Peace Train - Hop Onboard

More than thirty years ago, Cat Stevens, now Yusef Islam, wrote Peace Train. The video is of his performance at the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize Ceremony. That night Muhammad Yunus was honored for his work to end poverty by providing microloans to individuals and small business owners, giving them the capital needed to change not only their lives but to help entire communities.

Listen closely to the words of the song. “Now I’ve been happy lately, thinking about good things to come…Now I’ve been smiling lately, thinking about the world as one…Now I’ve been crying lately, thinking about the world as it is…Why must we go on hating? Why can’t we live in bliss?”

Why can’t we? Abraham Flexnor, a respected medical educator, once said, “Probably, no nation is rich enough to pay for war and civilization. We must make our choice. We cannot have both.”

Read any spiritual writing from any great spiritual mind from Jesus to Muhammad to Buddha to Gandhi to the Dalai Lama and you will find admonitions against war…pleas for and instructions on peaceful coexistence. Yet, we still kill one another as some sort of protracted resolution to conflict or retribution for misdeeds against another. We still beat each other into submission in the name of bringing peace.

Carol Hamel of My View of “It” has sent out the call for bloggers to join The Peace Train. Bloggers have power and should use their unique voices to rise up in unison, speaking out against violence in our world. I’m with her. Are you?

If you’d like to join The Peace Train please post the logo in your sidebar and notify Carol you’re onboard. She’ll include you in a list of links on her blog. Look to my next post for links to this and other organizations promoting peace.

Let’s make this the year peace happens. If it becomes a resolution in my daily life and we ALL strive to live peacefully, I believe things will change for the better. Once we taste the happiness of living as if our neighbors were ourselves, we will no longer tolerate declarations of war handed down from our leaders, killing of innocents or abject poverty among our fellow man. How could I? How could you? Think about it.

Tide - When Clean Laundry Spells Compassion

Long before Casinos dotted the Gulf Coast and long before they were wiped away by hurricane Katrina, I lived in Biloxi, Mississippi. Debbie, my best friend at the time, bought a house on the back bay with her husband. Tom was in the military and this house represented a stable future. No matter what came their way, the house in Biloxi belonged to them...home base at the end of a long career.

Six months before he retired hurricane Katrina battered the little house, flooded it with several feet of water, and rendered it unlivable. When the time came, they moved back anyway and planned to rebuild their dream.

Recently, a letter came in the mail from my dear friend. For the past two years they've been living in a camper while they slowly reclaimed their lives in Biloxi. I couldn't help but think about the things they've sacrificed during that time and how hard daily life must have been. They are truly strong people and I admire them greatly.

I wondered how Debbie managed the simple tasks like cooking and laundry. That reminded me
of a program I'd heard of shortly after Katrina left her devastation. Loads of Hope is a mobile laundry service run by Tide, owned by Procter & Gamble. They moved their mobile laundry mat into New Orleans and opened up shop, washing, folding, and delivering clean clothes back to the weary people of Saint Bernard Parish.

During that time Loads of Hope washed over 20,000 loads of clothes for free, providing an invaluable service. This is a textbook example of "offering up your unique skills and talents". The conversation at the Tide company must have gone something like this.

Executive #1, "Those poor people. Some one shoud do something."

Executive #2, "We could write a check to the Red Cross."

Executive #1, "But that's so impersonal. There must be something WE can do."

Assistant pouring coffee for Executive #1 whispers timidly, "Well, we could wash their clothes."

And there you go.....a grand idea.

Loads of Hope was such a success and morale booster for the residents it helped that Tide wants to keep the program going. They plan to send their mobile units out in response to future natural disasters. They rushed out to California after the wildfires a few months ago and are still there washing sheets and clothes damaged by the smoke.

If you'd like to show your support for this program you can purchase a tee shirt for $15.00. On the front is the vintage Tide logo. The back says Loads of Hope. All of the proceeds will go to help families rebuild after a natural disaster.

I hope that other companies follow Tide's lead and look at the unique help they can offer to philanthropic causes. It does a good turn for the world and gives the employees a sense of pride in the accomplishments of their company.

In the letter from my friend she passed on thanks to all the people and organizations that have helped to make life easier during their long period of recovery. I'm sure the people who used the Tide Loads of Hope service feel the same way.

Look on their website for Loads of Hope mobile locations if they can be of help to you.

A New Year - What That Means To Me

A new year is a fresh start, a beginning. A new year is the continuation of a dream, the next step in a journey. A new year is the end of old, no longer productive thought and action, a time to take stock and redirect our efforts.

I'm not one to make New Year's resolutions. If I want to lose weight or finish a project I've learned the hard way that a list scribbled on a scrap of paper doesn't get me far. Before long I misplace the list and life goes on as before in my normal half-organized, half-spontaneous way of living.

What works better for me is taking a moment to reflect and regroup. Finally in my fourth decade, I'm getting it right. My children are constant sources of joy and amazement. I cry tears of pride each time I witness their accomplishments - the lightning fast run into the end zone for the first touchdown of the game - The look on my son's face as he breaks a board with a flying sidekick - Notes picked out on the piano and finally the melody of a song from my child who's teaching herself to play - Discussing ambitions for college, possibly music school in Los Angeles and daydreaming of the summer afternoon when my oldest walks across the stage to receive his diploma - The sheer terror and joy of watching my baby scale a 30-foot rock wall at the climbing gym.

2007 became the year of personal accomplishment and growth. My career is on track and I'm working on my next book. My personal life is awesome thanks to the love of an incredible man. LifePrints, which started on a whim, has become a source of daily inspiration and joy. I've made some incredible new friends who share my ambitions toward writing and changing the world one person at a time.

Through the posts I've written, I've learned so much about the resilience of the human spirit and the goodness of the human heart. Each day, I'm more convinced that we will solve the problems facing our world. We are capable. If each of us step up, speak up, and act up...things will change for the better.

I hope to have more this year of what I had last. I hope for you to find a way to your dreams. I hope for the world that suffering ends and true living, instead of just surviving, begins across our planet.

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL