Be Courageous

Author e.e. cummings wrote "It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are." Valentino Achak Deng is the epitome of being courageous.

Growing up in a remote Sudanese town, Deng was caught up in his country's civil war. Separated from his friends and family, Deng became one of the 27,000 "lost boys" of Sudan who were displaced and/or orphaned during war where an unimaginable two million people died.

As he fled on foot, "Valentino and other refugees were attacked by soldiers beside a crocodile-infested river. He swam to safety through water bloodied as some swimmers were shot and others were snatched by crocodiles." When he made it to a refugee camp he learned to read and write. After a while he was accepted as a refugee into the United States.

Once in the U.S. he settled in Atlanta, Georgia, attended community college and met Mary Williams, who was the founder of an Atlanta-based organization called the Lost Boys Foundation. Through Williams he was able to meet author Dave Eggers who spent the next three years writing What Is The What: The Autobiography of Valentino Achak Deng: A Novel.

When the book was published in 2006 Deng established the Valentino Achak Deng Foundation. All proceeds from the book support Valentino's Foundation. The Foundation's first major project is the construction of an educational center in Valentino's hometown of Marial Bai.

The Marial Bai Secondary School is the first high school in the entire region, where decades of war completely devastated the educational system. Thousands of students applied to attend the school, including hundreds of girls from across the region. Unfortunately, due to cultural and family pressures, only 14 of these young women were actually able to enroll.

In Southern Sudan's male-dominated society, girls often drop out of school to work at home or are forced into early marriage. Deng wants to enroll more than 50% girls. This presents a herculean challenge since only about 500 girls, out of a population of eight million, have graduated annually from elementary school in South Sudan.

Questions To Ask Yourself

• Living out a dream often requires courage. Deng has demonstrated tremendous courage going back to Sudan and opening up a high school. What courageous acts do
  you need to take to fulfill your own dreams? 
• How do you define being courageous?  When have you been courageous in your life?
• What role does being courageous play in achieving your dream?
• Is there something right now that could benefit from you being courageous?
• What is stopping you from being courageous?