HumanKindMedia

Hope

I get some notes and calls asking about the blog every once in awhile. There are many explanations for a 4-month lapse in blog-writing (too many to write about here) but mostly, what initially drove the blog was my feeling of a lack of hope in the world. As strange as it sounds, I felt like hope came back last year--in my life, in the media (well, some places in the media), and in the world. I may have quit writing because there was so much hope out there, I felt redundant.

Lately since my last post about "Yes We Can", I'm excited about vegetables, and I'm still exploring possibilities for my own version of Dave Eggars'826 Valencia to begin next fall to help ease the burden on teachers and schools in my community that are suffering severe financial cutbacks. Everything I want to do takes a community. I'd like to build a community of HumanKind writers (as you know I can't keep it up on my own :--), I'll be looking for a community of volunteers to implement my writing/tutoring group to support schools. Friends around me are losing loved ones, having illnesses, recovering from illnesses, and there is financial strain and worry everywhere. But, I find there is hope in coming together to solve the not-so-impossible problems if we're together.

There is nothing that cannot be helped by us creating, building, sustaining, and nurturing community in our lives, our regions and our world. This past week, Karen sent me the Stand By Me video by Playing for Change and I found the wonderful Antwerp Station video on You-Tube. If you enjoy them, share this post with your friends. I hope you're building your own communities around the things you care about. I'll be back soon. In the meantime, watch and enjoy these two (and, yes, if you feel moved to do so, dance!).

Revisiting the Global Oneness Project

One of my favorite places to visit every once in awhile for inspiring videos is the Global Oneness Project. Yesterday I found so much, I just have to invite you to visit, too. Amazingly, as I was looking for this original post we did on them last year, I realized that it was almost exactly a year ago that I found them.

Much has happened on the Global Oneness Project front in a year. From The People's Grocery creating sustainable food sources for an impoverished community in Oakland, and Goonj using every scrap of cloth to help the poor in India to peace efforts in Israel and Palestine, Emmanuel and the Global Oneness Project team have been meeting people around the globe so we can meet them, our fellow global citizens, too.

I especially recently enjoyed this blog about their visit to Israel, and still love this interview with Nipun Mehta of the smile card revolution.

The Global Oneness Project mission is simply to create short films and interviews from around the world to explore how we are all connected. To that end, they offer their amazing videos free for downloading or you can order a free DVD for use in screenings for your neighborhood, your communities, your friends. I'd recommend a favorite video, but now I have too many to mention them all. Click here and watch for awhile. You'll see what I mean.

The New Orleans 100

On the anniversary of Katrina, there are probably more stories about new possibilities than there were about tragedy and devastation 3 years ago--probably thousands of stories about healing in New Orleans and the areas affected by Katrina.

Kudos to All Day Buffet for creating the New Orleans 100. In their words: " To combat top down media during the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, we will leverage bottom up tools on the social web (email, blogs, twitter, facebook, digg, etc.), which can reach a combined audience of millions to raise awareness about New Orleans and inspire action to make a difference.'

From the high visibility stories like Brad Pitt's Make It Right Campaign to the RUBAR (Rusted-Up-Beyond-All-Recognition) project restoring bikes and helping the youth of the 9th ward and the Nola 180 schools project which I hope also finds its way to Dave Egger's list of stories about possibilities for schools. The New Orleans 100 has great links and great stories from great writers including a moving Sports article (I love moving sports articles).

Here's to a fine example for celebrating possibility and providing inspiration for the rest of us! Help spread the word!

Matt's back

Sometimes you know what someone is doing is important even though you can't describe it in words. Matt's back with his 2008 dance around the world--take a look.

Visit Matt's site here for his story, the 2006 and 2007 versions, the equally wonderful outtakes and his blog. Watch. And, try the dance yourself. If you can find words for what happens when you watch, let us know.

If you're a new reader, welcome to HumanKind. You can get free updates here. Wonder what we're up to? Click on the links on the upper right, or scroll through the topics and archives on the left. If you're a regular, thanks for your support! Let us know what HumanKind can do to keep the media you'd like to see coming your way. You can e-mail me at chris (at) humankindmedia dot com. And please do share HumanKind with your friends.

Day 1 of HumanKind Challenge #4

Hooray, it's June 1, the first day of HumanKind Challenge #4. I'm pondering the little personal idiosyncracy of mine that made me have to start the 29-Day Giving Challenge at the beginning of the month. If I look back at my week, I "gave" my time, my energy, stuff, and love all week long. So did you probably. But, somehow, today, waking up with the intention of being generous, I feel a different lightness and connection, and I feel a little happier. I can't wait to hear how it's going for you. I expect the 29 days will be filled with ups and downs, dids and didn'ts, but most of all a sense of shared community and fun.

If you're on the fence about joining us, I'm invoking Mother Teresa here to give you encouragement:

"If you can't feed 100 people, then just feed one."

and

“We cannot do great things on this Earth, only small things with great love.”

If I needed a reason or a "goal" to do a giving challenge (which, apparently I did), my goal would be to help Cami, the amazing person who started this, meet her goal. She's looking for 2000 people to do the 29-Day Giving Challenge by the end of July. My goal is to help her by encouraging as many people as I can to join with me. I'm #349, and there are already several after me. Wouldn't it be cool if you all joined, and then invited 3 or 4 friends to join (who invited their friends?). More than 2,000, or 20,000 would be good. Not impossible. (You know my stance on "impossible".)

I guess the reason I waited until June 1 was so I could invite my HumanKind readers and my friends to join me. Now you've all received your invitation. I hope you'll jump in. Some of you already have signed up, I see, and I applaud those of you who started right away (thanks, Audrey) without that artificial June 1 hang-up I had.

Liz says informs me that signing up is a two-step process. If you've signed up at the 29-Day Giving Challenge community, but not the HumanKind Challenge #4 group yet, you have to click on our little "globe-in-the-hands" logo on the main page (on the lower right) or on the group page and "join" the group. You'll read our daily updates there, and can share some of your experiences, too, once you're in the giving-your-comments mood. If your browser is different and you don't know what the heck I'm talking about, e-mail me and I'll try to explain it differently.

I woke up pretty excited about my ideas for my first day of giving. You can read my recap on the 29-Day page. I'll just say that already before noon, I'm filled with that special kind of gratitude for the world that comes from doing a small thing for someone else.

Coming up on Tuesday Links: a myriad of links and ideas for your 29-Day Challenge. Stay tuned.

If you're a new reader, welcome to HumanKind. You can get free updates here. Wonder what we're up to? Click on the links on the upper right, or scroll through the topics and archives on the left. If you're a regular, thanks for your support! Let us know what HumanKind can do to keep the media you'd like to see coming your way. You can e-mail chris (at) humankindmedia dot com. And please do share HumanKind with your friends.

Lamed Vovniks redux

To reform a world, to reform a nation, no wise man will undertake; and all but foolish men know, that the only solid, though a far slower reformation, is what each begins and perfects on himself. ---Thomas Carlisle

Some bloggers get a little obsessed with their blog stats--how many people visit, how many subscribers actually read the blog, percentages of newcomers, length of visit, and on and on. I'm hoping that over the next several years mine keep going up, but I'm happy with slow, solid growth and trying not to be too affected by the sky-high days and the low trough days. I do watch the stats to see which links people visit and I really enjoy the wild searches that lead to HumanKind Media. In fact, if you're a regular reader that found me from an accidental search, I'd love to hear about it (begging for comments, again.)

I am intrigued by a mystery, though, and the most mysterious and wondrous of all the stats for HumanKind Media are the "lamed vovnik" hits. Way back in the fall I wrote a rambling piece about the Jewish legend of the Lamed Vovniks, the 36 Just Men (just, meaning righteous or good). You can read the whole post here In it, I performed a complex set of steps toward reasoning that, if the Jewish scholars hundreds of years ago thought there were 36 wise men (translated to "humans" by me), we should be at millions or billions of wise humans by now (using math, genetics, and Jewish scholarship, none of which I'm proficient in).

It was my way of saying we all have the potential for goodness and contribution to changing the inequities in the world, and that the prognosis for doing so was getting better every day. "Unabashed optimism" could have been the tagline for the post.

Anyway, it's historically the most visited page on the site--several times a week. It's a complete mystery. Maybe there are more Jewish scholars out there than I could imagine. Maybe somewhere in the world every day, a few people just google "wise men" and up pop the vovniks, or maybe the word "vovnik" means something in every language in the world, and I'm just lucky I put that word in a title.

Since I have this regular Lamed Vovnik reminder in the stats, I've begun looking around for vovniks in my daily travels. We've written about some of the more famous, obvious candidates: Paul Farmer, Jeffrey Sachs, Mohammed Yunus. I think Randy Pausch, the Last Lecture professor, certainly has my vote, and I'd put my Sweet Husband Jeff on the list because he knows just what to do (which is normally nothing) when I'm off balance (or schizoid) and because he has the wisdom to enjoy life to its fullest while I'm over-thinking it sometimes. My friend and meditation teacher, Pam, is one of the wisest humans I've ever met, and, of course, I'd put the Dalai Lama and Jimmy Carter on the list--and all the older, wiser leaders working tirelessly and patiently for peace and understanding around the world.

But, if I knew you, I might put you on the list for saying something to someone who needed just what you said last week, or for being quiet when it was the right time to be quiet. Or, if you reached out and helped a stranger, or if you're thinking about voting this year for your love for the world rather than your fear of the future, I'd put you on the list for your courage--that's got to be a Lamed Vovnik trait. I might put someone on the list for tutoring children, or drilling water for villages that have none. I'd put anyone on the list who had learned to forgive, or let go of a bias. If you've felt that longing to make a difference, and haven't turned away at what seems like the impossibility of it all, you're on the list for sure.

I do think we're all Lamed Vovniks. Every Lamed Vovnik search hit I see in the stats makes me wonder--is it you? What's the wise and just-ness in you up to these days? Do you see yourself as a Lamed Vovnik, a just , good, wise person? I hope so. Imagine the possibilities.

Got any candidates you'd add to the list? Send me a comment! (2nd begging for comments in one post--new record!)

----

Tomorrow, June 1, is the first day of the HumanKind Challenge #4, 29-Day Giving Challenge. Everyone is invited to participate. Invite your friends, too. What could be more fun than practicing generosity together for a month? Here's the post with the details, and here's our group page (where I'll post my daily updates and hope you will, too) on the 29-Day Giving Challenge community page. For those of you still absorbing your possible Lamed Vovnik status, it's a great place to start.

If you're a new reader, welcome to HumanKind. You can get free updates here. Wonder what we're up to? Click on the links on the upper right, or scroll through the topics and archives on the left. If you're a regular, thanks for your support! Let us know what HumanKind can do to keep the media you'd like to see coming your way. You can e-mail chris (at) humankindmedia dot com. And please do share HumanKind with your friends.

Theme Tuesday: Friends we haven't met yet

New Plan: Theme Link Tuesday. When I was stuck last week, I let go of my fixation on themes for series of blog posts. Now, I can throw caution to the wind, and just write about anything, I told myself. Well, I could, but that much freedom might cause paralysis--too many choices every day. I've had about 8 different things rumbling around in my head for the several weeks after Pangea Day, that I've just wanted to share without creating a big essay. Oddly enough :--), they all seem to have a theme. So the new plan is themes on Tuesdays, where if you like the theme, you can follow the links.

I love the new abundance of stories and news with a different narrative than what I found troubling in the mainstream media. I picked the name HumanKind Media for this blog because I was dismayed at the amount of "us vs.them" and "right vs. wrong" stories in the media. I thought a "humankind" perspective helps tell a different story every time, whether it's a city council meeting someone's writing about or a national election, education or travelling to Mars.

In his decades of work as an anthropologist, Donald Brown has been researching and documenting human universals, the traits that every human on the planet has in common. In this talk on Pangea Day he talks about what he's learned during his years of studying humans.

In his list of human universals are weapons, and agression in males, but also disapproval of violence. He found we all form collective identities (I vote for HumanKind), we all look for mediation of conflict and all disapprove of stinginess. All humans share food. We all share the same facial expressions for the same emotions. Just tripping through the list is a reminder of how little difference there is from me and my 5 billion+ other fellow humans I haven't met. Also, good to remember when you're mad at your boss, disagreeing with someone's beliefs, or stuck in traffic.

Here are some of the wonderful, artistic, beautifully conceived places online you can visit to get a reminder of all those friends you haven't met. What's possible in a world where we look more to our similarities than our differences? Is there someone in your life to tell a different story about?

onBeing Listen to someone's story

one sentence Write your sentence, hit skip (unless you want to publish your sentence), and read the other sentences

6 Billion Others Pick your language first (you can skip the intro if you're in a hurry), wait for a load, and hear what some of the 6 Billion others have to say

We Feel Fine Click on the "Open We Feel Fine" at the top, let it load, then click the dots (or you can select "murmurs" on the left and see what happens.)

If you're a new reader, welcome to HumanKind. You can get free updates here. Wonder what we're up to? Click on the links on the upper right, or scroll through the topics and archives on the left. If you're a regular, thanks for your support! Let us know what HumanKind can do to keep the media you'd like to see coming your way. You can e-mail chris (at) humankindmedia dot com. And please do share HumanKind with your friends.

Pangea Day: stories told by the world for the world

What could be better for changing the world than meeting each other through stories? Hooray! Saturday's Pangea Day! Finally. A chance for all you global citizens to connect courtesy of a TED wish. Participate somehow!

See when it's happening where you are, find a venue near you, call some friends over to watch on the internet , or take your phone with you and watch. They've left no room for excuses for not meeting the world on May 10. Hope you can partake. I'll be watching from home between birthday preparations for the 15-year old. If you're watching from home, too, let me know and we can make it a HumanKind party, celebrating wonderful media for connecting us global citizens.

Post #101 - 4 things I learned in April about impermanence

There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered. --Nelson Mandela

I'm back. And as I try to think of a jaunty way to write about this past month of travels, I realize its not just geographical travels that have been working on me. It's the question of sustainability which was deeper than I imagined, and the ever-present reminder that time is long and short and what I do with it is what matters. It's this occasion of post #101. It's my 9-month anniversary of blogging at HumanKind Media (now without my buddy Liz who is recovering and moving on to work in her field of journalism). It's the impending graduation of my oldest son, and the rapidly-approaching end of the spring irises (already).

If I had to distill these recent experiences: travelling to a theme park with kids rapidly becoming adults, my road trip across New Mexico, feeling for and missing Liz, writing about Annie and going to a "Journalism that Matters" conference, I would say the theme is impermanence.

The Buddhists and others consider impermanence to be one of the big categories of suffering, and I certainly can take up the banner for that one from my travels in April. But as usual, a way out of suffering is to accept what is--nothing lasts forever, in this case--rejoice, and enjoy the flip side of what change has to offer. Here are four things I've been thinking about:

1. This time of my life, this time in our culture, this era of humans, even the life of this planet is a blip. The scale of time of the petrified forest and 25,000 years of humans at Acoma, Arizona, and our many billion-year old universe reminded me of that. In addition to experiencing the deep time of that landscape I also discovered my new favorite TED talk about what's beyond our corporeal sense of space and time. Jill Bolte Taylor's very personal exploration of the brain is the most e-mailed TED talk of all time. If you haven't seen it yet, check it out.

2. Learning to hold "what is" and await "what unfolds" can usually be a difficult experience that's full of gifts. Most of my pain and suffering around change resides in the trying to hold on to what I know or push away what I don't. Randy Pausch, the Last Lecture professor, is my most recent example of being with what is and watching what enfolds. If you haven't seen it (not the same as reading the book) please take some time out of your busy schedule to see someone who masters impermanence and rides the waves of its unfolding.

3. If you let go of something having to be the way you envision it, the real possibilities move into the space.
My latest example of this was the "unconference" format for the Journalism that Matters conference. Here's a great description PBS MediaShift's author Mark Glaser. For me, it was exciting to explore possibilities with journalists, technologists, professors, entrepreneurs, and fellow humans, all in service of telling good stories and contributing to a better world. Many amazing things will be germinating from these sessions and I hope to write about some of them. It was also an affirmation that if you create a space for possibility--it comes flooding in. Good news on the heal the world front.

4.The good news is that everything changes. If you didn't like the last president, this year's Oscar winner, what your kid wanted for dinner every night when he was 4, or the weather--it's ok, because it will change.
The bad news is that everything changes. I'm trying not to be dramatic about this but this last trip might have been the last time boys climbed the fort on the island at Disneyland together. But, there are oh, so many cool adventures ahead of us and our "newly grown" children.

On the future of journalism and creating a useful narrative for our society, I have not yet figured out the good and bad news, but I did meet many people who are in the same question this past week--many creative, intelligent, inspiring people who live to tell the stories we all should be so lucky to get to read or hear. Though much is changing in the journalism world, there was less "hand-wringing" and more highly committed, energetic people looking for new ways to create meaningful content in new ways.

I have been altered by my travels and experiences in April. At the NewTools 2008 journalism conference, I was classified as a "new media blogger". Ironically, one of the seasoned news guys kept calling me "Hope" instead of Chris. (Better than Polyanna, I guess.) I'm excited to explore many of the ideas, groups, and people I met as the possibilities unfold. Classified as a human, I'm happy to continue to hold "what's possible?" as my torch into the future. And, with my new reminders about how time is short, and people are good and infinitely resourceful, I plan to make use of my possibilities as long as I can.

Sustainability and Scrabble

Lately, since I've been following Saorise and his pilgrimage for FreeCommunity and reading my daily doses of generosity stories at helpothers.org, I've been thinking about everything in terms of different possibilities for the exchange of goods and services as a means toward a more sustainable world. Yesterday, this article in the New York Times touched on something near and dear to my heart: online Scrabble. I'll admit it, when I'm not working, writing for HumanKind or wearing one of my many "mom hats," I'm playing online Scrabble, most recently on the site in question in the article.

I'm hoping you're still with me after I gave you that Scrabble link. If you are, I bet you're wondering how I can go from sustainability and the freeconomy to Scrabble. So am I, but let's give it a go: For several years, I have "offered" my coaching services to private clients for whatever they can offer in return. I ask them three questions to help them determine what that is: "What is it worth to you? What would you pay someone else? What can you give?" After considering these questions, these wonderful, good humans find something they can offer. I don't turn anyone down. All have been generous both with their resources and their appreciation.

This is not a new practice. Exchange communities have been around since humans began interacting together in groups. Recent examples of this are RadioHead's online, pay-what-you-want release of In Rainbows, which, though it's over now, will generate ripples through the music industry for quite a while, and Open Source software, which has had its own evolution.

Maybe this classifies me as a Pollyanna, but my belief is that the majority of people are inherently generous and don't want to dupe anyone out of their fair share of profits, kudos, appreciation, or livelihood. My other belief, as you know, is that those few who might be the opposite get far more press than the generous ones (except, here, of course).

I would love to see Hasbro and the Agarwalla brothers reach some way out-of-the-box to offer the game as more and more people hook up world wide to waste their time (did I say that?) in the spirit of global gamery. I would be willing to donate (a small amount). I would love to imagine that Hasbro and the Brothers A would be willing to offer access to the game for whatever benefit they and the players think is fair -- without anyone getting too greedy.

Am I too naive or is this possible? "Possible," my favorite word, is a Bingo(a word that uses all your letters) in Scrabble if you can use one letter on the board. Big points for everyone.