NEW INDEPENDENT MAGAZINE, IMAGINE, INSPIRES READERS TO CREATE A MORE MEANINGFUL LIFE

SPOKANE, Wash., -- Aug. 18, 2005 – The fall issue of Imagine magazine, an independent national publication dedicated to developing the human spirit through creativity and contagious inspiration, provides life-changing content with sections on personal growth, social awareness and global activism. New articles include turning life’s passion into vocation, experiencing spiritual activism and journaling the way to happiness.

Personal Growth: Inner Passion; Translucent Revolution; Journaling; Living Wills

Based on Imagine’s belief that the starting point of one’s relationship with everything in the world comes from within, the magazine devotes many pages to personal growth. This fall’s section recognizes the fortunate who discover their calling, do it for a living and turn their lives and jobs into passionate play. By encouraging readers to examine their lives, Imagine produces an inspiring guide to discovering inner passions, overcoming roadblocks and acting with courage so that a job becomes a vocation in sync with the heart’s desire.

Also gracing the issue’s personal pages is the story of a man who, on the verge of suicide, experienced an unexplainable revolution that brought about a new translucent view of the world. Imagine introduces this new way of life as "spiritual activism," a vertical activity in which the deeper one goes into his or her spiritual understanding, the clearer they see harmony on the path ahead. The article is followed by five easy ways for people to nudge their own world into one of translucence, where motivating positive change and accepting what happens are simultaneous.

Other stories in this section detail how journaling has helped one woman overcome significant trauma and how many others are now using writing as a healing tool. The process is proven to improve both mental and physical health, so Imagine offers advice for readers interested in starting their own journal. And, in light of the recent Terry Schiavo case, one story recognizes the fact that decisions might have been much simpler if she would have had a living will. Since the Schiavo case, thousands of people are now writing their living wills, and this story gives readers advice on how to create their own while they still can.

Social Awareness: One Company’s Tribute to Everyday Heroes

Imagine then ventures from the inner into the outer relationships with stories on social awareness and community service, highlighting Volvo Cars of North America and the Volvo for Life Awards, the nation’s largest search for and celebration of everyday heroes. The program’s featured finalists and winners in the categories of safety, environment and quality of life reflect not only Volvo’s concern for the safety and well-being of people, but also the importance of recognizing the millions of individuals in the world humbly doing extraordinary things for others every day.

Global Activism: Simple Ways to Combat Food Waste, Conserve Water

In addition, the issue’s global activism section includes eco-friendly features on combating food waste and conserving water. In today’s land of plenty, hunger and malnutrition remain the biggest risks to health around the world. Imagine recognizes this rapidly growing problem, highlighting a study by University of Arizona anthropologist Timothy W. Jones, which found 40-50 percent of all food ready for harvest in the United States never gets eaten. As a call to action, Imagine gives readers five simple ways to combat food waste.

Imagine also asks readers to consider the fact that 2.5 billion people live in areas where it is difficult to find sufficient quantities of fresh water to meet their needs. While several factors negatively contribute to the water crisis, every individual can help conserve it by paying attention to the article’s ten ways to conserve water. The list strives to make readers more aware of how they are using their water and to motivate them to reduce water waste both at home and in their daily lives.

Other cause-related stories include Eleanor Wasson’s formation of WomenRise, a group of 20 women dedicated to improving global peace one community project at a time; resources on how to help the more than one million people who have become refuges from political conflict and ethnic violence in the Darfur region of Sudan; protecting the environment and wildlife by building with eco-friendly wood produced in one of the U.S.’s four main forest certification programs; and recognizing every individual’s potential to save a life by registering with the Gift of Life Bone Marrow Foundation.

Regular Columns: Bibliotherapy; Heart Matters; Life Matters

The magazine’s three regular columnists produce helpful and inspirational advice for readers, including author Caroline Leavitt’s Bibliotherapy column. Leavitt makes it possible to relive those giddy feelings of going back to school by reading three books where grammar, history and literature come alive through learning. Readers also get their questions answered in Dr. Harriet Lerner’s Heart Matters column where she provides everyday wisdom on matters of the heart. Author Gregg Levoy’s column, Life Matters, offers guidance on living a more authentic, courageous life.

Imagine: Creating a Meaningful Life

Imagine magazine’s mission is to stir the creativity, spirit and will of its readers to live their best lives and help others to do the same. Every issue features the Bridge Directory, which connects readers to life-changing resources throughout the United States. Its goal is to make personal growth and community outreach meaningful, substantive and joyful simply by imagining and acting upon the possibilities of life.

The magazine’s core audience includes a diverse but like-minded group of 50 million Americans who care deeply about relationships, peace, social justice, authenticity, self-actualization, spirituality and self-expression. These "Cultural Creatives" care intensely about both the most inner and soulful aspects of life and about the big picture of what is happening around the planet. Imagine is dedicated to inspiring this audience and all other individuals who imagine creating a meaningful life for themselves and others.

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Kate Spencer: Creating a Meaningful Magazine

Kate Spencer, Imagine magazine founder, editor and publisher, is committed to publishing a magazine that focuses more on doing our best rather than weighing our least. The magazine was a dream of Spencer’s for many years. She envisioned enough real and significant risks attached to launching an independent publication that she easily could have put it off indefinitely. However, after a tragic turn of events, Spencer’s outlook on life and the magazine changed dramatically.

Just a few years ago, Spencer was faced with tremendous adversity when her mother had a series of strokes that left her on the verge of death. Through these events and the experiences leading up to them, Spencer found the courage to live each day with meaning, and to create Imagine as an outlet of inspiration that allowed people around the world to do the same.

During the series of strokes, Spencer frequently visited her mother in the nursing home. In conversation, the two women, along with many others, found themselves stunned by how quickly life passes, youth becomes middle age, and middle age becomes a nursing home. It was not until her mother’s seventh stroke that resulted in nearly complete paralysis, and her witnessing her nursing home roommate’s death that Spencer’s mother stopped covering her terror in snipes at the rest of the world, and began to consciously live. Time was measured in maximizing minutes, words were chosen with care, every gesture became important, and a simple bowl of ice cream held all the delicious bliss of the world.

Ultimately, her mother’s death gave Spencer the spirit with which to live and the determination to pass whatever she could on to others so they would not choose to wait until their last breath to finally take their first. Many people think Spencer named the magazine after John Lennon's song, "Imagine." She didn't. She named it after Imogene, her mother.

Prior to starting Imagine, Spencer was the publisher of Massage magazine, an international trade publication for licensed massage therapists. Concurrent to that position, Spencer wrote a regular op-ed column for the Spokesman-Review titled "Real Time." She also has worked as a freelance feature writer; edited manuscripts of fiction, nonfiction and poetry and helped prepare them for submission; worked for two small book publishers as an editor and manager; and is currently working on a novel and spiritual memoir.

A Spokane, Wash. resident, Spencer plays mother to numerous wildlife inherent to her home on the Little Spokane River, including two dogs, six cats, seven peacocks, eagles, moose and great blue herons alongside the Little Spokane Wildlife and Wetlands Refuge. The serenity of the area is something that was a tremendous gift to Spencer’s mother in the last years of her life, and her ashes were scattered in the river after she died. Today, the Little River Publishing offices are there too, both for practical reasons and because Spencer wants everyone who works on Imagine to be surrounded by and grounded in nature.