“You can gauge a country’s wealth, its real wealth, by its tree cover“, was a favourite saying of Dr Richard St. Barbe-Baker OBE.

I met St.Barbe when he was in his 90s in Washington at a retreat. He made me organic wholemeal pancakes for breakfast and we soon became friends. He showed me how to hug a tree and pay attention to its hydraulic vibes. I wasn’t sure whether it was my kind of thing, at first, but then I grew to like it. I soon adopted a tree just a few doors from my apartment in Gramercy Park, Manhattan. My first tree friend I called ‘Dagobert’. I’ve had tree friends ever since.

…   St. Barbe’s organization, the Men of the Trees, eventually grew to be known as the International Tree Foundation. Ultimately, there were chapters in over 100 countries. By some estimates, organizations he founded or assisted have been responsible for planting at least 26 trillion trees, internationally.

The CSIRO has information on trees here …

In 1981, at the United Nations in Manhattan, I was a co-founder with René Dubos and Richard St. Barbe Baker of the Children of the Green Earth Society.

The purpose of this intitiative was to try to broaden the public understanding of the fundamental threat to the green planet.

  Our trees are our friends because they give us oxygen, so the idea we came up with was this:
that every human child could plant at least one pet tree.

If you’d like to be considered for membership in the Children of the Green Earth Society click here and post the following information:

1. What is the name of your tree? What do you call your tree?

2. Where is your tree? What district or town is it in?

3. When did you last hug your tree? Or, at least, visit your tree?

Brendan Lewis has an interesting take on making his will using the IF THEN ELSE decision format.

Visit Brendan’s blog and see what he’s done …

‘A NEW IMPROVED RELIGION’

Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, the Dalai Lama, is visiting Australia next week so I am posting here my meeting with him 26 years ago, in 1981, on his second tour of the United States.

I had a private meeting with the Dalai Lama in New York where we discussed controlling anger, worry, happiness and pain and I also asked him to design a strategy for “a new improved religion”.

He still remains, in my experience, one of the most spontaneous and authentic people I’ve ever had the pleasure to meet.

Click here for the transcript of my meeting …

escape + search = think

escape + search = think

escape + search = think

escape + search = think

… which is why cvs2bvs is currently the most powerful brain software in the world.

Michael, Peter Cosgrove, John Tickell and other leading Australian speakers will work with more than 200 of Australia’s business people and thought-leaders at a unique workshop on the Gold Coast in August.

……

Your Business Success Seminar
Sheraton Mirage, Gold Coast
Friday 3 August – Sunday 5 August 2007

“In the twenty years I have been in the corporate speakers business I have never seen a seminar post a line-up as strong as this.” Barry Markoff, CEO - ICMI Speakers & Entertainers

BOOK RESERVATIONS HERE: The Your Business Success program on Channel 9 has seen many struggling businesses and sometimes the only reason they are not succeeding is due to the mindset of the operator.

“Before I could put my name to this seminar I needed to be convinced it offered substance and the right ingredients to allow all attendees to receive real take home benefits for their business.” Andrew Vincent, Executive Producer - Your Business Success, Channel 9, every Sunday.

Gallup Poll. Princeton, NJ:

About one-third of the American adult population believes the Bible is the actual word of God and is to be taken literally word for word.

This percentage is slightly lower than several decades ago. The majority of those Americans who don’t believe that the Bible is literally true believe that it is the inspired word of God but that not everything it in should be taken literally. About one in five Americans believe the Bible is an ancient book of “fables, legends, history, and moral precepts recorded by man.”

Belief in a literal Bible is strongly correlated with indicators of religion, including church attendance and identification with a Protestant or other non-Catholic Christian faith.

There is also a strong relationship between education and belief in a literal Bible, with such belief becoming much less prevalent among those who have college educations.

More from Gallup …