Help Me Make a Micro-loan Through Kiva

I'm a Kiva lender. I work with Kiva.org to help alleviate poverty through micro-lending. I'm one of 700,000 who have made investments as little as $25 in food shops, vegetable co-ops, child care centers and the like, in places like Congo, Tajikistan, and Cambodia. It's a way to help bring political stability and quality of life to developing parts of the world, and do so with kindness instead of guns, drones, tanks or rhetoric. 


Surely nothing can stabilize life more than grassroots economic empowerment. Take the economic leverage out of the hands of dictators and put it in the hands of the people. Then see what real, honest democracy looks like.


Simply put, Kiva ... works. Those seeking loans apply and submit their stories. Local orgs coordinate with larger orgs to complete the loan process and fund the recipients. They sign repayment guarantees on their honor in front of their families and communities. 


As a lender, you don't earn interest on these loans, but you have the tremendous satisfaction of knowing you've directly and vitally changed people's lives for the better. As a person of faith and follower of the Golden Rule, that's all the interest I need.


And I've had great success with Kiva! Since 2008, my Foundation and I have made twenty-one loans to small groups and individuals. Most of the loans I've chosen to fund are to women, or groups headed by women, and in countries and regions where women are typically oppressed or whose voices are not heard. I believe that when we empower women in this way, we make the world a kinder and better place.

As of today, every cent I loaned has been repaid. To me, this is remarkable -- think of the default rate in most lending situations. The result is that I currently have funds sitting in my Kiva account, waiting to be re-invested. I'd like you to help me choose where to allocate it. 

Here's what I'd love you to do:

• Visit kiva.org/lend and look at the current loan requests. These are heart-rending stories of real people who want to get ahead in life.
• Leave the name of the person or group who most appeals to you as a comment on this blog. Include a blurb about why it appeals to you, if you like.
• I'll pick the top three and make the investment on your behalf with my dollars. 
• If you are as inspired as I am by the whole process, you may become a Kiva lender yourself. It just takes a few minutes to sign up, and you can loan as little as $25.

I am really excited to see how this will go. PLEASE participate. It costs you nothing, and can help change lives!

The Longest Journey Begins with a Single Misstep

Since I was a child, my mind has churned with words, language, sound. Thoughts parade through my head at night. By day, the speed and intensity of what comes up sometimes keeps me from dealing with basic tasks effectively. Doctors have tried medication to calm my thought storms, but the treatments either don't work or dull me, dimming my light.

My thoughts fray and tire me, but without them I'm not truly myself. So I go on, crazy but oddly productive in ways that are valuable to me.

Puns, rhymes, peculiar associations come to me at the most random of times. In this instance, it was in the middle of the night. I woke with this sentence in my head:

"The longest journey begins with a single misstep."

I smiled at the play on words my subconscious had handed me, and began to wonder if it meant something or was just funny talk. As I drifted back to sleep, I tried to think of times at which a misstep might be an auspicious start to a long journey. I woke a second time, maybe an hour later, with what felt like the answer. I jotted down a few sentences on the writing pad I keep next to the bed. Here's what I've distilled from my scribbled notes:

Aeschylus, in ancient Greece, may be the first person credited with the idea that wisdom comes through suffering alone. Buddha spoke at length about suffering as a tool of transformation. In the Bible, God says “I have refined you, but not in the way silver is refined. Rather, I have refined you in the furnace of suffering.” (Isaiah 48:10)

C.S. Lewis, speaking also of the Christian perspective, wrote in the early 20th century, “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”

I got a letter from my sister Peggy last week in which she talked about Lent. She wrote about the sacrifices and hunger for which she and Catholics worldwide volunteer with the goal of spiritual transformation. There is deprivation, hunger, an acknowledgment of darkness so unflinching that it is almost an embrace. The suffering, in this instance, is willfully created and invited in. It's bracing--my sister described it as like being doused in cold water--but fortifying.

Secular voices have been divided on the point: Dale Carnegie wrote that discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success. But many of his contemporaries, and popular voices since then, have instead suggested ways to avoid adversity or inoculate ourselves against its ravages through positive affirmations, self confidence boosters, and a plucky, can-do attitude.

As I lay there in my darkened room, I thought about how this short term pragmatism--being able to blinder oneself and "keep a good perspective"--might conflict with what's ultimately best and most useful for us. By suggesting we champion adversity rather than allowing it and learning from it, have countless well-intentioned teachers stripped us of our most valuable lessons?

I then thought about what we showcase in our resumes. We highlight our successes, university degrees and achievements, hoping to be seen in the best possible light. We bury or minimize what we view as our trials and failures. Yet, if our goal is to present a global perspective on who we are, and our failures really tell the story more clearly than our cum laudes and awards, we are, ironically, leaving out the best parts of the story.

As a writer, I embrace secrets and untidiness in the lives of the characters I create. In the mid 1990s, I wrote a book manuscript called Splinters. It was about a deeply troubled middle American family, and the title was drawn from the same basic notion chasing me, now, in my dreams--that it's our scars and the shards of life that lodge beneath our skin which tell our story more honestly and rewardingly than the frilly parts.

So, I'm going with Aeschylus, Buddha and the architects of Christianity who believed slogging through the painful crap in life--and letting that be our finest teacher--far preferable to assiduously avoiding suffering through a process of anesthetization.

But if this is such great advice, why don't we heed it as a matter of course?

Because it is freaking difficult. It's making the conscious choice to chew on glass when there is milk and honey at the ready. It's remarkably counter-intuitive. It requires a willed reworking of our natural tendency to shy away from pain and make a dash for the arms of comfort.

What is the longest journey? To me, it is the one from here to enlightenment, to spiritual transformation. And without a costly misstep, or suffering, that journey can never even begin.

A Valentine to my cat. Yes, seriously.

I've always had a thing for animals. But my cat Teddy and I have a particularly good relationship. To be fair, he seems to have a good relationship with nearly everyone, human and animal alike. He got the name "Teddy" at the shelter because his temperament is more Teddy Bear than cat: he's cuddly and extremely tolerant, and seems designed to hug. You could probably put a broad bow around his neck, like an actual Teddy Bear, and he wouldn't object.

Since I'm the human he spends the most time around, I am the prime beneficiary of both Teddy's delightful qualities and his occasional quirks and oddities. (Oddities like his extra-long incisors, which scrape the insides of my elbows when he presses his face in the crook of my arm as we lie on the sofa reading. His teeth leave fine scratches that turn gently, allergically pink before fading.)

Teddy the cat is unflappable and Buddha-calm. You could light a firecracker next to him and he'd barely react, parade a marching band through the room and he's look up, but you wouldn't get more enthusiasm than that. The dogs chase after him, and half-maul him, putting his head in their mouths, slobbering on him and batting him around. Teddy is remarkably permissive, allowing quite a bit of torment before batting the dogs on the nose sharply to dismiss them, sending them yelping off to their crate in the kitchen.

I used to feel badly for Teddy, almost wanting to apologize to him for the indignities he suffers at the dogs' enthusiasm. But he's clearly okay with it. As with everything else in this world, he takes their silliness in stride, sometimes grumbling to me about it briefly in funny cat-talk, but otherwise allowing what is to simply be.

One of the more endearing things he does is purr himself to sleep when he lies curled with me in bed. Whichever way I'm turned, he positions himself in the "be spooned" position, with his spine pressed against my chest and his head tucked under my chin. When I roll over, he climbs over me and reorients himself in a mirror of our slumbering poses a moment before.

At first I didn't understand that the funny sound Teddy made, sometimes for many minutes nonstop, was purring. It sounded metallic and wheezy. I thought it might be asthma, or even pneumonia. I asked the veterinarian about it. He laid a stethoscope on Teddy's chest, listening intently and looking serious for a few moment. Then he smiled, slipped off his stethoscope, and handed Teddy back to me.

"Your cat doesn't have a respiratory problem," Mr. Johnson, the veterinarian told me with a chuckle."He's just unbelievably happy."

I love you, Teddy. You're the best shelter kitty ever.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Dad

Decency Knows No Political Party

I admire anyone who stands up for equality. But I particularly salute those for whom taking a stand is risky and may cost them personally and professionally. It touches my heart that some of the most moving and eloquent advocates for LGBT equality, lately, have come from within the ranks of the GOP.

It's important that we support these courageous people. While nationally we've passed the magic 51% number as far as acceptance (presumably making it a good long-term bet for ANY politician to support us), Republicans still fight uphill within their own party. And coming out in support of LGBT equality can have negative consequences for them at the ballot box and in contributions NOW, in current election cycles.

Meet my hero of the day -- Maureen Walsh, Republican State Senator from Walla Walla. Listen to her beautiful words on the floor of the Washington Senate Tue during that legislative body's debate over same-sex marriage.

And let's remember Maureen, financially and otherwise, when she's up for re-election, whether we typically vote Democrat or Republican. Because decency and justice know no political party.

No Faggots in Jack City

"NO FAGGOTS IN JACK CITY!" the gleeful, blood-thirsty cameraman says over and over.

This video is in the process of going viral. A (presumably) gay man is badly beaten outside a grocery store in Atlanta. You'll see it all over the web in the next few days. It's hard to watch, but you need to watch it.

I suspect that no human who values the dignity of others can look at this without cringing. We've come a long way toward toleration and mutual acceptance in America, but we've clearly got a long way to go. There's much talk during the current election cycle about America being a "shining city on a hill." Those are pretty words ... but we're not there yet.

Thankfully, per reports, the Atlanta PD's Gang Unit is all over this incident, and an investigation is underway. But this is one case that got caught on camera (astonishingly, by the perpetrators themselves as a twisted boast or "proof of performance" for their friends or other gang members) ... there are an untold number of similar incidents every day in America that we don't see, that don't get reported or, if reported, are sneered at and dismissed by law enforcement.

There are those of us fighting every day, as individuals and through organizations, to keep awful scenes like the one above from EVERY happening again. I entreat you -- join us. Stand beside us. Do not be silent.  Obviously, if you see something occurring, DO NOT LOOK THE OTHER WAY. But more than that, raise your voice against any intolerance when it crops up around you.

Thank you.