One of the biggest lessons that I’ve had to learn in life – and in the world of international development work – is to let go.  

I’m a Type A control freak so this lesson isn’t one that comes easily for me.  Rather, it’s a constant process. 

For those who knew me in my former life as a finance manager, with my color-coded spreadsheets and perfect PowerPoint slides, this comes as no surprise.  For those who don’t know me – you’ve now been warned.

This type of control makes me feel safe in a world of chaos.  

So, when our beloved Elayne and dear friend and volunteer Kim called me yesterday to tell me that the online booking agency or the airline or both screwed up and never booked her outbound flight to Kathmandu despite the confirmation email we got, the control freak in me froze up.

What?  We have to postpone the trauma healing staff training?  But we’ve already delayed this training once before (panic sets in). 

What about the teachers’ training schedules?  And, the pre-training evaluations?  And, the eBay Foundation grant?  And, the kids?  And, this thing… and, that thing… and… and… and…

And, then I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.  

I remembered the time when I was about to board my flight to Nairobi for a month-long journey of field work and getting a phone call at the gate that the Nairobi airport had caught on fire. 

Or, Elayne getting a nasty flu in the Congo that was so debilitating that she was in the hospital on an IV drip and had to conduct part of the training with the caregivers gathered around her bedside.

Or, the running water going out for several days in Ethiopia.  Or, the daily power outages in Nepal.  Or, getting bumped off my flight from Nairobi to Addis and spending half the night in the airport.  The examples are endless.

Life IS chaos.  

Despite all of our good intentions and careful planning, things happen.  

The Western world doesn’t tend to cope well with uncertainty and hiccups in our well-laid plans.  Surely if something goes wrong, it’s someone’s fault, could’ve been prevented, and we need better contingency planning in the future.  People tend to fall off the rails, lose their cool, and still – it doesn’t change anything.

However, the rest if the world has something to teach us about letting go.  

Whether it’s the oft said “hakuna matata,” meaning “no worries” in Swahili or the many mantras and themes of “letting go” in Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu, and Yogic texts, it’s all about realizing that there are things in life that we just can’t control. 

In the end, it’s all about how we choose to deal with it.  And, practicing gratitude for the breath we are still breathing and the lessons we can learn. 

Nepal will be there tomorrow.  As will the children’s home, the kids, the staff and the teachers.  With a refund for the botched flights, the funding is still there.  

We’ll just have to reschedule.  

And, so it is.

NB: The Nepal trauma healing training has been rescheduled to January 2015.

​By Amy Paulson (Reposted from The Gracias Foundation, now called Global Gratitude Alliance)

I remember when I first read Long Walk to Freedom, the epic autobiography of Nelson Mandela.  It was 2006.  I lived in a 100-year old house in Germany that had poor heating.  I tried to keep warm by soaking in the bathtub every day while reading his book.  If you’ve seen it, you know that this particular book is thick and heavy.  You can imagine the number of times it fell into the tub by accident.  

This book had been on my personal reading list for years.  I’d put it off because it seemed too intimidating. But, at some point, I bucked up and decided that if Mandela could spend 27 years of his life imprisoned for fighting a system of institutional racism that was so morally wrong that in 1973 the UN declared it a crime against humanity, then the least I could do was spend a few days reading his book.  

Wow.  I’m so glad I did.  Here’s why this man became my hero:

• He was the first of his family to attend school. He finally completed his law degree while in prison in 1989.

• His actions followed his words: “Rhetoric is not important. Actions are.”

• Even in prison, he continued the struggle, organizing debates, studying law and even Afrikaans - the language of his oppressors, surviving solitary confinement for possessing news clippings, and fighting against racism within the prison system.

• After he was released from prison at the age of 71, his message to his countrymen was one of peace, forgiveness, and reconciliation: “As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn't leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I'd still be in prison.”

• He continued to campaign for peace, human rights, education, and HIV/AIDS advocacy (his son died of AIDS in 2005), well into his 90's.

Mandela proved to the world that humans – even fallible humans like him – are capable of changing the world. 

It may sound cliché.  But, reading that book in the bathtub sparked my interest in the work I do at The Gracias Foundation today.  It helped clarify what I wanted to do (the courage and the plan for how to do it would come many years later) and reminded me that I, even as one person, have something to contribute to global humanity.  While doing nothing at all would be akin to accepting the status quo.  

After hearing about the passing of the beloved Madiba yesterday, I felt heavy, depressed, and fearful.  And then I took a deep breath and remembered that I am still alive.  And what washed over me was a renewed sense of purpose, commitment, hope and gratitude... and the realization that the best way to honor his life and struggle is to continue, in my own modest way, to make a difference.