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The ebb & flow - never ends - peace now
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

I can breathe again! Yay!

It's funny how life is never settled. The "ebb and flow" is not a cliche -- it is a reality.

It is the dichotomy. It is the duality. It is the yin and yang. It is the dialectics.

It really is, and what a comfort. You are never alone. Even holed up, shelled up, tucked away, buried in, you are NOT alone. There is always something to come out of, and that struggle ensures your survival and the fight to live. It's the right to live.

Everything's changing right now... lots of turmoil and tension around the world, but also lots of hope + prosperity. Maybe the universe is shifting gears, what a cosmic crunch.

Peace to Iran's upcoming election. Peace to Euna Lee and Laura Ling. Peace to the Holocaust museum in Washington D.C.

June 10, 2009 | 9:45 PM Comments  0 comments

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Holocaust Memorial & Re-focusing


I am doing lots of community work as you know, but I feel like taking it easy a bit and focusing on physical recreation and leisure. Today I resigned from my volunteer opposition at the Holocaust memorial. I love that place and everyone I have met there and it makes me sad to leave it. Especially when I think about Elizabeth asking me if I'd stay. But I can always go back and I feel it's really important to work on my body and soul right now.


- Melissa




February 26, 2009 | 6:33 PM Comments  0 comments

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It's Time
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

It's time
to move on
to the things we are meant for. We have worked
this hard to get here, and work harder
to get there. Let's not disappoint.

Don't say "Give up," don't walk away from your vision.
You may be the only one who sees it, don't let it go!



February 16, 2009 | 11:01 AM Comments  0 comments

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My Birthday
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

Today is my birthday, and here is my birthday video, when my head feels heavy, it makes my feet feel light...



I have a birthday wish and hope I'm not disappointed, but with the way the universe works, I'll otherwise understand....

love,
Melissa

February 3, 2009 | 8:34 AM Comments  2 comments



Safe Spaces & Settling
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

I do not mind settling. Some must think I want to get up and go; I used to be this way.

But I have seen within the past few months what it means to take it easy, to have precious time to read poetry, to read books again, to play ball with the dogs. I see that love. I appreciate this. And I believe in resourcefulness, I would take up my graduate degree at UCF to earn a degree in Nonprofit Management, a certificate in Domestic Violence, graduate to engage a program from within my region. I appreciate the relaxed, but engaged, life.

February 1, 2009 | 2:33 PM Comments  0 comments

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Commitment/Committed?
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

We should all know that youth engagement means constancy, commitment and patience. Can we work toward this by fulfilling the obligations that we've initiated?

I look around at non-profit organizations that lay by the wayside, unfortunate because some once set amazing goals. And for whatever reason, people move on and these projects seem to come to the end of their lifespan.

Let's not do this. I'm guilty of it, but we've got to practice consistency, especially in this digital age: browsing through Internet sites that lead to dead ends of important topics, who is left to engage, stimulate, and create flow for these issues?

January 30, 2009 | 6:09 PM Comments  2 comments

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"580 Letters, One Check" / My Beloved / Sufi Poet (967 - 1049)
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

"Let sorrowful longing dwell in your heart.
Never give up, never lose hope.
Allah says, 'The broken ones are my beloved.'
Crush your heart. Be broken."


--Shaikh Abu Saeed Abil Kheir, aka Nobody, Son of Nobody (lived 967 - 1049)

(An epithet from Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson)

January 30, 2009 | 11:43 AM Comments  0 comments

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Article: "World unemployment rises" from the BBC
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

This is an excerpt from an article I'm reading on BBC News... It is about world unemployment, but ends talking about the hope of IT workforce, and problems the Digital Divide presents...

"The global economy will have to generate 500 million new jobs during the next 10 years just to accommodate new seekers of the labour force and reduce the current level of unemployment."

...

It hopes the information technology revolution, will provide some of the new jobs.

But the ILO says developing countries will only benefit if they can improve education standards and their telecommunications infrastructure.

Only 5% of the world's population has ever logged on to the internet, and nearly all the users live in industrialised countries.

The report warns that the digital divide, between the technological haves and have-nots is widening.

And it says that those countries that don't get on board the digital revolution face a loss of competitive economic strength, as well as a possible decline in national income.

Writer: Claire Doole (Geneva)
Origin: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1133980.stm

January 30, 2009 | 10:38 AM Comments  0 comments



My Country INFURIATES Me
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

Sometimes I feel discouraged, but right now, I feel furious.

There are some recent events in my country, the U.S., all set off by people that indubitably seem like a reflection of the North American spirit. And there are moments when I feel so discouraged by complete strangers' ethics that I wonder how accurate outsiders' perceptions of my homeland really are.

(1) Hudson River plane crash. A highly skilled pilot maneuvers an airline plane to safely land in New York's Hudson River without one death of the 150 passengers; this feat under all circumstances was almost implausible. Given this, along with $5000 compensation by the airline, some of the passengers have recently decided to sue the airline, citing that emotional damages and lost luggage cannot be rectified by $5000.

(2) Greedy Corporate executives. While we talk about the capitalist nature of the States and as U.S. Americans attempt to defend it, we are drenched by an economic undertow of a recession that is currently driving numerous families to murder their families and then suicide. The most recent was in Southern California.

In turn, these companies that have been lending money do not pay for the repercussions, and are given money to bail out their companies which is not just giving a "slap" on the wrist, but--for anyone knows what it's like to train a dog or is familiar with Pavlov--is reinforcing NEGATIVE BEHAVIOUR. One executive involved has already committed suicide, and generations ahead will be paying for this greed.

(3) God love them, I overhear people talking about Banana Republic not going out of business. And I want to say, "Have you SEEN pictures of Gaza Strip? Have you HEARD about the accounts of explosives and shrapnel deforming civilians?" This is Maya (in the sense of a veil covering the eyes and shrouding clear perception) and we as North Americans (or just the mainstream?) are oblivious to it.

(4) Even someone as stupid as former presidential candidate John Edwards running for president in 2008 INFURIATES me. And this is why: He tended to his cancer-treated wife, and was allegedly caught post-candidacy having an affair. It is not the morals/ethics of this situation that incites me, it is the EGO with which one believes that he can escape and get away with deceit in a time of turmoil, when already the U.S. citizens dissented against George W. Bush and feared governmental corruption, misleading verbiage, and most of all, gross disappointment with leadership. And to think that one can knowingly bring another disappointment and bad representation of liberalism to the forefront of our nation?? Behooves me.

This type of rant is counterintuitive to what TakingITGlobal stands for, as we are focused on positive outlook to bring about constructive change. But in the midst of seeing huge character flaws that reflect my homeland's well-being, I am just so discouraged by what has become of our people.

Someone once told me that those in the East are far more spiritual than those of the West, as a whole, and that it is perfectly evident. Having never been to the East, I cannot say this is false or accurate, I can only say that based on my vision and imagination, the practice of Eastern religions appear to be far more authentic and promising than the neglectful nature of the characters I have seen here. Whether without a doubt these practices are Christian, Muslim, Orthodox Judaism, Buddhist, I am not in honor to be in my country right now, and would long for a moment to be close to that sense of spiritualism and away, even for a while, from the secularism that currently overwhelms me.

(4) Around Christmastime, at a Walmart (superstore), a mass of people waited to get inside to buy sale items early in the morning. In the stampede of all those folks rushing to get inside, one person was trampled to death, and no one stopped to help him.

January 29, 2009 | 6:04 PM Comments  0 comments



Two Years Ago to the Day
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

Drove home today 4:30
Lake Mary to Waterford Chase via 417

There was something in the momentum that I wanted to capture and carry forever; it was the sun, the skyline of a slight gray-blue; the freshly mowed grass tho' brown; it was breezy, and it streamed through my windows.

I listened to Belle & Sebastian, "The Life Pursuit", because it's got a special place in my heart of a special time, and I wanted that memory stimulated because it felt right. Everything at work in that time made headway for me, and my emotions elated to a point that felt relived from two years' ago time. I could have held it for as long as possible, if the universe let me.

This would have taken me miles on miles, the air still damp with late rain. There was a hope in me that this was like Scotland, the flat rusty-green grass and the horizon bending back over the road up ahead.

It was a moment I loved; that pursuit with which I am in love



January 28, 2009 | 5:49 PM Comments  1 comments

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