“Active Hope” in Myanmar

The Myanmar Youth Project Team recently launched a beautiful new website for the Myanmar Youth Project (MYP) along with the Burmese translation of the book Active Hope, which is available for free download. 

MYP’s roots trace back to connections between Ye, Aya Terasawa and Yuka Saito. Hearing of the military coup in 2021 and ongoing atrocities across the country, Joanna Macy recommended Active Hope for the people of Myanmar. The MYP team members embarked on a journey of reading the book together and subsequently translating it. 

This note comes from Ye. 

Dear friends, warm greetings from Myanmar Youth Project Team.

We would like to inform you that we have launched the website for “Myanmar Youth Project-MYP” along with the Burmese translation of the book “Active Hope”. It can be done only with the support of many people who are living in different places, from Myanmar to Thailand, United States, Japan, and Australia. The connection and shared value of these people is just wonderful.

I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Aya Terasawa and Yuka Saito, as the roots of MYP started from the connection of these two. It was in 2021 when there was a military coup and ongoing atrocities around the country. It is a time; the dream and opportunity of many people were destroyed. People felt lost, overwhelmed and emotionally numb. Communities divided. 

To cope with these hardships and despair, we three started reading “Active Hope”. In 2022, Joanna Macy and Chris Johnstone gave their blessings to our project so that we can extend our book club to people in Myanmar. Then, the translation of the book came alive.

For me, the touch with Active Hope is a new experience. It shows a way to discover hope with actions. It showed us a way to hold our hands together in the darkest time. It showed us a way to see our pain as a source for solidarity. Throughout these experiences, it transformed me in a fundamental way, and I believe these extraordinary experiences will continue flowing through Myanmar people and youths.

So, welcome to this new website, and the book. This book is free downloadable so if there are any Myanmar friends around you, please forward the book with love and compassion.

Thank you!

Ye

*Ye is one of the translators of “Active Hope” (Burmese) and a nonviolent activist in Myanmar.

The Work That Reconnects in Myanmar also created this translation of the Joanna Macy and The Great Turning trailer with Burmese subtitles.