Here The Liberators hijack a giant corporations sound system to start a dance party as a healthy alternative to buying more products. This is a playful example of what we can do instead of buying more stuff we don’t need.
Category Archives: Inspiration
I love Ram Dass. Below is a beautiful story he shared on the power of unconditional love.
So I started out on the New York thruway. I was just galumphing along in such a high state that I was hanging out with various forms of the Divine. I was doing my mantra, which I usually am doing one way or another, to remember that this isn’t the only game in town. So I’m holding onto the steering wheel and I’m keeping enough consciousness to keep the car on the road. At another part I’m singing to Krishna, who is blue, is radiant, plays the flute, is the seducer of the Beloved, all of whom we are, back into the merging with God, back into the formless. I am in ecstasy hanging out with blue Krishna, driving along the New York freeway, when I noticed in my rear view mirror a blue flashing light.
Now, there is enough of me down, so I knew it was a state trooper. I pulled over the car, and this man got out of the car and he came up to the window. I opened the window and he said, “may I see your license and registration?” I was in such a state that when I looked at him, I saw that it was Krishna who had come to give me darshan. How would Krishna come in 1970? Why not as a state trooper? Christ came as a carpenter.
So Krishna comes up and asks for my license. He can have anything, he can have my life. All he wants is my license and registration. So I give him my license and
registration, and it’s like throwing flowers at the feet of God. I am looking at him with absolute love.
So he goes back to the car and he calls home. Then he comes back and he walks around the car and he says, “what’s in that box on the seat?” I said, “they’re mints, would you like one?” He said, “well the problem is you were driving too slow on the freeway, and you’ll have to drive off the freeway if you’re going to drive this slowly.” I said, “yes, absolutely.” I’m just looking at him with such love.
Now, if you put yourself in the role of a state trooper, how often do you suppose they are looked at with unconditional love? Especially when they’re in their uniform. So after he had finished all the deliberations, he didn’t want to leave. But he had run out of state trooper-ness. So he stood there a minute, and then he said, “great car you’ve got here!” That allowed me to get out. And we could kick and spit and hit the fenders and say, they don’t make `em now like they used to, and tell old car stories. Then we ran out of that. I could feel he still didn’t want to leave. I mean, why would you want to leave if you’re being unconditionally loved? Where are you going to go? You’ve already got what you wanted. What are you going to do? That takes care of your power needs, all of it.
So finally he runs out, he knows he’s got to come clean that he’s Krishna, so he says, “be gone with you,” which isn’t state trooper talk, but what the hell. As I get into the car and I start to drive away, he’s standing by his cruiser and I look in the mirror and he’s waving at me. Now you tell me, do you think that was a state trooper, or was that Krishna? I don’t know.
~Ram Dass
Source: https://www.ramdass.org/unconditional-love/
There is something so beautiful about strangers hugging. Love this.
17-year-old Mariah Smith of Hampton, Virginia had a life-changing moment when she encountered a homeless man shivering in a parking lot: she gave him food and a blanket from her car, and left determined to do more. Now, three years later, Mariah has handed out more than 80,000 blankets and bagged lunches to homeless people in her community through the non-profit organization she started, Blankets for the Homeless.
Mariah herself was dependent on the kindness of strangers as a child: abandoned as a newborn on Christmas Eve, she spent the first two years of her life in foster care before being adopted. When she gave away her first blanket in 2011, she realized how much difference such a small gesture could make to a person in need. “The look in his eye when I wrapped that blanket around him haunts me to this day,” she told NBC News. “It was a look of desperation and appreciation all at once.”
Her mother, Moira, helped her launch her non-profit, which is dedicated to providing blankets, food, and other necessities to homeless people in the community. Word quickly spread among the homeless community, who nicknamed her Blanket Girl. It also spread among local churches, businesses, and schools, who started contributing to her work. “We couldn’t do all that we do without the support of the community,” she says.
Now a psychology major in college, Mariah spends hours every day gathering and distributing food and blankets. She also speaks at elementary schools, universities, and Girl Scout troops to raise awareness about homelessness, letting others know how they can make a difference: “Once you help someone who’s homeless it changes your life forever,” she says. “You think about them when it rains; you think about them when it’s way too hot outside, when you can’t stand to be out there.” This Christmas season, with the help of local donors, she assembled over 850 stockings to hand out, full of supplies like toothbrushes, hats and gloves, as well as treats like cookies and personal messages of support.
In the long-term, Mariah would like to encourage others across the country to join her cause by keeping a box in their cars full of blankets, cold-weather gear, and non-perishable foods that they can give out immediately when they see someone in need. “I just want everyone to start to think about the homeless more and maybe themselves a little bit less especially in this time of year. I hope people will start opening their minds more and think about the reality that people are really going through.”
So thankful people like Mariah exist. And thanks to A Mighty Girl for this post.
This is such a beautiful story. Now if all soldiers everywhere could just agree they have no quarrel with each other and bond together as Brothers and Sisters, we could end this madness once and for all.
“Dearest mother, I have seen one of the most extraordinary sights…”
So begins a letter from a Scottish soldier in 1914 — a letter just published that confirms the Christmas Day football match between warring sides as seen through the eyes of a soldier for the first time, according to the Independent.
The Christmas Day Truce happened 100 years ago today, between England and Germany, when both sides laid down their weapons in a 2-day respite from World War I to wish each other Happy Christmas, exchange items — and play football.
“About 10 o’clock this morning I was peeping over the parapet when I saw a German, waving his arms, and presently two of them got out of their trench and came towards ours,” wrote Captain A D Chater in the letter.
“We were just going to fire on them when we saw they had no rifles, so one of our men went to meet them and in about two minutes the ground between the two lines of trenches was swarming with men and officers of both sides, shaking hands and wishing each other a happy Christmas.“
“I went out myself and shook hands with several of their officers and men,” Captain Chater wrote.
“From what I gathered most of them would be glad to get home again as we should – we have had our pipes playing all day and everyone has been walking about in the open unmolested.”
“We exchanged cigarettes and autographs, and some more people took photos.
“I don’t know how long it will go on for – I believe it was supposed to stop yesterday, but we can hear no firing going on along the front today except a little distant shelling.
“We are, at any rate, having another truce on New Year’s Day, as the Germans want to see how the photos come out!”
Thanks to the Good News Network for this post.
Women in India are increasingly turning to women-only taxi services like Mumbai-based Viira Cabs whose female drivers are all trained in martial arts and carry pepper spray and batons. The company is the brainchild of 35-year-old entrepreneur and social activist Preeti Sharma Menon, who wanted to create a service to help women feel comfortable traveling any time of day in a country with a poor record on women’s safety. The trend toward women-only taxi companies in India has grown even more prominent in recent weeks after a reported rape by an Uber cab driver led to the service being banned in New Delhi earlier this month. In discussing the idea behind her business, Menon explains, “I was looking for something new to do and I wanted to do something that would make a difference.” She adds that, in addition to training in self-defense, the drivers also undergo extensive training in driving skills and customer relations since finding qualified drivers was initially a challenge: “[t]he biggest ongoing challenge is that there are no ready women drivers. We have to source, mobilize, train and employ drivers… Our motor school focuses on training women exclusively from low income groups. Viira means brave women, who have been limited to temporary unskilled jobs due to lack of skills and opportunities but have decided to change their lives.” Many of Viira’s drivers are the sole bread-winners in their families and the steady income has helped many rise out of poverty. Raju Chergat, one of Viira’s drivers, says, “Before, my salary was very low, but now my income has gone up – so it makes a difference. I am independent. I am not under anyone’s dominance. I am master of my own will and I can take care of my household.” Mumbai’s women are thrilled with the availability of safe transportation. Sajna Sivan, a regular customer of Viira, says her work as a photographer is easier when she knows she can call for a Viira Cab: “I have lot of late nights. So when that happens I don’t want to randomly take a car with all my equipment. I’d rather get someone with whom I feel comfortable.”
Always inspiring to hear about women helping and empowering each other. Love this.
Thanks to A Mighty Girl for this post.
I am so in love with social artist Peter Sharp. Check out his awesome dance of Freedom :)
“I quickly realized that my passion for creating social art was what I was born to give after inspiring and leading a social movement in Barcelona Spain.
The movement gave me the chance to really explore and express all of my creative potential. Not only was I creating art for myself, the creation of art became a shared priority for people from all over the world to unite in something life changing. My life work points itself towards engaging communities in playful activities that empower people to share acts of love and kindness with others.”
“This is a wonderful time for Planet Earth, as ugly as it may look at times; for it is the tipping point from which everything can move forward in a very new way. It will be a busy time. The coming years will bring much movement, much activity, sometimes frenzied activity. Hold your calm, hold your center, know that all is well and you will be an ambassador of that for others as well as for yourself. And from that place, you will create the most extraordinary new levels of experience for yourself, for your people and for this planet. The analogy we will give you is moving from black and white television, to 3D Technicolor. That is going to be the experience of what is possible on Earth. And energetically this planet is going to come alive in a way it has not been for many, many thousands of years. This is a wonderful thing. We invite you to embrace it. You are part of everything and that is beautiful.” ~Zapharia through Lee, from The Crystalline Body
What a beautiful gesture this is for the homeless. Makes me so happy to see them treated with such dignity.
“Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place.” ~KURT VONNEGUT
Street Art by Mr. Brainwash
Under The Blue Door 
