With less than 4 weeks to go

I have seriously been thinking about my motivation for the things I do and my growing interest and passion for societal transformation; seeing an end to injustice, poverty and exploitation of humankind.

Yes I am a Christian and do take to heart the mandate to be my "brother's keeper" but for me it goes beyond even that. I am not an advocate of communal poverty because I believe that one has to have something in order to be able to give it. At the same time, I don't think that one can only give from an excess because that introduces too much relativity in this individualistic world we live in.

For me it boils down to compassion; how can I be content when I have a standard of living that at least 60% of the world only dreams about yet there is no reason for things to be that way?

People have been conditioned to think that they can only succeed or get ahead if somebody else doesn't. Western thought around performance and measurement would seem to support this notion with performance bell curves and the limitations as well as grading systems in schools and colleges but this is simply not true.

I strongly believe that "there is enough pie for everyone" and judging from conversations with various people lately, a lot more people are coming alive to that concept as well. We live in an age of such innovation and speedy progress that while natural resources are still limited, mankind is increasingly coming up with different ways of not only harnessing those resources, but also making better use of what we already have with an increasing awareness of our responsibility to one another and the earth we live in.

I know I am but one piece in the puzzle and that there are a lot of other people doing their part to address these issues. My group of the day is ONE.org who are supporting an initiative for debt cancellation in some of the most impoverished nations in the world by doing their piece in the US and asking congress for an intervention. See http://www.one.org/blog/

People who are poor are NOT stupid but find themselves in a situation that is sometimes beyond their control, yet they make the best of it and carry on daily with much less than it costs most of us to eat a meal!

I know my efforts are small compared to the problem aat hand, but am encouraged to know that there are so many people and organizations tackling societal transformation in their own way ( clinton foundation, save a tree, local NGOs, save darfur )

Thank you so much for your support for my upcoming trip to India. For all of you that have already given so much of your time, effort, finances and support; my unending gratitiude.

To everyone that has indicated they would like to help, but haven't been able to do so just yet, the time getting shorter by the day, I leave for India on November 9th and need your committed support to make it happen.

Thanks again to you all.