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Wiki says Mindfulness: is a state of being in which greed, hatred and delusion have been overcome, abandoned and are absent from the mind. 
Summer camp is a place where mindfulness is promoted each and every day. When we live with others it is important that we take the self out of our actions and think more about the group and what we need to accomplish. Today, business’s are doing the same.....

Developing Mindful Leaders


3:32 PM Friday December 30, 2011 by Polly LaBarre
Organizations invest billions annually on a success curriculum known as "leadership development," which ends up leaving so much on the table. Training and development programs almost universally focus factory-like on inputs and outputs — absorb curriculum, check a box; learn a skill, advance a rung; submit to assessment, fix a problem. Likewise, they leave too many people behind with an elite selection process that fast-tracks "hi-pos" and essentially discards the rest. And they leave most people cold with flavor of the month remedies, off sites, immersions, and excursions — which produce little more than a grim legacy of fat binders gathering dust on shelves.
What if, instead of stuffing people with curricula, models, and competencies, we focused on deepening their sense of purpose, expanding their capability to navigate difficulty and complexity, and enriching their emotional resilience? What if, instead of trying to fix people, we assumed that they were already full of potential and created an environment that promoted their long-term well-being?


In other words, what if cultivating a successful inner life was front and center on the leadership agenda?


That was the question Todd Pierce asked himself in 2006 after years of experimenting with the full menu of trainings, meetings, and competency models in his capacity as CIO of biotechnology giant Genentech. He had just scoured the development reports of some 700 individuals in the IT department and found that "not one of them had an ounce of inspiration. I remember sitting there and saying, 'There's got to be a another way.'"
At the time, Pierce was benefiting personally from work with a personal coach and had recently woken up to the power of the practice of
mindfulness. He called in a kindred soul, Pamela Weiss, a long-time executive coach and meditation teacher, to help design an experiment that would cast out the traditional approach to leadership development to focus instead on helping people grow.
"If you want to transform an organization it's not about changing systems and processes so much as it's about changing the hearts and minds of people," says Weiss. "Mindfulness is one of the all-time most brilliant technologies for helping to alleviate human suffering and for bringing out our extraordinary potential as human beings."
Pierce and Weiss distilled a set of principles that form the basis of what became the "
Personal Excellence Program" (PEP), now heading into its sixth year inside Genentech (Pierce left the company this fall after 11 years to join salesforce.com). Together, these pillars offer up a short course in unleashing human capability, resilience, compassion, and well-being (and they're unpacked in even more detail in Weiss and Pierce's entry).
1. 
Developing people is a process — not an event. "Development is all too often considered a one-time event," says Weiss. She and Pierce designed PEP as a ten-month-long journey that unfolds in three phases, with big group meetings, regular small group sessions, individual coaching, peer coaching, and structured solo practice.
2. 
People don't grow from the neck up. Too much training focuses on the the mind — it's about transferring content. "We talk about the head, the heart, and the body," says Weiss. In fact, they do more than talk about it — they enact it every day at the start of every meeting. The "3-center check in" is the gateway drug to mindfulness. As Weiss describes it: "You close your eyes for a moment and you notice, 'What am I thinking — what's happening in my head center,' then you notice, 'What am I feeling — what's happening in my heart center.' then, 'What am I feeling — what's happening in my body.' It's a way in which people start paying attention and practicing mindfulness without ever practicing meditation."
3. 
Put mindfulness at the center (but don't call it that!). Weiss and her team were careful to keep the language of specific belief systems and religions out of PEP. The program revolves around three phases: reflection on and selection of a specific quality or capacity you want to work on (patience, decisiveness, courage); three months of cultivating the capacity for self-observation; and the hard work of turning insight into deliberate, dedicated, daily practice.
4. 
It's hard to grow alone. "People grow best in community," says Weiss. "People don't grow as well just reading a book, getting an online training, or just taking in information. There's an exponential impact in having people grow and learn together." That's why the PEP "pod" (small 6-8 person group) is the main vehicle throughout the year.
5. 
Everybody deserves to grow. Pierce felt strongly that PEP should be available to people across the board — not just the usual "stars" — and that it should be voluntary. "The program is by application and not declaration," he says.
As PEP heads into its sixth year at Genentech, some 800 people have participated in the program. (Weiss added a graduate curriculum and a student training program to create "PEPtators" as few people want the journey to end.) The impact has been nothing short of transformative for individuals and organization alike. When Pierce took over the IT department in 2002, its employee satisfaction scores were at rock bottom; four years into the program, the department ranked second in the company and is now consistently ranked among the best places to work in IT In the world (even in the wake of Genentech's 2009 merger with Roche Group — always a turbulent and dispiriting experience).
Pierce attributes that to "the emotional intelligence of people and the capacity to change" developed in PEP. But don't take his word for it. The data-obsessed Pierce commissioned a third path impact report on PEP. It came in glowing: 10-20% increase in employee satisfaction, 50% increase in employee collaboration, conflict management, and communication; 12% increase in customer satisfaction; and nearly three times the normal business impact.
"Through PEP we have created a smarter, more agile, and more responsive organization," says Pierce. "The reduction of suffering, the capacity to deal with difficulties, the level of engagement — these things are very powerful and you can't call a meeting to get them or give people stock options and have them. These are skills and qualities you have to cultivate and practice."
So how's this for a new year's resolution for hard-charging leaders: turn every ringing, pinging, tweeting, and blinking thing off — especially your mind — and just breathe.

Summer Camp Should Be Mandatory for a Child: 
It Changes Lives

By Phillip Morris
Call it an emotional report card.
It was one of those moments that give you a reality check on how your kid really feels about you deep down.........
I had just rounded the bend that led to her cabin at Camp Christopher, a residential campground in Bath Township. It was Saturday, and she had been gone for six days — the longest she had been separated from her mother and me during her eleven years on the planet.
I was busy running my mouth, so the little girl spotted me first and set upon me like a blur. As she screamed “Daddy!” while racing the fifty yards or so toward me, I noticed that she had a large black boot on her left foot and a sandal on her right.
She nearly bowled me over as she leaped into my arms and exclaimed “Daddy!” several times and hugged me tight.
She told me she missed me “so much,” and then shifted her weight, which was my signal to put her down.
Once on the ground, she stepped back, looked me up and down, and then spoke to a friend who had come running up behind her: “My dad has a hole in his t-shirt. Daddy, why are you wearing that shirt?” she asked, redirecting her gaze toward me.
I could only shake my head. That’s when I knew my loving moment was over. Now Faith was back to being a pre-teen.
My designer t-shirt, with the strategically placed designer hole in it, was fair game. Now, after being separated for a week, I had to stand there and listen while my gear was publicly critiqued by a sixth-grader wearing a rubber boot and a sandal.
It wasn’t until we got the girl to the car with all of her luggage — including the broken sandal that had been replaced by the boot — that I started to understand how a week away from the parents, how a week at a well-run 
summer camp, can change your kid’s perspective, if not their life.
Only after she did a rapid checklist of everything she had done during the week — the swimming, the hiking, the canoeing, the fishing, the archery, the zip-lining, the horseback riding, and the learning of more campground songs, cheers, and prayers than any kid she should learn in six days — did she finally get to the heart of her camping experience.
“Daddy, I know what I want to do now when I grow up,” she said about thirty minutes into our drive home.
“I want to work with mentally disabled people.”
The short statement that seemingly came out of left field momentarily stunned me.
The girl has told folks for years that she plans to become a singer, a writer, and possibly an attorney when she grew up.
But as we drove, I recalled that she had enthusiastically spoken to a mentally-challenged young man as we left the campground. She had called him by his name. They had exchanged high-fives with each other and smiled broadly as they departed.
“Why do you want to work with the disabled?” I asked.
“Because they seem so happy. It’s like they don’t know that they are disabled,” she responded.
“They’re always smiling. I like them.”
Camp Christopher accommodates children and young adults from all over the region. The diminished mental capacities of a few of the campers doesn’t subtract from the camp's potential to transform lives — it only adds to it in ways many might not imagine.
My little singer, writer, future lawyer now has an appreciation for others with whom she had never had much exposure with before. Her capacity for compassion has been expanded. We have the Catholic-run camp to thank for that. It clearly lived up to its motto: “Come grow with us.”
Only perhaps next year they might also teach her how to sew. I know just the shirt I’ll be sending with her.

Phillip Morris is a Metro Columnist for The Plain Dealer. He also blogs, discussing general interest topics with a focus, on Cleveland.com at www.cleveland.com/morris/.

Summer school, all-year school, summer sports programs, and electronic media have become the staples of children’s play in recent years. Children are kept fully scheduled...

with mostly indoor activities these days. The arena of play has come indoors. The light of the sun has been supplanted by the flickering lights of computer monitors and hand held game screens. Soon, however, changing times may call for a change in the way we consider our children prepared to live a whole life in the world they will inherit.

Our kids will need to find a way to reconnect with our natural environment to become participants in a global effort to restore ecological balance. Environmental awareness begins with a sense of personal connection to nature. 

How do parents bring back balance to a child’s experience? One answer has been around since the 1920’s: summer camp. Modern summer camps can guide kids back into a natural alliance with nature through the pure fun of movement. The challenges of summer camp are fun rather than stressful, but they are no less effective for developing a child’s sense of confidence and independence.

One good example of a modern “green” summer camp is Swift Nature Camp near Minong, Wisconsin. The directors have developed policies that promote camper experience perfectly attuned to the needs of the times, without sacrificing the great fun and memorable friendships that are the classic benefits of summer camp.

Jeff and Lonnie Lorenz, directors of Swift Nature Camp, begin with their policy on electronic devices. “We do not permit cellular phones, BlackBerries, pagers, radios, iPods, cassette or CD players, laser pens, TVs, Game Boys or digital cameras. They simply are not what camp is about.”

Swift Nature Camp combines traditional camp activities with ways to immerse themselves in and learn about nature is likeliest to succeed in inspiring environmental awareness in campers.

Looking for the best choice among countless summer camps can appear to be an almost endless task. Camp information is everywhere, especially on the world wide web. There are day camps and......

overnight campseverywhere in the world. If you and your child know have discussed what you want in a camp, you can make a successful choice.   

Every imaginable kind of camp can be found in the variety of summer camps. Some are traditional and others are limited to certain areas of interest. If you study camp information carefully you can find the right camp for your child. Discussing ideas with your child can be a useful guide to choosing the kind of camp that will give the most to your child’s life.  If you want to choose an overnight camp the information needs to be considered and followed up on even more carefully.

If you compare camp information about all summer camps in the geographic areas you prefer, especially if you are looking at overnight camps, you will find a wide variation of offered facilities and activities. The web sites of specific summer camps will give you a starting place, but it will be up to you to ask questions and study the camp information with a critical eye.

Asking the right questions about summer camps once you have thecamp information in hand will make the difference for a successful search. Basic questions about license, accreditation, quality, camp history, time in existence, philosophy, personnel and facilities are your starting place. But the key to a great choice will be in the details. Can you contact references from campers and parents who have gone to that camp? How is the food? How are the sleeping facilities forovernight camps? What happens when it’s a rainy day? What are the rules about cell phones and computers? How will the camp personnel handle a medical emergency?

When you are just starting out, preparing the right questions before you study camp information can help you find the right camp from all available summer camps. The way you approach information aboutsummer campscan make all the difference to the eventual experience your child will remember all his or her life.

Summer seems a long way off, but now is the time to be looking atsummer camps to find just the right camp for your child. Remember that the best camps fill very fast. For that reason.......

Signing up far ahead of time is important. The first thing to do when selecting a kid summer camp is to look at your child’s needs and wants. Will they thrive in a sports camp or a general camp. What do they want from their summer? Skill building or building friendships?
 

Summer camps should be a complete departure away from teachers and a time for mentors to step in. The essence of the best camps are imaginative, experienced and quick witted people who staff them. These mentors shape up the milieu of the camp so that every camper brings life lessons learned when he or she returns home. The experience which is gained and the knowledge acquired in every case go a long way in shaping up the overall persona of the person a camper becomes.

Kids Summer Camp is a resource with more focus on arts and crafts with special regard to environmental consciousness. Kids go on from camp refreshed, delighted and full of experience when they return to regular classes in the fall.  The exposure that summer camps offer a child will stay with the camper for the rest of a life as the wisdom that can only come from experience. How can parents with a good grasp of what is good for their kids find the right camp? The best place to search for obtaining precise information is of course the World Wide Web.

With a bit of patient research on the internet, you can easily lay your hands on some resourceful data. Parents might assume that if they are paying a higher rate for the kid summer camp that the child will return home with more education. They disregard the fact that the true meaning of summer camps is all about the experience. With the guided presentations of web program directors, the best traditional camps included have woken up to the archetypes involved in the whole process.

Parents ought to seek the best professionalism from persons representing summer camps. There is always a lot of apprehension and questioning for parents in terms of pros and cons their child will face in every social situation life brings. But the right kid summer camp is a good opportunity for every camper to socialize at a level which encompasses every facet of life.

We All know how wonderful summer camp is. But have you ever thought about what Swift Nature Camp looks like in February? A few days ago we were at a MN summer camp show and after that made our way up to camp. It was great....

Be sure to see the Movies
to see Super Tom. You might recall his back had been hurting last summer after his surgery. Well, Im happy to report that he seems finally to be on the mend. He has not been to his winter job of school custodian but will be ready for camp. YEA!
summer camp
As you know the Midwest has been very dry this year with almost no snow. When we first arrived it seemed more like April with many bare spots around the bottoms of the trees. But, snow was covering most of the land and the lake. Giving us a chance to play.

One day we walked out to Picnic Island just to see what was going on. It is a different place in the winter with no low plants so you can see almost across the island. We particularly wanted to go look at the Eagles nest. It seems that the winds from one of the storms destroyed the nest. However, we still saw eagles flying around so they are still nearby but we did not see where their new nest might be.

 

As you can see from the movie I tried a new sport. I got out the water skis and put them on over my socks...it was very tight and then I hooked up to Super Toms 4 wheeler and off I went for a little skiing on the frozen lake. Look at my Hitch Hiker! It was much harder to turn than when you are in the water. Yet, it was fun to try something new. Much of the time we were in sleds being pulled. We tipped so many times yet it was very fun and seemed like winter even though it was near 40 degrees.
 

One of the most exciting time we had was when we woke up one morning and looked out the window to see two dog like creatures run from Picnic Island across to Sawtooth Isle. They looked like Wolves to me. Later that day we went for a hike to see if we could find the tracks and we did. That was so cool.
 

After a few days we left and that very night, the snows came and came and came. Tom reported that Swift Nature Camp was covered with over 15 inches of snow. Sadly we missed the real winter that finally came to camp. If you are ever up in the Northwoods in winter be sure to stop by camp and take a look, it is beautiful but kind of depressing with out all he campers there having fun.

See Ya next Summer
Lonnie, Jeff & Forrest

Ever wonder why SNC is Soda free? Do you know what happens when you drink soda? More than you might imagine. Look at the various health effects of that sip of soda on your body, from your teeth to your heart to your bones. Maybe you will stop drinking it at home as well.

soda-health-pop
Live Long and take care of your Health.... Make good choices

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So here it is a few days into summer camp and you miss your child. That’s normal. So you pick up tyour cell phone and start to call your child’s cell phone. Then it hits you, summer camp has a NO contact policy! Why would such a thing exist? To make the parents suffer? Well, maybe its much more than this.
Here is the secret, a large part of the magic of an overnight summer camp experience is being in a closed community that is conscious. Summer camp if done well totally immerses a child. They live camp with their camp friends, and become part of the story of camp. So how does a cell phone ruin this adventure. It butts into the “life of camp” and brings children the reality of back home. For this reason many directors discourage parents from calling their campers and seem even discourage visiting . Camp Directors want to provide “creative separation” which allow the children to develop a healthy sense of independence, in turn leading to a healthy sense of adventure. For many children this is their first time away from home and it is in a protected child centered environment that only leeds to good results. Most camp directors want parents to see everything that happens at camp but that is not possible if you buy into the giving your child a secure freedom. So some have gone to daily publishing photos on their websites, newsletters, periodic Tweets , or videos. Some Directors have tossed off technology and encouraged each parent to call the office and ask about their child. Remember most camp Directors want to help you after all we are parents too.
This cult we call summer camp has its positive impact soon children forget about the cliques at school, their concerns about grades, and what their friends are doing and wearing.Summer Camp will replace these things with campfires, caring for others, singing in the dining hall, trying new things and increase their growth as a paddler, a rider, a gymnast, and a climber. Even more, they will be replaced by a community of friends 

Okay So you don’t buy it! You need to be in touch with your child. You know you are a helicopter parent. No need to fret.? There are a huge variety in the ways different camps help parents and campers stay in touch. Some camps allow campers to carry cell phones, some allow access to email. Many camps have visiting days. Every camp is different so be sure you ask the director how communication happens before you enroll in camp. This may also be a growing time for you ... getting you ready for those not to far off college days

As camp Director along with my wife Lonnie at Swift Nature Camp we constantly are surprised by the wonderful world of summer camp. Each day we see the Benefits
As camp Director along with my wife Lonnie at Swift Nature Camp we constantly are surprised by the wonderful world of summer camp. Each day we see the Benefits of camp and wonder how much better the “real world” would be if only everyone acted like they were at camp. Here are a few attributes that the rest of the world could adopt:

1. Respect.


Daily we see campers from all over the nation and the world come together with mutual respect and understanding for each other. You might not see this on the first day but after a few trip where it is a cabin group versus nature you realize that everyone in your cabin has you back and is going to watch out for you and respect what you stand for.

 

2. Equality.


Camp provides an equal playing field for all. Makes no difference if your dad is the Ambassador to Guatemala or if your parents run a restaurant. At camp all children are equal. This goes for staff as well. Counselors receive their power from the friendships they make not from the authority of a “counselor”.

3. Real Communication.


In this world of texting and highspeed internet summer camp provides an oasis where adverting and pop culture have no impact. Being away from the “outside world.” only brought people closer together. Conversation were more real, more open leading to the development of better friendships, even closer than some friendships back home. Amazingly, each summer I hear children say “It will be hard with out my smart phone”, yet at the end of camp I hear”it was freeing not having to answer every text and be on call 24/7”.

4. Activity.


In a day and age when working out for children is placing 50 text message, summer camp activities of running jumping, swimming and just playing are a wonderful thing. At our camp we mostly compete against ourselves making camp a place where kids stress free about WINNING. It’s kinda old school to think kids can play outside in a safe child friendly place. The interaction between age groups is amazing older helping younger and Gals being the adopted Moms for the youngest boys. It’s like having one big family that get together every summer.

 

5. Encouragment.


Camp is a place to build each other up. It is a place where children are taught how important their actions are. They learn that one cranky word can bring down the whole cabin. This encouragement takes campers and staff far beyond what they thought they could do. Camp provides the opportunity for people to realize its ok to make a mistake, we all do it. Regroup , apologize wait for forgiveness and move on. When we get encouragement from those around us we are open to reinvent ourselves and better see how we want to be seen in the “real world”.

Camp is not of this world it is like living in a dream where we are each challenged to stretch and grow and be better than when we first arrived camp. Each summer I have staff and campers tell us how they wish the world was more like a camp... Maybe we all just need to try a little more. One last thing, do not assume that all camps are the same. It is important you look for a camp that promotes the values discussed earlier. This can only be done by talking with the director. Read more about this special place Summer Camp. I want to learn more bout How To Find A Summer Camp go Summer Camp Advice and learn more

So it is that time of the year again when parents start to wonder how to make their child’s summer fun but also educational. Summer camp has often been thought of taking care.....
So it is that time of the year again when parents start to wonder how to make their child’s summer fun but also educational. Summer camp has often been thought of taking care of the fun part of the summer but not necessarily enriching the child. Summer is the perfect time to stop worrying about grades and let your child socially develop with higher self esteem, greater leadership skills and how to make friends. Not all camps believe they enrich a child’s personal development so be sure to ask the director their goals before you rush to sign up for a camp that your family friend is attending. To Find The Best Summer Camp it is important to get the right information.
Summer camp and summer enrichment programs do come dearly, but it is important to realize that benefits your child will develop for the rest of their life. Be sure that when doing your investigation you chat with the Director to be sure you are both on the same page. Some summer enrichment camps are little more than a expensive vacation.
Camp activities that promote camper enrichment are important. But equally important is that children get an opportunity to use these skills daily. Does the camp have a well panned schedule? Or are the children just hanging out most of the day? Look at the stated benefits of a program and at the summer enrichment camp sessions offered. Do the activities match your child’s areas of interest? Will the instruction enhance your child’s personal development?

Staff training is a key. It is important to again chat with the camp director and find out the training his staff has. Do they have certifications in specialized areas like ropes course or archery? You may have hear the fact that often camps scramble at the last minute to get staff and sometimes use international staff. These staff are often more interested in seeing the world than seeing to campers needs.
We all know children do not want to go to school during the summer. Therefore it is important that staff do their best to incorporate learning in to games. When campers enjoy the process they learn alot more than behind a desk in school. Camp is about hands on learning. Learning socialization skills is a contact sport.

Again , it is important to understand that camp teach “Life Long Learnables” the things they just do not teach you in school. So when you hear “summer enrichment” its not all school. Camp benefits children by providing them with:Confidence, motivation and self-esteem, as well as their communication and leadership skills. These are the things that really help a child excel in life. 

So you have found the right place, How long should they stay? As a camp Director I believe that longer the better. However, many children have scheduling conflicts and maybe too expensive for many parents. The truth is the shorter the time the less impact a child will have. 

Finally, be sure to investigate your summer enrichment options thoroughly because sending your son or daughter to the right summer enrichment camp will offer long-term benefits for the entire family. As well as making the wrong choice on a sumer camp can have negative impact as well. Remember increased motivation and confidence can translate into better grades, and lead to new academic and personal interests.

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Winter

25 Baybrook Ln.

Oak Brook, IL 60523

Phone: 630-654-8036

swiftcamp@aol.com

Camp

W7471 Ernie Swift Rd.

Minong, WI 54859

Phone: 715-466-5666

swiftcamp@aol.com