“Children study in the public school, Luciliio Da Souza Reis in Juliana in the Amazon region of Brazil near Manaus. Brazil. Photo: © Julio Pantoja / World Bank” Uploaded on March 27, 2008 by World Bank Photo Collection on flickr,licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 Generic

Take a look at this pencil. You have wood from trees in California. The trees were felled with saws made from metal dug from the ground somewhere else. That metal was formed into saws and shipped to the logging camp on trucks. There were people who built shelter for the lumberjacks, who made their meals and brewed their coffee. Once the tree is down, it’s taken away using ropes, made from hemp imported from Canada. Someone had to grow the hemp, harvest it, turn it into rope and send it to the forests. The lead in the pencil is made from graphite mined from India, combined with paraffin from Mexico. The zinc used in the metal end of the pencil was perhaps mined from China or Australia. The eraser uses a little rubber used as a binding agent, but also sulfer chloride and pumice from Italy. The lacquer is made from castor bean oil, which also needed to be grown and harvested and needed technology to go from a bean to paint. If you use your imagination, you can see how millions and millions and millions of us had a hand in making this pencil. Not just this generation, but this pencil is the creation of all the generations of human beings that came before it.

http://libertarian-bahai.blogspot.com/2008/09/pursuit-of-happiness-begins-with-point.html

My  wife’s favorite pencil is made on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation in Montana not too far from where she grew up. She still has a few in the drawer. My wife is not the only person to wax poetic over a finely made pencil. -gw

The Blackfeet Indian is almost impossible to buy now, but I remember a time when I could go to Palace Arts in Santa Cruz and buy them by the dozen. They are beautiful: simple hardwood, lots of grain, very simply varnished. The eraser worked like a Pink Pearl, and although you could get them with a gold ferrule, my favorite version is the one with the black ferrule. It looked so minimally beautiful, matching the simple black print on the pencil body. The gold ferrule, to my eye, was a little too flashy, a little too Hollywood. I loved the black. The lead was magnificent. It was never gritty. The line was an impressive black. It did not smear. It held a point pretty well, and what’s even more impressive, I never had a Blackfeet Indian pencil turn into one of those nightmare pencils that break when you sharpen them, and the lead never fell out of the wood after sharpening, either. The lead in these pencils also would last. I bear down when I write and I can use up a Faber Castell Grip 2001 in a couple days. Not so with the Blackfeet Indian pencil. The weight of this pencil was also wonderful, not too heavy, not too light. Some newer pencils, well it feels like the wood is really dried out to the point of where the pencil lends no weight to the writing job. You have to bear down to get a line, some. The Blackfeet, well, it is equal to the task of writing.

http://www.pencilrevolution.com/2005/11/humdog-on-native-pencils/

I have spent the past two years doing on-again, off-again research into the Baha’i religion. I really like what I see - I’m on the verge of conversion. There is one problem - something that’s nagging at the corners of my mind: Why isn’t this religion more popular? Is there something that I’m missing that everyone else is seeing? … Help?

 About Metafilter

Metafilter is a weblog (what’s a weblog? | comprehensive history of weblogs) that anyone can contribute a link or a comment to. A typical weblog is one person posting their thoughts on the unique things they find on the web. This website exists to break down the barriers between people, to extend a weblog beyond just one person, and to foster discussion among its members. http://www.metafilter.com/about.mefi

How-I-became-a-Baha’i stories are unbiquitous to the Baha’i community. -gw

… For the next few years, I experimented with Religion. I learned about Christianity, Buddhism, Taoism, and Mormonism. I found great hope and joy in the Mercy Street community . I found people whom I could talk with about those questions I had held in my heart.

When I moved to Austin from Houston, I couldn’t find that same community life and I drifted. After two years a friend of mine from one of my classes invited me to her house for a “multi-faith devotional”, food being provided. I couldn’t resist. We went around in a circle readings writings from many different Religions including one I had never heard of, the Baha’i Faith. I don’t remember what the topic was, but everyone seemed interested in sharing their thoughts. I felt completely at home.

Over the following months I was invited to more Baha’i activities where I was introduced to the principles of the Faith and its central figures. I found a religion that gave me hope for the world; not only were the writings so beautiful, but the Baha’i Community was systematically growing into a reflection of those writings. After being around the Baha’is for a few months I was convinced that if I couldn’t come up with a more effective way to help the world become a better place and signed my enrollment card.

Since that day, I have enjoyed deepening myself in the writings, being part of a loving community and sharing that love with the greater Austin community. The four core activities that Baha’is participate in are devotionals, study circles, children’s classes and junior youth groups. All of the activities are open to Baha’is and non-Baha’is.

http://www.fortressforwellbeing.org/blog/?p=5

[Re-posted with permission]

* Photo, top: “us” * Photo, bottom: “intensive” *

IN THE OTHER VIEW 

There are things

that should swing

the pendulum

of man=s recognition

of what is the stable

essence of life

such as; roses

spring tides

birds, butterflies

compassion and prayer.

These things are

significantly

complimented by

a mothers care.

Another poem from “blackoaktree,” Charles King. -gw

Photo: “Spring Tides, Reflections,” Uploaded on August 19, 2008
by anNZstream on flickr,licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 Generic

Recently I’ve posted some messages about various materials and processes intended to help reduce global warming. Each has its own pros and cons. None is perfect. The thing is — we’ve got a situation that’s complex because our behavior is impacting the whole environment, which is a highly complex system. No single solution is going to fix that. We have to learn how to think systemically. We have to assemble a set of mutually supportive solutions, each addressing a different aspect of the problem. To repair a damaged ecosystem requires both an awareness of complexity and an ability to create meshed solutions. …

The more I think about it, the more I suspect that this is our species’ current lesson. Think systemically. I recall that the Baha’i Faith teaches that humanity has evolved ever-larger social structures: individual to family to clan to tribe to city to city-state to nation, and now we’re supposed to be learning “The Earth is one.” Not necessarily a homogenous society, any more than the environment is homogenous; but part of a whole with an understanding that what affects one area surely impacts others as well. We can do this. The examples of how it’s done are all around us. The tricky part is, it means not just thinking outside the box, but dismantling the box and thinking in whole new dimensions.

http://ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com/315043.html

Photo: Uploaded on May 1, 2008 by lauren_pressley on flickr, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 Generic

My friend Pattabi Raman, who teaches and gives talks on systems thinking, would call the attention of the reader here to László and Whitehead -gw

Regard ye the world as a man’s body, which is afflicted  with diverse ailments, and the recovery of which dependeth upon the harmonizing of all its component elements.
(Bahá’u'lláh, Súriy-i-Haykal §152 (to Napoleon III), in The Summons of the Lord of Hosts, pp. 79-80. Haifa, Bahá’í World Centre, 2002.) Baha’i quotations on the environment

I read this morning that a chunk of ice the site of Manhattan is free-floating in the Atlantic now due to global warming. If this is a sign of affliction, I know the cure. -gw

Photo: Public Domain. Courtesy: National Science Foundation [via pingnews]

Thank you, Praveen, for this information. -gw

LazosLearning has partnered with the Foundation for the Application and Teaching of the Sciences (FUNDAEC) in Colombia to offer two of its courses online.

A Discourse on Social Action is a 12-week course that explores a few fundamental concepts that help create a discourse on social action such as the purpose of existence, human nature, and the relationship between the individual and social institutions. The course also emphasizes the importance of language as a tool that permits reflecting on experience in an orderly manner, and seeks to strengthen powers of written and spoken expression.

Constructing a Conceptual Framework for Social Action is a 17-week graduate-level course from FUNDAEC’s Education for Development program. The course explores a framework within which an individual concerned with the transformation of society acts and reflects on action, and is directed to students of social processes, people engaged in social action, and those whose careers are oriented toward service.

http://www.lazoslearning.org/en/offerings.html

In its efforts to promote learning through the diffusion of proven materials, LazosLearning is also concerned with developing approaches and methods related to the deployment of such content to global participants on a large scale, especially using electronic media. Specifically, the Association is striving to learn how to assist groups of individuals in different locations and with different backgrounds and experiences to study together online, while maintaining critical elements of reflection, discussion, and thought about application of concepts in action that characterize the in-person study of the same materials.

http://www.lazoslearning.org/en/about-us.html

Our new weekly drop-in meditation group, the Great Heart Circle, [is an] an experimental group in the Zen Peacemakers tradition, exploring our individual and collective living presence. We use Zazen, Buddhist chanting, relaxation and guided mindfulness meditations, partner exercises from theatre training, and study material from the Zen Peacemakers lineage.

http://ukzenpeacemakers.blogspot.com/2008/06/weekly-great-heart-circle-gets-going.html

Check out the picture with the post below. Warmth of spirit indeed! -gw

On Friday 29th August we were delighted to have a guest talk in our weekly Great Heart Community group by a couple of speakers from the Baha’i faith, Chris and Grace. Howard had met Chris by chance through a Baha’i plummer- he was in Manchester for two weeks training in giving introductions to their religion. Grace, from Kenya, has come to Manchester for a year to act as steward of the local Baha’i centre as a form of service. They gave a very full introduction to the history and outlook of the Bahais, and we were all really taken with their warmth of spirit.

I’ll bet they say this - “a website grade of 94/100” - to all the blogs. But appreciation is always nice to hear. Thanks David Henderson of Blog Strategies for bringing this site to my attention (and bringing me to WordPress, BTW, and for the great picture on my blog header). -gw

HubSpot’s Website Grader

Report for bahaiviews.net
September 03, 2008 at 12:21 PM

A website grade of 94/100 for bahaiviews.net means that of the hundreds of thousands of websites that have previously been evaluated, our algorithm has calculated that this site scores higher than 94% of them in terms of its marketing effectiveness. The algorithm uses a proprietary blend of over 50 different variables, including search engine data, website structure, approximate traffic, site performance, and others.

Thanks, too, to Barney for nominating me for the “I Love Your Blog” Award. The blogs he mentions in his post are all blogs that inspire me, too, each and every day. In keeping with the pass-it-on nature of  the nomination, let me spread the love. Here are my Quick Seven blog nominations generated in 0.7 seconds at 10:12 a.m. during my morning break here at work.

Flitzy Phoebie, my wife’s blog, a good place to start and an understandable acknowledgement, eh?

The Badi Blog, always good for my mental health and spiritual well-being.

Enochsvision’s Blog, a portal to captivating arts and imagery.

Seventy and Two. Age ain’t nothin’ but a number, but this radiant youth has taught me a thing or two.

Rooster In The Roaster. Hearth and home, Baha’i family life-style.

teaching.bahai.us. One of the most important blogs in the world, it might be argued.

Tacoma Baha’i Community. Again, an understandable choice. You go, dearly loved LSA secretary Gary!

Ask me again tomorrow, I’ll give you another great (to me, at least) list of seven. -gw

“The Future of Web Apps”

Imagine… -gw

A set of web services and widgets designed to make it easy for members and friends of the Baha’i community to locate those with common interests, engage in conversation and learning, and build communities.

- Found on the web

Photo: “Scott Beale / Laughing Squid”