When K1 was home for winter break, she had the opportunity to participate in a panel discussion on social justice to a group of early high school youth in our congregation’s Coming of Age program. The other three panelists were all More Experienced Adults, so K1 was closest in age to the youth and tried to speak to what SHE would have wanted to hear in such a panel. After all panelists spoke and there was time for Q&A, the youth were asked to share one thing they’d take away and remember from the hour. By far the most common response — even more common than our cynical-advisor-expected answer of “I dunno” — was something K1 had said:
Don’t be afraid of doing something just because you can’t do a huge project or All The Things. It’s important that you do SOMETHING, not everything.
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Many of us tend to believe in the Go Big or Go Home model of success. In other words, to count as an Accomplishment, it’s gotta be big. Transitioning to healthier eating by cutting out soda? Not enough unless you also remove chips, HFCS, processed meats, GMO anything and anything grown more than 100 miles away. Taking the stairs instead of the elevator to get a few more steps in? You better be parking three blocks away, buddy.
I’m trying to recognize the role baby steps play in our lives, and how they are vital to setting us up for success. Here are two of mine to report this weekend- please share YOUR baby steps in the comments!
- I am notoriously bad at making plans with people. Oh, I LOVE plans, and I love people. But I am terrible at reaching out and making them. Instead of FOMO, it’s FOBR (Fear Of Being Rejected). This week I had dinner with a high school friend, and we talked about a mutual friend of ours… someone I have not seen in person in over 30 years. She and I have been chatting on social media, and I have no reason to think it would be awkward, but… FOBR has had me waiting for months hoping our mutual friend would set something up. I took a baby step and IMed her, saying “Waiting for all our schedules to align will be hard, do you want to get together just us some weekend?” (see, baby steps… I wasn’t quite ready to propose a specific date :-)). She responded immediately asking if I was free next Saturday for lunch. And so, I will be headed up north to visit my friend a week from today, and we both are eager!!
- Ever since November 2016 I’ve been slowly getting more active in the local political arena. I started attending Democratic Committee meetings in my town. I was a delegate to the state convention last year. I did GOTV work last November. But I am extremely shy about speaking directly to people, which kept me from doing phone banking, doorknocking and other similar outreach activities. I want to change that!
One of my fellow Democratic Committee members just announced her campaign for state office, and she asked for volunteers to collect signatures to get her on the ballot. I realized if I couldn’t go do this for a friend, I was never going to be able to get over this hurdle, and so for two hours this morning I took a baby step and collected signatures. And lived both to tell the tale and to be excited to get more involved!
[there’s another diary in the works about that experience, but Life intervened and I won’t have it up until early next week].
It doesn’t have to be big. The important thing is that we each do something, and keep doing it. That is how the work gets done. It’s also how the sausage gets made here at Top Comments: you, the readership, nominates a comment to our inbox that ends up in our Top Comments. Or rec individual comments and pictures as you go about your dKos day, and those collective recs form our Top Mojo and Top Pictures. It all adds up, so please- keep doing it!!!
TOP COMMENTS
Brillig's ObDisclaimer: The decision to publish each nomination lies with the evening's Diarist and/or Comment Formatter. My evenings at the helm, I try reeeeallllyy hard to publish everything without regard to content. I really do, even when I disagree personally with any given nomination. "TopCommentness" lies in the eyes of the nominator and of you, the reader - I leave the decision to you. I do not publish self-nominations (ie your own comments) and if I ruled the world, we'd all build community, supporting and uplifting instead of tearing our fellow Kossacks down. Please remember that comment inclusion in Top Comments does not constitute support or endorsement by diarist, formatter, Top Comments writers or DailyKos. Questions, complaints or comments? Contact brillig.
From HiVoter:
Nominating this great comment by wandering in samsara, from glenn berger phd’s From The Summer of Love To Donald Trump: We Blew It.
From Pam from Calif:
This comment by 4democracy is awesome. From Murfster35’s A few "under the radar" things to remember about Mueller's investigation.
From raptavio:
War on Error found a truly novel way to express the death of irony in the era of Cheeto Benito.
From yours truly, brillig:
In Greg Dworkin’s Abbreviated Pundit Roundup, Mishima evokes the spirit of Gandhi union leader Nicholas Klein.
Fordmandalay speculates as to what might have embravened the security guards.
TOP MOJO
Top Mojo for yesterday, February 23rd, first comments and tip jars excluded. Thank you mik for the mojo magic! For those of you interested in How Top Mojo Works, please see his diary on FAQing Top Mojo.
TOP PICTURES
Top Pictures for yesterday, February 23rd. Click any picture to be taken to the full comment or picture. Thank you jotter!