These two are my superpower–they’re my secret weapon to living a life of joy and meaning.🌈
We tap into energies 24-7.🌌 Energy is in our daily environment: our living and workspace, the food and information we consume, the people we surround ourselves with, the conversations we have. When we’re deliberate about the kind of energies we send out and let in, we get to supercharge more effectively.
💜 On Purple Day, turn to your human energy centers. Who are they who renew you and keep you charged? Are you connected to them? How often do you plug in and recharge?⚡️
To live in a disconnected city means to be naturally predisposed to feeling disconnected. Your daily commute is unpredictable, your social life is jagged or effortful to maintain, and your inner world is subject to the same disconnect. On the flip side, to live in a connected city gives us a natural feeling of being connected, plugged in, and alive (because we’re connected to ourselves).
I’m thankful to live in İzmir, really a beautiful coastal city known for its public transportation system. The whole stretch if Izmir from end to end–about 300km–is easily navigable via buses and trains.🚉
We rode the İzmir tram today with our 5yo. She loves trains and it was a joy to see her enjoy this simple part of our everyday life here. Asked if the tram station is beautiful, she replied, “Yes, it has grass.” 🌿
Our environment has such a big role in nurturing our habits, mindset, moods. “No man is an island” doesn’t only apply to our innate need to connect to people, but also to our connection to the outer world: our living space, work space, home, neighborhood, city.🛤
💙 On Blue Day, take a look at how connected (or not) your city is, and how this affects you and your everyday life.🚗 What can you do about your living environment to nurture beauty and inner connection?
We’re rewatching Mamma Mia with all the feels because we’re over here in Foça, Turkey across the movie’s beloved island of Kalokairi, aka Skopelos, Greece in real life.🏝 We now get to swim in the same Aegean coast, feel the same summer heat, and eat the same food and fruits as Donna, Sophie and all their fun friends.
The Dancing Queen scene tugs especially different this time. Meryl Streep makes her way to the beach and local women follow behind her, awakened and caught up in the moment of dance. Even our daughter dances to it with extra umph.💃
This is a powerful scene, now made extra special because we can relate to Kalokairi. We feel connected to it. The physicality of space and environment has made Mamma Mia real for us.⛱️
Now that @leadiagrowth Festival is coming closer, we’re rolling up our sleeves and readying our own parade.🌈 The energy that we’re putting in this parade is the energy of possibility.🌬
Very excited how İstanbul will amplify this, making it real and new at the same time. Space has energy. People have energy. Gatherings have energy.⚡️
💙 On Blue Day, I invite you to review the parades that you’ve signed up for–this year, this month, today. What kind of feels do they awaken in you?
When a group of people share a common interest and decide to pursue that interest together, you have a community. And today, there is an unprecedented level of participation and engagement made possible in communities through tokens.
Over the weekend we connected with Murshida and Zeal, amazing entrepreneurs from Singapore and Malaysia, who have a vision of a sustainable community of inspired and like-minded conscious entrepreneurs, very much like the vision of Montalut Creative Communities. They’re the husband-wife team behind Love and Respect: Coaching for Change. And what’s amazing is that they’ve already covered two big steps in their project: acquiring the land, and building the community of like-minded entrepreneurs who want to do good.
The resonance was so strong in listening to them share about their project, and we very clearly saw how they could superpower their community by tokenizing it.
The idea was new to them, and we were very happy to share our experience about it in the simplest way possible.
Disclaimer: I am not a tech or legal expert, and ideas shared here are from a conceptual point of view, meant as a basic start to a deeper dive into tokenization.
What is Tokenization?
Let’s define some terms first.
Blockchain
There’s no talking about tokenization without talking about blockchain.
When I first “met” blockchain in 2017, I was blown away by the possibilites of a distributed, transparent, and immutable system of exchanging value, such as money. Blockchain is a technology, like the internet, that creates a public ledger or recordbook with a touchmove feature: once a record is made, there’s no editing it. What does this mean? It’s a reliable way to keep important records, such as financial transactions (payments, investments) and contracts, such as buying and selling assets like art, property, even gaming assets.
What are the features of Blockchain?
Transparent Records
Records are kept in a shared aka distributed network of computers scattered all over the world, that crosscheck each other.
Direct Transactions
No more middleman (bank, government, etc.) to make transactions. Anyone on a blockchain can directly transact with others on the blockchain, aka peer-to-peer (P2P).
Immutable
Permanent, historical records that cannot be edited.
Use case of blockchain technology: Tokens
Tokenization is a phenomenon that grew out of blockchain technology.
Real-world assets, like company shares and real estate, can now be given a digital value in the form of tokens. The real magic sauce here is that tokens can be bought in bits and pieces, what’s called fractional ownership. What does this mean? You don’t need to buy big to be able to participate in a project. If you see something that resonates or interests you, you can support and benefit from it with a low entry cost.
Here’s an example: I’ve been brokering real estate for over 20 years, and for many, the golden goal is to acquire commercial property that earns rental income. That’s a big amount of capital we’re talking about before you can participate in the gains. With tokenization, an asset like a commercial building worth 1M can be tokenized for let’s say 1,000,000 tokens, with each token representing one of a million or .000001% share in rental income. This allows up to 1,000,000 individuals to buy tokens and enjoy the benefits of their investment. A real estate investor today can easily go in and out of property investments all over the world, at a fraction of the cost and without having to deal with administrative and legal hoops, by buying and selling tokens of tokenized real estate.
Tokens for Communities
So how does this apply to communities?
1. Tokens allow participation in the mission
For this alone, I will stand by the benefits of tokenizing a community.
When I first dreamt of a creative community, I was a lone believer. Then I started talking about it to as many people as possible, and everyone I talked to felt the passion and determination I had for it. Those who were deeply moved by it asked how they could support it, or contribute to it, and almost always these conversations ended with “let’s see what happens”. I just didn’t have any means of welcoming them into the party in a concrete way, even if they loved the vision and wanted to support it.
A tokenized community can let anyone have a stake in the project through the token. The beauty here is that these token holders are curated investors who believe in your cause and who will be your natural community or project ambassadors.
2. Tokens are built for borderless connections
Even from day one, the vision I had for Montalut was to create a model that would be replicated in many parts of the world. Tokens can be used as the currency of the community that can be used in any location, without friction cost of conversions, transfers, etc. It is a unit of trust that’s being passed around within the community.
Because tokens are borderless, your audience also becomes borderless. A real estate community project in Singapore can easily attract entrepreneurs in Minsk or Istanbul. What does this mean? Borderless marketing, borderless offers, borderless possibilities.
3. Tokens are customizable
Whether the token translates to rights to make decisions or rights to a share in the profits entirely depends on you and how to design your token. Tokenization can be designed according to any business model, and is especially suited for those that work as a community or ecosystem.
Any feature you want in your token, you embed in its smart contract on the blockchain, so token holders are also fully aware of the benefits that they can expect from having your token.
On our LEADIA ecosystem, for example, we designed tokens as a complement to the idea of bringing together 1) successful tech companies from Eastern Europe that have maxed out their existing markets, 2) small businesses and professionals in Southeast Asia who would benefit from these tech tools to optimize operations and profits, and 3) investors who want to support this project and ride on the growth journey of these tech companies. The LEADIA Token, $LFT, is the magic that brings all these pieces together in a quantifiable, fluid, and borderless way.
Tokenizing a Farming Community
Back to Murshida and Zeal’s project. Top of mind, here are possible ways of tokenizing a farming community:
Traditional Way
Tokenized
Benefits of Tokenization
Real Estate/Land Ownership
Subdividing the land for traditional titled land ownership for each home/family
Tokenized ownership of the land
Unlimited and fractional owners
Raising Capital
-Founding members to fund it or seek out traditional investors/VCs to develop the farm
-Lumpsum investments
-Tokenized ownership of the animals + farm plots
-Fractional investments
-Faster Fundraising and wider community engagement
-Progressive inflow of funds (i.e. you can start your project with one small investor with just one cow and grow from there)
Income Streams
-Harvest -Membership approach, like a timeshare -Renting out built housing or commercial units -Renting out the land
Tokens with rights to harvest/rental income
Distributed profits
These are just initial ideas we bounced off them, and they are of course subject to laws and regulations in the jurisdiction of the intended community.
Final points
Possibilities are endless on how tokens can superpower a community! The ideas of distributing entry point, entry cost, share in the gains, and even decision-making–they are all aligned with what most communities do in the first place.
Tokenization is a powerful tool in supercharging your community.
CAVEAT: Not every project can benefit from being tokenized, especially since there are costs to being on the blockchain.
It’s important to first pin down the architecture of your community to see how tokens can come into the picture.
Also understand your tokenomics: How will your token flow in and out of your community? How will this flow balance the supply and demand for your tokens?
If you have a community project in mind and are considering tokenizing it, let us know how we can support you on your journey. We would be glad to see more and more people understand and use this superpower so that more good can come out of this amazing technology.
“You have a match!”
Materials used: Plaster and GI wire
Date completed: March 31, 2014
(back view)
Online dating is a whole new world I’ve recently explored, and it’s both exciting and scary. There are some hilarious days, some dull ones, but mostly it gives me a unique insight into men and women interacting in a free space…no physical, even geographic boundaries. Does it level the playing field, reverse roles, objectify? It’s so fascinating.
I like working with economy, using minimal elements, especially for a subject that is normally warm and abundant: love and relationships. Online dating is a push and pull between male-female, truth-ideal, real-virtual. It zooms in on the tensions we already encounter in boy-girl relating, because everything is pared down to the modern day chat: a conversation without voice, gesture, eye contact.
Does it make it easier to impress, to tug at the heart, to connect? Or is the efficiency it promises its own undoing?
#wire #sculpture #dating #men #women
Process documentation:
I wanted to do a piece that was streamlined and simple — to give that feeling of starkness, efficiency, straightforwardness. It was a modern piece so it naturally fell in with the minimalist sensibility of wires.
I used just three pieces of wire in total: one continuous line for the faces (to show union), and one each for the bodies of the man and woman (to show two separate individuals that compose the union).
I decided to add in a plastered base and focal point for the Yes-No button (Heart and X), to show that with one click, the connection either comes to life or isn’t even given a chance to exist.
Below is my creative process at every step:
First step: To create the faces using one continuous wire.
Step#2: Add in the bodies. Basic lines done.
Carving out the X and the heart.
Adding the final element:
I played around with different materials to add to the piece: paper hearts and flowers.
Textual Documentation / Lessons learned:
Simple is best.
Lines can be powerful communicators when used with restraint.
Additional sketches/References:
Inspiration for the wire portraits were the works of Gavin Worth.
We see it in movies all the time–non-stop smiling, giggling and wiggling in one’s panties–and it’s tempting to dismiss the whole set up as a cliche, as overrated, if only it weren’t so fascinating! Anyone who’s ever fallen in love would agree–masarap umibig–and just like our obsession with photos to capture and store our kodak moments, wouldn’t it be nice to also have the sensation of falling in love available at our beck and call? Think instant pocket of sunshine, microwavable or downloadable just when we need a happy pill.
If only happiness could come in instant packs. The motions of being in love come and go, it’s just how things are, but maybe where we do have a hand is in keeping them coming.
Love is serious and demanding–it’s the older brother that needs to be responsible, that needs to make the difficult choices. Falling in love is the bunso, the cheeky one who gets away with being naughty and creating a mess. Just because.
Let’s remember how wonderful it is to fall–into the unknown, unfamiliar, unmanageable–and to do it front-faced, with courage and trust that what’s waiting for us at the bottom is, more than anything else, a possibility, an opening that could make for a great adventure.
Let us remember that to fall in love is to encounter and to surrender, not always to someone but maybe to something–an idea, a place, a job, a memory…and what joy in that surrender! In a strange way, it asks us to be humble, to accept willingly and excitedly that we are not alone, that we connect to something or someone outside of ourselves, and it’s okay. We’ll play and be merry and it’s okay. 🙂
And to fall in love AGAIN, wow, this assumes we have braved the journey before, including the part where it had to end, and still we stand unfazed, ready for the peaks and troughs of yet another journey, or maybe a collection of mini-journeys.
Wow. What a way to welcome the new year.
To falling in love again and again and again, friends! To 2010! 🙂
Sharing something I wrote in November 2008 after a funeral mass for my friend’s brother:
it happens every time someone i know dies– i get this compulsion to tell everyone i love them, to right every wrong, even those wrongs that are still pending
there’s that urgency, a jolly sort of rushing, not because there’s no time, but because the best time is now
it’s a reminder, almost a command, NOT TO WAIT
for anything– for a better time, for safer circumstances, for someone to say sorry first, for time to heal wounds
to just seize and be happy now
to resolve whatever conflicts are in my heart now, whether small or big
and just be happy
live in peace
and all the more this death, miguel’s
he’s a spirit warrior
he purposefully looked for God, for oneness, for joy
his favorite quote: “The Heart has a thousand strings, and can only be tuned by Love.”
by Hafiz, a Sufi poet
his friends called him the angelman, and he shared and promoted love through his music
he played the sitar
all the family members gave eulogies
and they all said he was deeply spiritual
moved on from the mundane world to a very connected spiritual plane
and at 24, thats deeply inspiring
so
it’s pushing me to move beyond the trivial in my life now–my sulking moods, brooding on how stuck i am (or think i am), even my latest obsessions which help me get by but are, in all honesty, distractions (twilight,
true blood, sookie stackhouse novels)..
just now i also got an email from a friend of a friend
contacts for lodging options in baguio
for next year, when teaching duties end
it’s my first step towards answering my deepest questions again
and im thankful for these pushes i get
nudges to put me on the right path (again)
let’s all pray for peace in our hearts
now
and every moment
Please say a prayer too for Miguel Dizon and his family, including my friend, Kitch.
