Big News: We're Launching an NGO between Colombia and Venezuela

Rodrigo, the baby who started it all.

September will mark the four-year anniversary of The Meaning Method. That's the month we opened The Writer's Block Facebook Group, and author Miranda Rijks signed a contract as my very first client.

The biggest development this year will be the launch of The Meaning Method NGO. This began right around Christmas with my good friend Nidia. We've started regular shipments of school supplies, toys and baby clothes to kids in Caracas. It all began with a very special baby faced a major turning point in life when he was eight months old.

Here’s the full story…

If ever there was a test for my romantic theories about generosity, it was the COVID 19 pandemic. When the first case of the coronavirus arrived in Colombia in March 2020, there was no compromising, we went into quarantine immediately and everything changed.

At that time Nidia and I had been with me, running the household, for nearly four years. I can’t speak for her, but I certainly felt our relationship had large margins. She’s probably the most generous person I know. When the pandemic struck she had nine people living in her apartment, including her daughter Yoli (pronounced Jo-lee) and Yoli's five-year-old daughter, Briana. Briana is my son's closest friend. They’re the same age.

Nidia and I would meet on a street corner so I could give her salary which she grudgingly accepted being that the quarantine restrictions wouldn’t allow her to come to work. No one felt like they had any job security. Yoli lost a job she’d held for years within the first few weeks of the lockdown. I was distraught by my son’s loneliness and my own income faltered as I swerved my priorities to attend to his school curriculum. Then Nidia gave me the first piece of the puzzle and I listened.

She said, “You know I could sleep on the couch a couple of nights and help you.”

Kids with school supplies we sent.

In this situation, I definitely followed her lead. Being a woman who crossed the Colombian/Venezuelan border to seek out a better life for the people she loved, she was very calm and clear-headed.

We realized that our problems directly complemented one another. I hired Yoli to oversee the school curriculum for both our kids and we rearranged the bedrooms so Nidia, Briana, and Yoli could stay with us. Soon, we’d set up a COVID bubble between our two apartments. Within the quickly shifting landscape, we were able to recreate a strong foundation by arranging our household. I had no idea how much I would love having a big family even in a relatively small apartment.

There were ups and downs. A member of our bubble had a new baby in April 2020 and by December of the same year, she decided to go back to Caracas to raise the baby in her parents’ house. At first, the only word to describe her decision was wrenching. Despite the fierce emotions of that moment, Nidia saw an opportunity to transport the resources we had to kids who needed them in Caracas. Diapers, toys, clothes, candy, food and supplies that had become impossible to find or afford. She was so passionate about it.

When our friend arrived in Caracas dozens of pics started rolling in. They were pics of all the clothes that Martín and Briana had outgrown over their lifetimes thus far. 

I looked at Nidia and squealed, "You’ve been organizing this for all these years?!”

And Nidia said, "There were so many times I thought I was being ridiculous and almost gave it away here, but I had this feeling. I that the opportunity would come to send, and I knew those kids needed it more and nothing was getting in over there."  

Cutie patootie with a new pencil case.

Our root system was connecting. Every time we cleaned out Martín and Briana’s closets over the past four years,  Nidia had been stowing away  the toys and clothes in service of a vision. It was something she could see that no one else could: children who’d been cut off from resources opening up those packages in utter delight. It was so beautiful. Especially the pajamas. The shrieks of joy and surreal smiles that poured into our phones were breathtaking.

That was only the beginning, once she found a way to ship care packages for children to Caracas, our kitchen became a packing station.

She was uniquely talented at organizing and distributing resources in a way that I would have made overly complicated. I started to think of her as “sea level.” If there was a pile of resources in one place, she would balance it out the way water does in order to reach equilibrium.

Soon I realized something pretty amazing had been sparked. Secretly, I’d always imagined a machine that would end poverty by bringing more meaning to people’s lives, but I had no idea how to put it together. I started small, by using my business to create stability for people I cared about during the COVID pandemic, but it wasn’t long before those very small initial steps took on a life of their own and grew organically without my direct participation.