What can we do?

Many people are pretty overwhelmed by what is happening now, the brutal statements, the takeover of the US government, the unmitigated self-centeredness; the term we hear often is whiplash. Part of the idea is to paralyze us into inaction. There are very many people right now who can only focus on one thing, staying safe or getting to safety. Looked at one way, getting overwhelmed into paralysis by the news is a luxury some don't have. So let's take a breath and discuss what we can do; here are some thoughts.

It's a sad sign of the times that "support" or "commitment" is often code for "money". It's not. We cannot pay or spend our way out of the mess we are in. In general, the efforts that focus the most on fundraising achieve the least. What the world needs us each to deploy most is our time, our skills, our expertise, our endurance, and our hope. The best acts and activities, the best venues, the best means of communication, are those that require no money. A gathering that takes place in a library is more likely to create change than a gathering that takes place in a fancy hotel event space because it matters the kind of people who will show up to a library and what needs to be done to get them there. The kind of people who will show up to a library and what they are there to do is to make a plan and get to work. Free and cheap public and private spaces and homes, are more conducive to trust, diversity, inclusion, and action.

About money, better to spend regularly, X amount per month, for a long time than to give one big chunk. And better to spend some time and learn about an issue and organization first, and give later once you know what is going on. Of course things require money, but the best things don't require much. For example, now is a time in which information and investigation is really really important. Investigative journalism requires time, and journalists need to make a living; support them, newsletters you like, OCCRP, or ProPublica. Whatever it is, monthly is better than lots once.

Whatever time you spend, do it daily, or at a bare minimum weekly. Change happens not with a spasm but with prolonged dedication, that can be relied upon. A good place to start is to measure or guestimate about how much time you spend on information input, staring at your phone, or listening to the news etc. For most people, it is not easy to differentiate between "news" and just junk, it's all just a bunch of videos and posts, some news, some not, all skimmed. But try to come up with an amount of time and then think of it as a balance sheet with the goal being to spend as much time doing something useful (output) as you spend on information input. Start with a few minutes each day. Start by picking a time each day, putting it in your calendar for "output" to do something; start with five or fifteen minutes Monday through Friday.

In terms of what to do, do something in your own community related to a topic you care about, think is important, and want to learn more about. It doesn't really matter what it is but you should be ready to learn about it, find people who are doing something about it, help them and they should be real people in your community. It should be on an issue that is personal for you; you have a story with that issue. See who is working on it, knows about it, and connect with them. Set up a Google Alerts on the topic and relevant things related to it.

Join or build a community around the topic. There are many ways to do this. There is a great word and tradition in Spain called a "tertulia", it is a group that meets every week or month at a set time in a specific place to discuss a specific topic; it can also be a book club. Work hard to get as diverse a group as possible interested in the topic who want to learn more together. Can be any possible group to meet up, non-partisan is always better, it can be focused on something "political" (whatever that is) but try to depoliticize it as much as you can. It can also be just to gather people to ride a bike from here to there each week at a specific time. Can be to meet up at a playground at a specific time with kids, to eventually build trust so that some parents can trade off watching the kids. Can be a barber shop or hair salon where you go once a week at a particular time to chat and get a haircut.

You should definitely contact your elected representatives, here is how to do that. First find out who they are at the local, state and national level. Phone numbers, mailing addresses, emails, constituent offices addresses, don't forget school boards and every other elected decision maker at each level. Find online the ballot you had in this past election to see who's there. At the local level there may be at-large representatives. It will be different in each state. Then divide up who you will contact each day, start out with just one or two a day. Before you call, do a quick web search on the representative and see if there is anything in the news. Call and just introduce yourself and ask about the issue that was in the news or something else you care about. Just ask, you don't have to offer an opinion unless you want to. Be very polite. Try to get the name of the person who answered the phone or email. After a while, you will learn lots doing this, about who makes decisions about what. The main thing is to contact at a minimum one person each day and be polite. Go out of your way to thank representatives that do something even a little worthwhile, this can include just showing up somewhere and meeting with constituents. After you have done this for a few weeks and have developed some expertise, start to tell friends, and via social media. Encourage them to do what you are doing, advise, and coordinate.

Related to volunteering, don't bother if you are not going to do it every week or every day. Progressives particularly tend to view elections as a collection of partisan candidate races, and we just need to win those which leads us to do things like going out of state to knock on doors or phone banking. That's why we keep losing. We need to connect with people in a real way, build trust, and have conversations. Most of all build communities, and that means regular long term engagement. Maybe because people who vote Republican tend to be more "in-group" focused, they are often better and more focused on community building and maintenance. Progressives need to get better at that. Volunteering can be a great way to do that. Volunteer to work at a polling station. There are always a ton of places to volunteer, but make it somewhere that you will connect with a group you care about and want to connect with. There are two main ways to volunteer. One is a place that says publicly "we need volunteers" that place will have a big volunteer management system and basically needs warm bodies. Great, particularly if you enjoy it and it is interesting. But you can also reach out to somebody you respect or some smaller entity and say "I like what you are doing, how can I help?" They may not know what to do with that, but they may ask, "Who are you, and what can you offer?" That can lead to incredible things if you and they can find a way to work together in a way that builds trust and benefits each of you. But you have to be in it for the long term.

So just do something, anything, each day, every day. It doesn't need to be big or have a big goal, but if you do a little bit each day, it will grow, you'll see. As Pete Seeger said, “I’m against big things. I think the world is going to be saved by millions of small things.”

###