What

is our role in creating change?

Margaret Wheatley, 2008 Proceed until apprehended! Diana Vander Woude Several years ago, I read of a Buddhist teacher who encouraged p eople filled with d espair over the state of the world. His advice was s imple and wise: Its our turn to h elp the world. I love this statement b ecause it reminds us of other times and other p eople who s tepped forward to help create the changes that were n ecessary. We do live in an era that is unique in at least two ways. F or the first time, humans have altered the earths ecology and created consequences that are just b eginning to materialize in frightening ways. And we are aware immediately of tragedies and horrors everywhere in the world, no matter where they occur. But for a ll of human existence, no matter how terrible the time, there always have b een people willing to step forward to do whatever they could to create positive change. Some succeeded, some d id not. As we struggle with our own time, its good to remember that we are standing on very strong shoulders that stretch far back in history. In working with many p eople in very d ifferent cultures, Ive learned to d efine leadership differently than most. A leader is anyone willing to help, anyone who s ees something that needs to change and takes the first steps to influence that situation. It might b e a parent who intervenes in h er childs school; or a rural village that works to get clean water; or a worker who refuses to a llow mistreatment of others in h is workplace; or a citizen who rallies h er neighbors to s top local polluters. Everywhere in the world, no matter the economic or social circumstances, p eople step forward to try and make a small difference. Because a leader is anyone willing to h elp, we can celebrate the fact that the world is abundantly rich in leaders. Some p eople ask, Where have all the leaders gone? But if we worry that theres a shortage of leaders, were just looking in the wrong place, usually a t the top of s ome h ierarchy. Instead, we need to look around us, to look locally. And we n eed to look at ourselves. When have we moved into action for an issue or concern that we cared about? When have we s tepped forward to h elp and thereby b ecome a leader? The process that creates change in the world is quite s traightforward. We notice something that n eeds to b e changed. We keep n oticing it. The problem keeps getting our a ttention, even though most p eople dont n otice that theres even a p roblem. We s tart to act, we try something. If that d oesnt work, we try a different approach. We learn as we go. We b ecome very engaged with the issue, spending more and more time on it. We b ecome exhausted b y our efforts, but s till we keep going. The issue keeps calling to us. Any time we succeed, no matter h ow small the success, we gain n ew energy and resolve. We become smarter as we learn more about the issue and understand it b etter. We b ecome more s killful a t tactics and strategies. As we p ersevere, and if we are successful, more p eople join us. Sometimes we remain as just a small group, sometimes we give b irth to a movement that involves tens of thousands, p erhaps millions, of p eople.

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This is how the world always changes. Even great and famous change initiatives b egin this way, with the actions of just a few p eople, when some friends and I started talking. Including those efforts that win the Nobel Peace Prize. In 2004, Wangari Maatai was a warded the Nobel Peace Prize for h er work in organizing The Greenbelt Movement which had p lanted over thirty million trees in Kenya and east Africa. Wangari was a biology professor at the University of Nairobi in Kenya. In a meeting with other Kenyan women, she learned that the fertile and forested land of h er youth had b een devastated. All the trees had been cut down for coffee and tea p lantations. Local women now had to walk miles for firewood, and the water had b ecome polluted with chemicals and run- offs from the p lantations. She knew that the solution to the p light of these women was to p lant trees, to reforest the land. So she and a few women d ecided to b egin immediately. They went to a large park in Nairobi and planted s even trees. However, five of these trees d ied. (The two that survived are still there today.) Their initial success rate was 28.5%, discouraging b y anybodys standards. But they d idnt give up. They learned from that experience and the women carried their learnings back to their villages. Gradually, they b ecame s killed at p lanting trees. Other villages saw what they were doing and, over time, a large n etwork of villages became engaged in tree planting. In less than 30 years, thirty million trees were flourishing in 600 communities, in 20 nations. V illages now have clean water, shade and local firewood, improved h ealth and community vitality. What if they had given up when the first five trees d ied? What if they had walked a way and left it to the government or the U.N. to plant trees? And yet, how is it possible to go from two trees to 30 million trees in just 27 years? Or, to go from a mere dozen men to 9 million p eople acting as one unified body in just a few weeks, as happened with the Polish Solidarity Movement? This exponential growth is one gift of living in a network of relationships. If the issue is meaningful, people pay attention, s ee its value, and begin to talk to others. Such passion moves like wildfire through our n etworks and communities. Suddenly, weve reached millions of p eople and created large-scale change. And its always true that these large powerful changes b egin with only a few people who d ecide to help. We can rely on this change process. If we have an idea, or experience a tragedy, or want to resolve an injustice, we can step forward to h elp. Instead of b eing overwhelmed and withdrawing, we can act. We dont need to spend much time planning or getting senior leaders involved; we dont have to wait for official support. We just need to get started. When we fail, which of course we will, we dont become discouraged. Instead, we learn from our mistakes. We look for openings and opportunities that present themselves, even if theyre different than what we thought we n eeded. We follow the energy of Yes! rather than accepting defeat or getting stuck in a p lan. And we n ever know at the b eginning where well end up. And it doesnt matter. Wangari Maathai calls h erself an accidental a ctivist, stepping forward to p lant those first few trees because it felt like the right thing to do. She d idnt know that she would end up in jail, or have her reputation d eliberately d estroyed by h er government. She didnt know shed win the Nobel Peace Prize. All she did was take that first s tep, and then the n ext, and then the n ext.

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This is how the world changes. And this is why we n eed to s tep forward for what we care about. Little b y little, step-by-step we can resolve the frightening issues of this time and restore h ope to the future. After all, its just our turn to h elp the world. Choose Life only that and a lways, and at whatever risk. To let life leak out, to let it wear a way by the mere passage of time, to withhold giving it and spreading it is to choose nothing. Sister Helen Kelley

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