Six Words for This Morning

Beeep! Snooze. Beeep! Snooze. Beeep! Snooze.

The Socially Proactive Stamp

I just read Seth Godin's latest post about "green marketing," and how it stands to be misunderstood or abused. That is, until someone can put a number to it. Once you can see the impact of your choices on a scale from 1 to 100 you'll make better choices, and the companies that offer those choices will prosper.

It's like the "fairtrade" stamp. Before that stamp your average consumer had no way to verify whether workers were being paid enough for their work. Now, at least we know that someone is looking into it, even if we don't know all the criteria that the fairtrade stamp represents.

Same with the "organic" stamp. I don't know exactly what it takes to grow organic apples, nor do I know all the ways in which they are better for me and for the world than regular apples. But I know that someone knows, and that they stamped it.

As the practice of social business takes off, in all its various forms, there is going to be a lot of confusion. The mixed motives of profit and compassion make for murky mission statements. I've seen it myself in building Acholi Beads, my first socially proactive business. The models of non-profit and for-profit are so firmly entrenched in consumer mentalities that they will gladly buy from a company that makes no claims as to how it treats its workers, but will thumb their noses at one that promises great things for the poor. Because there is no stamp to prove it.

As with "green" marketing, there is ample opportunity for companies to neglect or abuse the concept of social business in order to make a buck. So if we are going to make this thing as powerful as it can be, we need to start working towards that stamp. People need that stamp, just like I need the organic stamp.

My friends Aaron, Daniel, Derek, Ben, Kevin and Clayton are all experimenting with socially proactive business models, and I know there are many more out there looking to do the same. Together we're going to learn how to do this right.

Try Harder...

My buddy Daniel came by our Acholi Beads locale at a local music festival today. The guy drips web savvy - you can actually follow the trail. Today the trail led back to his new blog "Try Harder to Suck Less." He kindly posted a video of a quick interview we did.

Check it out here.

Six Words for May 1, 2008

Walked where San Diego meets Africa.

Six Words for April 23, 2008

Standing here, leaning into the future.

Six Words for April 22, 2008

Transition: A life in the re-making

Six Words for April 19, 2008

Sudanese kids, Ugandan beads, and me.

Six Words for April 17, 2008

Creative Action. Creative Action. Creative Action.

Life, captured in a short sentence

Like the new six word adventure? It was inspired by Smith Magazine. They held a contest for memoirs. Writers could use only six words. They could not use five. And they certainly could not use seven. So they had to be creative. Check out the video linked here. Life stories in only six words. Turns out, they say a lot.

Like Microsoft Word for the Human Machine

Community: the killer app of humanity.

[Update: I've changed my mind. I think love is the killer app of humanity. Community is what love looks like broadly lived.]

On television, creativity, and adventure

I was watching the debate between Obama and Clinton tonight and saw ads for upcoming television episodes: "This Thursday on Grey's Anatomy..." followed by references to past and upcoming fictional drama.

So many people are invested in these shows. They wait for the writers to dictate their emotions, to dream up their adventures and script their happy endings. When such passion awaits your passivity at the end of the day, it's much easier to live the life of the American consumer.

But what if we turned off the TV? What if we had to create our own stories? What if the only drama and comedy and adventure that we felt were for real, created and pursued by us, in the real world around us? What if sitting on the couch was the least interesting part of our day?

Oh what a world it would be. And I'd like to build it. I'm not very good yet at creating adventure, at coming up with the situations that we need for fulfillment, that will replace TV. But I know some people who are. Let's make that happen. Let's create our own lives. Let's live adventurously. Let's be the show. And let's invite everyone to join the cast.

Six Words for April 16, 2008

Ate lunch quietly in the sun.

Six words for April 15, 2008

Building a rocket? Or another wagon?

It's for everyone

What percentage of people in America can work for a non-profit? If everyone gives 10% to non-profits, and 90% of that should be used for programs, and only 50% of what's left is used for salaries, then at most, one half of 1% of people can work for a non-profit. And that's being generous.

100% of people can work for socially proactive businesses.

The Hard Work of Community

We're so good at making money. Or so good at trying, at least. We work more hours per week than any society on earth, ever, so that we can bring home the paycheck. The principle of hard work for hard-earned cash is sunk deeply into our paradigms even before we can pronounce 'paradigms.'

But here we are, checks banked, enough money to buy all that we need and more, and not satisfied. Here we are, distracted and isolated. Here we are, lonely. So terribly lonely.

Loneliness, I've recently discovered, is nothing more (or less) than the desire for community. Some will tell you that it's the need for romance or marriage or sex. But it's not, not this deep, pervasive loneliness, the one that feels like the inexpressible inside of you is shouting silently. That one is the desire for a rich, vibrant, deep community.

This community only exists when a group of people decide that they are going to love each other. That's what the church is. Remember what Jesus said about spotting his followers? You'll know them by their love for one another.

But this kind of community doesn't come easily. Most people seem to think (I know I did) that if they're relatively nice, normal, perhaps even interesting people then community will rush along and embrace them and they will be satisfied. But it doesn't come. It's never as rich as they know it ought to be, as they need it to be.

That is because, just like working year after year to build wealth, it takes sacrifice and commitment to build community. It takes a thousand little tasks - scheduling time to converse, asking questions, washing someone else's dishes, giving rides to the airport. And it takes major paradigm shifts - I'm responsible for your well being, your needs are as important to me as my own. And until we are ready to do the hard work of community we will remain rich and lonely, wondering why our paychecks can't hold a decent conversation.

For those of you who have agreed that the church as we see it on Sunday mornings is not all that it could be, I have no proven answers. What I do have is a direction that I'm headed, and that I'm confident will lead us closer to the lifestyle that Jesus taught. And that is the direction of deeper, more committed community. The direction of more love for one another. I don't presume to know what that looks like in all contexts, or your context, or even my own half the time. But I challenge you to begin doing the hard work of community. I have a hunch it's going to pay off better than any paycheck I've ever gotten. (Though that's not saying much.)

Six words for April 14, 2008

"... as centuries, loaded, fragrant" and tiring.


- from a favorite Emerson quote.