“Your actions are shouting so loudly I can’t hear what you’re saying!” So goes an old adage which reminds us of the importance of finding authenticity and integrity in our lives.
This term’s Project Week experiences tell many stories of purposeful action, personal growth and genuine engagement with diverse communities. As one of our unique learning resources, Project Week offers remarkable opportunities for discovery and awareness: experiential learning at its most profound.
There’s no doubt that community interactions like these are all about the possibility of change and the chance to make a difference. Recent discussions have focused on the nature of this change: is it really all about “changing the world”, or is there something more subtle and more significant in all this?
When Mahatma Gandhi invited us to “be the change you want to see in the world” he echoed a truth found in many of the great religions and spiritual traditions of the world: that real change has to begin within us before it can take shape in the world out there.
Every day here there are countless opportunities to be “agents of change”; not in the conventional sense of changing the world, but in living our lives with integrity and in becoming authentic individuals. These are the challenges of achieving a resonance between our words and our actions in every encounter and interaction – striving for sincerity.
My hope is that every young person here will discover the joy of service and purposeful action. But I also hope we will recognize the awesome opportunity in taking on the challenge of personal change, for in that lies our greatest capacity to truly make a difference.
Our actions can shout so loudly that people cannot hear what we are saying – that goes for our lives together here on campus as much as it does in Paud on a Friday night – or even in the interactions of a distant Project Week experience.
The following words are inscribed on an ancient tomb in London’s Westminster Abbey: "When I was young and free and my imagination had no limits, I dreamed of changing the world. As I grew older and wiser, I discovered the world would not change, so I shortened my sights and decided to change only my country. But it, too, seemed immovable. As I grew into my twilight years, in one last desperate attempt, I settled for changing only my family, those closest to me, but alas, they would have none of it. And now, as I lie on my deathbed, I suddenly realize: if I had only changed myself first, then by example I would have changed my family. From their inspiration and encouragement, I would then have been able to better my country, and who knows, I may have even changed the world".
Dr Jonathan Long
Head of College
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