Last week I attended the annual planning meeting of Groundswell International, a global partnership of NGOs working with small-scale farmers through agroecology to improve food systems and well-being. They do great work, and it was a pleasure to be with them for a week.

As a means to introduce ourselves to the other participants we were asked to stand up, state our name and affiliation, and say what we are passionate about. I didn’t have much time to think about it and I offered that “Injustice bugs me. And food is often central to injustice.” I thought about that a lot after saying it. I do think I spoke honestly and accurately. Injustice does bug me and it motivates me to work, through food and nutrition, to try to make the world a more just place. During the evenings of the Groundswell conference after finishing work for the day we would sing songs. One of my favourites goes “Solo le pido a dios que el injuste no me sea indiferente” - ~ I only ask of God that I not be indifferent to injustice.” Well, that is a prayer that has been answered. I am not indifferent to injustice, but… Now, I know what I am about to say is a bit of a “first world problem”, but being motivated by a negative, injustice, for the past 30 years is a heavy burden and not really healthy for me. And on the other side, I often do not notice justice or other things that go right. Yes, yes, good, something went right, now let me focus on all the negatives around and how I can try to fix them…

But then I realized why I like working with Groundswell so much. They are inherently, irresistibly positive. They work in very difficult circumstances, but they don’t seem to dwell on the negative, but rather on the many positives. I don’t mean to say they are all happy and blissfully ignorant of the suffering around them. Rather, one of their key practices focus on “positive deviance”, which is based on the observation that in every community there are individuals whose “positively deviant” behaviours and strategies lead to better outcomes despite having access to the same resources and facing similar challenges as the rest of the community. Groundswell works to spread positive practices.

I will try this. I will focus on what is going right, focus on the positive deviants, and see if I can be passionate about justice. As an anti-nuke demonstrator once told me, although I guess I didn't really hear him, “just because you are saving the planet doesn't mean you can't have a good time".