S5:E31 - What's to Come in 2026 Rebecca Undem

You are listening to the Growing Small Towns Show, a podcast dedicated to supporting you, the person who really cares about the future of your small town. We believe when people get better, everything gets better, and our episodes offer the ideas and actions that prioritize people and small communities. Thank you for listening. We're so glad you're here. Hey friends, It's Rebecca. It is your podcast host of this show. And this is the last episode of Season 5. We take a brief hiatus, really just the rest of the holiday season, and then through January off, and we batch some new content and get some new episodes together for you. And we will be announcing Season 6, um, the release dates shortly. And originally I had a different plan for what I wanted to leave you with for Season 5. Um, and then per, per usual, if I ever get a hit of inspiration for a solo cast, it's usually because, um, it just keeps like either the theme of the thing, or sometimes it's not even so much just the theme, but it's like it literally keeps smacking me directly in the face. And that's what happened with this particular topic. And so I feel like half of the solo casts that I record for you guys are like love notes to you guys. Because I do not claim to be a guru of any kind, really. I am a deeply passionate deeply caring, um, a person who's always been truly fascinated by how humans tick. And this organizational development kind of focus with leadership and coaching. And honestly, I love business. I think business is just so fun. Business is such a good generic word, but I like, I actually love, um, the kind of the chaos and the uncertainty and and the immense and intense reward of doing work for yourself. And then I also just, I love being in a space where other people are pursuing their own things. I love working with small business owners, entrepreneurs, people that like end up with a dream or end up with like a nagging feeling of this is something I really wanna try or I really wanna do. And then they have the audacity to do it. Those are the people I wanna do life with. And so, um, earlier, and I, I can't honestly even remember why I was like digging back through files. Oh, I, I remember suddenly it popped into my head. I, we're updating and kind of refreshing our, our website. I'm actually refreshing both websites, kind of my speaking and consulting website. Um, and then the one for, for our show and for Growing Small Towns. Uh, anybody that knows me, this is not, my best work. Okay. It's, I don't love it. I don't find a whole lot of joy in it. Um, and right now, just due to where I'm at in the both of these respective businesses, fully outsourcing, it's just not an option. So, so there I am slogging away at my, at my business, uh, or website development. And I, I kind of was like going back through the archives, if you will. I was going back through my Google Drive and I started to write down, um, because I, I, I felt struck by this. I started to write down all the different things that I have offered and, um, marketed and promoted and sold technically since becoming fully self-employed in 2013. Um, and, and it's, it's, it's kind of crazy. It's, it's a really wild journey. And I'm going to pull in a few, um, comments that I've got, I've received and just heard from people. Um, there was a couple of episodes that we've done in the recent past here. Tessa Klein was an episode that we got. I got a lot of feedback on. It really resonated with people. And so I'm going to share some feedback that I got about that one. Um, Brooke Taylor's also is another one where people just they have a lot— people have a lot to say about— and we're bringing people on and having conversations that are really— they're hitting people in that me— oh my gosh, I'm not alone— and kind of Me Too kind of a way. Um, and I realize that the reason I love having people like Tessa Brooke and every guest we have on is because they almost always reflect something to me where I feel such relatability and such connection to them as a person. And, and I realized it's because I've been grinding. I've been grinding in my business, my various businesses since 2013. And I'm gonna share a little bit of that with you. Um, but first I just wanna share some of this, this feedback that we had gotten that really, again, kind of solidified to me like this is the topic that people want to hear more about. People, people, it, it means something to people because right now, um, you might be one of them. You might be one of the people sitting here listening and you are a business owner, you are a person trying to make it work. Um, you're battling whatever version of your demons looks like it might be. I mean, again, it just, there's such a wide variety of challenges that come with running a business because our businesses can be all very different. Um, the political climate and some of the bigger changes, you know, regu regulatory-wise have been really challenging for, you know, For example, in my neck of the woods, farmers. Farmers have been having a hard time. I've got friends that are in the food service industry, and so their margins have really gotten squeezed. Like, and then there's just, will I make payroll? And what happens if I can't cover this month's expenses? Like, those feelings are real. And you might be sitting there, oh, I'm getting emotional already. I kind of was like, am I gonna cry? I might, I don't know, we'll see. But you might be sitting there thinking, like, truly having that feeling of, am I truly the only one? Like, am I the only one that feels like this? Am I the only one that wrestles with this stuff? Because let's be real, like, there isn't a lot of places where we get to just safely bring those kinds of challenges. Out into the open. And I honestly, I swear that going into 2026, that's one of the things that I am hell-bent on making sure we not only create, I think we've created it within the four walls of our facility, our physical facility, but when we show up in a room that that's what we offer is the psychological safety to share what's really going on and the wins. 'Cause it's as hard as it is to talk about the challenges we have, it's honestly in some respects, almost as hard to share a win because you don't want to brag and you don't want to say, you don't want anybody to think that you think you're something special. And I'm just like, ugh. So I'm here for all of that. But the first message I got about Tessa's episode was from a listener. And again, I'm just going to name her first name and share just a couple of sentiments that she shared because I think I, I really just wanna say to you, we do this show so you have those moments of, I really needed to hear that. So her name is Molly. Molly and I do not know each other. She reached out and said, uh, I just wanted to thank you for the good listen of a podcast with Tessa. As a maker, I really needed to hear the extra push. And she said, I don't know if I've ever had a day where I was like, holy cow, this is it. Maybe once. But I'm constantly trying to up it and make everything I do better. She said, I really enjoyed her philosophy about, okay, I just have to take one more step to where I want to be. And it's such a good reminder that we just have to keep stepping towards the dream, but also that the struggles are real. She said, I think we listen to too many podcasts or even social media that share only the highlights. I really want to always hear the details on what stood in the way and how to— she used the phrase open the gates. Um, and so I wanna first of all, thank Molly for reaching out because I got this and I thought, this is, that's what we need. That's what, that's actually what every single person, and this is my, my core belief, every single person that wants to do something on their own needs a, a challenge, like a challenge network and a support network. It's both of those things. You need the people that will cheer for you and you need the people that will challenge you. You need the people. That you can commiserate with. You need a variety of people. I talk about that when I go speak places because it's absolutely true. And so then my friend Ellie had said, she does, she's very creative, she's a photographer, she makes cool stuff, balances a really busy little family. And she was like, Tessa, she's like, that episode, I needed it so bad. Said, I feel now like I can actually head into holiday season and, and I, it like brought my fire back for it. And I thought, how incredible is that? And then, um, also just wanna call out Addison. Um, Addison listens to our show. Addison works a lot with us here locally. She's made huge strides in her business and she too talked about, about Tessa's episode and how it just really reminded her, because again, I think any single person that has a social media presence or any sort of kind of public-facing expression of their business or even of themselves, and people know they own a business, they— even if you're not, because like the way Tessa shows up on, on social is not in a way where it's like all sunshine and rainbows. Like she doesn't do that. But it's really easy because you can, you almost kind of fall in love with her. You fall in love with the brand. It is so easy. It's not even putting 'em on a pedestal, but it's kind of just assuming that they outgrow the hardship. Hardship, and that just doesn't actually happen. You don't, you don't really outgrow hardship. So like, as we, as we kind of scale up and move through our businesses, the other thing that's al— also like, we are always changing. Uh, the market and the environment around us is always changing. Um, for people that are running their own business, like fully doing it, maybe not just like higher level operationally, but are actually owner operator. And that's what so many people that I work with, that's what I am. I don't, I don't have a whole enormous team of people. I have a team, I have people helping me, but I'm not just like, you know, flying in on my, I don't know, are there people that like fly in on a jet and just kind of like direct some meetings and then fly out? I mean, if that's success, I guess great. That then I'm not successful because that's not what my business is. What my business looks like at all. I am the brand. I do, I do the actual delivering, right? Like I'm in it. And so I think there's this idea that the only way that we succeed is if we actually do get ourselves out from that and we no longer are actually actively operating the business, but we're managing it. Well, that's one way success looks, but that's not the only way success looks. You do not have to scale. Scale your business to have a successful one. And so I think, I think that's one of the big— so I'm not, by the way, this episode is not me saying, here's the top 5 things I want you to know. It is legitimately just an open love letter to all of you who are trying, because that's what I've really decided. Like, that's the energy I want in my life. That's the energy I want to continue to like nurture and foster at Growing Small Towns. I want us to be a home of people who are willing to try. It takes a lot of guts to try because it's trying without necessarily knowing what's going to happen. There's hope and there's faith and there's belief, and then there's a ton of grit that has to come alongside that because things don't always go the way you plan. So for us that are owner operators, you, you can feel like you get all your systems in place. I mean, there's just so much bullshit, frankly, about how to do this stuff better. And usually it's, it's stuff like, it's advice that feels and is to me incredibly trite and pointless. Like, well, you just don't have the right systems in place. You can have perfect systems in place. And if you are the one of like a primary cog in what makes your business run and somebody close to you dies, more than likely there's not actually a system, perfect system in the world that's gonna make that like a non-event, you know? So I think it's just really truly recognizing the chaos and mess that is business ownership and entrepreneurship. You can figure lots and lots of things out, get better at certain things. There's no doubt about that. Our problems don't get smaller, we just get better at handling them. But then again, as we level up, all of a sudden it like opens up a whole new crop of things that we never had to deal with before. And now we're dealing with. So I think that's like the, the biggest thing I wanna remind you of is we bring people on this show to tell that story and to, and to have those conversations because they're important. Um, it's way too easy to look at, and I, you know, Molly alluded to it in her, her email to me that it's like we see what we think are the highlights. I don't, that's not, sometimes that's entirely intentional on the part of the like creator, sometimes I think we just assume that they don't have problems because maybe they aren't posting a, a lot about that. Right? Um, also if we don't really know those people, then they're maybe not sharing that with us and that's okay too. Bottom line, we all need a place where we can take the hard that comes with trying to do big things. Okay, so all of those thoughts made me think, and again, I want to take you back. I want to share, I'm going to share with you. This is, I'm going to be honest, I wrote this list down and I was like, it makes me a little embarrassed. And then I did actually catch that thought and I was like, why would I be embarrassed of my, you know, 13-whatever years ago self? Because she had audacity too. 13 years ago, I didn't— when I started my own business, one of my children wasn't even born yet. So it's like, I don't— and so I decided I'm not going to look at this with that lens. I'm not going to say, oh God, that's so cringy. Oh God, that's so embarrassing. I'm going to say, God, that was so brave. The Growing Small Towns show is recorded locally at the Growing Small Towns podcast studio located in Oak North Dakota. It's produced by Pheasant Canteen Studio in Aberdeen, South Dakota, with marketing support from Cassidy Johnston in Canyon City, Colorado. Our intro music was created and produced exclusively for Growing Small Towns by James Bergman, singer and songwriter from Fargo, North Dakota. Local and small, it's what we support and it's who we love. Get your community a shout out on the podcast. Call 701-203-3337 and share your small town success that you just don't feel is being celebrated quite enough, and let us shout you out. You can also share your biggest people challenge, and we'll dedicate an episode to offering ideas to help. Hell, you can basically tell us anything and we'll do what we can to answer. We can't wait to hear from you.

You know the hardest part about community work? It's not the funding or the planning, it's the people stuff. The burnout, the resistance to change, the "we've always done it this way" people. And that's why we started the Growing Small Towns Club, a place where where community doers and dreamers can bring their toughest challenges, share what's working, and feel a little less alone. It's part think tank, part pep talk, and 100% heart. Join us for just $30 a month at growingsmalltowns.org/club, because communities thrive when their people do.

Today's episode is brought to you by The Yellowbird, the small family-run skincare company that proves you don't need a science degree in chemistry to read a product label. My good friend Nicole started The Yellowbird because she wanted safe, natural, and super simple ingredients for the products for her own kids. And now the rest of us just get to benefit. Everything is chemical-free, fragrance-free, and full of ingredients that actually do what they're supposed to do, and at a price that you can actually afford. They are practically the official skincare brand of GST. We highly recommend the face oils and the chapstick. Try these products out for yourself and use code GST at checkout to save. So as I was looking back, here's a few of the things that I did that's crazy. I realized, so not everybody knows, but I started my career with, we moved back home to my hometown. I had been gone for about a decade And I was working remotely. I worked remotely from the moment I moved back here. So that was also very weird. Um, doing that in a small town, it's like people don't really think you work, which is fine, but it's just, it's just like a thing. People don't get it. And I did training, I facilitated training and I sold training for Dale Carnegie Training, which is a global training company. The franchise was out of Fargo. And so I traveled, all of my work pretty much happened outside. Of the walls of my community. Then a client that was in one of my programs, they hired me into a full-time org dev director position for a large nonprofit. I worked for them for 3 years and, uh, you know, lots of beautiful learning and all of that, like without, without question. Um, the reason I left that job was because I truly, the, the work of org, organizational development to me is very values driven. At least it should be or ought to be. And I just had, I had way too many moments where I felt like the way I needed to and wanted to show up in the work didn't fully align with my employer. And so I do give my spouse a lot of credit. I, it was a really good job for, for my little town. I worked remotely most of the time, into the office twice a week, and I gave it up in, in June of 2013. And at that point I had been blogging, like I always kind of had an affinity or penchant for writing. So I was blogging. Um, I didn't really have a strong plan, like this is what my business is gonna be. But I also knew, so I went back to Dale Carnegie and did some Dale Carnegie training and was kind of like launching my own thing. So that takes me into, um, like looking at this idea of You know, who do I wanna work with and how do I really do this? And what does digital, what does a digital business really look like? Like I wanna reach people outside of just my community, so how do I really do that? Right? So I think about the programs that I bought and the coaches that I paid and the memberships that I was a part of, like tons of money, tons of time. Tons of hours and tons of days, many, many days. Eventually all of that turns into years of investment and trying to figure these things out. One of the things that I did, you know, you have to kind of have some content that you're creating. So I looked back and realized that for an entire year, every single Monday at 9:00 AM Central Time, I went live on Facebook to talk about just again, it's kind of, they're kind of, when I think about it, it's like they're org development foundational things and they were just like little snippets and people would hop on or they wouldn't, you know, but they were there. And I consistently did that for 52 straight weeks. I didn't miss a week that entire year. Eventually I launched a group coaching program, um, that I called Groove School, kind of a playoff of my book that I wrote in 2016 called How Mommy Got Her Groove Back. Which is all about like this process, like kind of some of this process that I'm talking about. Um, there was a period of time where I was in an MLM. That is a detour of my life that I don't, I, it, that one, that one was a little harder for me to like come to terms with in terms of kind of embarrassment. And, and it's not because I don't think it's legitimate because I know a lot of wonderful, amazing people that have chosen that route for themselves. I truly genuinely still just don't believe that's the route for me. And I am gonna say this with all the love in the world. If you're listening to this and you're like, Rebecca, you'd be so great at it. You just don't know, or you haven't found the right company. Don't come at me with it. 'Cause I'm not, I'm not, I'm really truly not open to it. Um, if you wanna say I have limiting beliefs, that's fine. I'm just gonna accept that that's the truth. Um, but that was something that I did. And, and again, so I, you know, again, I wrote a book. Um, I had one of my opt-ins at one point, I created something called a Small Town Survival Kit and you could like give me your email address and then I'd send you all these little things. And they, it seems silly, but they were like, these are the things that I'm doing not to survive my town. That's what I mean. I branded it that way, but it was like, it was truly so that I could still feel like me in my town. Um, I, I offered and sold a number of, so for a while there, one of my primary keynote messages was called Living big in the life you're in. I still have a twist on that now because I love— okay, so like, I'm almost 6 feet tall. I take up a lot of space, like physically. I think it's kind of funny to be like this big person in a small town. Like, I was never— I never expected that I could move back here, right? So it was kind of this whole play on the fact that like, you're— the size of your life isn't determined by the size of your zip code. That's a thing that I I still, and I believe it, right? And so it's just the evolution of it has morphed quite a bit over the years. Um, but I look at all of these things and as I was looking, and then I, I did a rural mastermind where I coached 9 small businesses and business owners for an entire year, worked with them, got into their business with them, care about them, cheer them on, champion them, all of that. Um, I bought and renovated an 8,000 square foot building. On Main Street, my community, we offer coworking. We've tried all sorts of things in this joint. That was all the stuff pro, like kind of prior to podcasting that I've never really talked about much. Um, and when I was writing all of this stuff down, I wrote down, oof, like this is actually kind of embarrassing. It's a little bit cringey. And then I said, but I tried. Every single one of these things is me trying. It's me showing up. It's me betting on myself. And then just a couple of days ago, um, a friend of mine from Fargo who, um, she's a firecracker of a woman. Her name is Dana DelValle. And she, um, and she and I don't get to see each other as much as I'd like, but she stopped being the CEO of a large success. She was really good at her job of a nonprofit in Fargo, and she started her own business. And she just talked, she just posted the other day about how finally she feels like something in her business has shifted. And she said, it wasn't, I just wanna share this little bit 'cause it feels, it felt so resonant. Like she said, it wasn't a viral moment, not a magic formula, just the quiet feeling that the wind had changed direction. It's me, 5 years in and choosing this work again and again without guarantees, staying long enough for it to take root. Dozens of blog posts and videos, endless networking calls, coaching sessions, retreats, travel experiences, podcasts, speaking gigs, a mountain of effort that didn't always feel like it was going anywhere. And I read this and then she also said, it's more than 2 years out of my full-time CEO role. And then she said, fully betting on myself. And that was— I wanted to include that because that's— when I look back at this now, I don't see a long list of embarrassing failures. I see a long list of proof and evidence that I show up. I show up for myself. I show up for my clients. My client Avatar, like who I'm trying to serve has, has shifted some in this work, right? I don't, it hasn't looked the same. It's morphed over time. All of that, that gets to just be, um, and, and again, like I think it sounds really obvious probably because I have kind of this nebulous service-based business. I say nebulous because I think sometimes it feels kind of nebulous, but it's like human development. Stuff, right? That's service-based. The same would be true if you had a brick and mortar and you were selling physical goods. And what I mean by the same, that there might be lines that you carry that you love, that you think you'll never let go of, and then at some point your passion for that, or the circumstances of your life, or whatever the reason is, that you decide to let something go or replace it with something different. Whatever that reason is, by the way, it's valid because it's your business. And so whatever those, those, whatever those days are, those moments are where you feel like, I don't really know if I'm good enough to do this. I want you to hear me tell you that every single business owner that I have ever talked to that I trust, as far as I can throw, I'll just add that in there, has told me that they've wanted to quit. It literally comes with the territory. I actually, and again, I, I'm not saying, I can't say with unequivocal certainty that every single human that's ever run a business has wanted to quit it, but I feel like it's probably holds that most of 'em do. And that's just not something we say because there isn't really a safe lane for that to live. Like you can't go to your clients. It's kind of funny. I'm literally on my podcast where some of you may one day have me come and speak in your community. That'd be rad. And I'm literally telling you that I've wanted to quit, but that's, this is, it is actually part of what I think we need to continue to build up in ourselves and in each other. That's the grit of both running a business, having a public-facing job like economic or community development chamber work where you're like in the line of fire of the public all the time. You're gonna wanna quit that job some days. I, I'm certain of that too. And, and again, as long as you keep coming back to why did I start this thing and what do I get to do? What does this thing let me do or help me have or give me the freedom to do that I wouldn't have if I just went and worked for somebody else? Because that's all this is. It's just a giant set of trade-offs. Um, I, and there was something really powerful for me and it happened probably a couple of years after I was in business for myself because we had our third child. We had our daughter in 2014. I didn't write my book until 2016. I published it in 2016. I wrote it in most of '15, published it in '16. And, uh, that whole time I still had this very, this very strong pull of like, Why don't you just get a job? Like, you're totally employable. And I was jo— I now say like, I'm actually not employable. I totally am employable. So are you, friend. I promise. But I, what I realized is that like, I, there are things I value in my life more than stability and security. And if that's what you need more than anything to feel good in your life, then maybe working for someone else is the right answer. And that makes it right for me. Create, like having some creative outlet, um, freedom of expression. And like, again, I think what I didn't really know about myself when I was younger is that I need the freedom to be able to try stuff because that's how I learn. Like I try it and I'm like, huh, okay, well that was cool. And, and the other thing too is every single one of these things on this list, I can name at least one person that I know because of that offer that I wouldn't have known without, without it. And so I also wanna encourage you to look at it that way. Every single time you show up for yourself and then you show up for your clients or you try something new, I, I really encourage you to take stock, pay attention, take a little inventory of the network that you have built. Over time doing things that you've been trying to do, even if they were things that you no longer offer. Because a lot of the stuff on this list, I don't offer these things anymore. And I'm, I'm, that doesn't mean they didn't hold a very important part of my learning and my development and who I, who I became in this process. It's so funny. I, I get asked, Uh, not, not like a lot, but it just depends on the audience. Um, sometimes I'll get asked, what should kids, how should kids approach getting a career? Sometimes I'll be, I'll be asked to speak in like a college class and I literally just tell them, try as many things as you can. And I don't necessarily mean just like job hop, but to me it's not job hopping if you can literally say, well, this was the skill I wanted to try and get, or like the thing I wanted to learn. And so that's why I took this job. And then if you're there for a year and you leave and go somewhere else and you can say, well, So this is why I was really feeling this wasn't the thing anymore and I wanted to learn this. And so I took this, like, as long as you can articulate that, like, it's not job hopping, it's growth. You built your own growth path. Nobody expects anybody to stay at any given place for any specific length of, length of time anymore. And that includes people that run businesses. It's, and if you are a person that started something, I also, I got reconnected with a friend named Leanne. I'm just gonna leave it at that. I'm not gonna say too much more about her, but she had followed her dream. She had pursued her dream. It was a brick and mortar in a really small town. And when I saw her again, just this past, gosh, what was it? What, what, it's October, October. It was in October. And I saw her at an event. She had had a massive life situation happen to her. And she had to close the doors of her restaurant. And I didn't look at her and say, "Oh, like, well, that's a shame." I said, it was first, "Are you okay? I'm so sorry that happened to you. What comes next? What's going on? How can I help?" Those kinds of things. Like, and anybody in her community that would say, "Well, she failed," they're just not paying attention. She didn't fail because it didn't stay open. She would've failed if she had never tried. And I know that in itself can sound trite, but I'm telling you, when people have the guts to go after something, and even if it's only open for a handful of months, your community learned. It's, it's all about what did we learn? Did, are we better for it or not? And if sometimes the answer is no, then I guess you can define failure how you want. But I just think that, um, this own kind of memory lane little trip that I took for myself, I just thought it's amazing how much we change and we grow and we evolve if we're honest and if we just keep freaking showing up. It is, uh, 2025 was one of the harder years for me personally. Um, a lot of deep reflection has come from out of this, this past year. And I really, as we close out season 5, and I just wanted to share all of this with you because it's very clear that there's a lot of you that aren't hearing enough that it's okay if you're struggling, that every single one of us at some point are having these really hard thoughts, and that sometimes you don't have to know what's gonna work out, but that you have to decide to try. And, and, and the reconnecting to why you're doing this and those questions that I shared earlier of like, what does this allow me to do? What, you know, how is this better than working for someone else? What's, what's the trade-off that I, what's the positive trade-off that I'm, what am I getting out of this? Um, I encourage you, if you've, if you've had a rough year or you've had a rough quarter, you've even had a fricking rough week and you're going into 2026, spend a little time with some of these questions. You, I encourage you fully to reach out to me. I want to know where that's, this is part of why we created The Growing Small Towns Club was so people would have a safe place that they could just bring their hard stuff. And it's not that all we do is vent. We, we're problem solving together. We're listening and we're supporting each other, but we're problem solving in real time. Because we all need that. We need like a little think tank, a little creative jam session. Like it's good for the soul, but it's imperative for people that are like doing their own thing. So I just wanted this last episode to be an open love letter to you. And the you are the people who are trying. There's a whole lot of people that bitch and complain and they point out everything that's wrong and never once do they have the audacity to say, well, I think we should do this and then actually put the effort into doing it to doing something about it. So like our work and this platform is about so much more than just dreamers. Like I think that just kind of comes with the territory. I don't really want to just hang out with people that have big dreams that never put even pieces of them into action. We like, fortune favors the bold and the bolder people that take action. And so that's another thing. When I say I get, I feel so boxy about this when I do these solo casts, but the truth is like, this is something This is an entrepreneurial mindset kind of way of thinking of like, okay, it's not even that there's a problem to solve necessarily, so let's start something and fix it. But it might just be like you have an idea that you really want to test. What's a small way to try it? And then have a way to get feedback and then have a simple way to make process improvements. Have a group of people that'll give you feedback. You know, have a group of people that you can talk to about it. Like I think the more that we all can grow in that kind of thinking, the better off all of our communities are gonna be. Because everything your town needs is an idea that hasn't hatched yet. Every great thing our communities have was somebody who took action. That's what it is. It's, and it's humans that do that every single time. So I wanna wish you, uh, an incredible holiday season. And as we wrap 2025, I really want you to know that I'm very, very grateful for your listen. I, I'm so grateful that you listen to this show. This is one of the key pieces of how we show up in the broader work outside of our little region and where I live. And since launching this thing, we now are in every single state. We have listeners that listen from every single state in the country. We haven't updated this in a bit, but it was 56 international country or cities. We're all over the world. And that's just, it just tells me that there's a lot of people with the audacity to show up, with the audacity to try. And we will continue to be here cheering you on, wishing you the best, and being that safe place for you. To share the challenges, the trials, tribulations, and the successes and the wins, because it's all a part of this journey. Um, and we need you. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next year. We hope you loved this episode of the Growing Small Towns show. We encourage you to leave us messages at 701-230-0000. 203-3337. And be sure to subscribe to our newsletter at growingsmalltowns.org. In the meantime, keep doing what you can with what you have, right where you are. Your community needs you.

Because we are Growing Small Towns. We are growing small towns. We're right here living our best lives, as crazy as it sounds. But we are growing small towns, growing small towns. We are growing small towns.

We are growing small towns.

We are growing small towns.