From Lion President Jane Jarrow
July 1, 2010
CHANGES!!!
As the Tri-Village Lions begin a new year – our 60th year! – we are faced both with tradition and with change. Our members continue, but the Board of Directors has changed. Our meetings remain the 2nd and 4th Thursday of the month, but our meeting place has recently changed. Our commitment to service has not changed, but the communities we serve are changing around us!
I went looking for famous quotes regarding change. Some of the quotes I found spoke to the inevitability of change:
- To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly.
- Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future.
Some cautioned about the difficulties of facing change:
- Change can either challenge or threaten us. Your beliefs pave your way to success or block you.
- Change is not made without inconvenience, even from worse to better.
And then I found two quotes that seemed to sum up where the Tri-Village Lions are today, as we begin our newest version of an old and established organization with a rich history in the community:
- Life is change. Growth is optional. Choose wisely.
- People can’t live with change if there’s not a changeless core inside them. The key to the ability to change is a changeless sense of who you are, what you are about and what you value.
We KNOW who we are, and who the Tri-Village Lions have always been, as well as what we value. “We serve” is more than a succinct motto for our logo – it is (and always has been) our commitment to our community and to greater society outside our immediate boundaries. So long as we continue to share that objective and strive to fulfill it, the changes we make in the way we approach the task – changes in our policies, procedures, plans – become an avenue for growth, not a threat to our stability.
As you read this newsletter, watch for the articles marked “Action Alert!” They are invitations to be active in supporting some changes, continuing some traditions, and becoming an active participant in our old, yet vibrant, community of service.
