It Takes All of Us to Bring About Change

The problem with making documentary films that use magic bullet scenarios, where you offer a simple solution to a complex problem, is that they lull an audience into a fals sense of complacency. You turn it off and you figure, OK well somebody at least figured out how to solve that problem. We shoot for the exact reverse: you're supposed to be disturbed by our films, you're supposed to turn our films off and realize that this is a complex societal issue for which there is no on simple answer. It takes all of us to bring about change — individuals, political leaders, etc. That's why we still make documentary films because we believe that you can effect some change. - Susan & Alan Raymond on The Art of Documentary Filmmaking.

The Courage of Forgiveness

Peace comes when you talk to the guy you most hate. And that’s where the courage of a leader comes, because when you sit down with your enemy, you as a leader must already have very considerable confidence from your own constituency.

Forgiveness is saying, "Whatever you may have done, however awful, it does not define you completely. Even if you committed murder, even the most gruesome murder, it doesn’t then turn you into a demon. You still have the capacity to become a saint." Forgiveness says you are given another chance to make a new beginning. - Archbishop Desmond Tutu on Forgiveness

Halfway around the globe another Anglican bishop, John Rucyahana, describes a reconciliation project that seems radical and unreal: Rwanda's ex-prisoners building homes for those who not only survived the genocide, but for the family members of those they killed. Laura Waters Hinson powerfully unfolds this story and expands our understanding of what makes us incredibly and oftentimes painfully connected to each other. With Rwanda's courage to transcend its transgressions we find ourselves challenging our own capacity to forgive. As We Forgive triumphantly expresses the highest form of leadership in action.

Awakening Possibility in Other People

The conductor doesn't make a sound. He depends on his power on the ability to make other people powerful. And that changed everything for me. I realized my job was to awaken possibility in other people. - Benjamin Zander

A Willingness to Find Meaning in Something Greater than Ourselves

"As we consider the road that unfolds before us, we remember with humble gratitude those brave Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains. They have something to tell us today, just as the fallen heroes who lie in Arlington whisper through the ages. We honor them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves. And yet, at this moment - a moment that will define a generation - it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all.

"Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends - hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism - these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility - a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

"America. In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations."

- President Barack H. Obama

The Ultimate Goal

is in changing a lot of things, upsetting local patterns, weakening existing structures, weakening the idea that things are the way they are. It’s an invitation for people to step up and do things differently. That first change touches a series of people who weren’t doing this before. They’re not passive anymore. They’re full citizens, change makers.” – Bill Drayton

Powerful Weapon

If you organize and dynamize space—whether it’s on a paper page or a web page (or any other medium)—what you see on it, place on it, and what you believe should be one and the same thing. But if you have the ability to render your beliefs and passions visually, you have a powerful weapon in your hands. If you don’t use it, you are wasting your life. - Tony Hendra

There is nothing...

with which every man (or woman) is so afraid as getting to know how enormously much he is capable of doing and becoming. - Søren Kierkegaard

Exercise: Life Experiences that Define You

Reflect on what has actually influenced your behaviors and attitudes. Identify those specific life experiences that you remember as significant, and then identify the value associated with that experience. If done with honesty, this kind of exercise will lead you to the basis for your own leadership, the fundamentals of a defining message, perhaps even to the institution within which you want to lead. - Terry Pearch, Leading Out Loud.

What are the life experiences that define you?

Why on Earth

would you settle for creating something mediocre that does little more than make money, when you can create something outstanding that makes a lasting contribution as well? - Jim Collins & Jerry Porras, author of Built to Last

Cautious, careful people, always casting about to preserve their reputation and social standing, never can bring about a reform. Those who are really in earnest must be willing to be anything or nothing in the world's estimation, and publicly and privately, in season and out, avow their sympathy with despised and persecuted ideas and their advocates, and bear the consequences. - Susan B. Anthony

Vision & Pragmatism

Social entrepreneurs often seem to be possessed by their ideas, committing their lives to changing the direction of their field. They are both visionaries and ultimate realists, concerned with the practical implementation of their vision above all else.

- Leslie Crutchfield & Heather McLeod Grant from Forces for Good

Do not go where the path may lead,

go instead where there is no path and leave a trail. - Ralph Waldo Emerson