The 31st of October and the 1st of November 2017 I participated at the Obama Foundation Summit in Chicago. The purpose of the Foundation is to inspire and empower people to change their world. Hundreds of civic leaders were chosen to participate to the inaugural ceremony. I sent my application at the web site Obama.org and my project and my experience has been chosen among 15k applications.
The Summit featured main stage sessions where we participated all together. We listened to very inspiring speeches from Barack Obama, Michelle Obama, Prince Harry, Anand Giridharadas, Marietje Schaake, Michael Tubbs and others. Moreover, we participated at breakout sessions. We had the opportunity to choose among many topics. The idea was to create small groups of people who shared the same interests and knowledges. I have to admit that I met incredible young civic leaders from all over the world with whom I am still in contact every day.
I will try to summarize in few points what really matters and what I learnt from this Summit:
1 I Learnt To Listen
During the opening speech the President Obama repeatedly mentioned the word listen. I remember how that word affected my participation and interaction with the other leaders during the Summit. I tried to hide deep in my mind all the prejudice that a man could ever have in front of other people. I tried to imagine being in a world where each word has the same value and weight. I have to admit that wasn’t easy. Generally, we use to pay attention to words (written or said) pronounced by influent people that maybe are CEO of something and have raised a lot of money in a brief period. Because of Twitter and other social we are pushed to use few words for expressing complex realities that can’t be explained in 240 characters. We didn’t realize that the answer or the solution that we are looking for is closer than what we thought. Sometimes we just need to listen the person who is sitting next to us with attention to learn something important.
2 A Better World Can Exist
For the first time since I was born I never felt how I felt during the Summit. There were about 400 people gathered in Chicago for the Summit from all over the world. People of all the religions, all the cultures. Black, white, yellow, pink. Straight, gay, lesbians, trans. No one of these details mattered. The only thinks that mattered were our ideas, our experiences and our engagement in our communities. That was the most pleasant feeling I have ever had in my life. That was the demonstrations that a respectful and peaceful society can exist. It is not just something utopian.
find your practice and practice it
find your teaching and follow it
find your community and join it
James Finley
3 Leadership Nowadays Is Necessary More Than Ever
We are facing a difficult moment for our society. In all the continents we can see the diffusion of xenophobic, homophobic and racist movements and political parties. It is happening in the USA as well as in Europe and in other continents. This is the effect of a global culture that considers as the main issue the money and personal profit rather than the human well-being. It is almost impossible today to hear a politician in any country talking about a citizen as citizen of the world, perfectly equal to the other of another state. Rather, you will hear about huge differences among people just because they believe in another God or because they have the skin of another colour, or just because they were born in the “wrong” part of the world. That’s why we need strong leaderships, because only good behaviours and good beliefs can effectively change the world and make it a better place. Today a leader has a huge challenge in front of him. He has to be able to read the way the society is changing and has to make the universal values stronger than ever. He needs to improve communication skills and support all the good drives from all over the world, it doesn’t matter where these are implemented.
4 It Doesn’t Matter Wherever You Try To change The World, You Are Not Alone
When you get involved in your community trying to do your best to change something, there are particular moments that you are alone. When bad moments occur it can be possible that you you have to manage all the burden of a failure or of an obstacle by yourself. During the Summit I have learnt that even if in my hometown I am alone, it is not so in the world because I know that in Mexico, in Palestine, in Brazil, in Indonesia there are other young folks that are feeling exactly what you are feeling in your small town in the deep South of Italy. All this gives you the strength to carry on your projects and to be in peace with yourself.
I hope that these thoughts will inspire you as they inspired me