Past Participant Reflections
Transformational Experience?
The Byron Fellowship claims to be a transformative experience. I struggle with that description. Transformation cannot be encapsulated in a single experience. Yet, somehow, Byron was impactful and transformative for me at the same time. As time has passed since Byron,...
Stay in the Emotion
“I stayed in the emotion, I felt into the tears, and I read my vision aloud to the world.”
My Vision for the End of Loneliness
“We went from being a group of strangers to a tightly-knit crew of friends who cried together, danced together, and laughed until we lost our voices.”
Returning to the Beautifully Hard Places
By abby mohaupt (2014 Fellow, 2018 Returning Fellow Mentor)When I came back to Byron in August 2018 as a returning fellow mentor, I came back because of Andy.In May 2014, I was part of the last cohort of Byron Fellows that gathered at Turkey Run State Park...
Field Notes: November 2018
In April of this year I looked out from my office in my rural village church to see the garden boxes readying for their fifth growing season. It didn’t seem that long ago…
Riding the Uncertainty Wave
By Sunghee Tark (2015 Byron Fellow) My summer before Byron was like a calm sky before a storm. I was calm on the outside, but I was nervous, insecure and vulnerable on the inside. I was about to start my last year of college and had just returned from studying abroad...
Vision and Vulnerability: Reflections of a 2015 Byron Fellow
Realizing the importance of carrying my vision is definitely the most important thing that I took away from Byron. Byron shifted my focus and way of being from discouragement, back to my original vision…
This is It—It has Started
It is irrational to dream. A vision must move through ‘what-ifs’ and worries if it is to become tangible. When envisioning, a leap must be taken, a leap past rationality and into a firm faith that a different future is possible. This leap starts with me. With my way of being…
An Ongoing Story
By David Ward (2014 Byron Fellow) As I sat on the plane flying over the east coast of America on my way back to England in the Summer of 2014, I was on a high. I had just spent a week at the Byron Fellowship, where I met inspirational people from all over the world...
From Fear to Freedom on the Path of No Return
The valley I returned to is the city of St. Louis in the wake of Ferguson, with its coldly warring factions of shouts and silence seemingly as opposed to each other as fire and water. My own sense of change is fleeting at the best of times. But those dreams that took flight at Byron flutter back to visit me when I need them the most…