I’m here today because of a question
it’s a question that occurred to me
quite a long time ago it’s a question
that I want to share with you hoping
that it will embed itself in your mind
the way it has mine this is a question
that has caused me to really look into
the way I interact with people and it’s
made me a better person
I had a 25 year radio career and I was a
news reporter and a sports announcer and
when you’re in that role in a community
you have a front-row seat to all the
good and bad things that happen I
remember covering fire that struck a
family about a week before Christmas and
wiped out everything they owned they
were okay but they had nothing and we
turned the radio station Lobby into a
storage facility for all the donations
that came in from people that were just
reaching out to strangers they were
asking nothing in return but utensils
and pots and pans and clothes and toys
and all the things that you would need
just started to stack up there in the
lobby it was a beautiful reaction from
the community I remember a key person in
our high school who suffered from cancer
and his diagnosis was not good and we
shaved our heads and raised a whole
bunch of money in his name in order to
just sort of hug he and his to be widow
to let them know one way or another
everything was going to be okay and I
remember talking with family members of
a soldier who was killed in Iraq the
wife and children of that man not
knowing what the future was going to be
like and how devastating that was and
yet the road between the chapel and the
VA cemetery was lined with thousands of
people with flags and signs and messages
of hope and love to a complete stranger
as that hearse rolled by and how much
that meant
to the family the pattern was
devastating tragedy followed by
incredible togetherness over and over
again and I remember the first time this
question occurred to me and I asked a
friend of mine do you suppose it’s
possible we could skip the tragedy and
just live in that togetherness is it
possible for us to have togetherness
without tragedy and he gave me a sort of
strange look and from what I remember
left the room and it kind of left the
question hanging in the air and it was
sort of up to me to decide how to answer
that question and I’ve been trying to do
that ever since that was 15 years ago
and at first I tried to answer that
question thinking about global tragedy
and how difficult it is when something
horrible happens across the globe and it
spreads like in in seconds especially in
our social media-driven world and I was
looking for a way for us to respond with
an event or something we could do that
would provide an equal and opposite
balance to this horrible thing that
happened and I had to quickly decide
there just was nothing that could
provide that kind of counterbalance to
that tragic event so I had to settle in
my mind on the fact that togetherness
without tragedy happens in small doses
like birthdays and anniversaries and
weddings and babies being born and
graduation ceremonies and for some state
championships national championships
world championships but that was always
involving a very small group of people
and it was short-lived usually and in
some cases if you’re not a sports fan
you couldn’t enjoy and be part of that
community so although it wasn’t a
perfect answer I felt like it was a
partial answer to this question about
togetherness without togetherness
without tragedy but that question lay
dormant for quite a long time because I
felt like I couldn’t really fully answer
it back then and it lay dormant until
October 1st 2015
of course that was a day when I’m quoc
Community College and our community was
knocked to its knees by a horrible
shooting tragedy that affected hundreds
if not thousands of people in this
community and for a lot of us the
recovery still continues it may continue
for many many
years and people here tend to have a UCC
recovery story my UCC recovery story
centers around an organization called
UCC strong that was the name given to a
fund that 1.3 million dollars came in –
from complete strangers around the world
trying to do something to help the
victims of that shooting and we had to
assemble the United Way had to assemble
and I helped them a group of about 15
people to manage this fund because while
it’s easy to give money away it’s hard
to do it responsibly and under the
potential scrutiny of all kinds of
people who would be more than happy to
sue us these 15 people dedicated
themselves to the cause of distributing
that money to the victims and I remember
the first time that group of people was
together in the room for the first time
and I was just thinking how is this
gonna work we have people from such
different points of view you had
philanthropists and and wealthy business
people in the same room with students
you had a mental health professional and
a pastor you had people that just
normally don’t associate with one
another labels just all around the room
and it was amazing to watch that group
of people put those labels down and
focus on the goal and distribute that
money and do it well the way we were
hoping and they did it because there was
something greater than them at stake
they didn’t ask anything in return they
just did the job and they did it very
very well they put those labels aside if
you think about it there was also young
and old and and liberal and conservative
gay and straight tattooed and unta tude
plenty of reasons for people to not get
along and yet they did such an amazing
job and it was an excellent example of
togetherness and the sort of thing that
I think about when I thought about
togetherness of course the catalyst for
that was tragedy I want to do an
experiment with you on labels just look
at me I’m a white middle-aged middle
class educated straight married
Christian conservative Republican
American man and I just divided the room
some of you will say that’s the kind of
guy I’d like to get to know but for some
other people you wouldn’t want to even
talk to me because of the labels I just
laid out there but you know what it goes
further than that for some people the
labels I just laid out create fear and
when I think about those labels I have
to wonder why do we pay so much
attention to labels is it because we
just really want to have relationship
with and trust the people that are just
like us who do you see only as labels or
who do you not see because you’ve put a
label on them following my UCC
experience I was able to go speak to
some leaders and other communities and
they would ask me what could we learn
from what you went through in roseburg
and I started talking about leaders and
the role leaders would play in recovery
if a tragedy and eventually one will hit
a tragedy hit that community what what
should leaders do and I would always
tell them I think the thing you should
do is think about the people who would
be around the table to help your
community recover if something were to
happen
think about the other leaders that would
be there you probably know some of them
but you may only know of others you
should reach out to those other leaders
and get to know them a little bit before
you’re forced to find out if you can
trust them or like them under the
pressure of recovery and it really
seemed to resound with people they
really like that idea and we came up
with the phrase of togetherness before
tragedy which awakened that whole
discussion about togetherness without
tragedy but there was also a incomplete
part to this whole thing as well because
if only leaders are able to help us get
to togetherness without tragedy we’re
missing out on a whole nother section of
people we need everyone involved in
order for togetherness without tragedy
to become a reality and so the idea lay
dormant again for a while until I found
the kindness Diaries one day I was
flipping through looking for something
to watch on Netflix and I came across
the first episode of the kindness
Diaries and I was fascinated the kind of
Diaries depict the effort of a
stockbroker from Britain who happened to
live in Los Angeles who got tired of
being a stockbroker and his idea was
even though the world looks like a very
bad place from a distance there still is
kindness in this world he just wanted to
go find it and so he conducted an
amazing experiment which is documented
in this series what he did was he got
into a canary-yellow motorcycle with a
sidecar and began driving across the
United States with a goal of going
around the world on nothing but the
kindness of strangers he had no money
for fuel food or lodging he was going to
rely completely on people now what he
did have was the ability to gift people
with a life-changing gift that would
help them change their lives because of
the incredible kindness that they showed
of course they didn’t know that’s kind
of an undercover boss thing so Leon took
off headed east and one of the first
episodes he comes across a man named
Richard who lives in Pittsburgh and it’s
getting late and getting dark and Leon
needs a place to stay and he runs into
Richard and he asked Richard if he could
stay with him for the night and Richard
said sure absolutely but I’m homeless
and Leon said that’s fine so Leon spent
the night in the doorway the Richard
lives in and Richard gave Leon his mat
and his blankets and some food and they
laid there talking all night long and
Richard told his story before he became
homeless he had a dream of being a chef
but he had dropped out of culinary
school as his path to homelessness in
the morning Richard gave Leon three
pairs of underwear and more food for his
trip and Leon told Richard that he was
going to pay for Richard to go back to
school so he could complete his dream of
being a chef and he did 15 episodes of
that inspirational get the Kleenex ready
it’s awesome well I was so inspired I
reached out to Leon through his Facebook
page and website and I was able actually
to exchange some emails with him and
eventually he and I Skyped for about a
half hour one day while he was in New
York
I told him about togetherness without
tragedy I asked him if he thought it had
legs and could I do something on the
same level as the kindness Diaries and
he encouraged me to do so his number one
piece of advice to me was be the change
be the change I wanted to see and we’ve
all heard that night really took that to
heart now I have been the change a
little bit on this I was part of a group
of people that did a thing called adopt
the block here in Roseburg for a couple
of years we went up and down Mill Street
with rakes and shovels and weed whackers
and lawn mowers and garbage bags just
knocking on doors and asking people if
there were odd jobs that we could do for
no pay we just wanted to do something to
help the neighborhood out mostly to get
to know people in case there was
something bad that happened because we
thought maybe we could help him out
amazing things happen during that time
there’s two stories to share one there
was a house we knocked on the door
nobody would ever come to the door we
could hear a TV but nobody would ever
come to the door months went by the
neighbor came to us one day and said
that fella fell down and broke his hip
in his back and he’s coming back in a
wheelchair and there is no ramp you
can’t get into his house so we built a
ramp for him we met a woman who was
raising her grandson because his father
had bailed out on drugs she was sleeping
on the floor of her house she had died
diverticulitis so bad she was headed to
surgery she was miserable she gave the
only mattress in the house to her
eight-year-old grandson and when we
heard that story we made sure she had a
twin mattress and you would have thought
we gave her a new house we didn’t ask
for anything in return it was simply a
gesture that needed to be done so I
understand be the change but as I
thought about it more actually what this
became was be the catalyst be the
catalyst began to ring in my head trying
to answer that question of togetherness
without tragedy be the catalyst well in
scientific terms a catalyst is an
element that’s introduced to an
environment that changes that
environment well let’s talk about the
environment we want to change we live in
an isolated anonymous angry label
throwing argumentative
divided in gree world right now just
begging for something to change begging
for something to believe in begging to
be part of something that we can all be
a part of something better than what we
have right now and if we choose not to
make any changes we’re just going to go
ahead and continue to add to all of
those bad things in fact if we don’t
make a change deliberately really what
we may be saying is we’ll just wait for
the tragedy to come along before we make
a change in how we treat one another but
there’s another option and that option
is to make a deliberate decision to be
the change to drop the labels the way
they did at UCC strong and the
preconceived notions that come along
with them to manufacture kindness the
way Liana Gotha teas did with the
kindness Diaries and then to go out and
look for opportunities in your own way
to generate and encourage togetherness
without tragedy
[Applause]
it’s a question that occurred to me
quite a long time ago it’s a question
that I want to share with you hoping
that it will embed itself in your mind
the way it has mine this is a question
that has caused me to really look into
the way I interact with people and it’s
made me a better person
I had a 25 year radio career and I was a
news reporter and a sports announcer and
when you’re in that role in a community
you have a front-row seat to all the
good and bad things that happen I
remember covering fire that struck a
family about a week before Christmas and
wiped out everything they owned they
were okay but they had nothing and we
turned the radio station Lobby into a
storage facility for all the donations
that came in from people that were just
reaching out to strangers they were
asking nothing in return but utensils
and pots and pans and clothes and toys
and all the things that you would need
just started to stack up there in the
lobby it was a beautiful reaction from
the community I remember a key person in
our high school who suffered from cancer
and his diagnosis was not good and we
shaved our heads and raised a whole
bunch of money in his name in order to
just sort of hug he and his to be widow
to let them know one way or another
everything was going to be okay and I
remember talking with family members of
a soldier who was killed in Iraq the
wife and children of that man not
knowing what the future was going to be
like and how devastating that was and
yet the road between the chapel and the
VA cemetery was lined with thousands of
people with flags and signs and messages
of hope and love to a complete stranger
as that hearse rolled by and how much
that meant
to the family the pattern was
devastating tragedy followed by
incredible togetherness over and over
again and I remember the first time this
question occurred to me and I asked a
friend of mine do you suppose it’s
possible we could skip the tragedy and
just live in that togetherness is it
possible for us to have togetherness
without tragedy and he gave me a sort of
strange look and from what I remember
left the room and it kind of left the
question hanging in the air and it was
sort of up to me to decide how to answer
that question and I’ve been trying to do
that ever since that was 15 years ago
and at first I tried to answer that
question thinking about global tragedy
and how difficult it is when something
horrible happens across the globe and it
spreads like in in seconds especially in
our social media-driven world and I was
looking for a way for us to respond with
an event or something we could do that
would provide an equal and opposite
balance to this horrible thing that
happened and I had to quickly decide
there just was nothing that could
provide that kind of counterbalance to
that tragic event so I had to settle in
my mind on the fact that togetherness
without tragedy happens in small doses
like birthdays and anniversaries and
weddings and babies being born and
graduation ceremonies and for some state
championships national championships
world championships but that was always
involving a very small group of people
and it was short-lived usually and in
some cases if you’re not a sports fan
you couldn’t enjoy and be part of that
community so although it wasn’t a
perfect answer I felt like it was a
partial answer to this question about
togetherness without togetherness
without tragedy but that question lay
dormant for quite a long time because I
felt like I couldn’t really fully answer
it back then and it lay dormant until
October 1st 2015
of course that was a day when I’m quoc
Community College and our community was
knocked to its knees by a horrible
shooting tragedy that affected hundreds
if not thousands of people in this
community and for a lot of us the
recovery still continues it may continue
for many many
years and people here tend to have a UCC
recovery story my UCC recovery story
centers around an organization called
UCC strong that was the name given to a
fund that 1.3 million dollars came in –
from complete strangers around the world
trying to do something to help the
victims of that shooting and we had to
assemble the United Way had to assemble
and I helped them a group of about 15
people to manage this fund because while
it’s easy to give money away it’s hard
to do it responsibly and under the
potential scrutiny of all kinds of
people who would be more than happy to
sue us these 15 people dedicated
themselves to the cause of distributing
that money to the victims and I remember
the first time that group of people was
together in the room for the first time
and I was just thinking how is this
gonna work we have people from such
different points of view you had
philanthropists and and wealthy business
people in the same room with students
you had a mental health professional and
a pastor you had people that just
normally don’t associate with one
another labels just all around the room
and it was amazing to watch that group
of people put those labels down and
focus on the goal and distribute that
money and do it well the way we were
hoping and they did it because there was
something greater than them at stake
they didn’t ask anything in return they
just did the job and they did it very
very well they put those labels aside if
you think about it there was also young
and old and and liberal and conservative
gay and straight tattooed and unta tude
plenty of reasons for people to not get
along and yet they did such an amazing
job and it was an excellent example of
togetherness and the sort of thing that
I think about when I thought about
togetherness of course the catalyst for
that was tragedy I want to do an
experiment with you on labels just look
at me I’m a white middle-aged middle
class educated straight married
Christian conservative Republican
American man and I just divided the room
some of you will say that’s the kind of
guy I’d like to get to know but for some
other people you wouldn’t want to even
talk to me because of the labels I just
laid out there but you know what it goes
further than that for some people the
labels I just laid out create fear and
when I think about those labels I have
to wonder why do we pay so much
attention to labels is it because we
just really want to have relationship
with and trust the people that are just
like us who do you see only as labels or
who do you not see because you’ve put a
label on them following my UCC
experience I was able to go speak to
some leaders and other communities and
they would ask me what could we learn
from what you went through in roseburg
and I started talking about leaders and
the role leaders would play in recovery
if a tragedy and eventually one will hit
a tragedy hit that community what what
should leaders do and I would always
tell them I think the thing you should
do is think about the people who would
be around the table to help your
community recover if something were to
happen
think about the other leaders that would
be there you probably know some of them
but you may only know of others you
should reach out to those other leaders
and get to know them a little bit before
you’re forced to find out if you can
trust them or like them under the
pressure of recovery and it really
seemed to resound with people they
really like that idea and we came up
with the phrase of togetherness before
tragedy which awakened that whole
discussion about togetherness without
tragedy but there was also a incomplete
part to this whole thing as well because
if only leaders are able to help us get
to togetherness without tragedy we’re
missing out on a whole nother section of
people we need everyone involved in
order for togetherness without tragedy
to become a reality and so the idea lay
dormant again for a while until I found
the kindness Diaries one day I was
flipping through looking for something
to watch on Netflix and I came across
the first episode of the kindness
Diaries and I was fascinated the kind of
Diaries depict the effort of a
stockbroker from Britain who happened to
live in Los Angeles who got tired of
being a stockbroker and his idea was
even though the world looks like a very
bad place from a distance there still is
kindness in this world he just wanted to
go find it and so he conducted an
amazing experiment which is documented
in this series what he did was he got
into a canary-yellow motorcycle with a
sidecar and began driving across the
United States with a goal of going
around the world on nothing but the
kindness of strangers he had no money
for fuel food or lodging he was going to
rely completely on people now what he
did have was the ability to gift people
with a life-changing gift that would
help them change their lives because of
the incredible kindness that they showed
of course they didn’t know that’s kind
of an undercover boss thing so Leon took
off headed east and one of the first
episodes he comes across a man named
Richard who lives in Pittsburgh and it’s
getting late and getting dark and Leon
needs a place to stay and he runs into
Richard and he asked Richard if he could
stay with him for the night and Richard
said sure absolutely but I’m homeless
and Leon said that’s fine so Leon spent
the night in the doorway the Richard
lives in and Richard gave Leon his mat
and his blankets and some food and they
laid there talking all night long and
Richard told his story before he became
homeless he had a dream of being a chef
but he had dropped out of culinary
school as his path to homelessness in
the morning Richard gave Leon three
pairs of underwear and more food for his
trip and Leon told Richard that he was
going to pay for Richard to go back to
school so he could complete his dream of
being a chef and he did 15 episodes of
that inspirational get the Kleenex ready
it’s awesome well I was so inspired I
reached out to Leon through his Facebook
page and website and I was able actually
to exchange some emails with him and
eventually he and I Skyped for about a
half hour one day while he was in New
York
I told him about togetherness without
tragedy I asked him if he thought it had
legs and could I do something on the
same level as the kindness Diaries and
he encouraged me to do so his number one
piece of advice to me was be the change
be the change I wanted to see and we’ve
all heard that night really took that to
heart now I have been the change a
little bit on this I was part of a group
of people that did a thing called adopt
the block here in Roseburg for a couple
of years we went up and down Mill Street
with rakes and shovels and weed whackers
and lawn mowers and garbage bags just
knocking on doors and asking people if
there were odd jobs that we could do for
no pay we just wanted to do something to
help the neighborhood out mostly to get
to know people in case there was
something bad that happened because we
thought maybe we could help him out
amazing things happen during that time
there’s two stories to share one there
was a house we knocked on the door
nobody would ever come to the door we
could hear a TV but nobody would ever
come to the door months went by the
neighbor came to us one day and said
that fella fell down and broke his hip
in his back and he’s coming back in a
wheelchair and there is no ramp you
can’t get into his house so we built a
ramp for him we met a woman who was
raising her grandson because his father
had bailed out on drugs she was sleeping
on the floor of her house she had died
diverticulitis so bad she was headed to
surgery she was miserable she gave the
only mattress in the house to her
eight-year-old grandson and when we
heard that story we made sure she had a
twin mattress and you would have thought
we gave her a new house we didn’t ask
for anything in return it was simply a
gesture that needed to be done so I
understand be the change but as I
thought about it more actually what this
became was be the catalyst be the
catalyst began to ring in my head trying
to answer that question of togetherness
without tragedy be the catalyst well in
scientific terms a catalyst is an
element that’s introduced to an
environment that changes that
environment well let’s talk about the
environment we want to change we live in
an isolated anonymous angry label
throwing argumentative
divided in gree world right now just
begging for something to change begging
for something to believe in begging to
be part of something that we can all be
a part of something better than what we
have right now and if we choose not to
make any changes we’re just going to go
ahead and continue to add to all of
those bad things in fact if we don’t
make a change deliberately really what
we may be saying is we’ll just wait for
the tragedy to come along before we make
a change in how we treat one another but
there’s another option and that option
is to make a deliberate decision to be
the change to drop the labels the way
they did at UCC strong and the
preconceived notions that come along
with them to manufacture kindness the
way Liana Gotha teas did with the
kindness Diaries and then to go out and
look for opportunities in your own way
to generate and encourage togetherness
without tragedy
[Applause]
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