Dive Into Your Imagination

During the past couple months there has been a lot of death and rebirth in my life, as with everyone.  We never know what another's path is.  Yesterday I spent my entire day at the Memorial Service for Gabriel Feingold-Swain who took his own life at 21.  I feel there is a lot of pain amongst young people these days, a pain they do not know how to deal with.  This week was transformational as I mourned for the family, with the family and with myself.  I have found peace and a mantra for my life that I am sharing with you.  Sometimes we just need to shift our old thoughts and beliefs.

"I choose this path.  Show me what to do so clearly that I know it is You, the Universe, my God behind me.  Please help me be the powerful voice and tool so I can continue to awaken people to a higher level of consciousness and spirituality the way I have been awakened.  I love you.  I love all of you.  I love me. And We are one.  We are all connected."

The closing of the memorial service, Pastor Linda from Unity Church read this.  It was so beautiful that I needed to hear it again.  There are many that I have lost in my short time on this Earth.  And what is left of all of them is the Love that lives within my soul, my heart that I get to share with others.  For those of you who know me, it is this love that I am giving...mine and all the loved ones I have lost.

The Legacy by John Wayne Schlatter

When I die, give what is left to my children.  If you need to cry, cry for your brothers walking beside you.  Put your arms around anyone and give them what you need to give me.  I want to leave you with something better than words or sounds.  Look for me in the people I have known and loved.  And if you cannot live without me, then let me live on in your eyes, your mind, and your acts of kindness.  You can love me most by letting hands touch hands and letting go of children that need to be free.  Love does not die, people do.  So that when all that is left of me is love...give me away.

Celebrate Earth Day, Everyday!

What we think, say and what we do matters.  We tend to follow a routine everyday, whether it is our morning coffee or exercise routine, favorite television show or meditation.  We all have something that gets our day going and many times it is the voice that lives within our own head, so we need to get our inner voice talking a new language.  We need to sprinkle our thoughts with that of our environment in mind and how we can make everyday Earth Day.  We need to think about our environment, talk about it and get into action in regards to changing our daily habits.

I remember sitting on the tile floor in the yellow kitchen on Pensacola Avenue listening to the small am/fm radio out of a child's reach on top of the refrigerator.  My mom would laugh and sing to the tune coming out of the black box with a three foot antennae, "I'm on top of the world looking down on creation and the only explanation I can find, Is the love that I've found ever since you've been around, Your love's put me at the top of the world!"  Oh the memories!  My mom still knows how to give me love.  This song from the Carpenter's has been sung in every country I have visited, every boat I have worked on and every time I am embarking on a new road in life.  It is a song of elation and one that makes me think of the world we live. I sing these words in faith and joy of our future as we do hold the world, our earth, our ocean in our hands.  We are sitting on top of the world with satellite radio, television and inventions we have dreamed into existence.  We are brilliant, yet we need to now strike a balance with Mother Nature.  Our environment has suffered and it is my pledge to make Earth Day Everyday! 

Water is life and our life exists because of our Ocean.  Most of us do not realize what a great regulator our Ocean is. We can live for three weeks without food, three days without water and about three minutes without oxygen. The Ocean is responsible for 70% of the oxygen our planet needs, all of the fresh water we drink and much of the food we eat. Yes, you read correctly. The phytoplankton mass in our Ocean is responsible for more than 70% of the oxygen our planet needs to survive! Everything we do on land affects the Ocean. Everything. The UN predicts the next world war will be about water, not oil. Our Ocean needs us to take ownership and responsibility for the role we play within nature and our environment, protecting our vital Ocean and its resources. I want to help you shift how you think about our world, our Ocean. We have given our Ocean five names because of its relation to the continents, but this body of water is connected and we have only one world Ocean. We are all connected.

And somehow in this connectedness is where we are going to find great transformation. When I heard the UN predicted that the next world war was going to be about water, I vowed I would do everything to bring awareness to this resource. There are people around the world buying up water rights the way prospectors bought oil rights to land.

Can you cut down or perhaps even stop using plastic?  In 2007, 8.8 BILLION water bottles were produced and between 500 Billion and 1 Trillion plastic bags, yet they predict that less than 10% were recycled.  Our landfills and Ocean are packed with billions of tons of plastic.  This miracle material takes 1,000 years to decompose.  We are at an environmental saturation level.  Everything we do on land affects our Ocean and right now we have two garbage patches floating in our Ocean, one larger than the United States times two.  I realize many of us are in denial because we are not physically swimming in plastic soup and it is hard to imagine what lies just beyond our horizon where the various ocean currents cause garbage collection zones.  But this is true and it is increasing at an alarming rate.  We must cut down on the use of plastic.

I have always praised plastic as John Wesley Hyatt first concocted this goop and it was first used to make photographic film.  So where would us photographers and cinematographers be without this polymer?  And it was Leo Baekeland that back in 1907 who improved the concoction was able to press it in molds and then reshape it, naming the substance “plastic.”  It was used to make everything from cups to cameras, cables to buttons.  Companies were able to revolutionize production lines with injection molding in the early 1930’s.  At one time a good day a company would be producing 350 plastic hair combs and overnight with new technology they could produce 10,000 pieces!

Reach out and touch someone was a slogan created by AT&T to get people to make more long distance phone calls and position the image of the company a part of everyday American life.  Millions of dollars was spent on this and it was so great that a few years ago they resurrected it.  But the way you are going to survive in 2009 is not be continuing to reach out to others, no.  You need to pull your energy back in and reach deep inside and be connected to yourself.  

Most of us go through life on auto pilot with our brains programmed, until we have a crash.  I have a computer that I rely on for everything.  How many of you have a computer?  So you can relate.  Well recently, I had a computer crash, hard drive loss and a website go down with the back up.  Now let me tell you, I was on my knees crying and praying and wondering why.  Why?  Why would I lose the back-up of the back-up what is the message?  And somewhere deep inside of me, I heard this voice, none of it matters.  You are not defined by your computer, your website or your business.  And suddenly I realized all the pain and suffering I was experiencing was the thought about my future and that of my past.