Your Bucket List

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It is without doubt I have outdated my absence. And it is with doubt the stupidest thing I’ve continued doing.

Please do continue reading because without further ado, here is the 9th way of changing the world

Well, the theme seems appropriate – 21/12/12 is nearing isn’t it?

Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever. – Mahatma Gandhi (a law graduate from UCL)

The Definition

To “kick the bucket” is to die.

Now, when you create an entity that is to be used, you come up with a list of objectives that go with it. Same thing applies to you, dear homo sapien. When you were born, you came with a list of objectives to be done before you expire. Only most of it was not written on paper for you. With the ticking of clocks and swirls of time, a bucket list is in order. After we’ve turned to ashes (I know you’re not all Hindu) and have been forgotten by generations to come, it isn’t your name that would remain .. unless you were  John Lennon or Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (umm, please don’t get yourself assassinated) .. it is the actions you do that make the difference.

A Bucket List, therefore, is a goal-oriented list of everything you have wanted to do before you kick the bucket.

Ask yourself this:

• Have you found joy in life?
• Has your life brought joy to others?

Now is the right time to have one if you haven't still.

The point I’m beating around the bush about has to do with what has been going on recently in Japan and how you can help the thousands of people affected by it. No, you can’t pick up your shovel and head on there to help build new homes and schools but, rest assured, you can help by donating money to aid in restoring what’s left of the Japanese’s lives post-March-Eleven.

I’m actually going to do “a small action” later on today and hoping more of you can do the same to bring about change in one part of the world that needs us the most.

If you’re interested and want to be a part of other people’s lives, DONATE. Give people hope and assure them they are not in this alone and that the world is witnessing a change in history. Support the cause.

Not everything you do has to have you’re name tagged to it but it should touch upon other people’s lives.

Donations are collected in one of the booths (to the left of the stage behind the Ford) at the P2BK Exhibition located in Mishref fairgrounds – Hall 8.  Ask for a Ms. Hana (@japwaiti on Twitter).

One Click & It All Begins With YOU

Save this as a mental image.

You have probably never heard of The Hunger Site from before. Launched in 1999, the hopes of eradicating world hunger by combining the forces of the world wide web and all it’s visitors with just once click began.

YOU click on the “give free food” button. The donation (equivalent to one cup of food) is paid for by a sponsor to be distributed amongst hungry persons in over 70 countries.

YOU have the chance to provide 365 cups a year by clicking on it once a day. YOU can also be sign up for the free click reminder service.

Imagine the number of people YOU’ll be able of helping. Now multiply that by hundreds of thousands if YOU simply share this piece of information with everyone YOU know. Do it now using Twitter @TheHungerSite, facebook, passing out flyers, printing out a banner and hanging it from the roof top, and for those of YOU fond of sabotaging your car bumpers with useless numbers and letters (you know what I’m on about), share the website!

Twenty five thousand people die every day from hunger.

Eighteen thousand of  those deaths are children under the age of five.

YOU. Can. Change. This.

Make it happen NOW.

Accummulative Thoughts

January 4th, 2011

Do a litter walk with some friends.

With the many beaches we have been blessed with in Kuwait, pick up the litter you find. Make sure you wear thick gloves to avoid injury with sharp objects (broken glass, etc).

Or better yet start a “Stop Litter” campaign!

 

January 5th, 2011

Buy a travel mug and take it with you to the coffee shop when you crave that caffeine rush! how many times do you drink tea/coffee per week. How many paper cups go to waste? Even if they were recyclable, why would you want to have them recycled in the first place when you can just wash your mug?

Think about it

 

January 6th, 2011

Get people to stop printing out emails. Start doing this at school or your workplace.

 

January 7th, 2011

Befriend an elderly at دار العجزة.

• Have tea with them.
• Share experiences from the past and the present.
• Collect their stories of life long ago.

Stop Climate Change: Start Licking Ben & Jerry’s (no pun intended)

January 3^rd, 2011

The Science of Global Warming

The Impacts of Global Warming

The Government?

Strategies for Change

Are you craving that brain freeze now after all those brain farts? If so, click here and here.

Do It! Make Amends.

January 2^nd, 2011

There’s bound to be someone in your past life that you’ve hurt, someone you’ve broken up with – a single word unsaid, someone who has been there for you but you’ve regretfully managed to push away. You find yourself among a group of friends, talking about football on a lazy Friday afternoon, then you’re silenced by the thought of that person. Unexpected. Unforeseen.

Wanted? Subconsciously, yes.

They wouldn’t be lurking in the back of your head if it weren’t for that unfinished business!

So get off your butt and get on with it. Don’t expect  a “welcome-back” reaction from them. In fact, don’t expect any reaction at all. You’ll end up hurting yourself, cussing at 365wcw, and bailing out from day 2.

What matters here is getting it off your chest. Letting loose, and letting go. Starting anew with a clean slate, a new page, a new beginning. That’s exactly what’s needed to change the world: recognition, appreciation and reconciliation.

The Ingredients?

What you need: A little humility

Time invested: 10 minutes (minus the planning)

The pay-off: A clean conscience and a good night’s sleep

Easy, innit?

If Bill Clinton could do it on national television in front of millions, on behalf of the wrong-doings of his past government, I’m pretty sure you can pick up that phone, text or send that draft e-mail that’s been living on the remains of your Junk Mail.

What have you to lose?

New Year’s Resolution

January 1^st, 2011

Every dream deserves a fighting chance, and your chances begin today. They say never leave today’s work for tomorrow. That you should go through with your desires right there and then.

But who’s “they” anyway?

“No matter

Try again

Fail again

Fail better”

Samuel Benett, Nobel prize winner in Literature in 1969, was one of the “they”.

 

2011 marks the first page of your clean slate. Look forward to its remaining 364 days. Resolve to making a better start to your life.

How?

By jotting down some resolutions. And the first on your list should be:

1.       Changing the world.

 

Stop rolling your eyes, you’re making yourself dizzy with unnecessary extra-ocular movements going at 30km/hr. You’ve heard this phrase day in day out, season after season, and war after another.

Even though the world isn’t bettering itself with all the injustice, poverty, disease, famine, and wars that are going on, why should you care enough to change magnitudes of issues? Because it is your responsibility to resolve matters of the world by changing your life. If you change your life, and the person next to you is changing his, and the person you forwarded this link to changed her life, and the person reading this on a toilet seat began changing his life (I could go on forever) we begin by creating a powerful coalition that will invade and ultimately change.

Do not rely on the elders, politicians, rulers, religious figures, or your parents; they’ve had their chance. It is YOUR responsibility to shine..to speak up..to plan..to take action..to endure the repercussions of those actions..to re-plan..to pride yourself with the results..and to teach others along the way. So, today, commit yourself by taking this initial step of a promise. Write it down somewhere. Your mirror, wall, make a poster, a t-shirt for crying out loud! START. WITH. SOMETHING.

It’s the baby steps that matter. The means to an end. And your end is to bring about change in our world.

 

The best way to predict the future is to invent it.

Alan Kay

Hello World!

A new year’s revolution starts with a new year’s resolution.