PEOPLE MATTER

Created on Thursday, 24 September 2015 13:23
Written by Marian Moore

FOOTPRINTS ...

Marian @ Krysan

THE WELLBEING CONSULTANCY

Planting Golden Seeds in Northumberland, Tyne & Wear, and Durham

__________________________ 

 

"We are like dwarfs sitting on the shoulders of giants.  We see more, and things that are more distant, than they did. This is not because our sight is superior or because we are taller than they, but because they raise us up, and by their great stature add to ours." 

SALISBURY

 

 Lorraine Nicholson Art Collection

 

P E O P L E   M A T T E R

The only thing that's changed is everything

 

 

In a blog that promises much in terms of good conversation, I begin by drawing attention to a TED talk which hit my wired world - along with much else - during the course of yesterday.  

Its author argues from the premise that climate change is unfair.  While rich countries can fight against rising oceans and dying farm fields, poor people around the world are already having their lives upended -- and their human rights threatened -- by killer storms, starvation and the loss of their own lands.

Mary Robinson asks us to join the movement for worldwide climate justice.  

No one left behind ...

*Mary Robinson campaigning on 'Climate Change'

Be like the bird that,
passing on her flight awhile on boughs too slight,
feels them give way beneath her,
and yet sings, knowing that she hath wings.   —Victor Hugo..

In a climate constrained world, we're all in this together.   —Mary Robinson

"... I recall very much the Climate March last September, and that was a huge momentum, not just in New York, but all around the world. and we have to build on that. I was marching with some of The Elders family, and I saw a placard a little bit away from me, but we were wedged so closely together -- because after all, there were 400,000 people out in the streets of New York -- so I couldn't quite get to that placard, I would have just liked to have been able to step behind it, because it said, "Angry Grannies!

"That's what I felt. And I have five grandchildren now ... I think about their world, and what it will be like when they will share that world with about 9 billion other people in 2050. We know that inevitably it will be a climate-constrained world, because of the emissions we've already put up there, but it could be a world that is much more equal and much fairer, and much better for health, and better for jobs and better for energy security, than the world we have now, if we have switched sufficiently and early enough to renewable energy, and no one is left behind. No one is left behind.

"And just as we've been looking back this year -- in 2015 to 1945, looking back 70 years -- I would like to think that they will look back, that world will look back 35 years from 2050, 35 years to 2015, and that they will say, "Weren't they good to do what they did in 2015? We really appreciate that they took the decisions that made a difference,and that put the world on the right pathway, and we benefit now from that pathway," that they will feel that somehow we took our responsibilities, we did what was done in 1945 in similar terms, we didn't miss the opportunity, we lived up to our responsibilities. That's what this year is about.

"... a great champion of the environment once said, "In the course of history, there comes a time when humanity is called upon to shift to a new level of consciousness, to reach a higher moral ground." And that's what we have to do. We have to reach a new level of consciousness, a higher moral ground.  And we have to do it this year in those two big summits. And that won't happen unless we have the momentum from people around the world who say: "We want action now, we want to change course, we want a safe world, a safe world for future generations, a safe world for our children and our grandchildren, and we're all in this together." - Mary Robinson TED talk 

Action for happiness ...

*The Dalai Lama supporting 'Exploring What Matters'

Be like the bird that,
passing on her flight awhile on boughs too slight,
feels them give way beneath her,
and yet sings, knowing that she hath wings.   —Victor Hugo. 

I received this email yesterday from my long-time friends at Action for Happiness.  Please read.  I think you too will be interested.  I've signed up ... to lead a course in my community.  Fingers crossed.

Dear Marian

This week, the Dalai Lama gave his support for our Exploring What Matters course which helps people become happier and more caring. Now we need your help to launch it. 

After sharing his wisdom on happiness and compassion he even went on BBC News to help spread the word.

'I wholeheartedly support the Exploring What Matters course and hope that many thousands will benefit from it and take action to create a happier world' ~ Dalai Lama

Help us get the course into hundreds of communities.

To bring this amazing course to communities around the world we are running a crowdfunding campaign to get it off the ground. The courses will non-profit and run by our members - but to launch them we need your backing.

We're off to a great start and there are still some amazing rewards on offer. We'd love your support at www.createahappierworld.com

Once we've reached our target we'll also need enthusiastic volunteers to bring it to their communities and take part. Let us know if you'd like to be involved:

Everything we do at Action for Happiness relies on brilliant supporters like you. We know this course will contribute to a happier and more caring world. To get there we all need to take action. 

I will take action to support the launch of Exploring What Matters.

Your action makes a better world possible.

Thank you,
Mark and the team
Action for Happiness

The only thing that's changed is everything ...

*Baby Harry Joseph on being 'a precious, precious child'

Be like the bird that,
passing on her flight awhile on boughs too slight,
feels them give way beneath her,
and yet sings, knowing that she hath wings.   —Victor Hugo.

Stitched in golden threads, the following words hang on my kitchen wall as a lasting tribute to times past. The tapestry onto which they were so lovingly sewn long ago is there where all can see, as if for the first time.  Perhaps, its prominent position will provide all who pass by with a chance to  reflect on the many people we have loved and who loved us in return. The words are, of course, from Mary Stevenson's famous poem, Footprints in the Sand.

One night I had a dream -
I dreamed I was walking along the beach with the Lord
and across the sky flashed scenes from my life.
For each scene, I noticed two sets of footprints,
one belonged to me and the other to the Lord.

When the last scene of my life flashed before me,
I looked back at the footprints in the sand.
I noticed that many times along the path of my life,
there was only one set of footprints.
I also noticed that it happened at the very lowest
and saddest times of my life

This really bothered me and I questioned the Lord about it.
"Lord, you said that once I decided to follow you,
you would walk with me all the way,
but I have noticed that during the most troublesdome times in my life
there is only one set of footprints

"I don't understand why in times when I needed you most,
you should leave me."
The Lord replied, "My precious, precious child,
I love you and I would never, never leave you
during your times of trial and suffering.

When you saw only one set of footprints,
it was then that I carried you." 

  


 

People Matter

Action for Climate Justice

"We want action now, we want to change course, we want a safe world, a safe world for future generations, a safe world for our children and our grandchildren, and we're all in this together." - Mary Robinson

Click on link below for Mary's TED talk in its entirety:

Why climate change is a threat to human rights - TED talk

 


 

The chief purpose of education is to teach young people to find pleasure in the right things.

PLATO (- 400 BCE)

 

 

 

Baby Harry Joseph 

So-me.  So-you.  So-us.

 

 

Reflection 275

Welcome!

All Powerful

Naturally you are all-powerful. You aren’t all-powerful in the sense that you could – if you really pulled yourself together and got around to it – set up a model universe in which there’s love without indifference and hate, courage without danger and fear, goodness without evil, beauty without dreariness and ugliness, life without death. No: you can no more make these improvements than you can make black whitewash or silent bangs. The list of the things that even you can’t do is endless. All the same, you are all-powerful in the sense that, accepting the coexistence and clash of opposites as the price (a terribly high price, but not prohibitive) of a cosmos, you let out an almighty YES! to it all – YES throughout it all and in spite of it all, YES because this (in all its astounding and awful and lovely detail) is what you are, and YES because you will what you are. (Douglas Harding. The Little Book of Life and Death.)

 

 

 

   BLOG'S END

452 hits @ 2015-11-06