Are you aware of the huge wave of progress underway in the world; one that you are already a part of? Without realizing it, you are changing the dialogue about our world.
The negative dialogue about our times is not keeping up with reality. We’re going to tell you why, point you to some of the thought leaders that will inspire you about our future, and tell you how you can get your friends similarly inspired!
Why the world isn’t a dumpster fire!
Contrary to what your television, radio, and social media are saying, there is a quiet but powerful movement happening around the globe. In the course of our work here at Ever Widening Circles, we’ve discovered something awe-inspiring: for nearly every major problem our world faces today there are people going uncelebrated solving them.
Almost daily we find ourselves excitedly telling our coworker about an inspiring project or are moved to tears by the work of a passionate individual. We are privileged every day to walk into work and shine a spotlight on the people hard at work making our collective future better.
If everything’s so great, why do I feel so much anger and anxiety about the world?
Let’s take a minute to ask ourselves some really important questions: Why do so many of us know the names of mass murderers, and many of Hitler’s monstrous generals, but we do not know the names of the people who hid Anne Frank’s family?
Why is it that we know about awful crime rates and the stories of war but not the numbers that point to progress and the magnificent stories of rebuilding?
The Harvard Professor and psychologist, Steven Pinker, has studied some of the reasons for our feelings of collective overwhelm and pessimism even in the face of such incredible human progress. When learning of our #ConspiracyOfGoodnesss movement, he made some wonderful comments on Twitter about it! Take a few minutes to let Professor Pinker transform your worldview in this short video. He has some incredible points worth remembering:
Progress has become “normal” and “normal” isn’t newsworthy! Think about the last time you shared a neutral story. It’s hard to get excited about a steady decline in poverty when there is a much catchier story that grabs our attention about a massive health crisis.
What if we were to find a way to celebrate these small wins, and make them awe-inspiring?
You know when you see people acting to make lives or the future brighter for others. When you smile because you notice a random act of kindness. If you are moved to share a video because it fills you with hope and brings you to tears. When you are excited to volunteer or be a part of a movement you care about.
All of those moments point to a movement we’re calling the Conspiracy of GoodnessTM.
The Conspiracy of GoodnessTM is made up of stories both big and small, of courage, ingenuity, and generosity.
This notion of a Conspiracy of Goodness is powerful. To truly appreciate it, we need to appreciate the awe-inspiring history of that phrase.
Recently, we were speaking to a thought leader for an article and they mentioned the phrase Conspiracy of Goodness, and the ground below our feet shifted. Those three words described exactly what our team at Ever Widening Circles had been observing.
So we dug into the origin of that phrase and heard the following story:
During World War II, the community of Le Chambon, France saved 3,500 Jews (many of them orphaned children) from the Nazis. Without any formal organization and at great risk to their own lives, the villagers managed to conceal thousands of strangers for several years. In fact, there were countless rescuers like this all over Europe during the war.
Decades later, in 1987, a Rabbi was giving a talk about that chapter in history and recounted, “Once, when I was speaking of the ‘conspiracy of evil’ in WWII: a Dutch rescuer asked me why I never spoke of the ‘conspiracy of goodness.’ The rescuer went on to add, “Do you think I could have hidden Jewish families in my home without the active cooperation of the mailman, milkman, and the neighbors? For every one person saved, there were seven who rescued. There was a conspiracy of goodness.” 2
“It takes the energy of a community to bring about the most important change.”
We can change our shared future if we are all part of a wave to celebrate and point to the Conspiracy of GoodnessTM that is all around us!
What if we were to make the people and organization moving us steadily towards progress “newsworthy”? What could happen if we were to recognize when we were excited or moved by the actions of others and took time to thank them, recognize them, and share their stories?
We have the choice of what we give our attention to!
This is our 1,000th article to publish on Ever Widening Circles. That’s a win for everyone because 5 years ago we set out to write exclusively about all the insight and innovation getting lost in the chaos of the web and we never ran out of material!
We’ve learned first hand that there are people across the globe, very often working in obscurity, not for fame or glory, to make the world a better place.
And we’ve noticed something. For ourselves and our readers, knowing about these individuals acting in the Conspiracy of Goodness makes us happier, less stressed, and more likely to see the world for how it really is: in a state of progress.
So, now, here are some of the stories, creators, and organizations we can celebrate and share when we are feeling overwhelmed by the seeming state of the world!
Stories worth sharing!
A Thought Leader Seeing without Eyes
Let’s start with a close friend of Ever Widening Circles, Daniel Kish. As an infant, he lost both eyes to cancer, and yet he travels the world unaccompanied because he has adapted to seeing with a kind of natural sonar. Dr. Lynda has talked with him as he navigated O’hare airport and taken long walks through new neighborhoods, all while discussing what possibility could look like for the blind community if we celebrated the remarkability our brains have to navigate even the most seemingly insurmountable obstacles.
Leadership is for Everyone
Want to change the world for others with a sentence or two? Drew Dudley is a thought leader who has mastered the next concept in everyday leadership philosophy. Imagine a world where co-workers, strangers, leaders, and learners were on the same page when it comes to bringing out the best in each other with one simple notion. Here’s our article about Drews latest insight. Drop into this wonder from his renown TED Talk…
Organizations Reframing our Answers
Inventing with “Practical Compassion”
One of the earliest friends to Ever Widening Circles was the founder of an amazing organization called The Shoe That Grows. Their founder, Kenton Lee, has an inspiring story that comes from a simple but powerful observation while on after-college volunteer experience in Africa. From there, a spark ignited a fire and now, in only four years, they have worked with 2400 partners to distribute over 250,000 pairs of The Shoe That Grows to kids in over 100 countries! In fact, the support was so great that there is now a way to buy the shoes for our own kids in an effort called Grow Five!
Using Old Cellphones to Save the Rainforest
The Rainforest Connection has found a way to take something we all have laying in a junk drawer – our old cell phones- and ingeniously repurposing them to save Rainforest. We met Topher White, founder of RFCX, at our favorite conference, PopTech. (Check them out if you are passionate about innovative thinking.) Topher is just exactly the kind of person you would entrust to champion this cause: super nice, tireless, well-spoken and always interested in making sure his effort include local communities in the best possible way.
How You and I Can Become Space Archeologists!
GlobalXplorer is changing the way we see human history, literally. Sarah Parcak, the founder of GlobalXplorer, pioneered a way to use satellite images to see signs of human intervention in the landscape all over our planet. Many of her discoveries so far will make re-writing the history books a necessity! You can even join their efforts searching for and protecting archeological treasures!
The Creators and Journalists Capturing the Movement
Turning YouTube into a Platform for Learning
It’s not just thought leaders that are making the #ConspiracyofGoodness possible. There is an incredible network of creators, videographers, and reporters hard at work shining a spotlight on undercelebrated insights and innovations. Take, for instance, PBS Digital Studios. With shows like It’s Okay to Be Smart, Eons, BrainCraft, and Physics Girl to name a few, they are making science, culture, and art accessible to the masses through a family of YouTube channels. Their content is an incredible place to find yourself saying “Why didn’t I know this!” And waking through the world feeling more empowered with knowledge!
Catalyzing Buzzfeed Viewers to Action
If you’ve followed BuzzfeedVideo over the past few years you have probably seen Auri before. Auri Jackson has created some of Buzzfeed’s most successful videos covering all angles of sustainability. If racking up tens of millions of viewers wasn’t enough, her work has gone beyond the world of the internet. She has empowered people to ask for change at the government level, given us all practical tips on how we can consume less waste, and has generally made living sustainably approachable for everyone. Visionaries using enormous platforms like Buzzfeed to help educate and empower people from all walks of life are a critical part of changing our shared future for the better!
Telling the Stories the World Needs to Hear
When we first ran into Great Big Story they were just starting out on YouTube. We remember watching their videos early on and thinking to ourselves “how do they only have 10,000 subscribers?! How do people not know about them?!” Now, with over 3.5Million subscribers they are still producing some of our favorite content out there! By taking us to corners of the globe we’ve never seen before, and profiling the thought leaders big and small having an enormous impact on their community, they are producing content that is changing the quality and perspective of media far beyond the web.
Helping us Enjoy the Daily Wonders We Encounter
What about the people who make life possible? The people and the history of food as well as the cultures that surround it? The fabulous creators at True Food TV are shining a spotlight on some unexpected corners of the world… our plates! With episodes covering the history of blueberries (surprise, it’s a remarkably diverse backstory) to the ways in which chickpeas have exploded into a global culture, their work makes us appreciate our food so much more.
Explore more of the articles we’ve published featuring those acting inside the Conspiracy of Goodness by visiting this circle:
Know anybody else? It’s time for you to get involved!
We are starting a movement shine a spotlight on the people, creators, and organizations working towards a brighter collective future. With #ConspiracyofGoodness we want people to share stories, and celebrate the people you think are making the world a better place!
#ConspiracyofGoodness: When we point to others who are making the world a better place for everyone, in ways large and small, we all win!
Visit the Conspiracy of Goodness page!
Why use #ConspiracyofGoodness?
This brings us back to the work of Steven Pinker. When we are faced with a consistent story-line that the world is negative, we will believe it to be so. Our brains actually have a quirk that leaves us towards believing a probability of an event is higher if it comes to mind easier. 3 So, if we have more mental images of bad than good in front of us and they come to mind easier, we will believe they occur far more frequently.
By mentioning the Conspiracy of Goodness when you hear people starting on a downward spiral conversation, you generate a new discussion about the state of the world. Giving yourself, and your friends, a more accurate outlook on the progress happening!
Every month we send out a collective donation — made up of $1 to $20 donations from Patrons — to an organization tackling the problem we’ve highlighted in that month’s edition of The Conspiracy Chronicles. Head over to our Patreon to learn more!
Your click is your vote!
The web is based on an attention economy. Every single click we make is being counted by someone. It’s a pretty simple system: whatever we click on, we get more of, as individuals and as a global community.
Good or bad, it makes no difference. A click is a vote that says, “Yes, please. Definitely give me more of this!”
If we click on web content that has roots in fear, anger or acrimony — even if it is just out of curiosity or boredom — then we will get more of that. And that’s exactly what’s happened to propagate this negative narrative about our times. But the reverse is true too! And that’s where the magic occurs for growing this Conspiracy of Goodness.
If we share, shout out, and click on the folks who are making the world a better place for everyone, we will get more of that and our future will finally turn a corner. It’s just that simple.
Click on their content. Send them a small donation. Choose them when shopping. They are already out there. We just need to support them with #ConspiracyofGoodness, all that we can.
- When you are excited about the good happening in the world, share it!
- If you’re proud of the people in your life making difference, spread the word.
- When you are moved by an act of kindness, share the story.
This is how we will change the dialogue about our future. This is how we will make progress. Our best solutions arise when we see infinite possibility, not we are confronted with a hopeless future.
Celebrating the #ConspiracyofGoodness around us will ensure that those solutions are found.
Conspire for good!
-Dr. Lynda & the Ever Widening Circles Team
Join the conversation over on Facebook!
Become a member of the Conspiracy of Goodness group to connect with likeminded individuals and learn more about the people, businesses, and organizations working to make the world a better place for everyone!
Notes:
- Freethink. “Steven Pinker Makes the Case for Optimism | Freethink.” YouTube, Freethink, 30 Oct. 2018, www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6JFr7QIkLE. Accessed 19 Apr. 2019. ↩
- Schulweis, Harold M. “Conspiracy of Goodness: An Untold Story.” The Harold M. Shulweis Institute , 2016,
hmsi.info/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/another-witness-the-conspiracy-of-godness.pdf . Accessed 15 Apr. 2019. ↩ - Pinker, Steven. “The Media Exaggerates Negative News. This Distortion Has Consequences | Steven Pinker.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 17 Feb. 2018, www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/feb/17/steven-pinker-media-negative-news. Accessed 19 Apr. 2019. ↩
