{"version":1,"type":"rich","provider_name":"Libsyn","provider_url":"https:\/\/www.libsyn.com","height":90,"width":600,"title":"Opal Tomashevska: Welcoming vs Belonging","description":"Angela welcomes back the very first Black Oxygen guest, Opal Tomashevska \u2014 a Madison native, credit union leader, poet, and newly elected board president of the Lussier Community Education Center \u2014 for a rich conversation on community care as resistance. Rooted in Opal's story of growing up in Wexford Ridge and coming of age through community institutions, they explore how the cooperative model of credit unions, Black professional affinity spaces, and tight-knit circles of accountability have sustained Black women through systems that were never designed with them in mind. The conversation takes a deeper turn as Angela and Opal examine what it truly means to belong \u2014 not just to be welcomed \u2014 and the quiet cost of spending years hustling for worthiness in corporate spaces. Against the backdrop of an alarming and underreported wave of Black women's displacement from the workforce, they reflect on codependency, self-abandonment, and what it looks like to finally stop making yourself smaller to stay safe. Opal's closing vision: a Black Women's Renaissance is already underway \u2014 and it is being built on belonging to oneself first. Key Themes Community care as resistance \u00b7 Welcoming vs. belonging \u00b7 The cooperative finance model and credit unions \u00b7 Black professional affinity spaces and ERGs \u00b7 Hustling for worthiness \u00b7 Self-abandonment and reclaiming agency \u00b7 Black women and workforce displacement \u00b7 Modeling self-care for our children \u00b7 Intergenerational community impact \u00b7 The Black Women's Renaissance #BlackOxygenPodcast #BlackPodcasts #Wisconsin #BlackInWisconsin #UpperMidwest #Diversity #Inclusion #Belonging ","author_name":"Black Oxygen","author_url":"http:\/\/blackoxygen.libsyn.com\/website","html":"