Featuring Special Guests: Khatema Fayaz, Mahbooba Fayez, Miranda Clendening with David Gershon

In this presentation, you’ll discover…
- Peace on Earth by 2030 movement and its Peace Game and Peace on Earth Zones Applications of Peace Game in Afghanistan with 300 girls forbidden to attend school by the Taliban and the transformation they have brought to their country in spite of these limitations.
- A true heroine’s journey.
- How you can be part of this grand strategy to create Peace on Earth by 2030.

HOSTED BY

David Gershon

David Gershon, founder and CEO of Empowerment Institute has been called the number one expert on social change. He has dedicated his life to empowering humanity to believe we can create the world of our dreams and designing the strategies and tools to help us make this a reality.

Based on his decades of empowerment and transformative social change experience he has architected a bold peace plan called Peace on Earth by 2030 with it’s two transformative change tools: a Peace Game and Peace on Earth Zones. This strategy is built upon his experience organizing the 1986 First Earth Run with UNICEF in which 25 million people and 45 heads of state in 62 countries participated in passing a torch of peace around the world. Wherever the torch went, wars stopped and the world was united as one. This global peace event was witnessed by a billion people through the media.

David is author of twelve books, including the award-winning Social Change 2.0: A Blueprint for Reinventing Our World and the best-selling Empowerment: The Art of Creating Your Life as You Want It. He directs Empowerment Institute’s Center for Reinventing the Planet which empowers change makers from around the world to design and implement transformative social innovations. He has lectured at Harvard, MIT, and Johns Hopkins and served as an advisor to the Clinton White House and the United Nations on empowerment and transformative social change.

PANELIST

Khatema Fayaz

Khatema Fayaz obtained a bachelor’s degree in computer science, faculty Information Technology (IT) from Kabul University. After graduation, she taught in private schools in Kabul for almost two years and taught orphans during summer holidays. She loved to play with them, bringing smiles to their lips and making them happy. It was the best experience she has ever had in her entire life. She enjoyed this work because she believed she could be a great remedy for human problems and have the ability and talent to put smiles on people’s faces. After the Taliban captured Afghanistan on August 15, she and her family fled to Pakistan. It is tough to write the whole story and explain how difficult it is to live illegally in another country. The collapse of Afghanistan and the difficulties she faced in Pakistan pushed her down.

After enduring these tough conditions, in November 2023, Khatema registered for a Cluster Education and Empowerment class at Estiqlal High School in Quetta, Pakistan. During the month she studied in Cluster Education, she learned about the "Peace on Earth" game by 2030. The students were divided into different groups, each with five members. Khatema was the team leader of the Mehr group. The Empowerment class and Cluster Education were lights in her life that shone during the darkest period. After contemplating suicide because my family forced me to get engaged to a boy who was addicted, Empowerment changed her life and gave her a wise vision of herself, others, and the world. It transformed her into a powerful leader in the world and my country.

On January 1, Khatema and her team members opened literacy classes to teach women for free. She started teaching four women with a whiteboard and a marker. After two months, her teacher, Aziz Royesh, said they deserved to be supported by 30BF as part of Cluster Education. Now, they teach 320 students and hope to lead other women to leadership. This is part of their activity in the "Peace on Earth" game by 2030. They found that education is the only way to achieve stable peace, invest in human development, and ensure sustainable development in countries.

Being a leader for six girls in our society is not easy. They face problems every day. They are even warned to close their classes because many believe education is not for women, but they have fixed part of it through direct and indirect talking and public awareness. Khatema enjoys each moment of her work and advocacy because she can bring happiness and smiles to women whose rights are violated and whom the world forgets. She firmly believes in the power of actions and is faithful that she can solve some of the problems our girls and women face.

Mahbooba Fayez

We cannot perpetuate our lives, but we can imbue them with meaning. After achieving many milestones during high school, Mahbooba Fayez graduated with high honors in 2018. She became an athlete, a volunteer teacher, and a second-year student of computer science at Kabul University. However, sadly, on August 15, 2021, when the Taliban seized control of Kabul, she had to immigrate from his home country, Afghanistan, to Pakistan. However, she has never focused solely on the difficulties of her life. She would rather use her time constructively than wallow in despair. She is a student of an empowerment class. In her empowerment classes, she has learned to believe in her own abilities, overcome fears, and shape her life as she wishes. She is a peace activist and a leader who coaches women, aiming to empower them to take on leadership roles.

As a peace activist, she takes part in “The Peace on Earth by 2030 Game.” By playing the Game of Peace, her spirit is always oriented towards friendship, unity, an abundance of love, and the seeking of prayers for all of humanity. It does not matter what the Taliban has done to her and her entire family, for as a peace activist, her entire concentration is to find ways and means to achieve peace and unity, doing away with hatred and prejudice. Mahbooba and her friends do not only work for a United Afghanistan, but for a United World, and the good news is that they now have a united movement. As a leader and as an Afghan girl, she wants to guide women towards taking more leadership roles within Afghanistan. She and her friends are coaching 360 women without charge. 360 of their students were illiterate to a degree that they could not even write the letter “A”, but now they can read and write. For too long has the history of women in her country been one of unacceptance and violence. However, during these six months of coaching, they have fortunately been able to make their students believe that women and men have the same rights and should enjoy an unquestionable equality.

Their students are now coming together to discuss these values on a regular basis. They discuss important issues such as how women should not be forced to remain silent for fear of religious beliefs or political persecution, fear of random arrests, abuse and torture, and that women’s rights should not be considered as a separate issue to human right. Now, her students are united with her in her principles and are working as one for peace and women leadership in Afghanistan and in the world. They have promised each other to work as hard as they can to see the day when a Talib takes his daughter’s hand and leads her to the doors of her school.

Miranda Clendening

Miranda is one of the Directors for UNIFY the World 501c3 also known as UNIFY or Unify.org. She also has a background as Executive Director and technology integration specialist for multiple large and small scale Non-profit Humanitarian Groups, and in the healthcare industry, is a holistic nurse, a mother of 5, regenerative whole-systems community development consultant, and large event facilitator. She also recently moved to Crestone, Colorado a spiritual Mecca in North America and became the Development Director for ScSEED (Saguache County Sustainable Environment and Economic Development) in San Luis Valley. She Is actively helping lead regenerative community development efforts there.

Miranda has past experience in creating and implementing values programs for children and families with Truthseekers and Families of L.O.V.E. (Living Our Values Everyday) Program and values-based business consulting with Best of Humanity. Miranda is very excited to be joining Evolutionary Leaders now and bringing her skills to our aligned missions. Miranda enjoys assisting with bringing partners together for projects around positive impact and helping leaders, organizations, projects, and individuals find each other throughout each of these impact areas. Being a mother of 5, and caring deeply about her family and community, youth outreach and transformational and educational programs for youth has been one of Miranda’s greatest passions. She has also been involved with Mastermind groups with the UN since 2016 for tracking impact with the SDGs in Science and Technology innovation.