Author: Lane Michel

Caring Scholarships – A Platform for Young Voices

Caring Scholarships A Platform for Young Voices

Unified Caring Association (UCA) holds scholarship contests throughout the year. As of this month UCA has awarded over 100 scholarships to caring students. These students are all ages across the U.S. These essays are a platform for young voices to express their ideas and experiences which brings more caring into the world. UCA designed this scholarship program to both reward kids for caring while also encouraging their kind heartedness and supporting their advancement in education. 

The Essays

UCA’s nationwide and program specific scholarships are created to reward students who write short, 500-word, essays based on the prompt question provided. Some examples are:

-How do you plan to live a life that promotes peace and Unity? How will you create the journey to fulfill this purpose?

-If you were the President of the United States, what would you do to promote Peace and Unity?

-How can caring and kindness be implemented more in your personal life and in your school?

-If you were the “Caring Ambassador” at your school, what would you do to inspire other students to be more caring?

The essay entries are scored on a caring rubric that differs from a traditional academic rubric. This allows students who may not typically be awarded scholarships to be celebrated and awarded for their unique talent of caring and kindness.

Previously Awarded Scholarships

Below is a list of our previous caring scholarship topics. These topics have inspired hundreds of applicants to share their caring thoughts, actions, and creative solutions to help bring more caring into the world today.

Who Loves These Caring Scholarships?

School guidance counsellors, teachers and students warmly embrace our scholarship program. As the students write beautiful, unique essays on the topic of caring they engage their caring intelligence and are reminded of the importance of kindness. We find that our scholarship entrants touch hearts with their caring essays. It is so hard to choose the winners!

Want to read an example? Here is one of our previous winners who fills our hearts with joy!

Sarah Cline–

“Genuine kindness is one of the most valuable traits a person can possess. Having real concern for those around you and caring about how they feel makes you stand out among everyone else. Nothing makes me feel better or lifts me up more than when someone goes out of their way to make me feel good and let me know they care about me. It is so important to treat people with kindness and respect, but this unfortunately is something that people forget to do all too often.

I was sixteen years old when, terrified, I was forced to move from my home in a small town in northwest Ohio to the city of Kaysville, Utah. Before this, I had rarely left the safety of the town I grew up in and leaving it for good was a rude awakening. The culture shock was brutal and my shy, quiet nature made it difficult for me to find friends in a place where I felt like an outsider. Starting over at a new high school was one of the most difficult experiences of my life. However, it eventually became one of the best because of the kindness I was shown by a few very special people. They became my friends, made me feel at home, and showed that they truly cared about me. They made me feel included, wanted, and even loved. The kindness they showed me during a really difficult time will stay with me for the rest of my life.

This experience taught me a valuable lesson. Life is hard when you are alone and don’t feel cared about. It makes everything difficult when you are struggling with feelings like these. However, even the smallest things can make a huge difference. A kind word or a simple question can change how someone feels. Caring and kindness can be incorporated more in everyone’s lives and in schools just by people making a decision to be more open, talk to someone, give them a smile, ask them how they are doing, be their friend. Be aware of who may need someone in their life or who may need to be shown some kindness and friendship.

Kindness and caring can be implemented by venturing out of cliques and going out of your way to make someone feel included. It can be implemented by inviting someone to eat lunch with you. It can be done by talking to someone new in class instead of only conversing with the friends you already have. It can be done standing up to a bully and standing up for someone in need. People need to be aware of their peers and be willing to reach out and make new friends. There were many times during that first year at my new school when just one person’s kind personality made my day better.  Kind acts, big and small, change lives. It only takes a little mindfulness and a little courage to go out of your comfort zone to be kind and show someone you care.”

Want to read more about UCA scholarship winners and get an extra dose of positivity on you news feeds? Read other caring scholarship blogs, scholarship blogs on gratitude, and or follow us on social media: Pinterest, Tumblr, Twitter, and Instagram. We are looking forward to sharing more with you!

Lifetime Membership

Lifetime Membership

Unified Caring Association (UCA) has been sharing caring news and resources with our members since 1987. We love supporting and sponsoring caring projects that reflect values that C.A.R.E. (Children, Animals, Reforestation, and Elderly). As we grow, we add more to our products and services, like our health and fitness tools, Caring Community online store, community resources, and scholarships! We are always  listening to what our members are looking for most to select our next caring addition. This time, the addition is all about flexibility in membership options. We are proud to present the newest membership option: UCA’s Lifetime Membership.

Ask, Listen, and Receive

UCA’s new Lifetime Membership option is a response to our members’ changing needs through their adult life.  When many members needed to reduce their benefit selection, we began asking if each member would prefer to remain a part of the membership community at a base level of benefits. The overwhelming answer was “YES!”  So, we have introduced the new Lifetime Membership option to provide the flexibility to meet life’s needs and be as active as desired without worrying about monthly charges.

A great way to see if being a part of this quietly building caring community of over 150,000 people is with the basic $15 month-to-month membership.  Members sign in to their secure area of UnifiedCaring.org to access a wide array of benefits. These benefits include: self-care, care for family and pets, community connections, savings on a vast array of online purchases, sponsorship of caring impactful projects, positive and inspiring news, and access to a whole bunch more benefits that keeps growing with members’ needs.  

With society’s need to grow caring children, take care of our communities, and equally importantly to take of ourselves over a lifetime, the new Lifetime Membership option of a one-time $99.95 forever purchase. This lifetime membership keeps our members connected to the mission and benefits so needed today and tomorrow.

Our membership is diverse across the U.S.  There is one thing common to the vast majority of those wanting to join and stay a part of the association. Our members want to find ways to live a healthier life and have an impact as a community to put caring into action. If they can do both plus receive assistance in reducing expenses or getting access to products and services with big savings, then “all the better value.”

Stop by UnifiedCaring.org and check out our membership benefits summaries.  We hope to see you join our community soon.

We love sharing UCA caring news and resources, research, and caring acts in our community through our website and blogs. Or would like to receive more Unified Caring Association caring notes throughout the week? Follow us on: Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest, and Twitter! We are looking forward to sharing more with you, our caring community!

Happiness = Health

Happiness = Health

Unified Caring Association (UCA) spreads caring in many ways, one of which is through sharing caring research. Often we see notes about how feeling happy more often helps us feel healthier. Recently we came across an article by HarvardHealth Publishing that suggests that there is scientific evidence that positive emotions can result in a longer healthier life. We are all for that! Want to know more? Here are the short notes on how happiness can equal health.

Start on Happy Things

Begin with what makes you happy. Playing with your pets, helping the elderly at a senior center, or painting are just some of the things that people like to do that brings them happiness. Doing things that make you happy also help lower stress levels. Continually and consistently doing things that make us happy lowers our stress levels and could reduce risks of health problems like a heart attack.

3 Pathways to Happiness

During their research on positive psychology, Research Psychologists Martin Seligman and Christopher Peterson examined three pathways to happiness: feeling good, engaging fully and doing good. As seen through the testing of hundreds of volunteers and focus groups, it was found that these pathways contribute to happiness and life satisfaction. 

Feeling good relates to our ability to seek pleasurable emotions. These emotions focus on reaching happiness in an effort to maximize our pleasure and minimize our pain. 

Engaging fully in the pursuit activities that “…engage us fully, from the influential research by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. For decades, Csikszentmihalyi explored people’s satisfaction in their everyday activities, finding that people report the greatest satisfaction when they are totally immersed in and concentrating on what they are doing.” (https://www.health.harvard.edu/healthbeat/the-happiness-health-connection) 

When we are doing good and doing caring acts that helps others we generate more happiness. More poetically put, doing is “searching for meaning outside yourself, tracing back to Aristotle’s notion of eudemonia, which emphasized knowing your true self and acting in accordance with your virtues.” (https://www.health.harvard.edu/healthbeat/the-happiness-health-connection) This is a feeling that can happen when you are “getting in the flow.”

How can you know you are in the flow?

What does it mean to be in the flow of things? Is it a fast paced atmosphere where everything seems to be going your way? Or is it when we spend time laughing with those we love? Check out some suggestions below on ways to get in the flow.

-Time just flies by and you realize that you have been working long and hard without feeling tired. The “loss” of time is no big deal, and you would probably do the activity again.

-Your mind is not occupied with your activities of your internal thoughts. “You aren’t focused on your comfort, and you aren’t wondering how you look or how your actions will be perceived by others. Your awareness of yourself is only in relation to the activity itself, such as your fingers on a piano keyboard, or the way you position a knife to cut vegetables, or the balance of your body parts as you ski or surf.” (https://www.health.harvard.edu/healthbeat/the-happiness-health-connection)

-You are present in the moment. This means not thinking about the daily “to-do” list that is sitting on your desk, refrigerator, etc.  An example is that you aren’t thinking about such mundane matters as your shopping list or what to wear tomorrow.

-Keeping an active mind and an active body. This can be done through learning music, reading books, playing sports, or going for a hike.

-You work effortlessly. “Flow activities require effort (usually more effort than involved in typical daily experience). Although you may be working harder than usual, at flow moments everything is “clicking” and feels almost effortless.” (https://www.health.harvard.edu/healthbeat/the-happiness-health-connection)

It is clear that whatever we choose to do, if it makes us happy, it is good for our health. When we do good we can get a bonus boost when we are helping others feel good too!

Unified Caring Association is constantly striving to help create a more caring world. We love sharing more caring information on our website and through blogs that share caring in our community, activities, and reviews. We also send out caring posts on our social media accounts (Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest, and Twitter) to give inspiration throughout the week.

Building Empathy

Building Empathy

Unified Caring Association (UCA) loves sharing with our caring community. The topics that we love to share often relate back to emotional intelligence. One component that is closely relates to emotional intelligence in empathy. There is just one troubling thing. We often have a hard time describing what empathy is and how we teach it to others. In our search for more information on empathy we have come across some great examples on how to bring more empathy to the world and our caring community. Let’s start from the top…

How can we define something like empathy?

In short, empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of one or more people. We can take this definition a step further. We can add that we are then are able to express our feelings and connection with the others. This requires one thing, active listening with our whole being by using our eyes, ears, body language, minds, and more. This is because listening is a strong way to show that you care about the other person and the topic that they are passionate about. Brigette Hyacinth has a good point about listening, “The quality of our listening determines the quality of our influence…[and] listening transmits that kind of respect and builds trust.” (https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/empathy-most-important-leadership-skill-needed-today-hyacinth/)  Overall, when we listen to others and understand what they are saying when they connect with us we demonstrate that we value others and have empathy for them.

Empathy and Denmark

There have been many studies about how Denmark is one of the happiest and nicest places to live. “This is according to the UN’s World Happiness Report, an important survey that since 2012 classifies the happiness of 155 countries in the world, and that for seven years has placed Denmark among the top three happiest countries on a global level.” (https://www.morningfuture.com/en/article/2019/04/26/empathy-happiness-school-denmark/601/) A big factor in this relates back to how people in Denmark seem to value and incorporate empathy in their lives. This can be seen through the prominent concept of “hygge.” Hygge is a phenomenon closely related to Danish culture; this word is both a verb and an adjective and does not have an English equivalent. “Hygge could be defined as ‘intentionally created intimacy.’ In a country where it gets dark very early in the year, it rains, it’s gray, hygge means bringing light, warmth and friendship, creating a shared, welcoming and intimate atmosphere.” (https://www.morningfuture.com/en/article/2019/04/26/empathy-happiness-school-denmark/601/) This is a fundamental Danish concept that creates a sense of well-being. Interestingly, hygge is becoming a global phenomenon! If you search for hygge on Amazon, you will get about 6,000 results, most of which are books. Instagram has more than Amazon, with #hygge racking up 5.2 million posts and counting! SO, how does a culture foster a concept like empathy so effectively? The answer: By teaching, learning and practicing from the ground up with kids.

Teaching Kids Empathy

Danish schools have a unique curriculum incorporated in their education plans. Students 6-16 years old spend about one hour a week in school dedicated to empathy. These lessons are called “Klassen tid.” This is a fundamental part of learning life skills for these students, much like learning English, science or math for U.S. students. During this hour “…students discuss their problems, either related to school or not, and the whole class, together with the teacher, tries to find a solution based on real listening and understanding. If there are no problems to discuss, children simply spent the time together relaxing and enjoying hygge.” (https://www.morningfuture.com/en/article/2019/04/26/empathy-happiness-school-denmark/601/) This time spent on exploration, problem solving and growth of emotional intelligence helps the students connect with each other through activities that build empathy. Unlike other places in the world, there is no stigma or stress connected to this emotion. The stronger the understanding of empathy the longer and more sincere the student’s relationships are. These enduring relationships correlate to the prevention of bullying and success at work. 

Empathy is a Life Skill

As we said before, empathy helps people be successful in their careers. This is because they are able to connect with their peers, are more goal oriented, and adept at team work related tasks. If we look back at Denmark, 60% of tasks in schools are teamwork based. Thus these tasks require the children to understand empathy in order to achieve good results. However, the focus of these results is not to excel over others, but to lift up your teammates that are struggling with the tasks. The success of the team is therefore the goal that everyone is striving for. It is because of the students’ skills in empathy that Denmark is often touted as one of the best places to have a career in Europe.

Empathy is then coupled with the viewpoint that competition is with yourself and not with others. Instead, Danes practice the culture of motivation to improve and the measurement is exclusively in relation to themselves. This is vastly different from the prominent mentality in the U.S. where the goal is to beat the other person and to strive for a win even if it is at the cost of your peers. “The Danes give a lot of space to children’s free play, which teaches empathy and negotiation skills. Playing in the country has been considered an educational tool since 1871.” (https://www.morningfuture.com/en/article/2019/04/26/empathy-happiness-school-denmark/601/)  Most of this is achieved through collaborative learning. This style of learning involves bringing together children with various strengths and weaknesses in different subjects. The teams of students then help each other with their studies by working together on various topics and projects. This format teaches the kids that they need each other to be successful and to connect they will need empathy. Jessica Alexander comments that, “Many studies show that when you explain something to someone…you not only learn the subject much better than you would do by memorizing it yourself, but you also build empathy skills which are further strengthened by having to be careful about the way the other person receives the information, and having to put oneself in their shoes to understand how learning works.” (https://www.morningfuture.com/en/article/2019/04/26/empathy-happiness-school-denmark/601/)

The results are echoed by Avery Konda, who recently tried to explain the concept  of empathy to kids. After trying to talk with children and pull out responses from them (which fell short of what he was looking for), he began to play with the kids. Through this play time with toys he helped the children discover deeper meanings of empathy. Konda concluded, “Students learn more from gamified activities that allow them to learn skills through application, more than they do through PowerPoints and traditional teaching…[They] take away more when they’re required to live and breathe the topic of conversation.” (https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-empathy-most-important-skill-world-today-avery-konda/?trackingId=ltUkZUWiNiFJLSRQ45YbyA%3D%3D) This is fascinating for all of us who are trying to excel in our careers, and for those that are raising children. If we all strive to listen closely to conversations with others and practice our teamwork skills, we can begin to strengthen our empathy skills. Building empathy takes time and consistent practice. If we look at how Danish culture has developed, we can begin to apply more empathy to our daily lives and continue to create a more caring world.

Want to read more about UCA and get an extra dose of positivity on you news feeds? Read our other blogs on caring,  empathy, how emotions shape your heart, and follow us on social media! (Pinterest, Tumblr, Twitter, and Instagram.) We are looking forward to sharing more with you!

Shaping Your Heart

Broken Heart Syndrome

Shaping Your Heart

“No other organ, perhaps no other object in human life, is as imbued with metaphor and meaning as the human heart. Over the course of history, the heart has been a symbol of our emotional lives… The very word “emotion” stems in part from the French verb ‘émouvoir’, meaning ‘to stir up.’ And perhaps it’s only logical that emotions would be linked to an organ characterized by its agitated movement.” (Jauhar) We at Unified Caring Association (UCA) continue to research and learn more about caring for others and for ourselves. In this journey we discovered a well spoken TedTalk by Sandeep Jauhar, a cardiologist and writer. In his presentation, we hear about how our emotions can in fact change the shape of our hearts.

The TedTalk from the Heart

Doctor Jauhar eloquently leads us on a journey during his speech. He recounts stories and examples of how the heart is affected by the mind and emotions felt by patients who are extremely happy or sad. “…we have come to understand that the connection between the heart and the emotions is a highly intimate one. The heart may not originate our feelings, but it is highly responsive to them.” (Jauhar) Doctor Jauhar continues on to explain how the nerves that control our unconscious processes like our heartbeat, can sense distress. This distress can trigger an abnormal fight-or-flight response that is often seen by signs similar to heart failure. Some examples are blood vessels constrict. The heart rate begins to gallop and there is an increase in blood pressure. All of these symptoms often result in damage. 

In recent history we have been more prone to seeing doctors uphold a scientific biological approach to heart. However with newer research and imagery we can literally see the heart organ change shape in response to emotions.  “[The heart is] more the domain of doctors like me, wielding technologies that even a century ago… were considered taboo. In the process, the heart has been transformed … into a machine that can be manipulated and controlled.” Doctor Jauhar states that there is a golden nugget resulting from this breakthrough. These techniques and solutions that doctors are currently prescribing to their patients need to be complemented by caring attention to the emotional well-being. This is reflecting upon the descriptions of the heart dating back to classical history. This is an era where it was believed that the heart was the seat of all thoughts and emotions; our lifeline.

To help explain this concept of how emotional health aids physical heart health, Doctor Jauhar cites a study published in the British journal “The Lancet” in 1990 called Lifestyle Heart Trial. This was a study based on a group of patients that had coronary (heart) disease. A portion of the group was given a ‘standard’ treatment plan (a.k.a. the control group). The other portion of the group was given an intense set of lifestyle changes. These changes included diet and exercise, stress management assistance, and support group activities. In the end, the group that was prescribed the intensive lifestyle changes by far was healthier than the control group. What is also interesting is  “…some patients [placed] in the control group adopted diet and exercise plans that were nearly as intense as those in the intensive lifestyle group. Their heart disease still progressed. Diet and exercise alone were not enough to facilitate coronary disease regression. At both one-year and five-year follow-ups, stress management was more strongly correlated with reversal of coronary disease than exercise was.” (Jauhar)

Broken Heart Syndrome

It appears that Doctor Jauhar is correct when he says, “…the emotional heart intersects with its biological counterpart in surprising and mysterious ways.” (Jauhar) This is best seen through a heart disorder that came on the scene about 20 years ago called “takotsubo cardiomyopathy”-“broken heart syndrome.” This is a disorder where the heart acutely weakens in response to intense stress or grief. Some examples of this syndrome are the sudden end of a romance or the death of a loved one, and even during a large widespread social upheaval, like a natural disaster. Doctor Jauhar displays a picture on the screen behind him of a normal heart, a broken heart and a takotsubo urn for which the syndrome is named.

Broken Heart Syndrome

The heart image in the middle is the broken heart, and looks very different from the normal healthy heart on the left. “It appears stunned and frequently balloons into the distinctive shape of a takotsubo, shown on the right, a Japanese pot with a wide base and a narrow neck. We don’t know exactly why this happens, and the syndrome usually resolves within a few weeks. However, in the acute period, it can cause heart failure, life-threatening arrhythmias, even death.” That is very serious. Interestingly, broken heart syndrome can be on set in relation to an extremely happy event as well. The main difference seen here is that the heart appears to react differently. The heart has ballooning in the midportion and not at the top as when the syndrome is from strife. Either way broken hearts are deadly, figuratively and literally. 

Animals Feel this Too

In 1980, the journal Science published findings on caged rabbits. These rabbits were fed a high-cholesterol diet in an effort to study cardiovascular disease in the rabbits. Much to the scientists’ surprise some rabbits became more diseased than others. “The rabbits had very similar diet, environment and genetic makeup. They thought it might have something to do with how frequently the technician interacted with the rabbits.” (Jauhar) The same high-cholesterol diet study was repeated with the rabbits, but they were divided into two groups. The one change was how the scientists interacted, or ignored the rabbits. “… in one group, the rabbits were removed from their cages, held, petted, talked to, played with, and in the other group, the rabbits remained in their cages and were left alone.” (Jauhar) After a year it was found that the rabbits who were interacted with and felt loved had 60% less aortic disease than the ignored rabbits. This is interesting because the rabbits as a whole all had similar cholesterol levels, blood pressure and heart rate. 

Keeping up with a Health Trend

It can be said that we are reaching the limits to what we can do for our heart health when we rely purely on biological processes. To keep the trend of discovering new ways to stay heart healthy something has to change. We will need to begin incorporating emotional health with our physical health. We can do this in various ways including strengthening our emotional intelligence. Doctor Jauhar clarifies that “The American Heart Association still does not list emotional stress as a key modifiable risk factor for heart disease, perhaps in part because blood cholesterol is so much easier to lower than emotional and social disruption.” (Jauhar) Taking the easier path is appearing to be less of a good long-term strategy. 

To keep up with our heart health we will need to begin using tools to increase our emotional well-being too. “Perhaps, if we recognize that when we say “a broken heart,” we are indeed sometimes talking about a real broken heart. We must, must pay more attention to the power and importance of the emotions in taking care of our hearts.” (Jauhar)

Watch the full TedTalk by clicking here!

Would you like to read more about UCA caring resources? We have other blogs on Unified Caring Association, caring in our communities, and caring the UCA way! If your would like caring messages throughout the week, follow us on Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest, and Twitter!

Investing in Green Spaces

Henry David Thoreau

As quoted above, Henry David Thoreau says so much about the caring link between nature and its effects upon us. In previous blogs we we wrote about how connecting with nature can help reduce stress and help us get grounded while helping us promote our happiness. We have recently noticed a green, growing trend of incorporating nature and gardens into city planning. This excites us and we are all for more greenery in our lives!

NYC’s Rain Gardens

New York City has been a leader in ‘going green’ for awhile now. Recently the city has commissioned a major expansion to their official Green Infrastructure Program. This expansion is to include curbside rain gardens in areas like Brooklyn, the Bronx and Queens. These uniquely designed gardens will “…absorb millions of gallons of stormwater each time it rains, beautifying neighborhoods, improving the health of our waterways and making the city more resilient in the face of global warming.” (https://www1.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/news/406-19/city-doubles-size-largest-green-infrastructure-program-nation-making-nyc-more-resilient-to) More than 9,000 curbside rain gardens are under construction in New York City! This will help prevent flooding when it rains in addition to reducing the Combined Sewer Overflows that often flow into local NYC waterways in upwards numbers of 500 million gallons per year. This reduced overflow will help protect and improve the  health of the local tributaries and that of NY Harbor.

Curb garden
NYC Department of Design and Construction

This is a wonderful idea to help bring green spaces to New York City since more than 70% of the city is paved with impervious surfaces. Often water gets absorbed into the ground and dispersed. But this cannot happen very well if the surfaces are paved. This means that impervious surfaces and massive amounts of water tend to create problems with flooding since the water has very few places to go. (Although it would be fun to race popsicle-stick boats down the full gutters along the street, but it becomes a bit more dangerous when the water goes past our ankles!) “More than 70 percent of New York City’s land mass is covered by an impervious surface… Curbside rain gardens help to soften the city’s landscape and allow the stormwater to be naturally absorbed into the ground, therefore reducing flooding that can impact roadways, homes and businesses.” (https://www1.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/news/406-19/city-doubles-size-largest-green-infrastructure-program-nation-making-nyc-more-resilient-to)

There is an additional benefit to these curbside rain gardens. The areas where these gardens are being created have a smaller tree count and often a higher reported rate of young people with asthma. “The increased tree canopy and vegetation created through the addition of the rain gardens will help to improve air quality, provide shade during hot summer months, and beautify the neighborhoods.” (https://www1.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/news/406-19/city-doubles-size-largest-green-infrastructure-program-nation-making-nyc-more-resilient-to) This is fantastic! But we still have one question that is lingering in our minds… What is a ‘curbside rain garden?’

What is a Curbside Rain Garden?

Curbside Rain Gardens are built along the street in city sidewalks to prevent the loss of street parking. Think a planter box set into the ground, only there is no bottom to the box per-say. The curbside rain gardens in New York City will entail a 5 foot deep hole into the ground. This hole is filled with alternating layers of engineered soil and stones. These layers of stones and soil will contain void spaces that will allow storage of stormwater and the subsequent natural drainage of that water. There are curb cuts to allow for water to flow into the garden to naturally water the plants. These curbside gardens are “…engineered in a way that will allow them to manage up to 2,500 gallons each during a storm… [and] designed so that all the stormwater is absorbed in less than 48 hours.” (https://www1.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/news/406-19/city-doubles-size-largest-green-infrastructure-program-nation-making-nyc-more-resilient-to) The addition of well chosen plants and foliage will assist the drainage and add air purifying beauty to the community!

Curbside Garden infographic

Green Vertical Gardens are a growing trend for cities around the world.

Curbside Rain Gardens are just one way that cities are embracing the use of greenery in their city planning. Another trend that seems to be sprouting up around the world is vertical gardens. A vertical garden is where the plants and flowers are growing in a planter on the wall that often spanse most if not the whole wall space. Engineers and architects have been using this concept to create beautiful and lush cities and neighborhoods.

Most consider the Italian architect Stfano Boeri to be one of the fathers of green high-rises. In 2014 the Bosco Verticale in Milan, Italy won the International Highrise Award. And he is currently working on a “Forest City” in Liuzhou, China near the banks of the Liuyang River. Upon completion in 2020 this 175-hectare city with 300,000 residents will have homes, shops, offices, etc. that echo the hillsides near it to be a lush and green thriving city. “At the same time, this green metropolis will be home to at least 40,000 trees, shrubs, flowers, and hundreds of different plant species, soon becoming a vibrant, wild oasis for insects, bees, and birds.” (https://www.smart-magazine.com/vertical-gardens/) With the prevalent greenery in the city, air quality will increase and the overall noise of the city will be reduced.

plans for vert garden
Designs for Bosco Verticale in Milan, Italy.
Milan Vert Garden
Bosco Verticale

Other ways we see vertical gardens is in Mexico City, USA. In Mexico City there are vertical gardens in the forms of pillars along the highways. These “…gardens are an innovative way of beautifying urban spaces, and absorbing CO2, heat, and city noise.” (https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/city-is-converting-highway-pillars-into-vertical-gardens-to-clean-the-air/) The garden’s irrigation system is self-sufficient by collecting rainwater, ensuring that the plants are well maintained. Additionally, the plants that grow on the pillars are chosen for their urban benefit of having low water consumption and high resilience. This process and selection is similar to those in other regions and cities. What is unique in the case of Mexico City is that the materials that make up the planters for the vertical gardens are made entirely out of recycled plastics. This makes this vertical garden sustainable and green in more than one way! 

CLICK HERE to check out the short video on Mexico City’s vertical gardens!

We at UCA are happy to see these green trends sprouting up around the world! Whether you are gardening in your backyard or driving down the street, having plants around helps reduce stress, anxiety and promotes productivity. All of these are good things to help us become more successful people that can help fill the world with more caring.

If you would like to read more blogs, Unified Caring Association has more blogs like ‘R’ is for Reforestation, A UCA Member’s Personal Well-Being Journey, and Starting Steps to Self-Care. Or if you would like a dose of caring and cheer in your day? Follow us on Pinterest, Tumblr, Twitter, and Instagram!

Mobile Apps for Caring Children

Mobile Apps and Games

Even more than before we see kids and teens with their faces glued to their phones either texting, playing games, or any variety of things. (Ok, maybe we can include some adults in this as well.) With this technology literally at our fingertips, we at Unified Caring Association (UCA) have great news! We have sourced amazing apps and games for ages 2 and up to play on a tech device of your choice. These apps and games are in line with our caring values, and are verified with Common Sense Media, a company that reviews , monitors and rates a wide variety of apps. Check out the variety of caring and educational apps we have found for our members that are available on iTunes, Google Play, or the Amazon Appstore!

Ages 2-5 Years Old

wheels-on-the-bus

Wheels on the Bus

Do you remember the classic kids song that is often sung on field trips? This app has it in sweet and interactive ways. Parents and kids will probably giggle with delight while singing along with this newest version of “Wheels on the Bus!”  You can even record your own voice singing the very memorable tune.

crayola

Crayola Color, Draw & Sing

Take some time to fuel you artsy side by being creative with this app! Kids choose a song to listen to while they create their masterpieces. Each and every action unlocks a new instrument or feature, even scribbling or changing colors! Your young artist will have a beautiful piece of art accompanied with a song in no time flat!

Ages 4-8 Years Old

intro-to-math

Intro to Math, by Montessorium

It’s never too early to start learning new skills! This app helps teach kids an early education in math through a game. In this game the ‘student’ will manipulate objects on the screen to achieve the end goal. There are several approaches to numbers that this app presents to the kids using this app. Who knows, your child might soon be giving you advice on stocks and investments?!

Intro-to-letters

Intro to Letters, by Montessorium

This is another educational app that we have sourced to help children recognize, pronounce and write letters! This includes lowercase and capital letters as well as phonograms to help sound out new or unfamiliar words.

khan-academy

Khan Academy

Creativity and learning are connected at the hip, especially when they are paired up with interesting characters and engaging activities! With this app, there are many ways for self-expression. It covers important topics like phonics, storytelling, mathematics, problem-solving and more! Through this app parents can view and track the progress their kids are making which enables them to help their children set goals and celebrate achievements upon completion!

Ages 6-8 Years Old

Winky-think

Winky Think Logic Puzzles

Puzzles are one of the most endearing games on the market. They touch a place of nostalgia in our hearts. With Winky Think Logic Puzzles your kids will feel the joy in a new techno way! This app has 180 logic puzzles in a wide range of difficulties! Kids will mull over complex games with obstacles, mazes and multi-touch action while strengthening their minds. 

toki-tori

Toki Tori

This is an adorable family-friendly puzzle adventure requiring analytical thinking that can be fun for younger kids, teens and adults alike! Parents and kids play cooperatively to solve puzzles by talking it out to decide the best strategy to win the game!

beyond-ynth

Beyond Ynth

This app is a strategic adventure that is a unique and fun way to travel. It is challenging, by not too hard for those kids that are on the younger side of the age bracket. The game plays the role of a little bug named Kribl. Kribl must traverse harsh landscapes inside the safety of a box.

Ages 6-12 Years Old

mindful-powers

Mindful Powers

One of the most valuable skills kids can learn early on is mindfulness. This will set them up for success by giving them the ability to cope with stressful situations that pop up as they grow. This app helps learn mindfulness by providing the tools and practice with Flibbertigibbet, an animated representation of emotions that your child feels.

dexteria-dots

Dexteria Dots2

Your kids will have a grand time while improving their fine motor skills and practicing math! Each dot represents a number, players combine and divide them to solve math problems. This easy to use app is attention grabbing for all ages with fun animations and bright colors.

plants-by-tinybop

Plants by Tinybop

Virtually explore wildlife with this app. Learn about nature by crashing clouds together, or how the seasons change by speeding up time! This app has eye catching illustrations that are filled with details. With open play capabilities and every season is a new adventure, we cannot wait to see what our kids discover next!

Teenagers

magisto

Magisto Video Editor

For the older kids in our lives who enjoy video making, we have an app for you! This is a powerful and easy to use video editing app. It can add music to existing video, stitch together footage, create show stopping slide shows, and more! Let your teens’ inner filmmaker thrive and see what they create! 

vocabulary

Vocabulary.com

Your teen can explore language by choosing different categories based on their grade level. A couple of examples of the categories are: soundslike and compound words. Add on the fun by picking what challenges to do in the app. Unscramble letters to make words, practice spelling by testing, alphabetize words, or use them in a game setting! Tons of fun your your teen!

high-school-story

High School Story

Teen players set up their own version of high school. Try to win the game by surviving teendom trappings like dating, bullying and cyberbullying, self-esteem, and other social interactions that cause stress. Just like the messages in this app, learn to gear your outlook and actions to be positive, filled with your teens authenticity, kindness and more to help support digital friends. This app contains some challenging topics and quests that help instigate teens using it to think and practice caring actions. 

words-with-friends

Words With Friends

Do you and your teens like to play word games like Scrabble? This app is for you! Words With Friends is a Scrabble-look-a-like game that is more for teens and adults. It has fast match ups to challenge friends and other people online, and an open chat (which is unfiltered) to catch up with friends and family members as your play!

sims-free-play

Sims FreePlay

This is a full Sims game to build your dream house, get that highly sought after job and have your dream relationship. The Fremium version is fun, enjoyable and can be easily played without spending money on in-app purchases. How will your teen plan out their lives in this game? Maybe they will have that mansion with a pool, or that fun, fast-paced career that brings in the dough while caring for the environment! The options are endless. The sky’s the limit!

Whatever games and apps your children choose to play, we at UCA value that they are filled with C.A.R.E., and help your children grow into caring ambassadors. Have fun and enjoy the apps!

Unified Caring Association is constantly striving to help create a more caring world. We love sharing more caring information and resources on our website and through blogs that share caring in our community, activities, and reviews. We also send out caring posts on our social media accounts (Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest, and Twitter) to give inspiration throughout the week. 

Is My Child Resilient?

resilience

Is my child resilient?

So many questions go through our minds as we think about our children. We want to make sure that our kids are able to handle all that life throws at them. Are they ready to take on life’s challenges on their own? (Or mostly on their own?) Are they able to focus on tasks? How quickly can they get back on track when they are distracted? These are a handful of questions that we ask ourselves and our children. All of these relate to one topic: is my child resilient?

Resilience

When we type in ‘resilience’ as a Google search, we come up with the definition stating: “the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness.”  This means that your kids know how to cope with their emotions and take action in spite of barriers, setbacks, or any other limitations that life throws at them. Resilience helps us measure and have the fortitude to pull ourselves up by the bootstraps. How much we want to achieve our goals even if we need to overcome challenges to get there. It also requires emotional strength and emotional intelligence.

Is my child resilient?

As parents, we are constantly striving to protect our children. There ever-increasing reports about stresses that kids encounter in their lives, one of which is cyberbullying. Unified Caring Association has an easy and effective way to help keep our kids safe by assessing their resilience. Building up our kids’ personal resilience. Being resilient is one of the best skills we can pass on to them.

We have developed a simple tool to check on your child’s personal resilience by answering a set of targeted key questions about them, giving each answer a value between 1 (never) and 4 (always). Some example questions are: 

-Believes in own abilities and competence? 

-Can cope well with stress to bounce back? 

-Shows empathy for others? 

This tool is applicable to all age ranges. And much like our personal assessment tool, it is best to repeat this assessment over time to check in on the top needs your child has  for building resilience.

Ready for the world filled with resilient caring.

Our children are filled with endless possibilities. With strong personal resilience, they are capable of creating a more caring world. Challenges will not shut them down, but instead help drive them to achieve their goals. We can all hope that they will continue to strengthen their emotional intelligence in an effort to help care for our communities, the world and each other. With tools like the UCA resilience assessment we can learn how to nurture ours and our children’s personal resilience, as well as learn how to pass along what it means to be resilient.

world

Would you like to read more about UCA caring resources? We have other blogs on Unified Caring Association, caring in our communities, and caring the UCA way! If your would like caring messages throughout the week, follow us on Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest, and Twitter!

It’s Going to be a Sunny Day… UCA & Love for the Elderly Work Together to Spread Cheer.

sunshine

Twitter-It’s-going-to-be-a-sunny-day…UCA-Sunshine-Box-work-together-to-spread-some-cheer.

Unified Caring Association (UCA) helps spread caring, kindness and cheer in our communities. What can brighten the day more than a special surprise delivered to you or a loved one?! UCA recently teamed up with Love for the Elderly to deliver Sunshine Boxes to help brighten the day for the elderly with the delivery of gifts to them.

Sunshine Boxes is the creation of a 501c3 non-profit organization called Love for the Elderly that began in 2016. They have been sending treasured gifts ever since. In the latest box delivery, these care packages were delivered by youth ambassadors to seniors in nursing homes in Arizona. Oftentimes, the seniors who live in the homes feel isolated and lonely. These cheerful boxes contain fun, cute, and silly items to bring about smiles and joy. Some examples of items that might be included in these boxes are neon smiley face stress balls, yellow bandanas emoji pens (of course smiley face ones!), and various other yellow and positive themed items.

Sunshine-Box

We are in love with these, and recently sponsored the delivery of the Sunshine Boxes! Included in this delivery was a Moonbeam Feeling Pack (includes cards and book) for each senior! We heard back and were moved by the stories. The big smiles and long conversations that are held with the elderly who receive the Sunshine Boxes warm our hearts. This is what we see as love and caring for the elderly. 

Moonbeam-deck-of-cards

There are so many more UCA activities, caring communities, and ways of sharing caring. Read more on our blogs, or follow us on social media (Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest, and Twitter) to catch up on a daily dose of care!

Your Words Help Create a More Caring World

words

Your Words Help Create a More Caring World
communication-and-caring-understanding

Communication is always evolving. With the newest technologies available to us, we are modifying how we talk and understand communication. (Do we all remember the #hashtag phase? If not Jimmy Fallon and Justin Timberlake did a comedy skit that sums it up perfectly!) One thing is true, we love to communicate with each other. If we are striving to be authentic and impeccable during this communication, we can continue to create a more caring and positive world.

Your Brain

Everyone has a slightly different way of thinking, and thus a different way of interpreting what is being said. If we break down the process of communication we have two parts of the brain that are performing tasks simultaneously. First we have listening and then talking. In his TedTalk neuroscientist Uri Hasson goes through a research study he helped perform. During this study, people were placed in an MRI machine to record which areas of the brain light up while being told/telling a story. What was observed was the areas of the brain that light up during these tasks and the wave patterns that are another depiction of the brains activity. At first the people that were in the MRI machines had irractive results (a.k.a. their minds were thinking about all different things). But when the story began, all of the brains synced up to display almost the same results. These results are an example of neural entrainment. “…we believe that these responses … become similar across listeners because of the meaning conveyed by the speaker, and not by words or sound. ” (Uri Hasson) Uri might be onto something when he comments that this alignment that we are seeing is vital for communication. This communication is stronger when the speaker and the listener are communicating in the same/familiar language. For example, if you have a strong grasp on English, a story told to you in English will be better comprehended verses a story told in an unfamiliar language. It is important to note that retelling a story or memory results in the same activities in the brains of the speaker and listener.Think about the warm fuzzy feeling that you get when telling someone your favorite memory.

Ok, when we both listen and talk our brains have the same activity. But what about truly understanding and the different perspectives people have? Misunderstandings happen all the time in our lives because we often understand the same occurrence in different ways. Uri had another phase in this experiment. He recounts the results on how a story is interpreted by two groups of listeners, where each group had a different framing as a preface to the story. “This one sentence before the story started was enough to make the brain responses of all the people …be very similar [within each group] in these high-order areas and different than the other group. And if one sentence is enough to make your brain similar to people that think like you and very different than people that think differently than you, think how this effect is going to be amplified in real life… that give us very different perspectives on reality.”

Click Here if you would like to watch the full TedTalk by Uri Hasson.

Be Thoughtful and Deliberate- Reaction vs Interaction

Now that we understand a bit more about the science side of talking and listening, how can we use this knowledge to be authentic with our communication? A lot of this deals with being present, thoughtful and deliberate with our words when communicating with others and yourself. (Remember, self talk is super important too!) When reading a Harvard Business Review article by Tony Schwartz and Emily Pines titled Great Leaders Are Thoughtful and Deliberate, Not Impulsive and Reactive, we come to the two-fold idea once again. The part of us that is what we are most familiar with and use day-to-day for scheduling, working, etc. This part is  “…run by our pre-frontal [sic.] cortex and mediated through our parasympathetic nervous system. This is the self we prefer to present to the world. It’s calm, measured, rational, and capable of making deliberate choices.” The second part is operated by a small cluster of nuclei in the midbrain called the amygdala. The amygdala “…is mediated by our sympathetic nervous system. Our second self seizes control any time we begin to perceive threat or danger. It’s reactive, impulsive, and operates largely outside our conscious control.”

Prefrontal-Cortex & Amygdala

(A.K.A. the lizard brain, great for surviving an attack by a t-rex or bear, less great for current day issues like when to do the laundry or talk with our partner about an issue.) Most conflicts from triggering the ‘lizard brain’ today are a result of our self value and worth being threatened. You can feel your face get hot, muscles get tense, and breathing can become irregular at these moments. “…but the danger we experience isn’t truly life-threatening. Responding to them as if they are only make things worse.” (Tony Schwartz and Emily Pines) We can do a number of things to remain conscious of these dueling ‘selfs’ as Tony Schwartz and Emily Pines dub them. Some examples that help us check in with our brains and what they are doing/deciding are meditation, journaling, taking a breather, etc.

If this sounds familiar, you would be correct. Taking the time to self-reflect on your thoughts before speaking is a part of self-care, understanding who you are, and how you would like to conduct yourself. This takes a lot to recognise your internal experience. “You can’t change what you don’t notice, but noticing can be a powerful tool for shifting from defending our value to creating value.” Self observe or a stoic stance helps to recognise the emotions and thoughts. Then we are able to interact with the situation/problem/feeling to promote a positive outcome. One way to improve your capacity to self-observe is to begin with a strong emotion such as impatience, frustration, or anger. When you feel it arising, it’s a flashing red light that you’re sliding into the “second self”. If all you can do is just name the emotion, you have made a huge first step to being able to transform them to a positive. 

Unified Caring Association has a tool that we love to use and share to help with this. We have a deck of cards and accompanying book called Moonbeam Feeling Pack. With these we can pull a card that has an emotion depicted, read the description, and then decide on what to do with that emotion.  If it is a heavy or depleting emotion, we can choose the opposite lighter and renewing emotion Moonbeam identifies which we might just prefer.

Moonbeam-deck-of-cards

What are other red flags for us? “…watch out for times when you feel you’re digging in your heels. The absolute conviction that you’re right and the compulsion to take action are both strong indicators that you‘re feeling a sense of threat and danger.” (Tony Schwartz and Emily Pines) At these times it can be helpful to ask yourself questions like, ‘Is there a different perspective here?’ or ‘What part of this is my responsibility?’ These regular inquiries on your thoughts and feelings help to offset “… your confirmation bias — the instinct to look for evidence that supports what you already believe. By always looking for your own responsibility, you’re resisting the instinct to blame others and play victim and focusing instead on what you have the greatest ability to influence — your own behavior.” (Tony Schwartz and Emily Pines) With practice these new skills will allow us to better interact with others while communication, not just react to the other person’s words. This interaction often promotes more creativity, productivity, and overall satisfaction. Know thyself can become a lasting mantra. Knowing our truth/authentic self/who we are is a core foundation to being impeccable with our words. Without our self-awareness and inner confidence we often struggle with actually knowing what to say.

What we say matters as much as how we say it.

“It’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice…being kind, being compassionate, being inclusive and straight up and just being good to people is what matters.” [Dwayne Johnson]

Yes this is a quote from ‘The Rock’ and it holds a ton of truth to it. Being nice goes a long way. We are now having a better grasp on what to do, now we need to practice how to interact. There is a bit of an art to this interaction while stating your new found, productive truth. We want to stand up for ourselves while maintaining a nice and positive attitude. This is not always easy to do, especially during an argument or giving bad news to another person. Joyce E. A. Russell talks about this a bit in her article on Forbes.com titled Being Honest And Nice At Work Actually Works: “…you do have to stand up for yourself and you have to give honest feedback to people who are not doing what they should be doing, but you can still do this in a kind, compassionate, nice and firm way.” This returns us to the original idea that we should be impeccable with our words. Have you ever received a bad review at work is such a nice way that you really heard the feedback? It not only leaves you feeling motivated, but you then have a better comprehension of what you should improve. 

understanding

Our brains love stories. We see through studies like Uri Hasson’s where we can map and measure how active and where the activity occurs. But the stories and words we hear often are not exactly what the speaker/teller means. It is important to be  thoughtful and deliberate when speaking and listening. This helps us ensure we are fully communicating and comprehending what is being said. This takes a bit of work, but being authentic, thoughtful, and deliberate helps with our caring communication. This all builds to the belief that  what we say and how we say it matters. We all want to help make the world a more caring and thriving place to live. We can do this by being impeccable with your caring words.

Works Cited

  • Hasson, U. (2016, February). This is your brain on communication. Retrieved August 21, 2019, from https://www.ted.com/talks/uri_hasson_this_is_your_brain_on_communication
  • Pines, T. S. (2019, April 18). Great Leaders Are Thoughtful and Deliberate, Not Impulsive and Reactive. Retrieved August 21, 2019, from https://hbr.org/2019/04/great-leaders-are-thoughtful-and-deliberate-not-impulsive-and-reactive
  • Russell, J. E. (2019, June 25). Being Honest And Nice At Work Actually Works. Retrieved August 21, 2019, from https://www.forbes.com/sites/joyceearussell/2019/06/24/being-honest-and-nice-at-work-actually-works/#2cf744106d46

Want to read more about UCA and get an extra dose of positivity on you news feeds? Read our other blogs on caring, member benefits, and or follow us on social media: Pinterest, Tumblr, Twitter, and Instagram. We are looking forward to sharing more with you!

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