Adrienne Vanterpool

Friday, September 28, 2018

Starbucks: Take responsibility for the milk you use

"The United Farm Workers’ need our support. Please pass out their flyer [below] and ask customers to help encourage Starbucks to tell Darigold member dairies to stop sexual harassment and other abuses."

Dear Starbucks Manager:

The women and men who provide you with the milk to make lattes, cappuccinos, frappes and other products urgently need your help. These workers, employed on Darigold member dairies in the Pacific Northwest, have faced sexual discrimination, violations of the law, and long hours with no rest or meal breaks. To make matters worse, many of these workers have been retaliated against for speaking out, lost their jobs, and in the case of the Darigold Dozen, been sued for complaining about not receiving legally mandated breaks.

Some Darigold dairies have made a practice of sexual harassment. The harassers keep their jobs and the women get fired. It’s time to take sexual harassment out of the supply chain.

Your mission statement talks about inspiring and nurturing the human spirit. To date, consumers, elected officials, even dairy workers themselves have called on Starbucks corporate headquarters to live up to this mission and take action. But to date, nothing has changed. For that reason, I’m now asking that you add your voice to our call for justice and corporate responsibility. By demanding that Darigold immediately met with the United Farm Workers to resolve this situation, Starbucks can truly demonstrate its commitment to social responsibility.

Starbucks is a major buyer of Darigold* milk. It needs to take social responsibility for the products it uses to make profits from.

Your customer

*Even if the packaging of the milk does not say “Darigold”, that does not mean it was not sourced from this company.

Sunday, September 23, 2018

Calming the mind works and brings peace.

Meditation the next step in freedom.

Friday, September 21, 2018

Strange Are The Ways of Ungrateful Man

Are You Ungrateful?

When trouble comes into our lives we cry out to God for help. We are torn and racked with pain, fear and worry about the outcome of our situation. As we kneel to pray, we do it with certainty that God will hear in some instances. This happens only when our hearts are full and overwhelmed by life on life’s terms situations. It doesn’t matter what is happening because what is currently occurring in our life has happened to someone in the past. The point is now that same thing is touching our lives. We have not seen this occur in our life before, therefore, we feel devastated as if life has somehow wronged us. When trouble has reached us, it takes a while for us to understand that there is a lesson to be learned and a way out.

As we traverse through the pain of being uncertain about the outcome, we call on God laying down, sitting, standing, at work, in our cars, on our friends’ shoulders and at every wakening moment. We cry out for God’s help despite what we say we believe. If He could just hear us, see our need and fit it; life would be so much better. When the answer comes it’s not always what we want to hear. Sometimes we are clearly instructed to let go and let God work it out. Other times we are in such fear that we lack the ability to let go or even perceive those clear signs staring us in the face.

Why cry out and pray for help when you really don’t want it? I say this because we are often given the hard choice of following God’s guidance or going it on our own. When it comes to following the clear guidance that does not match what we think it should be, we tend to move in the opposite direction. You really don’t want help or guidance unless it matches what you think it ought to be. There you are stuck in your mess crying out for help only to receive it and then turn it away.

Ungrateful man how strange are your ways. What is even stranger is that once God’s help prevail in our situation, how quietly we forget to thank Him, praise Him, and even tell others of His goodness and mercy. We somehow envision that it was not as bad as it had seemed, that we in some miraculous way changed the outcome of our circumstance and totally forget how hard we cried and prayed for God’s help. Even asking for forgiveness has slipped our minds. Now in some way we have become invincible.

Trials will come and so will pain and suffering, we will cry out again and again to our God. However, will we continue to forget His mercy? Will we forget what has God delivered us from? Has He healed your body or saved the life of someone close to you? Has death taken hold of some suffering soul as a means of relief? Yes, death comes to each of us and is the door that releases us from this world of sorrow and pleasure.

Death should be celebrated for in it lies a greater reward. All to often we forget that God has blessed us with this life and that death is our return to unto Him. It's all about the journey. I am grateful to have lived and enjoyed the life my creator designed for me. My journey has taught many lessons, some very difficult to grasp and others much easier. However, the journey home is sure. The time and date I will reach my destination have already been determined. There is no need to grieve, but rather focus your attention on life’s journey, for life is the path that leads to everlasting and eternal joy. I am grateful to have shared my life with you. “Adrienne Vanterpool”