The Story of The Power of One

Yesterday was an exciting day for TARA, our Power of One video was featured on You Tube's homepage for 24 hours. While that, in of itself, was fantastic what is really remarkable is the story behind the video.

Several months ago we were invited to the Clinton Global Initiative's University conference. We wanted a video to show case our work but with limited funds and even more limited Flash skills we reached out to the TARA community for help. Alyssa posted a request for a Flash designer on her FaceBook page. Her friend had friend and made an introduction. That's how we met Chloe Cooke-Warren, Flash designer extraordinaire. We gave her the script and the music and she created magic! We premiered the video at the Clinton Global Initiative conference in Miami in April.

While at the conference I sat in on a social media lecture with You Tube execs who talked about a new program, video volunteers, that they were launching. The program linked up nonprofits with volunteers who created You Tube videos for them and each month a theme was chosen with a contest -- the winners would get 24 hours on You Tube's homepage. I asked what the next month's theme would be and low and behold it was women's empowerment. Kismet, right?

So Chloe entered the video and we won! But that's not the end of the story. Within 24 hours we had over 200,000 viewers watch the video. That's almost a half a million people introduced to TARA and our work. Simply amazing.

But what may have been the best part of the story came last night when I received an email from a young girl in Iran who wrote:

I like your project, even tho I'm only 15 and I can't help much with money but I wish for you my best regards and God bless you for what you are trying to do! I hope you have helped many people and that you made a smile on many faces. Good job and I wish you a very best luck :-)

-- Alaa

Well, Alaa -- you certainly put a smile on our faces. Ultimately, this is what TARA is about -- creating community and helping people understand the world beyond their backyard. Alaa may not have money to help us but she has heart and she will personify yesterday's success for me.

I encourage you all to watch the video if you haven't already seen it. Please share it with your friends. We, at TARA, are working so hard to get the message of our work out there. But we can only be successful if the larger TARA community helps us.

Here's the video...I hope it puts a smile on your face.

Cheers, Amy