Discovering our piece of the puzzle

Mark Twain once said the two most important days of your life “are the day you are born and the day you find out why.”

I believe the “why” is connected to a “how”—your gift, what you are good at. I believe we each possess a unique and specific talent that we can use to make the world a better place for everyone, everywhere. No one can tell you what your talent is; you must discover it for yourself. I like to call this your “#SDGTalent.”

Most talents are best used locally, perhaps improving the life of just one person or small group of people. Sometimes you can take your local experiences and contribute to global solutions through social media and the internet. Sometimes you can reach out and inspire someone halfway around the globe to take the same actions you did to reach out and improve a life or situation locally. We each hold a piece of a giant puzzle, a puzzle that will never be solved or complete until each of us knows where we fit into the big picture.

We are each a dot in a constellation of possibilities. On our own, we can discover, refine, and contribute our talents to the greater good. But when we are inspired by others, learn from others, and join forces with others, we become an unstoppable movement. Social media enables and empowers us to connect with others across time and space, connecting the dots to form a picture of us as we were meant to be—an “us” without a “them.” When we have realized our collective potential as a human race, we will no longer need a “them” to blame for our problems. For ultimately there is no them, there is only us, currently 7.53 billion of us on a warm rock spinning through cold space, trying to figure things out.

So, let’s get busy and connect the dots.

(from the preface of Taking Action Online for the Environment, Social Justice and Sustainable Development. You can read the entire preface and the first few chapters for free by going to this link, and clicking on "Look inside."