[Announcement]

Hi Ascenders,

Ellie here.

I know Oz would normally be in touch with you, but this is something that doesn’t really involve Molly and her team just yet… And I wanted to make sure that you saw it, just in case you hadn’t been on the fb page over the last couple of days.

It was a special announcement.

And I was super nervous about sharing this, but everyone has been so uber supportive, I’m feeling happier about it now.

So what was the big piece of news?

When I started writing with Michael I was a different person.

You may have read bits here and there where Michael has talked about me being a business and marketing consultant. Which is part of the story. The rest of it is that I have a coaching company which helps folks to drop the mind stuff that keeps them stuck so they can get on and make automatically better decisions.

Anyway, without getting too much into all of that, the reason I mention it is two-fold: the first reason is to introduce you to my alter ego, and the second is to ask for your help with something.

Ok, so my alter ego is called Laura Leigh Clarke. (Yep, just switch out Laura for Ell and you get the idea.) Laura is the business coach. She’s the one that solves problems and gets entangled in making shit happen. Laura isn’t bothered about writing stories… which is why you’ve never had reason to meet her.

Until now.

You see, there is something big happening in the world, and Laura decided a few years ago she was going to be a part of it. She wanted to touch people’s lives and solve some of the world’s problems. But one of the ways she realised she could do this was through story.

[Incidentally. For full disclosure, neither of these are my legal name. But they are truer expressions of who I have become. And Ell is the predominant personality in all this now, so no need to try and relearn what you call me… this is all just FYI 😉

Shit, I sound like I have multiple personality disorder… but I swear, it’s all perfectly… Fuck it. Yeah, maybe I’m nuts.]

And the origin of this story goes back to one of those ah-ha moments.

You know the ones, where suddenly everything you thought you knew just gets flipped upside down by one little insight.

The kind of insight that you could have heard a million times before, but in that one moment you really heard it. Maybe in a way that no one else listening heard it.

So when my friend, Pamela Jaye Smith, mentioned in a mythology class in one of our recent conferences that the values of a culture are a result of the mythology the society was built upon… the penny dropped.

To say it was a face palm moment is an understatement.

(I’ll share the link to the video where it happened in a moment…)

So there I was, fielding participant questions, holding space, doing my moderator thing (as Laura)… and all of a sudden I get hit smack in the brain by this wisdom-bomb.

And literally, everything I thought I knew about the world got turned on its head.

I started to consider: what if we could use this concept to change the world?

I was so moved by this concept I could think of nothing else for DAYS.

And so was born the Storytelling for Social Profit conference where we discussed not just what needed to be changed, but also the detailed mechanisms for how to do that…

i.e. how to harness this (largely untapped) potential of this vast subject we call “story”.

It’s actually super informative – made up of excepts from some of our experts –  but it’s main purpose was to propose a panel for an upcoming conference.

You may have heard of the conference. It’s called SXSW — South by South West.

We — and by we I mean MA and I — need votes, in order to be considered for this opportunity.

The opportunity of having this discussion on stage with a bunch of creatives who really could take this on board and make the world a better place through the work they do.

We’re talking studios like Pixar and Warner Bros. We’re talking about writers of movies and TV shows.

Imagine if these guys understood these concepts and started making films and shows that were awesomely entertaining, but also automatically layered in values that you and I wished we could see more of in the world.

You know — like er… not killing each other, or respecting others no matter what their gender or skin colour.

You’d be on board with that, right?

And normally we’d say to ourselves, things like: “these are big issues. There’s no way I could make a difference to these things.”

But right now — *you* could.

You can help us to make this shift.

And all it will take is 1 minute of your time to give us an “Up Vote”.

And if you want to watch the video you’ll even see a clip of Yoda giving a talk. (He even mentions Ivan, which suggests he hasn’t forgotten that Ecaterina has a brother!)

But right now, if you’re game for making a difference in the world, and helping to make sure this panel discussion is heard, I’d love to invite you to click through, check it out and give us an Up Vote.

(You’ll need to sign up for a free account in order to vote, but it’s a really slick and easy process, and I’d be massively grateful to you.)

This one little click would mean the world to us.

Literally.

And you know, there’s room on the page to leave comments… I’d love to hear your thoughts about what we are proposing to talk about!

Here’s the link: http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/78923

Agh. Shit. I’m all nervous again….

E x

P.S.  Thanks so much to those who have already logged in an Up Voted us. It really does mean a lot, and I really appreciate you taking time out of your day, and from reading the stories, to support us on this. You rock! <3