Look What We Did

Dear People of Love,

One year ago, OneVoice was still an idea. I might have said “only” an idea, but that wouldn’t be true. Ideas are powerful. Intention is powerful. Saying “yes” to those ideas and intentions is, I have learned, amazingly and ridiculously powerful. And yet, there was so much we didn’t know. We didn’t know where our first project would be or what it would look like. We didn’t know where the money would come from. And we didn’t know if our core conviction–that the voices of children are powerful enough to change the world–would resonate with anyone. After all, it can sound like a pretty radical proposal.

And then, in our inaugural year, we created fundraisers and partnerships with Whole Foods, Great Kids Village, Epic Change, Kids Place Live, and more–all of which became over $25,000, which became a musical journey to Shepherds Jr. School in Tanzania, which became LaLaLove, a celebration of kid-powered music that stretched from Tanzania to New Jersey to Texas to California. That celebration–30 music videos from 16 states and 2 countries–became $27,740 which is now in the process of becoming Shepherds Secondary School, which will, in February 2012, become the educational home to twenty 8th graders learning under the loving guidance of Mama Lucy, the founder of Shepherds Jr.

We did this together and I have learned that we are enough.

What does being enough look like? It looks like Mama Lucy and the kids of
Shepherds Jr. :

My Voice Is Powerful

And it looks like Missy O’Keefe and the children of Sylvia Rosenauer Elementary in Jackson, NJ who raised over $5700 during LaLaLove by singing their hearts out:

LaLaLove–Sylvia Rosenauer Elementary

When told they had raised the most of all the participating organizations, their PTA Vice President emailed us this:

My name is Jackie Capasso and I’m the vice president of the PTA at Rosenauer elementary school. We entered the LaLaLove contest and since then our school has not been the same. But first I must give you a little background of our school. We are the smallest elementary school in our area with about 345 kids from kindergarten to 5th. We are also considered to be of the lowest income in our area. We are like a family here and the fact that we have come so far in so many ways including this contest is amazing. Our children are so excited they watch their video and sing it all day long. They know what it’s like to go without and the fact that they know they are helping to build another school in Tanzania just gives them such pride.

It looks like Brownie Troop #542 of West Columbia, who won “Best Video” for LaLaLove by conspiring to create an original song and for having the time of their lives while doing it:

LaLaLove–Our Love Is a Rainbow

And, finally–incredibly–it looks like a new school in Tanzania:

Shepherds Secondary shep 3

And so now, almost one year since the birth of OneVoice, we know a lot. We know that children, when told they can do something, will. We know that love, gratitude, and music aren’t just beautiful things to talk about and share, but that they are full of power. And we know that in a world that teaches so many of us that we are not enough . . . hundreds of children have dared to show us that voices joined together in love, are enough–beautifully, radically, abundantly enough.

Thank you for everything you have given to OneVoice in 2011–your intention, your energy, your resources, and, most of all, your willingness to say “yes”. Many plans are afoot for 2012, and I am so excited it is everything I can do not to spell them out for you here. But, there will be time for that soon enough. Right now, as you take time to celebrate the abundance of a New Year, also take a moment to reflect on the fact that, this year, you were part of something that changed the world. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

In this holiday season, may you be well in all ways.

Love,

Robbie
Joy and Ecstacy

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