Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace … One School at a Time
by: Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin

How can you change the world? You start by finding something worth changing. This biography of the Eastern adventures of Greg Mortenson sometimes caused me to sit in my car in the parking lot to keep listening to the audiobook. It is an amazing tale of bringing education to rural villages in Taliban territories in the 1990’s and 2000’s. Education can truly change a life and whole societies as noted in my review of Half the Sky. You can hear the passion in Greg’s story of a mountaineer turned entrepreneur in three ways:

1. It comes from within
• No two dreams could be more different than walking into Pakistan to climb K2, the world’s second highest mountain, and walking out promising to build a school. Sometimes chance encounters change you for the better and take you to the next step of your life like it did for Greg. Nothing else was causing him to take this challenge except himself and that is the most powerful motivator.
2. He sacrifices everything
• Greg has the drive to keep going through every loss I know. He gives up his mountaineering passion; he loses his career, his friends, his love, and pretty much every penny to his name. It is just a heart-wrenching story that keeps you rooting for Greg like a hero.
3. It strikes a chord with his followers
• Sometimes you fight alone, but slowly people start listening. When there is a cause worth fighting, all it takes is just one person that is influenced (as Greg learned presenting at an empty auditorium on more than one occasion). That one person then repeats the story to his/her network. It becomes contagious and soon Greg is running a multi-million dollar organization!

Greg’s life story is a true story of overcoming the odds and never giving up. His frugality and perseverance were admirable traits that made his efforts successful. It is hard to imagine how he staying positive through all the difficulties and naysayers. This book left me with a new drive to demonstrate the same passion in my own efforts to “change the world”; no matter what comes my way.