Don't just do something! Sit there!*

*quote from a Zen funny guy...

In this post: action vs. talk, value of both, intention of ASGB, Social Action Forum

The ASBG was started because I wanted to talk with smart, interesting people about Yunus' work. I also kept meeting people that I felt like should meet each other and the group idea seemed to work for both scenarios - interesting discussion and connecting people.

When you get a group of energetic, passionate people in the same room talking about really Big Ideas, there is a natural desire to "do something". We had a series of discussions around what to "do" and its possible that some feel we are not doing enough.

I understand that.

What draws me to Yunus' work is that it is so practical in its applications - while others theorized about how to bring the bottom half (in terms of income) of the population into the economy, he has been doing it for 20 years via his work with microcredit. Now he's at it again, proposing an evolutionary change for capitalism as a whole.

All talk, ? action

Yunus' ideas about social business as a new dimension of capitalism are new to us and it makes sense that they would be discussed and debated prior to action. He has actually been talking about capitalism's next steps for several years - I saw him at a talk at the LBJ school in 2003, before he won the Nobel Prize, there were maybe 20 students in attendance. Later, he wrote his book, and it has spurred conversations all over the world.

Meeting and discussing Big Ideas creates an energy that has stand-alone value, whether the result is an immediately actionable project or not. I think the people that have attended our meetings would back me up on that.

In addition, there are some people in our group that are actively involved in social business experiments. Part of the reason I started the blog was to lift up their activities to the group and beyond.

For 2009, I'd like to explore creating a Social Action Forum and how we may create one or more of them here in Austin. More on that soon in an upcoming post.

My ongoing intention for the group is to facilitate a meeting space and if needed provide a framework for conversation, but not to "lead" the group per se. My personal intention is to practice enjoying the process and to not become attached to forcing an outcome that does not evolve naturally from the group's collective ideas.

Thanks to all of you for what you do!

Best,
Kala