Getting It!

I think one of the difficult aspects of doing community transformation work is being able to evaluate what you are doing. I know that with some of my key volunteers and board members it is easy not to see the trees through the forest. I know that activities can seem to be the focus, i.e. tutoring, helping families in crisis, painting houses, reaching out to community partners or doing a job life skill group. The end goal is to see a life turn around, a family impacted from this and then the culture of a neighborhood transformed.

I know that as I watch the wedding of my son happen in the next day that I can honestly say that my son has gone from being a typical teen that assumed mom and dad would pay the way to an adult that is responsible, hard working and owns his situation. I know that over the last 10 years of my journey with my son I could have said at times that we are loosing the battle. Yet, today I’m a gloating dad who is sooo proud of his son and his accomplishments.

We were having a board meeting last week and we were trying to articulate what we are really about. I know that it is easy to use buzzwords and attempt to narrow everything into a sentence, yet it isn’t easy with the scope of doing neighborhood transformation work. So I had one of those moments where God took me by surprise.

We had started doing a job life skill group during the summer and have continued it through the school year. We have different adults and college students share their journey in life and how they discovered their passion and then pursued it. One of my key team leaders has gone out of his way to relate back to one of our older teens. I had paired him up with one of our Hispanic teens. We had meet a month ago and talked to our seniors in high school about the path of getting into college and also deciding what you are going to really do. My friend, Marc, had challenged his teen, Matt, to think outside the box about what he really wanted to pursue.

So as we are tossing back and forth what we are really about my friend Marc shares a story about his teen – Matt. The college prep meeting had placed both college students and adults with our teens that are graduating this year. Marc had been paired up with Matt. They had talked a bunch about Matt’s present choices and what would be the next step. I hadn’t heard this story until Marc shared it at the board meeting. He proceeds to say that he asked Matt if he wanted to talk with a friend who has his own auto mechanic business. (Matt had decided that he wanted to be similar to his dad but actually own his business and employ mechanics.) Marc told Matt to come prepared with questions and think through what he would say. The business owner and Marc were blown away by Matt’s questions about this individual’s business and life experience! All of a sudden the lights come on about what we are truly about – seeing a youth or young adult get it about what to do with their life.

Fast forward a few days and I get a text from Matt saying he has a job interview at the Mall with Reebok. So I volunteer to take him to his interview. All of a sudden I see months worth of talking about getting a job, doing an interview and then learning how to keep job make sense. Matt comes back from the interview with a smile on his face and a sense of accomplishment. I don’t know whether he will get this job or another but I do know that the time Marc has spent with him has made a significant impact on his life.

As I think back to our board meeting and our desire to accurately describe our purpose and passion it all became clear as we talked about Matt. Marc and I could remember when we first met him when he was 12 not 17. He has grown up and now has become a quiet leader in our group. He speaks now both by his actions and his suggestions to other to get it, step up and do it!