Posts about community organizations, inspiring individuals, leadership and mentorship, as well as new ideas in education.
WikiLeaks threw US diplomacy into chaos when it started releasing more than 250,000 classified State Department cables on November 28, 2010. The firestorm of controversy surrounding the documents leaked raises the question, what are those in power so afraid of?
While we don’t always look in the right places, wanting to be happy, safe, healthy, and cared for are part of our common nature. Practicing compassion and generosity can be healing and contagious. Listening to each other allows us an opportunity to connect at a basic human level.
The best way to honour the ones who have fallen in battle this Remembrance Day is to start by creating peace in our own lives through the higher values of respect, compassion, forgiveness and wisdom. From there, we will begin to create peace in the world. Only then will we truly honour their memory.
More and more people are responding to need where they see it. My first experience with these causes of the heart (which Nicholas Kristof recently coined as DIY Foreign Aid) was through the work of my dear friend, Maria Miller, and her friend, Sasha Bilar, who co-founded Toys for Thailand (T4T). T4T provides support for orphaned, abandoned, and refugee Hill Tribe children in remote villages in Northern Thailand.
Fresh Air, Exercise, Eco-learning, history and geography all wrapped into one fun outing! That is exactly what the children of Mount Pleasant Elementary School experienced when Gary Dover took them on a guided Fall Nature Walk this week. The walk was part of the Green Team program which promotes environmental literacy and leadership. Helping children connect to nature, along with reducing waste and conserving energy at their school are the main tenets of the program.
As the world watches the Chilean rescues, the positive messages of the tenacity of the human spirit, global community, people helping each other and oneness are reminders to everyone of our true nature. Let's take this moment to reflect on our human essence and try to hold onto this sense of connectedness in the future when our lives feel less harmonious and balanced.
Artists and designers are creatively using others’ castoffs in this economy to create chic, reusable and recycled works of art, including bridal gowns. Transforming dresses, paintings, furniture, homes, trash, or all manner of items into something new, something creative, something else is similar to our own growth and changes in life—using the raw material of our experiences to make new ones is what we do.
I was extremely fortunate to have attended the Wisdom 2.0 Conference in Silicon Valley last weekend. It is the first of its kind, bringing together leaders in new media and technology, like Twitter, Google and Facebook, with spiritual and social consciousness leaders. I first heard about the conference about a month ago from a friend.
Operation: "Flat Kerrsen" What began as a grade two school project later became a colossal endeavor, bringing hundreds of people together, including current and past Olympic gold medalists, rock stars and hockey legends, to share in the true spirit of the Olympics. It all started with a single note and a picture that was sent by Margo Johnston, Olympic organizer, to her friends and colleagues: I have been asked by a friend to help her grandson with a Flat Stanley project. Kerrsen is 7 years old and lost his father to cancer last year. He has mailed us his little flat self to explore British Columbia...and we are taking him to the Olympics! Your mission, should you accept, is to contribute to Flat Kerrsen's school project by making his trip to the Olympics unforgettable!" And unforgettable it was! There wasn't a more traveled person, albeit flat person, at the Olympics. Not even the press would have seen the events that he saw, nor met the number of people both behind the scenes and in front of the [...]
Come join us! WALK FOR DUNES LAKE WOODS The Friends of Dunes Lake invite you to join them for a walk through the bog, woods and trails surrounding Dunes Lake to raise awareness of the ecological, recreational and quality-of-life value of this area. A road and housing development is being planned between the Bordelais Bog and Dunes Lake. This is home to many bird and animal species as well as old growth forest. It’s not too late to save this place, but we need your help! Let’s show the developers and Town Council that St. Lazare residents don’t need another road here - we want this ecologically sensitive area preserved for future generations! WALK INFORMATION Nature Interpreter Ryan Young will be our guide as we explore the bog, adjacent woods, and Dunes Lake. Come see some of the flora and fauna that make this area so special. Date/Time: April 11, 2010, 1-2 pm Start: Bordelais Bog parking lot (rue Yearling/Bordelais) Bring your children, your friends and your dogs for the Walk, Easter Egg [...]
