On Our Must Read List: One Small Step Can Change Your Life

As humane educators and committed citizens, we know the importance of working for both personal and systemic change; one won't work without the other. But all the demands and distractions on our time, the challenges of stepping outside the furious flow of the mainstream mindset, and the feat of overcoming fear, inertia, and the sheer overwhelmingness of working toward lasting, significant change can leave us paralyzed.

The strategies in the book, One Small Step Can Change Your Life: The Kaizen Way, by Robert Maurer, offer a pathway for breaking that paralysis and growing our way toward meaningful, transformative personal and systemic action through small steps.

Kaizen (which focuses on small steps for continual improvement) breaks down the big picture into actions that are manageable and lead to bigger steps. In Maurer's book, he outlines several small Kaizen strategies, including:

• asking small questions to dispel fear and inspire creativity;
• thinking small thoughts to develop new skills and habits;
• taking small actions that guarantee success;
• solving small problems, even when faced with an overwhelming crisis;
• giving small rewards to yourself or others to produce the best results;
• recognizing small but crucial moments that others ignore.

The book is filled with examples and ideas for helping us use Kaizen in our own lives and work for a better world. And as these anecdotes show, sometimes making many small improvements has a bigger impact than trying to reinvent an entire process.

For some of us, change is scary and difficult. So starting with even tiny steps can help bypass the scary and jumpstart new habits and behaviors that are more closely aligned with our values and lead to bigger changes and actions that help transform the world and help us live with joy and meaning.

~ Marsha

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