Having Impact

Thinking Through the Reality of How We Impact the World

In 2012 I received a TED Fellowship. As part of the fellowship, I was flown to Edinburgh to give a talk at TED Global. Yes, I gave a TED Talk (LINK), while tap dancing. I’ve given a few since, but that isn’t the point here. I want to tell you about some of the other fellows in my cohort. The fellow who spoke before me was a photographer who took photos from conflict zones that graced the front pages of papers like the New York Times. The fellow who spoke after me ran an organization that taught law to death row inmates in Uganda so that they could appeal their own cases and fight the corruption found in the court system there. There was even a fellow who learned how to fly helicopters to facilitate medical evacuations for people in need of care in her hometown. And there I was, just tap dancing.

Imposter syndrome was a big part of my TED journey. Compared to my fellow fellows, and the larger TED community, what kind of impact on the world was I having? Unless you are uber famous (particularly in the arts), measured today by social media follows and viral videos, one’s impact can seem minimal.

A Different Way

There is another way of looking at this. As a human being, we find ourselves in an ecosystem, not in isolation. We live in relationship to our surroundings, other people, and even ourselves. That means that the choices we make automatically have an impact. They impact our surroundings, other people, and even ourselves.

Maybe this obvious. Maybe you grew up with siblings and felt the effects of choices they made on you, or the ones you made on them. Maybe you are a parent and have seen the effects of the choices you made on your children. Our impact within the range of our effective will may be obvious. But what about scale? Big, global impact. Isn’t scale what we need to solve the massive problems we experience today?

Thinking about Scale Differently

I’d like to think through this idea: The greatest impact we can have is on our own inner world, or the inner world of another human being. This is tied to another idea that is just as important. The kind of person we become is our greatest contribution to the world.

Our choices – the thoughts we cultivate, and the actions that come from them – come from the kind of person that we are. There is good and evil, at odds with each other, working within each one of us. We can attempt to change the way we act, and that might work for a while. But if we don’t change the kind of person we are, the possibility of going back to old habits of thought and action will loom over us, and snapbacks are almost inevitable. Is this kind of transformation even possible? Yes. This is one of the fundamental aspects of the propositions of Jesus. That upon trusting him, and following him, we will experience a new birth and become a new person – even a new kind of person. The old person will be put death, and with the new person we will have a new kind of life. With this new kind of life, the impact that we have on ourselves, and the world around us will be categorically different. The greatest possible change is to the inner world of a person - including the kind of person they are. It affects everything. Including the person we become, which is the greatest gift we can give to the world.

Where does this work of transformation happen? It happens within the context of our inner world. It is the unseen world of thoughts and emotions, human will, wants and desires, social relationships – the human soul. This is work that does not happen on our own, nor can it be dealt with directly. Dallas Willard, in discussing the work of spiritual disciplines, describes the idea as indirect action. For example, the spiritual discipline of solitude practically separates us from our social relationships for a time. During that time our attachments to those relationships are interrupted. That interruption allows the follower of Jesus to more deeply connect with God in place of the lesser attachments to people. Thus, the action of solitude provides allowance for communing and growth in relationship with God that cannot be done through direct action. We do what we can (move into solitude) and God does the rest (the communing and growth).

Therefore, with God, we can do what we can to transform the landscape of our inner world. As we enter into that work, how we show up in the world around us changes. We begin to cultivate different kinds of thoughts. Our habitual actions shift toward the good. This kind of change is immeasurable. Our entire world will change. We do not live in isolation, therefore as our world changes the worlds of those around us will change as well.

This is not easy, nor is it always smooth, but it is good. The difficulty and roughness of this work is often on account of internal and external habits. Habits are simply organized thoughts and actions that have become automatic. Hear a loud noise, and your body jumps (or doesn’t), for instance. There is a breaking of normalcy as we begin to transform. There is change. There is a coming up against the regularity and momentum of life that we have been in with those around us. All of these things can provide resistance. Not because they don’t want what’s on the other side of the transformation, but because they do not want the change.

Imagine for a moment the magnitude of change one would go through to overcome the habit of a temper – to transform into the kind of person that instead of getting angry, calls out a blessing upon the offending party. That magnitude of change is equivalent to climbing Mount Everest! Now imagine the kind of impact on the world around them this same person would have. Instead of the threat of a temper or the anger itself attacking others, blessings would be shared. Can you begin to imagine the potential for change in that corner of the world this would have?

Now imagine this kind of transformation happening in someone who sits in a position of authority, or someone with access to resources?

Every single human being is already changing the world around them. We all already impact our family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, and even strangers. Our choices begin ripples that have effects we may never see or know. If I turn to think about the impact that a single choice of mine can have in this way, the number of choices I make in a single day, and the potential impact, I will be crushed under the burden of wanting to make the best choice. Such a burden begins with the understanding that my automatic choices are not always to be trusted as good. This may be true, but it is something that can change.

There is Another Way

This way is one of inner transformation, such that what comes out of us easily and naturally are good things – blessing and not cursing, love and not contempt, kindness and not anger, peace and not war, gentleness and not violence.

Maybe it’s easy to imagine one person – even yourself – doing this work. Maybe you’ve already begun this journey, or have been in it for a while. Can you then imagine what a small group of dedicated practitioners would be like? What would happen to your life if you had two or three other people doing this with you? What would happen to your collective worlds? And for those who are interested in magnitudes of scale, here is the question I keep asking myself: How many small groups of dedicated practitioners, engaged in the work of inner transformation with God, do we need so that we would witness the kind of sweeping change that would signal a fundamental shift in the way the world worked?