I, alongside 21 wonderful volunteers, am delighted to invite you to the 5th Serbian Philanthropic Gala. To understand why we have a gala, I’d like to share a personal story.
A personal story
When I was younger, I loved the Star Wars movies. I must have watched them over a dozen times, drawn to the action and special effects. I came for the spectacle of spaceships and aliens and lasers. I would sit through the entire film, including stretches of dialogue or music, waiting for the next action sequence, watching, listening, and absorbing what was on the screen. The “boring parts” were a small price to pay for all the eye candy a boy could ask for.
Many years later, I was blessed to become a father. Becoming a dad lets you revisit your own childhood, and fatherhood brought me back to those movies. As I watched them alongside my kids, I saw them again with new eyes.
To my surprise, the boring parts with the words held my attention like never before, and I started to consciously see all the richness I had absorbed without ever realizing it. I traced a lifelong appreciation for classical music to those movies.
I still appreciated the work of the talented artists who did the flashy special effects and futuristic designs. But I also came to appreciate the work of those who pored over more subtle trades like set design, costume design and sound design. All those elements had artistry and the capacity to showcase human creativity, ingenuity, care and even a sense of humor.
Most of all I realized I had picked up intentional moral messages. Beneath the action and adventure, were some guideposts to life – lessons on what’s right and wrong, what makes for good decisions vs. bad ones.
Galas take effort
Let’s face it, a gala is hard work. You need a nice venue. You need to get dressed up. Once you’ve asked people to make the commitment to come, you feel compelled to create an atmosphere for your guests and give them a quality dining experience and entertainment. All of it takes effort, all of it is an investment.
While it takes time and effort, all those elements offer an opportunity to put forward people’s creativity and passion. They offer a vessel for people’s talents and lets them share what they consider to be beautiful, or inspiring, or fun, or challenging. It offers a grand stage to gather human excellence and express it in many different forms, be it music, fashion or cuisine.
There is a spectacle that comes with so many people putting their best face forward. Attendees run the range from aspiring to established, but none of them are lacking in effort and the courage of trying. They are willing to make sacrifices, invest themselves and put themselves out there. It is a self-selected community of people who are still striving, and who want to be surrounded by some idea of beauty.
So to recap, if your only goal is to raise money, a gala is a pretty inefficient starting point. If your top priority is gathering the most people possible, a gala implicitly makes too many demands of the audience. If neither gathering the most people, nor raising the most money are your goals, why bother with a gala?
Gala as spotlight
To me, the reason you have a gala is to create a cultural spotlight.
And say what you will, but the show is hard to ignore. When everything is excellent and everyone is trying, it’s a special occasion. Each attendee and every element is a star that comes together to form a dazzling constellation.
Where you choose to shine that spotlight is a tremendous responsibility.
Since our inception, the Serbian Philanthropic Gala has been focused on shining a spotlight on those who take action to improve their community. We haven’t always got everything right, but our aim is to highlight people who sincerely devote their time to making the world a better place. That’s the moral of the story, and where we look to put the emphasis.
The central purpose of the evening is to give an award to someone who has taken Philanthropic Action. The wording is intentional – action. We celebrate those who didn’t accept the status quo, the way things are but instead took action. They faced the risk of failure, they paid the investment of time from their busy lives, and they had the courage to do something to make a positive impact.
The actions they took may have started small, but they ripple like waves in a pond and have lasting and unexpected impacts on people’s lives. A helping hand at the right moment, or cracking the door of opportunity for someone, can literally change the trajectory of a person’s entire life. From personal experience I can attest that small acts of kindness and care can provide a lifetime of inspiration.
How else do we shine the spotlight we’ve created? For the fifth gala, as with all prior galas, all money raised goes to a third-party charity. In this case, it will help raise money to build Makers Labs for students, so they can learn, explore and maybe discover a passion or develop a talent. While we hope the evening raises ever more money for our partners, at base we raise awareness of their work.
We state our mission is to celebrate contributions, spark ideas and inspire action. Showing people that things exist, that they are possible, can give hope. It is our hope that these examples unlock people’s creativity and get them to take initiative.
Conclusion
To be part of a vibrant community is a blessing. To be a part of group with people who are empowered and creative, who are generous and caring, who are engaged in their lives and striving for excellence is to be truly wealthy. That type of community is the definition of thriving.
A gala is there to raise awareness, to strengthen community, and celebrate the best we have to offer. It exists to inspire, first and foremost.
I’d like to close out with another brief personal story. When I was younger I listened to the ‘fun pop-rock’ songs of Bajaga. Within the catchy rhymes and hooks were words with meaning; words that left an imprint on me and inspired me many years on.
It feels surreal that someone who inspired me at such a young age, and left such a durable impression, will be the headline act for our fifth gala.
Our attendees are an amazing collection of people, each a shining light. I hope the gala lets them come together and see, they are not lone lights in a dark world, but rather part of a wonderful community- ovo svetlo nije usamljeni zrak. To borrow his eternal words, I hope everyone who attends leaves feeling “osecam ipak, ko da nismo sami ti i ja.”