life? There are, of course, many strong programs that have been designed to help students develop empathy and positive relationships. But new research suggests another way: awe. Very little is known about the experience of awe; however, several new studies, many conducted by the GGSC’s Dacher Keltner, have shown awe to be a potentially powerful positive emotion that might just help our students develop empathy. Here’s how it works: When we see a grand vista in nature such as Victoria Falls, or experience an inspiring work of art such as Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” or Michelangelo’s Pieta, or ponder the phenomenal inn... posted on Dec 19 2013 (108,834 reads)

with life. This relationship emerged in poor and rich countries alike—again, it held up even after controlling for individuals’ income. Across the 136 countries studied, donating to charity had a similar relationship to happiness as doubling household income. The link between prosocial spending and happiness seems to be remarkably universal. But these findings don’t mean that people always experience pure, unmitigated happiness from helping others: Research shows that the nature of the giving situation matters. Investing in others can take a seemingly limitless variety of forms, from donating to a charity that helps strangers in a faraway country to buying lunch for a ... posted on Nov 11 2013 (33,101 reads)

they didn’t lose weight or achieve noticeable improvements. They go outside. Want to feel alive? Just a 20-minute dose of fresh air promotes a sense of vitality, according to several studies published in the Journal of Environmental Psychology. "Nature is fuel for the soul, " says Richard Ryan, Ph.D, the lead author of the studies. "Often when we feel depleted we reach for a cup of coffee, but research suggests a better way to get energized is to connect with nature." And while most of us like our coffee hot, we may prefer our serving of the great outdoors at a more lukewarm temperature: A study on weather and individual happiness unveiled 5... posted on Dec 27 2013 (356,065 reads)

is generally a reflection of our inner dialogue, which is constant and unceasing. Our inner dialogue tends to support our particular world view, our image of ourself, and our subjective beliefs. We know too much; we can name and provide a label for everything under the sun. We have our own agendas, our predisposed attitudes, and our own ­cultural biases. We rarely see the world in a fresh way or question the numerous and often unconscious filters that ­influence the nature of our perception. Moments of real seeing are beyond the labeling propensity of the mind, beyond what we think we know. Seeing is a step into the unknown and requires some degree of intentio... posted on Jan 3 2014 (30,674 reads)

contributor Steven Kotler wrote in a piece on Einstein's creative genius. They ask the big questions. Creative people are insatiably curious -- they generally opt to live the examined life, and even as they get older, maintain a sense of curiosity about life. Whether through intense conversation or solitary mind-wandering, creatives look at the world around them and want to know why, and how, it is the way it is. They people-watch. Observant by nature and curious about the lives of others, creative types often love to people-watch -- and they may generate some of their best ideas from it. "[Marcel] Proust spent almost his whole life ... posted on Mar 24 2014 (179,343 reads)

Do a three-minute body scan. This is a long-established idea among well-being practitioners. It involves mentally scanning your body by briefly becoming aware of each part of your body as you practice deep breathing. It's a powerful form of self-care. If you need some guidance in this regard, check out this three-minute video from Elisha Goldstein, a psychologist and the author of The Now Effect: How This Moment Can Change the Rest of Your Life. 3. Spend time in nature. Take a walk in a park, or anywhere in nature, on your own. Don't answer the phone, or check email. As Pickert suggests, "Take a hike and observe your surroundings. Resist the urge to ... posted on Jun 1 2014 (143,694 reads)

toys to each other. Henry, 5 (Berkeley, California) Maudy, 3 (Kalulushi, Zambia) Somewhere between Peter Maisel’s Material World series, James Mollison’s poignant photographs of where children sleep, and Rania Matar’s portraits of teenage girls through their bedroom interiors, the series touches on something beyond the sheer visual curiosity of this global atlas of childhood. What emerges is a poignant living testament to the nature-and-nurture model of human nature: The children’s choices, far from pure personal preference, are deeply rooted in social norms and gender conditioning, as in the dominant pink color in m... posted on May 21 2014 (16,973 reads)

Positive Electron Topography scans, of the brain showing different regions thinking at different times when certain questions are asked. Now is that rudimentary, or what? RW: Well, Chardin said something about depending on the scale at which you look at matter, certain things are apparent. But they are not clear on a different scale. The earth’s continents move around clearly if you’re looking at them in geological time, but for us, they appear to be fixed. The minerals of nature would seem to be inert, but what about the odd element that is radioactive? What the hell is that? Chardin makes an analogy between radioactivity in the mineral world, and consciousness in the ... posted on May 26 2014 (11,062 reads)

one simply has to look. She watches a “puffy-feathered female cardinal” rustle in the bush outside the window, picking at the bright red berries in a coat of her own colorful plumage as “the male hits the eye like a sudden manifestation of grace, or even of God.” Witnessing this whimsical vignette, Oates pauses to consider her very capacity — our human capacity — to behold such beauty: Queer, in fact maddening, to think that “beauty” in nature is for us alone: for the human eye alone. Without our consciousness it doesn’t exist. For though the birds and other creatures “see” one another they don’t, I assume, &l... posted on Jun 19 2014 (9,916 reads)

science is just beginning to understand how Facebook has changed our social lives since it was born ten years ago. Over the past ten years, Facebook has added a new dimension to the social lives of over a billion people—and together with other social media like Twitter and Instagram, it has created an entirely new category of social ties. Given their popularity, social media have become the topic of a growing body of research in the social sciences. For Facebook’s tenth birthday, I collected ten discoveries this research has yielded. If you’re on Facebook, then these studies apply to you! 1. Facebook might increase dissatisfaction with your life. Th... posted on Nov 16 2014 (28,968 reads)

that ideal in a modern context: The good death has increasingly become a myth. Actually, it has always been for the most part a myth, but never nearly as much as today. The chief ingredient of the myth is the longed-for ideal of “death with dignity.” [...] The belief in the probability of death with dignity is our, and society’s, attempt to deal with the reality of what is all too frequently a series of destructive events that involve by their very nature the disintegration of the dying person’s humanity. I have not often seen much dignity in the process by which we die… Only by a frank discussion of the very details of dying can we... posted on Nov 3 2014 (24,906 reads)

of attention” — has also shown promise for children with ADHD and autism, and for narrowing the achievement gap between children of differing socioeconomic backgrounds. I spoke with Adele Diamond in Vancouver at a series of gatherings with the Dalai Lama in conversation with social activists, scientists, and educators. The government of British Columbia has changed its educational guidelines in response to research like that Adele Diamond is doing on the whole-body, whole-spirit nature of learning. MS. TIPPETT: Did I hear in one of the sessions here at this conference in Vancouver that British Columbia has instituted a fourth “R” in its educational ph... posted on Dec 6 2014 (26,625 reads)

with someone you love and care about.    *   Ask some friends or loved ones what they appreciate about you. Don’t be too shy to ask. You aren’t fishing for compliments—you’re looking for objective input that can be used to counteract moments of doubt.    *   Meditate and connect with your inner being. Shine a light on your true potential by picturing your new, more-empowered essence. Get in touch with your relaxed, self-assured nature. Meditate on this. It is human nature to doubt yourself and act fearful rather than confident. But if you work on establishing new core beliefs, you will start to conquer the negative though... posted on May 19 2021 (56,349 reads)

but is itself the enterprise and adventure of the day. If you would get exercise, go in search of the springs of life. Think of a man’s swinging dumbbells for his health, when those springs are bubbling up in far-off pastures unsought by him! Illustration by D. B. Johnson from 'Henry Hikes to Fitchburg,' a children's book about Thoreau's philosophy. To engage in this kind of walking, Thoreau argues, we ought to reconnect with our wild nature: When we walk, we naturally go to the fields and woods: what would become of us, if we walked only in a garden or a mall? […] Give me a wildness whose glance n... posted on Jan 2 2015 (30,473 reads)

sense of wonder and innocence that you represent, how you see things from closer to the earth than we do, how you express your emotions honestly and revel in your imaginative play. Meanwhile, too many of us adults have looked the other way while the world we're leaving behind for you has been damaged in ways that will be hard to fix. Basic things that people have mostly taken for granted in recent years -- like food, water and shelter -- will be harder for you to find. Quiet moments, nature experiences and open spaces will be more difficult to come by. Your chance to be hopeful about the future will be less than ours was, unless... Unless adults listen to you more and stop acti... posted on Dec 14 2014 (24,003 reads)

who move also in a dance, to a music so subtle and vast that no ear hears it except in fragments. Illustration by Emily Hughes from 'Wild,' one of the best children's books of the year. Echoing Thoreau’s ode to the woods and psychoanalyst Adam Phillips’s assertion that cultivating a capacity for “fertile solitude” is essential for creative work, Berry extols the ennobling effects of solitude, the kind gained only by surrendering to nature’s gentle gift for quieting the mind: We enter solitude, in which also we lose loneliness… True solitude is found in the wild places, where one is without... posted on Feb 1 2015 (27,544 reads)

a miracle. And I think it's enough to keep a person afloat. MS. TIPPETT: [laughs] Let’s talk about your last couple of books. Which also are an insight into you at this stage in your life. And then I’d love for you to read some poems. MS. OLIVER: OK. MS. TIPPETT: You have said that you were so captivated. That you were — I don't know if you've said this that way, but it seems to me you've kind of written about being so captivated by the world of nature that you were less open to the world of humans. MS. OLIVER: Yes. MS. TIPPETT: And that as you've grown older, as you've gone through life, what did you say, you've entered mor... posted on Mar 18 2015 (28,793 reads)

about digital technology for 35+ years, most of the time in Silicon Valley. Over the decades our evolving devices, and what we can do with them, have dramatically transformed almost every facet of our lives -- from how we bank, travel, and shop, to more abstract realms like how we derive a sense of self-worth, how we forge and sustain relationships, and how we choose to spend our attention. I think the first step to getting a human and humane handle on this rapid transition from a nature-based to a digital-based society is for us all – individually and collectively; technologists and the public - to step back from time to time, catch our breath, and re-visit our relations... posted on Apr 8 2015 (21,644 reads)

with clay and ceramics from years past. By the time we sat down to speak for the record, our conversation had come around to the legendary potters Shoji Hamada and Bernard Leach. I asked De Staebler if he liked Hamada's work...  Stephen De Staebler: His work doesn't do much for me, but I like some things he said. He kind of teamed up with Leach and they made quite an impact on Western potters. I think that's the modern beginning of sensing the richness of clay in its own nature. You don't have to transform it into something else to find beauty. You have to burn through a lot of pretty work in order to love the gift of the clay-its randomness, its tendency to crack... posted on Aug 9 2015 (9,162 reads)

other emotions such as pride. Participants consistently reported that awe produced “a reduced sense of self importance relative to something larger and more powerful that they felt connected to,” says Piff. And subsequent analysis confirmed that this feeling of the “small self” was responsible for their ethical behavior. This seems to suggest that experiencing awe prompts people to help others. Yet another experiment exposed different groups to an awe-inspiring nature video such as Planet Earth, a funny animal video, or a neutral video. Once again, people who experienced awe reported a feeling of a “small self” which triggered more generous behav... posted on Aug 28 2015 (13,111 reads)