Growing up, Natacha Sako always wanted a big sister to help her navigate adolescence. When she tried fostering relationships with familial levels of depth with girls in her life, she often felt she was coming up short.
“I was the first child of my dad and my moms, and they didn’t have another kid until I was 9. I wasn’t very educated about how to deal with guys, or simple stuff like how to create meaningful relationships with other people. I always felt I was a good friend to you, but you were not being a good friend to me, and I was over extending myself,” she said.
Today, as an adult, Sako wants to create what she wishes she had growing up — a place for teens to connect with like-minded individuals and learn lessons that schoolbooks often fail to teach. She founded her nonprofit organization, Krown Keepers Inc., as a way to fill this void. Krown Keepers had its first official event this year in February. At the event, the girls had brunch, offered each other positive affirmations and talked about how to be kind to themselves and others.
“These are things all girls go through but don’t have anyone to talk to about it. There are a lot of people whose parents didn’t teach them about credit, or about your 401k, or what a health plan is. There are a lot of kids who don’t know, and they are thrown into the world, and it’s just like, ‘OK, go,’” said Sako. “There are a lot of girls who don’t even feel that they are beautiful. We have about 10 girls, and so far a lot of what we have talked about is self-esteem and self-worth. No matter what we talk about, it ends up going back to that.”
This fall, Sako plans to meet with the girls once or twice a month. In September, she is taking the girls to outdoor adventure company Go Ape: Treetop Adventure to teach them about overcoming self-doubt while giving them an opportunity to face their fear of heights. Sako is looking for more girls to join the program and more women to volunteer their time to the cause.
“There is no cost. We are not-for-profit, and we want to make sure that we never have a cost for the girls, because these things are not something you can put a value on. We will do fundraisers, but we don’t want to put that pressure on the families,”
said Sako.
Find Krown Keepers online at Facebook.com/krownkeepersinc.For information regarding getting a girl you know involved or volunteering with Krown Keepers Inc., contact Sako at krwnkeepers@gmail.com.
