Make a Living, Make a Life
I met poet and independent bookstore owner John Evans over 20 years ago. Here, he paraphrases Louis Patlers response to a womans question about the place of independent bookstores in the culture. "This may sound strange to you, but I think a bookstore's main function is to provide an aesthetic presence in its neighborhood." Evans writes, "I understand that completely." In this short essay he unpa... posted on Jun 08 2019, 2,929 reads

How Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?
Today young people are trying to balance the question of "What do I want to do when I grow up?" with the question of "Who and how do I want to be in the world?" Physician and writer Abraham Verghese and education researcher Denise Pope argue that's because the way we educate for success doesn't support the creation of full, well-rounded humans. And they see the next generation challenging our cult... posted on Jun 07 2019, 6,246 reads

Navigating the Transition into Caregiving
"Being a caregiver is not something most people think or dream about, let alone prepare for, even though it's a role many of us will inhabit, since there are approximately 43 million informal caregivers in the United States and 6.5 million caregivers in the United Kingdom. When a loved one becomes a caregiver everything changes, including responsibilities, beliefs, hopes, expectations and relation... posted on Jun 06 2019, 10,369 reads

Weeds: A Conversation with Doug Burgess
Photography is a way of probing the world, says Burgess. Take weeds, for instance. "Two or three years ago, one weed was the same as another for me. That's changed now. I can go anyplace and feel that I have friends and knowledge. I mean I know the weeds by name now and know a little about them. Maybe it's one of the major tools I've found to come to some sort of ease with the world." There's much... posted on Jun 05 2019, 2,228 reads

Meredith's Joy Jars
How do you help a teen get over a broken heart? Pam found a way and Meredith found a calling. A simple solution which has reached thousands around the world. Learn more through this beautiful short video.... posted on Jun 04 2019, 4,031 reads

Luc Reynaud: Welcome to My House
Luc Reynaud is a musician from Washington, focused on combining music and service to others. When Hurricane Katrina hit the southeast coast, Luc felt compelled to go down and help, using some construction skills (and a guitar) he had picked up during a soul-searching trip. Luc began playing his guitar around the shelter he was volunteering at, eventually writing a song with one of the children, ca... posted on Jun 03 2019, 5,204 reads

A New Republic of the Heart
When we face a moment of crisis, individually or collectively, a whole wave of radical conversations is inevitable. For these conversations to really make a difference, we must break through our personas and our inauthentic poses. This is a deeper level of discourse than has hitherto seemed thinkable in public--disarming, tender, and authentic. Such a conversation requires a level of trust, vulner... posted on Jun 02 2019, 5,699 reads

Grief is Praise
In this excerpt from The Smell of Rain on Dust, Martin Prechtel tells the story of a friend who has asked his advice about burying his recently deceased mother. In the book, Prechtel explains that the unexpressed grief prevalent in our society today is the reason for many of the social, cultural, and individual maladies that we are currently experiencing. In this beautiful tale, he illustrates wha... posted on Jun 01 2019, 39,945 reads

Why We Walk
Erling Kagge is a Norwegian explorer, lawyer, art collector, author, and the first person to have completed the Three Poles Challenge on foot --the North Pole, the South Pole and the summit of Mount Everest. Kagge is also the author of "Walking: One Step at a Time," and six other books. What follows is an excerpt from Walking.

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School Strike for Climate Change
At a young age, Greta Thunberg realized that all of the facts and solutions about how to stop climate change are known. But why aren't we applying this knowledge in order to make a difference? At age 15, Greta started a school strike outside the Swedish Parliament. While many people tell her that she should be in school or that she should study to be a climate scientist, Greta believes that if nob... posted on May 30 2019, 1,791 reads