THIS SITE IS DEDICATED TO SUMER NICOLE ALVAREZ ~ AN INSPIRATION TO ALL
Sumer dreamed of making a difference in the world. Her time on earth was brief, but she had a powerful impact on all who knew her. Her family and friends feel blessed to have shared in her life and know that her dream of making a difference in the world came to pass and will continue through the work of the Sumer Nicole Alvarez Foundation.
Please read below for more information about Sumer’s life and the Sumer Nicole Alvarez Foundation. Your interest, input and involvement are welcomed and appreciated!
We have highlighted many different worthwhile causes and organizations on this site and hope that one or several will resonate with you and inspire you to get involved in making our world a better place for all.
We also encourage you to read and contribute to this site’s blog ~ your perspectives, interests and what you have to say have this forum in which you can share your thoughts with others and us.
Our blog contains inspirational quotes and profiles of inspirational people, comprehensive information on many topics, including advocacy, leadership, mentoring, the environment, breast health and breast cancer, MS, and other diseases and health- and health care-related issues and resources. The blog also includes comprehensive information and resources pertaining to several other important subjects and issues including social justice, human rights and the nonprofit sector. There is a wealth of information at your fingertips, and we hope that you find it informative, helpful and motivational.
So please read on, share your thoughts with us, choose a cause and get involved!
And most importantly, to quote the great Mahatma Gandhi:
BE THE CHANGE YOU WISH TO SEE IN THE WORLD.
ACTS OF KINDNESS ~ DON'T ALMOST GIVE ~ DON'T ALMOST ACT ~ PLEASE GIVE & ACT NOW ~ HERE ARE WAYS HOW
FRIENDS OF SUMER IN ACTION ~ PLEASE SUPPORT OUR EFFORTS TO HELP ORPHANS IN NEED
Running the Mt. Kilimanjaro Marathon with AIDS Orphans at Tumaini Children's Center in Nyeri, Kenya
For more information, see TrippingOnWords.com
Pictures and Video Available
Contact: [email protected]
Claire A. Williams
For my first marathon, I trained in cotton socks. I didn't know better, and four months of blood blisters punished me for this oversight. My shoes were old, and I never measured the miles I ran. Instead, I relied solely on my own all too optimistic minutes-per-mile calculations on the city streets where I trained. I had no cause, raised no money, and was lucky to have my one and only spectator on race day. Naturally, she forgot to take any pictures. The result of all this preparation was a slow, existent finish to the Madrid Marathon 2006.
The second time around, though, I'm doing things differently. For four months, I will be training for the June 24 Mt. Kilimanjaro marathon at an orphanage in Kenya, where I'll try to keep up with some of the orphanage's 150 AIDS orphans in a makeshift, after school running program. Along the way, I'm hoping to raise funds for the their home: the Tumaini Children's Center. There are many places to help do good things and learn new ideas in this big world of ours, and this is but one. However, it is a good one, and one worth considering.
I work as a writer and anthropologist studying international volunteer organizations, and firmly believe in the power of such efforts to transform the lives of the individuals who take part in such endeavors – on both sides. Over and over again, it seems that doing something worthwhile in this world is not just about the money you give out, but the connections and experiences you have trying to do so.
A volunteer's experience in another place in the globe can certainly be worth the cost of a plane ticket to get there, and in the long run such an expense really can do as much as or more than sending money abroad – since it helps transform the nature of our global citizens' response to growth, aid, and healing change. When I'm lucky, this is the reason I get to go to the places I go. On this trip, though, I'm also asking for donations for the kids. In return, we'll give you – and everyone, really – a daily video blog of their experiences on the move.
I happened upon the Tumaini Children's Center with my traveling companion and sole Madrid Marathon spectator, Lara, during the last leg of our eight month trip around the world. On our way to climb Mt. Kenya, we got stuck at an organization that runs itself far better than many of the fancy (correctly tax bracketed ones) ones I have worked for.
In sum, the Tumaini Children's Center was started in response to the significant number of AIDS orphans that began appearing at the local primary school. As more and more children came seeking food, the members of the local parish stepped up to provide them with at least one good meal a day. As the numbers grew, and as the grandparents in the community were unable to keep up with the demands of the many children growing up without parents, the project expanded.
At Tumaini (Kikuyu for "hope"), every building is named something symbolic, and the philosophy of their projects melds together Florence's Duomo (use all your resources to build it, and you'll find more) and Shoeless Joe Jackson's Field of Dreams (if you build it they will come). With their sporadic donations, the Presbyterian parish overseeing Tumaini Children's Center has built up a very well run orphanage (now with 150 waiting empty beds for more kids), a smaller orphanage for disabled children, a brand new community health clinic, and an up and coming old folks' home.
My traveling-cum-running partner and I are absorbing all the expenses and consulting with more knowledgeable marathoners and physical therapists to make sure that we train the kids safely. However, along with the orphanage we would love to give the kids the support they need to make a real commitment to running. Thus, we're seeking donations. For more information, to read about the project and donate shoes, running apparel, or funds, please visit TrippingOnWords.com.
Everything you give goes straight to the kids, and we'll thank you every step of the way.
Please learn more about a cause that the Sumer Nicole Alvarez Foundation is helping to sponsor. To donate or get involved, refer to TrippingOnWords.com
HOPE RUNS
Training for the Annual Mt. Kilimanjaro Marathon with AIDS Orphans from the Tumaini Children’s Center in Nyeri, Kenya
For more information, see TrippingOnWords.com. Pictures and Video Available
Contact: [email protected]
Current Sponsors:
From Our Feet
Project Active: Diffusing World Tensions through Sport
Cathedral School for Boys (San Francisco)
Fieldston Lower School (New York)
First Presbyterian Church of Berkeley
The Sumer Nicole Alvarez Foundation
Individual Donations
You! (Contact Claire and [email protected])
Purpose: The HOPE RUNS program has three main goals:
1. To start a committed running program at the Tumaini Children’s Center in Nyeri, Kenya. This will serve as a means of introducing the healthy benefits of running into the lives of children, and of providing a structured after school activity for these orphans.
2. To raise awareness about and funding for Kenya’s Tumaini Children’s Center through the public documentation of these orphans’ efforts to train to complete some portion of the annual Mt. Kilimanjaro marathon on June 24.
3. To collect books to create a working library in the local secondary school, as well as improve the small libraries of the Tumaini Children's center and the Primary School.
Background
In Nyeri, Kenya, an orphanage exists where local children can get the food, schooling, and care they need. The Tumaini Children’s Center was started in response to the significant number of AIDS orphans that began appearing at the local primary school. As more and more children came seeking food, the members of the community parish stepped up to provide them with at least one good meal a day. As the numbers grew, and as the grandparents in the community became less able to serve as parents to so many children, the project expanded.
At Tumaini (Kikuyu for "hope"), every building is named something symbolic, and the philosophy of their projects melds together Florence's Duomo (use all your resources to build it, and you'll find more) and Shoeless Joe Jackson's Field of Dreams (if you build it they will come). They build a foundation, and then wait for more funding to come in to keep adding stories. With their sporadic donations, the Presbyterian parish overseeing Tumaini Children’s Center has built up a very well run orphanage for kids ages 3-18 (now with 150 empty beds for kids once more funding arrives), a smaller orphanage for disabled children, a brand new community health clinic, and an up and coming old folks’ home.
Why Running?
We first planned to use this community solely as a welcoming and comfortable base for climbing Mt. Kenya, but we had never seen a place so committed to community building and welfare. Read Claire's letter that lovingly coerced people to come to the orphanage with us here. As we recount here , we extended our stay, but still knew we had to come back with more resources. With experience in numerous types and examples of non-profit organizations between the two of us, we knew the real thing when we saw it. Starting from only hope and faith a few years ago, this parish has built something amazing. The kids are healthy, they eat three substantial meals a day, they are close to the elders of the community, and they play and scold each other like a family. We decided to go back, and we wanted to find a way to contribute something that further strengthened this feeling of community, and that helped the commitment to health and well-being that this organization had prioritized.
We had both just become serious runners—Claire training for a second marathon and Lara her first—and it had brought us considerable freedom and joy over the last few months. When the primary contributor to Tumaini from the U.S. suggested a running program as a way to inspire pride and focus in the kids, we knew it was the right idea.
The Kilimanjaro Marathon on June 24th is only a few hours and a few months away. Most conveniently, it is a race around the base of the mountain that circles the same track four times. Knowing we are training a group of varied age, ability, and commitment, we felt this was the best way to offer options for different lengths and time. We only expect a few of the teens to actually want to train for the whole thing, and we plan to host a smaller race for the much younger kids around the area of the orphanage to celebrate the running club. The point is that everyone is welcome to participate, and everyone will learn about safe and healthy ways to make physical fitness a part of their lives.
Logistics of the HOPE RUNS program:
From the first week of March through the race at the end of June, we will run with the kids five days a week on the dirt roads around the orphanage. In addition to actually just running with them, we will be focusing on stretching techniques and on teaching them about the health benefits of such a habit. There will be varied lengths of runs and different running activities to make sure that every child or every age that wants to remains involved and interested. For those interested in running the full or partial marathon, we take a conservative approach to training that focuses on completion rather than racing. This means that the mileage goes up slowly, keeping the emphasis on the habit of running rather than the speed or duration of the runs.
As a subsidiary to this program, we will be maintaining a daily website of our experiences with the kids that we hope to help involve them with. We hope to attract sponsorship and donors to help subsidize our work with the kids, but also the Tumaini project as a whole. While there, we will also be working with the orphans on reading skills, a newsletter and an art therapy program as a means to deepen our connection to this community and to improve these children’s practical skills.
We are absorbing all the expenses and consulting with more knowledgeable marathoners, physical therapists and nutritionists to make sure that we train the kids safely. However, along with the orphanage we would love to give the kids the support they need to make a real commitment to running through equipment, particularly sneakers.
WHAT WE NEED:
1. Shoes: The orphanage struggles to find shoes normally, and in the face of high activity, we wanted to make sure to minimize injuries and maximize enthusiasm by providing literal support.
2. Books: If you've got a box of books - send them to us in Kenya! At 1 dollar per pound via Media Mail to get there, your old children's, teen, and adult books and a small shipping cost can go a long way.
3. Publicity: We want to spread the word about this amazing place as far as we can, both for inspiration and for the hope that support and donations will arise.
4. Financial Donations: We need to find a way to support shipping equipment, marathon fees, transportation and other costs. Anything beyond what we can use for the running program will go directly to the orphanage in its efforts to bring more orphans into the 150 currently empty beds.
How You Can Follow the Project:
Over the last year, we have kept a daily account of our travels, including our trip to Tumaini, at TrippingOnWords.com. We have developed a loyal readership, and we will use this web-based format as a way of keeping the world in touch with our program’s progress through videos, writing, and audio updates!
Project Directors:
Claire A. Williams: With a B.A. and an M.A. from Stanford University, I work as an anthropology consultant with several different international volunteer organizations. I firmly believe in the power of such efforts to transform the lives of the individuals who take part in such endeavors – on both sides. Over and over again, it seems that doing something worthwhile in this world is not just about the money you give out, but the connections and experiences you have trying to do so. A volunteer's experience in another place in the globe can certainly be worth the cost of a plane ticket to get there, and in the long run such an expense really can do as much as or more than sending money abroad – since it helps transform the nature of our global citizens’ response to growth, aid, and healing change.
Lara Vogel: After graduating from Stanford University with a B.A. in Human Biology and International Public Health, I balked in the face of returning to school. I took the next logical step and took up writing. Most recently, I have spent my last year traveling to over twenty countries as a travel writer, but I am excited to be contributing my efforts to one project over the coming months. Having worked in health clinics around the world, I am confident in the positive effects that health education programs, particularly for children, can have on the health of a nation and certain of such work’s relevance.
Where Do The Children Play? ~ Song & Images
TUMAINI ~ WORDS OF HOPE
We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
When you do nothing, you feel overwhelmed and powerless.
But when you get involved, you feel the sense of hope and accomplishment that comes from knowing you are working to make things better.
~ Pauline R. Kezer
Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.
~ Dale Carnegie
I have learned two lessons in my life: first, there are no sufficient literary, psychological, or historical answers to human tragedy, only moral ones.
Second, just as despair can come to one another only from other human beings, hope, too, can be given to one only by other human beings.
~ Elie Wiesel
Listen to the Exhortation of the Dawn!
Look to this Day!
For it is Life, the very Life of Life.
In its brief course lie all the
Verities and Realities of your Existence.
The Bliss of Growth,
The Glory of Action,
The Splendor of Beauty;
For Yesterday is but a Dream,
And To-morrow is only a Vision;
But To-day well lived makes
Every Yesterday a Dream of Happiness,
And every Tomorrow a Vision of Hope.
Look well therefore to this Day!
Such is the Salutation of the Dawn!
~ Kalidasa
Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations.
I may not reach them but I can look up and see their beauty, believe in them, and try to follow them.
~ Louisa May Alcott
If you lose hope, somehow you lose the vitality that keeps life moving, you lose that courage to be, that quality that helps you go on in spite of it all.
And so today I still have a dream.
The Trumpet of Conscience
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.
~ Winston Churchill
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul
And sings the tune without the words
And never stops at all.
~ Emily Dickinson
ACTS OF KINDNESS ~ DON'T ALMOST GIVE ~ DON'T ALMOST ACT ~ PLEASE GIVE & ACT NOW
HERE ARE SOME MORE WAYS HOW:
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Charity: Water ~ When You Give $20 ~ You Give Someone Clean and Safe Drinking Water for 15 Years
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ACTION IS ELOQUENCE. ~ William Shakespeare
Hoya Outreach Programs & Education (HOPE)
Hoya Outreach Programs and Education (HOPE) is an organization of Georgetown students dedicated to community involvement and service.
Website: http://hope.georgetown.edu/who.htm
Keep hope alive.
~ Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
I am only one; but still I am one.
I cannot do everything, but still I can do something;
I will not refuse to do the something I can do.
~ Helen Keller
When a collection of brilliant minds, hearts and talents come together… expect a masterpiece...
~ Author unknown
ACT NOW, DON'T WAIT ~ GET INFORMED & GET INVOLVED ~ BE HEARD & MAKE A DIFFERENCE
PLEASE VISIT OUR SISTER SITE at:
http://www.livelikesumer.blogspot.com/
Mrs. Mullen's Interests Include:
Reading, Hiking, Cancer Advocacy, Cancer Research, Oncology, Neurology, Psychoneuroimmunology, Parkinson’s Disease, Multiple Sclerosis (MS), Biomedical Research, The Sciences, The Survivor Personality, Physics, Political Science, Leadership, Sports Psychology, Organizational Psychology, Organizational Effectiveness, Critical Thinking, Appreciative Inquiry (AI), Teamwork, Community Outreach, Grassroots Organizing, Public Policy, Public Health, Medical Ethics, Health Care Reform, Universal Health Care, Patient Education, Patient Advocacy, Patient Empowerment, Physician Education, Human Rights, Animal Rights, Cultural Competency, Public Speaking, Philanthropy, Cause-Related Marketing, Blogs, Blogging, Nonprofit Development, Nonprofit Reform, Mentoring, Volunteer Development, Volunteer Management, Music, Poetry, Environmental Protection, Yoga, Meditation, Spirituality, Philosophy, The Arts, Arts & Crafts, The Needlearts, Education, Anthropology, Cultural Anthropology, International Peace, Archeology, Biblical Archeology, Social Justice, Social Change, Comparative Religion, Truth, Personal Empowerment, Youth Empowerment
Sumer Nicole Alvarez ~
SEEK TO DO BRAVE & LOVELY THINGS THAT ARE LEFT UNDONE
BY THE MAJORITY OF PEOPLE. GIVE GIFTS OF LOVE & PEACE TO THOSE WHOM OTHERS PASS BY. ~ Paramahansa Yogananda
Sumer Alvarez
He exhaled; she, divinely inspired
Created from the breath of God
Gift to the world, messenger, saint
Grace, love, light, compassion
A portion of these
Perfect reflection of His omniscient beauty
Life that will reverberate ages on
Universe, Galaxies, Milky Way, All
God-given body infused with Spirit
Life force of all beings
Blessed in birth, exalted in death
Do not let the loss of this earthly body crush your hearts
Bitterness in loss holds no truth
Chalice of her Soul spilled forth
Overflowing, bathing those around her
Baptizing all in God’s Light and Grace
Some did not know her, I need not
I know of her deeds, of her life
They are well written and recorded
Will your next twenty years touch the many
The way Sumer did?
Do not feel bad, I ask, that will never make
Anyone feel good or feel God
Reach out to the family expressing love
Revel, Celebrate, Sing her name
We are better because she lived
Wiser from the example she set
Thank her, Thank God, Thank her parents
For the everlasting gifts bestowed on all
“Greater deeds than I, you will do,†Christ said;
Sumer was on that path
She has found eternity living in immortality
Be aware, she shall be in your presence
Listen for her, look for her, call on her
Suspend your disbelief, purchase wonderment
Angel checking on us, watching us
Her short but very deep footsteps
Forever planted in the
Sacred soil of God’s garden
She, giving hope and life to those around her
Connecting to all people, those cast away trod asunder
Devoid of love, peace, comfort and hope
Take the lesson of this life and learn
She is ever present
Are you walking without
Fear, anger, resentment, hate?
Do you see your enemy in front of you?
Sumer in clothing you do not recognize
Testing us, asking are you worthy of eternity?
What path are you walking?
Does it follow, the one represented by her life?…
Forgiveness to all people, injustice or not
Know love, have compassion, find forgiveness
These will bring you to the truth
Sumer’s body has gone, called home
Her Spirit lives, Embrace her life, her legacy
Do not let her path, so clearly illuminated
Go dim and disappear
Blown out by the winds of time
Forever erasing these footsteps of charity
As our lives go on; more this, more that, more than you
If that’s your life, change course now
Reach out, grasp it, take hold of her life
Brilliant polestar guiding us all
Find a way to continue her legacy
Bring the music of her life to the children of the world
She will be watching us…
Author: © K. G. Mullen 03.09.06
Since love grows within you, so beauty grows.
For love is the beauty of the soul.
~ Saint Augustine
Some people come into our lives and quickly go.
Some people move our souls to dance.
They awaken us to new understanding with the passing whisper of their wisdom.
Some people make the sky more beautiful to gaze upon.
They stay in our lives for awhile, leave footprints on our hearts, and we are never ever the same.
~ by Flavia Weedn
The thought manifests as the word.
The word manifests as the deed.
The deed develops into habit.
And the habit hardens into character.
So watch the thought and its ways with care.
And let it spring from love, born out of concern for all beings.
~ Buddha
Our real self, the soul, is immortal.
We may sleep for a little while in that change called death, but we can never be destroyed.
We exist, and that existence is eternal.
The wave comes to the shore, and then goes back to the sea; it is not lost.
It becomes one with the ocean, or returns again in the form of another wave.
This body has come, and it will vanish;
but the soul essence within it will never cease to exist.
Nothing can terminate that eternal consciousness.
~ Paramahansa Yogananda
In loving honor of all those impacted in the tragedy at Virginia Tech.
Source & Resource: Copyright © Self-Realization Fellowship. All rights reserved. Website: http://www.yogananda-srf.org/writings/death.html; WHERE THERE IS LIGHT: Insight & Inspiration for Meeting Life's Challenges; Author: Paramahansa Yogananda
LIVE LIKE SUMER
BE UNIQUE
SHOW COMPASSION
SEEK KNOWLEDGE
EMBRACE YOUR CREATIVITY
SEE BEAUTY IN YOUR SURROUNDINGS AND OTHERS
BE TRUE TO YOURSELF
GIVE BACK
HAVE FUN
SEEK ADVENTURE
BE OPEN TO NEW IDEAS AND EXPERIENCES
SHOW YOUR INTELLIGENCE
INDULGE YOUR CURIOSITY
BE BRAVE
ACT DON’T WAIT
Please Choose a Cause & Get Involved
THE CANCER SCHMANCER MOVEMENT & CANCER SCHMANCER FOUNDATION
Cancer Schmancer’s mission is "to ensure that ALL women’s cancers are diagnosed in STAGE 1, when it is most curable.
Early detection equals survival.
It’s as simple as that.
Through education, legislation, and social reform, we will not stop until the very landscape of America’s women’s healthcare consciousness has been replanted."
..
For more information and to get involved, please visit Cancer Schmancer’s website at:
http://www.cancerschmancer.org/
Getting through another day should not be a matter of luck.
You can make an important difference in the world right now.
Don't Almost Give.
Please Act Now; Don't Wait.
http://www.parkinsonsresource.org/
http://www.read2kids.org/
United Through Reading's programs encourage parents and extended family members to read aloud with young children, with special emphasis on the first five years, for the educational and emotional benefits to all involved.
Welcome to Our CommUNITY of Friends
Our Space ~ Think Globally, Act Locally (please see this site's blog for details)
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. ~ Margaret Mead
Imagine Peace ~ Create Peace ~ Advocate Peace ~ Unite in Peace ~ Sustain Peace
Albert Einstein Quotes:*
Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities.
The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence.
I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.
If I had only known, I would have been a locksmith.
You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war.
Through the release of atomic energy, our generation has brought into the world the most revolutionary force since prehistoric man's discovery of fire. This basic force of the universe cannot be fitted into the outmoded concept of narrow nationalisms. For there is no secret and there is no defense; there is no possibility of control except through the aroused understanding and insistence of the peoples of the world. We scientists recognise our inescapable responsibility to carry to our fellow citizens an understanding of atomic energy and its implication for society. In this lies our only security and our only hope -- we believe that an informed citizenry will act for life and not for death.
* Source: http://www.humboldt1.com/~gralsto/einstein/quotes.html
Mahatma Gandhi Quotes:*
A cause has the best chance of success when it is examined and followed on its own merits. Measures must always, in a progressive society, be held superior to men, who are after all imperfect instruments, working for their fulfillment.
If we could erase the "I's" and "mine's" from religion, politics, economics, etc., we should soon be free and bring heaven upon earth.
*Source: Gandhi Speaks…Selections from his writings; Published by Self-Realization Fellowship
CommUNITY, Charity, Philanthropy ~
community - Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:*
261 Moby Thesaurus words for "community": Everyman, John Doe, Public, accord, accordance, affiliation, affinity, agape, agreement, alikeness, alliance, amity, analogy, aping, approach, approximation, ashram, assimilation, association, balance, bipartisanship, body, body politic, bonds of harmony, branch, brotherly love, caritas, caste, cement of friendship, charity, church, citizenry, clan, class, closeness, coaction, coadjuvancy, coadministration, coagency, cochairmanship, codirectorship, coequality, collaboration, collaborativeness, collective farm, collectivism, collectivity, collegiality, collusion, colony, commensalism, commerce, common effort, common enterprise, common man, common ownership, commonwealth, communal effort, communalism, commune, communication, communion, communism, communitarianism, community at large, community of interests, companionship, company, comparability, comparison, compatibility, complicity, concert, concord, concordance, concurrence, conformity, congeniality, congress, consociation, consortship, constituency, conversation, converse, cooperation, cooperative society, cooperativeness, copying, corelation, correlation, correlativism, correlativity, correspondence, cultural community, culture, democracy, denomination, division, duet, duumvirate, dwellers, economic class, ecumenicalism, ecumenicism, ecumenism, empathy, endogamous group, equilibrium, equipollence, equivalence, esprit, esprit de corps, estate, ethnic group, everybody, everyman, everyone, everywoman, extended family, faction, family, feeling of identity, fellow feeling, fellowship, folk, folks, frictionlessness, general public, gens, gentry, good vibes, good vibrations, group, habitancy, happy family, harmony, identity, imitation, inhabitants, intercommunication, intercommunion, intercourse, inverse proportion, inverse ratio, inverse relationship, joining of forces, joint effort, joint operation, kibbutz, kinship, kinship group, kolkhoz, like-mindedness, likeness, likening, linguistic community, love, mass action, men, metaphor, mimicking, moiety, morale, mutual assistance, mutualism, mutuality, nation, nationality, nearness, nuclear family, octet, offshoot, oneness, order, organization, parallelism, parity, partnership, party, peace, people, people at large, people in general, persons, persuasion, phratria, phratry, phyle, polity, pooling, pooling of resources, populace, population, profit sharing, proportionality, public, public ownership, pulling together, quartet, quintet, race, rapport, rapprochement, reciprocality, reciprocation, reciprocity, relativity, religious order, resemblance, sameness, schism, school, sect, sectarism, segment, semblance, septet, settlement, sextet, sharecropping, sharing, similarity, simile, similitude, simulation, social activity, social class, social intercourse, social relations, socialism, society, solidarity, speech community, state, state ownership, stock, strain, subcaste, symbiosis, symmetry, sympathy, symphony, synergism, synergy, team spirit, teamwork, totem, town meeting, trio, triumvirate, troika, understanding, union, unison, united action, unity, variety, version, whole people, world, you and me
unity - Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:*
165 Moby Thesaurus words for "unity": accord, accordance, affinity, agape, agreement, amity, bonds of harmony, brotherly love, calm, caritas, cement of friendship, charity, coequality, coherence, cohesion, coincidence, collectivity, combination, communion, community, community of interests, compatibility, completeness, complex, comprehensiveness, concord, concordance, concurrence, conformance, congeniality, congruence, congruity, congruousness, consensus, consistency, consonance, constancy, continuity, correspondence, elementarity, embodiment, empathy, entireness, entirety, equability, equality, equanimity, equilibrium, equivalence, esprit, esprit de corps, eternity, evenness, exhaustiveness, feeling of identity, fellow feeling, fellowship, frictionlessness, fullness, fundamentality, glory, good vibes, good vibrations, happy family, harmony, holiness, holism, homogeneity, homoousia, identity, immutability, impartibility, inclusiveness, indiscerptibility, indissolubility, indistinguishability, individuality, indivisibility, infinite goodness, infinite justice, infinite love, infinite mercy, infinite power, infinite wisdom, infinity, infrangibility, infusibility, inseparability, insolubility, intactness, integer, integrality, integration, integrity, kinship, light, like-mindedness, likeness, love, majesty, monism, monolithism, mutuality, no difference, omnipotence, omnipotency, omnipresence, omniscience, omnisciency, oneness, organic unity, peace, persistence, pervasiveness, plainness, purity, rapport, rapprochement, reciprocity, resemblance, sameness, self-identity, selfhood, selfness, selfsameness, severity, sharing, similarity, similitude, simpleness, simplicity, singleness, singularity, solidarity, solidity, sovereignty, stability, starkness, steadfastness, steadiness, sympathy, symphony, synonymity, synonymousness, synonymy, team spirit, thoroughness, total approach, totality, ubiquity, unadulteration, unanimity, understanding, unification, uniformity, union, uniqueness, unison, uniting, universality, unmixedness, unruffledness, unsophistication, whole, wholeness
And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three;
but the greatest of these is charity.
~ I Corinthians: 13:13
char·i·ty n. pl. char·i·ties 1. Provision of help or relief to the poor; almsgiving. 2. Something given to help the needy; alms. 3. An institution, organization, or fund established to help the needy. 4. Benevolence or generosity toward others or toward humanity. 5. Indulgence or forbearance in judging others. See Synonyms at mercy. 6. often Charity Christianity The theological virtue defined as love directed first toward God but also toward oneself and one's neighbors as objects of God's love.
[Middle English charite, from Old French, Christian love, from Latin caritas, affection, from carus, dear; see ka-in Indo-European roots.] The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright ©2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2003. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
Source: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/charity
philanthropy -Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:*
Philanthropy ..Phi*lan"thro*py.., n. [L. philanthropia, Gr. filanqrwpi..a: cf. F. philanthropie.]
Love to mankind; benevolence toward the whole human family; universal good will; desire and readiness to do good to all men; -- opposed to misanthropy. --Jer. Taylor. [1913 Webster]
2. An active effort to promote human welfare; humanitarian activity. In this sense, it is an action, not merely a state of mind.
[PJC] philanthropy -WordNet (r) 2.0 (August 2003): philanthropy
n : voluntary promotion of human welfare [syn: philanthropic gift]
*Source: http://onlinedictionary.datasegment.com/
If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease one life the aching,
or cool one pain
Or help one fainting robin Unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain...
~ Emily Dickinson
Only your compassion and your loving kindness are invincible, and without limit.
~ Thich Nhat Hanh
People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.
~ Bonnie Jean Wasmund
Tenderness and kindness are not signs of weakness and despair, but manifestations of strength and resolution.
~ Kahlil Gibran
Reach Out to Others ~
PRESS RELEASE ~ Hope Runs: Running Program for Children at Tumaini Children's Center; Two Stanford Graduates Lead Marathon and Fitness Training for Two Hundred Orphans in Nyeri, Kenya
HOPE RUNS
NYERI, Kenya, March 19 (AScribe Newswire) -- Following in a long tradition of running in Kenya, two Stanford graduates are starting an after-school running program for the orphans of the Tumaini Children's Center in Nyeri, Kenya. Only a short drive outside of Nairobi, the Nyeri community was devastated by the AIDS epidemic. As the local parish began providing meals for local children suffering from malnutrition, more and more came seeking food. While the number of orphans grew, the grandparents in the community became less able to serve as primary caregivers, and the project expanded. In the past few years, the Presbyterian parish has built an orphanage for children aged 7-20 and a new community health clinic. They also support a local orphanage for disabled children, and have just laid the foundation for an elderly home.
Christened the Tumaini Children's Center - with Tumaini meaning "hope" in the native Kikuyu - this project represents the result of this community's faith in its ability to build a caring and healthy community for itself. In the spirit of Florence's Duomo, which used all its resources to build a structure it did not know how to finish, the Tumaini Children's Center devoted all of its time, energy, and money to building a foundation and now relies upon outside generosity to continue adding levels and utilities. In fact, the Center currently houses 150 extra beds which must remain unused because the parish does not have the funding to care for that many more orphans.
Stanford graduates Claire and Lara stumbled upon the Tumaini Children's Center during their last week of an eight month trip around the world. They felt an instant connection with the children at the orphanage and the adults caring for them. As Lara said at the time, "This is a place we have to come back to; we could really spend our time getting the word out about this effort." It was only a matter of time before they were brainstorming ways to help and rallying others to this cause.
Claire and Lara, both avid runners and firm believers in the power of setting goals that seem too good to be true, have set out to create an after-school running program with the aim of initiating a local community race in June. Additionally, the two women are signed up to participate in the Kilimanjaro Marathon on June 24th, 2007, and plan to bring any orphans who want to train along with them. Conveniently, the marathon's route circles the same track four times, offering the club's youngsters options for races of different lengths. All children, independent of age and ability, are welcome to participate, as the primary goal is to teach participants about the safe and healthy ways to make physical fitness and long-term goals a part of their lives. As Claire adds, "We firmly believe in the power of such efforts to transform the lives of the individuals who take part in such endeavors - on both sides."
As the result of extensive outreach, Claire and Lara have forged partnerships with a variety of organizations intent ..ing, such as One World Running, Project Active, From Our Feet, See Jane Run, The Sumer Alvarez Foundation, the Cathedral School for Boys in San Francisco, First Presbyterian Church of Berkeley, College Avenue Presbyterian Church of Berkeley, and the Fieldston Lower School of New York. In the process, the women have been able to collect over 700 pairs of running shoes for the orphans and, with the help of American Airlines, a portion of the funding needed to ship the supplies.
Of course, there is always more to do. While the running program is their main focus, the orphanage's elders and children have also discussed their empty library, desire for improved English language skills, interest in a monthly newsletter, need for internet skills and a choir eager to record their unique music. All these projects are a part of their daily work there, and to support their efforts, the women have put out a call for books, computer supplies, recording equipment, and, of course, more funding.
The progress of the running program is noted in daily posts on their blog: TrippingonWords.com. The site, which has expanded rapidly as the travel journal of their travels for the past year, will narrate the story of their experience and that of the orphans.
About Claire and Lara
Claire A. Williams
With a B.A. and an M.A. from Stanford University, Claire works as an anthropology consultant with several different international volunteer organizations to encourage programming that targets volunteer experiences in the field. She firmly believes that doing something worthwhile in this world is not just about the money you give out, but the connections and experiences you have trying to do so. A volunteer's experience in another place in the globe can certainly be worth the cost of a plane ticket to get there, and in the long run such an expense really can do as much as or more than sending money abroad - since it helps transform the nature of our global citizens' response to growth, aid, and healing change.
Lara Vogel
After graduating from Stanford University with a B.A. in Human Biology and International Public Health, Lara decided to take time off before medical school to pursue a writing career. In the past year alone, she has traveled to over twenty countries as a travel writer, and is excited to be contributing her efforts to Hope Runs in the coming months. Having worked in health clinics around the world, she is confident in the positive effects that health education programs, particularly for children, can have on the health of a nation.
Current Sponsors:
One World Running/Shoes for Africa - From Our Feet
Project Active: Diffusing World Tensions through Sport
The Sumer Nicole Alvarez Foundation
See Jane Run
Cathedral School for Boys, San Francisco
Fieldston Lower School, New York
First Presbyterian Church of Berkeley
College Avenue Presbyterian Church, Berkeley
Individual Donations
Thanks to American Airlines for covering part of a recent shipment.
- - - -
INTERNATIONAL CONTACTS:
Claire A. Williams and Lara Vogel
Hope Runs Marathon Program
Email: [email protected]; [email protected]
U.S. CONTACT:
Betsy Mullen
Email: [email protected]
-30-
Media Contact: See above.
AScribe - The Public Interest Newswire / 510-653-9400 www.ascribe.org
How lovely to think that no one need wait a moment, we can start now, start slowly changing the world.
How lovely that everyone, great and small, can make their contribution...how we can always, always give something, even if it is only kindness.
~ Anne Frank
The more you loose yourself in something bigger than yourself, the more energy you will have.
~ Norman Vincent Peale
The unselfish effort to bring cheer to others will be the beginning of a happier life for ourselves.
~ Helen Keller
We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give.
~ Winston Churchill
Do all the good you can
By all the means you can
In all the ways you can
In all the places you can
To all the people you can
As long as ever you can
~ John Wesley
One thing I know; the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who will have sought and found how to serve.
~ Albert Schweitzer
Children are likely to live up to what you believe of them.
~ Lady Bird Johnson
A lot of people have gone further than they thought they could because someone else thought they could.
~ Unknown
True heroism is remarkably sober, very undramatic.
It is not the urge to surpass all at whatever cost, but the urge to serve others at whatever cost.
~ Arthur Ashe
One's mind, once stretched by a new idea never regains its original dimensions.
~ Oliver Wendell Holmes
To the world, you may just be somebody.
But to somebody, you may just might be the world.
~ Unknown
You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
You really can change the world if you care enough.
~ Marion Wright Edelman
What we have done for ourselves alone dies with us.
What we have done for others and the world remains and is immortal.
~ Albert Pine
Hope Through Heartsongs
For Our World
We need to stop.
Just stop.
Stop for a moment.
Before anybody
Says or does anything
That may hurt anyone else.
We need to be silent.
Just silent.
Silent for a moment.
Before we forever lose
The blessing of songs
That grow in our hearts.
We need to notice.
Just notice.
Notice for a moment.
Before the future slips away
Into ashes and dust of humility.
Stop, be silent, and notice.
In so many ways, we are the same.
Our differences are unique treasures.
We have, we are, a mosaic of gifts
To nurture, to offer, to accept.
We need to be.
Just be.
Be for a moment.
Kind and gentle, innocent and trusting,
Like children and lambs,
Never judging or vengeful
Like the judging and vengeful.
And now, let us pray,
Differently, yet together,
Before there is no earth, no life,
No chance for peace.
~ Matthew Joseph Thaddeus Stepanek; September 12, 2001
Sources & Resources: Artwork & Poem, Copyright Mattie J.T. Stepanek; 2001; Poet & Peacemaker, Age 12; 1990 – 2004; Author of Hope through Heartsongs; Copyright 2002; Hyperion Books; ISBN # 0-7868-6944-5; For more information about Mattie and his work, please visit: http://www.mattieonline.com/
Bono's Speech After Receiving the Chairman's Award at the 38th NAACP Image Awards
Jake Shimabukuro - 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps'
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SHANTI SHANTI
Shanti ~ Sanskrit for calmness, serenity, peace ~
Shanti Shanti is gaining worldwide recognition for their Sanskrit chanting as well as for their unique approach to New Age music. Sanskrit is the ancient language of India and is known for its tranquil and harmonious effects.
For more information and upcoming events, please visit http://shantishanti.com/.
Prayer or worship is considered to be an integral part of the Hindu way of living. The chanting of mantras is the most popular form of worship in Hinduism. Yoga and meditation are also considered as a form of devotional service towards the Lord.
Before the process of ritual, before the invoking of different deities for the fulfillment of various needs, came the human aspiration to the highest truth, the foundational monism of Hinduism, pertaining ultimately to the one Brahman. Brahman, which summarily can be called the unknowable, true, infinite and blissful Divine Ground, is the source and being of all existence from which the cosmos springs. This is the essence of the Vedic system. The following prayer was part and parcel of all the Vedic ceremonies and continues to be invoked even today in Hindu temples all over India and other countries around the world, and exemplifies this essence:
Asato Ma Sad Gamaya Tamaso Ma Jyotir Gamaya Mrityor Ma Amritam Gamaya Om Shanti Shanti Shanti.
This means: "Lead Us From Untruth To Truth, Lead Us From Darkness To Light, Lead Us From Death To Immortality, Aum (the universal sound of God) Let There Be Peace Peace Peace."
Source & Resource: Excerpted from Wikipedia ~ The Free Encyclopedia; Website: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prayer_in_Hinduism
MICHAEL PENN
Websites:
http://profile.myspace.com/michaelpenn
http://www.michaelpenn.com/main.php
http://music.aol.com/artist/michael-penn/5126/main
TO WRITE LOVE ON HER ARMS
“To Write Love on Her Arms is a work in progress. This began with one broken girl, one painful night; addiction, depression, cutting. This is a glimpse at the five days that followed, a decision to love and to begin telling her true story. To Write Love on Her Arms is becoming something bigger, something hopeful. It's the realization of what life can be when we commit to meeting a need. A friend of mine told me there's no such thing as suicide prevention. This is an attempt to prove him wrong, to say that love can change a life. We can hold back the darkness. Rescue is possible. More soon to come. Join us as we continue to write her story, and as we begin to offer hope to the many hopeless who walk these dark roads. A Jimmy Eat World lyric has been stuck in my head today, ‘Believe your voice can mean something’."
Source & Resource: http://www.myspace.com/towriteloveonherarms
What is COURAGE?
Confronting the dragons.
Overcoming the obstacles.
Understanding the risks.
Really living.
Always believing.
Going the distance.
Expecting the BEST! ~ Author unknown
Live Like Sumer
EQUALITY, JUSTICE, DIGNITY ~ World Conference Against Racism
www.un.org/WCAR/
We Are All Connected ~ Let’s Join Together & Let One Another’s True Colors Shine Through
Gandhi ~ The Movie
Ahimsa (Non-violence), Understanding & Tolerance
Man and his deed are two distinct things. Whereas a good deed should call forth approbation and a wicked deed disapprobation, the doer of the deed, whether good or wicked, always deserves respect or pity as the case may be. 'Hate the sin and not the sinner' is a precept which, though easy enough to understand, is rarely practised, and that is why the poison of hatred spreads in the world.
This ahimsa is the basis of the search for truth. I am realizing every day that the search is vain unless it is founded on ahimsa as the basis. It is quite proper to resist and attack a system, but to resist and attack its author is tantamount to resisting and attacking oneself. For we are all tarred with the same brush, and are children of one and the same Creator, and as such the divine powers within us are infinite. To slight a single human being is to slight those divine powers, and thus to harm not only that being but with him the whole world.
~ Mahatma Gandhi
Source & Recommended Reading: Gandhi ~ An Autobiography ~ The Story of My Experiments with Truth; Author: Mahatma Gandhi; Publisher: BeaconPress/Boston; ISBN # 0-8070-5909-9.
This edition of Gandhi's autobiography is published by arrangement with the Navajivan trust and is the only authorized American edition. The Navajivan Trust was founded by Gandhi, and all royalties earned on this book are paid to it by the publisher for use in carrying out Gandhi's work.
SYNOPSIS
Gandhi is a riveting story about activism, politics, religious tolerance and freedom, depicting the life and times of Mahatma Gandhi, the Indian political leader who managed to free his country from the British rule using peaceful means and thus giving hope and inspiration for generations to come. In addition to four time Academy Award nominee Kingsley (Schindler's List, Sexy Beast), the brilliant cast includes Edward Fox (A Passage to India), Roshan Seth (A Passage to India), Academy Award nominee Candice Bergen (Best Supporting Actress, Starting Over, 1980; TV's "Murphy Brown," "Boston Legal"), Academy Award winner Sir John Gielgud (Best Supporting Actor, Arthur, 1981), Academy Award nominee Trevor Howard (Best Actor, Sons and Lovers, 1960) and Martin Sheen (The Departed, TV's "The West Wing").
Source: http://www.ropeofsilicon.com/movies.php?id=910
THE SECRET
The Secret team has created a visualization tool, "The Secret to You ", which you can view here and download for free and play every day.
The Secret’s Website is: http://thesecret.tv/secret-treasures.html
"The Secret to You" has been especially created to harness all the power of The Secret to transform your life into happiness, prosperity, health, love and joy.
To experience maximum power from the visualization tool, read the words and feel them with all your heart.
From all at The Secret, we celebrate you, we give thanks for you and we wish you a life beyond your wildest dreams.
AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH
Available Now on DVD
WHAT IS GLOBAL WARMING?
The Science:
Carbon dioxide and other gases warm the surface of the planet naturally by trapping solar heat in the atmosphere. This is a good thing because it keeps our planet habitable. However, by burning fossil fuels such as coal, gas and oil and clearing forests we have dramatically increased the amount of carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere and temperatures are rising.
The vast majority of scientists agree that global warming is real, it’s already happening and that it is the result of our activities and not a natural occurrence. [1] The evidence is overwhelming and undeniable.
We’re already seeing changes. Glaciers are melting, plants and animals are being forced from their habitat, and the number of severe storms and droughts is increasing.
The number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes has almost doubled in the last 30 years. [2]
Malaria has spread to higher altitudes in places like the Colombian Andes, 7,000 feet above sea level. [3]
The flow of ice from glaciers in Greenland has more than doubled over the past decade. [4]
At least 279 species of plants and animals are already responding to global warming, moving closer to the poles. [5]
If the warming continues, we can expect catastrophic consequences.
Deaths from global warming will double in just 25 years -- to 300,000 people a year. [6]
Global sea levels could rise by more than 20 feet with the loss of shelf ice in Greenland and Antarctica, devastating coastal areas worldwide. [7]
Heat waves will be more frequent and more intense.
Droughts and wildfires will occur more often.
The Arctic Ocean could be ice free in summer by 2050. [8]
More than a million species worldwide could be driven to extinction by 2050. [9]
There is no doubt we can solve this problem. In fact, we have a moral obligation to do so. Small changes to your daily routine can add up to big differences in helping to stop global warming. The time to come together to solve this problem is now – TAKE ACTION
1. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), this era of global warming "is unlikely to be entirely natural in origin" and "the balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence of the global climate."
2. Emanuel, K. 2005. Increasing destructiveness of tropical cyclones over the past 30 years. Nature 436: 686-688.
3. World Health Organization
4. Krabill, W., E. Hanna, P. Huybrechts, W. Abdalati, J. Cappelen, B. Csatho, E. Frefick, S. Manizade, C. Martin, J, Sonntag, R. Swift, R. Thomas and J. Yungel. 2004. Greenland Ice Sheet: Increased coastal thinning. Geophysical Research Letters 31.
5. Nature.
6. World Health Organization
7. Washington Post, "Debate on Climate Shifts to Issue of Irreparable Change," Juliet Eilperin, January 29, 2006, Page A1.
8. Arctic Climate Impact Assessment. 2004. Impacts of a Warming Arctic. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Also quoted in Time Magazine, Vicious Cycles, Missy Adams, March 26, 2006.
9. Time Magazine, Feeling the Heat, David Bjerklie, March 26, 2006.
Source & Resource: For more information and to get involved, please visit: http://climatecrisis.org/
Nature is full of genius, full of the divinity...
~ Henry David Thoreau, Journal, 5 January 1856
Every part of the earth is sacred to my people. Every shining pine needle, every sandy shore, every mist in the dark woods, every meadow, every humming insect. All are holy.
We know the sap that courses through the trees as we know the blood that runs through our veins. We are part of the earth and the earth is part of us. The perfumed flowers are our sisters. The bear, the deer, the great eagle; these are our brothers. The rocky crests, the berries in the meadow, the body heat of the pony and the people, all belong to the same family.
The shining water that moves in the streams and rivers is not just water but the blood of our ancestors. Each shimmering reflection in the clear water of the lakes tells of events and memories in the life of my people. The water's murmur is the voice of my father's father.
The rivers are our brothers. They quench our thirst. They carry our canoes and give drink to our children. So you must give the rivers the kindness you would give any brother or sister.
The air is precious to us. The air shares its spirit with all the life it supports. The wind that gave our grandfather his first breath also receives his last sigh. The wind also gives our children the spirit of life.
The earth is our mother. What befalls the earth befalls all the children of the earth. All things are connected like the blood that connects us all. We did not weave the web of life; we are merely strands in it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves.
This we know: that our god is also your god. The earth is precious to God and to harm the earth is to heap contempt upon its creator.
What will happen when the buffalo are all slaughtered? The wild horses tamed? What will happen when the secret corners of the forest are heavy with the scent of many people and the view of the ripe hills is blotted by talking wires? Where will the thicket be? Gone! Where will the eagle be? Gone! And what is it to say good-bye to the swift pony and the hunt? The end of living and the beginning of survival.
We love the earth as a newborn loves its mother's heartbeat. Preserve the land for all children and love it, as God loves us all. We Indians are part of this land. You too are part of this land. The earth is precious to us. It is also precious to you. None of us can be apart. We are all brothers and sisters, together woven in to this sacred earth.
~ Chief Seattle, "Every Part of the Earth is Sacred"
I'm not imagining it when I say that looking up at the sky, the clouds, the moon, and the stars makes me feel calm and hopeful.
It's better medicine than either valerian or bromide;
nature makes me feel humble and ready to take each blow with courage.
~ Anne Frank, The Diary of Anne Frank
The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy is to go outside,
somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature...
Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be…
amidst the simple beauty of nature.
As long as this exists, and it certainly always will,
I know that then there will always be comfort for every sorrow,
whatever the circumstances may be.
And I firmly believe that nature brings solace in all troubles.
~ Anne Frank, The Diary of Anne Frank
Louis Armstrong
WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD (George Weiss / Bob Thiele)
I see trees of green, red roses too I see them bloom for me and you And I think to myself, what a wonderful world
I see skies of blue and clouds of white The bright blessed day, the dark sacred night And I think to myself, what a wonderful world
The colours of the rainbow, so pretty in the sky Are also on the faces of people going by I see friends shakin' hands, sayin' "How do you do?" They're really saying "I love you"
I hear babies cryin', I watch them grow They'll learn much more than I'll ever know And I think to myself, what a wonderful world Yes, I think to myself, what a wonderful world
Oh yeah
Source: http://www.mathematik.uni-ulm.de/paul/lyrics/louisa~1/whataw ~1.html
Self-Realization Fellowship Retreat Center & Meditation Gardens; Encinitas, California http://www.yogananda-srf.org/temples/encinitas/index.html
Please spread the word about this week’s special Bloomingdale’s sales event to benefit Cancer Schmancer’s mission to raise awareness for Stage 1 diagnosis of all women’s cancers and encourage everyone you know to do the same?
Meet Fran Drescher, Founder of Cancer Schmancer, at
Bloomingdale’s Beverly Center "Dress Well. Be Well." Event
to Raise Awareness for Stage 1 Diagnosis of All Women’s
Cancers
LOS ANGELES, April 1 (AScribe Newswire) -- The Cancer
Schmancer Foundation today released the following media
advisory.
- - - -
WHEN: Saturday, April 5, 3 p.m.
WHO: Fran Drescher, actress, New York Times best-selling
author, women’s health advocate, and President and Visionary
of the Cancer Schmancer Foundation
WHERE: Bloomingdale’s Beverly Center, Dresses On 2 8500
Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90048
WHAT: Fran will be on-hand to greet guests and raise
awareness for the importance of Stage 1 diagnosis of all
women’s cancers in support of the Cancer Schmancer
Foundation. Fran will autograph her DVD, "Cancer Schmancer
Tea Party" as a gift with a $250 regular-price dress
purchase. Ten percent of the day’s dress sales at
Bloomingdale’s stores nationwide will be donated to the
Cancer Schmancer Foundation. Plus, customers will receive a
10 percent savings on their purchase of a dress on that day
only.
MEDIA OPPS: Photographs and interviews with Fran
Drescher.
Based on her second New York Times best seller, "Cancer
Schmancer," Fran Drescher has launched Cancer Schmancer as a
two-pronged non-profit organization dedicated to ensuring
all women’s cancers are diagnosed in Stage 1, when they are
most curable. To this end, the Cancer Schmancer Foundation
educates women on the risk factors, early warning signs, and
tests that are available for early detection of women’s
cancers. The Cancer Schmancer Movement advocates for
improved women’s cancer healthcare legislation. For more
information, visit http://www.CancerSchmancer.org .
Bloomingdale’s is America’s only nationwide, full-line,
upscale department store; and a division of Macy’s, Inc. It
was founded in 1872 and currently operates 40 stores in New
York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Maryland,
Virginia, Illinois, Minnesota, Georgia, Florida, Nevada and
California. For more information or to shop any time, visit
http:www.bloomingdales.com .
CONTACT: Wanda Ahmadi, Bloomingdale’s Public Relations,
310-772-2114, [email protected]
-30-
Media Contact: See above.
AScribe - The Public Interest Newswire /510-653-9400
http://www.ascribe.org
ADVISORY for Sunday, October 14
LEAD for Darfur Benefit for the Zam Zam Safe Motherhood
Clinic in Darfur: Let Everyone take Action for Darfur!
BALTIMORE, Md., Oct. 1 (AScribe Newswire) -- Clayton Fine
Books and Cyber Cafe is pleased to announce a LEAD (Let
Everyone take Action for Darfur!) for Darfur Benefit for the
Zam Zam Safe Motherhood Clinic in Darfur. The event will be
held at Clayton Fine Books & Cyber Cafe, 317 N. Charles
Street, Baltimore, Md. 21201, on Oct. 14, 2007 from 2 to 4
p.m. All donations go to Relief International to directly
benefit the clinic.
The benefit will feature a live auction of donated art
works and jewelry, live entertainment (including a poetry
reading by local poet Reginald Harris), and a slide
presentation on the Zam Zam Clinic.
Free drinks, hors d'oeuvres, and desserts will be served.
The Zam-Zam clinic is operated by the NGO Relief
International in Darfur, serving some 35,000 refugees
displaced by the conflict in Sudan. It remains one of the
few facilities providing medical care to the refugee
community.
Your donations are urgently needed now more than ever to
keep the clinic running. In 2006, Patricia Crawford was able
to donate $10,000 to the Zam Zam Clinic due to a fundraiser
she organized in Washington, D.C. Recently, Patricia and her
efforts were featured on ABC-TV national news. Now she hopes
to do the same or better in her hometown of Baltimore.
We ask you to help us keep health care coming to
displaced refugees fleeing the conflict between government
and rebel forces in Darfur. Diseases continue to thrive in
unsanitary and dire conditions. The situation requires
continued intervention from relief organizations and
benefits like ours.
We look forward to meeting you at the LEAD for Darfur
Benefit!
Suggested donations at the door: $10 students (id
required) $15 all others. All donations are tax-deductible.
See www.lead4darfur.org for more information on the Zam Zam
Clinic and how you may become involved in our effort.
For more information on the Zam Zam Clinic, our efforts,
and how you can become involved, see www.lead4darfur.org.
- - - -
CONTACTS: Donna or Cameron Northouse,
Clayton Fine Books & Cafe,
317 N. Charles Street, Baltimore, MD 21201,
410-752-6800, [email protected]
Patricia Crawford, Chair, [email protected],
-30-
Media Contact: See above.
AScribe - The Public Interest Newswire /510-653-9400
http://www.ascribe.org
HEALTH AWARENESS & ADVOCACY PORTAL
(Under Construction)
Welcome. Pease visit our blog for extensive information regarding a wide-range of disease-specific, health and health care related topics and issues, many of which are represented below. This is an ongoing work in progress and we welcome your comments and suggestions.
…Each patient carries his own doctor inside him.
They come to us not knowing this truth.
We are at our best when we give the doctor who resides within each patient a chance to go to work.
~ Albert Schweitzer
What Injury, Illness & Disease Cannot Do
Injury, Illness & Disease are so Limited ~
They cannot suppress love,
They cannot shatter hope,
They cannot corrode faith,
They cannot destroy peace,
They cannot kill friendship,
They cannot silence courage,
They cannot invade the soul,
They cannot steal eternal life,
They cannot conquer the Spirit.
~ Author unknown
THE GOAL IS PREVENTION ~ TWO KEYS TO PROTECTION ARE EARLY DETECTION & THE RIGHT INTERVENTION
Get Informed. Get Involved. Take Good Care of Yourself & Others.
Doing good to others is not a duty.
It is a joy, for it increases your own health and happiness.
~ Zoroaster
Getting through another day should not be a matter of luck.
You can make an important difference in the world right now.
Don't Almost Give.
Don't Wait.
Please Act Now.
The sum of the whole is this: walk and be happy; walk and be healthy.
The best way to lengthen out our days is to walk steadily and with a purpose.
~ Charles Dickens
Health, Wellness & Health Care Resources
…the patient must combat the disease along with the physician…
~ Hippocrates; The Hippocratic Corpus
The information provided herein should not be used during any medical emergency or for the diagnosis or treatment of any medical condition. The information presented on this web site is intended for informational purposes only and is not intended to render medical advice. This information should not be used for diagnosing or treating a health problem or a disease. It is not a substitute for professional care. A licensed medical professional should be consulted for diagnosis and treatment of any and all medical conditions. Call 911 for all medical emergencies. Links to other sites are provided for information only -- they do not constitute endorsements of those other sites.
Scleroderma Awareness ~ Together We Can Make A Difference
Resources:
MedicineNet, Inc.; Website: http://www.medicinenet.com/scleroderma/article.htm
U.S. National Institutes of Health Department of Health & Human Services National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases; Website: http://www.niams.nih.gov/hi/topics/scleroderma/scleroderma.h tm
International Scleroderma Network; Website: http://www.sclero.org/medical/about-sd/a-to-z.html
The Mayo Clinic; Website: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/scleroderma/DS00362/DSECTIO N=2
Stroke Awareness
Additional Resource:
U.S. Department of Health & Human Services Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Website: http://www.cdc.gov/stroke/
Heart Disease Awareness
Resources:
U.S. Department of Health & Human Services National Institutes of Health National Heart, Lung & Blood Institute; Website: http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/public/heart/index.htm
The Mayo Clinic; Website: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/heart-disease/HB99999
General Cancer Information Resources
The National Cancer Institute (NCI) ~ Sources of National Cancer Institute Information
Cancer Information Service (CIS): Toll-free: 1–800–4–CANCER (1–800–422–6237) TTY (for deaf and hard of hearing callers): 1–800–332–8615
NCI Online ~ Internet:
Use http://www.cancer.gov to reach NCI's website.
LiveHelp Cancer Information Specialists offer online assistance through the LiveHelp link on the NCI's Web site at https://cissecure.nci.nih.gov/livehelp/welcome.asp
Source & Resource: National Cancer Institute; Website: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Support/end-of- life-care
Get live, online assistance from the National Cancer Institute's LiveHelp service:
LiveHelp does not provide medical advice.
LiveHelp is confidential.
LiveHelp for general cancer questions or assistance in navigating NCI Web sites is available Monday - Friday 9:00 AM - 11:00 PM Eastern Time.
LiveHelp for smoking cessation assistance is available Monday - Friday 9:00 AM - 11:00 PM Eastern Time.
CareCounsel’s Healthcare Assistance Program; Website: http://www.carecounsel.com
Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC); Website: http://www.cdc.gov/cancer/linksalt.htm
Physician Data Query (PDQ); Website: http://cancernet.nci.nih.gov/pdq.htm
Association of Clinicians for the Underserved (ACU); Website: http://www.clinicians.org/
CareCounsel’s Healthcare Assistance Program; Website: http://www.carecounsel.com
Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC); Website: http://www.cdc.gov/cancer/linksalt.htm
Physician Data Query (PDQ); Website: http://cancernet.nci.nih.gov/pdq.htm
Association of Clinicians for the Underserved (ACU); Website: http://www.clinicians.org/
Commonweal Home Page; Website: http://www.commonweal.org/
National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM); Websites: http://nccam.nih.gov/about/advisory/capcam/Physician Data Query (PDQ): http://cancernet.nci.nih.gov/pdq.htm
Division of Cancer Prevention and Control (DCPC); Website: http://www.cdc.gov/cancer/
FDA Cancer Liaison Program; Website: http://www.fda.gov/oashi/cancer/cancer.html
National Cancer Institute; Website: http://www.nih.gov/
National Cancer Institute: Information for People with Cancer; Website: http://rex.nci.nih.gov/ PATIENTS/INFO_PEOPL_DOC.html
Brain Cancer Awareness
Resource:
The U.S. National Institutes of Health National Cancer Institute; Website: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/wyntk/brain/allpages
Women's Cancer Awareness
Resources:
The Cancer Schamncer Movement & The Cancer Schmancer Foundation
Based on her second New York Times best seller, "Cancer Schmancer," Fran Drescher has launched Cancer Schmancer as a two-pronged non-profit organization dedicated to ensuring all women’s cancers are diagnosed in Stage 1, when they are most curable.
To this end, the Cancer Schmancer Foundation educates women on the risk factors, early warning signs, and tests that are available for early detection of women’s cancers.
The Cancer Schmancer Movement advocates for improved women’s cancer healthcare legislation.
For more information, please visit http://www.CancerSchmancer.org
Breast Cancer Awareness
Resources:
http://blog.myspace.com/betsymullen
Breast Cancer Trials Home Page; Website: http://cancertrials.nci.nih.gov/clinicaltrials
Breast Implant Answers.com -- Information about Breast Implants and Breast Reconstruction; Website: www.breastimplantanswers.com
The Breast Cancer Research Stamp ~ Fund the Fight. Find a Cure.
The Breast Cancer Research Stamp is sold at a surcharge above the price of an ordinary first class stamp. Currently, first class stamps sell for 41-cents. The Breast Cancer Research Stamp costs 55-cents.
The surplus above the price of the first class stamp is collected by the United States Postal Service and allocated to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Department of Defense (DoD) to fund breast cancer research.
You Can Purchase The Breast Cancer Research Stamp Online at:
http://shop.usps.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDispla y?catalogId=10152&storeId=10001&productId=14101& langId=-1
AScribe Home Live Newswire
Breast Cancer Research Stamp Raising Far More than Money; Cutting Edge Website www.OnePixelataTime.org Is New Weapon in Fight Against Breast Cancer
WASHINGTON, July 25 (AScribe Newswire) -- Nine years ago this week, history was made by the issuance of the first United States Postal Service fundraising postage stamp in US history -- the Breast Cancer Research Stamp. United States Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) together with breast cancer survivor and advocate Betsy Mullen (San Diego, CA), who led the charge to enact a unique, semi-postal stamp designed to help raise funds for the fight against breast cancer, are again working to secure legislation to keep this vital stamp on the market.
As of today, this beautifully designed stamp has not only raised more than $55.5 million for biomedical research, with over 773 million stamps sold, but it has also inspired individuals across the country to make a difference in the fight against breast cancer ... one person at a time. The awareness and hope raised as a result of this historic stamp designed to save lives continues to be priceless.
The message of the Breast Cancer Research Stamp is clear. "One stamp at a time," each person can make a difference. Embracing this concept, the 2,500-plus members of The National NeedleArts Association (TNNA) began their own campaign to honor the stamp in 2004.
Since its initiation, TNNA's Stitch to WIN Against Breast Cancer has participated in nearly 100 events and raised over $70,000. Members of the association and needlearts guilds have shared the joy of needlearts while raising awareness of the Breast Cancer Research Stamp and funds for Living Beyond Breast Cancer (LBBC), TNNA's non-profit partner. LBBC is dedicated to providing valued services to breast cancer survivors and their families.
Fiber arts professionals interpreted the stamp's original fine artwork (created by Whitney Sherman of Baltimore, MD) into the needlearts by fashioning five distinctively different wall hangings, each in a different discipline (knitting, crochet, cross-stitch, needlepoint and embroidery). Event attendees were invited to help fight breast cancer by completing the stamps "one stitch at a time."
In 2006, the completed wall hangings were presented to the Smithsonian National Postal Museum at a special ceremony honoring Senator Feinstein and Betsy Mullen for their efforts in making the stamp possible. At this special ceremony hosted by Allen Kane, Director of the SNPM, a unique web site was also unveiled: www.OnePixelataTime.org. The site invites visitors to help complete images of the Breast Cancer Research Stamp ‘one pixel at a timeâ€,,. For every pixel purchased, participants receive valuable gift coupons from over 40 sponsors and become eligible for a grand prize of a spa vacation provided by Spa-quest.com. Once completed, the site will raise nearly $3 million for LBBC.
Stitch to WIN Against Breast Cancer continues to spread the message of the Breast Cancer Research Stamp at community events and fairs around the country. This past May in Philadelphia PA, TNNA members volunteered to teach stitching to attendees at LBBCâ€,,s Yoga Unites Healthy Living Expo. The wall hangings, after traveling to California and back, gave the 600-plus attendees an opportunity to see firsthand what can be done "one stitch at a time."
Stephanie Hollis, a National Accounts Manager for the United States Postal Service and herself a knitter, volunteered her time at the event along with Jeannie McFall and Cathy Finely of Finely a Knitting Party in Swarthmore, Pa. In addition to teaching stitching, volunteers encouraged attendees to continue to buy the Breast Cancer Research Stamp and to visit OnePixelataTime.org.
Nine years later, "one stamp at a time" has inspired "one stitch at a time." "One stitch at a time" has given rise to "one pixel at a time." One by one, we will win against breast cancer.
For more information about the wall hangings, please visit: www.businessdirectionsinc.com/onestitch.html, email [email protected] or call 614-237-0700.
For more information on the Breast Cancer Research Stamp, please visit: www.myspace.com/betsymullen. To purchase the stamp, please visit http://shop.usps.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDispla y?catalogId=10152&storeId=10001&productId=30051& langId=-1; call 1-800 STAMPS 24 (1-800-782-6724) or visit your local post office.
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MEDIA CONTACT: Sherry Mulne, Virtual Ventures, LLC; 614-237-0700; [email protected]
Media Contact: See above.
Childhood Cancer Awareness
Resources:
The U.S. National Institutes of Health National Cancer Institute; Website: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/types/childhoodcancers
Pediatric Oncology Resource Center; Websites: http://www.acor.org/ped-onc/diseases/causes.html & http://www.acor.org/ped-onc/index.html
Colon & Rectal Cancer Awareness
Resource:
The U.S. National Institutes of Health National Cancer Institute; Website: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/types/colon-and-rectal
Leukemia Awareness
Resource:
The U.S. National Institutes of Health National Cancer Institute; Website: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/types/leukemia
Lung Cancer Awareness
Resource:
The U.S. National Institutes of Health National Cancer Institute; Website: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/wyntk/lung/allpages
Melanoma Awareness
Resource:
The U.S. National Institutes of Health National Cancer Institute; Website: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/wyntk/melanoma/allpages
Ovarian Cancer Awareness
Resource:
The National Cancer Institute (NCI); Website: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/wyntk/ovary/allpages
Prostate Cancer Awareness
Resources:
The U.S. National Institutes of Health National Cancer Institute; Website: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/wyntk/prostate/allpages
University of Virginia Health System; Website: http://www.healthsystem.virginia.edu/UVAHealth/adult_urology /online.cfm
Testicular Cancer Awareness
Resources:
The U.S. National Institutes of Health National Cancer Institute; Website: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/pdq/screening/testicular/ patient/allpages/print
Testicular Cancer Resource Center; Website: http://tcrc.acor.org/chemoquest.html
AIDS Awareness
Resources:
U.S. National Library of Medicine & the National Institutes of Health; Website: http://sis.nlm.nih.gov/hiv.html
Global Health Council; Website: http://globalhealth.org/view_top.php3?id=227
Lou Gehrig's Disease (ALS) Awareness
Resources:
U.S. National Library of Medicine & the National Institutes of Health; Website: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/amyotrophiclateralscleros is.html
The ALS Association; Website: http://www.alsa.org/
Alzheimer's Disease Awareness
Resources:
U.S. National Institutes of Health National Institute on Aging; Website: http://www.nia.nih.gov/alzheimers
U.S. National Institutes of Health National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke; Website: http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/alzheimersdisease/alzheim ersdisease.htm
Autism Awareness
Resources:
U.S. Department of Health & Human Services Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Website: http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/
Cerebral Palsy Awareness
Resources:
U.S. National Institutes of Health National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke; Website: http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/cerebral_palsy/detail_cer ebral_palsy.htm
U.S. Department of Health & Human Services Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Website: http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/dd/ddcp.htm
Diabetes Awareness
Resources:
National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, National Institutes of Health National Diabetes Information Clearinghouse; Website: http://diabetes.niddk.nih.gov/
U.S. National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention National Diabetes Education Program; Website: http://ndep.nih.gov/
Eating Disorders Awareness
Resources:
U.S. National Library of Medicine & the National Institutes of Health Medline Plus; Website: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/eatingdisorders.html
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office on Women's Health National Women's Health Information Center; Website: http://www.4women.gov/bodyimage/eatingdisorders/
Mental Health & Mental Illness Awareness
Resources:
Medline Plus, a service of the U.S. National Institutes of Health Department of Health & Human Services, U.S. National Library of Medicine; Website: http://familydoctor.org/online/famdocen/home/articles/589.ht ml
The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH); part of the National Institutes of Health, a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; Website: http://www.nimh.nih.gov/healthinformation/index.cfm
The National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH); Website: http://science.education.nih.gov/supplements/nih5/Mental/gui de/additional-web-res.htm
Multiple Sclerosis Awareness
Resources:
British Medical Journal (BMJ) Best Treatments; Website: http://www.besttreatments.co.uk/btuk/conditions/16742.html
MedicineNet, Inc.; Website: http://www.medicinenet.com/multiple_sclerosis/article.htm
Muscular Dystrophy Awareness
Resources:
The Mayo Clinic; Website: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/muscular-dystrophy/DS00200/ DSECTION=1
U.S. National Institutes of Health National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke; Website: http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/md/md.htm
Parkinson's Disease Awareness
Resources:
Parkinson's Resource Organization (PRO); Website: http://www.parkinsonsresource.org/
MedicineNet, Inc.; Website: http://www.medicinenet.com/parkinsons_disease/article.htm
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) Awareness
Resources:
The National Institutes of Health, Department of Health & Human Services, U.S. National Library of Medicine ~ Medline Plus; Website: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/posttraumaticstressdisord er.html
The United States Department of Veteran Affairs The National Center for PTSD (NCPTSD; Website: http://www.ncptsd.va.gov/ncmain/index.jsp
Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy (RSD) Awareness
Resources
National Institutes of Health Department of Health & Human Services US National Library of Medicine; Website: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/complexregionalpainsyndro me.html
National Institutes of Health Department of Health & Human Services National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke; Website: http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/reflex_sympathetic_dystro phy/detail_reflex_sympathetic_dystrophy.htm
Spinal Cord Injury Awareness
Resources:
National Academy of Sciences Institute of Medicine (IOM); Website: http://www.iom.edu/CMS/3775/14986/26196.aspx
The National Institutes of Health, Department of Health & Human Services, U.S. National Library of Medicine ~ Medline Plus; Website: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/spinalcordinjuries.html
Substance Abuse Awareness
Resources:
The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA; part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; Website: http://www.nida.nih.gov/
National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA);part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH),a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; Website: http://www.niaaa.nih.gov/
Pregnancy & Substance Abuse ~ The National Institutes of Health (NIH),a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; Website: http://health.nih.gov/result.asp/534
Traumatic Brain Injury Awareness
Resources:
National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke National Institutes of Health; Website: http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/tbi/tbi.htm
National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, National Institutes of Health; Website: http://www.nidcd.nih.gov/health/voice/tbrain.htm
Domestic Violence Awareness
Resources:
The National Institutes of Health, Department of Health & Human Services, U.S. National Library of Medicine ~ Medline Plus; Website: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/domesticviolence.html
American Medical Association (AMA); Website: http://www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/category/15507.html
Please check out our blog for tips and resources to quit smoking.
Friends Don't Let Friends Drive Drunk
Maintain a Balanced, Healthy Lifestyle ~ Work Out & Nurture Your Body, Mind & Spirit
Source: www.bikramyogachelsea.com/images/postures.jpg
Resources:
Nurturing Body, Mind, and Spirit Health Planner
University of Minnesota, Life Science Foundation, Center for Spirituality and Healing; Website: http://takingcharge.csh.umn.edu/healthy_lifestyle
NUTRITION
U.S. Department of Health & Human Services Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); Website: http://www.cdc.gov/nccdphp/dnpa/nutrition/index.htm
The CDC nutrition efforts cover a wide spectrum of related topics. Good nutrition is vital to good health, disease prevention, and essential for healthy growth and development of children and adolescents.
Nutrition for Everyone
While you know it is important to eat a healthy diet, it isn’t always easy to sort through all of the information available about nutrition and food choices. The CDC has compiled a variety of resources with healthy eating tips and information.
Healthy Weight
To maintain a healthy weight, you need to balance the calories you use with those you take in. Learn more about how healthy eating and physical activity work together in healthy weight maintenance. information.
FruitsandVeggiesMatter.gov
Check out the new Fruit & Veggies Matter Web site for tips, recipes, and more! You can find easy ways to add more fruits and vegetables into your daily eating patterns.
Breastfeeding
Both babies and mothers gain many benefits from breastfeeding. CDC's Breastfeeding site has frequently asked questions, recommendations, national breastfeeding statistics as well as information on a variety of other topics. You can also find links to other breastfeeding resources.
Resources for Health Professionals
Nutrition Resources for the Professional is a comprehensive collection of resources designed to assist health professionals working in areas of nutrition, health promotion, and disease prevention. You will find information about CDC-supported programs and research, key reports and recommendations, and surveillance data.
IMMPaCt: International Micronutrient Malnutrition Prevention and Control Program
CDC's IMMPaCt program aids countries in building national capacity to eliminate micronutrient deficiencies.
Folic Acid
Folic acid is a B vitamin. It is used in our bodies to make new cells. If a woman has enough folic acid in her body before she is pregnant, it can help prevent major birth defects of her baby’s brain and spine.
Healthy Youth Nutrition Topics
This section provides information about school nutrition programs and policies, and statistics related to adolescent nutrition and health.
Food Safety
Preventing food borne illness and death remains a major public health challenge.
• CDC Food Safety
• FDA Safe Handling of Fruits and Vegetables
• FDA News and Alerts
* Links to non-Federal organizations found at this site are provided solely as a service to our users. These links do not constitute an endorsement of these organizations or their programs by CDC or the Federal Government, and none should be inferred. CDC is not responsible for the content of the individual organization Web pages found at these links.
HEALTHY EATING & NUTRITION EDUCATION
Information about improving nutrition and establishing healthy eating habits in school, child care, adult, and after school settings.
California Department of Education
Website: http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/he/
California's Farm to School Program
An education model that connect schools with local farms.
Website: http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/he/farmtoschool.asp
Classroom Cooking
Support academic standards through cooking in the classroom.
Website: http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/he/classcook.asp
Feed More Kids: Improve Program Participation
A series of four brochures and other information featuring field-tested strategies for increasing school lunch and breakfast participation and improving meal program quality and operations.
Website: http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/he/feedmorekids.asp
Food Safety
Information and links about food safety during food preparations and transfer, and California Uniform Retail Food Facility Law (CURFFL) requirements.
Website: http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/ed/foodsafety.asp
A Garden in Every School
In collaboration with organizations and individuals throughout California, the Garden in Every School Program promotes linkages among the school classroom, school cafeteria, local agriculture, waste management, and others.
http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/he/garden.asp
Local School Wellness Policy
Information and resources on the Local School Wellness Policy, Section 204 of the Child Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act of 2004.
Website: http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/he/wellness.asp
Nutrition Education in the Classroom
Resources to assist with teaching nutrition education in the classroom and throughout the school community.
Website: http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/he/nec.asp
Nutrition Education Sites
Links to nutrition education information and activities for kids and teens.
Website: http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/he/nutredsites.asp
School Menu Planning
Information and resources on the School Meals Initiative menu planning options, nutrient analysis, competitive foods, and meal patterns for the national school lunch and breakfast programs.
Website: http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/he/smi.asp
SHAPE California
Shaping Health as Partners in Education (SHAPE) - Information about the network of schools and child care centers that are developing collaborative, positive nutrition policies.
Website: http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/he/shape.asp
Team Nutrition
Information about USDA's program that provides nutrition education materials for children and families and training for food service professionals.
Website: http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/he/tn.asp
Questions: Education and Nutrition Policy Unit; 800-952-5609
Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons
"Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons, Copyright 1956, Copyright renewed 1984; Author: Paramahansa Yogananda; Publisher: Self-Realization Fellowship; For free introductory booklet 'Undreamed of Possibilities' and lessons application information, order online at http://www.yogananda-srf.org/lessons/index.html"
Description from Self-Realization Fellowship's Web Site (http://www.paramahansayogananda.org/):
"During Paramahansa Yogananda's lecture tours, he often remained in one city for several weeks to conduct classes for those interested in a more in-depth study. The personal instruction he gave was later compiled, at his direction, into a special series of lessons for home-study."
"The Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons are unique among Yogananda's published writings in that they give his step-by-step instructions in the yoga techniques of meditation, concentration, and energization that he taught. These simple yet highly effective techniques enable one to recharge the body with energy, to awaken the mind's unlimited power, and to experience a deepening awareness of the Divine in one's life.
In addition, the Lessons cover a broad range of other subjects -- offering inspiration and practical guidance for living every day in greater harmony with oneself and others, and for coping with the multitude of problems and pressures we face in today's world.
Topics covered include:
How to Bring a Spiritual Perspective to Daily Life
Yoga Methods of Healing, Relaxation, and Rejuvenation
Strengthening Will Power
Finding Your True Vocation
Developing Creativity and Memory
How to Select a Life Companion
Creating Harmony in Marriage and Family Life
The Art of Getting Along with Others
The Power of the Human Mind
Understanding Karma and Reincarnation
Living Without Stress and Fear
Yoga Principles of Diet
How to Apply
The Lessons are offered on a subscription basis for a nominal fee to help cover printing and mailing costs.
If you would like to apply for the Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons in English, please read Undreamed-of Possibilities and print out the application that follows.
After filling it out, either mail or fax completed application to:
Mailing address:
Self-Realization Fellowship 3880 San Rafael Avenue Los Angeles, California 90065-3298 Fax number (for credit card enrollments only): U.S./Canada: (800) 801-1952 Other countries: (818) 549-5100
If you prefer, we would be happy to mail you a copy of Undreamed-of Possibilities and the application in print form. Please contact us if you wish us to send you these materials, or for information about the SRF Lessons series in other languages."
Public Health Resources
The World Health Organization (WHO)
The WHO Agenda
WHO operates in an increasingly complex and rapidly changing landscape. The boundaries of public health action have become blurred, extending into other sectors that influence health opportunities and outcomes. WHO responds to these challenges using a six-point agenda. The six points address two health objectives, two strategic needs, and two operational approaches. The overall performance of WHO will be measured by the impact of its work on women's health and health in Africa.
1. Promoting Development
During the past decade, health has achieved unprecedented prominence as a key driver of socioeconomic progress, and more resources than ever are being invested in health. Yet poverty continues to contribute to poor health, and poor health anchors large populations in poverty. Health development is directed by the ethical principle of equity: Access to life-saving or health-promoting interventions should not be denied for unfair reasons, including those with economic or social roots. Commitment to this principle ensures that WHO activities aimed at health development give priority to health outcomes in poor, disadvantaged or vulnerable groups. Attainment of the health-related Millennium Development Goals, preventing and treating chronic diseases and addressing the neglected tropical diseases are the cornerstones of the health and development agenda.
2. Fostering Health Security
Shared vulnerability to health security threats demands collective action. One of the greatest threats to international health security arises from outbreaks of emerging and epidemic-prone diseases. Such outbreaks are occurring in increasing numbers, fuelled by such factors as rapid urbanization, environmental mismanagement, the way food is produced and traded, and the way antibiotics are used and misused. The world's ability to defend itself collectively against outbreaks will be strengthened in June 2007, when the revised International Health Regulations come into force.
3. Strengthening Health Systems
For health improvement to operate as a poverty-reduction strategy, health services must reach poor and underserved populations. Health systems in many parts of the world are unable to do so, making the strengthening of health systems a high priority for WHO. Areas being addressed include the provision of adequate numbers of appropriately trained staff, sufficient financing, suitable systems for collecting vital statistics, and access to appropriate technology including essential drugs.
4. Harnessing Research, Information and Evidence
Evidence provides the foundation for setting priorities, defining strategies, and measuring results. WHO generates authoritative health information, in consultation with leading experts, to set norms and standards, articulate evidence-based policy options and monitor the evolving global heath situation.
5. Enhancing Partnerships WHO carries out its work with the support and collaboration of many partners, including UN agencies and other international organizations, donors, civil society and the private sector. WHO uses the strategic power of evidence to encourage partners implementing programmes within countries to align their activities with best technical guidelines and practices, as well as with the priorities established by countries.
6. Improving Performance WHO participates in ongoing reforms aimed at improving its efficiency and effectiveness, both at the international level and within countries. WHO aims to ensure that its strongest asset - its staff - works in an environment that is motivating and rewarding. WHO plans its budget and activities through results-based management, with clear expected results to measure performance at country, regional and international levels.
Source: WHO Website: http://www.who.int/about/agenda/en/index.html
Remember Darfur
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion Office of Public Health and Science
The Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion; Website: http://odphp.osophs.dhhs.gov/
The Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office of Public Health and Science, Office of the Secretary, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), works to strengthen the disease prevention and health promotion priorities of the Department within the collaborative framework of the HHS agencies.
Selected Projects
Steps to a HealthierUS (Steps)
Steps is the Department's initiative to advance the President's HealthierUS goal of helping Americans live longer, better, and healthier lives. It will identify and promote programs that foster healthy behaviors and prevention. Priority areas for the Steps initiative are diabetes, obesity, asthma, heart disease, stroke, and cancer; also included are poor nutrition, physical inactivity, tobacco use, and youth risk taking.
Visit www.healthierus.gov/steps/.
Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2005
Published jointly with the U.S. Department of Agriculture every 5 years since 1980, this publication is the statutorily mandated basis for Federal nutrition education activities.
Visit http://www.healthierus.gov/dietaryguidelines/.
healthfinder.gov
healthfinder.gov is a gateway Web site linking consumers and professionals to over 6,000 health information resources from the Federal Government and its many partners since 1997. Visit http://www.healthfinder.gov/.
Healthy People 2010
Healthy People 2010 presents a comprehensive set of disease prevention and health promotion objectives developed to improve the health of all people in the United States during the first decade of the 21st century. Visit http://www.healthypeople.gov/.
Healthy People 2010 Health Communication Focus Area
The six objectives in the focus area represent a range of key issues in health communication. They address the diffusion of the Internet to households, the quality of health Web sites, health literacy, provider-patient communication, research and evaluation of communication programs, and Centers of Excellence in health communication.
Visit http://www.healthypeople.gov/document/HTML/Volume1/11HealthC om.htm.
Luther L. Terry Senior Fellow serves as the Senior Clinical Advisor in the Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion (ODPHP), which is located within the Office of Public Health and Science (OPHS) in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Visit http://odphp.osophs.dhhs.gov/projects/LutherTerry.htm for more information.
National Health Information Center (NHIC)
This Internet-accessible clearinghouse with a toll-free number provides a central health information referral service for consumers and professionals using a database of more than 1,700 national associations, Government agencies, and other organizations. Visit http://www.health.gov/nhic or call 1-800-336-4797.
Prevention Communication Research Database (PCRD)
PCRD is an online, searchable collection of audience communication research conducted or sponsored by HHS agencies .. prevention topics. The PCRD highlight communication-related research findings that may not be widely known or published in peer-reviewed journals. Visit http://www.health.gov/communication/. Also view the PCRD e-Letter online.
UC Berkeley, Sheldon Margen Public Health Library
Public Health Resources on the Internet
Website: http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/PUBL/internet.html
Our Stolen Future
Website: http://www.ourstolenfuture.org/Sources/scimed.htm
Scientific and Medical Sources on Endocrine Disruption
Protecting Your Child From Toxic Threats to Brain Development
Website: http://psr.igc.org/
Personal Guidelines for Children, Parents, and Future Parents. Recommendations from Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility.
The Tulane/Xavier Center for Bioenvironmental Research
Website: http://www.cbr.tulane.edu/
A multidisciplinary research center with programs in Environmental Astrobiology, Ecosystem Research, Biomonitoring/Bioremediation, MiRIR, Women's Health and Environmental Endocrinology.
Environmental Estrogens and Other Hormones (a project of the Center for Bioenvironmental Research)
Website: http://www.som.tulane.edu/ECME/eehome/
An excellent resource for learning about the basic concepts in endocrine disruption, and for updates on research and conferences.
Distruttori Endocrini
Website: http://www.iss.it/inte/Scripts/Iniziale.asp
Information in Italian and English about endocrine disruption. Istituto Superiore di Sanità Viale Regina Elena, 299 Roma(Italia).
The Why Files
Website: http://whyfiles.news.wisc.edu/045env_hormone/index.html
A project created by National Institute for Science Education and the National Science Foundation, and funded by the Graduate School, University of Wisconsin-Madison. Its website provides basic information on endocrine disruption and updates on the EPA's screening process.
MEDLINE
Website: http://medlineplus.gov/
The National Library of Medicine's premier bibliographic database covering the fields of medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, and the preclinical sciences.
Environmental Health Perspectives
Website: http://www.ehponline.org/
A scientific journal of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS).
Environmental Toxins and Reproductive Health - About.com &
GANDHI: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY ~ THE STORY OF MY EXPERIMENTS WITH TRUTH By Mohandas K. Gandhi
Gandhi's nonviolent struggles in South Africa and India had already brought him to such a level of notoriety, adulation, and controversy that when asked to write an autobiography midway through his career, he took it as an opportunity to explain himself. Although accepting of his status as a great innovator in the struggle against racism, violence, and, just then, colonialism, Gandhi feared that enthusiasm for his ideas tended to exceed a deeper understanding. He says that he was after truth rooted in devotion to God and attributed the turning points, successes, and challenges in his life to the will of God. His attempts to get closer to this divine power led him to seek purity through simple living, dietary practices (he called himself a fruitarian), celibacy, and ahimsa , a life without violence. It is in this sense that he calls his book The Story of My Experiments with Truth, offering it also as a reference for those who would follow in his footsteps. A reader expecting a complete accounting of his actions, however, will be sorely disappointed.
Mohandas K. Gandhi is one of the most inspiring figures of our time. In his classic autobiography he recounts the story of his life and how he developed his concept of active nonviolent resistance, which propelled the Indian struggle for independence and countless other nonviolent struggles of the twentieth century. In a new foreword, noted peace expert and teacher Sissela Bok urges us to adopt Gandhi's "attitude of experimenting, of tesing what will and will not bear close scrutiny, what can and cannot be adapted to new circumstances,"in order to bring about change in our own lives and communities. All royalties earned on this book are paid to the Navajivan Trust, founded by Gandhi, for use in carrying on his work.
"…Thus service of the Indians in South Africa ever revealed to me new implications of truth at every stage.
Truth is like a vast tree, which yields more and more fruit, the more you nurture it.
The deeper the search in the mine of truth the richer the discovery of the gems buried there, in the shape of openings for an ever greater variety of service."
~ Mohandas K. Gandhi
Source & Resource: Amazon.com
A free on-line Download of Gandhi An Autobiography: The Story of My Experiments with Truth and other writings by Gandhi are available at the following web site: http://www.forget-me.net/en/Gandhi/
THE FOUR AGREEMENTS By Don Miguel Ruiz
Everything we do is based on agreements we have made - agreements with ourselves, with other people, with God, with life. But the most important agreements are the ones we make with ourselves. In these agreements we tell ourselves who we are, how to behave, what is possible, what is impossible. One single agreement is not such a problem, but we have many agreements that come from fear, deplete our energy, and diminish our self-worth."
"In these agreements we tell ourselves who we are, how to behave, what is possible, what is impossible."
In this powerful book that has remained on The New York Times Bestseller List for over five years, don Miguel reveals the source of self-limiting beliefs that rob us of joy and create needless suffering. When we are ready to change these agreements, there are four deceptively simple, yet powerful agreements that we can adopt as guiding principles. The Four Agreements offer a powerful code of conduct that can rapidly transform our lives to a new experience of freedom, true happiness, and love.
The Four Agreements:
1. Be Impeccable With Your Word Speak with integrity. Say only what you mean. Avoid using the word to speak against yourself or to gossip about others. Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love.
2. Don't Take Anything Personally Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won't be the victim of needless suffering.
3. Don't Make Assumptions Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want. Communicate with others as clearly as you can to avoid misunderstandings, sadness and drama. With just this one agreement, you can completely transform your life.
4. Always Do Your Best Your best is going to change from moment to moment; it will be different when you are healthy as opposed to sick. Under any circumstance, simply do your best, and you will avoid self-judgment, self-abuse and regret.
Source, Resource & Ordering Information:
Copyright © 2005 Don Miguel Ruiz & Don Jose Luis Ruiz. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.miguelruiz.com/fouragreements.html
http://www.miguelruiz.com/books.html
Please Do Something ~
WE CAN ALL DO SOMETHING ~ GET INVOLVED NOW TO CHANGE OUR WORLD FOR THE BETTER
Oprah Winfrey
"A hip organization called Do Something, a group that rewards young people who come up with creative ways to change the world."
Andrew Shue
Co-Founder of Do Something "Do Something is an organization that seeks to change the world through young people."
Christina Aguilera
"Young people can make a difference. 'Come On Over and Do Something' represents that ability. Every individual has the power to create change."
http://www.dosomething.org/
THE POWER OF INTENTION ~ LEARNING TO CO-CREATE YOUR WORLD YOUR WAY By Dr Wayne W. Dyer
Intention is generally viewed as a pit-bull kind of determination propelling one to succeed at all costs by never giving up on an inner picture. In this view, an attitude that combines hard work with an indefatigable drive toward excellence is the way to succeed. However, intention is viewed very differently in this book. Dr. Wayne W. Dyer has researched intention as a force in the universe that allows the act of creation to take place. This book explores intention -- not as something you do -- but as an energy you’re a part of. This is the first book to look at intention as a field of energy that you can access to begin co-creating your life with the power of intention.
Source & Resource: http://www.hayhouse.com/index.php
THE POWER OF NOW by Ekhart Tolle
Ekhart Tolle's message is simple: living in the now is the truest path to happiness and enlightenment. And while this message may not seem stunningly original or fresh, Tolle's clear writing, supportive voice, and enthusiasm make this an excellent manual for anyone who's ever wondered what exactly "living in the now" means. Foremost, Tolle is a world-class teacher, able to explain complicated concepts in concrete language. More importantly, within a chapter of reading this book, readers are already holding the world in a different container -- more conscious of how thoughts and emotions get in the way of their ability to live in genuine peace and happiness. Tolle packs a lot of information and inspirational ideas into The Power of Now.
Source & Resource: Amazon.com
WHISPERS FROM ETERNITY By Paramahansa Yogananda
Paramahansa Yogananda’s universal prayers and vivid descriptions of his experiences in elevated states of meditation beckon readers of all faiths to cultivate their own intimate relationship with the Divine. Features invocations to the great prophets and leaders of the principal world religions, and a special section of children’s prayers. Illustrated throughout with evocative nature photos and masterpieces of art, many in full color. Also available is a photographic reproduction of the well-loved first version of Paramahansa Yogananda’s inspirational poems and prayers before he revised the book later in life.
From Whispers From Eternity:
“O Lord of Compassion, teach me to shed tears of love for all beings. May I behold them as my very own -- different expressions of my Self.â€
~ Paramahansa Yogananda
Source & Resource: Self-Realization Fellowship; https://www.srfbooks.com/Item.asp?id=1231
A single idea
can transform a life,
a family,
a business, a nation,
a world.
~Dan Zadra, Think Big
There is a Power that will light
your way to health, happiness,
peace, and success, if you will but
turn toward that light.
~ Paramahansa Yogananda, Answered Prayers
If Tomorrow Never Comes
If I knew it would be the last time that I'd see you fall asleep,
I would tuck you in more tightly and pray the Lord, your soul to keep.
If I knew it would be the last time that I see you walk out the door,
I would give you a hug and kiss and call you back for one more.
If I knew it would be the last time I'd hear your voice lifted up in praise,
I would videotape each action and word, so I could play them back day after day.
If I knew it would be the last time, I could spare an extra minute or two
to stop and say "I love you," instead of assuming, you would know I do.
If I knew it would be the last time I would be there to share your day,
well I'm sure you'll have so many more, so I can let just this one slip away.
For surely there's always tomorrow to make up for an oversight,
and we always get a second chance to make everything right.
There will always be another day to say our "I love you's",
And certainly there's another chance to say our "Anything I can do's?"
But just in case I might be wrong, and today is all I get,
I'd like to say how much I love you and I hope we never forget,
Tomorrow is not promised to anyone, young or old alike,
And today may be the last chance you get to hold your loved one tight.
So if you're waiting for tomorrow, why not do it today?
For if tomorrow never comes, you'll surely regret the day,
That you didn't take that extra time for a smile, a hug, or a kiss
and you were too busy to grant someone,
what turned out to be their one last wish.
So hold your loved ones close today, whisper in their ear,
Tell them how much you love them and that you'll always hold them dear,
Take time to say "I'm sorry," "please forgive me," "thank you" or "it's okay".
And if tomorrow never comes, you'll have no regrets about today.
~ Author unknown
Ascension
And if I go, while you're still here...
Know that I still live on, vibrating to a different measure
-- behind a thin veil you cannot see through.
You will not see me, so you must have faith.
I wait for the time when we can soar together again,
-- both aware of each other.
Until then, live your life to its fullest.
And when you need me
Just whisper my name in your heart
...I will be there.
~ © Colleen Corah Hitchcock
Our Stolen Future
By Dr. Theo Colborn, Dianne Dumanoski & Dr. John Peterson Myers
"The central point of the Our Stolen Future is that some man-made chemicals interfere with the body's own hormones. These compounds find their way into our bodies through a variety of pathways. They build up over time, often over years.
When a woman becomes pregnant, some fraction of her contaminant burden is transferred to the fetus. When this happens they interfere with the hormonal signals directing development and thus disrupt fetal growth. Sometimes the effects are conspicuous, sometimes they are not.
Some of these chemicals alter sexual development. Some undermine intelligence and behavior. Others make our bodies less resistant to disease. Sometimes the effects don't appear until a child reaches puberty or afterward, even though the exposure took place in the womb.
These chemicals pose the greatest hazard in the earliest phases of life because hormones orchestrate development and because fetal development is exquisitely sensitive to tiny variations in hormone signals. For a fetus to grow up according to its genetic blueprint, the right hormone message has to arrive at the right place in the right amount at the right time.
The emerging science we present in Our Stolen Future is about what happens when something interferes with the delivery of that message. A signal doesn't arrive because it is blocked. One that was small becomes large. One that shouldn't have been there at all shows up nonetheless.
The first nine chapters of the book examine a chain of evidence that extends from wildlife populations to laboratory experiments to the epidemiology of exposed groups of people. There's not a lot in these sections that is controversial.
We are working from a data base of over 4,000 scientific publications. Over 100 scientists have participated directly in deliberations that have produced a series of consensus statements about the nature of the problem. Many scientists reviewed their sections of the book word-by-word to ensure that we did not misrepresent their findings. This is not fringe science.
After we examine in Our Stolen Future the basic science from wildlife, lab animals and relevant human studies we then ask a larger set of questions.
Given these findings,
* given the the uncontested observations that endocrine contaminants are ubiquitous
* and given that at least in some places in the world those background levels of contamination are within the ranges in which effects are seen in the laboratory and in people.
* given all that, what signals should we look for in human populations?
We could have stopped before this. We knew that going on would be controversial. But as we thought about the implications of these basic findings and their potential ramifications, we concluded that the only responsible course was to go on and find out what science was able, and not able to say, given the current evidence.
If you have read this section, you will find it replete with all sorts of cautionary statements, with many comments to the effect that data on one issue or another are as yet inadequate to reach a judgement. In sum, however, the weight of the evidence says we have a problem. Human impacts beyond isolated cases are already demonstrable. They involve impairments to reproduction, alterations in behavior, diminishment of intellectual capacity, and erosion in the ability to resist disease. The simple truth is that the way we allow chemicals to be used in society today means we are performing a vast experiment, not in the lab, but in the real world, not just on wildlife but on people."
"Nine Key Points from the Book:
1. There are demonstrable effects outside of the laboratory in wild animal populations and in groups of people exposed by accident or through medicine.
2. Work at low exposure levels, very low exposures, show that the classic high dose experiments can completely miss important low dose effects. Moreover, these results are reproducible in the lab. This science does not rest on extrapolating high dose curves down to the low end of exposure.
3. It's not just estrogens. While the first two decades of this work focused largely on man-made chemicals capable of mimicking estrogen, within the last five years we've seen that expand to include estrogen blockers, androgen blockers, progesterone blockers and compounds that interfere with thyroid. This last one is especially important because thyroid hormone is key to proper brain development.
4. It's not just the disruption of the endocrine system. Natural chemical signals are important at all levels of organization of life--within cells, among cells, between organs, even between organisms, including from one species to another. Any of these chemical signals, in principle, are vulnerable to disruption. Scientists, for example, have just begun to look at the chemical signals that mediate communication between symbiotic organisms, such as nitrogen-fixing bacteria and the roots of the plants in which they live, and are examining how synthetic chemicals might interfere with these signals. Disrupting these 'signals of life' could have important ecosystem impacts.
5. The developing fetus is exquisitely sensitive to both the natural hormone signals used to guide its development, and the unexpected chemical signals that reach it from the environment. Both the natural signals and the chemicals that disrupt them act as "morphogens." They guide the fetus through forks in its developmental path and also help set its sensitivity to subsequent hormonal signals. This involvement of setting sensitivity can have life-long consequences. New science, for example, on the developing prostate, shows that natural and synthetic estrogens experienced in the womb can lead to enlarged and hypersensitive prostate in adulthood.
6. Work with the best known of the endocrine disrupters, particularly diethylstilbestrol, or DES, led to great scientific confidence about the predictive value of lab animal studies for anticipating human endocrine impacts.
7. The contamination is very widespread and it comes from many sources, some quite conspicuous and others completely unexpected.
8. Some of the synthetic chemical compounds are notorious because they accumulate in our fatty tissue. These chemicals can then bioaccumulate up the food chain, and can be passed on in the womb and through breast milk. Because, they are not flushed through our bodies chemical accumulation in the fat tissue and breast milk can reach very high concentrations over time, concentrations millions of times higher or more than plant estrogens.
9. Plant estrogens are widespread in our diets and when eaten in large volume they can cause serious problems. In fact they have been used as antifertility agents by many cultures for a long time. But normal diets usually don't create risks because our gut chemistry quickly flushes them through and because there are special proteins in our blood that are effective at ensuring many (but not all) of these natural compounds don't reach the fetus at levels sufficient to have an effect. For example, while the most common plant estrogen in soy has a half life in our body of about 6-8 hours, DDT's half life is 10-12 years."
Source: Our Stolen Future; Website: http://www.ourstolenfuture.org/Basics/keypoints.htm
"Recommendations
What we recommend:
1. A significant commitment of federal research dollars to resolve scientific questions and determine which of these potential risks are real and which ones are not. Industry should be encouraged to support research on these issues, but the funds should be placed in a trust fund overseen by a governing body including appropriate representation of all major stakeholders to insulate researchers from the pressures of special interests.
2. Improvement of existing protections. Regulations should protect the most vulnerable members of our community, especially children, the unborn and the elderly. They should explicitly recognize that compounds interact unpredictably in the real world and they come from many sources. Enough information is already available to warrant dramatic strengthening of the constraints on use and distribution of a number of persistent organic pollutants, known as POPs, by implementing international protocols. Far more stringent testing should be required before allowing new compounds to enter into widespread commercial use. New products should be designed with the goal of reducing exposure. And there should be an accelerated research program to test compounds now in use that have escaped scrutiny.
3. Fulfill the public's right to know. People want to make informed decisions for themselves about these issues and right now a variety of laws and practices prevent access to crucial information.
4. Build the capacity in the United States to monitor contamination levels, health impacts, and the links between them. The National Center for Environmental Health at the US Centers for Disease Control is an extraordinary national resource and needs public support to ensure it can do its job.
5. Support implementation of the precautionary principle. Current regulatory practices give chemical manufacturers the benefit of the doubt. Substances can be removed from the market only if their health impacts can be demonstrated with scientific certainty. This burden of proof needs to be shifted. If plausible doubt can be justified about the safety of chemical compounds, their use should be allowed only if the manufacturer can prove they represent no inappropriate threat to human or ecosystem health.This is especially important for endocrine disrupting chemicals because increasingly it appears that aspects of their modes of action make it very difficult for epidemiological science to demonstrate causality with certainty. On the contrary, epidemiological studies of endocrine disruption in humans are biased toward finding false negatives."
Source: Our Stolen Future; Website: http://www.ourstolenfuture.org/Basics/corerecs.htm
For more information, please reference "Scientific and Medical Sources on Endocrine Disruption" in the HEALTH AWARENESS & ADVOCACY PORTAL section above.
SUMER NICOLE ALVAREZ
"Live like Sumer" is a phrase that family and friends have started using to measure their lives and actions.
Sumer never wanted to be 'just like everyone else’, she had the courage to embrace change, test her abilities, and explore new things. During high school she excelled academically in honor level classes, participated in JV volleyball and Varsity soccer, surfing, and track and field. Prior to the beginning of her senior year she decided to redirect her efforts – she petitioned, developed the by-laws, and initiated the start of an art appreciation program and a chess club on campus. She became a math tutor, and increased her level of volunteerism with campus ministry and at her church.
Sumer started Georgetown University during the fall of 2003. Although as a freshman she was a little overwhelmed with new campus life and a vigorous class schedule, this did not deter her from sharing her indomitable spirit. She spent any free time immersed in the arts and humanitarian interests through painting, photography, and volunteering. She was actively involved in tutoring adults through Catholic Charities and Prison Outreach, and she gave guitar lessons at the YMCA. However, her passion was the children’s theatre program at Georgetown, where she designed sets and starred in productions given to inner city children.
During the summer of 2005 she decided to volunteer her time in India tutoring impoverished children. She lived with a host family in the small village of Samode, where she described the conditions as very rustic and the people as beautiful and kind. Tragically during the early morning hours of July 31, 2005, while attending a birthday party at one of the finest hotels in Jaipur, India, Sumer was electrocuted after falling into an air-conditioning unit. She was only 20-years old, but she managed to accomplish many things in a mere twenty years that others would not be able to complete in a lifetime. She was a role model for others and a truly remarkable young woman.
We hope to continue her legacy through scholarships to individuals that perpetuate her dedication to the arts, social justice, and humanitarian efforts especially those focusing on children.
The Sumer Nicole Alvarez Foundation is being established to carry on Sumer’s legacy:
Sumer dreamed of making a difference in the world. Her time on earth was brief, but she had a powerful impact on all who knew her. Her family and friends feel blessed to have shared in her life and know that her dream of making a difference in the world came to pass and will continue through the work of the Sumer Nicole Alvarez Foundation.
The Sumer Nicole Alvarez Foundation Mission Statement:
To improve the quality of life and facilitate lasting change for women and children around the world through developing and nurturing their unique individual strengths and abilities.
The Sumer Nicole Alvarez Foundation Vision Statement:
To perpetuate Sumer’s thirst for knowledge, curiosity, compassion, dedication to social justice, education, and humanitarian efforts especially as it relates to women and children globally.
The Sumer Nicole Alvarez Foundation Culture:
'Live Like Sumer'
Embrace your strengths, dare to be unique, seek knowledge, be creative, show compassion, see beauty in yourself, your surroundings, and others, trust in yourself, give back, act do not wait, find fun in what you do, be open to new ideas and experiences, acknowledge your intelligence, indulge your curiosity, seek adventure, be brave.
What it means to Live Like Sumer:
Be Unique
Show Compassion
Seek Knowledge
Embrace Your Creativity
Act Don’t Wait
See Beauty In Your Surroundings and Others
Be True To Yourself
Give Back
Have Fun
Seek Adventure
Be Open To New Ideas and Experiences
Show Your Intelligence
Indulge Your Curiosity
Be Brave
For additional information, please visit the following web sites:
http://www.livelikesumer.blogspot.com
http://the-tidings.com/2005/1118/sumer.htm
http://taborripress.com/html/spirit5.htm
http://www.thehoya.com/news/080605/news1.cfm
http:/obit.lafuneral.comwrapper_gb.php?id=242850&clienti d=lafuneral&listing=Found
Sumer Nicole Alvarez -- 5/30/85 – 7/30/05
SUMER, MY BELOVED NIECE
A young lady, so beautiful and bright, to the world she was a shining light.
One was filled with joy by her charm; and to no one would she ever cause harm.
She decided that it would be a good deed to go to India to help children in need.
She packed her bag and to India did go with all her hopes and dreams aglow.
She was with the children only a short while creating on each face a beautiful smile.
Then death rose up, showing its ugly face
And took her life from that distant place.
Her death caused such pain and sorrow,
For a moment there seemed to be no tomorrow.
But her light did so brightly shine, that to me she will always be a sign
That one with hope who really cares
Is willing to face all that this life dares.
And in my mind there is no doubt,
Her light in others will never go out.
THE LIGHT BLUE OF THE EARTH
Periwinkle are the oceans of the earth from an up-top view
Or close to the shore on a crystal morning.
Periwinkle makes me feel like
I’m sailing over clouds on eagle’s wings on a brisk afternoon.
Periwinkle is the taste of clean water or fresh air from a forest.
Periwinkle is the smell of dew on a freshly mowed grass
Or flowers on a clear spring day.
Periwinkle makes me feel calm and with peace with myself.
Periwinkle sounds like the desolate silence of winter.
Periwinkle is the softness of the Earth.
~ Sumer Alvarez, Age 10
____________________________________________________________ ____________
Dear Betsy
...Also attached is a copy of my remarks at the memorial service for Sumer here at Georgetown.
And, finally, I have attached a copy of Sumer's email from India to her family, friends and professors; and my response to that email. I love her email. It is a wonderful piece of writing. It is Sumer at her most spontaneous and at her best. It captures her great exuburance for life. ...
Bill McDonald
Professor
Correspondence with Sumer Alvarez
SUBJECT: RE: India!!!!
FROM: Sumer Nicole Alvarez
DATE: July 2005
Sumer Nicole Alvarez wrote:
Preface: I am sending one mass email out due to the slow and expensive internet connection in my village. I apologize for this and hope I can make up for it when I get back to the main city and find a faster and cheaper connection. Please feel free to forward this message...or parts of it...to anyone I have left out, which is a bajillion people. I must first address my professors, so everyone else please just ignore the first bit. Cheers.
Professor McDonald,
Thank you for sending the letter of recommendation. I greatly appreciate it. Please let me know how your vacation went, when you have the chance. Also, read below if you would like to know how mine is doing. Thanks again!
Best,
Sumer
Dean Cloke,
Thank you also for the letter of recommendation. I actually have heard a lot about the Corcoran's art program from the people here(a lot of them are from Georgetown)and am very excited about the prospect of being a part of it. Also, please send any thoughts you have on my (very) rough draft. I have a lot of time on my hands now that this first week has died down and would like the chance to work on improving what I have so far. Thanks!
Take care,
Sumer
ok, now for the good stuff
Hello All,
I am sorry for those who are worried about me that this email is arriving so late in my trip. I would have sent an email yesterday, but after the flooding of the town, the one internet connection here broke and no one knew where internet was in the next village over (or at least it seemed they did not know---my Hindi is only slowly improving).
So, how is India, you might ask? I might reply that there are bugs everywhere...and big ones at that... I might say that the small town I'm in is rampant with cows, boars, goats, lizards, and monkeys...that people live in absolute poverty, that the ground is covered with water and dirt and sewage....that is impossible to escape the smell of the sewage...that children do not go to school...that they follow me around and ask for rupees wherever I go...that I have been bitten by mosquitoes 32 times...that I have sweated through all of my clothes already...that I shower by candlelight...that there are no sit down toilets and no toilet paper ...that we can only drink bottled water...that people drive in the middle of the street or wherever they want...that the word seatbelt does not exist in hindi...that I was told that 9 out of 10 odds, I would get lice...that I have already gone through two bottles of sanitizer...that I have not eaten meat since I got here...that I was told by 6 men so far to pull down my skirt past my knees...that no one in my host family understands me except the host father...a little...that we get three power outages a day......that I stepped ankle deep in elephant poo...that I had my glasses stolen...
but, I would rather tell you that
India is fricking amazing!!!!!! I would use my whole bag of expletives to describe this place if this was not a mass email....Oh my sweet Jesus, it is absolutely beautiful...the people are beautiful....the places are beautiful....everything is fantastic. It has made me exhausted to see anything here because it is plain and simple stimulus overload. I can't even begin to describe everything....Well, I guess I started off by naming all the bad bits, but mostly so I could get to all the wonderment...that sounds ridiculously cheesy, but I can't help it. India is beyond words. Whoever told me it was something that I would never be ready for was right. Dead on.
Ok...let me try to get some organization here. I hate writing by the clock. First, I am fine. I have not been sick or had any type of stomach thing yet. This is only my third day in the village, Samode, and I already feel like I am welcome here. My host family actually consists of three brothers and their wives, children, a nd parents. Half of them sleep outside. THere is a temple in the house to krishna...they bang cymbols every time there is a time for worship...which is like four times a day. There are five small kids who live in the house...they are all adorable...my photographer's eye wants to shoot them all the time...the walls are all light blue and purple...the woman all wear traditional Saris and have their hair covered at all times. There is a shower head in the house, which is a luxury here. All meals are served on metal trays and consist of chubati (bread), rice, and some sauce/food. We had four days of training in Jaipur in the confines of a engineering college. This is where we ate our meals and stayed. All of us who are teaching were paired with a member of the college (all boys) and were assigned schools.
While in Jaipur, we went to see the amber fort/palace and many other temples, palaces, forts, markets----AMAZING!!!! I keep on saying the word beautiful in this country that by the time I get home I'll be sick of it. There is no order in India...at least in the places I've been....It has all been complete and utter chaos...which is really cool....
so different...everyone stares at the weird foreigners...most of them smile while they stare...everyone is so friendly...completely different mindset. I think it is only because we look so different, but it's really refreshing. Even in the more westernized places---bars---dance clubs---everyone is very friendly.
I have felt the most content here and now than I have at any other point in my life...well, I can't really say that being amongst all this abject povert...but everything feels very pure.
At the amber fort especially----oh man, the pictures I have taken are precious to me---I have seen so much only in the past couple of days---all the people and the wildlife (elephants, camels, monkeys) and it's so common here!!
the Indian students working with us in the villages are really cool too. Their English is pretty good and we've been having a lot of fun together. We actually had our first lesson today after visiting all the schools in Samode yesterday. The primary schools----alll these little kids---no shoes----lessons in the dirt----branches over them as protention----all their hair is cut short to prevent lice, which the majority fo them already have, skinny, tattered clothing...some of them haven't seen pens in their entire lives....kids start school as early as 2 and a half----so you have these crying kids that the older children are trying to maintain...some of the private schools have their children wear uniforms, which are adorable....private schools aren't that much better...my class is a secondary school so I have 10-14 year olds....300 of them. They know some vocab words, but we really need to work on structure, which is something I did not prepare...but it will be good. None of the faculty members speaks any english, though, so I have to have everything translated pretty much...a few english phrases here and there....but that's probably the toughest part right now---sorting out when and where and who we are going to teach...
ok...There's been another customer waiting to use the internet for a while. I should go. I am sorry this email is so scatterbrained----just think of it in the spirit of India. Wow, India.
Mom, I will call you today, if possible. I will send individual emails when I get the chance.
Again, I apologize for the lack of organization---I just hope it gives you all an idea of what india has been like...now, I should go before these two centipedes by my feet crawl up on me. hahahah India!!!
All my love,
Sumer
____________________________________________________________ ____________
SUBJECT: RE: India!!!! FROM: William F. McDonald DATE: July 2005
Dear Sumer:
Thank you for the truly exciting and fascinating email from India! You've captured the contradictions that are India; the beauty despite poverty; the hope despite the hopelessness; the power of the human spirit to overcome and even thrive in such squalor. Also I am glad to hear that you have taken plenty of pictures. You should plan an little show for the American studies people. I suppose you have already thought of writing your senior thesis about your experience. I am already thinking of possible titles, Another Passage to India; The Jewel, The Crown and The People; Moby Raj; Puritan Boston and Hindi India! :-)
Keep me on your mailing list.
As for my vacation, it pales next to your account of life in India. But we did get to see some fascinating places that you should plan to see before you leave the Washington area: the new American Indian museum; the new Smithsonian airplane museum out at Dulles; the Meriweather Post house and gardens, Hillwood; Red, "White and Tuna"- a two-man comedy act at the Kennedy Center, each guy plays about 10 characters from a small town (Tuna) in Texas and does quick changes -- very funny and no bugs; Camden Yards, Baltimore, for an Orioles vs Yankees game.
Good luck. WF McDonald
____________________________________________________________ ____________
Professor Bill McDonald Remarks at the Memorial Service for Sumer Alvarez
William F. McDonald Professor Department of American Studies & Department of Sociology and Anthropology Georgetown University
Oct. 25, 2005
Greetings. I am Professor Bill McDonald. I teach in the American Studies Program and in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology.
Sumer was in my American Studies course last spring, American Culture and Social Structure. We read books like Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America , and a book entitled Puritan Boston and Quaker Philadelphia by E. Digby Baltzell and some other books.
I teach about 200 students a year. At 200 students a year I have a hard time remembering names. When I look at old class lists, I see names of many students about whom I cannot remember anything. But, some I remember, sometimes very vividly but for different reasons.
For example, I remember the well known basketball star who played for the Miami Heat, Alonzo Mourning. He took my Research Methods course. I taught him everything he knows about Chi square. It doesn't seem to have helped his game.
I don't remember him for anything he did or said in the course. I remember him because the first year after he graduated from Georgetown and began playing for the NBA, he made more money in that one year than I had made in my entire life.
My memories of Sumer Alvarez are different. Probably the most vivid memory is about her method of transportation for getting to class. I have been teaching for 35 years. Sumer is the only student who ever rolled into class everyday on a skateboard.
And Sumer 's skateboard was no modest affair. It was huge, not something you could fold up and stick in a bag while you were in class. I believe her skateboard must belong to the Mack Truck family of skateboards. The first time I saw it I thought it was a surf board with wheels.
On the way to my first class I saw this girl slaloming down the hallway in ICC. I thought to myself: "Who is this nut cake? I'll bet she's from California; and, I pity the poor professor who gets this one." At that point she took a right turn into 117 ICC, my classroom. I figured it was going to be a crazy semester.
Well, I was half right. Sumer was from California; but the more I got to know her the more I realized she was definitely not a nut. She was just a free-spirit, grabbing as much out of life as she could.
She made me think back to the days when I thought of myself as being a free-spirit. Skateboards had not been invented in those days. But if they had been, I might have cruised around on one myself.
Towards the end of the semester Sumer asked me to write two letters of recommendation for her, one for the India Volunteer Program of The Learning Foundation; the other for an internship in the Education Programs at The Corcoran Gallery of Art.
To the India Volunteer Program, this is what I wrote:
I have known Sumer Alvarez since January 2005 as a student in my course, American Culture and Social Structure. She is a faithful attendee at class and a useful participant in class discussions.
I have also gotten to know a little about her interest in India and in teaching. When she asked me to write this letter we had a talk about her extra curricular activities and interests. I was impressed to learn about the extent to which she gives her time and talent in tutoring activities in the Washington area. She has a good sense of social justice and a remarkable interest in India.
She has traveled abroad and to Mexico. But she says India is particularly intriguing to her.
I think she will make a good teacher/tutor in your program. She has a nice spirit about her and is easy to interact with. I think the people of India will like her and will learn from her.
- - - - - -
For the Corcoran I modified the letter a bit. This is how it read:
I am writing to send my enthusiastic support for Sumer Alvarez's application to the academic year internship program at the Corcoran Gallery of Art.
I have known Sumer since January 2005 as a student in my course, American Culture and Social Structure. She is a faithful attendee at class and a useful participant in class discussions and a good student – albeit slightly off-beat, arriving at class on her skate board.
[Normally I wouldn't have included anything that might be considered a negative comment in a letter of recommendation. But it was for an internship to work with artists, not a law firm. So I figured they would read this comment favorably.]
My letter continued as follows:
I have also gotten to know a little about her interest in art, particularly photography. She included several photographs in her final term paper to enhance her argument. And, she let me select for my personal use one of her photos which she has taken during the year. I recognized in her the kind of enthusiasm for photography that I have always had. But in my earlier life I used to try to do the kind of artistic work with the camera that Sumer is attempting.
But Sumer has a considerably longer and more serious commitment to the art world than I ever had. Looking at her resume I see her interest in art was evident back in high school and has continued to grow. She is interested in performing arts and literature as well as photography. She has what I guess is an unusual combination of interests. She not only wants to produce her own work but also wants to support the advancement of the larger enterprise by organizing and managing activities of others devoted to art in its various forms.
Sumer has a nice spirit about her and is easy to interact with and has many interests. I think she would make an ideal intern. The internship's value would be a reciprocal one, a win-win situation. The internship would enhance her interest in the world of art and she would find ways to enhance her value as an intern to The Corcoran.
- - - - -
The photograph that Sumer gave me was given as a token of appreciation for writing the letters of recommendation. She brought several photos to my office and let me pick the one. They were black and white photos and she had mounted them, titled them and signed them.
There was one of a lamppost silhouetted against a mackerel sky. While the photo was rather artsy, the title was unpretentious and direct, "Lamppost." It was classic Sumer Alvarez. That's the one I chose.
Although it was already signed, I asked her to write something more on it. So she wrote the following:
Professor,
Thank you so much for such a rewarding year.
Yay! De Tocqueville!
Sumer
I have gotten only a few presents from students over the years. Usually it's a bottle of alcohol. I am not sure what that means.
In all my years I have never received a present that a student actually made herself. Sumer 's photograph was another first for me.
When Sumer arrived in India she sent an email to many of us. Most of you have probably already read it. It was wonderfully written, with great enthusiasm and humor and warmth. I am not going to read it here. I would like to read what I wrote back to her.
Dear Sumer:
Thank you for the truly exciting and fascinating email from India! You've captured the contradictions that are India ; the beauty despite the poverty; the hope despite the hopelessness; the power of the human spirit to overcome and even thrive in such squalor.
Also I am glad to hear that you have taken plenty of pictures. You should plan an little show for the American studies people.
I suppose you have already thought of writing your senior thesis about your experience. I am already thinking of possible titles for your thesis: Another Passage to India ; The Jewel, The Crown and The People; Moby Raj; Puritan Boston and Hindi India! :-)
Keep me on your mailing list.
- - - - - -
A couple of weeks later when I received that email from Sumer 's mother it went through me like a knife. I could not think of Sumer as a student any longer. I could only think of her as a daughter.
I have one child, a daughter, and at the time she was pregnant with what would be our first and possibly only grand child. They already knew the baby was a girl. I forwarded the email to them. A week later my wife and I were up in New York to visit my daughter and son in law. I hugged my daughter a little tighter than I usually do. We talked about what happened and we all came to the same conclusion. When her daughter arrives, we will never waste one moment of time with her.
Well, the blessed event has happened. Last Saturday morning we got a call from my daughter that things were happening. We hopped in the car and got up to hospital by 4:30 pm. We visited for a while and then went to their apartment to await the arrival. At six the next morning we got the call from our son in law.
The baby had just been born and if we hurried we could visit with her even before the nurses took the baby off to be weighed and all that. We sprinted the seven blocks to the hospital. We found the most beautiful baby girl waiting for us. We took turns holding her.
When it was my turn, I held that precious package in my arms, and listened to her cooing, and I thought to myself, "You know what, girl, when you are old enough, I am going to buy you a skateboard."
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The Peace Prayer of Saint Francis
Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace;
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love;
for it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.
Amen.
Live Like Sumer
Be the change you wish to see in the world. ~ Mahatma Gandhi
Celebrate Life
Sing Like Nobody's Listening
And Dance Like Nobody's Watching
Be Heard & Make a Difference ~ Visit http://www.livelikesumer.blogspot.com/
Live your beliefs and you can turn the world around.~ Henry David Thoreau
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