Saturday, May 17, 2008

What makes it all worthwhile

"Do you remember me ?" she asks smiling
"Vaguely." i answer truthfully, i often tell people "no" because i dont remember lots of people and give lots of workshops where they walk away with more of a sense of me than the other way around.

"We talked at Twin Oaks a number of years ago when i was a visitor. We had lunch together and i still remember and refer to the conversation."

Her name is Jen. She is a cross-pollinator. She has embraced an activist and i would argue a memeticists life style since visiting Twin Oaks after she finished her studies at Cornell. She lives at Tryon Life Farms where Sky and Kassia are staying for the summer.

And she gives some credit to me for her trajectory into this life. She works now to bring diverse networks of activists together at a person to person level, rather than a top to top approach.

It is reminders like this that have tremendous positive influence on me. That people are walking away influenced, activated and engadged. I once wrote to the Canadian rock performer Bruce Cockburn:

I don't measure our success in the number of progressive pieces of
legislation passed or nuclear reactors stopped or other campaigns won
- tho there have been a gratifying few. For me personally, it is
about the lives changed, about the people who because of our work see
the world differently and are now working for the many, rather than
just for themselves. If you look at things the same way, then you
can take partial credit for one more success - me.

No comments: