Chris Moyles Talks Up Church

There's been several mentions of Chris Moyle's show the other day, where he was absolutely amazed to see people ENJOYING being Christians - clearly been going to the wrong churches!

#assk64: Trending

#assk64

Finally, I am "trendy", and was ahead of fashion!

The website "64 words for Aung San Sui Kyi" launched yesterday evening at 9.30pm (GMT), and I was only the second person to Tweet using the hashtag #assk64. Working late on something, I watched it start to take off, particularly once @SarahBrown10, @jimmycarr and @eddieizzard started tweeting about it.

Trending Topic
The image to the left is a screenshot from Twitter in the last 10 minutes, showing that #assk64 is now the third most popular topic on Twitter right now - that's pretty impressive in less than 24 hours! Most are redirecting people to the website although of course there's always a few mis-using it - ignore them!

So Where are most of the Retweets coming from?

The organisation behind this hasn't been slow in asking celebrities to post their "64 words" (although many, like me, have tweeted about it, rather than written their 64 words), and I suspect that @stephenfry (with over half-million followers) has had quite a bit to do with an extra spurt in popularity and the official @64forsuu should be worth following too! @assk64 has dropped off the top trending topics, but still plenty of activity, particularly triggered by Alan Davies this afternoon.

On the Website: George Clooney, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Vaclav Havel, David Beckham, Daniel Craig, and the British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown have all written messages of support.

The News: Waiting to see it start to appear, only 1 story in Google at the moment.

Take Action: On the website, on Twitter, or on Facebook!

Update 11th July 2009: Interestingly #assk64 is still circulating on Twitter.

The Big Sleep Out: Winchester

Winchester: 15th May 2009

Do you feel inspired to sponsor these people who are CHOOSING to spend a night out in the cold, in the aid of those who feel they have no choice?

I'M NOT ASKING FOR BIG AMOUNTS, BUT IN TUNE WITH THE IDEA THAT SMALL CHANGES ADD UP TO BIG CHANGE(S), AM LOOKING FOR 50 PEOPLE TO SPONSOR ME WITH £2.00 EACH... of course you can pledge more if you wish... I'm just looking to get lots of people involved/raise awareness, etc.! If you'd prefer to give me the money offline, that's fine too...

http://www.justgiving.com/drbexl

Companions: Amanda Henocq Charly Norton, been chatting to Martin Tod on Twitter about it, and also from the University The Sleepy Heads!

About the charity : Winchester Churches Nightshelter
Big Sleep Out: a fundraising event in Winchester Cathedral Close, in aid of Winchester Churches Nightshelter and Trinity Winchester. Both charities are extremely stretched by high demand and need your help; so do their guests, those sleeping rough and the hidden homeless. Please support us.

Winchester Churches Night Shelter offers an essential lifeline to the homeless, providing high quality food and shelter and a secure support network offered to address problems and re-develop life skills. We are the only direct access accommodation for the homeless in Hampshire, and a vital first port-of-call for our guests. Our team of professional support workers and staff is focused on helping guests move into sustainable, long-term accommodation and escape the homelessness cycle for good. Further details: www.wcns.org.uk

Trinity Winchester is a day time drop-in centre that provides services for those experiencing the effects of homelessness, vulnerable housing, problems with substance misuse, mental health issues, poverty, unemployment and social isolation. Further details: www.trinitywinchester.org.uk
Charity Registration No 1080443

[Addition on the day: Please help get my sponsorship up to £100! It's raining, and we either sleep outside, or we sleep in the Cathedral - which will be FREEZING (a hard stone floor)... Every penny counts]

Thankfulness and Positivity

As we rolled into 2009, I'd already been preparing to start my "Thankfulness Diary", which is a cross between a prayer diary (inspired by Bill Hybels "Too Busy not to Pray") and a focus on that for which I'm thankful on a daily basis. I often like to get things "right" and both my thankfulness diary and this blogs are areas in which I want to play and see where the path takes me (in a similar way to how I prefer to travel!), as for paid work it's a lot more focused, but without that space for creativity, no new thinking will emerge.

Thankfulness Diary
I bought an A4 page-to-a-day diary (and would you believe how long it took to find one which had full pages for Saturday/Sunday as well as weekdays, finally, a £1 shop!), and either in the morning or the evening I combine my chapter of Bible reading with some notes from The Word for Today and then I let myself at it. Text is still my primary medium, but I let myself at the scribbled drawings too, and who knows what else might come to mind as I relax into it more!

Whether to go morning or evening depends on my mood, and each has different benefits. In the morning set off for the day with a particular spring in the step, in the evening can really think back over what has happened on that particular day. 

I have noticed a difference as with "the current economic climate", the fact I'm living out of a suitcase in a friend's spare room whilst job-hunting I could just focus on the the mountains to climb, but instead am concentrating on a step at a time (and looking back at the steps already taken) as I'm incredibly grateful that I do have a roof over my head, I'm picking up some bit-work which all adds to the portfolio, and there's space for some creative thinking, further learning whilst I move through the process.

It's not an "instant fix", and it certainly doesn't mean walking around on (or in!) a cloud of hot air all day. A bad news story, e.g. "more jobs lost" can still knock you sideways, but looking back at all the things there are to be thankful, and looking at it within the bigger picture wins the battle.. eventually!

Positivity
I wondered if anyone had set up a positivity blog to counteract the current negative thinking, particularly focusing on positive news stories. Not found one like that, but the first entry on Google does have a lot of tips for creating a positive mindset for yourself, and in fact offers a specific "Positivity Challenge" which chimes with the above.

Linking Note
To note, if you wish to create a link to a long URL (I'm especially thinking if you want to create a posting in Twitter) use Tiny URL to create a short URL which doesn't break-up in emails, or use up all that space.