“Perhaps the most profound question that philanthropists can ask themselves at this ripe time for reinvention is this: What stories do you want or expect grantees to tell you? What stories do you tell about yourself?”

Thank you for this article, Courtney. I appreciating the connection you make about the stories we tell and are asked to tell. Here, regarding the recipients of philanthropy, you point to the types of stories we should tell. Change doesn’t always happen in sweeping, highly visible shifts, but in the perseverance and dogged effort to make change in the small details that make a difference to individuals and eventually add up to real change. It takes a combination of chutzpah and humility (as Parker Palmer writes in Healing the Heart of Democracy) to value stories that shine light on how the shifts in people’s hearts — and relationships — contribute to lasting change.