Recently, I had the opportunity to join an inspired group convened by visionary Bobby Fishkin to plan 
Visionaries & Revolutionaries Day (Saturday, Jan 25) on the closing weekend of the Dissident Futures Exhibit at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco.  

We generated 100++ ideas in a brainstorm. Refined these into an action packed schedule including scenario planning, climate change meme healing, mapping collages, vision boards, building utopias, a revolution booth, a hold up, performances and more! 

If you can't join in person, you can follow our tumblr of digital artifacts from V&R Day at Dissident Futures at YBCA. 

12:00 Kickoff 

“Make your mark, share your vision-- the start a revolution booth” led by Kyle Stewart & Kate Michi Ettinger [Lobby 12 - 6]

• Utopias: Lost & Found: Co-create the future of Utopias Lost and Found. Collaboratively create the future of society in the lobby of the YCBA. Use your imagination build your Utopia and watch your vision change between entering the show and exiting the building.

• Share your vision-- start a revolution: Share your vision for humanity and the revolution that will help us get there. In < 5 minutes create and publish your story, share it and find co-conspirators to ignite your revolution

“Break-down Barriers to Break-Out Your Revolution” Booth led by Tara Samiy, Marlena Zahm and Amanda Leitner 

• Drop in to create vision boards from 12 - 2 in Conf 1

1:00


“Stories of the Future-- a scenario-planning workshop” led by Lina Constantinovici 

• 2 Hr Workshop in YAAW that will develop vignettes for the 4:30 finale performance
  
  

“Hold up for CauseRoot: part of Worldwide Hold Up Day” led by Chris Geraghty & MakeSense Gangsters 

• 2 hr Workshop in Conf 1 ... More Details: FB Event for the CauseRoot Hold Up 

2:00


“Cut and paste your future: a collage” led by Bobby Fishkin & Maya Belitski 

• Drop into to collage a map of your future from 2-4ish 
  

3:00


“Climate Change Meme Healing” led by Lazlo Karafiath (90 minutes) 


“Cut and paste your future: a collage” led by Bobby Fishkin & Maya Belitski (Ongoing drop in 2 - 4:30)



4:00

• YBCA special performance by Myra Melford and Ian Winters in the Galleries 4-5pm

4:30    Finale Performance: Visions of the Future in the Screening Room

• The day's public V&R activities will conclude with a performance of Visions of the Future, produced by Lina Constantinovici
  
• Followed by a tour of YBCA

Hashtag for the day: #V&RFutures
Follow our Tumblr for digital artifacts: vratybca.tumblr.com

You may RSVP on our FB event, or message an organizer to join the V&R guest list! Please bring co-conspirator friends! 

This public program is organized in conjunction with the group exhibition Dissident Futures which is currently on view at YBCA until February 2, 2014. Dissident Futures is an investigation into possible alternative futures, particularly those that question or overturn conventional notions of innovation in biological, social, environmental, and technological structures.

Visionaries and Revolutionaries is a creative community with members representing a diversity of disciplines, who come together to share the ways in which they solve social problems that they care about in imaginative ways. Through this series, social innovators can explore the intersection of their aspirations for world change and learn from each other's diverse backgrounds in art, science, and technology.

Schedule Confirmed.  For details on the workshops click on Read More.

Last January, the effervescent writer and life coach MeiMei Fox published 40 Days of Joy: A Happiness Practice on her inspiring HuffPo blog: The Life Out Loud.  The post went viral as people took up the challenge to cultivate joy in everyday life sharing their adventures on Twitter with #40daysofjoy  Inspired by the idea and reminded of the wisdom that a great year is made up of great days, I decided to make a gift to share the 40 Days of Joy practice with a friend.  I realized that forwarding the post wouldn't be enough to prompt action, so I decided to prototype a gift for 40 Day of Joy. Here's the what/how/why. 

Step 2: Determine the prompts.  I worked from MeiMei's original post and interspersed a few of my own joy prompt ideas. I also made a stash of extras just in case the prompt of the day didn't sit well with my friend. Any action is better than no action when cultivating a new habit. 

The most challenging part of this project was figuring out how to make it "aichaku" (a "love fit" as the brilliant John Maeda explained beautifully in this post), so that participating daily in this practice is easy and enticing.  I wanted to design a beautiful and joyful experience - a ritual action with positive reinforcement and visual feedback so that one wants to do it again and again.  All too often we start these feel good practices, yet they fall by the wayside amidst our busy lives and other pressures.  

Step 3:  Decide on the means of the daily prompt.  

I found these little clasps with colorful strings and attached one clasp to each prompt card to be pulled off a hook one day at a time, then placed in a jar of joy.  I used a simple glass jar for all the finished prompts.  Since it's clear, it can be a decorative reminder of the joys cultivated and may also serve as a repository for beginning a new 40 day journey. 

Another alternative idea was to cut a small cork board canvas to sit on a miniature easel.  Each day, one pulls a card from a pile, then pins it onto the cork board with colorful pins. I suggest to see what you find around to repurpose or what you discover when you go to the store.  Think about what would engage the recipient most- if they are avid on twitter or facebook, perhaps inviting them to share their joys prompts or activities with the #40daysofjoy community.  I am curious what other ways you hack this gift to meet the recipient's rhythm, so please comment and let me know what you do.

Time will tell if the design works as a love fit for this friend. Today is Day 1 and I've already heard the first joy prompt is "skip" and the first step to any practice is to begin...  

Wish you joy and a skip in your step! 

One of my favorite practices is to begin the year with a reflection on the big moments of the past year - sights seen, people met, things accomplished, lessons learned.  2013 was a team year, so it is fitting for this to be a public celebration.  

In January, my passion project the Hapa-Hafu Kitchen Project published the HKP blog.  With 2 hapas, 2 hafus, 6 passports, 10 countries of residence between the three of us, fusion fun in the kitchen was delight-filled! Beginning in 2010, we met irregularly, experimented wildly and ate decadently.  Along the way, we were hosted by culinary artist Diana To, Star Anise Foods founder Karen Cheng, and Quisting's Kitchen Christine Fong. Our team learned that we prefer cooking to blogging, but we buckled down to document out culinary adventures because Reika Goh, one of our core HKP team, returned to Singapore this year.  Since cooking together won't be possible, we may cook something up digitally over at Global Culture Kids... stay tuned!

At Startup Weekend Transmedia organized by transmedia talent Alice Gillet, I joined the team of social innovator Shauna Nep from LA2050.  In 54 hours, our rockstar team, including Brooke Estin and Michael J Coren, built an app to enable citizens to share  visions for LA in 2050 on multiple media platforms. To inform the design, we got out onto the streets of San Francisco to interview people about the city and to learn about engaging people to share their visions for the future.  Our app won an Audience Award!

From 39C in Botswana to -6C in Berlin, it was complete temperature-culture shock, but an absolute thrill to return to my beloved Berlin to kick off dotHIV's ethics-infused policy advisory board.  dotHIV is a pioneer.  The only social purpose enterprise in the top level domain (TLD) market (TLDs are .com, .org, .edu).  dotHIV will sell websites that end in .hiv - as a digital red ribbon; funds will create a foundation to support grassroots and technology-centric HIV/AIDS initiatives. For awhile, I have held the question whether there is a lateral application of my bioethics expertise in decision support that applies to social entrepreneurs navigating uncertainty and negotiating values conflicts at the intersection of money and meaning. Carolin Silbernagl, the passionate and visionary co-founder of dotHIV said, absolutely!  Together we designed the scope, roles and function for the policy advisory board and its commitment to create a roadmap for other social purpose ventures that seek to enter this market.  Carolin engaged an outstanding advisory board including Patrick Ryan, Megan Yip, Joan Irvine, Pavel Richter, Laurindo Garcia (not pictured: Michael Bouldin, Philip Grabensee). Thanks to the dotHIV team and advisory board for an epic beginning!

This summer, I had the chance to work on an exciting research project for the Goldhirsh Foundation with social innovation visionary and impact rockstar Tara Nell Roth and social media diva Shauna Nep.  Working with highly driven and high performing teams is an exceptional privilege-- especially when the focus is on building better futures.  I also met up with makers, nomadic developrs, and 3D printing designers with inspiring projects to create change in the world!  And most importantly, I had great times with family and old friends.

Family Moment: Participating as one of 3 generations of Sanmiyas tree climbing on Manitoulin Island.  Thanks to my cousin, Toby Sanmiya for taking us to new heights. You can climb with him next time you're in British Columbia, check out Elementree.  Lesson: Together we can reach new heights, and it helps to have an experienced guide.

Epic Moment: Our project, OpenQRS, was selected as one of 39 projects from 650 to be semi-finalists for the Knight News Challenge: Health.  With the launch of OpenQRS- the idea of my TEDx: Integrity by Design turned into an open project. Thanks to everyone for your support - we rocked audience engagement on the Knight platform! 

Special shout out to our amazing team on this proposal: Laura Thierry (visual communication designer), Maite Hernandez Zubeldia (first follower catalyst and operations), Julian Muresianu and Nukomeet on (tech development), Walter Karlen (device adviser), Marigo Raftopoulos and Ben Stokes on game design, Indy Johar and Rachel de Sain (enterprise advisers).

A month of firsts:

• First time to Singapore!
  
• First time to Hong Kong! 
  
• First mother-daughter vacation!
  
• My first MakeSense SenseCamp and Hold Up in Asia! MakeSense is a global network passionate to support social entrepreneurs solve challenges. I participated in Hold Ups on 4 continents this year, the MakeSense impact is truly global!
  

December brought the chance to move forward by standing still.  Sometimes in the rush of goal setting and pushing to make things happen, it seems an anomalous approach to set the course forward by just being where you are.  The decision to respond to the "what's next" question with "I'm standing still to figure that out" was met with a surprising amount of support from my social entrepreneur peers.  Entrepreneurs live in uncertainty and the normal response is to do, learn and iterate through the unknowns.  This December, I opted to resist that constant pressure to move forward- show your drive, set goals, tick off to do lists, and execute by creating space to stand still.  It's counter cultural yet I find that it is a powerful practice that yields great rewards. Inspired by a visit from my friend Jan Stewart, who is the founder of the School of Space and was in SF for the Search Inside Yourself Leadership Institute course, I was reminded about this intentional stopping to sit in the messiness of the unknown. It afforded me time to catch up with mentors and to stumble on serendipitous encounters that set a beacon for what lies ahead... TBC!

Spectacular Morning:  Seeing a pod of dolphins in San Francisco! My first visit to Fort Funston for a walking meeting. Many thanks to the delightful and multi-talented Eugene Kim for capturing the dolphins on this beautiful morning and creating this perfect parting shot for 2013. (Click here to zoom in) Shared by Eugene Eric Kim under a CC BY-NC-SA 2.0