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Much of my life has been a bunch of unrelated building blocks. And, until recently, it did not make any sense. Each opportunity was better than the one before, but there never was really a breakthrough that I could stick to; there was always something missing.

I had many successes and some serious failures but I was never able to move on to a lasting work and purpose. Then the death of my wife in 2010 changed me and I had no drive to continue the rat race of trying to be a success in other people’s eyes. I was done. Plus, much of how I had done things I was now not able to use. I couldn’t function without her; it was too painful. But life did not stop, and somehow I started to move forward again.

For a few years before my wife passed away in 2010, I was studying some really powerful stuff. The areas of study would not be considered to be related by most scholars, theologians, and politicians; but I was finding they were.  The areas of study were:

• Data Analytics – my professional field
• Data and Mathematical Structures – my professional expertise
• The role of motivation and bias in data and fact – my professional soapbox
• Logical Signatures – this came from the need to be all, to function as functional dyslexic
• Intimacy stages and models – my spiritual hobby
• The mathematical models found in Love, benevolence, and charity – my passion
• Sustainable Community Economics – a connection between my passion and my professional field

I started working on a concept called BRG Street. The name came from the concept of a bridge from our modern technological human existence to a future human existence where everything was positive – a bridge to heaven. I had very much come under the impression that God was not dictatorial, that His rules were not arbitrary commands but actual guidelines based on what were the best and smartest ways to do things.

In the mathematical models I was working with, I was seeing the actual destruction of selfishness in the economy. What many leaders were shouting about as being huge successes were, in truth, outright theft and no real value gain was gotten from them at all. On the other hand, as I developed those models further I could see the possibilities of growth that could be over a thousand-fold increases in value in an economy based in teamwork and compassion. As I continued, I started writing down what could be concluded as theorems and started reviewing if they would stand up to cross-examination.

I found a serious flaw. A heaven-like economy seemed to only be possible if selfishness and the free choice to be selfish was completely removed. One theorem basically states that that ripple effect from a single act of selfishness has the potential of bringing down the whole economy. This discouraged me and trapped me into believing it is impossible to hope for solutions to the economic woes of the world. I could work with those who were will to try and do the right thing but at great risk. I concluded at the time that, without a miracle and a removal of selfishness through an event like the predicted second coming of Christ, no profitable free market-based in benevolence was possible.

When I could, I continued my studies and somehow kept finding new possibilities that I learned a lot from and I was closer to the end goal of the BRG Street concept; but each one, in the end, was not what was needed and I could not continue. Again, at the start of 2015, my whole world collapsed in on me. There was a serious failure on my part and no options left for me, and the worst was that my daughters were going to have to go without some basics. Then there was a miracle of about $25,000. The things that were going wrong in my new marriage ended up being a good thing and a new vision started to develop. I started working on what ended being the last piece that was needed – BarraBlue.US, a self-sustaining, environmentally smart fish and vegetable farm that was coming out of Australia and China. This was cool; this had real potential.

But I was being stymied again. I asked a new friend who had been through all the pain I had been through to join me. She was like my twin. She had lost two husbands and a baby. Her baby did not make it for the same reasons my wife and I had lost our first girl. She had suffered childhood abuse like my wife and me, but she had found the blessing in her sorrows like I was trying to find.

She said, “I do not know how I can help you but I am not doing anything else.” We both had discovered that we had compound intelligence, meaning we had a cross between a female and a male brain. Mine was a stronger male brain with an almost fully functional female brain inside a male body and hers a stronger female brain with a very functional male brain inside a female body. We would laugh about how sometimes when the two sides of our brains got to arguing inside our heads it was like we had marriage going on inside our heads. In a way, when talked about ideas, it was like putting four brains together, each brain bringing a different point of view and set of skills to the table.

The pieces just started fitting into place. It was possible. A sustainable community-styled economy that was guided by other center benevolence was not only possible; it was going to be profitable. We researched, reviewed, and documented everything we could. The name we gave it was BRG Street Community. BRG now stands for Benevolent, Resourceful, and Green. We started writing a project plan and completed our first thorough review. It was possible and we started working on getting the resources needed to complete each of the pieces.

On June 1, 2016, she passed away; one day before the 6-year anniversary of my wife’s passing. Somehow, in their honor, I continued.

There were still some big problems. First was how to sell this concept and project. Most traditional sales methods are built around feeding selfish interests. And we could not do that. Another problem was that Americans had just voted in a President who was the glorification of selfish boastful capitalism. This meant that somehow a large part of the core of our society was at odds to concepts like this one. Another big problem was that most humans believe that the only reasonable economic options are benevolent capitalism or democratic socialism. I had learned by now that both of these were holding on to elements of individualism that were destructive to the overall value gains need for a healthy economy. I had found in the models that the only reason that economies of this world were surviving was because they were stealing from the resources of the earth and, most likely, very soon those resources were going to run out.

By the end of 2016, I was working with a team. We had four core members along with a handful of other interested individuals. Two new concepts for sales were worked out.  A round-table presentation method that we will call LOVE_ARC and a blog that attracted like-minded individuals into discussions that promoted the concepts and the building blocks of a BRG Street Community. The blog was to mix the concepts – personal histories along with a character that was fun and relaxing. It needed to be challenging and, on the other hand, light-hearted. It needed to deal with hard realities of damaged lives and give real renewing hope.

What to name the blog? I wanted a name like Single Dad Laughing but widower is not a word for laughter. I love kayaking and I love to take 360-video sweeps. My favorite kayak is green and I like the mix of nature with human construction. This is what has led up to Green Urban Paddle. We really hope you come to enjoy our space on the web and get engrossed in the conversations you find here. A better world with increasing value is possible through our care about you and your care about others. Please join in the discussion. We have a lot to learn and I am sure you have something to add. The models I have been studying say you are an important part to our future. You have something, some gift, experience, knowledge, or skill, that is needed.

I believe the conclusions of the economic models are this:

• The only real economic/political enemy is selfishness, and we each have some of that
• The only real economic future is in loving benevolence, and we each are born with at least some of that
• The only real choice is ours and that choice, according to Native American wisdom, is that it is our choice which of the first two items listed we feed. The one we feed is the one that will grow.

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