Living In My Own World

How to Live Greener Without Really Trying

Not all of us can throw our bodies in front of tractors that are about to cut down trees or walk around naked in a protest against fur… And you know what? That’s okay! Not all of us have to!

But its pretty naive to assume that if you cant join in on the bigger causes then any other effort is worthless. Ironically enough, getting more people to make smaller changes in their lifestyle can ultimately have a much bigger impact on the planet than joining in on the current minority of “tree hugging fanatics” as I have heard them been called.

Having said that, I am currently working on a new blog called Green Your Day which I hope will focus exactly on this: on the small, seemingly insignificant things we can all start doing TODAY for greener living.

Think of it as “The Lazy Person’s Guide to Greener Living”. Ideal for all those out there who think: “Yeah, but what could I possibly do about it?”

So anyway, check it out as I get this blog rolling and even more importantly: If you have any easy and/or fun environmental tips which you think might be a match for the site, please send them to me at livinginmyownworld@gmail.com and I promise you will get the credit you deserve.

Once again, thanks for helping me change the world one post at a time…

The Most Important Movie You Will Ever See

From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view.

The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world.

It’ll teach you something, it’ll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever.

Please, please, please put aside 20 minutes to watch this movie:

http://www.storyofstuff.com/

Thank you.

What Would You Do If You Weren’t Afraid?

What would you do if you weren’t afraid?

OK…

So…uh…what exactly are you waiting for?

This isn’t a dress rehearsal…

Wake up!

Here’s the deal: What we can be, we MUST be.

Period.

There’s no getting around that one.

So, turn off your TV. Put down your drink. Get off the medication.

Quit numbing yourself. The pain’s not going away.

Not until you thinkarete.

More »

Israeli Version of “Survivor” Premieres with Animal Cruelty

As I am writing this, the first episode of the Israeli version of the hit TV series “Survivor” is being aired on Israeli television (channel 10).

Having bought the rights to the show, it is so far a fair imitation of the original series, this one shot on the Caribbean Islands.

So far, survivors were split into groups and challenged to jump off a boat in the middle of ocean and get the game started.

What they were asked to do was swim to rafts filled with tools necessary for survival, grab as many as they can and swim back to their new individual boats.

So far so good.

What I didn’t see coming, however, was a couple of cages with live chickens amongst the items on the raft.

The participants of each group swam to and jumped on the cages trying to get a hold of them first, causing the chickens in the cage to panic. That was already a huge shock to me (because anyone who knows me knows how sensitive I am to animals) but if that wasn’t enough, the struggle over the cages caused them to open, the chickens fell into the water hysterically trying to swim and the contestants continued to fight over who gets the chickens!

The whole thing was just 30 seconds of chaos: people yelling, chickens panicking, feathers flying, water splashing…

At that point, I just burst into tears and ran out of the room leaving my husband in shock.

He knew how long I had been waiting to see the Israeli version, with all the promos and publicity the show has been having - but I couldnt help it! I just started crying in disbelief.

How is it possible, as we head towards the year 2008, that today’s society and media STILL allows this kind of mistreatment of animals!

And for what???? For rating????

I’m not proud of my reaction. I wish I could go on watching the show as if nothing happened (just like millions of Israelis are probably doing right now). I wish I didn’t take everything so hard and get so emotionally involved when I witness these kinds of injustices…

But I do. It’s just who I am. I have always been this way and I guess I always will be.

And so I continue in my personal (and sometimes emotionally exhausting) pursuit of a better world.

“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.”

- Mahatma Gandhi

UPDATE: I just saw a promo for next week’s episode where survivors argue over whether to kill the chickens. Apparently the show is called “Survivor” based on whether or not the animals on the island make it out alive…

YET ANOTHER UPDATE: This post gets on Ynet and makes a difference?Click here to read all about it.

The Write Way to Advertise

I love it when bloggers get creative!

Part-Time Blogger came up with a cool new idea to advertise your blog on a new website that’s sort of like the Million Dollar Homepage but with a human touch:

The website is called WriteAdvert.com with the slogan ‘Its the Write Way to Advertise.’

The concept is simple: you write your advert down on paper, take a photo of it and email it to me to be approved & published. There are 100 125×125 pixel ads available on the homepage for each calender month. Advertising is Free for November and December, when the month expires all ads will be moved to the monthly archives and kept on the site.

Get out the paper and crayons and grab this creative opportunity to bring more traffic to your blog. I already sent in my ads for Living In My Own World and ChangePerPost (see if you can find them!) and I have to admit I had a whole lot of fun the 60 seconds it took me to create the two ads.. Made me feel like a kid again!

You Know You’re in Israel When Every Day is a High School Reunion

I cannot get over the fact how often Israelis run into people they knew from their childhood in the middle of the street.

Everywhere I look, people seem to be “catching up on old times” with people they grew up with, went to high school with, served the army with, etc…

And it always seems so natural!

Just the other day my husband ran into a friend of his and they automatically starting chatting about this and that, what they’re up to, what they’re doing, about keeping in touch and then each of them casually went their separate way.

After they parted my husband said to me nonchalantly, “That’s funny. I haven’t seen him since second grade…”

I guess as someone who grew up in New York, I will never fully be able to comprehend this.

Because regardless of the millions of people that seemed to cross my path at any given moment, the one thing I could always count on was remaining completely anonymous.

What the World Would be Like if More People Walked Barefoot

Today my husband and I were walking home from a concert and my feet were really hurting from my shoes. Next thing I knew I was walking down the streets of Tel Aviv barefoot.

All I can say is: What a relief! I couldn’t believe how good and natural it felt. I honestly felt like I was connecting with the Earth, like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders. What was even more astonishing was that every person who walked by didn’t seem to give it a second glance. It seemed so natural, both to me and to the people who noticed, that it made me wonder: Why don’t more people walk around barefoot? And what would the world be like if we did? More »

The Lazy Person’s Guide to Cleaning the House

I love it when my house is clean.

I love the spaciousness that a clutter-free environment creates. I love to walk into my bedroom and see that the bed is made. I love the smell of a freshly washed floor. I love to see the kitchen sink empty. I love to see all my “stuff” neatly in place. And I love to sit down at my sqeaky clean desk and blog to my heart’s desire.

I really do love a clean house.

Unfortunately, what I hate… is actually doing it.

So the way I see it, I have two options: A) Get a housekeeper or B) Get over it!!!

While getting a housekeeper might seem like the easier solution, it’s definitely more costly. And the truth of the matter is that I tried it once and it made me feel really bad: not only did I feel lazy having someone else do the dirty work, but I actually found myself repeatedly apologizing to her for having to clean up my crap!

So what I decided to do was go back to plan B, only here’s the catch: I found a way of “getting over it” which actually works and is surprisingly (I can’t believe I’m saying this…) FUN! More »

Somebody Poke Me, I Must Be Dreaming

Somebody poke me: the government of Syria has made the move to block Facebook inside their borders.

According to sources speaking with Reuters, the official statement from officials is that they fear “Facebook could become a conduit for Israeli penetration of our youth”.  Critics of the government say that it is really to cut off access to the outside world. 

“Facebook helped further civil society in Syria and form civic groups outside government control. This is why it has been banned,” women’s rights advocate Dania al-Sharif told Reuters.

One Syrian confirmed on Digg.com that the block is in fact true, and that when he tries to log onto Facebook he gets the following message:

ERROR
The requested URL could not be retrieved
Requested URL:http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?
Error message: Access Denied
Administrator: webmaster@190.sy 

The “official” statement blames it on Israel, but as another Digger bluntly commented:

“Oh yeah, you wouldn’t want Israeli kids and Syrian kids to interact. I mean can you imagine? They might grow up to throw all the old racist, bigoted, war loving politicians out in both counties and actually get along in the future…Can’t f*ckin’ have that man. Gotta keep teaching them to hate each other otherwise who will they blame for all their left inflicted religious, social and economic problems?”

or as another digger puts it:

“It is sooooo typical of Syria to blame everything on Israel when in reality they just want to keep their community as ignorant as possible so they can control it better. just sad.”

or my personal favorite:

“Israel should just send a ‘friend request’ to Syria.”

So Syria can try as hard as they want - and they are definitely trying, including blocking off Hotmail and other websites - but the truth of the matter is that any person who truly wants to speak out and get heard, will always find a way to speak out and get heard.

That’s why it seems to me that dictorial regimes cannot last for long, once the people they seek to control and govern understand that they are the “oneness” that holds such governments together.

Or as Neale Donald Walsch puts it, in his book, Tomorrow’s God: Our Greatest Spiritual Challenge:

This is exactly what has already happened in the former Soviet Union. The people there understood that their solidarity was where the power was, not with the government, and so an oppressive government was ultimately dismantled, because it could not survive.  It was glasnost and perestroika that opened the door for this.

The same thing is what brought down the Berlin Wall, ended the regime of Slobodan Milosevic in Yugoslavia, and truncated the reign of countless dictatorial, oppressive governments and leaders.

Dictatorships will never be possible when the mass of the people are educated in, and embrace the basic principles of [freedom] and people will accept nothing less when they realize that freedom is the natural state of all things.

So call me a dreamer, or call me crazy, but I can only hope and pray that the people of these countries will continue to find ways to educate themselves and others, and that the light of freedom will one day shine upon their people.

Together, WE ADD UP

The climate crisis is real and it’s happening right now. Yet, it’s so easy to feel helpless and overwhelmed. People keep asking, “What difference will changing my light bulbs really make? The problem is so huge, and I’m just one person.” I always try to explain to whoever is willing to listen how every little bit counts and I also try to find and promote other websites and/or organizations that can help to get the message across.

That is why I am so glad a stumbled upon a new website called WE ADD UP.

WE ADD UP is a new global campaign that uses organic cotton t-shirts that literally “count you in” the fight against global warming. It was created by mother-daughter team Judy Pezdir and Jill Palermo who represent the type of people who are crazy enough to get a vision and follow it through.

According to their website:

Our goal is to get millions of people around the world counted in and committed to helping stop global warming. With our combined effort, we can create a healthy, thriving world for generations to come. So, get counted in. Because you + everyone else = change.

The interesting approach they take is that every shirt is printed by hand with a unique number. YOUR number represents your place in the sequential global count of all the people who are taking steps to help stop climate change - a perfect opportunity to show the people around us that we don’t really have to do it alone… That we’re all in this together!

As the count grows, they demonstrate to the world how “WE ADD UP.” On the back of each shirt is a word or phrase that describes an action almost anyone can take to reduce their carbon footprint on this planet, such as Unplug, Lights Off, Carpool, Shower Together, Hybrid, Bike, Buy Local, Recycle, Demand Change and 16 others. You choose which action you are committed to doing and then instantly get counted in with your own unique number! I think it’s a very creative (and hopefully, very effective) idea.

I also love their motto:

“No one can do everything. Everyone can do something.”

And in the end, WE ADD UP.

People of Israel: Remember Who You Are (Video)

Somewhere along the way we have forgotten who we really are and what it is that we really want.

I made this short video in hope of helping us all remember before it’s too late.

Before commenting, please keep in mind:

I am a Jew was born into the Jewish religion and I am Israeli. I am proud of certain things that this religion and country represent and yet, believe it or not, I am also aware of the fact that 1) We are not always right and 2) Others are not always wrong.

Having said that, while I respect everone’s opinion and will always allow freedom of speech on this blog, I will not tolerate comments that promote hate and/or racism.

All I ask is that we respect each other.

Thank you.

Top 50 Things They Don’t Tell You in the Job Description

Scott Adams from the Dilbert Blog gave his readers an amusing assignment: “describe your own job in one sentence, preferably in a humorously derogatory way.” He must have hit a soft spot because hundreds of readers jumped at the opportunity to tell it like it is. Check out some of the best replies from among the hundreds, with my top 10 at the end.

(UPDATE: I’ve also added the Top Ten Digg Responses)

My Job Is To…

1. Read things that don’t matter, then write papers saying they do matter, for points that don’t matter, in order to get a job doing something totally unrelated: Student
2. Take numbers on pieces of paper, rearrange them and put them on different pieces of paper: Tax Accountant
3. Explain big words to sales people and then cower before customers while trying to convince them that the sales people really didn’t say what the customers understood: Customer Solutions Engineer
4. Learn laws created ages ago so that I can tell engineers why I’m smarter than they are while complaining how it’s a travesty that they get paid more: Physics major
5. Show you innovative ways to burn money in the spirit of patriotism: Fireworks Stand Manager
6. Help people lie consistently to their bosses: Business Intelligence Consultant
7. Teach your kids enough to complain but not enough to make a difference: College Teacher
8. Stand on a field and get yelled at for hours: Baseball Umpire
9. Make people who are already filthy rich somewhat richer by duping poor people into buying stuff they don’t need: Corporate Software Engineer
10. Find as many synonyms for “explosion” as possible: Novelist for Teenage Boys
11. Supervise the guys and gals who try to protect the good people from the bad, only to be hated by the good people AND the bad: Police Sergeant
12. Watch the lunatics take over the asylum: Teacher
13. Manage waste recycling, promotion & sales: Antiques Dealer
14. Arrive after the battle and bayonet all the wounded: Auditor
15. Sell gas: Energy and Telecom Business Analyst
16. Tell forty year-old men it’s okay to behave like fourteen year-old school girls: Printing Press Production Coordinator
17. Make corporate propaganda feel like folksy truthisms: Tv Ad Director
18. Shepherd clients through the process of setting their products on fire: Consumer Products Tester
19. Manage urban renewal and pest control: B-52 Bomber pilot
20. Persuade kids that it’s really fun being wet, cold and scared out of their minds: Sailing Instructor
21. Draw up plans for something that will not be built according to those plans: Civil Engineer, Transportation Design
22. Teach kids to be evil…or so they say: Video Game Creator
23. Ensure that stupid people stay in the gene pool: Lifeguard
24. Do all the tasks nobody else wants to do: Admin Assistant
25. Wear a tuxedo and smash metal plates into each other: Musician
26. Go to strange people’s houses and take their money: Pizza Delivery Boy
27. Sell gluttony: Cinema Concession Stand Attendant
28. Tell people that they can’t spend money they thought they had: Government Analyst
29. Take pictures of the unlucky and the stupid: X-ray Technician
30. Profit from the misfortunes of others: Cops and Courts Reporter
31. Take a simple two-way promise and turn it into several complicated one-way promises which neither side can understand or hope to fulfill: Lawyer
32. Bring a little rain into the lives of flood victims: Government Debt Collector
33. Have people spend far more than they estimated: Building Inspector
34. Make sure nothing ever happens: IT Security
35. Move things from one tube to another: Microbiologist
36. Clean up an animal that makes more money then me in a year: Assistant Horse Trainer
37. Make people feel bad about their work: Quality Assurance Tester
38. Be a human napkin: Stay-at-home mom of three
39. Make food that is as healthy before it goes in your body as when it comes back out: Fast Food Employee
40. Repeatedly fix what you repeatedly break: IT Director   

My Top 10

1. Help people hate each other: Divorce Lawyer
2. Talk in other people’s sleep: College Professor
3. Try not to kill the baby: Housewife  
4. Show people how beautiful the Earth would be without them: Mountain Landscape Photographer/Climber
5. Copy and paste the Internet: Student
6. Write words that no one wants to read: Technical Writer
7. Misinterpret the universe: Astronomer
8. Spend most of the day looking out the window: Pilot
9. Run away and call the police: Security Guard
10. Sell magic potions filled with psychotherapy: Bartender  

(Adapted from the original list found on jobmob.co.il)

UPDATED: Top 10 Digger Responses

1. Ruin the economy, start multiple pointless wars, make every other country on earth view you as an aggressor: President of the United States
2. Every week, remind people that they will be doomed for eternity unless they do as he says: Priest
3. Act calm and reassuring while stifling the impulse to gag at bad breath and tooth rot: Dental Hygienist
4. Assure people that the $70 standard definition DVD player they are about to buy will look 100x better with a $120 video cable and swear on my mothers grave that even though neither will ever fail that it’s still a good idea to get a 5 year extended warranty for another $100: Fry’s Electronics A/V Salesman
5. Make people equate inconvenience to safety: Airport Security
6. Slowly go insane while trying to explain to people why their expired trial copy of Norton AntiVirus 2003 let viruses get on their computer: Computer Tech
7. Get a transferred phone call and asks the customer the same questions that he’s already been asked by the first guy he just talked to: Tier 2 Technical support.
8. Run back and forth blowing a little whistle for 90 minutes only to receive 90,00 death threats: FIFA referee
9. Tell people they’re not crazy: Psychologist
10. Bring sites down: Digg

Feeling motivated? Try your creativity in the comments below.

When Was the Last Time You Skipped?

What do you mean ’skipped?’

You know….SKIPPED!

The hippity hoppity gallop that came naturally to us as children, but that the majority of adults haven’t done since they were ten…SKIPPING!  

Like Dorothy and the gang did arm in arm down the yellow brick road….SKIPPING! 

As in expressing joy by leaping happily down the street without a care in the world??

There have been times when I have snuck in a little skipping as I walked down the street (though on the rare occasions that it happens it is usually because I’m so gitty with joy and full of energy that I swear I can’t control myself.)

And whenever it happened to me, it always felt so good, so natural… so RIGHT!  

But then, of course, I force myself to stop because I feel like I’m doing something illegal… Like it’s illegal for a grown person to skip!

Which made me question: Where did it all go wrong???

Well according to one website:

Skipping down the road is something that is surprisingly challenging for most adults to do.

In order to do so, you must be willing to let go of your fears about what other people think about you. You must defeat your own inner critic that says “People will think you are crazy” and choose to let your childlike spirit have some fun.

If you can find the courage to do so regularly, you will be amazed at the feeling of freedom it can bring to your life. When the judgment of others is no longer an issue, magical things can happen.

I skipped into the living room and asked my husband when was the last time he had skipped…

He couldn’t remember!!!

So, how about you?

Living In My Own World… Or AM I?

Yesterday I received the following email from a new reader (welcome Gina!) and felt inspired to answer it here in case others out there have similar questions… Here goes:

Someone at work keeps telling me I’m living in my own world (?) I don’t get it, so i searched online and up came your site!  You have a beautiful soul.  Can you tell me what it means to live in our own world? is it good? 
 
Also, about “the only message you’ll ever need“. That is so cool. How do you tell someone or give that message to people? 
 
long live happiness.
gina

First of all, Gina, thanks for the kind words and thanks for reading!

For me, it’s like this:

In the beginning (of time) I would get frustrated because I felt like I didn’t fit in or that people didn’t understand me… As I wrote in my little introduction text on the sidebar, I always did what I felt was right (a typical Indigo) and yet somehow my thoughts, opinions and dreams of a better world, just didnt seem to please society around me… I was pretty young when I realized that I was alone in this; that me and the ‘real world’ were just not on the same page… and I have to admit: it was tough.

Then, as the years went by, and I grew to know myself more, I slowly came to the conclusion that I liked myself for who I was and that I was sick and tired of trying to adjust myself to fit “inside the box.” I became proud of the fact that I was different and that my views on life were different. Because if following my heart meant that I was living in my own world, well then gosh darn it: SO BE IT!

That was then. 

What is happening now, however, (and this took me a while to comprehend) is that in the past 10 years or so, especially due to the age of Internet, I have been gradually awakening to the fact that maybe I’m not so alone in this after all!  So many people out there seem to be craving the same things as I, fighting for what they believe in, being the change that they want to see in the world and educating and inspiring others about it (through personal weblogs, sites like Zaadz, etc…).  So many more than I ever thought possible… I mean, you people are EVERYWHERE! 

And thanks to all of you, I realize now that I am not alone. None of us are alone, because we are all in this together…

Sorry, I didn’t mean to get all sentimental on you (ok, well maybe I did…)  So anyway, back to your other question:

…about “the only message you’ll ever need“. That is so cool. How do you tell someone or give that message to people? 

Well first of all, I’m so glad you asked this, because it shows that you care. It shows that you have what it takes to make a difference in this world.  So how do you tell others that you see them as they really are? How do you spread that love, that healing?

It’s simple:

By first seeing yourself for Who You Really Are. Even when others do not. Especially when others do not.  Because to see this in yourself is to change the world.

(Thanks, Gina, for crossing my path…)

How Microsoft Took Away My Freedom of Choice

Did you know that it is impossible to create a folder called CON using Microsoft Windows??

Everytime you open a new folder and try to change the name, it will automatically go back to ‘New Folder’…

Go on, try it - I know you want to.

Weird, right? But before all my conspiracy theories get out of hand, big brother is watching, etc.. I decided to do a little research and found this article:

It is in fact perfectly true that you cannot create a folder named “CON”, nor can you rename an existing folder to “CON”. However, there is no mystery surrounding this restriction whatsoever. The “team” at Microsoft, and a great many others besides, know perfectly well why you cannot name a folder “CON”. “CON” and a number of other character strings are in fact reserved names that go back to the days of DOS and cannot be used to name folders or files. Other reserved names are:

PRN

AUX

NUL

LPT1

COM1

Potential drive letter - A: to Z:

A number of others

 I have to say, I feel kind of *conned*… I always assumed that I could name my folders anything I wanted.. the possibilities were ENDLESS… the world was at my feet…

And now THIS.