Sunday, July 28, 2013

Gig in a BALLROOM.

Here I am for a whole week facilitating all day workshops in a fab ballroom like Downton Abbey. Wow.
Bit the humans give me the biggest 
W O W

Saturday, July 27, 2013

Grooming Video - danger for Young Humans.






Social workers raise online grooming fears


Unidentifiable young girl using an iPad


Many social workers lack confidence and know-how when it comes to dealing with online grooming and sexual abuse of children, a survey has suggested.
The British Association of Social Workers (BASW) said they desperately needed specialist training.
An online survey of 327 social workers found 74% wanted more support, while half felt concerned about dealing with online sexual abuse or behaviour.
One said social workers were "way out" of their depth.
Warning signs
Almost three in four of those surveyed said they needed more support with child protection cases which involved "an aspect of online and complex sexual abuse".
The survey also found:
  • 17% did not know how to "assess the risks" to a child when there was an "online dimension", such as internet grooming, to the case
  • 20% said they did not know the "warning signs" of what online sexual abuse looks like
  • 43% lacked confidence about the language used by young people talking about the internet, and more than a third said they did not know the right questions to ask in order to identify and assess online abuse
"The number of cases in which the internet plays a part in the grooming and abuse of children is rising," said the BASW's Nushra Mansuri.
"Social workers need to be equipped to recognise the warning signs."
Grasp the basics
One of the social workers, who wanted to remain anonymous, said: "I have worked with a young girl who experienced horrendous sexual and violent threats via her mobile phone... and it was very difficult to know how best to proceed."
Another said: "We are way out of our depth and training measures are needed without delay."
The NSPCC charity said it had developed an online training guide for child protection professionals - backed by the BASW - to educate them about the risks the internet posed to children.
Chief executive Peter Wanless said paedophiles were using chatrooms and social networks to groom victims, adding that young people were being "coerced into sharing explicit images of themselves via mobile phone messages and apps".
"It's worrying that the majority of social workers surveyed by BASW are struggling to understand how online child abuse happens," he added.
"We know they are doing a tough job under pressure and shouldn't need to be technology experts but they do need to have a grasp of the basics."

Friday, July 26, 2013

Great Interview with Beccie D'Cunha the new Greenbelt CEO


Beccie D’Cunha Greenbelt CEO

'We need to focus more on young people and young adults'
Click to enlarge

This is a picture of me in Jerusalem in May, where I was doing some facilitation work with a team from the UN Relief and Works Agency, which provides services for Palestinians in refugee camps in the region.
I went to Bethlehem, for the first time in over ten years, to visit an inspiring organisation called the Holy Land Trust, which Greenbelt supports and which was organising its inaugural Bet Lahem live festival in June.
I was shocked and angry to see at first-hand the eight-metre wall that now cuts Bethlehem off from Jerusalem, and the economic, social, and cultural hardship it has caused. Many streets that were bustling on previous visits are now ghost streets.
I've been CEO of Greenbelt for just seven weeks now. The job involves leadership and management of the staff team, strategic development of the organisation, business development and financial oversight, working with the board of trustees, and generally ensuring the organisation runs smoothly.
It's a very significant time in the life of Greenbelt. This year's festival is our 40th. It will be a creative celebration of Greenbelt's journey to here, and its vision for the future - and a great birthday party, of course.
I hope that Greenbelters will increasingly take the spirit of Greenbelt back to their communities, so that we can build a movement and be far more than a great festival. We've already begun this journey with various events we are hosting or collaborating on throughout the year.
My first experience of Greenbelt was about 20 years ago, when I was in my teens. Greenbelt had moved to Deene Park in Northamptonshire. I attended with friends and my older brother.
I loved the atmosphere. We saw The Proclaimers and Midnight Oil, and spent a fair amount of time in the Tiny Tea Tent. Otherwise, I must confess that my resounding memories are of running out of money, and hitching a friendly ride to the coach station at the end of the festival with my friend.
I think we need to focus more on young people and young adults.There are a lot of loyal attendees who have grown up through the festival - some of them for 40 years - but to have longevity, we need to appeal to more young people to get them along.
Also, people see Greenbelt as a one-off fix to give them nourishment and inspiration; but we'd like to make it happen all year round. There's a real freedom and creativity in the festival, and people are free to be themselves in this quite magical space created by the staff and volunteers. But I think there are opportunities to develop an online community where people can get inspiration and ideas year-round, and to create smaller-scale events which mirror that creativity and bravery found at the festival.
Every year is so unique. I often choose a different theme for myself each year. Sometimes it's literature, other times dipping my toe into diverse expressions of worship. At other times, I enjoy the music, or just spend time with friends soaking up the atmosphere. My highlights from recent years include Billy Bragg, Herbaliser, Kate Rusby, and Courtney Pine (who is returning this year), Nitin Sawhney, Shlomo, and the Austin Francis Connection (also returning this year), Pádraig Ó'Tuama and his mesmerising poetry, spiritual direction and Ignatian meditation in Soul Space, hearing Jim Wallis speak (he's back this year, too), and learning to Lindy-hop.
I went to various Christian festivals when I was younger, but for me Greenbelt is completely unique. What has always appealed is the diversity of beliefs and traditions, and the brave and exploratory nature of the talks programme.
Before, I was working as director of a management consultancy,TCM (Train. Consult. Mediate.), which specialises in mediation and in helping varied organisations to handle conflict more constructively. We trained and coached managers and leaders in conflict resolution, as well as in wider leadership skills. TCM has a staff team of around 20, and my role involved managing the operations and the people, as well as developing products, quality assurance, sales, and client-relationship management.
Before that, I worked in campaigns, on a variety of social-justice issues, in particular the arms trade. Alongside this, I did various volunteering roles, including community mediation in Hackney, where I live.
I grew up just outside London, but my mum is from Northern Ireland and my dad is from India; so I have always had an interest in the world, social justice, and conflict issues. I'm a middle child, and I think this may have started me on a path to becoming a mediator. I remember hours spent rescuing stray animals or even injured insects.
My parents were both Catholics, and I always went to church with them till I was ten. We started going to a house church through my teens; I went to a Baptist church at university; came back to Hackney and went to the URC church because it was local to me; and attended an evening congregation called fEAST (very creative, small congregation, focused on justice and community and eating together).
My husband had always been an Anglican; so we started going to St John-at-Hackney, and I now feel a real affinity with the Anglican Church.
I really love being able to go to sing Taizé songs, and then celebrate at a L'Arche community event, and then pop in and see the Franciscans, and go to a Moot meditation, when I'm at Greenbelt. My first real job after university was for SPEAK, a campaign and prayer network focused on students and young adults. I'm a bit old for them now. We used to put on creative services at Greenbelt: prayer and liturgy with some kind of campaign action.
I definitely feel more drawn to contemplative prayer than I used to,and have hopefully learned a bit from Ignatian spirituality. I'm definitely an off-the-scale extravert, but know contemplation and retreats do me a huge amount of good.
From an early age, I aspired to be an artist, and spent most of my time reading, drawing, and doing crafts. While I decided to give up studying art at 18, and focused on English literature instead, I have continued, albeit sporadically, to draw and paint, with a particular love for life drawing.
I tend to see the opportunities in situations; so I am not someone who, often feels regret for what has passed. One regret I do have is that I am now in my mid-30s, about to have a baby, and have not yet learnt to dance the Argentinian tango.
I've been really influenced by Anabaptist thinking and theology, in terms of commitment to peace, justice, and integrity. I first trained as a mediator with Bridge Builders, which is a Mennonite organisation, and found inspiration in Wood Green Mennonite Church. They have a real focus on living in a community, and commitment to working through conflict openly, which most churches don't get right.
Training with them shaped my outlook and my working life in so many ways. They helped me shift from being an often angry campaigner to a less judgemental campaigner, willing to listen to those who oppress, as well as to their victims.
It is difficult to name a favourite place, but among my favourites are the Old City of Jerusalem and the bustling souks, and the Amalfi Coast, where I spent my honeymoon. But it's hard to compete with a spring day walking through bluebells in a wood in Kent, the garden of England.
One of my favourite books has to be The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. I love the art, music and literature of the '20s and '30s. It is hard to find a more beautiful and poignant tale of love and longing.
One of my favourite books of the Bible has to be Isaiah, and chapter 58 in particular. The "true fast" of breaking the chains of oppression inspired me as a student to become a campaigner.
I'm happiest when I'm spending time with friends, neighbours, or family, often in east London. An ideal weekend would involve a lazy stroll round a local market, a picnic on my beloved Hackney Downs, and a pint or three in one of my local pubs.
If I had to be locked in a church with someone, I'd choose Henri Nouwen. I've always loved the L'Arche movement, and The Wounded Healer has been a source of inspiration for me. A lot of my work has been around mediation and non-violence, and there's something powerful in his writing about being a non-judgemental presence for people in their woundedness. You can't always change everything, but listening is sometimes enough.
Beccie D'Cunha was talking to Terence Handley MacMath
from the Church Times.
www.greenbelt.org.uk

BLOB MASLOW - an activity with developmental objectives



BLOB MASLOW 
- an activity with developmental objectives 

Where I am today ..... becoming.


I am away for a week this forthcoming.

I guess I will not be blogging much.

"The only normal people 
are the one's you don't know very well"
Alfred Adler 
I will be Leading workshops at the  Adlerian Summer School.

ADLER WEEK out in Dorset - a region I am not familier with.
I will be leading a group every morning - same group all week.
DITTO every afternoon.
Two different groups of BHP's
Details here  http://bit.ly/11EVxjX

I don't know anyone who will be there.
I met a couple of the leaders about a year ago.
They must think I fit the Adlerian culture
even though I know little about Alfred Adler.
What I have read seems to fit with Pipology - where I am.
I am always moving 
so where I am always seems to come out as I facilitate.
I learn about myself as I learn with others.

Usually I am invited to lead a course or week-end for a team,
organisation, school, group of young people.
They have organisational visions, missions, values.
This event is made up of a collection of individuals, 
with some regulars and totally new to this event I guess.
So I don't know who they are, what they do.
Exciting but a different starting point.
I have planned a start but the week thereon ........
will be designed around needs and desires as we progress.

The venue seems to be a great place.
I look forward to being and becoming 
with everyone present.

I am now at my desk with lots to do.
Lists and lists.
Before me, always before me, are some stickers with names on.
Certain BHP's in my life who I offer to the Divine daily.
Serious accident, life deteriorating condition, residing in prison .....
and more. 
I feel, as I click, for their differing tragic circumstances.
I-sort-of weep because of them. With them.................

Also touching my inner depths are certain people who are so 'set'.
I am thinking about facebook contacts of mine.
I have recently read a comment
'cus I am white'

There are so many I know, and deliberately keep in contact with,
who are bitter against people of 'other' faiths, 
even they seem to have little themselves.
It also hear their hate for people of colour.
Bitterness and forceful whilst highly promoting the English flag.

I try to understand them.
not hang stereo type labels around their necks.
Asking myself 'why they 'feel' like this'.
It hurts that BHP's can be like this.
I still believe in their beauty and value.
I dislike their behaviour and words emanating out of their hearts.

Moving on from these disturbing feelings ........
I want to feel disturbed ........... I don't want to avoid .....

I am aware that I am getting older - like you.
But aware that I am getting closer to becoming completely spiritual!
I am trying to keep fit including eating healthy - 
so difficult for the poorest in all parts of the world.

I always want to be working
work hard - play hard ....... always liked that!
But aware that as you get older it is not as easy to be active.
I have been on my bike three days this week.
It is always a challenge for me to leave undone
to peddle out ...... and I am such a fair weather biker.

Ending with some words I composed this week - 
(I Tweet and Facebook
this sort of stuff - 
details somewhere on this website)

This one is about how it is so easy to have our emotions triggered
so we end up behaving like the person who upsets our feelings.
Do you decide how you will react under pressure?

Here is my thoughts put into a few words::


Nasty. 
Put downs. 
Aggressive. 
Rejection. 
No matter how others behave 
I will live and communicate 
as I have decided 
and not to change 
because of another persons behaviour.
#YouAreBeautiful

Greenbelt short videos - come - see you there.


A great selection of Greenbelt YouTube videos here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsSOxN6EBEw&list=PLsETO-87Lu1MBEBY4wvO6VR08c2baOOQG

Jobs from around the nation - ymca and beyond.



JOBS JOBS JOBS
JOBS JOBS JOBS
JOBS JOBS JOBS
PASS THEM ALONG
GREAT NEEDS OUT THERE
JOBS JOBS JOBS

Wednesday, July 24, 2013

ROYAL BABY BLOB - FREE DOWNLOAD from Blob Tree.



FREE DOWNLOAD
ROYAL BABY BLOB
Some ideas for use - I am certain you will have your own.

 In a group context.
Hand a copies around or display as a projected image.
Get everyone to say where they are on the Blob Tool - and why?
How do you feel about the Royal Baby-world?
How will this baby's life differ from your baby or a baby you know in your family/community?
Get everyone to share a baby story, their own, in their own family or a neighbours? 
Talk feelings. Stories. Learn from the experiences of others.

 
In the workplace.
Stick one up near the water cooler/coffee outlet.
Ask everyone to add their name next to a Blob which best describes their feelings about Baby Royal?
It can be fun abut self revelation is always good in terms of relationships.




I would like you to do something for me.



I would love you to share this with your networks
www.blobtree.com

A beautiful human unknown in Covent Garden.



I was in the Damson Cafe my favourite hangout in London town.
You can see all sorts of characters, I meet many of them, but some stand out from a distance.

This guy walked into the Cafe. Bright blue suit and dapper hat. WOW I felt.
He then popped out and sat in the sun and was framed in the Cafe window.
I couldn't resist a snap - one of my Pipturesque.

It has become a favourite of mine.

Beautiful human unknown.

I would rather know you ........

Bono says he is particularly annoying when he feels most vulnerable.



An interview with Bono, who shared his views on faith, family and his activism. The 25-minute interview was recorded last month at the American Bible Society in Manhattan. Bono spoke candidly about Jesus being a punk rocker, David being a blues singer with his Psalms, and the justice-mindedness of the New Testament. Much of what Bono spoke about has been previously covered in his interviews with Willow Creek Association's Bill Hybels and his forward to the Book Of Psalms. Bono admitted that his arrogance comes from a sense of insecurity, and that he is particularly annoying when he feels most vulnerable. You can listen to the interview from Focus On The Family's site.

Tuesday, July 23, 2013

How Bono sneaked into the Greenbelt festival in disguise, to see Bruce Cockburn play.


Bruce Cockburn: Pacing the Cage is a moment of reflection on Bruce Cockburn’s career

Bruce Cockburn.
Handout
Bruce Cockburn.

Pacing The Cage
Rating:


Director: Joel Goldberg
Writing Credit: 
Genre: Documentary
Duration: 70 minutes
Release date: May 24, 2013
Synopsis: A documentary on the life of iconic Canadian musician Bruce Cockburn.
There’s a story of how Bono, in the early 1980s, sneaked into the Greenbelt festival in disguise, to see Bruce Cockburn play.
Who is Bruce Cockburn?
The producers of Pacing the Cage(Cockburn’s manager Bernie Finkelstein and Joel Goldberg, who also directs) require just over an hour to answer that question, as much to feed existing fans of the musical artist as for those uninitiated.
“Zen songwriter, singer, activist, psalmist,” the early Bono pronounces in an interview (so young he hasn’t got his trademark sunglasses yet), after reciting the lyrics of “If I had a rocket launcher” from memory as though speaking Dylan Thomas verse. Scenes like these Pacing the Cage more than makes the case for Cockburn as poet, as any listen to any of the folk-rock icon’s songs might. On their 1987 album, U2 would also allude to the famously evocative image from Cockburn’s indelible “Lovers in a Dangerous Time:” “Got to kick at the darkness ‘til it bleeds daylight.”
But the documentary is also about Cockburn as mystic, romantic troubadour, excellent guitar player, prophet and political activist. Michael Ondaatje praises his poetry; fellow songwriter Sylvia Tyson opines that he’s done all that while preserving his soul.
And all this, before the opening credits.
That sort of gives you an idea of who Bruce Cockburn is in Canadian culture as a performer, and in the international songwriter community. Who Bruce Cockburn as a father, perfectionist or otherwise? Not really.
Cockburn, who turns 68 next week, comes across overall as self-deprecating. About his skill on the axe (“I play pretty good guitar for a lyricist”) and about how he has lived down being a folk-rock icon long dubbed ‘the Bob Dylan of Canada.’ His manager calls him a ‘working musician’ and when he recounts a story of jamming with West African superstar, it’s not immodest: it’s to share an anecdote that illustrates his regret at not being a better father to his now-adult elder daughter.
Throughout, montages and images in Super 8 are the shorthand typical of road movies — the flickering of steel bridge beams overhead, of blurring past the tour bus windows, of the highway’s broken meridian lines disappearing below. If you know songs that capture that experience, it’s probably because Cockburn’s written them.
The album “All the Diamonds,” is recalled as the turning point, when Cockburn decided he was a Christian, with close-up of his journal at the time (pages he recently donated, along with 31 other notebooks, career papers and ephemera, as a collection McMaster University) that mention Jesus and not wanting to be perceived as a Jesus freak. As what Cockburn calls a rich “body of myth,” Christianity isn’t the only worthwhile one out there, he says, whether one reads the Bible or romantic love or humanist care into his lyrics, or the Buddhism, Beat literature and existential influences Cockburn cites as influences. The songs work regardless of one’s particular political of spiritual affiliation (although admittedly, “Lord of the Starfields” and “Festival of Friends” are frequent fireside circle songs at Bible camp).
It’s also a doc about Cockburn as mentor (to next-generation singer-songwriters such as Sarah Harmer), activist (fundraising concert for child soldiers with Roméo Dallaire) whose first overtly political song, the one so coveted by Bono, was born from a visit to Guatemalan refugee camps and “out of a sense of outrage,” Cockburn says, written “in a hotel room with a bottle of whiskey.”
Although there is a lot of footage from his 2009 solo tour (sometimes entire performances, just a guy onstage singing, with his guitar, aaaahh), it’s not a concert documentary, and although peers, friends and fan experts weigh in, Pacing the Cagenot a biopic, a eulogy or as flattering as it is, even really a tribute. If anything, it’s like the space between songs on an album, a moment of reflection. A persuasive pause in a career of perpetual creative motion, before the next song.

A personal poem from my friend Alise

ABOUT
her sister


PROMISE 
The days go by so slow. 
Never ending. 
Never sharing. 
Never trusting.
The road you travel, can be Your friend and enemy.
You just got to take a chance. 
And jump.
Wait and see for what happense, won't help you.
You just have to help, and make Things happen yourself.
And let People around you, that care about you, in. 
Before its too late. 
You can do anything, as long as you believe in yourself.
And People around you believe in you. 
Nothing can stop you, except yourself. 
You thought me that. 
I love you and miss you a lot
You are one of the strongest persons I knew.
And I am going to keep my promise. 
I wont give up.
Because you are in my heart.

Like we used to say and the last thing I said to you: 
LolololololololololololololovlovlovlovlovlovlovlovloveloveloveLOVE  

By Alise Ellevset to Stine Røøyen Ellevset
23.07.2013 

new U2 album ‘most exciting release’ in years


Gavin Friday says new U2 album ‘most exciting release’ in years

U2’s thirteenth album could rival ‘Achtung Baby’


U2's new album rumored to be great
U2's new album rumored to be great
Photo by Google

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Gavin Friday, who has been named a consultant by U2, said the Irish group’s upcoming album is their "most exciting release since Achtung Baby” back in 1991.
The Herald reports that Friday was given an exclusive first listen to U2’s thirteenth album months before it is due to hit shelves.
I've heard the new album and it certainly is a development. U2 turns corners very quickly and what hits you is how fresh it sounds. With Edge involved, there is still plenty of guitar," Gavin told the Herald.
"They asked me what I thought and I told them I really liked it. It's definitely their most exciting release since Achtung Baby."
The Herald goes on to reveal that Friday, a long time friend of frontman Bono, came up with the title of early U2 single 11 O'Clock Tick Tock. However, Friday hasn’t lent much creative help to the band since.
“U2 have plenty of their own ideas for song titles," he said.