What subject(s) should we cover first here on this blog? Where is there a smart place to start? There are many experts out there that have already covered a lot of material on the topics we want to cover. So where should we start? What would be an interesting and possibly fresh place to start? Does the most important go first? NO, the most important does not go first!

When you go kayaking the most important part of the trip is the destination but you do not start there. You start with making sure that you can launch the kayak at the launch site. You start with having the right kayak and maybe a good friend to go with you. You start with maybe a wetsuit or maybe sunscreen or maybe both. No matter what you do, you do not start at the destination.

I will be honest with you. The destination for this first trip through greeenurbanpaddle.com’s original articles will be to gain a satisfactory understanding of BRG Street Community. However, that is not where we will want to start. If we were to start there, many of you will not take the trip. You will assume BRG Street is about socialism or a hippie commune or some radical evangelical training compound. So I am suggesting we start with some basics in the following areas: humanity, love, doctrine, fun, economics, hard work, compassion, greed, gardening, sustainability, mathematics, data and resource management. Can you see what I am saying? These are the basics. Then there is what comes after the basics – aquaculture, humanitarian service, increasing corporate profits through charitable giving, strengthening work teams and neighborhoods through interdependence and sharing, the failures of both capitalism and socialism, and much more advanced topics than that. All proven concepts but put together for the first time for BRG Street Community prodject. This list may change as we get ready to launch the BRG Street concept and we will weave a lot of other concepts and relevant stories into the mix, but as you can see there are a lot of pieces to consider as we take a fresh look at economics and community in the Age of Data.

For fun, let us start with fun. One of the key ingredients to life and living life in an abundant manner. Nobody wants to be a part of a team or community that is boring. We all want fun full complete lives.

Here are some good questions.

• Where does Fun come from?
• What is Fun?
• Who has the fullest life?
• When was the last time you had fun?
• What is too much Fun?

“Fun is the enjoyment of pleasure, particularly in leisure activities. Fun is an experience — short-term, often unexpected, informal, generally not cerebral and generally purposeless. It is an enjoyable distraction, diverting the mind and body from any serious task or contributing an extra dimension to it. Although particularly associated with recreation and play, fun may be encountered during work, social functions, and even seemingly mundane activities of daily living. It may often have little to no logical basis, and opinions on whether or not an activity is fun may differ.” Wikipedia

“Fun is learning how to enjoy wherever you are and whatever you are doing, no matter how stupid it seems to be.… Fun is the idea that life is to be enjoyed.” Dr. L Wilson

You really already know the answers to most of those questions. From the first laugh as a baby to the proud smile of a grandparent, we know what fun is. At some point, we have all searched out what we think is fun to do. And we all have had moments when fun was desperately needed and seemingly impossible to find. A very boring task at work, tears over the loss of a loved one, or just a lonely gray afternoon. It was in some of these not so fun moments that I realized we as humans miss something that definitely distorts our ability to experience life to the fullest. We tell ourselves these bad moments are moments we wish to avoid and the un-fun unpleasantness that we associate with them. To survive, I had to change away from this type of thinking.

My new type of thinking is this. Life is full and our fun moments are enough when each moment, fun or not so fun, is experienced to its fullness. No more running from tears or pain. No more avoiding difficult tasks or unpleasant people. Instead, we dive in and experience all the depth there is in the pain or sadness of the un-fun moments. When we embrace the fullness of all experiences, life becomes full and the fun moments become more enjoyable. I have a long ways to go to achieve this way of experiencing life. I have just begun. But then again that is true of most of you. We all have so much to experience that is already a part of our lives. No more searching for the fun stuff, the fullness we seek is already part of our lives. We just need to embrace it.

So can we change the statement that reads, “Life is worth living when you make fun out of the work you are doing”? Yeah, I want us to think beyond the concept that sugar helps the medicine go down. Experiencing the medicine makes the strawberries taste better. Green Urban Paddle has been set up in such a way so we take serious look at and experience the things that are right around us in a new and fulfilling way. The happiest place on earth is not in Orlando, FL. It is right where we are and we can experience a little of it right now.

Authors note: Well while I was writing and editing this piece a very un-fun moment happen to me and the change in my attitude to just experience the moment, take it for what it is, no less, no more, made a pleasant difference. Try it, next time you need to cry or are fighting with your spouse, dive in and experience the moment.