Perseverance and the value of one life

CLI Co-founder Nathaniel Houghton reflects on his trip to Kinshasa to visit our team in the DRC. Written on January 19.

CLI has been working in the DRC now for eleven years, and we have much to point to as far as proving success. But on a day like today, it doesn't always feel that way.

I truly love Kinshasa - anyone will tell you that it’s one of my favorite places in the world - but it has its challenges, and trips to Kinshasa always feature at least one day like this:

It's so hot.

My clothes are dirty. As in, actually covered in dirt… from where? I don’t know.

The Internet doesn't work. Then it does - for just long enough to trick me - before it stops again.

My shower is cold.

My bed is hot.

The power is out.

Did I mention that it's hot?

To add to my difficulties, today, several of the youth who were scheduled to attend the CLI training session today were unable to do so - due to travel, sickness, pre-existing commitments, etc. Sitting and watching the training, I am not proud to admit that I started to feel sorry for myself. My ego had some things to say! I came all this way and they didn't bother to even show up. For me!

It took me longer than I'm willing to admit to recognize my selfishness and notice how engaged the nineteen CLI young leaders in attendance remained throughout the lesson on business planning. I had forgotten that this is training that is hard to come by where they come from (or anywhere). I had forgotten that this training is deeply and meaningfully changing their lives, like it has for a few thousand youth before them.

Most of all, I had forgotten that one changed life would be worth many times the effort we've put into CLI since 2009.

We'll continue to collect metrics and stories and photos, but it's good to remember the value of changing one life (not to mention nineteen, let alone 2,500 or hundreds of thousands more whose lives are positively impacted by our young leaders). That remembrance, for me, provides the perseverance to keep going for eleven years or more. I hope it does the same for you.

Even when it's hot.