Change of plans! What now?

The secret of change is to focus all your energy, not in fighting the old, but in building the new. Socrates How many times have we heard or seen this phrase in different media, You know this article according to my "plan" should have been about who I was, who Silvia Love by Grace is, I had everything ready to tell you more about me. But everything changed, the situation that the world is facing at this moment gave an unexpected turn to all plans including the articles planned for the blog.

I remember starting this 2020 in Romania, one day I will tell you about this country that is full of beautiful landscapes. But let's go on, I was full of plans, goals, meetings scheduled in my agenda, several workbooks, excel tables, study projects, vacations, trips, and the list goes on, I had so many things planned, But in the blink of an eye, everything changed. And I know that the same thing happened to you, for a moment I sat down to try to understand that the plans we have are not achieved, sometimes due to circumstances beyond our control. 

Sinaia Mountains Romania

 

Vlad Dracul Castle, Brasov Romania

 

As a business I had created a plan for each month, I had a series of strategies to reach my goal for this year 2020 of selling my mochilas or women handbags, These beautiful bags are handcrafted by indigenous Wayuu women and the earrings of Esmeralda to achieve with 50% of the profit intervene through the two lines of projects to several Wayuu communities, who work with us around the Maicao, Guajira in Colombia. And now what do I do? I felt uncertain about what would happen in the future, for a moment I got blocked, but I remember that in every situation my focus has to be on the solution, I can't say that it was easy, but I made the decision to rest and I mean not to think so much and to wear out my mind in the and "now what am I going to do?" instead I focused on acting, and I started to rewrite the strategies, to rethink, to reinvent my plan to achieve my goals this 2020. 

As this happened, I remembered the essence of my brand, which motivated me and led me to work 100% on this dream. Did you know that Love by Grace was born based on love for others and the use of the gifts and talents given by Grace to serve others. This led me to ask myself another question? Silvia and apart from the contribution to the projects through the sale of the products. What will I do to support this hard time more directly?

The first idea and it was the simplest one, was the direct intervention to the women who weave the handbags, mochilas and who have been taught the art of crocheting, at a very early age, as part of their traditions and legacy and are part of this dream called Silvia Ardila Love by Grace. You know, this time is very hard for most Wayuu communities to sell their bags during the lockdown, motivated by this was that we decided to support our communities managing to arrive around with markets to 29 communities around the municipality of Maicao in the Guajira, Wayantamana, Marrajamana, pairamana, ruanamana, amalina, jurrimukal, alurrucha, jaturrucho, provincial, jerjer, pueblo Wayuu, shomkomana, juriakal. Bootoneka, warramander among others, where some of their members weave the beautiful handbags to be later in our atelier intervened with appliqués and then marketed by Silvia Ardila Love by Grace. But we did not do this, a friend from Germany when she knew what we were going to do wanted to be part of it and make a donation to be part of this, she knows who she is today I say Thank you for having accompanied us in this. 

Organizing the Groceries, Maicao, Guajira

 

Groceries

 

Joe and Celia Community

 

Group of some of our craftsmen

 

This groceries that will help them for at least one or two weeks, there were 29 families that we were able to support, in Colombia restrictions continue, and everybody need stay in-home, and for the communities who live in the desert, the situation is difficult, among them our communities. I would like to help more artisan families but for this I need to sell more of my products to continue supporting in these hard times, if you buy our Bags and earrings you will be also part of this. I don't want to stop there, I would like to help more artisan families but for this, I need to make a sustainable my business to do this, if you buy our products you are also part of this, or if you want to make a special donation you can.

 

Credit Picture: Adriana Loureiro Fernandez for The New York Times, Article https://www.nytimes.com/es/2020/04/10/espanol/coronavirus-grupos-indigenas.html

 

 

Our next activity was the Birth of Silvia Ardila's son Love by Grace, if we now have a baby, I mean Love by Grace Kids, that was born with the desire to contribute in this moment of quarantine or isolation, looking for through our free activities to collaborate in the fun and learning of a dynamic way of the children. Due to the current situation, the recreation of children has become a real challenge for parents. What can we do with the children at home? This is the question of many parents every day and we want to help them in those moments.

Love by Grace kids rescues the love of grace, in these difficult times for many, using our gifts and talents to reach out with love to children and their mothers. All mothers who want to be part of this network and be able to live day by day the experience of the different free activities that go from science activities, crafts, master cook, stories and dance, all our activities are free. In addition to this project we have friends who support us with their different talents in some sessions, such as Andrea who with Sabriela her princess every Thursday takes us on a fun journey of music in Spanish, English, and Dutch  https://www.facebook.com/lacolombianitaintwente/ Also, Sandra Luz https://www.facebook.com/sandraluzeindhoven/ special flowers who accompanied us last Friday doing an activity for the mothers of the children.

https://www.facebook.com/lovebygracekids/

We opened our Love by Grace kids Facebook page and now we have almost 300 followers, and we continue every day to bring activities for our children, these activities we start in Spanish and also do them in English. You can follow us on our Love by Grace kids Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/lovebygracekids/ or send us an email to Lovebygracekids@gmail.com

During this time so many things have happened, that as I said at the beginning I did not have within my plans, April 7 was my birthday, and I celebrated it by zoom with some friends but that day I received a bigger surprise. But what I was going to do with my birthday is to start a campaign to support several families in the Syrian refugee camps a campaign made by Facebook for the organization Preemptive Love https://www.facebook.com/preemptivelove/ an organization that I love very much because I know the exemplary life of its CEO Jeremy who I had the opportunity to listen in London in a congress and believe me that it changed my perspective about Love.

 

 

This campaign was joined by several friends around the world who know who they are: I want to thank you very much, friends, from different parts of the world like Italy, Colombia, Romania, Holland among others who contributed their grain of sand to support the Syrian refugee families. To all of them today I want to say THANK YOU! 

For you

 

If you realize how much this change of plans has caused, maybe, in the beginning, it was terrifying and has led me to reinvest and has strengthened our essence, our commitment to love, believing that Love has to adapt to this new stage more profoundly in these turbulent times has been accompanied by many other emotions that we had forgotten: compassion, gratitude, kindness. It is up to us to make this moment a time where compassion, altruism, and goodness.

 

 

Today I invite you to be sensitive and to let yourself be carried away by the love and to continue with the living hope that soon this will be a chapter, but that in that chapter wonderful feelings surfaced within you and that made a difference around you. And do not forget that situations or change of plans are not terrible, is that you can see those moments as an opportunity to reinvent yourself and change the plans in your agenda to let everything good in your life.