Celebrating 600: Proof This Is Still An Amazing World!

What do 18.2 % of us have that might just change the world?

Since March of 2014, I’ve learned it’s three things: A graceful tendency to be open-minded, a relentless sense of curiosity, and a seemingly endless capacity for hope.

Source: Pixabay

Congratulations! Whether you are just discovering us here at Ever Widening Circles (EWC) or you visit us regularly, you are probably in that 18.2%! You are tuning out fear and tuning in insight. Together, the “18.2-Percenters” seem to have the right stuff to turn our shared future back to a place where possibility, progress, and wonder are “normal.”

There is a future for us all where the doom and gloom of the current 24-hour news cycle seems out-of-step with reality. In fact, there is actually a present where all the negativity of the mass media looks wastefully irresponsible because there is actually so much good going on! And that place is right here at Ever Widening Circles, where every day we demonstrate this is still an amazing world. We are sharing the wonder that is all around us, with carefully fact-checked articles about the remarkable things happening in science, the arts, technology, extreme sports, space, social improvements, and the natural world.

We are pointing the world to the amazing work of thought-leading YouTubers, extraordinary Podcasts, and the very best TED Talks. This list of innovative thinkers goes on and on.

Why 18.2%?

Since the earliest days of the EWC project, we have found that 18.2% of the people who visit once come back again and again for a daily dose of possibility. It’s been one of the most delightful surprises. It doesn’t seem to matter whether we are getting 1,500 visitors per month or 60,000; or whether we are promoting the EWC project in the U.S., Nepal, or Algeria.

Our return visitor rate has always been 18.2%, and we find that incredibly inspiring! 18.2% of your friends, neighbors and fellow travelers on this spinning blue planet are open, curious and hopeful enough to move the world in a better direction.

Celebrating 600

Today, we are celebrating over 600 reasons to be open, curious and hopeful! Over the last 12 months, since our launch in October of 2015, we have published 600 articles that each prove – in every way under the sun – that this is still an amazing world. And today we look back at the best of the best!

We’ll give you our personal recommendations on the “Must-See” articles in three categories: Most-shared, Hidden Gems, and some of our EWC Team Favorites. (Although that last category is impossible to curate because we only write about the things that all of us agree are remarkably inspiring!)

These curated lists are our gift to the growing EWC community. Make the time to dive into each of these at some point and you will find yourself walking a lot taller. Enjoy!

Some of EWC’s Most-shared…

Some of EWC’s Hidden Gems…

(These are articles you might not dive into, but should! They are all real “game-changers.” Some have insights that are completely counter-intuitive others use humor to transform our perspectives.)

EWC’s Team Favorites…

Continuing the Transformation…

Well, I hope you’ve taken a little journey with EWC today by opening into some of these fabulous reminders of the fact that this is still an amazing world. Best of all, you can come back to this article for weeks whenever you need to feel elevated!

Source: Eric Rolph // Wikimedia

Our goal is to change the negative dialogue about our world. As it turns out, the growing EWC community might just be able to do this! So many people around the planet seem ready for a place on the web with no agenda, celebrating insights we could almost all agree upon.

On this day of our 600th article, we have over 100,000 views a month from places as diverse as Cambodia, Belgium, Ethiopia, and Pakistan. We have 180,000 Facebook page-fans, with 10,000 from Afghanistan, 20,000 from India, 7000 in Mongolia, and tens of thousands more from places we could never imagine. Now we have globally famous authors, Nat Geo Photographers and other thought leaders helping to expand our community.

Maybe there’s a common chord running through many of us that still craves the promise of innovation, beauty, and creativity?

Like many of our readers, I was finding it harder to fight that fight of staying positive alone. Have you ever felt “back to the wall”, so hopeless about the future that you are ready to throw up your hands like so many people seem to do?

I was nearly there in the winter of 2015, and the EWC project you are discovering now is the result of my effort to transform more than just myself. I knew there was a better world out there that the media was not celebrating anymore.

Source: Ken Lund // Flickr

At first, the task of finding, carefully fact-checking and writing was like climbing a rock wall, making the most of every toehold. Eventually, we found an opening in that rock wall and burst through it.

And now we are on top of that bluff and can see the horizon.

It’s clear ahead, folks!

There are so many great things going on that our team does not have time to bring you all of them! (You can read our story, mission, and team bios if you are curious.) Liesl and I have published 600 articles, but we still have over 600 in drafts! Every day, more things to be celebrated keep coming our way!

You can join or partner with us on this project if you are inspired. There are so many ways to help, even in your spare time. Otherwise, just make it a routine to drop by daily for a bit of insight and wonder. You can subscribe to find our daily article right in your inbox. Share EWC with people who you might think are in that curious and still hopeful 18.2%.

And thanks for joining our growing community from over 190 countries. You are making the world a better place, just by learning more about it!

Stay open, curious and hopeful!

~ Dr. Lynda