Anne Kubitsky has a vision.  In a country with a tanking economy, a discouraging political situation, and escalating national protests, she has become a leader in the awakening of gratitude.  The ‘Look For The Good Project’ is a community art project that encourages people (like you!) to share little bits of what they are grateful for, via postcard, in an online art gallery.

“Why not offer people a chance to pause and reflect on something that

In recent weeks, I have found myself wishing for a resolution of the violence in the world.  I have wished that both the police and protestors at the occupy encampments across the nation could find a way to practice non-violence in their actions.  I have often wished that economists, politicians, and those in academia would practice non-violence in their suppositions, beliefs, and attitudes.  And, like many of you, I have wished that the people around me (close friends, family, people next to me on the bus) could practice non-violence day to day in their interactions.

"There is only one consciousness, equally distributed everywhere." - Ramana Maharshi

This year has been a year like no other in history.  On Jan 25th, Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak was ousted from power following 18 days of unrelenting public protest.  In August, Moammar Gadhafi's 42-year rule came to an end as Libyan rebels overtook Tripoli, after 6 months of civil war.  Earthquakes and tornadoes have escalated to unforeseen severity, and the U.S. has seen the rise of the Occupy Wall Street movement in every major city, and met with the opposition of police forces in New York, Cleveland, Oakland, Denver, Atlanta, Nashville, and elsewhere.  

In the Abounding River Logbook, one of the six currents is creation. We say that active creativity is essential to achieving abundance. We must both actively create things in the world, and actively see and create a vision of abundance.  I access creativity through taking personal responsibility. I take responsibility for how I’m acting, what I’m producing, but also what I am actively creating and envisioning. I take responsibility for my vision of the world, and recognize that I can not only create a new vision, but recognize that I have been actively creating my vision of the world all along.

I created a design that was six years in the making that I made become my vision of the world. Out of my education and work in social justice, I envisioned an invasive tree that took too much from the soil. The tree represented the power structures and oppressive systems I wasn’t committed to. In my design (see second image) I created a tearing up of the tree through various metaphorical imagery (vines tugging down the branches, something rotting away the roots… branches being cut off). All of these metaphors I lived by- on how to deconstruct the tree that I saw as being damaging to the overall environment.

And deconstruction is how my life looked for 6 years. I used criticism against everything without much idea for how to instill hope or rebirth after the death of the system. I used various methods of social change to address problems that I saw, and constantly came across seeing that I was never bringing answers or solutions to them. My experience of the world was through that vision that I was actively creating and recreating.      Two weeks ago I really noticed that my tree metaphor wasn’t working for me to create hope. So I set off to find a new image, a rebirth of the tree, or something that I was committed to. I created the image above, the conclusion of the oppressive tree, and a new habitat for a rebirth. In my vision, the roots have been torn away to where all is left is love. Rooted in love, a new sprout is born and there is pure possibility.

As a means to re-train myself in my new vision, I’m taking on the 365 day challenge. Every day for the next year I am creating a piece of art with this new image. Every day through this creativity I am actively creating hope in the world by transforming my vision and by physically expressing my vision to others. I am day by day re-inscribing a new belief through my repeated creations.

The Idea for the practice of 365 projects came from Noah Scalin, who took on creating one image every day with a different medium himself, and then created a journal to encourage others. Check out the book here; check out some of the variations of my design here.              This week I invite you to look at what belief you have that’s causing you suffering. Taking responsibility for it as your creation and not truth is empowering. What can you actively create in its place? What belief can you adopt that serves you and serves the planet? We say that a belief is a thought practiced over and over again. What new thought can you begin with today?

I am inspired by a great friend of mine who has the courage to make an incredible journey and goal for himself, follow through, and listen and change it when the people he cares about ask him to stop.  My friend Garrett took it upon himself to walk a pilgrimage from his hometown in Vista, CA in San Diego county all the way up to Portland Oregon.  I am floored by his incredible goal and his commitment to this journey as he’s been walking since June to make his way north as what he calls “a journey without and a journey within”.  He spent most of the walk without even a sleeping bag and has slept many of his nights on the streets and eating canned food as he finds it.  Garrett is a gentle soul whom I have always looked to for guidance in unconditional love.  He’s housed many homeless men in his home and has an unstoppable lifelong devotion to being in service to the planet.  He met with me last night after over 300 miles of walking since June and told me about his decision to stop his journey. 

Garrett is beginning his training to become a friar for Saint Frances.  During his plan for this journey his advisor requested that he not walk the pilgrimage in concern for his safety and in need of his services elsewhere.  Garrett told me how he felt conflicted around wanting to make the trek, and knowing how powerful the journey is for him… and also respecting and honoring the request of his supervisor.  Garrett chose to obey his advisor’s wishes and concluded his journey in the middle of California, not reaching his goal to reach Portland and travel through the Missions.

What especially inspires me about Garrett’s story is actually his ability to be open-minded while being focus on his goal.  I typically witness in myself a drive that gets so strongly intent on the outcome of my goal that I never look up or take into consideration any other input or any change in direction.  I admire Garrett for his ability to walk with selflessness, and then him stopping and releasing his personal goal to be in service where people ask of him.

I woke up this morning with scarcity on my mind.  I’m sure many of you have had this experience.  Before my cup of tea, before letting the chickens out in the yard, or taking a hot shower, my mind was churning with fear and disappointment.  The theme today was: “I am not making enough money.”

Lately, I am so present to how important it is for me to be in integrity and be a good role model for those coming up behind me. On this incredible spiritual path that I get to walk, I see how critical the integrity of the people who walked before me is.

I see them walking in such a good and powerful way.  I so appreciate all of the work they have done to be where they are.  I see how patient and loving they are with me when I take a tumble on my way.  They don't try to change me or fix me no matter what kind of fit I might be throwing.  They just stand strong, looking at me with love.  I receive so much inspiration and encouragement from that.  It gives me the opportunity to pull it in and remember my own strength and light.  And I get that me doing that inspires them in return. 

I didn't always have that.  It can be a challenging world to grow up in these days.  I came through some really painful times.  And I give thanks for the all of it.  I have the courage, we allhave the courage to look at those places where we struggle and where we have or have not received inspiration from others and really love on ourselves and have compassion with ourselves.  We all have the courage to take on really being in integrity with whatever path we're walking, with whatever practices and ways of being we are taking on.  That way we can look around us, with so much love and understanding in our hearts and eyes and inspire hope in the hearts of the young ones today and all of those around us.

Being human is a unique kind of joy, a unique kind of sadness, and pain, and ecstasy.  An old woman sat at my bar the other day, and told me she was having a bad day.  She said, "Not all days can be good days, you know."  As short as my life has been, I know this as well.  Not all days are happy days.  Some days are full of anxiety, others brim with sadness, and some seem dark but are laced with hope.  On days like these, I sometimes have trouble accepting my life as it is.  I think "If only they didn't have to go," "If only I hadn't been that way," or "Why is this happening to me?"

At times like these, I try to pay attention to the opportunity that I have.  I chose to have a human experience, and that means that I will find many challenges in my life: separation, death, and parts of myself and others that I do not like.  The tremendous opportunity that I have is to love it all, especially these things that I do not like, and to remember that each of these is a gift from the universe to make my life even more amazing.  Rumi (a 13th century Muslim Mystic and poet), muses on this in his poem Guest House:

Happy Tuesday,

Such sweet Springtime weather. I am cleaning out our yurt today and I feel SO GOOD! There is something about dusting off winter that is so wonderful. The cobwebs, both inner and outer, the rearranging of what works for our life at this time... Today we had more salad than cooked food, which is always a sign of Spring! 

In what ways do you clean out the winter for the newness of Spring?