This year of two-thousand and sixteen, as graphically depicted on Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, was definitely a rough one for many people across the world. However, one prevalent theme throughout the restlessness and chaos of 2016 has been activism. Activism is how I see that I've changed and that my friends have changed. Our conversations have increasingly become crucibles for exchange of ideas about politics, religion, society, racism, sexism, social justice. Something about the current events is waking up a passion inside of us we didn't know existed. Which is why the pain of the evil in this nation and in the world have become all the more acute, leaving us to wonder what to do about it. Injustice keeps multiplying like gremlins attacked by a fire hydrant, and like a wound gushing blood there seems to be no amount of pressure or bandages on our part to staunch the flow.

I was encouraged and inspired by a seven-year-old girl from Aleppo, Bana Al-abed, whom The Washington Post has already dubbed the "Anne Frank of the Syrian civil war." Anne Frank didn't have Twitter, but Bana did, and she has been sharing over the past few months her daily life as a citizen of Aleppo under the crossfire of war. Her last tweets were videos of her mom showing the brutality of airstrikes near Bana's home and a heart-breaking farewell.

A couple months back, The Washington Post reported that

[Bana] misses school. She dreams of being a teacher someday, like her mother, whose English-language skills helped make the family’s Twitter feed popular in the United States and other Western nations.
She would love to write a book.

One of Bana's tweets caught the attention of author J.K. Rowling as she asked for a way to read Rowling's Harry Potter books. Bana and her siblings were able to acquire them online.

In the midst of losing her loved ones to airstrikes and the prevalent grief, Bana and her family were able to make a tiny space of solace and hope through books and her connection to the outside world, her ability to make her voice heard to millions of people who would otherwise never know the daily lives of people in Aleppo.

For us who are outside of Aleppo, there are many ways to create those safe spaces of hope and love in the middle of absolute devastation. For Bana, it was the circle of family surrounding her book. For many of us, it could be buying Christmas gifts like hand-crafted soaps and candles made by people in refugee camps. Preemptive Love Coalition is one of the most prominent organizations working in Aleppo, creating safe places for displaced families and empowering them by investing in their small businesses and education.

With all that's going on in the world, it's hard to sit still and wait. Whether we're waiting to finish our final exams, or at the airport for the next delayed flight, anxious to be home in the suffocating melee of people—it's hard to feel useful and connected to what's going on. While many people are out there changing the world, many of us are staying behind and watching, following the news and spreading awareness in little ways. But wherever we are, I hope we may see our lives as getting somewhere in the long run. If we are students, not all of us can be activists protesting on influential platforms, but we can certainly work hard at our studies so we can have the skills and knowledge to help many more people down the road. If we're working a desk job, we can save up to partner with organizations like Preemptive Love and invest in other people. Wherever we are, my hope is that instead of growing desperate and restless, we remember that good things take time.

And waiting for that time doesn't have to be static. Preparation isn't static. It's constant growth and learning. We change as we go. We change because we practice change today, because we create new habits and order our priorities. We can find better ways to love people around us each day. We can invest ourselves in our community and neighborhoods. We can give our best in our jobs and schooling.

Besides working towards change and waiting, we also need to find the right balance between a desperation that can spur us into action and giving ourselves enough grace to wisely determine the next best step towards effective, genuine activism.