Inspire, collect and share 1000 manifestos > create a world that works for more people
Manifestos that promote an alternative to mainstream living
Creator: Yvonne Collier of Maddison Training, is a people skills expert and international educator.
Purpose: Help people produce productive and profitable relationships at work and play.
Life is a challenge … meet it
Life is a dream … realise it
Life is a game … play it
And Life is love … enjoy it.
Creator: Barbara Hannah Grufferman, writer and speaker on women’s issues, and author of “The Best of Everything After 50”.
Purpose: Share the lessons learnt at 50 that one wishes they knew in their 20s, 30s, or 40s. Don’t wait until your 50 to learn this!
Don’t Stop Networking
Whether you choose to stay home to raise children some day or work straight through, you should never stop networking, and building on that network. It’s much better to have choices and options, than not.
Do Create a Personal “Board of Directors”
…Having a trusted group with whom you can review life’s challenges, is essential. Invite several friends (or even just one) who will encourage, inspire and guide you.
Don’t Smoke
Lung cancer is the #1 leading cause of cancer death for women, but it is avoidable. The #1 cause? Smoking, which is also associated with many other illnesses.
Do Wear Sunscreen
Apply sunscreen every single day of the year, including on your neck, chest and hands.
Don’t Have Risky Sex
Unsafe sex = higher risk for pregnancies and STDs, some of which are life long. Don’t think because you are young, you are immune and invincible. You are not.
Do Move Your Body Every Day
Get yourself into the habit of working out, and don’t let excuses (even really good ones) get in the way of giving yourself this daily gift. Make fitness a lifelong commitment.
Don’t Ignore Your Young Bones
Osteoporosis is a disease of the bones that we associate with aging, and rightly so. But, it takes time to get there. …My doctor told me that every woman should start — and maintain — strength-training exercises in her early 20s, and make them part of her life forever.
Do Save More and Spend Less
Retirement is, presumably, years away, but it’s never too early to plan for it. The more money you have when you reach 50, the less stress and anxiety you will have.
Don’t Be Apathetic
We’re all busy with family, work, friends… but that’s no excuse to stop thinking about causes that are important to us and to the world. …Get involved, stay involved. Be the change.
Do Embrace Your Age
Don’t fight aging. Embrace it. …Live fully engaged with each year of your life, embracing the future ones with joy.
Share this with the women in your life, and share your own “commandments” with us by leaving a comment.
Complete Article and Manifesto on the HuffPost Women – posted 21 July 2011
Creator: Mat Robar is a former Inc. 100 corporate finance manager turned Adventure Capitalist, Mat now travels the world in search of warm water, big waves and powder snow.
Purpose: To chase an ideal – to chase passion.
I chase an ideal, I choose to chase passion.
…For all intensive purposes, happiness can be broken down into 3 levels.
• Pleasure – The shortest lasting happiness that is based off stimuli and always chasing the next high. It is this happiness that most people focus on with things like material possessions or sex, yet it has been proven to be a very fleeting form of happiness.
• Passion – The second longest form of happiness is Passion. Passion refers to a state in which you achieve “flow” or what is sometimes referred to as “being in the zone.” Time passes without notice when you are passionate. When you find something that not only gives you pleasure but also becomes a passion then you have achieved this second level of happiness.
• Higher Purpose/Ideal – The longest lasting form of happiness is being connected to or with a higher purpose. This supports Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs that states once the basic fundamentals of life are met, human beings desire to be connected to a higher purpose or something bigger than themselves. It is this purpose or ideal that in turn gives purpose and meaning to life.
As a general rule, the vast majority of the population chooses to chase pleasure and vow to get to passion and purpose once they reach the proper amount of happiness. When in reality to achieve long lasting happiness you must actually do the exact opposite. Find your purpose first and then layer passion on top of your purpose and ultimately find the pleasure that comes along with it, not the other way around.
This is a concept that I believe we all know inherently, but we lose over time as the world pushes us back to and rewards us for pleasure based happiness. To have seen this concept so simply laid out like above was a turning point in my belief system, lifestyle and life.
Just as the surf bum spends his days in search of Zen through surfing and the stoke that goes along with every wave, we too must each find our own purpose and have the courage and strength to pursue it.
This site is dedicated to and written by those who are out there doing it, living their dreams, finding their purpose and pursuing their passions. I encourage you to peruse the site, get involved and starting thinking about how you can take some of the ideals and concepts referred to above and apply them in your life today.
Creator: By Lauren Viera, Features reporter for the Chicago Tribune
Purpose: To transform the humble, often maligned Veggie Burger and turn into “an entree worth salivating over… no matter the dietary preferences of its customer.”
It’s almost easier to define the modern veggie burger by what it isn’t, rather than what it is.
A veggie burger is not, for instance, a proteinless vessel comprising typical burger fare (lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, onions) built between two buns and melded together with a consolatory slice of American cheese. That’s a sandwich, not a burger. And respectable burger joints that know better rightfully refer to it as such.
Nor is a veggie burger born by substituting a meat patty with a pseudo-exotic vegetable sliced into a half-inch disc. Many otherwise savvy places get away with this tactic, including Patty Burger (eggplant), M Burger (beefsteak tomato), et al. (portobello mushrooms galore). Yes, those are literal veggie burgers: vegetables accompanied by burger accouterments assembled on a bun. But flavor-wise, they’re redundant. Does anyone honestly desire to sink his or her teeth into a “burger” whose dominant flavor is a giant rubber tire of a fungus?
The list of veggie burger faux pas is long. Among the worst offenders: turkey burgers (a turkey is not a vegetable), salmon burgers (ditto), tofu burgers (just plain wrong). The most controversial? Black bean burgers. Black beans long to be liberated, free to swim in chili, soup and dips — not mushed together into a claustrophobic pancake smothered with ketchup and mustard, only to fall apart at the first opportunity. Whoever thought the black bean burger was a good idea was probably a meat eater. (One exception made our list.)
Eliminate the impersonators and you’re left with only the true entries deserving of the veggie burger title: traditional burger architecture (buns, ingredients, condiments) showing off a non-meat patty comprising a balanced combination of vegetables, grains and/or texturized vegetable protein.
That’s it.
Thanks to those chefs who strive toward deliciousness within the aforementioned parameters, the veggie burger is no longer limited to consumption by vegetarians. Conversely, it is no longer acceptable to offer a veggie burger on a menu boasting a chef by name, only to plate a defrosted Gardenburger (or worse, Boca burger).
The best veggie burger, like the best hamburger, should inspire in its maker a desire to create an entree worth salivating over, one that requires two hands and several napkins to conquer, no matter the dietary preferences of its consumer. Until all burger-makers are on board with this manifesto, our work isn’t done.
Article from the Chicago Tribune Food and Dining Section, June 30, 2011
Creator: Haydn Shaughnessy writes for Forbes.com about Innovation within the New Economy.
Purpose: The stats show that unto 66% of US workers are actively dis-engaged with their work. That means only 33% are! Thus the search for meaning and empowerment from ‘unconventional’ sources.
People are busy adding unconventional twists to their lives and their narratives, building twists like minimalism, reducing our dependency on material possessions – there’s a list of minimalist growth indicators here; or it’s about collective as well as personal innovation: looking for ways to engage, transitioning the relationship between the town and the countryside – or the wacky art allied to gardening, the vegan tattoo, or the conventionally unconventional like the street food movement.
The New Work Manifesto is I want to do it my way. This is not just or even a Gen Y phenomenon. It is a story that 66% of us might want to tell. So how do we reconcile people’s desire for personal innovation with the enterprise’s need for innovative people and ideas?
A couple of years ago I interviewed an artist at the Disonancias project which arranges artist residencies inside Spanish companies. Her observation of working in a company? Everything I proposed they found a way to cut.
As an artist she was accustomed to starting small and growing a creative work. In business she started small and still got cut.
Enterprise leaders need to look to how people are innovating and creating and then set out how they want to interact with the workforce. We have to take the personal seriously.
Full Article on Forbes.com: The New Work Manifesto: Be Unconventional, 24 June 2011
Image from Daylife: Job Seekers waiting to talk to employment agencies.
Creator: Patterson Stark, health practitioner and author of “Live Now, Die Later”
Purpose: Seven simple things that you can do to promote longevity, health and happiness. Plus live to 100 years of age and still be sexy.
1. Focus on good health! – Know what it take to make the grade and review this often.
2. Great Relationships are the best medicine! – Do you belong in your tribe? Have a reason to get up each day and help someone else – it’s strong medicine!
3. Food is life! – Every 3 hours eat it right, fresh, wholesome – no crap .
4. Exercise can kill you! – If you don’t get your hour per day and love what you’re doing and who you’re with.
5 Water is the the fountain of life! – Most of us are dehydrated. Water can stop heart attacks, dementia and strokes!
6. Have a medical plan of prevention! – Not an intervention plan.
7. Personal time, quiet time! – Reflection and gratitude are the virtual elixir of longevity.
Live Now, Die Later – Website of the Book
Creator: John Vernet Cole and Mary Allen
Purpose: In response to and to “balance out the story” of the Manifesto for the Conscious Man
As a woman to men:
• I respect and honor you for providing strength, stability and protection for our well-being, generation after generation.
• I respect and honor your intelligence, leadership and willingness to provide.
• My sisters and I deeply appreciate your unique gifts.
• I honor you for providing for my children, taking responsibility, even when they were not your own.
• I honor you for providing for women before you provide for yourself. I
• I honor you for remaining steadfast through my often irrational and emotional storms.
• I honor you for being a gentleman.
• I honor you for giving me the freedom to make my own choices about what I do with my body.
• I apologize for gladly taking a seat in the lifeboat while thousands of men went to an icewater grave that April night.
• I apologize for making an issue out of the rare practice of female genital mutilation, while remaining silent regarding the common practice of circumcision.
• I honor you for giving me a voice in shaping society through the right to vote.
• I honor you for your risk-taking, pushing boundaries and competitive nature, so essential for progress.
• I honor you for creating millions of jobs through enterprise, ingenuity and hard work.
• I respect and honor all the soldiers, police and firemen who have sacrificed their lives to keep me, and my family, free and safe.
• I acknowledge that boys and girls have different learning styles and we have radically shifted education to support girls.
• I honor you for wanting to fully develop your mind so you can maximize your contribution to humanity.
• I appreciate men for creating room for me in higher education.
• I apologize to American industry for eroding the talent pool it desperately needs.
• I honor and respect men for providing the safety net that I know is always there should I need it.
• I honor you for creating a legal system that protects my rights.
• I honor you for the long-standing practice of taking my word over one of your brothers, while protecting me, and my anonymity.
• I appreciate you for taking on the “honey-do’s” while still putting in long days at work.
• I honor your stamina and drive to provide for our family and me.
• I honor you for creating so many means to spread information and entertainment around the world.
• I honor your strength and athletic ability.
• I honor you for the world’s greatest religions, which have provided me hope, meaning and a guiding philosophy in life.
• I appreciate the great gift men gave to women – civilization.
• I honor you for your fighting spirit and recognize how essential it was to our survival as a species.
• I appreciate the grandeur of what has been wrought by men.
• I honor you for giving me my reproductive rights.
• I honor you for your integrity and unwavering sense of responsibility.
• I honor you for creating a system of justice that makes the world a safer place.
• I honor you for your commitment and respect for the environment.
• I honor your commitment to the institution of marriage, even when it means sacrificing.
• I promise that when I see men dominating at the top I will also look down, where I will see men concentrated at the bottom.
• I promise to remember that one cannot rise to great heights without sinking occasionally to great depths.
• I promise not to confuse honoring women with denigrating men.
Manifesto For the Conscious Man
Creator: Arjuna Ardagh and Gay Hendricks Ph.D
Purpose: “To give voice to the emerging conscious man: who is willing to fully honor and to be honored by the awakening feminine.” (Facebook Page)
Dear Woman:
I come to you today as a man committed to becoming more conscious in every way.
As I become more conscious, I grow more aware of the play of masculine and feminine energies: within me, within you and in all of life.
I commit to owning and stewarding a masculinity that honors and celebrates us as equals.
As men, our relationship to the feminine has often been unconscious.
I may not have done these things myself, but I am aware of the forces in the unconscious masculine psyche that feel threatened by and then seek to dominate the feminine.
I acknowledge that the religions of the past several thousand years have been mainly founded by and propagated by men.
I honor your deep connection to the earth.
I honor your intuition and your profound capacity for feeling.
I honor the beauty and integrity of your body.
I honor your capacity for peaceful resolution of conflicts, your ability to apologize effectively and forgive with grace.
I honor your capacity to listen to your body and its needs for food, rest and playtime.
I honor your sense of compassionate justice.
I also know that global economics have been dominated by the unconscious masculine, often living in a sense of lack and greed.
In apologizing to you for the hurts we men have caused you, I acknowledge that I and many of my brothers have also felt hurt by our mothers, our sisters, our partners and ex-partners.
From this day, moving forward, I vow to treat your heart as the sacred temple it is, and I commit to honoring the feminine in you and me and in my relationship to all life. ??Together, we can make miracles.
Manifesto For the Conscious Woman
Creator: Emilie Wapnick, blogger and multi-potentiate at puttylike.com
Purpose: A starting point for people who have many grand dreams, but don’t quite know how to structure their lives in a way that incorporates all of them.
The Manifesto consists of these six parts:
Introduction: Finding My Place
One: Who Are You and What Are You Doing Here?
Two: Defining Your Dreams
Three: Financing Your Dreams
Four: The Skills Your Need to Live a Life that Integrates Your Many Interests
Closing: Some Parting Words for Your Journey.
Creator: Andrew Castronovo, editor of Blast Recipes for BlastMagazine.com
Purpose: Some rules to live by that make things simpler than counting the amount of each vitamin you consume on a daily basis.
• If something is green and from nature, eat a lot of it.
• If something is brightly colored and from nature, eat a lot of that as well.
• If an animal is not active and looks fat when it is alive, don’t eat that much of it (to make it clearer; if an animal is involved in games where liquored up hicks push it over, don’t eat a lot of it).
• If an animal runs around and gets exercise while it is alive, you should probably eat a lot of it.
• If a nut is raw, it is very good for you. If a nut is salted, it is kind of good for you. If a nut is honey roasted, it is candy.
• Don’t eat a lot of candy.
• If after eating something you defecate liquid or don’t defecate at all, you probably shouldn’t eat it a lot and should definitely diversify your diet.
• Regarding bread or rice, the darker it is the better it is for you. The lighter the color, the worse it is for you. Eat a lot of the dark kind.
• While writing a piece about food, if you start to sound like Jeff Foxworthy, you are probably a hack.
The original Blast Magazine article
Image from Wikimedia