Features Reporter
They hold posters on street corners, build houses for the homeless, design campus-wide art projects and research happiness. Who are they? They are not hippies or communists or religious zealots. The “99 percent” is not their concern. Neither is the rest of Wall Street for that matter. Unlike the Wall Street protesters, this movement has structure and a plan. Using the mediums of art, activism and academia, its message is simple, yet revolutionary. They are the CMU club and soon-to-be non-profit organization Positive Movement, using the simple message of positivity to change the face of culture.
“It goes back to the winter of 2006 or so when we saw a gentleman holding a sign that said ‘positive thoughts’,” President of Positive Movement Nicholas Moore said. “At first glance, it didn’t affect me too much, but then I saw him in a snow storm holding the same black and white sign, and it really provoked a lot of thought in terms of where I was at in my life and what conscious choices I was making.”
Although the man holding the sign hasn’t been seen for a few years, Moore and company picked up where he left off, using sidewalks and street corners as platforms to generate positivity throughout the community. According to Vice President Joel Adams, the movement has recently been working on more than just impactful signs.
“We came to the realization that we could do more by being actively positive in the community,” Adams said.
That was a great turning point for the club.
“We began putting the energy we had into something we could see tangibly,” Moore said.
The movement took its energy to the community and worked with local organization Homeward Bound to build a home for a homeless family and put on benefit concerts for international disasters and local charities. It is seeking to continue this community-based trend.
“We have some interesting things going on within our three segments: Art, Activism and Academia,” Moore said. “So that means positivity in art, positivity in activism and positivity in academia.”
In their art segment, Positive Movement hosted an open canvas booth on campus where anyone can come and place emotions onto a blank surface. Some of these canvases will be used in an art exhibit at Roasted coffee shop in November. To add to this effort, the movement is calling all artists who are interested to add their abilities to the project.
“We’ve had some really weird stuff, some really dark stuff sometimes, but we’ve had some really incredible canvases come out,” Moore said.
However, Positive Movement is progressing just as fast on their other two fronts of activism and academia.
“Our Activist segment is focused on food, water and shelter initiatives,” Moore said. “Those are the simple vitals.”
And with that intent, Positive Movement will be throwing a concert/jam session on campus Thursday, Oct. 25, to support Sustainability Week. They will have free water bottles and will be teaching students about water facts.
Besides teaching, Positive Movement is also seeking to learn. In academia, they are beginning to put together a happiness research project similar to one begun at the University of Pennsylvania. They will compile psychological data to help judge general happiness and contentment among students using the Authentic Happiness Survey designed at University of Pennsylvania.
Although the group does have structure and continues to reach out actively into the community, their roots are still tied to the messages of positivity portrayed on their signs.
“To be positive doesn’t mean the lack of understanding or acknowledgement of negative,” Moore said. “People assume we are allowing ourselves to be oblivious to struggle, but rather than that, we are facing it with these concepts and doing something productive about it.”
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