Transcription

• Speaker #0

  Welcome to the Hummingbird Collective. I'm your host, Sarah Noble, head of global engagement, creative peace building, and inner development at the Co-Initiatives of Change Foundation. The world feels really heavy right now, and it's easy to feel helpless. But here we choose a different path, inspired by the legend of the tiny hummingbird who carried small drops of water to the fire in her forest while the other larger animals were paralyzed with fear. When those animals asked what difference the hummingbird thought she could make, she said, I'm doing the best I can. Here, we recognize that the fires in our world exist, and we choose to do something about them. This podcast features the stories of people carrying their drops of water to the fires in our world. Our method is intercultural dialogue, the art of listening and speaking across our differences. And we're here to lift our illusion of insignificance, one conversation at a time. This is the finale of Season 1, Stories in Motion. This season has showed us, through five very different lives, what intercultural dialogue actually looks like. At the end of every episode, we asked each guest what is something any of us can do, starting today, to carry our own drop of water to the fire. And we called it the Be the Change moment. I want to share three Be the Change actions that cut across all of our guests that you can start doing today. The first... is listen to understand. When Roberta Ventura first went to the Gaza refugee camp in Jordan in 2013, it was after years of working in banking and asset management, and she was donating to several organizations supporting refugees. She arrived thinking she might set up after-school programs, but the women she met stopped her. What they wanted was work, dignity and work, and they told her, if you really want to help us, you need to listen to us. So she built SEP, her social enterprise working with Palestinian artists whose embroidery is now sold all around the world. Anche Herberg, who has spent more than 20 years mediating between parties in conflict across some of the hardest rooms in the world, told us, don't just listen to what people say, listen to why they're saying it. That alone changes your conversation. So listening to understand, not to respond, not to fix, not to offer, is something every single one of us can practice today. in our families, in our workplaces, in our communities. And it's where real dialogue begins. The second B, the change, is to look for what we share. We live in a world that's very good at showing us what divides us. Different cultures, different beliefs, different experiences of the world. And it's easy, especially when things get very challenging, to let those differences become walls. Mohamed Shahadat, a youth leader, knows what it means to start over more than once in more than one country. Born in Syria and displaced to Jordan for over a decade, he carried that experience into every room he entered. He looked for the similarities before the differences. He told us, the first and most important thing that unites us as people is our humanity. Sharing stories is the first link of communications between cultures. We also had Bahishtan Ohtani, who grew up in Afghanistan under the Taliban and went to school in secret as a girl. She also continued working across Afghan communities and with international organizations. And she told us, people can be different. They can talk a different language. They can have a different culture. But every human being has a positive intention. And our energies together can be the strongest energy in the world. So we need to look for what we share. And that's a choice. It's a daily practice. And it's possible. Every guest this season proved it. The third Be The Change is just start. Heba Ali spent a decade reporting from conflict zones around the world. before deciding that bearing witness wasn't enough. She learned about a clause in the United Nations Charter called Article 109 that has existed since its creation but has never been used, and it allows the countries of the world to reform how the world cooperates. Everyone told her the idea was crazy, and she started anyways. And she told us, the work at the beginning is just to have the courage to talk about something when no one else is talking about it. That's all. Make it acceptable for others to do the same. When we look at the scale of what is broken in the world, wars, displacement, injustice, and we think, what could I possibly do? The problem is too big. So we wait for the right moment, for enough resources, for someone else to go first. But none of our guests did. None of them asked for permission or certainty. They just had the conviction that their drop of water mattered, and they were right. The hummingbird doesn't put out the fire alone, but the hummingbird starts. And that start, that single drop, is what makes it possible for others to start too. We have three Be the Change practices. Listen to understand, look for what we share, and start, wherever you are, with whatever you had. That is what Roberta, Mohamed, Bahishta, Anji and Heba showed us, each in their own way. And the reason we know this, the reason any of it reaches us, is because of story. And this is why storytelling is at the heart of intercultural dialogue. not statistics not headlines a person in their own words telling their own truth to someone willing to listen and that shift from the abstract to the human is where empathy begins and where the illusion of insignificance starts to crack because when we hear someone who's faced something really challenging and has chosen to act anyways we don't just admire them we recognize something we think if they can do that maybe i can do that too and that recognition is everything and that is why we tell these stories And here's what I believe. If they can do it, you can do something too. Not the same thing. Your thing. Your drop of water. Because the forest is large and it needs all of us. We all have a role to play. This is the end of Season 1, Stories in Motion. Season 2 is coming. We're calling it Stories of Creation. Stories of how we create in a world on fire. If this season has moved you, share it. Talk about it. Use the hashtag Hummingbird Collective and share what you've learned. Because every story shared is another drop of water on the fires of our world. And we need it. Thank you.