Breathe Respiration Hackathon + Global Respiration Initiative
With Rodney Yee, clearly inhaling before we enter MIT Media Lab
A convening of researchers, technicians, designers, clinicians, innovators, scholars, patients and others to incubate ideas and define ways to drastically improve the life of people living with COPD. The Hackathon simultaneously happened in Cambridge, MA, London, England, and Haifa, Israel.
The MIT Media Lab website had this to say concerning my role in this truly optimistic event -
"To help the teams ideate and provide some breaks from the intensive hacking we are facilitating breakout sessions. Some will be determined during the event, un-conference style, and some are already scheduled, including sessions with Rodney Yee, Linda Stone, Neema Moraveji, Keely Garfield and others.
At hackathons, the sustained high level of creativity and technical innovation takes a toll mentally and physically. With the help of Keely Garfield we have set up restorative stations to help rejuvenate the participants during the day. Keely is an E-RYT 500 Yoga Instructor, Urban Zen Integrative Therapist (UZIT), Reiki Master, Zen Meditation teacher, and hospice caregiver."
So much to report! Everybody moving around the graceful, futuristic yet homey space of the Media Lab with total commitment to making LIFE AS WE KNOW IT BETTER! One young researcher runs up to me panting, "So what is it I need to KNOW about the nature of inhalation?" "Not that", I tell her, "Think about the exhalation. How can you facilitate the completion of the breath out? The air that cleanses and detoxifies, and that naturally lends itself to a fuller experience of breathing...in." Her eyes are lit with Prana. She knows what to do.
So that there, that is a picture of Peterson who I met on one of my trips to Haiti, leading a UZIT team. We raised money to purchase, and then deliver him a portable oxygen machine. This made it possible for him to finally leave the confines of his hospital room and the enormous tank that he was shackled to for life, literally, and see and breathe in, the garden. That is the snapshot right there...a young boy simply experiencing freedom. I think of you with every breath I take...
Peterson out and about for the first time in a long while...