Positively Newsworthy
Good News From Around The Globe
Our spring 2026 Issue has hit the shelves! Guided by the theme of Kindness, each page is filled with love, care, and connection. Get your copy at a health store near you or have it delivered to your door each season at positivelife.ie/subscribe <3
Divine Remembrance
THE LANGUAGE OF THE ROSE.
by Alison McEvoy
I’m attending a restorative yoga and healing class with Celine Florence these Sundays. I felt the calling to restore in circle, to gather in rest. On the first night, I noticed roses adorning the centre of the room and the scent of rose. I felt it almost speaking to me.
That evening, I remember feeling like I’d been taken right into the tenderest part of the rose, in among the softest petals, and just rested there in the class. It was a truly beautiful experience.
The second week, during the relaxation, I had memories resurface…
The rose garden in my local park, a place I used to go every single week as a teenager and twenty something. I’d journal or lie on the grass and take in ‘beauty medicine’ as I used to call it. I’d go there for days on end if I was recovering
from heartbreak.
When I lived abroad, a lonely and struggling twenty something, I found a rose growing in some random garden that would ‘speak’ to me – that life is beautiful ultimately and that my inner resources are deep despite my ‘sweet and kind’ exterior.
When I eventually shared my experiences with Celine, we had a conversation where it felt like time stood still. She revealed she is the founder of the Rose Ray School of alchemy. She told me of the ancient stories and myths of the ‘Rose Lineage’; the rose was seen as a keeper of sacred wisdom, a conduit for divine teachings. I felt tears in my eyes. I felt like I had never been alone and I somehow knew that each time I would pass a rose I would feel something familiar, something that reminded me of truths that would keep me through the storms of life.
If a rose has ever ‘spoken’ to you and inspired compassion, kindness and self-care then I recommend you delve deeper. The rose is resurfacing through so many sisterhoods and schools and for good reason. She has been here all along, with our grandmothers, mothers and now, with us.
celineflorence.ie
True Colours
61-YEAR-OLD FATHER SEES COLOUR FOR THE FIRST TIME.
A 61-year-old father broke into tears when finally seeing colour in his world for the first time after receiving a special
Christmas gift.
Jim Gogan always had trouble seeing reds and greens. In fact, when he joined the Air Force, he wasn’t able to
become a pilot because he couldn’t read the radar screens.
For years, his family talked about gifting him a pair of special colourblind glasses, but in December, his son, Kyle, was finally able to make it a reality—thanks to a bonus from his employer.
A video shared by the family (pictured above) shows Jim in tears after seeing colours clearly for the first time.
“He’s never been able to tell colour,” said 39-year-old Kyle, from South Carolina. “He’ll say things like, ‘grab my blue
shirt,’ and it’s green.”
Before giving him the glasses, Kyle had printed out colourblind tests for the whole family to take—and Jim got almost every question wrong.
Then, Kyle handed him the glasses and the results were immediate.
As Jim placed them over his eyes, and looked at the coloured drawing of a Christmas tree, tears began to well up in his eyes.
“It was very emotional watching my dad react,” Kyle told SWNS news agency. After composing himself, Jim retook the test and, this time, got every answer correct. The colour red delighted him the most.
“He kept commenting on how beautiful the bricks on houses were.”
The next day, the family took Jim on a drive to enjoy the outdoors in all its colourful glory.
Caring Collaboration
“FREE STORE” PROVIDES FOR EVANSTON COMMUNITY.
by Persephone Kianka
Last December, the 611 Free Store, a pop-up in Evanston, Illinois, opened to allow people in need to “shop” for food,
household items, clothing, and other essential items for free.
Fuschia Winston, a community organiser with the grassroots nonprofit Evanston Community Cares (ECC),
founded this initiative to help meet the community’s growing needs. As the Evanston RoundTable explains, the ECC is a partner of the 611 Community Care Hub, which temporarily houses the 611 Free Store and Evanston Community Fridges.
Customers who visited the store could fill two bags if they were alone, or fill one bag per person if they came as a family. Eight people were permitted in the store at a time, which was divided into several small rooms, to give shoppers a dignified shopping experience.
“We want people [to] come in and feel comfortable [where] they get to shop for a certain amount of time and not really
feel the pressure of snatch and grab or get things before they’re gone,” Winston explained.
According to her, over 150 households visited the store in December. Currently, shopping is limited to one bag per person per month, with additional shopping time offered to mutual aid volunteers. Fortunately, high-demand items, such as toiletries and household supplies, do not count toward the bag limit.
The Daily Northwestern shared the inspiring words of ECC co-founder and organiser Valerie Kahan, regarding
the city’s recent mutual aid efforts: “Evanston Community Cares has been a facilitator and a connector for all of these different organizations,” which includes procuring and promoting spaces, as well as fundraising. “We’re all just connected and collaborating,” Kahan said.
Though the future of the 611 Free Store is uncertain, there are ways for the community to keep giving no matter what, like donating to Evanston Community Fridges, as Winston urges.
