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Showing posts from 2014

Who do you think about when you're alone?

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The view from my outdoor hotsprings water "bathroom" this month in Pai, Northern Thailand While my kids are away with their dad this month, I've rented a small house in the mountains north of Chiang Mai, near Pai - a lively and lovely small town that we've visited before. I am on my own with the intention to disconnect for a while. Since arriving 4 days ago, though, one lingering issue keeps disturbing my peace.  Some dear friends of mine in Uganda are facing a serious crisis.  What remains of the Life in Africa I founded in 1999 is a tight-knit group of self-empowering war-affected women who live in Kampala's displaced Acholi Quarter. After years of working together to learn skills that would serve them whenever they managed to move back home to Northern Uganda, the land in the displaced camp/slum these women live on has now been sold for commercial development. They now need to move back to Northern Uganda urgently, which is causing quite a lot of unrest

Slowing down to see eye to eye

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The Ci2i Global group never ceases to soothe and amaze. If we've done nothing else together in the past 3 years of regular working group calls, we have developed a beautiful culture of being together in community with each other, even if we are spread out on all continents of the globe. What we continue to learn from each other - about our work and about ourselves - is an important source of inspiration and energy for all of us as we make our respective marks in the world.   I wrote about our most recent call at the Ci2i blog, where - among other things - we reminded each other how important it is to take each time for ourselves and slow down in order to maintain a sense of peace and presence.  See the post: LEARNINGS FROM A VIRTUAL CIRCLE OF CO-CREATIVE IMPACT PRACTITIONERS Enjoy the deep wisdom of these amazing social impact-driven women. 

Milestones, eras, shiftings

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It's just us 3 next year... From my facebook: So graduation festivities are over and much else has begun, or is in motion. My 3 boys are at this moment in the sky on their way to Holland and the US for the summer, marking the end of an era for our joy-hunting family - chances are high that we will never again all live under one roof as the 4 of us. Single mom of 3 boys is no longer part of my identity, as my first born leaves to live as a you ng man on his own, in another friggin' country, no less! I will see him again before he takes up residence in the Netherlands, but his stuff is with him in the air now - except his awesome sculpture class work, which just couldn't be packed It feels milestone-like, happening in the midst of more shifts happening (and asking to happen) at different levels. Only hours after the boys were gone I was coming together back to back with the  Evolutionize It  Board and my beloved  Ci2i Global  working group in skype gatherings that fel

My belated birthday wish for a new Life in Africa

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My birthday was yesterday, so today I am celebrating the successful launch of my 48th year on this planet, and the re-launch of a crowdfunding campaign for my dear sisters at Life in Africa. These are some LiA Members who recently learned to grow mushrooms together. They're part of a group of 35 war-affected women who are now urgently seeking funds to help deal with  another forced family displacement. Please know that your support to this campaign at any level will feel like an invaluable gift to me personally. If I could just give these ladies $15,000 myself, I would. I have known them for 15 years, and they are like sisters to me. They are soon to be homeless and really need the power of their networks to pull through for them now - not to mention that they are a wonderful group and their plan is a good on. This all means I'll be appealing more directly to everyone I know on this one than I normally do.  You're invited to a facebook event page where we can fol

What if the Happy song and video memes came with more actual happiness in the world?

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Pharrell Williams' 2014 hit Happy song and the  24 hours of Happy  video have sparked a meme that's even more fun for high school kids than the Harlem Shake was in 2013. Graduating seniors at Chiang Mai International School have danced their goodbyes in a Happy montage, that keeps me grinning ear to ear (and not just at the moments my oldest son is in it!) But Pharrell Williams isn't the only force moving us toward greater happiness these days. Fascinating new research on happiness is now available, about what it actually is and how it actually comes to be in our lives. The "Happy" movie is well worth the $2.99 to rent it . Right after I watched it I made my kids sit down and watch it with me - the practical information in this little gem of a movie made an immediate impact on our lives. Happy - A Documentary Trailer from Wadi Rum Films on Vimeo . Another inspiring must-see if you value happiness is the Economics of Happiness documentary rel

Co-creative learning from Piglets for Progress Phase 1

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Last week a friend and I  invited the Mae Sot trash dump community to share their experience and learnings with each other about raising pigs, in order to surface the practical gaps to be addressed in planning for a possible Phase 2 of the Piglets for Progress initiative.    What they shared offers a super interesting read, with fascinating insights that I'm still chewing on.  Read more  at the  Piglets Blog   about the event and how we facilitated the conversations between 100+ people whose language we don't speak. 

Fire at the Mae Sot trash dump

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There’s a crisis with the air quality at the Mae Sot trash dump that is affecting both the families and the pigs. The people are not able to work, which means there is now also a food crisis. A number of pigletsforprogress supporters are working together on facebook to do something helpful.  Gratitude to those who've contributed for a delivery or rice and cooking oil - details of the group effort are in the comments here:  https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10152699139078242&set=a.89826248241.108359.504778241&type=1&theater

My Career Case Study - presented at the Learn/Share Lab for co-creative impact and innovation

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. . View the presentation Soon to be online at Ci2i Global , I've written about the work I've been doing for the past several years as a case study. Click the image above to see the presentation I gave about it. The text below appeared in a booklet of case study background information which participants at Ci2i Global's  Learn/Share Lab for Co-creative Impact and Innovation  also received earlier this month.  -------- Career case: designing frameworks for co-creative international development Presenter: Christina Jordan @christinasworld Learn more :    Lifeinafrica2.org | Evolutionize.it | ci2iglobal.com | pigletsforprogress.org   Ci2i Global Founder Christina Jordan’s career as a serial social entrepreneur in international development has spanned several continents, online spaces, container organizations and initiatives to impact globally marginalized local communities since 1999. She is also a passionate activist for collaborative professi