Inspirational Words from Humanitarian Betty Williams

Gandhi, Mother Theresa, the Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso...a small handful of the people on this planet who have served humanity and, frankly, put the rest of us to shame (and rightly so). We cannot all be liberators and humanitarian machines, but I think we should desire to be so, to have the intention of doing good, to have the mindset of one who cares and wants to make a difference by improving understanding between cultures and religions, or by abolishing child slavery, or by working towards the end of mass starvation, even in some small way.

Added to the above list of ambassadors for humanity is Betty Williams. I admit I knew very little of her, until I saw and transcribed her interview on the new Canadian show, "Shameless Idealist" with host (and founder of Free the Children) Craig Kielburgur.

She is an inspiration, to say the least. Most importantly, she proves that anyone can, with courage and conviction, make an impact on current world issues.  

On Being a Woman - Mothers and Homemakers:

Williams has always, first and foremost, been a mother and homemaker, and I think she would agree that the  job (because that's what it is) of being a mother and homemaker is constantly undermined. The state of womanhood in general is undermined, as evidenced by cultures that even now mutilate women through female circumcision and refuse to give their female population equivalent pay to their male counterparts, or worse, the right to vote, or speak freely, or even be seen in public. But Williams, a mother and homemaker, is also a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate. How can anyone call a woman who won the Nobel Prize, who went door-to-door, and created a movement of mothers to stop violence in Northern Ireland,  just a housewife? 
She herself says, "you'll hear that term, and I've heard it referred to a lot. She's only an ordinary housewife. I have never met an ordinary housewife, have you?"
I think Betty Williams is a wonderful example of womanhood, of the strong and indomitable female spirit. She witnessed the slaughter of three innocent children before her very eyes, as they were mowed down by a car following an altercation during the period of ethno-political violence in Northern Ireland known as The Troubles.  

Williams confesses she has nothing against men. In fact, she loves them, but she also feels that there is a reason why women bear children, and not men. 
Beyond our physiognomy, there's a strength, a tenacious, resillient determination without which the act of motherhood would, I think, be unbearable. 
Being a woman, and being a mother, takes an unfathomable amount of fortitude, and courage. Especially because, according to Williams, "Every child killed in our world, every single child that dies of starvation or illnesses that can be prevented or in wars they don't declare, it's a mother's labour spurned. That's what it is, because from the day you become pregnant...the first thing your baby hears is your heart. You grow that child right under your heart. How dare anybody destroy that gift that God gave you to give life?"

Ultimately, she says, "It's as simple as that."
The states that the Bible "says 'Thou shalt not kill'. It doesn't say, 'but you can kill for this reason, or you can kill for that reason, or you can kill for the other reason.' It says, 'Thou shalt not kill.'"


On Making a Difference:
William has, since her heroic acts in Northern Ireland, gone on to fight for men, women and children around the world. She has, according to Craig Kielburger, taking on some of the most intractable conflicts in history. Some have in past called her actions futile, and claimed she could never bring peace to the Middle East.
When asked what she tells these people, she replies: "Get out of my way!...Because I'll tell you something. People who tell you that, are people who don't want to do anything. That's the truth.  The biggest killer in the world is apathy, or 'it's none of my business.'"


I have struggled with the idea of making a difference, of making an impact on current world issues. Mainly, I have no idea what I can do. Everything seems so big, and it is easy to think that anything I do will seem a feeble attempt. I always felt like I could make a huge difference, if only I had lots of money, or a well-known name! A young student broached this topic with Williams, and he is not alone in his sentiments. "Whenever I watch the news," he says, "it seems they always talk about war, violence, or poverty. I'd really like to do something to help, but I don't know where to start."
Williams replies that the "newspapers, and usually the television, they're all full of what went wrong in the world yesterday. Do a non-violent protest about the way the news is performing. Stop buying their newspapers." And, with cheek, "Hit them in the pocket!"
Interestingly, however, according to announcer Craig Kielburgur, Arch-Bishop Desmond Tutu sees the newspaper as "God's to-do list, delivered to our front doors every day."
Imagine if we only treated it as thus, what we could accomplish.


On Dreaming:
Announcer Craig Kielburgur then asks Williams, "do you think that we need more of those crazy dreams in our world?" 
After all, he states (and many would agree) that for the longest time, it was crazy to ever dream that peace would come to Northern Ireland. 
Williams suggests that everyone be an "absolute idealist, and when somebody tells you you're wrong, if you can non-violently spit in their eye, do it."


On Domestic Violence:
Williams says, once "I was only about 5 or 6 and I was a very difficult child, because I was a self-willed...And that day, my mother had a flying slipper."
She claims it "used to fly around corners, it was like a boomerang," and Williams "always seemed to get it in the back of the head: Oh God, here's Mummy's slipper again!"
This particular day, however, Williams had been particularly "naughty" and her mother claimed that she'd had enough of it. Her mother said: "Just you wait till your Daddy comes home."
Until this time, Williams claims she had never been afraid of her father. But, as her mother began to list all of Williams trangressions on a piece of paper, she became terrified. "So," she says, "I ran up the hall, Daddy was coming up the path, I could hear him, and I ran up the hall and got behind the coats in the hall...didn't realize my Daddy could see my feet, you know."
He came into the house, and proceeded to wash his hands. "My mother started to tell him everything I'd done that day...and my mother said to him, 'Jordy, you're gonna have to do something about our Betty. She was really, really impossible.' And Daddy said, 'Well Margaret, what do you suggest I do?'"
Betty's mother thought that maybe they should smack her. 
And here Williams shares the best part: "And my Daddy said, 'Have I ever smacked you?' She said, 'No, certainly not.' He said, [then] 'Why would I smack something smaller than you?'


On Raising Caring, Peaceful Children:
"Love them, love them, love them, and show it 24/7," Williams instructs. To do this, she stands firmly behind hugs. To raise children with the ability to love, and care, and strive for peace, we need to give them "hugs, and hugs, and hugs, and hugs and tell them every day: I love you." She claims her son actually asked her to stop telling him she loved him, because she said it so often. She replied, "I can't." She adds: "My father used to wake us up to make sure that we knew he hugged us before we went to bed. It was really annoying, you know. You'd be in a fast sleep and he'd wake you up to give you a hug."


On Anger:
It's easy, I think, to feel discouraged. No matter how objectively we look upon the issues facing the world today, we are all affected and cannot help but feel affected in some way. For some, as I've already mentioned, a feeling of helplessness sneaks in, and it seems as if nothing we do, no matter how great or how small, could ever make a measurable difference. Others become resigned, apathetic. Others still become angry. 
For instance, it makes me angry that Sun Chips have discontinued their noisy compostible chip bag...due to public complaints. Ok, so compared to other issues plaguing mankind, this is a little petty, but seriously! How are we ever going to reverse global warming and pollution, if having a quiet chip bag is more important than reducing landfill waste?!! Grow up, consumers. But I don't act on my anger...I might complain that Sun Chips has messed up priorities and should have stood firm in their resolve to help the environment. But I would never become violent. Sadly, this is not the case for all. There is so much retaliation in the world...this "eye for an eye" mentality that just gets us further from peace than we were in the first place. 
Williams too admits to such feelings of anger, but she is not a slave to those emotions. Rather, she uses her emotions for good. She says: "His Holiness [the Dalai Lama] has taught me how to transfer anger, how to take the anger I feel and turn it into something productive, instead of something destructive. Because anger is so destructive. But if you can keep the energy of anger, and turn it into something good...It took me a long time to learn that, you know."


On Fear:
Announcer Craig Kielburger asks Williams, regarding the period during which she fought for peace in Northern Ireland, "how did you overcome the fear that was so pervasive at that time?"
She was working against terrorists, and there were times when she received death threats. 
Williams replies: "I refused to live in fear, I just simply refused...I threw it away and I said listen: fear is contagious. But so is courage."

I was deeply moved by her accounting of loss within her own family. She describes her Aunty Bridie's son...pre-med, handsome, smart. Catholic. He worked in a pub to help put himself through the long and intensive schooling required for him to become a doctor.

One evening he came home from work and fell into his mother's arms, a bullet-hole cross etched over his chest by an automatic rifle. 

When the media so callously and cold-heartedly asks Bridie how she feels following her son's death, she says:

"I'm so glad I'm the mother of Danny, and not the mother of the man who killed him." 

Inspiration:

I think of Betty Williams when I become frustrated with the world...when I hear of political agendas becoming more important than keeping children from starving, or from providing them with helpful medications. Sometimes I can't believe how callous we as human beings have become. When did life, any life, become expendible?  

Here I am in my little bubble...safe from most of the pain in the world. Here I am feeling helpless, and useless...but if Betty Williams is able to rise up and make such a difference in the world, who is to say that I can't do it too? The same goes for all of us. We just have to make the effort, and believe that we can make a change for the better.

Starved for Attention: What Will You Do?

I held a newborn baby this week who was only 8 hours old. I've never had children, and as the baby in most situations haven't had much opportunity to hold a newborn, so for me it was a big deal. He had perfect little fingers, miniature, robust, wrinkly reproductions of adult hands with perfect little finger nails.
Then, I saw this picture, this African hand so frail and far from the lusty vigour of its Canadian counterpart, and I wondered: how do we let this happen?
It's Thanksgiving, and the turkey is in the oven. Nothing elaborate this year...in fact, we've opted for the bone-in, pre-stuffed turkey breast option this year, since it's just the three of us (my parents and I). My husband is half a world away, and my brother chose to partake of what I can only imagine is a more organic celebration with his girlfriend on one of the gulf islands. Still, even our toned down feast comes replete with pumpkin pie, yams covered with brown sugar, butter and pecans, and homemade pucker-perfect cranberry sauce. And this, after a $200 dinner the night before at a gourmet restaurant!
I can't help but feel a sense of guilt as I eat. Here I am again, gorging myself on food, when around the world there are people emaciated with hunger, little children with aching, distended bellies subsiding on a few piddly mouthfuls (if that) a day. And I think, how often have I thought this, how often have I said this exact same thing, and how often have I actually done anything about it?
We all do it...we're aware of what's going on in the world. In an effort to seem more humane and less...spoiled...we tell our children not to waste an entire apple just because it has a bruise: "A child in Africa would be thankful to have that, bruise and all."
In some places in the world, we purposely leave food on our plates, essentially wasting it, because it's polite. We wouldn't want the chef to think he'd underfed us, now, would we? I always thought this particular pratice rather funny...I have very vivid memories of eating dinner with my best friend at 12 years of age, who happened to be Australian. At their house, you ate everything that you were dished up. My brother and I were sickeningly full the first evening we were there, but learned to eat with our stomachs, and not our eyes.
So, many of us have some sort of practice in place to reduce waste, either with table manners or composting or both. But how many of us do anything beyond? How many times have I thought about poverty and starvation in a place like India, and what have I done about it? Zilch. Nothing. I eat extravagant food, and I'm the first to admit that despite my childhood lessons to do otherwise, I pick off the bruises on my apples, and I still take too much and then don't eat it because my eyes were bigger than my stomach.
I AM the reason children are dying in 3rd world countries. I have everything I need, so I wince and whine about our foreign policy and lack of efforts as a nation to combat starvation in war- or plague- or drought-ravished areas, but that's as far as it goes. I'm complacent.
I think it's great that celebrities are out there, donating their money and their time to making a difference. Oprah, for example, has donated millions of her own personal fortune to charity, although sometimes I have to wonder about the selflessness of a woman who chooses to put her own portrait on the cover of every single issue of her magazine...a little narcissistic? The band Bedouin Soundclash advertised over CBC Radio that they would give away a trip to India for their Mumbai concert to some lucky fan who donated through their website to Unicef's efforts. And now, they even have awards for celebrities who donate their time and money. Case in point: the Bob Hope Charity Award, given this year to George Clooney at the Emmys. What a funny culture we live in...
When I think about creating great story in my life, I think about finding value. We all find value in different things, but in the end, for me, value will come from feeling as if my life mattered, as if I did something beyond myself and my little bubble of existence that made a difference to someone "out there".
As I eat my turkey this evening, I will be very thankful for all that I have. I have parents who love me, and a wonderful husband that I adore (even despite the fact that we are not together for the holidays this year), and friends who bring me joy and share with me the wonders of life as they bring their children into the world...and I will be thankful for my food, and will waste not one morsel if I can help it.
But I also want to share my sense of thankfuless, and that involves giving.

I received in the mail this week an action kit from Doctors Without Borders, called "Starving for Attention," aimed at getting action started at a local level to raise funds and awareness of starvation in Africa. My stomach twists in knots over the casualties of western bureaucracy, mostly young children who are dying of hunger because of politics and the fact that we just can't seem to figure our crap out. I think it's time to at least try to do something about it. Last year, my students put on a drama production that raised $600 in relief following the earthquake in Haiti. We raised awareness, and did something to address the issues that came up as a result of the earthquake.
I've always taken my own thankfulness for granted, but I've always had something to be thankful for. I am thankful for life, but not everyone can say the same. If I were living on the street, a woman who has known nothing but abuse and violence, would I be thankful? If I were a child with nothing to eat, with parents dying or dead of AIDS, would I be thankful? I want to share my state of thankfulness, to raise someone to a place where he/she can feel thankful too, and that requires taking some initiative, getting out there and doing something about it. So, tonight, I'll open up my action kit, and see how I can help.
What will you do?

Journey over Destination

per·spec·tive  /pərˈspektiv/

-noun (pl. -s)

1. A view or prospect.

2. A particular attitude toward or way of 
regarding something; a point of view.

3. True understanding of the relative importance 
of things; a sense of proportion.

I've been staring at the TV on the ceiling of my dentist's office too many times this year...first the elusive cavity that made eating ice cream an exercise in tongue acrobatics -- I might as well have eaten with my head sideways for all that it was effective in stopping my tooth from throwing a tantrum -- and then the half-accomplished (half-failed?) root canal and the astronomical bill to get it finished by someone who actually knew what he was doing. Now the tooth is "compromised." I'd always fantasized about the idea of wearing a crown (why moon over an A-list actor when you can drool over a prince?!), but I'd hoped to see it on my head, not my tooth.
What is it that always brings us back to these places? Not literally the dentist's office -- I know why I go there, and how to prevent going there too! But what is it that brings us down, into these places where we're forced to look up, reaching for something that always seems just out of grasp? Whenever I sink into these pits, I feel cheated of story in my life. I feel dull, bland, problematic.
Some would call it the pit of despair, I suppose. It's the place where you go when life just has a hankering for making things get hairy. A dark place, where you lack control, and hope, and the belief that you could ever have enough chutzpah to get out of it.
That's the amazing thing about perspective though...just when you see your life as really going down the sinker, you get a chance to look at it in a different way.
When I was growing up, my grandparents lived in the South End (insert quintessential horror chord here). It had its seedy bits and had an overall run-down air, a place where a desperate person could (and in my grandmother's case, did) steal in from the back alley-way while you were gardening out front and abscond your wedding ring right from your jewelry box. My cousin and I, both under 12 at the time, walked to 7-11 for penny candy and gawked at ladies standing on corners wearing what my grandmother called "inappropriate attire," and one day we encountered a group of locals walking, police-escorted, up and down the street with signs, shouting in protest against pimps and johns and the drug-trade. So the city blocked the streets. Now, we still have pimps and johns and the drug-trade, and it's impossible to get anywhere in a direct line.

This past month, however, I ended up gliding through the sky over Georgia Strait, looking down from a sea plane on this same seedy area, thinking how incredibly majestic it looked. Gone was the dirt and grit from my street view. As the sun set beyond my window in the cabin, I had this Grecian vision of Day kissing Night, and suffusing the world in this otherworldly, titian glow so that all below became a tiny, perfect world in miniature.
I realize in these moments that my problems = small potatoes. When I'm down, it's so easy to dwell on the grit in my life. I get so incredibly disheartened when my life is difficult, and bland, and without story. I have to force myself to see it in a different way. I met a woman a few weekends ago whose reality spanked my bottom into a state of thankfulness. Not only had she lost one of her three children, but she herself had fought cancer three times. Here I am despairing over money, over plans gone awry and achy teeth and indecision and lack of excitement while she, who has gone to hell and back, lives and breathes hope and gratefulness and contentment. Not to downplay my own existence or the challenges I meet within it -- I have a legitimate right to say "oh pooh" now and then and feel like someone, at least, should cry me a river -- but I think it is important to think "from without" and dwell more on what's great instead of what sucks the big toe (as my husband would say).
My own problems always seem so epic, nearly insurmountable at times, but when seen in comparison to the problems plaguing other people around the world, my own issues seem rather insignificant.

Life is a story. Conflict is story. When a character gets beat up in a novel, it is still part of the story. Thing is, the character uses that low moment to rise up and do something better, be something better. As I've said before: we must experience the bitter in order to truly appreciate the sweet. We just have to remember what it feels like during the sweet times, to remind ourselves during the bitter times that better exists.
With my newly-discovered, or at least newly-recovered sense of proportion, the pits I occasionally sink into are no longer as despairing as they were before. Today I woke feeling, where the heck am I going right now? What am I accomplishing? And instead of stewing in a vat of my own pity, I know that this low point will only serve to make me strive harder for something great, and how sweet it will be when I get there! A healthy sense of proportion, or perspective, gives me hope; it reminds me that great story, and living a great story, isn't just about the destination but also the journey that gets you there.