Dont Read this you wont like it...

1. Approximately 75-80% of human trafficking is for sex.^a
2. Researchers note that sex trafficking plays a major role in the spread of HIV.^b
3. There are more human slaves in the world today than ever before in history.^l
4. There are an estimated 27 million adults and 13 million children around the world who are victims of human trafficking.^l
5. Human trafficking not only involves sex and labor, but people are also trafficked for organ harvesting.^k
6. Human traffickers often use a Sudanese phrase “use a slave to catch slaves,” meaning traffickers send “broken-in girls” to recruit younger girls into the sex trade. Sex traffickers often train girls themselves, raping them and teaching them sex acts.^l
7. Eighty percent of North Koreans who escape into China are women. Nine out of 10 of those women become victims of human trafficking, often for sex. If the women complain, they are deported back to North Korea, where they are thrown into gulags or are executed.^h
Approximately 30,000 victims of sex trafficking die each year
8. An estimated 30,000 victims of sex trafficking die each year from abuse, disease, torture, and neglect. Eighty percent of those sold into sexual slavery are under 24, and some are as young as six years old.^j
9. Ludwig “Tarzan” Fainberg, a convicted trafficker, said, “You can buy a woman for $10,000 and make your money back in a week if she is pretty and young. Then everything else is profit.”^l
10. A human trafficker can earn 20 times what he or she paid for a girl. Provided the girl was not physically brutalized to the point of ruining her beauty, the pimp could sell her again for a greater price because he had trained her and broken her spirit, which saves future buyers the hassle. A 2003 study in the Netherlands found that, on average, a single sex slave earned her pimp at least $250,000 a year.^l
11. Although human trafficking is often a hidden crime and accurate statistics are difficult to obtain, researchers estimate that more than 80% of trafficking victims are female. Over 50% of human trafficking victims are children.^l 
12. The end of the Cold War has resulted in the growth of regional conflicts and the decline of borders. Many rebel groups turn to human trafficking to fund military actions and garner soldiers.^k
13. According to a 2009 Washington Times article, the Taliban buys children as young as seven years old to act as suicide bombers. The price for child suicide bombers is between $7,000-$14,000.ⁿ
14. UNICEF estimates that 300,000 children younger than 18 are currently trafficked to serve in armed conflicts worldwide.ⁿ
Pregnant women are increasingly being trafficked for their newborns
15. Human traffickers are increasingly trafficking pregnant women for their newborns. Babies are sold on the black market, where the profit is divided between the traffickers, doctors, lawyers, border officials, and others. The mother is usually paid less than what is promised her, citing the cost of travel and creating false documents. A mother might receive as little as a few hundred dollars for her baby.^k
16. More than 30% of all trafficking cases in 2007-2008 involved children being sold into the sex industry.^o
17. The Western presence in Kosovo, such as NATO troops and civilians, have fueled the rapid growth of sex trafficking and forced prostitution. Amnesty International has reported that NATO soldiers, UN police, and Western aid workers “operated with near impunity in exploiting the victims of the sex traffickers.”^g
18. Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance” video is about human trafficking. In the video, Gaga is trafficked by a Russian bathhouse into sex slavery.^f
19. Human trafficking is the only area of transnational crime in which women are significantly represented—as victims, as perpetrators, and as activists fighting this crime.^a
20.  Global warming and severe natural disasters have left millions homeless and impoverished, which has created desperate people easily exploited by human traffickers.^k
21. Over 71% of trafficked children show suicidal tendencies.^l
22. After sex, the most common form of human trafficking is forced labor. Researchers argue that as the economic crisis deepens, the number of people trafficked for forced labor will increase.^k
23. Most human trafficking in the United States occurs in New York, California, and Florida.^l
24. According to United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), over the past 30 years, over 30 million children have been sexually exploited through human trafficking.^k
25. Several countries rank high as source countries for human trafficking, including Belarus, the Republic of Moldova, the Russian Federation, Ukraine, Albania, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Romania, China, Thailand, and Nigeria.^l
26. Belgium, Germany, Greece, Israel, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Thailand, Turkey, and the U.S. are ranked very high as destination countries of trafficked victims.^l
27. Women are trafficked to the U.S. largely to work in the sex industry (including strip clubs, peep and touch shows, massage parlors that offer sexual services, and prostitution). They are also trafficked to work in sweatshops, domestic servitude, and agricultural work.^l
Sex traffickers often use brutal violence to “condition” their victims
28. Sex traffickers use a variety of ways to “condition” their victims, including subjecting them to starvation, rape, gang rape, physical abuse, beating, confinement, threats of violence toward the victim and victim’s family, forced drug use, and shame.^l
29. Family members will often sell children and other family members into slavery; the younger the victim, the more money the trafficker receives. For example, a 10-year-old named Gita was sold into a brothel by her aunt. The now 22-year-old recalls that when she refused to work, the older girls held her down and stuck a piece of cloth in her mouth so no one would hear her scream as she was raped by a customer. She would later contract HIV.^l
30. Human trafficking is one of the fastest growing criminal enterprises because it holds relatively low risk with high profit potential. Criminal organizations are increasingly attracted to human trafficking because, unlike drugs, humans can be sold repeatedly.^k
31. Human trafficking is estimated to surpass the drug trade in less than five years.  Journalist Victor Malarek reports that it is primarily men who are driving human trafficking, specifically trafficking for sex.ⁱ
32. Victims of human trafficking suffer devastating physical and psychological harm. However, due to language barriers, lack of knowledge about available services, and the frequency with which traffickers move victims, human trafficking victims and their perpetrators are difficult to catch.ⁱ
33. In approximately 54% of human trafficking cases, the recruiter is a stranger, and in 46% of the cases, the recruiters know the victim. Fifty-two percent of human trafficking recruiters are men, 42% are women, and 6% are both men and women.^d
34. Human trafficking around the globe is estimated to generate a profit of anywhere from $9 billion to $31.6 billion. Half of these profits are made in industrialized countries.^d
35. Some human traffickers recruit handicapped young girls, such as those suffering from Down Syndrome, into the sex industry.^l
36. According to the FBI, a large human-trafficking organization in California in 2008 not only physically threatened and beat girls as young as 12 to work as prostitutes, they also regularly threatened them with witchcraft.^e
37. Human trafficking is a global phenomenon that is fueled by poverty and gender discrimination.^k
38. Human traffickers often work with corrupt government officials to obtain travel documents and seize passports.ⁱ
39. Women and girls from racial minorities in the U.S. are disproportionately recruited by sex traffickers in the U.S.^l
40. The Sunday Telegraph in the U.K. reports that hundreds of children as young as six are brought to the U.K. as slaves each year.^m
Japan is a major hub of sex trafficking
41. Japan is considered the largest market for Asian women trafficked for sex.ⁱ
42. Airports are often used by human traffickers to hold “slave auctions,” where women and children are sold into prostitution.^m
43. Due to globalization, every continent of the world has been involved in human trafficking, including a country as small as Iceland.^k
44. Many times, if a sex slave is arrested, she is imprisoned while her trafficker is able to buy his way out of trouble.^l
45. Today, slaves are cheaper than they have ever been in history. The population explosion has created a great supply of workers, and globalization has created people who are vulnerable and easily enslaved.^l
46. Human trafficking and smuggling are similar but not interchangeable. Smuggling is transportation based. Trafficking is exploitation based.^l
47. Sex traffickers often recruit children because not only are children are more unsuspecting and vulnerable than adults, but there is also a high market demand for young victims. Traffickers target victims on the telephone, on the Internet, through friends, at the mall, and in after-school programs.^o
48. Human trafficking has been reported in all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and in some U.S. territories.^e
49. The FBI estimates that over 100,000 children and young women are trafficked in America today. They range in age from nine to 19, with the average being age 11. Many victims are not just runaways or abandoned, but are from “good” families who are coerced by cleaver traffickers.^o
50. Brazil and Thailand are generally considered to have the worst child sex trafficking records.^k
51. The AIDS epidemic in Africa has left many children orphaned, making them especially vulnerable to human trafficking.^l
52. Nearly 7,000 Nepali girls as young as nine years old are sold every year into India’s red-light district—or 200,000 in the last decade. Ten thousand children between the ages of six and 14 are in Sri Lanka brothels.^j
53. Human trafficking victims face physical risks, such as drug and alcohol addiction, contracting STDs, sterility, miscarriages, forced abortions, vaginal and anal trauma, among others. Psychological effects include developing clinical depression, personality and dissociative disorders, suicidal tendencies, Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome, and Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome.^l
54. The largest human trafficking case in recent U.S. history occurred in Hawaii in 2010. Global Horizons Manpower, Inc., a labor-recruiting company, bought 400 immigrants in 2004 from Thailand to work on farms in Hawaii. They were lured with false promises of high-paying farm work, but instead their passports were taken away and they were held in forced servitude until they were rescued in 2010.^c
55. According to the U.S. State Department, human trafficking is one of the greatest human rights challenges of this century, both in the United States and around the world.^l

References
^a Aronowitz, Alexis A. 2009. Human Trafficking, Human Misery: The Global Trade in Human Beings. Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood Publishing Group.
^b Destefano, Anthony M. 2007. The War on Human Trafficking. Piscataway, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
^c “Hawaii Home to Largest Human Trafficking Case in U.S. History.” ABC News. September 2, 2010. Accessed: December 26, 2010.
^d “Human Trafficking.” Unglobalcompact.org. Accessed: December 26, 2010.
^e “International Human Trafficking.” FBI. November 23, 2009. Accessed: December 23, 2010.
^f Keehn Anne.  “Lady Gaga’s Bad Romance Video About . . . Sex Slavery?” FTSBlog.net. September 13, 2010. Accessed: December 26, 2010.
^g “Kosovo U.N. Troops ‘Fuel Sex Trade.’” BBC News. May 6, 2004. Accessed: December 20, 2010.
^h Liebelson, Dana. “Nine out of Ten Women Escaping North Korea Are Trafficked.” Human Trafficking Change. October 29, 2010. Accessed: December 26, 2010.
ⁱ Malarek, Victor. 2003. The Natashas: Inside the New Global Sex Trade. New York, NY: Arcadia Publishers.
^j “Millions Suffer in Sex Slavery.” NewsMax. April 24, 2001. Accessed: December 26, 2010.
^k Shelley, Louise. 2010. Human Trafficking: A Global Perspective. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
^l Skinner, E. Benjamin. 2008. A Crime So Monstrous: Face-to-Face with Modern-Day Slavery. New York, NY: Free Press.
^m “Slaves Auctioned by Traffickers.” BBC News. June 4, 2006. Accessed: December 28, 2010.
ⁿ “Taliban Buying Children for Suicide Bombers.” The Washington Times. July 2, 2009. Accessed: December 29, 2010.
^o “Teen Girls Stories of Sex Trafficking in the U.S.” ABC News/Primetime. February 9, 2006. Accessed: December 26, 2010.

AM I who I AM

AM I who I AM? Ask yourself the same question.

I’ve lost count of the times I’ve been categorised and defined by the things I have no control over. Who my parents are, where I was born, the school I went to, the house I lived in as a child. Circumstances and statistics try to define us.

As a young adult there have been various times where race has tried to define me.

If being ignorant was a competition – I’m sure I’d reach the final. Things I’ve done, people I’ve hurt along the way who may never forget the mistakes I’ve made. Our past tries to define us.

Due to my beliefs, the language I use, the way I dress the intentions I have. Opportunities have been opened or closed because our past tries to define us.

Is it my intellect, my education, or my social status that demands respect?

Is it the house I live in, the suits I wear or the car I travel in that commands attention? Our material possessions try to define us.

There’s only one person who can define you…

This is who I AM

I am a massive factor of positive change and inspiration.

I am not my past.

I am confident enough to get back up when I fall.

I am more than a conquer.

I am a distributor of peace.

I am limitless in love.

I am bold in faith.

I am pure in spirit.

I am



YOU WERE CREATED WITH PUROPOSE SO BE 100% YOU. The world is in desperate need for you to realise who you are and then to be absolute in being you.

Re-work with the S.A.S.

One of my favourite definitions of sin is this:  Trying to be something you were not created to be.

One of the worst things that can happen to a person is that you become successful at something you were not created be….   So often because we see success in a particular area we assume what we are doing must be what we are supposed to be doing.    However if you’re ever caught in this scenario  it can often cause a deep rooted crisis within you.

Ever wondered why so many famous people have so many issues or why so many wealthy people are not happy…. 

The mind-set and culture we currently live in allows a person to believe that unless you are successful you carry no real value.   (Check out what sociologists introduced as social Darwinism in 1877). 

Quite early on in the development of mankind we find that humanity has always had a deep need for:

Significance

Acceptance

Security

Let’s refer to the above as the S.A.S

Push any of us to a place where we don’t feel these three things and you’ll notice that strange things start to happen:   We start to live from a performance mentality.   We try our hand at perfectionism but that generally only make our life or the lives of those around us very hard work.

There is a distinguishable difference between Perfectionism and Excellence.   

• PERFECTIONISM is the fear of being wrong.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is the willingness to be wrong and to learn from it.
• PERFECTIONISM is seeing any effort that doesn’t turn out exactly as planned as failure.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is seeing any effort that doesn’t turn out exactly as planned as a valuable opportunity to refine the plan and make it better.
• PERFECTIONISM is fear that others might think you don’t measure up.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is a desire to be the best you can be.
• PERFECTIONISM is staying stuck in anger and frustration.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is growing beyond where you ever expected to grow.
• PERFECTIONISM is confining.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is freeing.
• PERFECTIONISM is conformity to presuppositions.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is exploring new possibilities.
• PERFECTIONISM is prejudging and rejecting any new possibilities.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is embracing them as they prove themselves worthwhile.
• PERFECTIONISM is seeking to win admiration without giving anything of value in return.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is giving something better of yourself to others.
• PERFECTIONISM is self-doubt.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is confidence.
• PERFECTIONISM is closing yourself off.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is opening yourself up.
• PERFECTIONISM is remaining right where you’ve always been.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is a journey of discovery.
• PERFECTIONISM is a determination to defend an unproductive status quo.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is a surrender to a greater good.
• PERFECTIONISM is fear.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is trust.
• PERFECTIONISM is selfishness.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is selflessness.
• PERFECTIONISM is a desperate and futile attempt to avoid rejection that you already expect as an absolute certainty.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is the openness to explore and the expectation that that exploration will ultimately lead to something better
• PERFECTIONISM is the fear that something unpleasant will come from your efforts.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is an excitement over the improvements that you will help discover.
• PERFECTIONISM is the expectation that your results will improve by continuing to do things in ways that have always failed in the past.
  THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is a willingness always to find better, more effective ways.
• PERFECTIONISM is a desire to stay exactly as you are and hope that doing so will make the world around you more compliant to your desires.THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE is a sincere desire to become all that God has made you capable of being as you make things better for others.

God never created a single thing for our approval.   He made all things for our discovery.

It’s interesting to see how our approach to creativity lines up with God’s approach to creativity.   We create and immediately need approval.   If we don’t find that approval we will almost always revert to something that gets the approval of those around us.

Please understand I am not saying don’t have wise counsel but I wonder how many of us have allowed yourselves to be moulded into something you were never created to be.  

Before you were formed in your mother’s tummy there was a plan for your life that no one else would ever fulfil.   The only way to fulfil that plan is to be true to who you were made to be.   There’s something that is so liberating when we actually cut the crap, stop being manipulated by a lie and get back to the TRUTH of that plan.

No matter what you feel about who you are and what you can do there is a higher truth that isn’t dependant on your feelings, your successes or your failures. 

I wish all Businesses, Schools, Families and Religious groups could operate such a culture of honour that they set people free to be who they were created to be.

Re-work the way you think.  Rather than working to feel like the S.A.S.(Significant, Accepted and Secure).  Why not agree with the Truth that you already are significant, you are already accepted and you are already secure and live your life from that stand point.

Placing a plan behind your dreams..

Have you ever sat down and thought 'What If'. 

It's interesting how so many people don't like practicing things:  The brain doesnt seem to like practice or limitations which is why so many of us give up on so many of the things we intend to do.  More increasingly if something doesnt provide quick gratification we can struggle to see the value in it or stick with it.

Giving up Smoking
Going to the gym
Learning a new language
Saving/Investing
Eating more healthily

Practice invites you to embrace failure and that doesn't feel great so we generally feel like giving up or actually do give up.

Anything worth doing is worth running the risk of failing at.

It's interesting that most of us will regularly have 'What If'  thoughts....      We can imagine a future where change has already taken place but doing the hard work to bring about that change almost always requires us to practice something.

Have you ever had an idea for an invention or a business or something.   For whatever reason you decided not to do anything about your idea, or maybe you didn't know where to start.   Years or sometimes months later you find out that someone else has developed the very thing you were thinking about.   How come they got to do it and you didn't?

Did you know the average 17 year old has heard the words 'NO YOU CAN'T' over 150,000 times!    The words YES YOU CAN are heard on average less than 8,000 times.   

Througout our lives we are conditioned to be boxed in by limitations we can only see possibilities has something that is somehow abstract to us.

Negative thinking is learnt behaviour......
Have you ever heard a toddler talking negatively?   At what point in life do we start being negative?

When we think negatively we create neuropathways in our brain.   This isn't the only way that neuropathways are created.  But it's one of the most dangerous ways.    Our brain prefers to be in a place of comfortable thinking - that's why these things call neuropathways exist.    They are generally created, physically carved out by habbitual behaviour.   If we attempt to do anything that is outside of our existing neuropathways (habbits of thinking or behaviour) our brain attempts to do whatever it can
to get us back to a palce where we feel comfortable again.    That's why it's harder to start a new good habbit or break a bad one.

My challenge to you is to make yourself accountable to someone for bringing about change in your own personal life.   If you dont know how to get started use this as a guide.

Look at the following areas of your Life:

Work
Relationships
Family
Living Enviroment
Lifestyle

Think about what you would like each of these areas to look like.
Think about what is currently stopping you from achieving/having what you want.
What beliefs have you accepted in order for these limitations to be in place.
What do you need to believe in order to allow yourself to see oppotunites rather than limits.

If you've been able to follow these steps you've already made a great achievement.    What happens next is up to you.  Rather than keeping your answers to yourself why not disucss your answers with someone you trust and ask that person to check in with you every now and again to find out how your progressing in changing your 'What If's'  into realities.

Thanks for reading this, please let me know your thoughts (good or bad)
Jools