Book excerpt: As Canadians, we are faced with a choice: do we continue to allow communities to merely survive or can we help them to thrive? Dr. Ann Dale has dedicated her life to studying Canadian communities and how they can transition towards more sustainable development paths. Since publishing her book At the Edge over fifteen years ago, her new book chronicles the various options that Canadians have to step back and actively implement sustainable community development practices. But what factors are stopping Canadian communities? How can a single 'story' dominate our development? What are the barriers and drivers and how do we reconcile competing agendas, and vested interests against changing the single story? Once again, Dr. Dale draws upon both the personal and the professional to discuss her own journey in reconciliation, reconnection and the power of relationships and ultimately love and compassion as one of the most important pathways for transforming human development. With 10-years of new research backed by many social innovations and progress in implementing sustainable community development, Dr. Dale concludes that there is hope but there is much more to do. As a country, we're only edging forward when we need to be leaping forward.