in perfectly structured conversations, but in moments where people stop performing long enough to be real with each other.
Where am I holding something back because it doesn’t feel safe to be seen?
What would need to change for me to feel safe enough to show up more fully?
Am I creating space for others to be honest, or unintentionally giving them a reason to keep their mask on?
Meet Your Host
Tonya Kubo is a community strategist, writer, and rebel with a cause: helping people find the place where they truly belong. She’s spent nearly two decades building online spaces that feel more like chosen family than comment sections, and she’s not afraid to call out the fluff in favor of real connection. As the founder of Find Your Freaks, Tonya brings together unconventional thinkers, builders, and bridge-makers who believe that “normal” was never the point. When she’s not hosting the show, she’s raising two daughters, leading client communities, and making meaning out of the mess.
If Find Your Freaks matters to you, help us keep it ad-free by buying us a coffee (or two!). Every dollar goes to production so more weirdos can find their people.
We love to talk about community. How to build it, grow it, sustain it. But next time, we’re going somewhere a little unexpected. Tonya sits down with bestselling mystery author Michelle Chouinard to explore the minds of people who obsess over red herrings, stay up all night chasing clues, and cannot rest until they solve the puzzle. But this conversation is not just about mystery writing. It is about curiosity, connection, and the way stories bring people together.
What if the thing that makes you feel like an outsider is actually the key to real belonging?
There’s a moment most people don’t talk about, but almost everyone recognizes.
You walk into a room — a party, a group chat, a comment section — and nothing bad happens. Nobody says anything mean. But you look around, read the room, and quietly decide: I am too much for this place.
So you adjust. You soften your voice, hold back your thoughts, edit your reactions. You make yourself smaller, not because anyone asked you to, but because it feels like the cost of staying.
For some people, that moment is occasional. For others, it becomes a pattern. A way of moving through the world.
In this episode of Find Your Freaks, Tonya Kubo sits down with Eli Trier — artist, writer, and self-described “dopamine dealer” — to explore what it means to live as an outsider and why that experience might be pointing to something deeper than we realize.
Because what if the problem isn’t that you’re too much?
What if the problem is that no one in the room has gone first?
Episode Highlights
[03:15] Why Eli’s “freaks” are the weird, creative, non-traditional souls
[09:40] What it means to be neuroqueer and AuDHD in a world built for sameness
[17:20] The experience of being “too much” and learning to self-edit
[26:10] Why fitting in can feel safer… but costs more than we think
[34:45] How Eli’s art creates a sense of recognition and belonging
[42:30] The difference between inclusion and true belonging
[51:00] Why community builders need to rethink what “safe space” actually means
[1:02:15] The power of showing up fully and going first
When “Too Much” Becomes a Strategy
For many people, especially those who identify as neurodivergent, creative, or just outside the expected norm, being “too much” isn’t a personality trait. It’s feedback they’ve been given over and over again.
Too loud. Too sensitive. Too intense. Too different.
Over time, that feedback doesn’t just sting. It teaches you how to adapt. How to scan a room and figure out which parts of you are acceptable and which parts need to stay hidden.
It’s a survival strategy. And in many environments, it works.
But it comes at a cost.
Because the version of you that gets accepted isn’t the full version of you. And the longer you operate that way, the harder it becomes to remember what unedited even feels like.
One of the most important distinctions in this conversation is the difference between being included and actually belonging.
Inclusion says, “You can be here.”
Belonging says, “You can be here as yourself.”
That gap matters more than most community builders realize.
Because you can have a space that looks diverse, welcoming, and open — and still have people quietly shrinking inside of it. Still have people translating themselves, toning themselves down, or performing a version of who they think will be accepted.
From the outside, everything looks like it’s working.
As a neuroqueer, AuDHD creator, she doesn’t just make art for people who feel different. She creates experiences where they don’t have to explain themselves in the first place.
Her work is a reminder that recognition is powerful. That feeling seen — not just included, but understood — changes how people show up.
It creates ease. It creates safety. It creates connection that doesn’t require performance.
And that’s what most people are actually looking for when they say they want community.
Not more access. Not more opportunities to participate.
A place where they don’t have to translate who they are.
If you lead a community, this episode lands differently.
Because it challenges a common assumption: that belonging is created through structure alone.
More programming. More guidelines. More opportunities to engage.
But belonging doesn’t come from perfectly designed systems. It comes from signals.
Who gets to be visible? What kinds of expression are actually welcomed? What happens when someone shows up in a way that doesn’t fit the norm?
People are always paying attention to those cues. And they adjust themselves accordingly.
Which means if you want a community where people feel safe to show up fully, you can’t just invite that.
You have to model it.
Going First Changes the Room
This is where the conversation shifts.
Because the question stops being, “How do I find my people?”
And becomes, “Am I willing to be the person who makes it safe for my people to find me?”
That’s a different level of responsibility.
It means showing up fully before it feels safe. It means being visible in ways that might not be immediately understood. It means risking being the “freakiest” person in the room.
But that’s also what changes the room.
Because when someone goes first — when they show up without editing, without shrinking — it creates permission. It signals to everyone else that maybe they don’t have to perform either.
If you’ve ever felt like you were too much, too different, or just slightly out of place, this conversation offers something simple but powerful:
You’re not alone.
There are more people feeling that way than you think. They’re just really good at hiding it.
Until someone goes first.
Freak Flags Fly
Each episode ends with five quick questions. Here’s how Eli flies her flag:
You’re my kind of freak if… you’ve ever felt like you didn’t quite fit — and decided to stay anyway.
Something you love that friends don’t get: reading ten books a week and following curiosity wherever it goes.
Community you’d infiltrate: any space where people are fully committed to their weird — the kind of place where no one is halfway in.
Practice that keeps you connected: making and sharing art as a way of saying, “you’re not alone” without needing to explain.
Someone doing freakishly good work who deserves a bigger stage: the artists, creators, and misfits quietly building worlds where other people finally feel seen.
Meet Our Guest
Eli Trier is a neuroqueer AuDHD artist, writer, podcaster, YouTuber, dopamine dealer, and founder of Elinor Trier Studio and Zuzu’s Haus of Cats, where she creates artwork that celebrates “otherness,” reminding you that you’re not the “odd one out,” you’re “one of a kind.” Her work lives in private collections worldwide and has been featured in multiple media outlets, including the Nautilus Silver Award-winning book Creatrix: She Who Makes. She reads ten books a week, snorts when she laughs, and might actually be a pile of cats in a sparkly trench coat.
Meet Your Host
Tonya Kubo is a community strategist, writer, and rebel with a cause: helping people find the place where they truly belong. She’s spent nearly two decades building online spaces that feel more like chosen family than comment sections, and she’s not afraid to call out the fluff in favor of real connection. As the founder of Find Your Freaks, Tonya brings together unconventional thinkers, builders, and bridge-makers who believe that “normal” was never the point. When she’s not hosting the show, she’s raising two daughters, leading client communities, and making meaning out of the mess.
The spaces that feel safest aren’t the ones where everyone fits in. In the next episode, Tonya explores what it really means to go first, why being the “freakiest” one in the room sets the tone for everyone else, and how showing up fully creates the kind of permission real belonging is built on.
Why the strongest communities aren’t built around leadership, but around shared ownership.
What would happen to your community if you disappeared tomorrow?
Not in a dramatic or worst-case scenario kind of way, but simply if you chose to step back for a period of time. Maybe you got busy, needed a break, or just stopped showing up as consistently. Would your community continue to function, or would things begin to slow down and eventually fade?
This is the question at the center of this episode of Find Your Freaks, and it is one that reveals more about the structure of a community than any engagement metric ever could. From the outside, many communities appear active and successful. There are posts, comments, and regular participation. But underneath that activity, there is often a hidden dependency on one person to sustain the energy, direction, and consistency of the space.
In this episode, I explore why sustainability in community building is not about increasing engagement, but about designing for shared ownership. I unpack the structural patterns that cause communities to become fragile over time, why burnout is often a predictable outcome rather than a personal failure, and what becomes possible when leadership shifts from being the center of the community to being part of a system that supports it.
Episode Highlights
[02:00] The question that reveals whether your community is built to last
[06:30] Why communities don’t actually fail from apathy
[12:15] How distributed ownership changes participation
[18:40] What happens when everything depends on one leader
[25:10] The difference between self-sustaining and self-running communities
[31:45] Why personality-driven communities are fragile
[38:20] How purpose creates continuity beyond the founder
[45:00] Delegation vs. true ownership and why it matters
[51:30] One simple shift to start redistributing responsibility
[57:00] The question every community leader needs to answer
It’s Not Apathy, It’s Burden
One of the most common explanations for struggling communities is that people simply do not care enough to engage. Leaders often interpret low participation or inconsistent activity as a lack of interest or investment from members. However, this explanation overlooks what is actually happening beneath the surface.
In many cases, people do care. The challenge is not a lack of desire to participate, but an imbalance in how responsibility is distributed within the community. When too much of the work, decision-making, and emotional labor rests on one person, the system becomes unsustainable. Over time, even the most committed leader will experience burnout, and when that happens, everything that depended on their presence begins to unravel.
This is why communities often appear strong right up until the moment they are not. The structure has been carrying hidden strain all along, and once the central support is removed, there is nothing in place to hold it together.
The Hidden Fragility of Leader-Centered Communities
Leader-centered communities often emerge naturally, especially in the early stages of building something new. The leader initiates conversations, answers questions, organizes events, and models the behavior they want to see. This level of involvement is not only helpful, but often necessary to establish the culture and direction of the community.
However, when this pattern continues without intentional design changes, it begins to create dependency. Members start to look to the leader as the primary source of value, rather than recognizing the contributions of others within the group. Conversations become centralized, with most interactions flowing through one person instead of developing organically between members.
Over time, this structure limits the growth and resilience of the community. It may still appear active, but its ability to function is tied directly to the leader’s availability and capacity. This creates a fragile system where any disruption in leadership can have an outsized impact on the entire community.
It is important to clarify what is meant by a self-sustaining community, because it is often misunderstood. A self-sustaining community is not one where there is no leadership or where everything operates without structure. It is not a free-for-all where responsibility is unclear or absent.
Instead, a self-sustaining community is one where the structure supports participation from many people, rather than relying on one individual to carry the load. There are clear expectations, shared ownership, and multiple people who are capable of stepping into roles when needed. Leadership still exists, but it is distributed and supported by systems that allow others to contribute meaningfully.
This distinction matters because it shifts the goal from removing leadership to strengthening the foundation that allows leadership to be shared.
In the previous episode, Tonya shared an example of a military spouse community that approached this differently. Instead of following a traditional top-down structure, the leadership focused on creating the conditions for connection rather than controlling every aspect of the experience.
Members were encouraged to create and lead their own activities based on their interests, while the organization provided visibility and light structure. This meant that the responsibility for participation did not sit with one person, but was distributed across the community.
As a result, engagement became more meaningful and sustainable. People showed up not because they were being directed to, but because they had ownership over what was being created. The relationships that formed were not dependent on a single leader, which allowed the community to continue growing over time.
A critical factor in the sustainability of any community is whether it is built around a person or a purpose. Communities centered on a personality often experience rapid growth because people are drawn to the leader’s voice, perspective, or expertise. However, this type of structure creates a dependency that limits long-term resilience.
When a community is built around a purpose, the focus shifts from the individual to the shared mission or experience that brings people together. Members are able to contribute in ways that extend beyond the leader, and the value of the community is not tied to one person’s presence.
This shift allows the community to continue even as leadership evolves or changes. It creates a sense of continuity that is grounded in what the community stands for, rather than who is leading it.
In response to the challenges of leader-centered communities, many leaders attempt to solve the problem by delegating tasks. While delegation can reduce workload, it does not fundamentally change the structure of the community.
Delegation keeps authority and decision-making centralized, even as tasks are distributed. Members may help execute certain responsibilities, but they are still operating within a system that requires approval and direction from the leader.
Ownership, on the other hand, involves a deeper level of trust and autonomy. When members take ownership of a role or initiative, they are responsible for shaping it, maintaining it, and evolving it over time. They do not need constant oversight or permission to act.
This shift from delegation to ownership is what allows a community to become truly self-sustaining.
For those already leading a community, transitioning to a more sustainable model does not require starting over. Instead, it begins with small, intentional changes.
One effective approach is to identify a single responsibility that currently depends on the leader and invite a member to take full ownership of it. This is not about assigning a task, but about transferring responsibility in a way that allows the member to shape and lead that aspect of the community.
Over time, these small shifts can change the culture of the community, creating an environment where shared ownership becomes the norm rather than the exception.
At its core, this conversation comes back to a single question: what would happen if you stepped away?
The answer to that question reveals whether a community has been designed for sustainability or dependency. If the community cannot function without the constant presence of its leader, it may be time to reconsider how responsibility, ownership, and participation are structured.
Designing for sustainability does not mean removing yourself from the community. It means building something that is strong enough to include you without requiring you.
Where is my community dependent on me in ways that limit its growth?
What would need to change for members to rely on each other instead of me?
Am I building something that requires me, or something that includes me?
Meet Your Host
Tonya Kubo is a community strategist, writer, and rebel with a cause: helping people find the place where they truly belong. She’s spent nearly two decades building online spaces that feel more like chosen family than comment sections, and she’s not afraid to call out the fluff in favor of real connection. As the founder of Find Your Freaks, Tonya brings together unconventional thinkers, builders, and bridge-makers who believe that “normal” was never the point. When she’s not hosting the show, she’s raising two daughters, leading client communities, and making meaning out of the mess.
If Find Your Freaks matters to you, help us keep it ad-free by buying us a coffee (or two!). Every dollar goes to production so more weirdos can find their people.
Tonya sits down with Eli Trier, an artist, writer, podcaster, and self-described dopamine dealer whose work is a love letter to weirdos and misfits. As a neuroqueer, AuDHD creator, Eli shares what it means to build spaces where being different is not just accepted, but celebrated—and why belonging starts with making room for the outsider.
When the community you want doesn’t exist, someone has to go first.
Many of us believe community is something we find. We imagine that somewhere out there is the perfect neighborhood, the perfect group, or the perfect circle of people who will instantly feel like home. We move to a new place hoping connection will naturally appear.
But what happens when it doesn’t?
In this episode of Find Your Freaks, Tonya Kubo sits down with Army spouse, leadership coach, and author Stacey Morgan to explore what it really means to build community instead of waiting for it. After 25 years of military life—raising four children while moving around the world—Stacey has faced a challenge many people never experience: rebuilding connection over and over again.
Military life requires constant resets. Families relocate every few years, friendships are interrupted by deployments, and support networks disappear overnight when orders change. The result is that many spouses arrive at new duty stations feeling isolated, even though they are surrounded by people living similar lives.
As Stacey explains in the conversation, one of the biggest lessons she learned over time is that waiting for someone else to solve loneliness doesn’t work. “There’s no rescuer coming for you,” she says, describing the moment she realized that if she wanted community, she had to help create it.
That realization may sound harsh at first, but Stacey describes it as freeing. When you stop waiting for someone else to invite you into belonging, you gain the power to start building it yourself.
Episode Highlights
[02:10] Why Stacey’s “freaks” are military spouses and the unique bond they share
[08:30] How traditional military spouse support systems quietly fell apart
[15:00] Why community connection impacts military family retention
[26:00] The hidden gaps created when volunteer support systems disappeared
[33:00] Stacey’s new model for community: “No dues, no drama.”
[41:30] How small interest groups spark real connection
[53:00] The story behind Stacey’s book The Astronaut’s Wife
[1:03:00] The life lesson that changed everything: no one is coming to rescue you
[1:07:20] Where to start if you want to build community in your own life
The Disappearance of Military Spouse Communities
For decades, military spouse networks provided a built-in support system for families navigating military life. These communities helped new arrivals meet neighbors, share resources, and find guidance from spouses who had already navigated deployments and relocations.
While informal, these networks were incredibly effective. Experienced spouses mentored newer ones, volunteer groups organized events and support systems, and families had clear pathways into connection.
Over time, however, cultural shifts changed the foundation of those networks. More spouses began working full-time careers. Families increasingly lived off base rather than in tightly connected military housing communities. Volunteer expectations changed, and the mentorship structures that once held these groups together gradually faded.
Many of the systems that supported military families were built almost entirely on volunteer labor from spouses themselves. When those volunteers disappeared, the infrastructure collapsed.
Today, many military families arrive at new duty stations to find that the community structures they expected simply don’t exist.
Why Community Matters More Than We Realize
Isolation isn’t just a personal challenge for military families—it can become a systemic one.
When spouses feel disconnected from their communities, it affects the entire family’s experience of military life. Surveys consistently show that spouse satisfaction and connectedness influence whether service members choose to remain in the military.
But the deeper truth goes beyond policy or retention statistics. Humans need belonging. We are wired for connection, and when that connection disappears, everyday challenges become heavier.
Stacey has seen both sides of this reality. She has experienced the loneliness of arriving somewhere new without support, and she has also experienced the powerful sense of belonging that forms when communities intentionally create space for each other.
The difference between isolation and belonging often comes down to whether someone is willing to initiate connection.
A Radically Simple Model for Building Community
When Stacey arrived at her current duty station, she quickly realized that the traditional spouse organization had effectively disappeared. The old model—with its leadership boards, membership dues, fundraising requirements, and volunteer obligations—was no longer sustainable.
Instead of trying to revive a system that was already collapsing, she and two other spouses created something radically simpler.
Their approach focuses on three basic principles: simplicity, accessibility, and participation.
Three people manage the basic infrastructure: an email list and a Facebook group. There are no membership dues, no fundraising expectations, and no complicated leadership structures. Their guiding principle is simple and memorable: no dues and no drama.
From there, the community grows through interest-based groups. Anyone who wants to organize an activity can do so. A spouse who enjoys pickleball can start a pickleball group. Someone else might organize a crafting meetup, a walking club, or a book discussion.
Instead of a small leadership team planning everything, the community itself generates the activity.
This shift transforms community from something people consume into something they actively create.
Why Bottom-Up Community Works
The beauty of Stacey’s model is that it removes many of the barriers that prevent people from participating in traditional organizations.
First, it eliminates burnout. In many volunteer groups, the same few people end up carrying most of the responsibility. Over time, those leaders become exhausted, and the organization struggles to survive when they leave.
Second, interest-based groups naturally attract the right people. When individuals gather around activities they already enjoy, conversations start more easily and relationships form more organically.
Finally, the structure is resilient. When one organizer moves away—as military families inevitably do—the system doesn’t collapse. Someone else can simply create the next activity.
Community becomes stronger when members feel ownership over it.
The Courage to Introduce Yourself
Despite the elegance of this model, it requires something that many of us struggle with: the courage to go first.
It is far easier to wait for someone else to introduce themselves, organize the gathering, or create the invitation. But waiting rarely produces the connection we hope for.
When Tonya asked Stacey where people should start if they want stronger community in their own lives, her answer was refreshingly simple.
Start by getting out of your house.
That might mean walking through your neighborhood without headphones so you can greet people. It might mean attending a local event or joining an activity connected to your interests. It might be as simple as introducing yourself to someone you see regularly but have never spoken to.
The action itself isn’t complicated. What makes it difficult is the vulnerability of initiating connection.
Yet that vulnerability is exactly what makes community possible.
Every friendship begins with a conversation. Every gathering begins with an invitation. Every community begins with someone willing to start.
Freak Flags Fly
Each episode ends with five quick questions. Here’s how Stacey flies her flag:
You’re my kind of freak if… you’re a military spouse — who can laugh even when life gets complicated.
Something you love that friends don’t get: leadership books.
Community you’d infiltrate: the full-commitment Renaissance fair community — the people who grow the beards, sew the costumes, and fully live the experience.
Practice that keeps you connected: the Marco Polo app for video messages with friends, especially when schedules make real-time conversations hard.
Someone doing freakishly good work who deserves a bigger stage: Sharon McMahon, for helping people understand civics with clarity and humanity.
Meet Our Guest
Stacey Morgan is an Army spouse of 25 years, mom of four, speaker, and author of The Astronaut’s Wife: How Launching My Husband into Outer Space Changed the Way I Live on Earth. Stacey serves on staff with The MomCo as an executive leadership coach, membership manager, and lead for military and online groups. She and her family are currently stationed overseas on Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands and will move this summer to White Sands Missile Test Range in New Mexico.
Meet Your Host
Tonya Kubo is a community strategist, writer, and rebel with a cause: helping people find the place where they truly belong. She’s spent nearly two decades building online spaces that feel more like chosen family than comment sections, and she’s not afraid to call out the fluff in favor of real connection. As the founder of Find Your Freaks, Tonya brings together unconventional thinkers, builders, and bridge-makers who believe that “normal” was never the point. When she’s not hosting the show, she’s raising two daughters, leading client communities, and making meaning out of the mess.
The strongest communities aren’t built around one person. In the next episode, Tonya explores why the best communities are designed to survive their founders, how Stacey’s model flips leadership on its head, and what happens when belonging becomes part of the structure instead of the job description.
