“Hold big dreams for the changes you want to make. Find the story and the purpose in the work you do. But realize that small and often easy habits, practices, tactics and experiments are how you’ll keep moving forward.” — Michael Bungay Stanier

It’s a daily challenge, trying to balance our individual and organizational capacities with our desire to make a difference.  The work doesn’t stop: Animals need care and outcomes. The next meeting begins. The phone keeps ringing, emails keep coming. The team is waiting for your lead. And you show up, again and again. It feels as if everything is on fire all the time. How do we put out the fire while also working on better fire prevention?

At KSMP, we also live in this tension. On days when our big dreams–for systems that support shelter teams and all of us connected to animals and one another–seem like they too are on fire, I remind myself why we have these dreams in the first place. 

For me, they started when I volunteered at a shelter, craving time with dogs because I didn’t have one of my own. The cinderblock building was tucked between a cemetery and a wholesale food distributor. In my memory, it is dimly lit, always damp, and busy with dedicated people. Again and again, I saw staff facing euthanasia decisions that conflicted with the reasons they chose–and kept choosing–to work at a shelter: to provide compassionate care for animals who needed care most. 

I’d walk dog after dog in the cemetery, then return to the shelter and hope to find interested adopters, though this was rarely the case. Back then, this was my habit: Out there under the shade of old trees, between fresh flowers left by loved ones, I’d wish things could be different. 

Now I’m guided by a different routine. I ask, What would it take to move in the right direction, one where shelters are places where animals and people find support and good choices exist for the people who work there? What small habits, practices, tactics, and experiments will keep me–and us–moving towards what we want to see, one step at a time? 

Here are just a few that remind me we can make a difference, and we are making a difference: 

• A city council approving a draft ordinance to let general managers waive fees so that more pets go home.
• Shelter and veterinary teams gathering to learn steps we can take to protect people and pets when co-workers and neighbors in our communities are threatened with sudden separation.
• Animal services carrying fence-fixing bags to keep dogs safe in their yards and sharing information and resources to prevent pre-seizure situations–succeeding in keeping pets with their people in every case. 
• A staff member shrinking an adoption application from more than seven pages to just-the-essentials, while embracing same-day adoptions–and then seeing animals happier in homes, faster.
• Staff and volunteers stuffing and freezing bright-colored Kongs for dogs to lick, or sharing cold water and popsicles with community members on a hot day.  
• Shelters and partner organizations coming together ahead of California Adopt-A-Pet Day to create and share outreach materials in multiple languages and welcome new adopters. (For 46% of adopters, this was their first time bringing home a pet from a shelter or rescue!)

Bright spots like these start with a single decision, choices we make in a moment that build to something bigger. They have a lasting impact, more than we may ever fully know. It’s important to recognize when things are hard and heavy. If today you feel like you can barely show up, you are not alone. And if today you feel like you can carry a little more, then be the one who checks in, who offers kindness, who reminds someone else that they are not alone either.

Small habits–practices and tactics we choose together–are proof that, though we may feel like it some days, we are not powerless. We are not without tools. And we are not without each other. 

What is one small good thing you’ve noticed lately? One habit you’re building to care for yourself or others, animals or people? I’d love to hear from you.

Dr. Cindy Karsten
Outreach Veterinarian