I have often heard people refer to secondlife as “just a game”; implying that it is something purely entertaining and of no real consequence or value.. But the more time I spend on the site, I am convinced this is not the case. Every day, I am struck by how deeply we affect each others' real lives through our daily interactions as pixels on SL. From the deep hurt and pain I have experienced (and saw some of my good friends experience) when my SL partnership broke apart.. to the exalting joy I felt when my best friend reached out last night and gave me an animated hug -simply because I helped her out in applying for a job;-) My goodness, there were real tears in my eyes when her avi reached out and touched mine and I felt true love for her -even though I don't even know her name in RL.
But this posting is rather inspired by all the tremendous charity I have witnessed in the past month alone by my fellow models; from the fierce campaign for the Relay for Life effort and the fundraiser that was launched by Patty and Kurvy through the Runway for Life group, to watching the gorgeous Lacey Bade walk around bald-headed for days to raise money for cancer research, to the Maseno project to help African children by Mimi and all the awesome professionals who came together to make this happen.
I am always humbled when I see people reach out and give of themselves like that, when they could have spent their time doing other paid work or furthering their own careers.. especially by SL models, who are often looked at from the outside as being those esoteric creatures who are highly obsessed with their own vanities. This couldn't be farther from the truth, and the proof is in the pudding as they say..
Inspired by these great acts of charity by Patty and Mimi and all my wonderful friends, I have decided to focus more time and effort on my new group Paloma Roja -which is a group I had created months ago to raise funds for my RL cause of animal rescue. This was my pipe dream when I first started on SL but of course I got distracted by my model training and trying to launch my career.. Paloma Roja had to go on the back burner for a while.. But in the next couple of weeks, I will begin to reach out to recruit volunteers and sponsors and hopefully we can all come together and do something fun and beautiful and good through this group too.
So- If you love animals like I do, and are willing to spend a little time and effort fundraising for this cause, I invite you to read more at
www.palomaroja.org and to please contact me to let me know if you're interested. Not to mention- If you're one of those rare few models who are not yet “grouped out”, please find Paloma Roja in SL and join!
It's free to join and we'd love to have you in the family:)
Hugs and kisses to all of you:-) Ocean
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