Small Acts

Well, I'm completely covered in paint and totally satisfied by today's work at Gracious School.

The Skill in Action team showed up for Day 3 of our service work and we spent most of the day painting, painting doors, walls, putting second coats of paint on, painting the exterior of the building and window sills. We worked well together as a team. Around mid-day the children became very interested in what we were doing, they knew we were upgrading their building, brightening it up and they decided they wanted to help. There was a strong sense of pride in their school. The children were excited about the changes and wanted to be part of them.



During Day 1 of our service, a participant in Skill to Action talked about the needs being so great in Huruma where Gracious School is located. And as I mentioned in an earlier blog, I thought about working from the inside out. If we focus on all the needs or what we perceive them to be, we lose sight of what a big difference a seemingly small task can make.  We transformed the school from inside out and it is about much more than our paint brushes. Once we painted some interior walls on Day 1, built desks on Day 2, and today moved to the outside of the building to paint, we started to interact with the community in a very different way.   Folks were around, cooking, talking, hanging up laundry, kids were running around, adults were speaking in Swahli while watching us paint, curious about what was happening in their community.  


"We don't have to engage in grant, heroic actions to participate in the process of change. Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world."-Howard Zinn

We return to Gracious for Day 4, our final day to finish up painting and to practice yoga with the children. It has been a full day, and my body is sore from the work. It's a good kind of sore though, the type of exhaustion that lets me know that I am making change in the world.