Today is Blog Action Day (BAD) and this year’s theme is “Raise Your Voice”. Today thousands of bloggers and different organizations from around the world will be writing about it for the 8th annual Blog Action Day on October 16, 2015. Every year Blog Action Day raises awareness about a specific theme and it is always a chance to be a part of something bigger than ourselves to feel that you can make a difference in the world around you. This year’s theme of “Raise Your Voice” really resonates with me on a variety of levels, all of which I will describe.
I’ve been taking part in Blog Action Day since the
first one back in 2007 and I’m happy to continue my involvement. Every year the theme’s build upon with has
come before and this year’s theme seems especially so, I’d even say that it is
at the core of making changes in our world. In order to make changes someone
first needs to speak up to “Raise Their Voice”. We live in a world of instant
results and instant gratification, and where most people won’t chase after the
big dreams. There is a lot of apathy everywhere and the overall feeling that
you see is that “one person can’t make a difference”, “you can’t fight city
hall”, “we’ve always done it this way”, “it will never work”, and the list of
excuses we tell our selves seems to grow larger. But change has to start
somewhere. I’m reminded of a story that I’ve heard several times in my life.
There
were four people named Everybody, Somebody, Anybody, and Nobody.
There was an important job to be done and Everybody
was sure that Somebody would do it. Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did it. Somebody got angry about that, because it was Everybody’s job. Everybody
thought that Anybody could do it,
but Nobody realized Everybody wouldn’t do it. It ended up
that Everybody blamed Somebody when Nobody did what Anybody
could have done.
(note: you can find the story was summarized here).
What escapes most of us a lot of the time is that we’re all “somebody” and
sometimes we need to be the one to raise our voice when other are afraid or
seem unwilling. That first voice gets momentum going and once momentum is going
it is a whole lot easier to get others to join in on a movement and when the
momentum is going fast enough, people will question what took so long and how
come it didn’t start sooner. While momentum is no guarantee of success, if that
first person doesn’t raise their voice, there is no inertia. In physics I was
taught that a body at rest tends to stay at rest while a body in motion tends
to stay in motion.
I’ve been very active in Toastmasters the last few
years and one of the things that has stuck with me from Toastmasters is that we
all have a voice. In the beginning many of us are afraid to use it before a
crowd. Many of us spend a lot of time trying to find our voice. What is it we
have to say? What is our message? Toastmasters provides a laboratory where you
can practice using your voice, you can make mistakes, and people will support
you. We’re all human and everybody makes
mistakes, don’t let the stop you from raising your voice. If you’d like to
practice using your voice you’re welcome to visit any Toastmaster club, but I
hope that you’ll take the chance to practice using your voice and to find your
voice.
Sometimes our world today seems overly complex and
overwhelming but when we’re in need of inspiration it can be found everywhere.
We’re blessed to be able to see thousands of motivating videos by inspiring
people on YouTube. We can find words of wisdom on Facebook and Twitter.
Sometimes you need to tune out all the noise but it is there for you to find.
Our world is full of people who are unable (or initially
unwilling) to raise their voice, but human history if full of unlikely people
who raised their voices and eventually others joined. If you look at Gandhi and
Rosa Parks, who would have thought that these two could ever have accomplished
what they did. I encourage you to be Somebody! Have a look at the Blog Action Day website, look around the
web to see what people are doing for Blog Action Day 2015, you can also look
for #BAD2015, #Bad15, #BlogAction15, #RaiseYourVoice, #FreeToWrite, #JustABlogger, and Blog Action
Day as hashtags and keywords. Be Somebody and “Raise Your Voice”!
The Future is not yet written, Let's build it
together!
Darryl
Darryl
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