Thank you for sharing these lessons. These seem relevant for many other movements and sectors trying to create social impact. I appreciate how you connect each of these to results. For example, “free up leaders to lead” is exactly that, versus how it is often described as support for child care.
As a cohort member of Move to End Violence, the investment in my leadership, the Idaho Coalition Against Sexual & Domestic Violence’s organizational development, and our movement to end violence against girls and women has been transformative.
As a leader, I have learned the importance of self-care - how self-care needs to occur throughout the day, not at the end of a massive project. Through Move to End Violence, I have learned the importance of connecting my head to my heart, the value of creating spaciousness in the day to spur creativity, and the power of the forward stance (a 60/40 physical stance rather than a defense posture). Our staff practices Tai Ji together each week. Our physical practice has taught us lessons about overextension, pace, and rhythm. As a result of this initiative, we encourage each other to take breaks every 90 minutes, and to look away from the computer every 20 minutes, to an object 20 feet away for 20 seconds.
As an organization, we are transforming from a project factory to a movement builder. We are integrating a deeper understanding of raising the visibility of communities marginalized by society and ensuring that they are at the center of our work. We intentionally create spaces to engage in deep conversations about race, class and other structural oppressions and power and privilege. Our organization is building relationships with other social justice allies - from immigration reform, economic justice, reproductive justice and more – understanding more fully that if anyone’s rights are diminished, all of our rights are diminished. We understand and actively step into the necessity for external change to be driven by our own internal evolution.
Move to End Violence has raised our consciousness. We are re-evaluating the entirety of our work to ensure that everything we do is linked to the root causes of gender violence - a culture of domination and exploitation that devalues girls and women and cultivates the conditions for abuse and rape – and reaches communities marginalized by society. We are engaging in and practicing using our strategic thinking muscles in order to increase our impact. Move to End Violence has increased our courage and our appetite for risk-taking.
For over thirty years, I have been a part of this movement to end violence against girls and women, and the fortunate recipient of several generous foundation grants. The NoVo Foundation Move to End Violence initiative has transformed myself as a leader in the movement and our state coalition, and the impact will continue to ripple throughout our state and to everyone we reach. This has been so much more than an investment in one person or organization - it has been the raising of our organizational consciousness and our collective hope in a vision of a world without violence.
COMMENTS
BY Monisha Kapila
ON November 4, 2014 09:12 AM
Thank you for sharing these lessons. These seem relevant for many other movements and sectors trying to create social impact. I appreciate how you connect each of these to results. For example, “free up leaders to lead” is exactly that, versus how it is often described as support for child care.
BY Kelly Miller
ON November 14, 2014 07:29 PM
As a cohort member of Move to End Violence, the investment in my leadership, the Idaho Coalition Against Sexual & Domestic Violence’s organizational development, and our movement to end violence against girls and women has been transformative.
As a leader, I have learned the importance of self-care - how self-care needs to occur throughout the day, not at the end of a massive project. Through Move to End Violence, I have learned the importance of connecting my head to my heart, the value of creating spaciousness in the day to spur creativity, and the power of the forward stance (a 60/40 physical stance rather than a defense posture). Our staff practices Tai Ji together each week. Our physical practice has taught us lessons about overextension, pace, and rhythm. As a result of this initiative, we encourage each other to take breaks every 90 minutes, and to look away from the computer every 20 minutes, to an object 20 feet away for 20 seconds.
As an organization, we are transforming from a project factory to a movement builder. We are integrating a deeper understanding of raising the visibility of communities marginalized by society and ensuring that they are at the center of our work. We intentionally create spaces to engage in deep conversations about race, class and other structural oppressions and power and privilege. Our organization is building relationships with other social justice allies - from immigration reform, economic justice, reproductive justice and more – understanding more fully that if anyone’s rights are diminished, all of our rights are diminished. We understand and actively step into the necessity for external change to be driven by our own internal evolution.
Move to End Violence has raised our consciousness. We are re-evaluating the entirety of our work to ensure that everything we do is linked to the root causes of gender violence - a culture of domination and exploitation that devalues girls and women and cultivates the conditions for abuse and rape – and reaches communities marginalized by society. We are engaging in and practicing using our strategic thinking muscles in order to increase our impact. Move to End Violence has increased our courage and our appetite for risk-taking.
For over thirty years, I have been a part of this movement to end violence against girls and women, and the fortunate recipient of several generous foundation grants. The NoVo Foundation Move to End Violence initiative has transformed myself as a leader in the movement and our state coalition, and the impact will continue to ripple throughout our state and to everyone we reach. This has been so much more than an investment in one person or organization - it has been the raising of our organizational consciousness and our collective hope in a vision of a world without violence.