The Global Event Trend

Yes, this blog design has changed. I was tired of pink.

I just learned of Live Earth, a music show set to take place over 24 hours in seven locations around the world on July 7, 2007, featuring top artists and sponsored by the people behind An Inconvenient Truth such as Al Gore.

I think the global event trend is picking up speed. That makes sense, given the state of the planet.

I can tell that some people I connect with are not especially impressed by this kind of thing, among them many socially active people. I respect that. A global happening is not everyone's cup of tea. Certainly the "Think globally, act locally" movement has immense value.

Yet some people, myself included, are fascinated by thinking globally and acting globally. When a bunch of us around the planet organize ourselves with a shared intention and express ourselves to that effect, connecting in realtime or near realtime to do it, this rivets me. I feel as though this is why I'm on the planet at this time. And it's practically a cliché now: global connecting is more accessible than ever before.

I remember being a child of five growing up in Wisconsin, imagining I had a friend in China, an exotic place I had never been to. I saw in my mind's eye a little girl wearing what I thought was Chinese clothing, and she was thinking about me at the same time. I felt so connected with her. This was probably inspired by the conviction held among neighborhood kids that China was on the other side of the planet, and if you dug a hole deep enough, say with a spoon, you would get there. I would see that hole and walk through it to meet this girl. Maybe my friend is out there somewhere, now age 42, wondering when we will meet in person. Please come say hello if you're reading this!

My first conscious fascination with global community experiences came a few years ago when I participated in a Planetary Dance of Anna Halprin's on Mount Tamalpais in California. That event started in the late 1980's.

Clearly the Beauty of Water design is influenced by predecessors such as these.

Wikipedia informs me that in the mid-80's, the first Live Aid concert was held in a manner similar to the Live Earth concert, raising funds for famine relief in Ethiopia. I was in college at that time and the concert wasn't on my radar. Indeed now the Live Earth concert doesn't draw me to participate. But I'll enjoy reading about it, and I am excited it is happening.

NEW and Improved Concept Paper

The new version of the Beauty of Water paper is now available from http://www.alignmentconsulting.org/downloads. I am waiting to announce this widely until the email address embedded in the paper is functional and until I receive and can implement feedback on the paper itself. I am interested in readers' thoughts and ideas. Please send them to me at lizabehrendt at yahoodot com until the other email address is ready. Thank you!

The Water Project => Beauty of Water

The Water Project is now Beauty of Water. Thanks to all who helped select a name. Here are excerpts from two contributors in the selection process:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Water:
is life
origin of life
is that which shapes the earth and gives it beauty through its geology,
topography, flora and fauna
has a duality: soft and yielding, flowing, controllable, the source of
all
life; hard, powerful, destructive
is universal- scientists think of it as the sine qua non of any kind of
life.

(Some life can live w/o air, directly (like gilled creatures), but no
life can
live w/o direct contact with water...)

thebeautyofwater
waterascreator

Art:
is an act of creation
is universal
effects change, so it can be creatively destructive
is a reflection of ourselves (water reflects)

Art is water, water is art
art of water, water of art...
art and water, water and art
ars, aqua (latin)
Art from water, water from art....

hm... just playing around with these... I like thebeautyofwater too.

from Tse-Sung Wu

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Yes, I like Beauty of Water. I'm trying to think of a name that evokes all the other things about water, in addition to it's beauty, but that's a tall order. And of course "beauty" can mean a lot more than just how something looks. I get that. And it could even be said that "beauty" does evoke all those other things -- things such as power, necessity, life-giving, life-taking, magnitude, Godliness, fearsomeness, gorgeousness, generosity, basic-ness, scarcity, abundance. You know, all that. I guess "Beauty" really can hold all that within it.

from Sarah Behrendt

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Renaming The Water Project

The past few weeks I've been adjusting to the new job at the health club. I work six days a week, and on the seventh I go skiing. Actually last weekend I went to my dad's in Milwaukee to see my sister Sarah perform in a play ~ excellent!

I have a good first draft of the new version of The Water Project concept paper. I will post it here soon. It emphasizes the collaborative, global, and artistic aspects of the project. It may not satisfy the urgings I receive to make it more specific for potential funders. I agree that will be needed. At this time, though, I am doing my best to midwife unfolding qualities that necessarily build on developing momentum. This is happening. It won't be too much longer before we can create financial structure. We're getting out of the embryonic stage.

Meanwhile, my good friend Terry Berger, producer of most of the early photos I posted through this blog, and of several photos in the paper for The Water Project, made a home page mockup. Thank you Terry! It was exciting to see this materialize. He also created a lovely website for the Indian artist, Santhan. I helped a little partway through, but Terry made it happen. Terry's own website is worth looking at, too. He is doing unbelievable work in India.

The title "The Water Project" was always meant to be a working title, to be renamed by people involved in the project at some point in its evolution. Well, that time has come, driven by the need for a domain name. I spoke with the keeper of thewaterproject.org, a pastor named Peter, who has extensive experience in internet marketing. Long story short, we each support each others work ~ take a look at what they are doing, it's great ~ and we hope to create a partnership of some sort in the future. For now, though, I'm prompted to get our "The Water Project" a new name.

Here are the top candidates at the moment.
thebeautyofwater.org
bethetide.org
projectartesia.org
quenchingart.org
liquidexpression.org

Please feel free to send me your opinion! My email address is available in the concept paper.

Oh, and last but not least, I have been connecting a bit with a US American artist who is interested in the project, and is already doing related work in the San Francisco Bay Area. We'll see...

Humans as Water

I am also in deep inquiry about WATER, water itself. I have a lot of internal messages telling me to sit with water, Be with water, and explore it on multiple levels. When I go there even just in my mind, I pretend I am a rippling lake, or a meandering river. I feel my weight as a noisy waterfall, or the weightlessness of water streaming upwards in a city fountain somewhere. I expand and become rain, falling onto the ground, forming puddles that children splash into with rubber boots. I am snow, silently floating down onto a mountain. When I imagine how these forms of water feel, personified, I become free, fluid, happy, danceful, and spiritually high. I get that this is important toward guiding The Water Project and understanding its power. We are all water.