All-Ages Beach Cleanup

Join us by the sea for an All-Ages Beach Cleanup. Our RE teens have adopted a beach, Annenberg North, and they invite you for hard work, sea air, and fun beautifying our beloved Santa Monica Bay shore. Everyone needs to sign the waiver (printable at https://www.healthebay.org/waiver) and meet up at the Annenberg Beach House parking lot.

Kids are most welcome, and they’ll be so proud to take care of “our beach.” Because this is a teen-organized event, all kids under 16 must be accompanied by a parent or guardian.

We’ll bring supplies and snacks. You bring your care and energy – and hats and sunscreen. Plastics and other marine debris are a global pollution problem that also impacts human health and safety. Each one of us can protect shore and marine habitats and wildlife by keeping our coast free from harmful pollution. “Sea” you there!

Contact Beth Brownlie, president@uusm.org

Join in a weekday morning meditation and check-in session on Zoom May 9-20 and May 30-June 10. We’re following along with Insight Timer’s Karen Anderson as she leads a course on Fostering an Undefended Heart. It's a 30-day course, and we are in days 11-20, but you will benefit from even one day of participation.

As Karen Anderson says, “Many of us wait for conditions to bring about enjoyable emotions such as love or peace. But wisdom traditions teach that we can in fact practice cultivating these states, as they are at the core of our true nature but often get obscured by fear and confusion. This course invites you on a profound exploration of daily 'heart practices', drawn from various traditions, to comprehensively promote positive emotional states. These pro-social attitudes- called the 'abode of the gods'- include loving-kindness (founded on forgiveness), compassion, joy and equanimity.” Although you may want to complete this course, it is recommended to repeat a given heart practice until it takes root in your heart and mind.

For these brief 30 minute sessions, we will sign on at 9 AM, settle in for a brief lesson and meditation, and close by a 10 minute checking in and sharing what’s on your heart and mind as you launch your day. Contact AdultRE@uusm.org for further information.

Celebrate spring by nature journaling on flowers.  We will spend this session learning about, thinking about and observing flowers.  Flowers have tremendous diversity and are fascinating to look at closely.  We will do a little botany, some drawing and some writing.  You are very welcome to join even if you have no knowledge of flowers, drawing or writing.  All you need are paper and pencil and a flower to observe. Your experience will be enhanced if you also have a magnifying glass and colored pencils or other tools to draw in color but these are not necessary.  A lifelong lover of the outdoors, Dorothy has more than twenty years experience encouraging people to a love for the natural world.  She leads hikes for children and adults in Topanga Canyon, Ballona Wetlands and Dockweiller State Beach.

Join in a weekday morning meditation and check-in session on Zoom May 9-20 and May 30-June 10. We’re following along with Insight Timer’s Karen Anderson as she leads a course on Fostering an Undefended Heart. It's a 30-day course, and we are in days 11-20, but you will benefit from even one day of participation.

As Karen Anderson says, “Many of us wait for conditions to bring about enjoyable emotions such as love or peace. But wisdom traditions teach that we can in fact practice cultivating these states, as they are at the core of our true nature but often get obscured by fear and confusion. This course invites you on a profound exploration of daily 'heart practices', drawn from various traditions, to comprehensively promote positive emotional states. These pro-social attitudes- called the 'abode of the gods'- include loving-kindness (founded on forgiveness), compassion, joy and equanimity.” Although you may want to complete this course, it is recommended to repeat a given heart practice until it takes root in your heart and mind.

For these brief 30 minute sessions, we will sign on at 9 AM, settle in for a brief lesson and meditation, and close by a 10 minute checking in and sharing what’s on your heart and mind as you launch your day. Contact AdultRE@uusm.org for further information.

Join in a weekday morning meditation and check-in session on Zoom May 9-20 and May 30-June 10. We’re following along with Insight Timer’s Karen Anderson as she leads a course on Fostering an Undefended Heart. It's a 30-day course, and we are in days 11-20, but you will benefit from even one day of participation.

As Karen Anderson says, “Many of us wait for conditions to bring about enjoyable emotions such as love or peace. But wisdom traditions teach that we can in fact practice cultivating these states, as they are at the core of our true nature but often get obscured by fear and confusion. This course invites you on a profound exploration of daily 'heart practices', drawn from various traditions, to comprehensively promote positive emotional states. These pro-social attitudes- called the 'abode of the gods'- include loving-kindness (founded on forgiveness), compassion, joy and equanimity.” Although you may want to complete this course, it is recommended to repeat a given heart practice until it takes root in your heart and mind.

For these brief 30 minute sessions, we will sign on at 9 AM, settle in for a brief lesson and meditation, and close by a 10 minute checking in and sharing what’s on your heart and mind as you launch your day. Contact AdultRE@uusm.org for further information.

The Pipes Lecture Series will have its Finale on Saturday, May 7 at 5:30 pm in the Sanctuary with memorials to three pillars of the lecture series committee, Leonard Adler, Rev. Ernie Pipes, and Marguerite Spears, pictured above. All three died last year within six months of one another. The committee felt it a fitting time to put on this final event. 

If you loved yourself well, what would your life look like?  What language would you use to describe yourself, to ask for what you want, to protect your boundaries?  Who in your life mothered you the way you most wanted to be mothered?  What would be different about your walk in the world if you treated yourself with that same love and compassion?  This morning we will talk about compassionate love and why it is sometimes so hard to give to oneself.