Reading Into Grief
"I had written a memoir three years earlier and couldn't find a publisher...I was burnt out. At 29, I contemplated retirement. I wasn't only disappointing myself. My dad, Lawrence J. Epstein, has always been my mentor and biggest cheerleader. A retired English professor who has published ten books on subjects ranging from comedy teams to folk singers to Jewish affairs, he and I often spent hours t... posted on Sep 27, 6993 reads

Lessons in the Old Language
"90% of the world's languages are dying and will be gone within decades, displaced by the cold, placeless tongues of global commerce and colonization. Millions of voices...are going silent and with them the local wisdom borne of millennia of intimate and sustainable communion with place extinguished. The very fabric of life on the planet is also under siege by the same forces. The problem of endan... posted on Oct 28, 15693 reads

98-Year-Old Woman Earns Judo's Highest Honor
"Is earning a black belt on your life list? Then this elderly woman in San Francisco just might be your ultimate hero. Just two years before her 100th birthday, Sensei Keiko Fukuda has become the first woman to achieve a tenth-degree black belt-the highest rank in the martial art and combat sport Judo. Fukuda is now one of only four living people who've earned the tenth-degree (or dan) black belt.... posted on Nov 8, 61396 reads

Lessons Learned from Writing Love Letters to Strangers
"I began leaving love letters all over New York City for strangers to find nearly two years ago. Though the idea sounds romantic, it was really a way to forget about my own feelings of sadness and loneliness for a while and focus on others in the big city who may have been feeling as let down as me. Every morning since that first love letter, I've pinned my cursive to writing and mailing love lett... posted on Oct 31, 29092 reads

Soil, Soul and Society
Nearly 50 years ago, Satish Kumar walked from India to the United States for peace, starting at the grave of Mahatma Gandhi and ending at the grave of John F. Kennedy. He walked without money, trusting in the kindness of strangers to support him. "Peace comes from trust. Wars come from fear." He advocates making peace with soil (nature), soul (yourself) and society (others) because the future well... posted on Nov 17, 3819 reads

See Good Intentions
"Recognizing the positive intentions in others, we feel safer, more supported, and happier. And when others feel that you get their good intentions, they feel seen, appreciated, and more inclined to treat you well. But it can be hard to recognize the goodwill in others. We're busy and distracted and stressed. Positive aims are often buried beneath negative behaviors. The brain's innate negativity ... posted on Nov 25, 14658 reads

The Benefits of Poetry for Professionals
"Wallace Stevens was one of America's greatest poets. The author of "The Emperor of Ice-Cream" and "The Idea of Order at Key West" was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1955 and offered a prestigious faculty position at Harvard University. Stevens turned it down. He didn't want to give up his position as Vice President of the Hartford Accident and Indemnity Company...I've written in the pas... posted on Dec 7, 0 reads

Everything I Need to Know I Learned in the Forest
"My ecological journey started in the forests of the Himalaya. My father was a forest conservator, and my mother became a farmer after fleeing the tragic partition of India and Pakistan. It is from the Himalayan forests and ecosystems that I learned most of what I know about ecology. The songs and poems our mother composed for us were about trees, forests, and India's forest civilizations. My invo... posted on Feb 13, 17190 reads

From Soap to Cities: Designs Inspired by Nature
"Imagine this assignment, says Bill McDonough in a recent TED talk: Design something that makes oxygen, sequesters carbon, converts nitrogen into ammonia, distills water, stores solar energy as fuel, builds complex sugars, creates microclimates, changes color with the seasons, and self-replicates. Sound impossible?Well, nature's already completed this one. It's called a plant. And the fact that it... posted on Feb 27, 12408 reads

Landfill Harmonic: An Orchestra Like No Other
A cello made from an oil can and pieces of wood thrown in the garbage; a saxophone made of spoons and buttons. These are the instruments crafted by Nicolas, a recycler with no previous experience making musical instruments, living hand-to-mouth by the garbage dump in Catuera, Paraguay. Inspired by this initiative and creativity, Maestro Luis Szaran, director of "Sounds of the Earth," formed a "rec... posted on Dec 21, 4256 reads

The Legacy of Baghcheban
"One day three deaf boys were brought to the school. No one in all of Iran in all of its history had ever thought of educating a deaf person. Everyone believed the deaf to be uneducable; they were treated as imbeciles. But Baghcheban could not ignore these three children. He tried to make them laugh, to reach them, to connect. He went to sleep that night haunted by the confusion and loneliness he ... posted on Feb 1, 13267 reads

Naomi Shihab Nye On Kindness
The poems of Naomi Shihab Nye have an uncanny way of showing up at exactly the right moment to summon you below the surface of your life. The child of a Palestinian father and an American mother, her poems speak a language deeper than culture, history or religion. Through the portal of the everyday -- a grocery store, an olive press, the headlines -- she draws us into the most profound questions a... posted on Jan 10, 27760 reads

GirlTank: A Sisterhood of Changemakers
Sejal Hathi and Tara Roberts found each other coincidentally while independently pursuing their dream of empowering young women worldwide. These dynamic young women joined forces and founded Girltank, an online community supporting young entrepreneurs doing exceptional things. "All around the world girls are starting promising projects," says Sejal, "yet there was no infrastructure for them to sus... posted on Jul 17, 7399 reads

Why Gratitude Makes Us Healthier
"Our world is pretty messed up. With all the violence, pollution and crazy things people do, it would be easy to turn into a grouchy old man without being either elderly or male. There's certainly no shortage of justification for disappointment and cynicism. But consider this: Negative attitudes are bad for you. And gratitude, it turns out, makes you happier and healthier (...) if you can find any... posted on Jan 24, 38377 reads

Mary Oliver On Mornings
Mary Oliver is a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet whose body of work is largely filled with imagery of the natural world -- cats, opossums crossing the street, sunflowers and black oaks in the sunshine. Her most recent collection is entitled "A Thousand Mornings"...Mornings with the notebook are part of a regular ritual for Oliver, though. "Most mornings I'm up to see the sun, and that rising of the li... posted on Dec 30, 8368 reads

Surfing For Change
It was around five years ago that Brazilian surfer Jairo Lumertz got the idea to join his two passions of surfing and protecting nature by creating surfboards made out of plastic bottles. The 39-year-old surfer is now traveling from beach to beach with his partner Carolina Scorsin promoting his invention to help children take up surfing and reduce waste at the same time. Lumertz's "eco surfboard... posted on Jan 19, 6350 reads

Until I Say Goodbye
"Susan Spencer-Wendel knows how to spend a year. She left her job as an award-winning criminal courts reporter and went to the Yukon to see the northern lights. Then to Cyprus, to meet family that she never knew. She and her husband, John, took their children on trips on which her daughter got to try on wedding dresses and Susan got kissed by a dolphin.She also got a new dog, put a splendid hut in... posted on Mar 10, 12940 reads

Who's On Your Fridge?
"His name, I later found out, was Marvin Moster. In the obvious ways, he was unremarkable. And yet, I couldn't help noticing him. He was older -- I guessed in his seventies -- and he was boxing with a trainer, punching in a rhythm they had obviously practiced before, ducking his head whenever the trainer threw a hook. Two things struck me: he was in excellent shape -- evidenced by his balance, his... posted on Mar 22, 17455 reads

Jessie's Joy Jars
Jessie Rees was diagnosed with an inoperable and incurable brain tumor at age 11. As part of an outpatient clinical trial, she was asked to undergo 30 days of radiation and chemotherapy. When she found out that some of the kids in the cancer ward did not get to go home everyday, she decided to do something to cheer them up and give them hope, and Jessie's Joy Jars was born. Before Jessie died a li... posted on Mar 23, 6996 reads

Six Ways to Sustainable Happiness
"Sustainable happiness takes into account that happiness is interconnected with other people, other species, and the natural environment by a remarkable web of interdependence. This means that our daily actions and decisions contribute to -- or detract from -- our own well-being, and that of others. Sometimes things that make us happy may harm our community, ecosystems, or future generations. Sus... posted on Mar 29, 41642 reads

The Stubborn Gladness of Elizabeth Gilbert
The bestselling memoir "Eat, Pray, Love," about losing and finding herself, was the book that shot Elizabeth Gilbert to fame. It is now both a movie and travel tour. Yet there is much more to Gilbert than this runaway success. "Her collection of short stories, 'Pilgrims,' was a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Award, and her debut novel, 'Stern Men,' was a New York Times Notable Book. Her 2009 TED T... posted on Apr 7, 32707 reads

The Science of Love
"We now know that a steady diet of love -- of these micro-moments of positive connection --influences how people grow and change, making them healthier and more resilient. And we're beginning to understand exactly how this works, by tracking the complex chain of biological reactions that cascade throughout your body and change your behaviour in ways that influence those around you as you experienc... posted on May 10, 28207 reads

111 Trees Planted for Every Girl Born Here
"A village in southern Rajasthan's Rajsamand district is quietly practicing its own, homegrown brand of Eco-feminism and achieving spectacular results. For the last several years, Piplantri village panchayat has been saving girl children and increasing the green cover in and around it at the same time. Here, villagers plant 111 trees every time a girl is born and the community ensures these trees ... posted on Apr 16, 6597 reads

5 Delightful Ways to Live What You Already Know
"In your heart of hearts, in the deepest place within yourself, you know the truth. The truth of living from love, of being free of whatever holds you back, of fullness, well-being, and contentment. Why pretend you don't know any longer? You might be afraid to acknowledge and live this knowing. You might be diverted by thinking your life doesn't measure up or you've been dealt a bad hand or you're... posted on Apr 14, 24515 reads

Givers vs. Takers: The Truth About Who Gets Ahead
"A colleague asks you for feedback on a report. A LinkedIn connection requests an introduction to one of your key contacts. A recent graduate would like an informational interview. New research from Wharton management professor Adam Grant reveals that how you respond to these requests may be a decisive indicator of where you will end up on the ladder of professional success. Grant recently spoke w... posted on Apr 24, 46886 reads

Talking It Out: Conversation Centered Leadership
"Every year, hundreds of thousands of new graduates enter the business world, eager to climb the corporate ladder. Their progress on the early rungs of that journey will often be determined by qualities like hard work, determination, knowledge and technical proficiency. But business consultants Alan S. Berson and Richard G. Stieglitz argue that those same qualities prove less helpful at higher run... posted on Jul 2, 36676 reads

Books of Ice
Did you ever think that comets were more than interstellar rocks and dust, that they might contain amino acids and nucleotides that build living things? Today, many scientists think that perhaps that's the way life began on Earth 4 billion years ago. Imagine the spinning arms of the galaxy casting comets over the planet, protolife smacking onto the broken lava plains, like seeds of ice, until basi... posted on Apr 30, 3508 reads

Reviving the Neapolitan Tradition of Suspended Coffee
"Tough economic times and growing poverty in much of Europe are reviving a humble tradition that began some one-hundred years ago in the Italian city of Naples. It's called caffe sospeso --- "suspended coffee": A customer pays in advance for a person who cannot afford a cup of coffee...The barista would keep a log, and when someone popped his head in the doorway of the cafe and asked, "Is there an... posted on Apr 28, 7472 reads

Why Exercising Makes Our Brain Happier
"Exercise has been touted to be a cure for nearly everything in life, from depression, to memory loss, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's and more. At the same time, similar to the topic of sleep, I found myself having very little specific and scientific knowledge about what exercise really does to our bodies and our brains." Piqued by his curiosity to dig deeper into the connection between exercis... posted on Aug 27, 59241 reads

Elders & Llamas: A Love Story
It's not everyday that a llama walks into your room. And that's the magic in it! The llamas is question are therapy animals, who visit nursing homes, mental institutions, and rehabilitation facilities to surprise, delight, nuzzle, and be-nuzzled-by the residents. These lovely, funny-faced creatures have received many hours of special training to provide a comforting, affection-inducing presence. A... posted on May 20, 6838 reads

Two Days of Infinite Love in South Texas
"Four mothers started Infinite Love in Southern Texas, as a way to transform the suffering in their own lives into compassion. One went through a tough divorce, another's son fell off a third story and is now paralyzed from waist down, another lost her husband to cancer. As biological sisters, they nurtured each other but the tipping point came when their 30-year-old nephew, Vishal, passed away fr... posted on Feb 23, 4289 reads

The Soul of Teamwork
Los Angeles Lakers coach Phil Jackson -- by percentage (.738) the winningest coach in NBA history -- is renowned for his ability to turn megastars into team players. And his secret is spiritual. "The most effective way to forge a winning team," he writes in Sacred Hoops: Spiritual Lessons of a Hardwood Warrior, "is to call on the players' need to connect with something larger than themselves." He ... posted on May 13, 35569 reads

Values and the Sharing Economy
According to the director of Share The World's Resources, placing greater emphasis on the social and environmental impacts of sharing rather than personal gain, can drive awareness and action on these larger societal issues. Today, the sharing economy runs the gamut from selflessly operated food distribution programs and people pursuing low carbon footprint lifestyles to entrepreneurs seeking to b... posted on May 21, 26454 reads

7 Billion Others
We share this planet with seven billion others. What is our relationship with them? Are we a single unity? Do we belong to one of many tribal divisions? Are we individuals in a planet full of individuality? There is, of course, no single answer to these fundamental questions. Our sense of identity and diversity depends on context. But the way we conceive of our place among the people of the world ... posted on Aug 17, 3581 reads

The Nature of Ambition
If you are lucky you will find something you love doing. Maybe you'll bake cream puffs or take alligators for walks. And maybe you'll find a way to make lots of money doing it. But what happens when your exotic animal walking business grows too fast and dog walkers band against you and you're faced with inner turmoil, fierce competition and self doubt? Find out in Grant Snider's insightful comic a... posted on Jul 16, 58601 reads

Mama Hill: A Gang's Worst Nightmare
This is an inspiring story of a 73-year-old former school teacher who has transformed her home into a refuge and resource center for local youth in Watts, CA. From her days of marching with MLK Jr., to raising kids as a single mom, and a long career serving in some of LA's toughest schools, Mama Hill (as she is endearingly called by her community) has a deep understanding of what urban youth need... posted on Jul 5, 8704 reads

An Abiding Ocean of Love: Artist Chris Jordan
The internationally acclaimed artist and cultural activist Chris Jordan explores contemporary mass culture and asks us to consider our roles in becoming more conscious stewards of the world. His work reflects the practices of making the invisible visible and developing empathy for all living things. In his series titled "Running the Numbers," for instance, he creates "beautiful works of art that ... posted on Jul 29, 83465 reads

Why Giving Thanks In Hard Times Helps
"It is vital to make a distinction between feeling grateful and being grateful. We don't have total control over our emotions. We cannot easily will ourselves to feel grateful, less depressed, or happy. Feelings follow from the way we look at the world, thoughts we have about the way things are, the way things should be, and the distance between these two points. But being grateful is a choice. A ... posted on Sep 12, 98583 reads

Find Your Moment of Obligation
People who successfully tackle big social, environmental, and economic problems are driven by what Lara Galinsky of Echoing Green calls a moment of obligation -- a specific time in their life when they felt compelled to act. These moments become their North Star and keep them going in a positive direction when everything seems dark. Activists or social entrepreneurs aren't the only ones who are mo... posted on Jul 23, 23952 reads

Four Ways to Give Good Feedback
"When effectively administered, feedback is a powerful way to build knowledge and skills, increase skills, increase motivation, and develop reflective habits of mind in students and employees. Too often, however, the feedback we give (and get) is ineffectual or even counterproductive." This piece from Time magazine suggests four ways to offer effective feedback, drawn from research in cognitive sc... posted on Jun 6, 15559 reads

Rituals for Wastelands
"We shut ourselves away from wounded places, psychologically, emotionally, and communally, but there is a better way to heal ourselves and our world." As earth-bound beings, when we witness the destruction of the natural environment, we find the darker parts of our humanity staring back at us. How do we heal our relationship with the land and with ourselves when such destruction can be so difficul... posted on Aug 26, 16899 reads

Is Technology Shaping Your Life Or Vice Versa?
"Sherry Turkle founded and directs the intriguingly titled MIT Initiative on Technology and Self. She made waves with her book Alone Together; it was widely reviewed as a call to "unplug" our digital gadgets. But as I've read her and listened to her speak, I hear Sherry Turkle saying something more thought-provoking: that we can lead examined lives with our technology. That each of us, in our ever... posted on Jul 1, 29380 reads

6 Ways to Find Work You Love
"The idea of fulfilling work -- a job that reflects our passions, talents, and values-- is a modern invention. Open Dr. Johnson's celebrated Dictionary, published in 1755, and the word "fulfillment" doesn't even appear. But today our expectations are higher, which helps explain why job satisfaction has declined to a record low of 47 percent in the U.S., and is even lower in Europe. If you count y... posted on Aug 8, 52388 reads

A Tale of Misplaced Love and Irony
"When the world began, there was a place for everything in the human heart, and everything was in its place. This meant one never, ever had to look for anything. Which sounds awfully convenient, and that is exactly what it was. Awfully. Convenient. In this impeccable order of things everything happened on a schedule. Serendipity, for instance got the 2 pm slot on Tuesday afternoons (which meant of... posted on Jul 12, 32520 reads

Can You Learn To Control Your Mind
Why should we control our minds? The wisdom of the ages and now, modern neuroscience, shows that "a human mind is a wandering mind and a wandering mind is an unhappy mind." On the other hand, being in the "flow", or being completely present to the moment, is linked to greater happiness. And achieving this state of mind isn't as ambiguous as one might think. It simply involves effectively controlli... posted on Aug 15, 61791 reads

Using Emergence to Scale Social Innovation
Do you want to change the world? If so, it may help to first understand how the world actually changes. This article co-authored by Margaret Wheatley describes how "emergence" - the linking together of local efforts and networks into global phenomena -- drives all substantial changes in nature and society. The networks we create, together with our mindfulness of other efforts regionally and global... posted on Sep 2, 35392 reads

Today I Lived And You Did Too
"I'm going Hands Free. I want to make memories, not to-do-lists. I want to feel the squeeze of my daughter's arms, not the pressure of over-commitment. I want to get lost in conversation with my spouse, not consumed by a sea of unimportant emails. I want to be overwhelmed by sunsets that give me hope, not by extracurricular commitments that steal my joy. I want the noise of my life to be a mixture... posted on Nov 14, 98492 reads

The Day I Stopped Saying Hurry Up
Being a parent in this fast-paced world often means constantly fighting the clock to maintain control, make appointments, and complete to-do lists. What effect does this constant rushing have on our parenting and on our children? Rachel Macy Stafford was blessed with a laid-back, carefree, stop-and-smell-the roses type of daughter who made her ask this difficult question and who opened her eyes to... posted on Sep 13, 133197 reads

How Big Ideas Spread
"In the era of the iPhone, Facebook, and Twitter, we've become enamored of ideas that spread as effortlessly as ether. We want frictionless, "turnkey" solutions to the major difficulties of the world -- hunger, disease, poverty. We prefer instructional videos to teachers, drones to troops, incentives to institutions. People and institutions can feel messy and anachronistic. They introduce, as the ... posted on Aug 1, 6028 reads

Just Do It: No TYME Like the Present
When Elaine was 23, she found herself with 3 infants and 3 teenagers under her roof. Her home quickly became the neighborhood hangout spot. When a small circle of sharing in her living room grew into the size of a church hall, she knew she had to do more. That's when TYME was born: Teach Youth, Motivate and Empower. By day, Elaine runs programs for underserved kids, teens, and adults. By night, sh... posted on Jul 30, 28610 reads