Creating Change - real, lasting change

For a long time I have had some very fixed ideas about creating sustainable change. For most of my career I have envisioned change (true, lasting change) coming from a "bottom-up" vetting process. Change - empowering, confirming, life altering change - I have held, would be a part of a bigger paradigm shift that would come when people were provided the basic tools they needed to "actualize" a new existence. This of course happens when we work together to help one another. It comes when we willing and able to provide caring, compassionate help.

Okay, don't get me wrong. I still believe that true change must come from the "bottom" and penetrate into the bastions of our societies. I do, however, think there might be another way to look at how we are involved in helping to create that change. I am going to make a small modification to my belief. My change of attitude comes to me by way of a wonderful movie that Lee and I watched recently.

The movie, The Blind Side, is based on the true story of Michael Oher and his incredible rise to the National Football League (NFL). The story is the tale of a powerful relationship that developed between Michael Oher and two extraordinary people (Anne and Sean Tuohy). Central to the story is the movement of Michael from the impoverished projects of Memphis to an upper crust private school and a starting position on the high school football team. The controversy comes into the story by way of a strong relationship that develops between the Tuohy's and Michael.

Their relationship is built from a simple need - Michael was a young, economically disadvantaged, homeless adolescent with few options. The Tuohy's were a wealthy, well-positioned, socially established family who were alumnus of the University of Mississippi. Eventually a series of steps take place that move Michael from a life of homelessness to the Tuohy's home, and eventually to a full scholarship with the University of Mississippi and a career with the Baltimore Raven's of the NFL.

These steps, simple movements really, are the focus of my "shift" in thinking regarding the help that we can provide to others. What I took from the movie was this - it doesn't really matter what drives our desire to help . . . we simply must help.

In the long run, if Michael was the "product" of the Touhy's desire to develop a top notch NFL prospect who could go on to play for their alma mater Ole Miss; or if the Touhy's were simply carrying out their Christian (the Touhy's were involved in the development of one of the largest Evangelical Churches in Memphis, TN) mandate of being their "brother's keeper." It does not matter!

I now really, truly believe, that change is more important than the "motives" that lead us to help others in the process of sourcing change. Okay, please do not get me wrong, moral and ethical rules still apply; but it seems to me that providing help (opportunity) is the critical piece of the change equation - not the reason that a person is compelled to help in the first place.

Okay here it is - the boilerplate statement: we can only change the world by accepting that fact that we are all a part of that change.

Sure, some people out there will be driven to help from the ethos that percolates in every aspect of their beings. But let's be honest, many of us will be motivated by a bit more self-interested reasons. In the end, if fewer children go to bed hunger, if more people have safe, affordable housing to build their lives, if more people feel safe to express their sexuality without concern for societal reprisal, if more opportunity is available for people to leverage a new life experience - then the reason we are engaged in creating that change is not that important.

So - let's get out there and help . . . regardless of the reason we are helping (yeah, yeah - all moral and ethical precepts held in consideration). Let's create a better world that will ensure that EVERYONE has an equal opportunity to become who they are really, truly meant to be.