Do you believe like I do?

Have you ever noticed that your kids are always watching what you do? 

They watch how you handle stress. They see how you treat other people. They look at how you deal with your feelings. They’re very observant and they soak in all that information like little sponges. 

It may not feel like they ever listen, but they are definitely watching.

I have recently been in knots over the dolphin slaughter in Taiji, Japan. As described by the Oceanic Preservation Society:

Each year from September to May over 20,000 dolphins are slaughtered in Japan. Fishermen round them up by the hundreds using sound barriers to disorient and herd the frantic pods out of their normal migrations into hidden lagoons like the one featured in The Cove. Bottlenose dolphins, especially ones that look like Flipper, are pre-selected by trainers and sold off for upwards of $200,000 to marine mammal parks around the world, where they will remain in captivity performing as circus acts. After the trainers and spectators have left, the rest of the dolphins are inhumanely killed in what can only be described as a massacre. 

My distress has been visible; my feelings have been heart broken; my children have been watching.

So the other day, H shows me this:

I am a big fan of Nintendo. For my birthday this year, my dad and I flew to Tokyo so that I could go to a Pokémon Center. I really liked Japan and I think that Tokyo has become my new favorite city. However, I am so sad and angry that the dolphin slaughter continues in Taiji. It makes me so mad that I don't want to support any Japanese companies until a law is passed to spare the slaughter of dolphins and whales.

My question to you is: Do you know about this in your country? If kids around the world quit buying your products until dolphins were safe, would you help make it stop?

I'd like to know that the Nintendo company that I am a big fan of believes that killing dolphins and whales in Taiji is inhumane and must stop. Do you believe in ending the suffering like I do?

Your Fan (until further notice), Harry Northrop age 11 

It's a letter he's written to Nintendo, a Japan based company that he adores.

Amazing!

And, here's the reply he received from Nintendo:

Hello Harry,

Thank you for writing and for your patience for our response. I appreciate your taking the time to write to us with your feedback regarding the events going on in Taiji, Japan. I can certainly understand your thoughts on this matter and want to assure you that your comments will be added to our records so that the appropriate departments at Nintendo are aware of your position.

I was glad to hear you had the opportunity to visit a Pokémon Center when you visited Tokyo with your dad. It's also great that you are aware of events going on elsewhere in the world. As a global company, we at Nintendo always appreciate hearing what is important to all our fans, young and old alike.

Thank you again for your email. I truly hope that you can continue to support our games and systems in the future.

Sincerely,

Nintendo of America Inc 

Brendan Johnson-Dong 

If you want to help, below is a list of popular Japan based corporations. 

I'm sure you have purchased from one of these companies in the past. Perhaps a letter from a loyal fan could turn the tide, so to speak.

• Bridgestone
• Canon
• Fuji
• Hitachi
• Honda
• JAL
• Kawasaki
• Mitsubishi
• Nikon
• Nintendo
• Nissan
• Olympus
• Pentax
• Ricoh
• Sanyo
• Sega
• Sony
• Subaru
• Suzuki
• Tomy
• Toshiba
• Toyota
• Uniden
• Yamaha

the reader

I owe a big "Thank You!" to everyone who participated in the Learning Lab Idaho's Lunch for Literacy! I so appreciate your support of a nonprofit community where adults are empowered by literacy skills to be self-sufficient and to participate in the workforce, education and civic affairs. THANK YOU!

As a special treat, watch this commercial for scotch… you'll be so glad you did.

do you dare to dream?

The Learning Zone is my favorite place to be. 
Perhaps I need to venture into the Magic Zone.

carefree...

...if only for a second.

off the planet

The new TED list of speakers came out the other day. TED 2014 will be in Vancouver, BC March 17-21. This year marks the 30th anniversary of TED and the theme is: "The Next Chapter". The list of speakers is amazing, but the most endearing to me is astronaut Chris Hadfield. Having spent six months off the planet, he has tremendous perspective on the meaning of life. Watch this interview excerpt to see what I mean...

you are beautiful

“What you do, the way you think, makes you beautiful.” 
― Scott Westerfeld, Uglies

I was part of the KickStarter for A Decade of You Are Beautiful book. My book came last week, and it is awesome. It came with 2 big packs of you are beautiful stickers. Fun!

There are many wonderful parts to the book, but my favorite chapter is chapter nine titled, Be Open and my favorite bit starts on page 92…

"I was attending a leadership conference to hear Seth Godin speak. Sitting among 7,000 people, with over 150 thousand teleconferencing worldwide, I was rather excited. Seth was speaking on the subject of gifts when I unexpectedly heard him say, 'Matthew Hoffman put an idea into the world.' My mom, who was sitting right next to me, gasped out loud. (Yes, I was there with my parents).

Pictures of my work and You Are Beautiful installations began to stream across the massive projection screens. It was the first time I had ever been publicly linked to the project. I realized I had just been outed by an idol." 

Amazing! 

Here's what Seth Godin said that day:

"Giving gifts. Going to someone and saying I am doing this for you, I am doing this with you, hoping you will spread it. Matthew Hoffman put an idea into the world. A very simple idea. Suddenly, it started spreading, it started changing people. And if you can give something to people to believe in, just give it to them, magical things start to change." 

Matthew Hoffman has done a beautiful thing with his stickers, and the final page of his book brought tears to my eyes…

Check out You Are Beautiful and Matthew Hoffman; you'll be glad you did.

for lovers of words

Shane Koyczan is amazing. I gave to his Kickstarter yesterday. It was funded in 12 hours; many other people think he is amazing too. If you love his poetry and would like a copy of his new book, head over to his Kickstarter to place an order. As a lover of poetry, show publishers that we are still here and willing to support what we love.

Shane does poetry/rock/rap with his band 'Short Story Long'.

Here's an amazing taste of his newest creation from a recent Tedx...

Below is the written poem "Blueprint" from which the Tedx was seemingly inspired. There were just so many awesome quotes. I knew that you, like me, would want to see the entire poem:

1. 
   

   Blueprint

   In times of unimaginable grief people will offer you their sympathies.

   And I appreciate the outstretched arm, but I’ve been in a breaking-things-kinda-mood. I’ve been scarfing down on the food for thoughts that I’ve got bowels so backed-up with brilliant ideas that eventually I’m gonna shit books.

   I’m gonna shit books so bad-ass they’ll be banned for trying to define bravery as walking into a biker bar wearing a pink sweat shirt with a picture of a unicorn being tamed by a gnome.

   Going it alone is like leaping out of a window waiting for God to catch you. And in the second before impact gravity becomes a fact so well established it makes you calm.

   I’ve gone from needing a shoulder to lean on to trying to calm the night into thinking it had the day shift. I’ve trained my shadow to shoplift light from the back pocket of levity, bent my forehead to the kiss of brevity hoping I could get through depression with some semblance of speed. 

   But the live camera feed is on a 24 hour delay, so I keep reliving the worst parts of yesterday in slow motion.

   And someone once told me that the finer points of devotion are about the size of a pin-hole. But there’s millions of them, and if you can connect each dot then you’ve got a diagram of what you think you thought you knew. And if you are willing to admit you know nothing, you’ve got a blueprint for a breakthrough.

   I’m just trying to get by. Huffing the glue that is supposed to keep me together in a world that lets global warming get this bad then bitches about the weather. A world where misdemeanour jailbirds of a feather flock to the back alley in an attempt to stage their own private protest rally, because it still seems that capitalism is a convenience store open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and if you’re not coming to buy something they won’t let you in to take a leak. But I want to live in a world where 76 year olds hang out in nightclubs, because they still haven’t hit their peak.

   I want a week spent in silence so the next time we speak others will be ready to hear what we have to say, and the following day will be comprised not so much of moments of silence, but 24 hours of noise.
   
   Noise for the toys that we as children never wanted to let go, because we live in a world that told us to grow up so we grew, growing up to know we knew noise is not enough, because our fathers are dying.

   We were left trying to make sense out of a world that doesn’t, because everything that was supposed to be wasn’t, because what wasn’t never was what we wished for. We grew up waging war against birthday candles, wishing our hearts would become handles for every time we needed to get a grip.

   I make noise for a man who gave 20 years of his life to a gold mine and two years before retirement was rewarded with a pink slip. Let us serve each chip on the shoulder of the tired and the poor, to the billionaires who are convinced that in owning everything, they still need more. This is for the bars bathroom floor. For the men and women who live there, because it’s easier to care about where your next drink comes from, then it is to go home to no one.

   Make noise for the son or daughter that lives inside you. Maybe someday we’ll understand what our parents went through. Make noise for everything you think you thought you knew as if knowing was enough to tough off the hard times; noise for the mimes that won’t, for the people that don’t, for the children that can’t. Make noise because the Land of Oz is crumbling and the Tin Man needs a heart transplant.

   This is for each senseless rant that will one day make sense. Let us put dents in the armour of those who said they could not be reached. This is for the beached whales beaching themselves because maybe love and loneliness are not just human conditions. Yell for the hopeless missions and hopeless wars fought by hopeful men. Scream for the times ‘that was now and this was then’. There will be times when noise is not enough and you must stand.

   So stand.

   As if you believe standing for the beliefs you believe in are worth standing for. As if every closed door is begging to be opened up, and every beggar’s cup is filled with the spare change needed to change the minds of those who’d have us think love is a missing link that we somewhere along the way misplaced.

   Our lifelines are traced by hands not yet old enough to hold pencils, and there are no stencils for any alphabet that can be arranged to explain or articulate how we feel, because we feel so much more than we could ever voice, because every choice we make takes us further from our fathers.

   And the disposition of long distance never bothers to explain that ‘I miss you’ means before and above all others. Miss you like we miss the grandmothers with Alzheimer’s whose lives resemble the missing punch line to one-liners.

   So wait.

   And when she finally looks at you, as if she was looking for you, stand and make noise just so she knows you were looking too. Tell her “Thank God I found you.” Because know it or not, you were part of her blueprint.

   She had blood like a flint that sparked your father or mother in to flame and you, like they, must burn whether you like it or not, but you were given gifts.

   You’ve got windpipes that house hurricanes, veins that pump floods.

   I’m not the first one to say it “Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, Old time is still a-flying: And this same flower that smiles today. Tomorrow will be dying.” 

   Every new birthday candle you blow out is only time trying to tell you that every breakthrough you make will only take you closer to the day that your parents must pay the ferry man for a ride to the other side of the river, and you will one day be on your own.
   
   But you carry with you a blueprint, a hint that your history will always be with you, that you were your parents’ breakthrough. Your blood will be the crazy glue that keeps you together on the eventual day when you must stand alone.
   
   So stand and make mountains jealous of how much you’ve grown.

          - Shane Koyczan

extend our circle of compassion

“We must fight against the spirit of unconscious cruelty with which we treat the animals. Animals suffer as much as we do. True humanity does not allow us to impose such sufferings on them. It is our duty to make the whole world recognize it. Until we extend our circle of compassion to all living things, humanity will not find peace.” 

― Albert Schweitzer

Want to learn how to make origami dolphins?

You can HERE.

origami dolphin

Learn how to fold an origami dolphin...



What you decide to do with it is up to you. I suggest an artful protest to the killings in Taiji, Japan.

Perhaps take inspiration from Billie Griebler's origami dolphin at the cove Taiji. With love for the Taiji dolphins.