Meet Lela Roy | Co-Founder of the HÜMNKIND Collective

We had the good fortune of connecting with Lela Roy and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Lela, every day, we about how much execution matters, but we think ideas matter as well. How did you come up with the idea for your business?
The honest version of how the HÜMNKIND Collective was started makes me sound very unhinged and unstable, but here it goes…

In August 2023 I had a very intense experience at a meditation retreat in Northern California that made me deeply reflect on my life path and work. At the time this happened my life was centered around my very cushy job as a full-time wildlife biologist for a well respected consulting firm and doing other early 30’s things like hanging out with friends, and making art and music on the side. The experience made me realize that the way I was living was completely misaligned with who I was and I needed to focus my career and life path around my heart and spiritual path. I didn’t really know what that meant at the time, but I did know that I needed to blow up my life in order to make it happen. Shortly after coming home from the meditation retreat, with no plan in mind, I told my boss that I would be leaving in the near future, I needed to go part time and I needed a significant raise. Somehow all this worked out.

I still didn’t know what I was doing with my life but I found myself getting really interested in the loneliness epidemic. I started doing extensive research about this topic as I felt deeply connected to this issue. I was astonished at the studies that showed the immense impacts of loneliness to our mental and physical health and how many Americans self-identify as being lonely (almost 3/5!). I’ve always despised social media, but all of a sudden I felt really called to create content around this issue. Loneliness seemed so stigmatized and I felt that almost no one was talking or doing anything about it.

I started offering virtual donation-based compassionate listening sessions to anyone who needed to be heard. The concept was simple. I didn’t judge, I didn’t offer advice, I didn’t therapize, I simply listened to people. Through these interviews, I made a surprising discovery. I expected the people I talked to would be isolated with little social interaction. However, what I found is that most of them actually reported having plenty of friends, family and other social connections in their lives. I realized that for a lot of people, it’s not the quantity of connections we have, it’s that many people are lacking a sense of deep, genuine connection, even with the closest relationships in our lives. We don’t feel seen for our authentic selves and don’t feel comfortable relating beyond the surface-level, which leaves many of us feeling very alone.

Through these interviews I started to recognise the need for creating spaces for people to relate with each other on a deeper level. Being a wildlife biologist and a nature-nerd, I thought it could be cool to start a hiking club where we make space to practice vulnerability and authenticity and talk about what is really going on in our lives. To get the word out, I made a silly instagram video for my new hiking club, but I didn’t expect anyone would actually show up. To my surprise, somehow my video must have been blessed by the algorithm gods, because after just two weeks I already had over 800 signups for my hiking club and the signups kept coming. I started leading two hikes a week, with almost every one of my hikes maxing capacity. Sometimes it felt overwhelming, but the immense response to Hike Club really made me see how desperately people in Los Angeles were craving deeper connection with one another.

After launching Hike Club, I made some very serendipitous connections with like-minded and kind-hearted community builders who shared my passion and mission for authentic connection. In December I met my co-founder, Dani Beutell, who has a background in purpose-driven business and community organizing. It was clear to us that the need for authentic, vulnerability-based community was so present in our city, we knew that this work needed to extend beyond just the hiking club. We decided to team up and put our skills and vision together to bring this budding community together in a bigger way, and in February 2024 we soft launched our project we called the HÜMNKIND Collective; a community organization dedicated fostering authentic human connection through donation-based social clubs and events centered around nature, the arts and mindfulness.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
To be honest, I never in a million years would have guessed that I would be running a community organization. My professional background is as a musician and a singer/songwriter (I fronted several bands throughout my teens and my twenties) and as a wildlife biologist (I really like birds). I guess my thread into this type of community building is centered around my love for people and humanity, and my belief that ridiculously simple human things can be so incredibly powerful and healing. I have never desired to be a leader in my life, but it feels like my life circumstances keep putting me there. Although I have spent much of my life fronting bands, and now as a leader of this community, I am actually a pretty introverted person and I am pretty scared and intimidated about leadership. It feels like a really big responsibility and I am so deeply afraid of causing harm to people.

Nonetheless, here I am a Co-Founder of this organization that I am so deeply in love with; the HÜMNKIND Collective. In layman’s terms we basically offer donation-based clubs and events centered around nature, the arts and mindfulness, but our mission is to create community around meaningful, deep relationships that value authenticity and vulnerability at it’s core. Right now our regular flagship programs include a weekly hiking club, a writing club, and a meditation club. In the near future we have an art club and a potluck/open mic event planned. Because our core programs are focused around authenticity and vulnerability, all our clubs include dedicated time to go deeper with one another and share about what is really going on in our lives.

I think what makes me most proud and excited about the HÜMNKIND Collective is that this is a community that is truly meant for people willing to bring their real, honest selves. We’re not the cool “sceney” LA social club, we’re here for whoever you are, as long as you’re willing to show up with kindness, respect and openness. I never could have guessed the level of impact that intentionally inviting authenticity and vulnerability has on people, but I see it and feel it every day being a part of this community. The world we live in today makes it so hard to connect beyond the surface level and people seem starved for something real. We hope to create space at HÜMNKIND for people to feel safe and accepted without our masks and connect back to the very simple things that make us all human.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
Well, I’m a nature-nerd so I would probably do a lot of things outside. Southern California has such rich biodiversity and ecosystems I would probably try to show them a little bit of all of that, including maybe camping or hiking near the ocean, mountains and desert. One of my other favorite things about LA is the cultural diversity, and I love taking my out-of-town friends to a Korean spa or going to get noodles in Thai Town. I would probably also try to show them some weird LA stuff like the Bunny Museum in Altadena or the Museum of Jurassic Technology. I also love underground art/music/performance stuff, so if we could find a backyard show, or a warehouse play or a good drag show, I’d probably take them to that.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I would like to recognize two incredible women in my life for supporting me in the work I do.

Firstly, I would like to recognize my roommate/bestie and adopted sister, Saumya Gumidyala, for always believing in me and supporting me, even when my ideas seem batshit crazy. I truly look up to Saumya as she is one of the kindest, most intelligent, hilarious and fiercest bitches I know. She has inspired me to grow so much, and I continue to grow more every day through knowing her.

I also want to recognize other bestie and business partner Dani Beutell for believing in me and bringing as much love and passion into the HÜMNKIND Collective as I do. Creating this project has been some of the most difficult, yet fulling and heartful work I have ever done, and I know that I could have never created this without her. I feel so supported and so proud to be partners with such a strong, kind-hearted, hard-working and intelligent person like Dani.

Website: www.humnkindcollective.org

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/humnkind.collective/

Image Credits
Bryan Sloss Freddy Torres