The impact we have
I choose the word impact with deliberation. As a lover of going to Source, be that the Source Idea, or the Source of nourishment, or the Source of a word.. the etymology of the word impact is from 1600 Latin, ‘to push into, drive into, strike against.”
I am not a fan of Impact Investing, as a term, for this reason. While the intention might be towards good, the choice of word carries the very energy I believe those people who might seek Impact investing want to transcend.
You might well accuse me of being pedantic. And I will agree. Yet words, and their Source, carry energy. If we want to create a world with a future we need to choose our words and our actions with deliberation.
Do we want to create an enterprise that pushes into, strikes against? Do we want that to be the effect?
Will more push, more drive, more striking against moving us towards a more beautiful world, where the centuries of Yang energy are balanced by the Yin?
Instead of impact, we might want to influence, from Old French influence “emanation from the stars that acts upon one’s character and destiny” (13c.), also “a flow of water, a flowing in,” from Medieval Latin influentia “a flowing in”.
Photo taken September 18th 2020
