Real People | Real Stories

A couple months ago, we wrote about our/Girlworld’s budget, and our commitment to transparency.

But we left something rather important out of the conversation, which is that while we have begun fundraising, we have not yet started to use the money we are raising. In other words, in spite of the fancy long budgets we posted that make it look like we’re getting paid to do this, we are not.

The way it’s working right now is, we are banking our proceeds from fundraising in an account administered by Shunpike, our fiscal sponsor (our arrangement allows us to accept donations and give receipts for tax deduction purposes, making us a virtual non-profit, among other blessings they confer upon us). When that account grows beyond our arbitrarily set go/no-go sum (currently $25,000), then we feel we’ll be able to ‘start the clock’, as it were, and actually begin paying ourselves for this Girlworld work.

Until that time, all our expenses, for running our lives, for running Girlworld, for keeping our cameras in good shape and macaroni on our table… all that money comes from our regular day-to-day freelance work. Which we richly enjoy, and which we would love to be doing more of. And even more, we’d love to reach (and exceed) that $25,000 Girlworld goal so that we can be doing less freelance and more Girlworld.

It’s a funny balance, and we’re trying every day to get it right.

Our buddy Chris B turned us on to this very cogent deconstruction of the very awesome video, “The Girl Effect”.

If you haven’t seen it yet, I urge you to run, do not walk, to your nearest YouTube purveyor and check it out. We’d love to hear your thoughts. Talk about a way to get a message across, without all that pesky global travel and trying to make your camera batteries charge on intermittent electrical service!

Well, now the same folks have followed the first ‘film’ up with Girlworld 2.0. We’d love to have some of this horsepower on board over here at Girlworld.

Thanks, Chris! This was the first I’d heard of the Heath Brothers, who seem to be messaging specialists of the highest order.

Our lovely neighbor and dear friend Liv Browning has started up a blog, around a genuinely sweet idea: Baking a Difference.

We are thrilled and humbled and beyond grateful to note that she’s already raised a good little chunk of money for Girlworld through this nifty initiative.

Thanks Liv! Thanks nice buyers of baked goods! Watch this space for word of an upcoming Baking a Difference event!

In July, Scott and I attended an ITVS workshop with Richard Saiz, their program director. Wooey! That guy is good. I hung on every word.

It took me back to when I flirted with being an English major. In the workshop we picked apart accepted ITVS films like we did Goethe in college. Richard spoke of symbolism, motif and universals.

Universals. What is it about our girls’ stories that our audience will, on some level, relate to— feel, “oh yeah, I understand that. I have been there. I know this story.”

With the girls, it is their determination to change their fate — to make their life better than their mothers’ and their grandmothers’. We all strive this. People working in factories in China strive to do better than their parents. People working in high rise offices in New York City strive for something different from how they grew up.  It is human to want to build up from the past. To change the way it has been. It is human to want to carve out your own life and identity, beyond what has been set up for you.

Shanta says this, “I am going to finish school. I am going to be someone.”

We all want to be someone.

Scott and I worked day and night on our ITVS application. We worked and reworked paragraphs. We would write a section, say “yeah, that is it”. And then read it again and start all over. It was a big brain teaser and I know it made us smarter.

No matter what happens with ITVS (We sent it off  in the mail on Wednesday!), I know come January when we are finally in the field and filming, the message of universals will be with us. Richard Saiz brought us back from focusing on fundraising and impact campaigns to what is the most important —what you have to have before you have anything else. STORY.

I love stories. That is why we make documentaries… we love stories.

Which makes me think I should turn on the radio. This American Life is about to be on.

Which makes me think of the bumper sticker I made up that I really need to get printed: What would Ira Glass Ask?

Something interesting from some colleagues (that we don’t know, yet).

A screenshot from the innovative story of "Tarla"

Go and visit the site.
We’d love to hear your thoughts about this. Catch “A Girl Story” also on Facebook.