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 By Stephen Dinan, founder and CEO of The Shift Network
The glorious weather of spring is upon us in California, a time of fecundity, rebirth (Easter today) and celebrating our beautiful Mother Earth, especially on the 44th anniversary of Earth Day (April 22)!
In honor of this time, we're delighted to be producing the world's largest Earth Day telesummit on Tuesday — with 12 hours of inspiration, solutions, and skills-training from top green pioneers plus human potential leaders and indigenous elders.
You'll be able to access leaders like Bill McKibben, Frances Moore Lappe, John Perkins, Andrew Harvey, Vicki Robin, Barbara Marx Hubbard, don Oscar Miro Quesada, Ocean Robbins, Chief Sonne Reyna, and dozens more.
The theme is "Turning Crises into Creative Solutions" and we'll focus on the positive solutions and the amazing inspiration of what is working around the world.
There are very serious crises facing humanity. At the same time, we ARE making progress in living greener and cleaner, and becoming wiser and more compassionate in the use of our precious resources. Too often, we focus only on the alarming trends (which are very real) and not enough on the positive solutions.
The Earth Day virtual telesummit is the kick off for 9-week positive action program as part of our full Spring of Sustainability, with groups like Sierra Club, Rainforest Action Network, and Climate Reality banding together to lead us into specific positive actions in major areas.
In this issue of the Catalyst, we focus on themes of sustainability with a heartfelt and compelling article by Hereditary Chief Phil Lane, Jr about the critical state of our Mother Earth and a powerful video message from Indigenous Peoples of North America and allies to President Obama (Headline Video).
Michael Brune, the Executive Director of the Sierra Club shares how the United States can move beyond fossil fuel by 2030. Kaitlin Sopoci-Belknap of Move to Amend Coalition shares an inspiring piece highlighting the environmental impact of the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling that "corporations are persons."
Lee Temple shares a lifetime of ground-breaking work and resources on sustainability. (See Member Profile)
May your spring be filled with beauty and reverence for the life we are given.. and specific actions that make a difference!
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Spring of Sustainability
The World's Largest Online Earth Day Celebration — ALL DAY on April 22, 2014, 8:00am – 8:00pm Pacific followed by a FREE 9-Week Action Program. To learn more, click here. |
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Obama's 50 Wounded Knees?
Acting as leaders in the role of caretakers, the Indigenous People of North America are rising to say no to the threats that can destroy our planet. An example is their commitment to stop the Keystone XL Pipeline. A video has been prepared to send a message to President Obama. We encourage you to inform yourself and advise others about the urgent situation we find ourselves in and join the Campaign to Protect and Restore the Sacred. |
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 The Critical State of Our Mother Earth
By Hereditary Chief Phil Lane, Jr.
Very Beloved Relatives,
More than 40 years ago during the early years of North American's "new" ecological consciousness, my grandfather, Vine Deloria Sr. had a conversation with one of his elder cousins on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in South Dakota. As his cousin loved to learn new words in English, he asked my grandfather to explain to him what the word "ecology" meant. "Well" my grandfather said, "you know, we have places where you can go and learn to read and study books. Then you learn how to write about what you have read about. Finally you learn to talk about what you have learned to read and write about! . . . [read more]
 All In
By Michael Brune
(Photo by Henrik Kam)
If we commit to it, America's electrical grid will be free of fossil fuels by the year 2030. That's only 16 years away—and it's a fix that will last forever. But first we have to kill off some zombies.
Lately I've been asking people, "Do you think we'll be able to cut carbon emissions enough over the next couple of decades to stop runaway climate change?" A lot of them say no. I don't agree with them, but I understand why they feel that way. When it comes to the climate, there's plenty of reason to be consumed by doubt and fear and resignation. The more you open your eyes to what's going on, the harder it is to have faith in humanity's ability to respond to this crisis. Almost every day, we hear more news from more scientists about the dark and depressing reality of climate change. And the near future is going to be even more depressing — we're going to be confronted by more and more evidence that the climate is destabilizing at a scale and a pace that we're not prepared for . . . [read more]
 Confront Corporate Personhood: Save our Planet
By Kaitlin Sopoci-Belknap
With the 44th anniversary of Earth Day, we have to look at why the health of the planet is at an all time low.
How many people do you know who would aspire for a world without clean water to drink? How many are in favor of acid rain, food poisoning, or natural disaster? What about asthma? Higher cancer rates? Starvation? Do many of your friends dream of a United States without our glorious mountain-scapes, deciduous forests, or glistening lakes? Would any rational person want these things for their country, their children, themselves? The answer, obviously, is no, they wouldn't . . . [read more]
For submissions and recommendations, email editor@theshiftnetwork.com.
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 Toward a Global Awakening
By Lee Temple
Challenging times. Solid science shows identical "hockey stick" trajectories of accelerating growth for human population, development, fossil-fuel usage, carbon emissions, natural super-disasters, and the number of climate refugees.
We already use over 1.5 times Earth's available resources, but still rely on growth-based economic, political, and behavioral models. To bequeath our great grandchildren a habitable planet, we must quickly unite across the globe to turn the climate crisis around. Life's future here now depends on it . . . [read more]
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Protect the Sacred – Indigenous Nations from across the United States and Canada and their Allies are working together to Protect the Sacred from the tar sands and Keystone XL. To learn more, click here.
Pricing Carbon: here an important NY Times article on many large corporations that are requesting the US government to put price on carbon and why. To learn more, click here.
Corporate Personhood: The other is a good article by Bill Moyers on how we can fight "corporate personhood" that has given corps. The ability to control the political agenda. To learn more, click here click here.
Sierra Club's Mary Anne Hitt writes a regular blog in the Huffington Post with up-to-date information, educational resources and ways to get involved. To learn more, click here.
The Living Universe Interview: Paiute Indigenous Elder Grandfather Marshall 'Golden Eagle' Jack In this interview Golden Eagle shares with us the wisdom of the star alignments during this energized month of April 2014…a month astrologers have been talking about for a long time and suggests ways to align with these energies to seed our prayers into the field and invoke our personal authority as powerful co creators of our world at this time. Click here to listen.
Breath Immersion – From Science to Samadhi – August 24–29 – Breath Immersion to explore leading-edge research and learn how to integrate and advance the power of breath into our modern world. Those new and experienced in breath practice are invited to participate in building a healthier world together. To learn more, click here.
The Fourth Annual Afterlife Conference! Portland, OR. June 5–8, 2014 – Learn about the world beyond death from mystics and mediums, ministers and medics, all under one roof during one amazing, life-altering weekend! To learn more, click here.
 Debbie Ford's final work, Courage: Igniting Self-Confidence – is now available in paperback. In Courage, Debbie provides a life-altering path to discovering confidence and authentic self-expression. Debbie wrote several bestselling books, including The Dark Side of the Light Chasers, Spiritual Divorce, Why Good People Do Bad Things, and The 21-Day Consciousness Cleanse. During her lifetime, Debbie Ford traveled the world conducting workshops and trainings that supported lifelong personal, emotional, and spiritual education and transformation. Debbie died in 2013 after her long journey with cancer. Her legacy lives on at DebbieFord.com and TheFordInstitute.com.
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2014 Catalyst: (#8, 4/20) (#7, 4/6) (#6, 3/23) (#5, 3/9) (#4, 2/22) (#3, 2/8) (#2, 1/26) (#1, 1/12)
2013 Catalyst: (#22, 12/14) (#21, 11/30) (#20, 11/16) (#19, 11/3) (#18, 10/20) (#17, 10/6) (#16, 9/21) (#15, 9/8) (#14, 8/25) (#13, 8/4) (#12, 7/21), (#11, 7/7), (#10, 6/16) (#9, 6/2) (#8, 5/12) (#7, 4/28) (#6, 4/14) (#5, 3/24) (#4, 2/24) (#3, 2/9) (#2, 1/26) (#1, 1/13)
Birth 2012 Catalyst: (#15, 12/9) (#14, 12/1) (#13, 11/22) (#12, 11/10) (#11, 11/3) (#10, 10/20) (#9, 10/6) (#8, 9/16) (#7, 9/8) (#6, 8/25) (#5, 8/16) (#4, 8/4) (#3, 7/28) (#2, 7/21) (#1, 7/14)
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Sustainable World Coalition is a coalition of individuals and supporting organizations who work toward a world that is environmentally sustainable, socially just and spiritually fulfilling. To learn more, click here.
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Ayla Nereo
By Eleanor Tara
Ayla Nereo's voice is uniquely magical and instantly recognizable. She delights her listeners with layers of vocal melodies and majestic harmonies as a solo artist, as one half of the newly formed duo, Wildlight, and as a frequent guest vocalist for her partner in music and love, The Polish Ambassador.
Ayla Nereo's 4th and newest album, Hollow Bone, was just released on Jumpsuit Records, and she recently shared this with her fans about the meaning of the album name: "To me, becoming a hollow bone is opening up to listen... to receive whatever the creative muses want to pour through us, and to give it as it is given. These songs arrived this way, and the entire record was recorded and produced this way: opening up and trying to really listen to how the songs wanted to be."
She listened well, because she has channelled an album that is both gorgeous and healing from start to finish. Her songs guide you along a prayerful journey that directly touches and opens up your heart and soul. Listen to Hollow Bone: click here. Ayla's Website: click here.
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