translating social change

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TRANSLATION

Sandrina (MonkeyTree.Community) 2015

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I don’t know how many of you experienced this before, but every time I am on a date with someone talking about global warming – that’s a real icebreaker.


>> 0 >> 1 >> 2 >> 3 >> 4 >> Sandrina (MonkeyTree.Community) 2015

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No, seriously, if I have a conversation with somebody about issues like global warming, animal rights, and world hunger I always recognize how, quickly they try to avoid that subject and respond with: “Hmm-yeah. Bummer. What was your favourite colour again?”


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Topics like that, are always matters that make people feel uncomfortable talking about, mainly since they know, that if they would give those topics more thought they would become aware of the fact that they actually would need to do something about it.


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… And of course people don’t have time for that; we don’t have the time to worry about things that a r e f a r a w a y a n d intangible - and with the little time and energy we do have, we do not think we can efficiently change something. So we rather do nothing.


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So what can we do to avoid this? Sandrina (MonkeyTree.Community) 2015

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Well, motivating people is about telling a story; a story people understand, they enjoy reading, and that makes the subject more relatable and tangible.


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I n f a c t , p e o p l e n e e d tangibility in order to connect with a certain topic. We are emotional beings, we need to feel understood and related to things in order to truly care, and we need direct and concrete feedback about what impact our actions have – on the short-term.


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People react on impulse and the messages of their direct environment. Long-term goals serve rational reasoning, however 90% of our actions are rather emotional.


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This is also the reason why dieting is always so incredibly difficult.


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However, what we are really good at instead is telling everybody a n d e s p e c i a l l y ourselves that it is not on us that we are not reaching our goals - it’s our genes, heavy bones or the ice cream season.


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Unfortunately, we also do that in other areas of life, fooling ourselves in thinking that it is not on us; that it is not our fault that people suffer in far away countries, and that the environment suffers with them – and so they just shift the responsibility.


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In fact, there are millions of other people that could do something too – so why would it be on us?


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Well, in order to overcome this we need to give people the tools to not only understand those issues, where they are coming from and that the responsibility lies within all of us, but also how they can react on that responsibility – in an actual relevant manner.


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Remember how your mom always told you to eat up your plate because there are children in Africa that do not have anything to eat – and you were like: What? So, if I eat up my plate the children are not hungry anymore? No.


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Of course it is not that easy, but it is also not that difficult. So, to fight against an issue like hunger, we need to start breaking it down and translate it in a SMART way; sentence by sentence and word by word to things that truly relate to us.


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SMART Sandrina (MonkeyTree.Community) 2015

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SMART Specific


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We need to make the impact we can have Specific. Who are those people that we can help and where do they live? People in general will be more concerned to help a single, identifiable individual than they will do to help a group, especially when they can relate to them in a certain way.


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SMART Measurable & Achievable


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Next, we need to make it Measurable and Achievable. What impact can I make, and what impact did I make with this specific action? In a positive and also in a negative way. So, we all relay on feedback in order to stay motivated, to reflect and to understand the role that we take in this world.


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SMART Relevance & Tangibility


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The last two points that I want you to keep in mind are Relevance and Tangibility. People are more likely to help their family, friends, and fellow countrymen not only because of a closer emotional connection but also, and maybe especially because a negative effect on those people is much more likely to have a negative effect on themselves. So, issues that relate locally, are of course more relevant.


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We need to realize that we in fact can do something against world hunger, our waste society and blind consumerism. Not just with the food we buy and the choices we make in the supermarket, but also through the conversations we have and especially the platforms we create, locally.


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Creating a spill over effect that truly can make a

difference.


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One of these platforms is the

MonkeyTree.Community


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A platform that for organisations that try to solve the world’s biggest challenges

&

The people that try to find ways to solve the problems they encounter within their own

environment.


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Organisations will be challenged to take down their high guards, and translate their

big goals and ambitious projects for far away countries into a tangible project that can be

run within a local community.


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While aiming to give people the features to challenge each other,

to brainstorm about their own initiatives, and actually make them happen.

They can get involved more in depth with

organizations and support projects of several initiatives by making use of their ‘donation

deposit’.


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The website is very simple and basic so far, but providing the tools that we need in order to go the next step. And make things happen

– here and today.

So, keep going and keep sharing.


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Join Us

www.monkeytree.community


translating social change

Government & Nonprofit

people dont

e n e e d tangibility

story people

motivating people

n d e s p e c

p e o p

n d intangible

little time