Day 3 at the E&Y Strategic Growth Forum

Another day that was awesome! The gala grand opening speaker due to a last minute change was Captain James Lovell, NASA Legend and Apollo 13 Commander. His role was played by Tom Hanks in the movie called Apollo 13. He discussed the similarities of business maneuvers and space flights. Tom Hanks spent a week-end with him and his wife so that Tom could try to play him and his life accurately. His discussion was thrilling and uplifting to show how a mind and spirit can triumph and soar even when faced with unexpected and impending life threatening disaster.

The next session was moderated by Jane Pauley, award winning journalist and co-founder of Dateline  NBC. The panelists were: Bart Weetjens of Sweden, a practicing Zen Buddhist monk and founder of APOPA, HeroRATS. I had the pleasure and honor of speaking with him about his work and could sense his excitement about how rats would detect land mines and at a fraction of today’s cost and yet not kill these highly trained rats that can live for up to 8 years! The reason that they are not killed is that they are so light that they do not trigger the land mines!

The other speakers were equally impressive with the largest recycler of worm pooh and the lady who was inspired by the New York taxi driver to make drugs for developing countries and still make a profit. I have been learning a lot of cool things by the minute. As in many other sessions I asked questions which were burning within me about various issues including spirituality with this panel.