John Graham - Stick Your Neck Out: A Street-Smart Guide to Creating Change in Your Community and Beyond

PREFACE

I WROTE THIS book because I care about the future of our communities and our planet. I wrote it because I have the experience to help solve the public problems that challenge us; Ive had failures that have taught me which paths not to take, and successes that have confirmed the ideas and actions that work.

Three key ideas anchor this book:

• Courageous and compassionate people can solve any problems and meet any challenges, in their communities and in the world.
• The surest path to a meaningful life is serviceacting for the common good.
• The key to success on this path is balancehead and heart, trust and street smarts, passion and professionalism, reflection and action.

As a young man, I didnt have these ideals or ideas. A Foreign Service Officer for the first 15 years of my professional life, I dealt with conflicts and chaos in the Third World, ignoring the suffering I saw and savoring the adventures. I cultivated a John Wayne image that I really thought was who I was. Then a battle in Vietnam forced me to confront the irresponsibility and shallowness of my life. Gradually I began to change. At the United Nations I finally learned that I could use my skills and experience to build peace and justice rather than their opposites.x

I left the Foreign Service in 1980 and began creating a series of workshops helping others to create positive political change in their communities and beyond. In 1983 I merged this work with the Giraffe Heroes Project, an international nonprofit founded the year before by Ann Medlock, a New York writer and editor. Ann was convinced that, in a society grown apathetic and cynical, telling people the stories of real heroes was a powerful way to inspire them to stick their own necks out for the common good. She was right.

The projects strategy was and is simple: We find people already acting with courage and compassion to solve important public problems, and then get the stories of these Giraffes told over radio and television and in print. That publicity brings Giraffes attention, support, andin the case of some Giraffes who are challenging powerful institutionsprotection.

But the most important purpose of telling the stories of Giraffes is to move others to follow their lead. People hear or see these compelling stories and are inspired to take action on problems important to them. Since 1990 the project also has been using Giraffe stories as the basis for programs for schools, moving young people to lives of courage, compassion, and active citizenship. Theres a vast amount of information about this work on the Giraffe Heroes Project Web site (www.giraffe.org).

Youll find stories of Giraffes throughout this booka sampling of the many hundreds weve honored so far. Giraffes are men, women, and kids, from many races, religions, and backgrounds. Theyre truck drivers, students, retirees, artists, waitresses, doctors, home-makers, businesspeople, and teachers. Giraffes are working on just about every problem you can think of, from poverty to gang violence to environmental pollution. Theyre people like

• Casey Ruud, a safety inspector who put his job on the line when he refused to ignore glaring threats to public safety at the Hanford nuclear plant (see sidebar, page 82);
• Ernesto Neto Villareal, a high school kid in Idaho who led a campaign to stop racist insults in his school and community (see sidebar, page 8);
• Andy and Vashti Hurst, who walked away from a comfortable life to fight poverty, disease, and injustice on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation (see sidebar, page 10).

Giraffes are not supermen or superwomen, and theyre certainly not saints. Theyre ordinary people who see a problem and decide to do something about it, despite the risks and obstacles.xi

At the Giraffe Heroes Project we recognize that inspiration is often not enough, so we provide practical tools that help people translate their inspiration into focused, successful actions. To create these tools, we expanded the three ideas that anchor this book into a set of strategies and techniques that can help anyone make a difference.

Ive tested and refined these tools myself, as a diplomat at the United Nations, as an environmental activist helping forge common-ground solutions in land-use battles in the Pacific Northwest, and now as a peacemaker in the Middle East and Africa. Ive taught many people how to use these tools in more than 20 years of speeches and workshops for communities, cities, issue groups, companies, government agencies, universities, and labor unions. Now Ive put them into this book.

This book is for people who see problems in their communities or beyond and want to help solve them. Its written for people with a wide range of experience and skill:

• If youre concerned about a public problem but dont have a lot ofor even anyexperience to take it on, this book can inspire you to get started, build your skills, guide your steps, and serve as a ready reference.