Happy Sunday, dear friends. Some days, we don’t have anything to say. Today is one of those days.
I feel complete stillness and silence within myself. My heart is simply wide open, and there is no room for anything other than deep gratitude. I am absolutely overwhelmed with the gifts of my life. What else is there to think about, but love and gratitude?
I hooked into this line of energy some time yesterday. I have always shied away from the material and commercial aspects of Valentine’s Day. I love big, every single day of the year, and I don’t need presents or chocolate to remind me that I am loved. I can feel it in my soul. I can see it in the actions of those around me.
My mother used to tell me, that actions speak louder than words, and this is certainly the case with love, in some circumstances. We love, and therefore we want to serve. We want to take care of others, and through our actions we show them how much they mean to us.
Lately, I have been making sure to show myself how much I love me, and how much I mean to myself as well. The first love really, the one that life in the old paradigm tries to strip away from us, is the most important love of all.
I think that I simply found the sweet spot, where I can love myself and truly feel the love of others for me, knowing it is and will always be. I can feel the all encompassing, all pervading peace of truly believing I am loved, from the inside out, from the beginning of time and out into eternity. I can accept it and I can finally feel that I deserve it.
My mind may not really have gotten itself around this concept yet and so, like a smart mind, it is sitting silent and observing this new experience of complete and total surrender to love. I can say it is pretty cool, that love literally blew my mind!
The Bloom Project creates beauty for hospice patients out of Valentine’s Day left overs.
Heidi Berkman is a former event planner, and she was always sad to see perfectly good flowers being thrown away after events. She realized that with a little sprucing up and pruning, even bouquets that were past their prime at florist and retail outlets could be given a new lease on life.
The Bloom Project was born in 2007, when a number of her extended family members were going through end of life hospice care. She wanted to create some beauty in the space of those going through their final days, and so she set about collecting floral donations that would have other wise gone in the trash.
The project has created over 78,000 bouquets since its inception. It began in Bend, OR, US, but has expanded to Portland and Granite Bay, CA. They don’t just make bouquets for the ladies either. Some of their most grateful recipients have been men, who say, they had never received flowers before in their lives.
What an absolutely beautiful and loving way to support beings who are preparing to transition. They are being supported with kindness, certainly, but bringing the gentle loving energy of the Plant Kingdom into their space is so soothing. I also adore the idea of reclaiming the beauty of the plants and flowers, that others considered trash.
Squeezing beauty and functional public space out of an abandoned urban landscape.
Many cities world-wide are seeing the need for natural spaces within an urban landscape. Greenery helps keep the urban atmosphere cleaner and improves air quality. The space also gives people places to relax, play sports and commune with nature, all of which add to the quality of urban life.
As a kid, when we drove to visit my relatives in Brooklyn, NY, we would pass close to the shoreline. It did not exist as a sea shore or river bank, but a series of piers and industrial terminals for the shipping trade.
As the years passed, we would look out the window of the car, with the skyline of Manhattan in the background, and watch the decay of these piers, as the shipping trade packed up and moved to other locations. It turned into a ghost town, that existed isolated and untended on the wrong side of a busy highway.
I am happy to say, that has all changed. Now, as we travel down the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, underneath the promenade at Brooklyn Heights, the area has exploded with a wealth of green and public space, as the Brooklyn Bridge Park was created.
Using a unique public and private sector partnership, the park was created using a sustainable income stream from local property tax dollars, in combination with concession vendor fees.
The scope of the project was tremendous, involving the rehabilitation of many abandoned piers, the reclamation of the shore line and the clearing out or repurposing of industrial structures. The first phase of the park opened in 2010, and additional phases have been opened as they are completed. The park project managers created something new, useful and beautiful out of something abandoned, like an urban phoenix rising out of the ashes of industrialization.
The park won the prestigious National Planning Award for Urban Development in 2014, and reclaims 1.3 miles of inaccessible industrially blighted shore line for public use. I am so happy for my birth city, that future thinking design was embraced to create this amazing space.
A Public-Private Partnership for the 21st Century by Angelina Horne for City Parks Blog
A young man turns some found money into an act of kindness that snowballed.
This video brought me to tears. I hope and pray that not another single child on this planet looses a parent to violence or war. This beautiful little boy named Myles Eckert lost his dad in Iraq. When he went to lunch with his mom and family one day, he found $20 in the parking lot.
When he entered the restaurant, he saw a soldier with his own family, and he reminded Myles of his dad. The boy wrote a note to the soldier, thanking him and telling him that his dad was in heaven. He wanted to buy the soldier lunch.
What unfolded afterward is a stunning example of how a small act can change someone’s life forever. Even though this young man has suffered, he still has a kind heart and is willing to show it. Beautiful hearts like his are what we need in this world. Beautiful hearts unite to create heaven here on earth.
Ohio boy turns found fortune into act of kindness on YouTube
And finally….
One bank turns its ATM into an Automated Thanking Machine!
This promotional video for TD Bank is simply delightful. Watch the reaction of regular customers as they come in to withdraw money, and walk away with gifts of gratitude from their bank! I love this idea and I hope they do it often!
Automated Thanking Machine on YouTube
That’s the good news for today. Have an awe-inspiring day. Please join Gavin Harrill for the Golden Gaia News Roundup on Monday.
Be Well. Be Joy. Be Love!
Alex