49. Never judge, there is always a story – Daniel Mendoza

The entrepreneur, speaker, writer and life coach Daniel Mendoza had a challenging childhood and adolescence, to say the least. His family fled from his native Uruguay in the seventies, and after having hopped between a few countries they ended up in Sweden. The human environment in Daniel’s early life was soiled with lovelessness. His father was violent. Daniel got into fights all the time. But he never wanted to hurt people. He was blessed with a pure heart and an inner belief that there is hope. ”Tomorrow is going to be a better day”, he said to himself. A human encounter in his early twenties turned out to be pivotal. It was an epiphany. It showed Daniel how much good there is within us humans. He made a u-turn and decided to choose a positive path. He decided to study economics. That didn’t quite resonate with Daniel, but it propelled him to the next chapter in his life: the creation of a very special newspaper, Good News Magazine. This journalistic product prompts me, the former journalist, to ask questions about the reasons why one should publish positively focused news. Is the mainstream media telling a falsely negative story about the world and humankind? Or is the world such a problematic place that we need to tell the positive stories as well, so that we can get the strength to find the solutions? Daniel and I have an interesting discussion about these things. At one point Daniel employed a person who was openly neo-nazi and who insulted him every day for two years. ”I knew that this guy needed trust”, says Daniel. ”And I needed to start by listening to him. I knew there was a reason why he said the things he said.” This is the way Daniel Mendoza sees people. ”What if we can leave every child with a feeling that it is possible to solve our problems?” he says. Early in life Daniel realized he had to face the problems in order to solve them. This began with him ending up in fights. But it transformed into a drive, a desire, to focus on the positive, on the solutions. ”I will never forgive the things my parents did, but I will not be angry with them. We judge the person, but we cannot blame the person, we have to understand what lies behind. There is good in everyone.”