How to Bless Each Other
"Every once in the bluest moon, if you are lucky, you encounter someone with such powerful and generous light in their eyes that they rekindle the lost light within you and return it magnified; someone whose calm, kind, steady gaze penetrates the very center of your being and, refusing to look away from even the most shadowy parts of you, falls upon you like a benediction.
That we can do th... posted on Dec 11 2023, 5,945 reads

Gems of Wisdom from Small is Beautiful
In 1999 Paul Hawken wrote, "What seemed so evident to early readers of "Small is Beautiful" still seems painfully opaque to the world today. When the book was first published, many thought that change would come about through insight, logic, compassion, and reason. Increasingly, it seems that change will come about after we have exhausted every other theory of greed and gain, and the winds of chan... posted on Dec 10 2023, 2,099 reads

Light & Danger Through the Crack in the Door
"Multiplicity of viewpoints, described, prayed over, celebrated, sung, danced, and debated by practitioners of many spiritual practices drove the five-day convening of the Parliament of the World's Religions, held August 14-18 at Chicagos McCormick Place Lakeside Center. There are those who think of religion as a lofty preoccupation, divorced from the sorrows and suffering of the real world. But f... posted on Dec 09 2023, 1,179 reads

The Unlikely Success of Wingspan
"We begin by angling a lamp toward the wall, allowing just the perfect amount of warm light to fall on the table. Windows are flung open, inviting the night air inside. Then, the careful act of removing each bag, box, and card. We fill clear, shallow bowls with small pastel eggseasily mistaken for Cadburys at first glance. Other bowls brim with cardboard tokens. And as I neatly unfold each players... posted on Dec 07 2023, 1,856 reads

Nick Cave: Loss, Yearning, Transcendence
"Here are some experiences to which Nick Cave gives voice and song: the "universal condition" of yearning, and of loss; a "spirituality of rigor"; and the transcendent and moral dimensions of what music is about. This Australian musician, writer, and actor first made a name in the wild world of '80s post-punk and later with Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. He also underwent public struggles with addic... posted on Dec 06 2023, 3,376 reads

How Language Shapes the Way We Think
There are about 7,000 languages spoken around the world -- and they all have different sounds, vocabularies and structures. But do they shape the way we think? Cognitive scientist Lera Boroditsky shares examples of language -- from an Aboriginal community in Australia that uses cardinal directions instead of left and right to the multiple words for blue in Russian -- that suggest the answer is a r... posted on Dec 05 2023, 2,330 reads

The Man Who Made Lonesome George Less Lonely
"In the middle of the Pacific the black, volcanic ruins of Pinta Island were once dotted by thousands of "living rocks," Galpagos tortoises chomping prickly cacti, hatching their babies, slowly chasing the equatorial sun. But the island was stripped bare over the 19th century, as hungry whalers discovered that they could be stored as fresh meat for a year without food or water in their ships' hold... posted on Dec 04 2023, 1,662 reads

Pico Iyer on the Wisdom of Travelers
Pico Iyer's latest book, The Half Known Life, looks at the ways in which we seek paradise on earth, sometimes in places that are fraught with risk. In this podcast episode, he and fellow writer Katherine May talk about the similarities in their work, particularly the ways in which they explore secular understandings of big spiritual questions, and they touch on the differences, too."... posted on Dec 03 2023, 1,590 reads

The Vital Role of Beauty Even in War Time
"Art philosopher Arthur Danto wrote that beauty, while optional for art, is not an option for life. Neuroscientists have shown that our brains are biologically wired for beauty: The neural mechanisms that influence attention and perception have adapted to notice color, form, proportion and pattern. We've found that refugees worldwide, often with limited or no legal rights, still invest considerabl... posted on Dec 02 2023, 1,367 reads

Duct Tape and Dreams
Become a kid again! Imagine building a soapbox car; anything you could dream up and build. And then getting to ride it downhill being cheered all the way down. Produced in collaboration with Stink Studios, "Duct Tape and Dreams: Reviving the Soapbox Derby at McLaren Park" captures the creativity, collaboration, and exuberance of everyone who participated and, of course, all that exciting downhill... posted on Dec 01 2023, 1,126 reads