Hello!
This weekend involves three BVU
students and their campus Chaplin on a journey to Valparaiso University to
attend the Impact National Conference. Students going are members of Student
M.O.V.E., a service-engagement organization, and are: Jessica Thuma, Taylor
Daniel, and myself (Zach Ahrens). Along with us is our fearless leader, Ken
Meissner. Our goal is to immerse ourselves in a positive learning environment
to help us become better servant leaders on campus and in the world.
On Wednesday we stayed in Des
Moines overnight, which allowed us to fly to Minneapolis the next morning where
we connected to our flight to Chicago. Traveling can be hectic, and I of course
had to run into problems at the airport (Why me??). I went through security
checkout with my two carry-ons and was asked to talk to a TSA officer about my
liquids. I had a quarter-full water bottle I forgot to empty and a tube of
toothpaste that didn’t meet the requirements. I had to trash the toothpaste and
re-enter security after dumping out my water, Hmph. I was a little bitter after
that, but hey, I didn’t follow the rules.
I met the most interesting
characters on our two flights that I could probably write an entire blog about.
For the purpose of this entry, I’ll keep it to a summary. The first was an
older man that sat next to me who was in his fifties or so. He used to be an
Olympic qualified swimmer until he got in a devastating car accident that left
him disabled. He now travels as a self-employed audio technician for a number
of organizations, including ESPN. It was so nice to be around such a friendly fella who was very open about sharing his story.
The second was a young man who
sat next to me radiating the smell of alcohol. He was still drunk from the
night before on a trip to meet his biological father for the second time.
Security had confiscated six bottles of liquor that he was determined to bring on the
plane with him. He was only 23, but he was making $55 dollars an hour doing road
construction. I’ll admit, my first impression of him was a “punk”, but I tried
really hard to learn something from him. He never went to college, but he loves
what he does. I let that sink in and said, “Hey, that’s what it’s all about.” Not everyone needs a college degree in order to have a fulfilling life. As long as you’re happy and
contributing to society in a positive way, I think that’s okay.
We arrived on
campus on Thursday to register for the conference and sit in on the opening ceremony. They
started off with a keynote speaker, Amber Smith. Her presentation involved The
Hero’s Journey to finding their “boon”. This boon was the end result of what
you wanted your journey to produce. For her, it was to make an impact by doing
good. She founded a non-profit, Activate Good, which started off as an
adventure her and a friend took on to spread random acts of kindness in over 20
states. She did everything from holding “smile” signs in Seattle to picking up
litter in ditches. They told their mission to two other people who ended up
dropping everything and joining them on their adventure.
Her concept of leadership
changed from being a stand-out soloist on her high school choir. She knew she
was good, but her arrogance held her back. She spoke of the importance of
mentors and how her choir director left her with a lesson in humility. She
allowed others the chance to solo and found to it to be a very rewarding
experience. This is where the definition of leadership finally made sense and
her passion for empowering others began. “Leaders are humble, they let others
shine.”
A word from her keynote that
really spoke out to me was Polarity. In science, polarity refers to the separation
of electrical charges of a molecule (fun stuff), but her purpose for using it
was to demonstrate the balance a person needs to lead. Leaders are filled with
positive qualities, but they are people too. That means leaders are flawed, a
concept that’s often neglected. A true leader recognizes their wholesomeness,
not just what looks good on their resume. She wanted to stand as a symbol, but
she found that being a normal person is just as important for helping her
cause.
Amber spoke of the relationship
between leadership, power, and service. She made the interconnection between
the three that made a lot of sense. She used the ripple effect, or Pay It
Forward theme, as the way in which volunteers can make a significant impact. Jessica
Thuma said, “I appreciated her perspective on the importance of power in
volunteerism.” There is only so much one person can do, but when one person can
inspire others to do all that they can do; it makes a difference. This
is the root of power that volunteers possess. When volunteers become leaders,
they facilitate this power to influence as many people as they can.
I believe leaders have to be
idealists in order to create change. Amber shared my view on this and how it
bothered her when people told her to be “realistic.” For her, that meant
lowering her standards and ultimately giving up on her dreams. An important
lesson that I took away is to focus more
on what I can do, while working towards what I want to do. Too often an
idealist will disregard the former, and it ends up hurting their
performance.
Taylor Daniel was moooved (2%
reference) by Amber’s speech and said, “She was very empowering.” The keynote
was a great start to what should be a moootivating (Ok I’m done) weekend. We
are all excited to see what tomorrow has in store and what else we can learn
from the workshops available. Our goal is to make some friends as we are all there
because we want to become better at serving others. This shared interest will
allow us to bounce ideas off each other and create networks of volunteers
working towards change. There is something we can learn from everyone, and when
those people are passionate about their aspirations, it’s easy to be inspired to
follow your own.
In service,
Zach
