I've spent my entire professional life in service, 8 years with an NGO, directing a nationwide violence prevention campaign based in SF, and 4 with a DC-based foundation leading a coalition of NGOs and foundations to convince Americans that multilateral solutions to foreign policy problems generally work better than unilateral ones. I've written books and reports on policy matters from the US invasion of Iraq to effective community responses to domestic violence. And for a year, I served as a White House Fellow at the Department of Defense, in the Secretary of the Navy's office, learning what service at the highest levels of government really means. I served on the board of a student-based organization running international health campaigns, and have helped create a couple of organizations focused on security issues. I love working in this community and can't imagine a life that doesn't involve giving.

Make national service mandatory, like it is in Germany -- one year after college, to give back to your country...

Nelson Mandela (who wouldn't). The guy who stood in front of the tank at tiananmen sqaure in 1989. Anyone who lay a rose down in front of police during resistance protests during the velvet revolution in Prague. Someone who lives in the bush in Ethiopia, so far away that she's never heard of a place called Ethiopia, much less a cell phone or a happy meal. Anyone who has faced or taken a bullet in wartime. More of my next door neighboors. And, it's true, Steve Martin.

Build a huge, foolish project. Like Noah. It makes absolutely no difference what others think of you. -- Rumi

Iceland, Ecuador, India, Italy, Canada, the U.K. Switzerland, France, Belgium, former Yugoslavia, Hungary, Germany (east and west), Russia, Mexico, Siberia, Puerto Rico. Most states in the US. And to the Arctic Circle. No, that is not a joke.

yoga, kayaking, hiking, writing (personal/travel essays), life coaching (I specialize in working with social change leaders), comedy, chick flicks and dramas too but nothing violent or I won't sleep, volunteering, internet marketing, kids, friends, family, Spirit

Semi-pitiful Russian and a bit rusty but still useful French. Does English go without saying for an Amerikanka like me?