Transcriber: Nawal Sharabati Reviewer: Elisabeth Buffard
It’s wartime in the wizarding world as dark clouds begin to gather.
There is widespread fear and doubt
amongst the students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Everyone seems frozen with indecision
when suddenly one person steps up.
Hermione Granger takes the lead and inspires her fellow students
to come together and form a secret club
dedicated to defending themselves against the coming war
with Voldemort.
If you couldn’t tell, this is a scene from Harry Potter.
I’m an avid reader and I’ve read Harry Potter more times than I can count.
One thing that always stood out to me was the role that Hermione played.
In the first book, she’s on track to become a pretty good student
with great grades.
However, she chooses to become something more.
She sees the chance to influence something greater than herself,
and grabs the opportunity with both hands, or at least with one hand and one wand.
Now that’s a changemaker:
someone who sees a need, steps up,
proposes a plan, and catalyzes the community to take action.
So why be a change maker?
I’ve already got so much on my plate.
Do I really need to pile on another task, another checkbox on my to do list?
No, thank you.
I’ll have to come up with ideas,
see if those ideas work, test out even more ideas… why bother at all?
There’s so many people already out there fighting battle.
Why can’t I just come on in my pom-poms and say yippee and cheer them on?
Why, when I can just enjoy the after party?
So that brings me back to the question, why be a changemaker at all?
Well, it’s not a change for the sake of change, my dear.
You shouldn’t be like: “OK, I need to change something,
Aha! There’s something I can change.
Let me change that, I’m done, I’ve been a-changing.
Change is rooted in purpose:
the Amazon rainforest is on fire,
we still have a deadly virus rampaging our world,
our planet is quite literally dying,
there’s misinformation everywhere you look,
violence in communities and guns in schools.
And already,
there’s too many people who are satisfied with that current status quo.
To put that into perspective, in just our last election,
80 million Americans did not vote.
So there’s plenty of purposes to go around.
I find my purpose to be bringing the joy of reading
and the discovery of new possibilities to the world around me.
I've loved reading for all my life,
and I think sharing the benefits I bring to the world is a thrilling prospect;
opening minds to new perspectives.
Now, that sounds pretty exciting.
I eventually settled on the medium of video book reviews
on a YouTube Channel for my making change journey.
I love reading, I typically read over fifteen books a month
and I often reread my favorite books over and over again.
To put that in perspective,
I’ve read the entire Harry Potter series over forty times at this point.
Because I’m so deeply passionate about reading,
creating these book reviews on my channel doesn’t feel like a chore.
It’s something that I genuinely look forward to at the end of every week.
Being a changemaker is, well, a challenging task.
But if you’re struggling to begin, just remember that you’re not alone.
I’ve struggled as well.
I understood how important being a changemaker was,
and I understand the benefits I could bring to myself,
people around me and my community at large.
I just had a couple hiccups while getting started.
My first efforts involved starting a tutoring program.
But close to nine and a half minutes in,
I get distracted by a recent book on my mind.
Will Frodo and The Lord of the Rings succumb to the influence of the one ring?
Will the blue-eyed Fremen, in the book Dune,
overthrow the tyrant ruler on the wild desert planet of Arrakis?
Later efforts included an online blog about serious societal issues,
which devolved into a discussion on Fahrenheit 451 backstory,
writing plays about inequality in today’s world,
which ended up having way too many Hunger Games references,
and interviewing schools officials for the newspaper,
which didn’t get past my first interview with the librarian,
which ended with me at the library reading books for the rest of the day.
And then it hit me.
The problem was a solution all the long.
Reading books wasn't something hindering me at all.
In fact, it could be the tool and the very foundation
for my change-making.
But what I learned at the end of all this is that ultimately,
you should stick to your passion and let it lead you to your purpose.
Your passion might not be reading, like me.
It could be something else entirely, like swimming or programming.
But no matter what it is, remember it’s something you can use
to help bring change to your comunity.
Greta Thunberg is passionate about the environment and climate change.
At the age of fifteen, she protested at the Swedish parliament
and today, she’s giving speeches to world leaders at the UN.
Now that’s a pretty big and large scale example
and I’m not telling you to end world hunger or solve world peace,
but even the smallest steps can make the biggest difference.
Be the Hermione.
Just as her one action catalyzed great change in her community,
yours can too.
Thank you!
(Applause)