Things We Can Do

"Who made the world? Who made the swan and the black bear? Who made the grasshopper? This grasshopper, I mean- the one who has flung herself out of the grass, the one who is eating sugar out of my hand, who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down- who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes. Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face. Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away. I don't know exactly what prayer is. I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass, how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields, which is what I have been doing all day. Tell me, what else should I have done? Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon? Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" "The Summer Day" by Mary Oliver, from The Truro Bear and Other Adventures: Poems and Essays.

Yesterday Barrack Obama voted in the senate to let what are essentially white collar government and corporate war criminals off the hook by voting for full immunity for lawbreaking telecoms and by terminating all lawsuits against them in the illegal wiretap and NSA spying scandal. "Obama's vote in favor of cloture, in particular, cemented the complete betrayal of the commitment he made back in October when seeking the Democratic nomination. Back then, Obama's spokesman -- in response to demands for a clear statement of Obama's views on the spying controversy after he had previously given a vague and noncommittal statement -- issued this emphatic vow: To be clear: Barack will support a filibuster of any bill that includes retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies. But the bill today does include retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies." Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com This is not change for America. To learn more read below: http://www.salon....

I just came from a meeting of a great group of smart, engaged, fully immersed, present and friendly ad people, called the Free Radical Syndicate, hosted by my amazing friend Laura Luckman-Kelber...unique I know, and fun! We were discussing the relative merits and de-merits of blogging. We were asking why in the face of so many interesting choices should I choose to spend my time in this way? "Isn't it just pissing in the wind?", "Does it really build community?" And if so "Isn't it a fake community without any of the tactile-ness of being in the same room with other people verbally sharing ideas?" My answer is I don't know. Ultimately I don't think one is better than the other they are just different tools used at different times for different purposes. You can opt out or into either. In the example of this here personal blog of mine, well frankly it is a bit of a shot in the dark as I am still a bit shy about my writing and therefore I do...

1. Practice Gratitude. Just say thank you. It's easy and it feels good. Wake up and say thank you for all the blessings in my life and then list a few. Simple things like waking up, having a comfortable bed, good coffee, someone you love, a job that helps you pay the bills, friends and family, your favorite socks. Gratitude is a good thing you can do. 2. Praise Others. Instead of tearing people down, lift them up. Practice recognizing and acknowledging even the small good things that the people around you achieve and watch them achieve even more. 3. Focus on Success. At the end of everyday write down the one moment that was your best. The one time where you had a conversation or communication or achievement where it all came together for you and you got to be your best self. The more success you remember the more likely you are to achieve even more success, 4. Let Go. Focus on the things you can change. Let go of the rest. 5. Find a quiet moment. Take just a few minutes each day t...

All Praise to Luddites! This weekend my family and I drove 3 hours into Michigan, past PawPaw and into Alleghan and stopped at Fat Blossom farm. There our friends Jake and Liz own a small organic farm. Jacob and Liz actually have 47 acres of land of which only 2 acres is farmed. We are the first family of the share holders for Fat Blossom, as well as being good friend's of Jacob's mother so we were there to work. I use the term loosely because we also brought with us our 3 kids, all of whom are under the age of 6 and because due to scheduling conflicts we arrived at 5pm on Saturday night. But we woke up with the sun on Sunday after an insanely torrential downpour which resulted in a near midnight dash from our tent in lightening to the house where we slept on the floor.

"If you want to engage the consumer, really get them spending time with your brand offer them a service not just an ad." - AdAge I think this maxim is absolutely true in terms of what makes a brand stick. I also think this is absolutely true of what the real Web 2.0 , some now dub 3.0 will be, and perhaps even the secret to fully monetinizing the web, UTILITY. The movement in this the next wave of the web is toward cleaning up all the junk we spewed in Web 1.0, because it simply is no longer true that if you build it they will come. There's too much built. If you're lucky they will try to come, but along they way they will stop off at Hulu or Youtube and poke around in Facebook and your brand is lost. People are busy. We know this. The consumer is harrassed, our goal, the goal of advertisers should be to acknowledge that and look for ways to make things easier, more useful and relevent. Crispin just got the Microsoft account they're biting this one right in the fa...

Sometimes Sunday really does feel like the day before Monday..especially late in the afternoon right before dinner, when your hanging in that middle zone as the days activities wind down and the dinner/bath/bed crush has yet to kick in. Then it's Sunday the day before Monday and work and lists and all the things you didn't quite finish last week. Sometimes, I will admit the thought creeps in and I think yeah, can't wait to get back at it...'cause this week I'm gonna....but other times it's like, quick, deflect...through up the wall..duck! Ok but this blog is supposed to be about the Things You Can Do..to make this life more livable for all...sustainable for the planet ..and generally just better, nicer,cleaner and safer for us all. So today's thought is from the Sunday NYT - Americans throw away and therefore waste some 93 billion tons of food a year. We but too much, cook too much, serve ourselves too much etc and all that food in the trash creates more gre...