Don’t get me wrong – the organization that I traveled with does great work and I feel fortunate to be affiliated with them. I’ll talk more about their work soon, but for now I just want to share my general impressions.

I’ve travelled to nearly 30 countries around the world – about half of those countries were developing countries where people endure poverty levels that don’t exist in the Western world.

Of all the countries that I have seen Haiti is the one most needing of help.

Whether people are living in mansions with personal assistants attending to their every whim, or they are starving on the streets with no clue where their next meal will come from, I believe that people are fundamentally the same. That was my big take away so far from travelling the world.

We all have similar desires, instincts and basic needs. We want to laugh, we do not want to worry about money and food and shelter, we want to feel loved and productive and respected, and we want to simultaneously feel unique and universal. This applies as much to Haitians as it does to Americans as it does to Africans and Asians and South Americans and everyone else.

The poverty I saw in Haiti was alarming. There were larger populations of homeless children living on the streets than I ever had seen. The streets were turned into literal landfills with discarded waste piling up in massive heaps. When the heaps got to be too large people were hired to wade through the trash (some barefoot) and move it to another location.

The number of hungry people is among the highest I have ever seen. One of the functions of the organization that I was working with is to provide milk to small children in need. When I spoke to one of the coordinators she told me that some of these kids will only have that one glass of milk and a small meal all day long with nothing else to eat.

Their national palace -the Haitian equivalent of America’s White House – was literally cracked in half from the earthquake in 2010. The infrastructure was in disrepair – I was literally sore after a long car ride from bumping up and down on the roads.

When we look at Haiti to begin addressing the problems, we have to understand their roots. Full disclosure – I am not an expert on Haitian politics or Haitian development. However I have asked numerous experts why Haiti has suffered so much and here were the most common answers:

• Government corruption
• Dependence upon NGOs
• Politicians using poverty as a political tool
• An unfortunate relationship to natural disasters and public health

What I took away from my trip to Haiti and what I’m hoping readers will take away: this is a country that needs our help. Such phenomenal poverty should not exist on earth. And yet, it does.

What sucked about my trip to Haiti was that I was forced to confront something incredibly painful: there are people -people exactly like you and I – on our planet living in crippling poverty, who suffer every single day from hunger, neglect, and hopelessness. And if we do nothing, nothing will change.

We have a responsibility to help. In my next article I’ll be discussing ways in which we can.

I think I’ll discuss the trip in three parts.

The first part, below is a collection of the 12 photos that best captured what I saw. The second part will be a narrative of the experience. And the third part will be an analysis of what we can do to help.

I am not a great photographer so please keep the following in mind as you look at these photos:

1) The earthquake the rocked Haiti took place in January of 2010. These photos were taken in April of 2012.

2) Had the fates dealt the cards ever so slightly differently you and I could be living in Haiti.

When I think about this trip I’m reminded of a few important things – most notably, why I bother volunteering at all.

I’d like to share my reasons. Though they are deeply personal, I believe they are also universal. I believe that you too can make your life and the lives of others better through service.

1) The world that we live in is a world plagued with unnecessary suffering.

In the United States 1 in 5 children are living in poverty. Millions of people in East Africa need significant help as they recover from a recent famine. On top of that every single continent is plagued with violent conflict and all of this – it’s just the tip of the iceberg.

If we do nothing, nothing will change. 

While one person cannot save the entire world, one person can make a positive difference in the lives of other individuals and small groups. You make that difference by volunteering.

2) It’s fulfilling.

Personally, it’s easy for me to get trapped in the material world. I want an ultrabook to replace my laptop, a cooler phone, and a bigger apartment.

Despite my desire, I know that none of those things will truly satisfy me; there will always be a sleeker computer, a cooler phone, and an even larger apartment to desire once I have grown accustom to what I have.

However I have found that when I orient part of my life towards helping others, I create meaning and satisfaction that is otherwise lacking. If you get into the habit of helping others this will happen to you too.

Service is fulfilling because we are investing in a life outside of our own. We foster human connection and brush against creating a life bigger than our own physical boundaries.

We are all caught in the throes of one of the hardest economies most living people have seen. In times like this it’s easy to turn inwards and be less generous. I urge you to turn outwards and spend time helping others. Doing so will build a better world and unlock personal happiness. It is a true win-win; only good is created.

Your next steps?

Find time to give back. You don’t have to take on a global project – the unfortunate reality is that your local community almost assuredly has problems that need volunteer support. Find a cause that’s close to your heart and spend a few hours making a difference. Doing so will improve our world, and your life.

The first step to getting a great job with an NGO (or any organization really) is to understand what they need and how you can help them get that. One thing that virtually every NGO needs: funds.

Become a fundraising ninja

If you want to get job offers from a wide variety of NGOs then take the time to become a master fundraiser. Don’t worry, this is easier than it sounds – it just requires an intelligent approach and a bit of experience.

First, read a book or two on sales. The tools of the master salesman are the exact same as the tools of the master fundraiser. Personally, I like Jeffrey Gitomer’s approach.

Next, sign up for a few local fundraisers. Consider running a 5k, doing a dance marathon, purchasing a ticket for an event held by a non-profit, or creating your own fundraiser for a charity you love.

Now fundraise your heart out. Blend social media, networking, and corporate sponsorship into your fundraising efforts.

Your goal is to raise as much money for the cause as you possibly can. You should aim to be in the top three individual fundraisers. If you’re not, figure out how to get there on your next campaign. Ask the top fundraiser what he or she did correctly and then emulate their approach.

After you’ve gone through this process at least once start approaching the NGOs that you love and want to work for.

Don’t bother sending an application, they get a million of those. Instead find the contact info of the most powerful person at the NGO and contact her. Politely follow-up every ten business days until she responds.

Explain that you really believe in their work and want to support them by joining their fundraising team as an employee. Ask who you should speak with at the NGO and explain your experience rocking local fundraisers and how you want to use those skills to serve the NGO.

NGOs are always on the market for talented fundraisers. If you take the time to become one, doors will start opening.

The most common answer: “Ummm, I don’t know.”

I’m not surprised. Modern leadership theory is muddled with contradictions, double-speak, and ideas that were more relevant before an uber-connected modernity became the norm for business, education, and non-profits.

In the following months, I will begin publicly working on Ignited Leadership’s Leadership Manifesto through my newsletter (you can sign up here) and blog. If you follow along you will learn how to develop the skills and perspective of a modern leader.

Lets begin with the definition: a good leader is someone who proactively helps other people. I discussed this recently in a guest post over here.

Below are the attributes that I consider essential for modern leaders [Note: this list itself is a work in progress and will be periodically updated  – if you have suggestions for additional attributes I would love to hear from you in the comments section].

the 12 Attributes of a modern leader

1. Modern leaders believe that there is serious work to be done. They look at the norm and have a problem with all of the needless suffering in our local and global communities. Modern leaders want to tackle problems ranging from quality of life in the workplace through eradicating malaria, HIV/AIDS, environmental degredation, and poverty.
2. Modern leaders believe that the best way to build a better world is by creating and becoming better leaders. Without good leaders taking action now, nothing will change.
3. A modern leader possesses both local and global perspectives.
4. Modern leaders believe that the first step to changing the world is changing themselves. They understand that external change cannot take place until internal change has occurred.
5. A modern leader knows when to follow.
6. A modern leader is dedicated to dreaming big, refusing failure, and choosing to test the limits of what is and is not possible for herself instead of allowing society to dictate the limits.
7. A modern leader asks a lot of questions and then listens.
8. A modern leader is a servant. This doesn’t mean they are necessarily consensus seeking or in the habit of using democratic decision making. Instead it means that their decisions are rooted in the question, “Is this life affirming for myself and the people I’m leading?” and only proceeding if the answer is yes.
9. A modern leader is adept at leaving his comfort zone.
10. A modern leader has a sharp understanding of the importance of honesty; both with herself and with the people she is leading. She knows how to encourage honesty in others.
11. A modern leader periodically disconnects from the mania of modernity so that they can reconnect with themselves and their personal vision. They understand that the elements that serve us (smartphones that are always at our side and never turned off, superfast laptops enabling us to work from all four corners of the earth, and the subtle demands of being everything to everyone) are also capable of enslaving us.
12. A modern leader believes that separation is an illusion and that ultimately, we belong to one another.

In the coming months I will be writing articles for both my newsletter and blog on why these attributes are critical in modernity, and how you can develop them to begin creating a better life for yourself, your local community, and our wider global community.

Are there attributes of a modern leader that you believe are missing? If so please leave them in the comment section below. Note: comments are held in moderation and do not post immediately.

I believe that passion can be found through a combination of chaos, silence, and discipline. Over the past two weeks I have discussed chaos and silence. Now I want to tackle the most elusive of the three: discipline.

To find your passion you have to exercise discipline to periodically schedule time for fostering chaos and silence.

And yet, most 20-somethings – myself included – struggle with discipline.

Why is discipline so elusive in modernity?

Discipline is ultimately a mind game that we have been wired to lose; if we aren’t mentally committed to focusing and taking action, we will never take action, even if it’s wildly beneficial.

Modernity creates a steady stream of constant disruptions forcing us to shift our attention from A to B to C to D and back to A which effectively dissolves discipline. [Case in point: I honestly just paused in the middle of writing this paragraph to send a quick facebook message.]

To borrow an analogy from meditation, our minds are more like untrained puppies wandering as they please than they are obedient dogs.

To make discipline work for us we have to be a bit more like a dog and a bit less like a puppy.

We also assume that discipline has to be unpleasant. The word itself is used interchangeably with punishment and evokes images of school teachers wielding rulers ready to hit disruptive students.  The fact is, discipline doesn’t have to be unpleasant.

The secrets to effective discipline: make it fun and use baby steps.

 With this in mind here is how to use the final element – discipline – along with chaos and silence to connect to your passion.

Sunrise with Tree - photo cred: h.koppdelaney

Last week, in the first of a three part series on using chaos, silence, and discipline to connect with your passion, I explained how to use chaos as one of the three elements. This week I will discuss the value of silence.

Using silence to connect to your passion requires a special type of silence – one that is different than the silence we are accustom to in modernity.

Often times we confuse silence with white noise. As millennials our day-to-day is filled with the omnipresent buzz of electricity, cell phones demanding our attention, emails popping in, music, tv shows, podcasts, movies, and chatter from the people in our atmosphere.

During the rare times we can cut through all of that static and create something close to silence, our inner monologues fill in the dead space with constant critiquing, brainstorming, predicting, fretting, planning, reviewing, replaying, and  flickering from thought to thought to thought.

To connect to our passion we need to create true silence – silence that lets us see ourselves. I want to propose three strategies for achieving the right type of silence that have helped myself and hundreds of millenials across north America find their passion.

I suggest you experiment with all three and use the approach(es) that work best for you.

1) Take yourself on a date

0239 - photo cred: Cia de Foto

One of the most effective ways to connect to your passion is to simply ask yourself, “what am I truly passionate about?”

To make this actually work you have to get rid of all the normal distractions that fill the space. Schedule a few hours to be alone without your cell phone, computer, iPod, or friends. Go on a long walk in the woods. Visit a coffee shop you’ve never been to. Book a hotel room in a different city.

Your aim is to be completely alone and to use this time to honestly ask yourself, “what am I passionate about?”

2) Meditation

I’ve never personally meditated for more than 10 consecutive minutes. However, meditation – even for one or two minutes – creates

the type of silence that you can use to truly connect to yourself and your passions. It allows you to be alone and connected with yourself.

As you begin to meditate ask yourself, “what am I passionate about” and then keep your mind trained on that question.

If you’re interested in learning meditation, I highly recommend “A Path with Heart” by Jack Kornfield (which I’m currently reading) or taking an introduction to meditation class at a yoga studio near you.

3) Friends and family

When I was about 1 semester away from graduation I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. To help figure that out, I picked six close friend and six acquaintances and wrote them an email saying, “I have no clue what I should do when I graduate – what do you think I would both enjoy and be good at?” I also asked my family the same question.

Then, I stayed silent and listened to what my friends had to say.

I was always tempted to explain to them what was right or wrong with their ideas, but I felt like this would poison the well. So I kept quiet. I learned a lot about myself from this exercise and eventually realized that I should launch Ignited Leadership.

To connect to your passions (or future, as I did), use a similar approach. Ask a few people who know you extremely well and a few people who don’t know you as well what they think you are passionate about. As they answer you, avoid the temptation to evaluate. Instead, stay silent and listen. You’ll be pleasantly surprised by what you learn.

The trick to making this work

The only trick you need to make silence work as a tool to connecting to your passions is honesty. Ask your friends to be honest with you and force yourself to be honest with yourself.

Once you have created elements of chaos and silence into your life, the only missing ingredient to connecting to your passion is discipline, which I will discuss next week.

Autumn Morning - photo cred: WadeB

To kick off the new Ignited Leadership blog I want to discuss one of the most pressing issues that modern millennials face: finding passion.

Recently I’ve listened to everyone from close friends – including one who is a wildly successful guy – who confided “truthfully, I’m not enjoying my life right now” to hundreds of students across North America admitting, “I can’t quite figure out what it is I want to do and it’s bothering me.”

I know the feeling. In January of 2009, a mere three months before I was scheduled to graduate, I had no clue what I wanted to do. I had job offers to do everything from working in the linguistics department at a University in Hong Kong, to managing volunteers at an NGO based in Washington, DC. But none of these options excited me and I had no clue what I wanted to do.

Many of us struggle to connect to our passions because our lives are designed to follow a narrow path that exposes us to a limited number of people, places, and experiences and does not provide significant time for reflection. The good news: we can fix that and find our passion.

Through my own personal experience and through my professional experience I have learned that there is a formula for finding your passion amidst the blur and whir of modernity. To connect to your passion you need three elements: chaos, silence, and discipline. Once you understand and exercise the interplay between these three elements you will be amply equipped to connect to your passions.

Chaos

Whether we admit it or not, most people’s lives – including my own – are relatively routine. We go to the same bars, coffee shops, restaurants, parties, buildings, classrooms, houses, offices, and apartments, week in and week out. Not only that, but we experience the same experience time and time again: exercise, stress from personal, professional, and academic obligations, sleep deprivation, brushes with success and failure, drunken nights out and casual nights in.

And we surround ourselves with the same people: family, close friends, a handful of acquaintances and coworkers, and possibly a partner. There is nothing at all wrong with routine. In fact, in a world where everything is always changing, routine provides comfort.

Time lapse fireworks display - photo cred: Express Monorail

However if you’re feeling disconnected from your passion, you will not be able to connect to it by doing the same thing day in and day out. You need to create a bit of chaos in your life. How do you do this? You say yes to people and experiences. A lot.

You leave your comfort zone. You try things you think you won’t like. You try things that scare you. You create new experiences for yourself. You go to the Rocky Horror Picture Show instead of studying one night. You take a Spanish class even though you hate foreign languages. You ask that cute stranger out on a date. You watch a foreign film with no subtitles. You go to a raging party and stay completely sober all the way through. You leave your laptop and phone behind while you hop on a jet to somewhere you’ve never been. You sit on the street and behave like a homeless person for an afternoon to experience that side of life and then the next day you get dressed up in your fanciest clothes and try sneak into the Ritz. You pay for a complete stranger’s lunch. You take a Krav Maga class… the list is endless. Your first goal, if you are to truly connect to your passion, is to insert as many new experiences into your life as you possibly can. As you begin to expose yourself to new experiences you’ll learn a lot about yourself. You’ll learn about what you love and you’ll learn about what you don’t love.

Not only will it create a more diverse and engaged life, it will also bring you closer to your passion. And to help you digest all of these new experiences, you’ll need silence – but a special type of silence – one that involves you and others, which I will discuss next week.

Don’t worry – the Changing the World 101 program that provides students and young adults with a complete roadmap for global service and leadership is alive and well! In fact as you read this I will be on a nation-wide tour presenting Changing the World 101 seminars to young leaders across America.

So what is Ignited Leadership exactly?

In the past both my live events and my social business were named “Changing the World 101.” Ignited Leadership is now the name of the social business and Ignitedleadership.com is the online headquarters of:

• the live program “Changing the World 101“
• my blog on social entrepreneurship, leadership, and being a millennial
• my brand new program, “Escape the Matrix and Lead“

I am extremely proud of Escape the Matrix and Lead. When I first started helping millennials get involved with global service, I saw that there was a lack of high quality and effective modern leadership trainings for young adults. Leadership is currently seen as something developed by mega-rich adults in their 50′s, 60′s and 70′s who have made and spent millions – often billions – of dollars in their life. While there is nothing wrong with that, it makes connecting to leadership in a deep way virtually impossible for modern young adults.

Escape the Matrix and Lead solves that problem. I spent nearly three years developing Escape. I began by studying leadership – I read everything from  ”The Art of War” through the “Leadership Challenge.” I interviewed some of the world’s most talented leaders from business, government, education, and non-profits. Then, I started testing different methods of helping millennials lead at their highest level. Quietly I offered seminars and workshops on leadership. I learned what works and what doesn’t work when it comes to training world changing leaders.

And the End Result is Escape the Matrix and Lead.

Escape is designed, and in fact it’s guaranteed, to help millennials become the type of leaders who improve their own lives, campuses, companies, countries, and ultimately our wider global community.  You can learn more about Escape here.

New Contact Info:
I have also updated my contact info and social media.
Email: Jason@Ignitedleadership.com
Phone: 202-595-9387
Twitter (which I promise I’ll actually use this time): @Ignitedleaders
Facebook (ditto the above promise): www.facebook.com/ignitedleadership

Finally:
The Changing the World 101 monthly newsletter dedicated to effective modern leadership and civic engagement will live on as the Ignited Leadership newsletter and will continue to come to you once a month.

To kick off the new Ignited Leadership Blog I will be releasing the first of a three part series on how to find your passion and maximize your creativity next Wednesday, February 29th, so be sure to check the blog then.

Ultimately, I think that failure is nothing more than an illusion forever propagated by the education system.

In school we learn that when we attempt something, say take a test, we either get some degree of success (anywhere from an A+ to D- grade) or an all-encompassing failure (an F).  Let’s call this model of failure and success the Pass-Fail Binary, or the PFB for short.

The PFB teaches us that success and failure is evaluated by a one-time experience such as a test, paper, or presentation graded by a teacher. Motivated by the fear of failure and forced into action, we learn to study hard.

The problem with PFB is that it almost always bleeds from the classroom and into our personal and professional lives. It creates the false mentality that makes “doing nothing” more appealing than taking action; with over a decade of education to condition us, we learned that when we take action, we risk failure.

Thus, if we have the option to not take action – especially for the really important things in our lives – many of us will remain inactive instead of risking failure.

To succeed in the real world we have to eliminate the PFB mentality that school conditioned us with and replace it with an understanding that as long as we are acting, we are progressing and as long as we are progressing, we will eventually succeed.

Let’s end the PFB that too often colors the rest of our lives and replace it with an attitude of action equals success.  Of course sometime when we act we wont get the exact results we were hoping for – but we will have learned something. We will have learned what does not work and that will bring us one step closer to success.

I want you to succeed on your own terms. Lets begin by agreeing that the only true failure is the failure to take action on a project that you care about and from there we will consider all action success – even if we don’t immediately get the results we want.

Depending on your vision you will work to make yourself a better leader, you will work to create a better community locally or globally, you will take risks to make yourself a more loving, more engaged, more interesting individual.  When you try something and get different results than you hoped for, instead of chalking it up as a “failure” as PFB from school suggests you do, you will realize that you can try again and again and again until you get the results you are looking for.

When you commit to action, you are committing to succeed by your own terms and you are unlocking a whole world of potential accomplishments. All that is left for you to do is to dream big, and act.