Long time

It's been a long time since I posted to this blog.  Years in fact.  But I can't stop thinking about the respect connection lately.  It's waking me up at night and distracting me while I drive.  Maybe it's because I'm back to work in the non-profit world.  This time, taking on the challenge of how to reduce the impact of childhood poverty in our community.

So much of what we talk about has an undercurrent of respect.  Or lack of respect.  And right now, we are starting with listening and understanding.  We recently finished up a listening project where we interviewed over 150 low-income people.  After analyzing the data and reflecting on the stories, we are at a point where we are starting to share what we heard.

Yesterday I presented our findings to a group of of leaders in our community.  What I was most proud of is that I upheld my commitment to the people we interviewed.  They asked what we were going to do with their information and the stories they so openly and honestly shared.  I said that part of the process would be to share their stories to people who have no idea about poverty.  To educate others who don't deal with poverty or don't think about it on a regular basis.  To start the conversation that we do have poverty in our community and here are real stories, from real people about what it's like to live on the edge.  Or below the edge of poverty.

Their voices need to be heard and their stories need to be shared.  For me, it was a moment of respect and I was proud to be a part of it.  It's a start.  A respect connection between different communities.