
Nov 17, 2023 KarunaNews: This Small Finnish City Will Be Carbon Neutral In Just A Few Years Lahti, a Finnish city about an hour of Helsinki by train, was once a polluted industrial center, but over the past few decades, it’s been working to become more sustainable. In 2019, it set a goal to become carbon neutral by 2025; the city is now likely to hit the target a year or two later than that, says Elina Ojala, Lahti’s environmental director. So far, the city calculates that it has cut emissions by 64% below 1990 levels. To help make it easier for residents to drive less, the city is building more bike highways; it already added new bike parking, a bike repair station, and shared e-bikes. Community groups are getting on board too. The local hockey team has stopped flying to games in other cities, and nudges its fans to walk, bike or take public transit to come to games; he local symphony orchestra is doing similar things. In total, the city is tracking more than 113 different sustainability-related actions and the work is embedded throughout the city. “It has been our goal in the climate work to really make it a common thing for the whole city and that people feel like they have a role in that,” Ojala said. Read the full, inspiring story here.
Nov 15, 2023 KarunaNews: 'Island Of Peace': Berlin's Israeli-Palestinian Restaurant That Won't Give In To Fear In the midst of recent surges in antisemitism and Islamophobia, owners of an Israeli-Palestinian restaurant in Berlin decided to re-open as "an island of peace". Jalil Dabit, a Palestinian, and Oz Ben David, an Israeli, are friends who own Kanaan, a restaurant that serves a menu representing the "best of both sides". The Israeli-Hamas war has taken a deep emotional toll on both Dabit and Ben David, but they have chosen to support each other and provide a safe place for people affected by antisemitism and Islamophobia. Dabit and Ben David will also soon meet with Germany's president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier to share ideas on ways of reducing tensions between pro-Israeli and pro-Palestinians. “If you are closing up, you are surrendering to terror,” said Ben David. “We will not agree to this kind of language of fear.” Read the full story here.
Nov 14, 2023 This week's Awakin reading is by George Saunders titled 'Mistaking The World We’ve Made For The Real World': The instant we wake the story begins: “Here I am. In my bed. Hard worker, good dad, decent husband, a guy who always tries his best. Jeez, my back hurts. Probably from the stupid gym.” And just like that, with our thoughts, the world gets made. Or, anyway, a world gets made. This world-making via thinking is natural, sane, Darwinian: we do it to survive. Is there harm in it? Well, yes, because we think in the same way that we hear or see: within a narrow, survival-enhancing range. We don’t see or hear all that might be seen or heard but only that which is helpful for us to see and hear. Our thoughts are similarly restricted and have a similarly narrow purpose: to help the thinker thrive. All of this limited thinking has an unfortunate by-product: ego. Who is trying to survive? “I” am. The mind takes a vast unitary wholeness (the universe), selects ... [Read more] Seed questions for reflection: How do you relate to the notion that we mistake the world we’ve made with our thoughts for the real world? Can you share a personal story of a time you became aware of your thoughts being within a narrow, survival-enhancing range? What helps you see and hear more than your projection?
Nov 13, 2023 At the sacred Mt. Hiei in Japan, Miyagi-san, Yuka, Kotaro, Yuko, Michelle, Don, Pom, and so many others are helping put on a gathering of indigenous wisdom from around the world -- to respond to the unprecedented crises of our world, with a collective heart of service!
Nov 12, 2023 For the last week, bunch of us have been immersed in our local communities across Vietnam, from Awakin Circles to Karma Kitchen to public events, with so much love! Yesterday, we finished a 2-day retreat on a farm 2 hours away from Saigon, with a very diverse range of participants from permaculture farmers to energized urban youth to prominent authors (like Dr. Giang) and inspiring social entrepreneurs (like Jimmy, who has spent decades uplifting street populations) to successful business people to Dean of a 6-thousand student college to some really solid volunteers ... even though few of us didn't speak Vietnamese, we all felt like brothers and sisters by the end of the retreat: The language of love communicates everywhere in the world! :)
Nov 11, 2023 Our friends at Soul Force are hosting an online concert today featuring Jewish, Arab and other musicians coming together for Gaza humanitarian relief benefit. *This Sunday Nov 12th 5pm (PST)* *Peace Now Online Direct Concert Link* (Concert to benefit Doctors without Borders in Gaza.)
Nov 11, 2023 Schumacher Institute announces the Jem Bot: As a curiosity and in tune with the times Jem has created an AI JemBot. You can engage with the ideas and text of the book ‘Breaking Together: a freedom-loving response to collapse‘ with the help of an AI provided by the organisation Service Space. This is one of the first contemporary non-fiction books made available in this way. It is provided with the aim of making the best use of technologies while we still have them. See: https://jembendell.com/jembot/ To access all 80+ bots on ServiceSpace, visit https://ai.servicespace.org
Nov 9, 2023 KarunaNews: The Zero Waste City: What Kiel In Germany Can Teach The World
Nov 6, 2023 Kathrin, a ServiceSpace volunteer in Austria, is serving local projects in Gautemala and was quite moved to see their flavor of 'heartivism' recently. "This journey was all about cultivating peace from the inside out, as I have wittnessed indigenous people saying no to coruption and supression after 300 years in a very peacefull way," said Kathrin. "They recently had elections and very suprisingly a man won, who is supporting the Mayans and their ancient culture a lot. His dad already did as a president 50 years ago helping them coming out of slavery. The other party, which lost, had contested the election result and out of that they started to block the roads. Over some weeks it was like a lockdown situation in certain areas. How the Mayans were blocking the roads deeply touched me." See photos of these very special cermonies for peace below.
Nov 3, 2023 KarunaNews: A Meeting Of Jewish And Muslim Women Gives Me Hope