Making human rights popular – Martin Luther King Jr. In his famous speech in 1963 entitled “I Have a Dream,” Dr. King shared his vision of a world where people could coexist harmoniously. While things are far from perfect, what seemed impossible in the 1960’s has certainly become possible now.

Putting a man an on the moon – John F. Kennedy gave a famous speech in 1961 in which he challenged America to send a man to the moon by the end of the decade. Most people seriously doubted that would ever happen, but that dream was achieved on July 20, 1969.

Reducing gang violence – Nelsa Curbelo, a 66-year-old former nun and schoolteacher, took on the toughest young criminals in Ecuador’s most violent city and won them over with love.

Inventing well-loved products – Dick Drew’s development of the first masking tape for 3M is an example of his extraordinary gift for overcoming impossible odds. It took hundreds of tries to achieve the right kind of glue and tremendous powers of influence to get the funding necessary from 3M because it was the beginning of the Great Depression. Side note: did you know that 3M at first rejected the scientist who invented Post-It Notes – they deemed it useless at the time.

Curing Homelessness. When Hannah Taylor was 5 years old she saw a man eating out of a garbage can. She asked her mother why he had to do that. When her mother explained homelessness, Hannah asked, “If everybody shared what they had would that cure the problem?” By the age of 8 she started The Ladybug Foundation. She now speaks internationally and has raised in excess of $2 million that support over 40 shelters.