728. How to Tell Stories That Fill the Hope Gap: 3 Lessons from 8 World-Changing Leaders - Jon and Becky
Stories That Fill the Hope Gap is a 10-part limited series bringing you eight extraordinary changemakers who are using story to cut through noise, build connection, shift culture, and move people to action.
From Sesame Workshop storytelling around the globe to a hyper-local hip-hop therapy program helping kids navigate mental health in the Bronx to the Center for Countering Digital Hate taking on the most haunting issues of our time, every single conversation left us feeling more hopeful. That is the invitation.
New episodes drop every Wednesday. Share your own story at weareforgood.com/hopegap.
Part 10: How to Tell Stories That Fill the Hope Gap: 3 Lessons from 8 World-Changing Leaders
Meet Jon + Becky: The Duo Behind We Are For Good
Jonathan McCoy and Becky Endicott are the hosts of the We Are For Good podcast, a community built around a simple value: simplify, humanize, and tell a great story. Across 15+ years together in nonprofit work and 700+ episodes, they've made storytelling their north star. In this series, produced with Afdhel Aziz and Good Is the New Cool, they interviewed eight mission leaders — from Sesame Street to Caring Across Generations to CreatiVets — about how story restores hope. This finale is their field guide to what worked.
What You'll Learn in This Episode
Why clarity is a superpower — how to name what you do, who you serve, and why the problem is solvable, without losing the emotion that makes it land
The head-and-the-heart formula: why "factually true" and "emotionally true" are different, and why every story needs both the stat and the human
How to find the number that delivers a gut punch — and pair it with a face so donors can actually see the impact
Why your personal story is often your mission story — and how founder and staff stories become the engine of a storytelling culture
Episode Transcript
Powerful Quotes
"Despair is paralyzing, but hope is galvanizing." — from the episode (Afdhel Aziz's reframe)
"Clarity is a superpower." — Jon
"The story is not just a story, the gala is not just a gala; your email is not just an email. It is the linchpin to bringing someone along." — Becky
"There's what's factually true, and then there's what's emotionally true, and those are not the same." — Becky (on Ai-jen Poo's insight)
"Your personal story is your mission story." — Jon
"Trust is the work. When you treat a story and a human with dignity, kindness, and care, something shifts." — Becky
"It's not really about the story; it's about the connection that it creates." — Jon
Resources Mentioned
We Are For Good: the podcast and community behind the series
Good Is the New Cool / Afdhel Aziz: series partner; introduced the "hope gap" framing and the roster of change leaders
Elevate Prize Foundation / Carolina García Jayaram: on narrative as infrastructure and how story shapes culture
The REACH Institute / Lisa Romanelli: scaling children's mental health care; "one in five children has a mental health condition, four in five never get treatment"
Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH)/ Imran Ahmed: on platforms serving self-harm content to new accounts within minutes
Caring Across Generations / Ai-jen Poo: 130M+ Americans in caregiving; founder of Give Not Take Media
CreatiVets / Richard Casper: connecting veterans to the arts to tell their own stories
Sesame Street / Scott Cameron: the "Sesame model": research + education + creative production
Share your story: quick submission form
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