A School for Refugees -- By Refugees
Refugees who have fled their native lands in search of a place to live safely and to be treated as human beings often find themselves stuck for several years in an environment which can be unwelcoming and even hostile. A group of refugees in Indonesia established a school so that their children could learn basic education while being offered a chance at normalcy through social interaction. Childre... posted on Oct 29, 1084 reads

Wim Hof: The Cold as a Noble Force
"Wim Hof is an athlete and extremophile daredevil nicknamed The Iceman for his feats of withstanding extreme weather conditions. The holder of more than 20 Guinness World Records, Wim attributes his endurance to specific meditation and breathing techniques. In this intriguing episode of Insights at the Edge, Tami Simon speaks with Wim about the Wim Hof Method of exercises, mindfulness techniques, ... posted on Nov 2, 3319 reads

7 Principles of Gardening
"My first principle is to learn gardening from the wilderness outside the garden gate. As I work to keep the links alive between the wild land and the cultivated row, I get my clearest gardening instruction from listening to the voice of the watershed that surrounds our garden. I know that January is the time to prune our Japanese Elephant Heart plum in the garden, but just when in January is alwa... posted on Nov 19, 5446 reads

How An Apple Tree Transformed My Life
"I was in between creative projects and feeling the need to do something more dynamic with my energy than sitting at the computer sending and receiving emails, so I followed an impulse to a local biodynamic farm and got a job picking apples during the last six weeks of harvest. The notion was quite romantic initially...I'd spend my days wandering the orchard rows connecting with my Muse, and my ev... posted on Dec 5, 4111 reads

From Bullets to Bangles
"I am happier now, after the angst of my earlier years. Those years were rough. I started life in a factory as a coiled mix of copper and zinc being pressed into a small, cup-like shape. Then I was pulled mechanically into a cylinder and stretched to form a tight tube. Even the memory is painful: in order to be stretched without breaking, I had to be heated, annealed, pickled, rinsed, and measure... posted on Dec 13, 2216 reads

Words Can Change Your Brain
"We wrote this book to help people to speak more honestly with each other, and to listen to each other more deeply. And we also wrote this book because the newest findings in neuroscience can teach us how to become better communicators, how to build deeper bonds of trust, and how to resolve conflicts without getting frightened or mad. We wrote this book to talk about the power of words, but we als... posted on Jan 6, 11271 reads

Jane Hirshfield: The Fullness of Things
"The esteemed writer Jane Hirshfield has been a Zen monk and a visiting artist among neuroscientists. She has said this: 'It's my nature to question, to look at the opposite side. I believe that the best writing also does this... It tells us that where there is sorrow, there will be joy; where there is joy, there will be sorrow... The acknowledgement of the fully complex scope of being is why good... posted on Jan 12, 4787 reads

Prayer for the Earth: An Indigenous Response to these Times
In his lifetime Stan Rushworth, an elder of Cherokee descent who was raised by his grandfather, has seen a river die, animals disappear, and the proliferation of box stores. The devastation of climate change is not new to him - his elders have been telling him about it all of his life. The traditional indigenous wisdom that is needed now is looking at how indigenous populations have managed to sur... posted on Jan 23, 3103 reads

What is Holding it Together?
"Words are delicious, but cannot say much. They often lose the water of meaning before it is delivered. But they can be stirred to form descriptions of the breath, glances, gestures, and pulses between lives. Perhaps writing is finding a scrape in the skin of knowing, where the sting and dirt and blood of the day is let out, and music is let in." The following excerpt, by Nora Bateson, noted resea... posted on Jan 26, 3042 reads

Being Simply Beautiful
We are surrounded by the stuff that we think is so valuable and important, but take it all away and what is left? The real you is left. Or at least the journey to the real you without all the stuff that you think defines you. In this video, Theo Du Plessis of South Africa, had a "Damascus moment" that opened him up to the only question he asks himself now before acquiring possessions or pursuing e... posted on Jan 29, 3337 reads

Thich Nhat Hanh: Ten Love Letters to the Earth
"Dear Mother Earth, I bow my head before you as I look deeply and recognize that you are present in me and that I'm a part of you. I was born from you and you are always present, offering me everything I need for my nourishment and growth. My mother, my father, and all my ancestors are also your children. We breathe your fresh air. We drink your clear water. We eat your nourishing food. Your herbs... posted on Feb 3, 11340 reads

A World Held Sacred...
"'Peace is Every Step,' Thich Nhat Hanh reminded us throughout his life and work. In this spirit, in the face of the concerted violence currently being waged against the Ukrainian people, we share the following resources to offer inspiration and support for the embodiment and expression of peace. Grateful living reminds us that every moment holds the opportunity for reflection, perspective-taking,... posted on Mar 1, 3125 reads

Greater Good Resources for Peace & Conflict
"As an educational nonprofit, the best we can do, perhaps, is to remind ourselves and our readers that peace is always possible, the vast majority of people resist killing, even the most violent primates are capable of change, there are steps we can all take to bridge our differences, and activism can make the world a better place." In the wake of the invasion of Ukraine, the Greater Good Science ... posted on Mar 8, 2777 reads

Spiritual Listening
"Spiritual listening is at the heart of all relationships. It is what we experience when we become a quiet, safe container into which the speaker is able to express his or her most genuine voice. There is a communion of souls. The way we listen to each other sets a tone for everything that follows. We often think that our speaking, the words we use, is the most important part of our communicatio... posted on Mar 9, 7526 reads

Finding Joy in the Unknown
"Writing was a way for me to communicate," says Dara McAnulty, "I didn't like to speak to people. In fact, I spoke to basically nobody outside of close family, and any conversation I had outside of that was incredibly awkward and I hated every second of it. Writing, on the other hand, I found incredibly easy to do. It was something where I could take what was going on in my mind and put it into so... posted on Mar 29, 3108 reads

The Two-Spirit Diplomat Who Mediated Two Worlds
"In Washington, D.C., a visiting celebrity of 1885 was from the Zuni tribe of the southwestern United States. Described as a priestess and a princess, the young woman named WeWha was 6 feet tall, with a self-possessed and dignified demeanor. WeWha had come to Washington on a diplomatic mission to represent the Zuni people, and her activities were reported in the newspapers. She demonstrated tradit... posted on Apr 5, 3827 reads

Being Simply Beautiful
We are surrounded by the stuff that we think is so valuable and important, but take it all away and what is left? The real you is left. Or at least the journey to the real you without all the stuff that you think defines you. In this video, Theo Du Plessis of South Africa, had a "Damascus moment" that opened him up to the only question he asks himself now before acquiring possessions or pursuing e... posted on Apr 9, 2942 reads

Children, Anger Control and Inuit Wisdom
Traditional Inuit parenting is incredibly nurturing and tender. If you took all the parenting styles around the world and ranked them by their gentleness, the Inuit approach would likely rank near the top. (They even have a special kiss for babies, where you put your nose against the cheek and sniff the skin.) The culture views scolding -- or even speaking to children in an angry voice -- as inapp... posted on Apr 22, 4465 reads

Why Did We Stop Believing that People Can Change?
"Belief in the fixity rather than the fluidity of human nature or maybe in guilt without redemption shows up everywhere -- not just in the formal legal system that decides questions of innocence, guilt and responsibility but also in the social sphere, in which we render verdicts replete with both unexamined assumptions about human nature and prejudices for and against particular kinds of people an... posted on Apr 24, 3309 reads

They Still Draw Pictures
""They still draw pictures!" So wrote the editors of an influential collection of childrens art that was compiled in 1938 during the Spanish Civil War. Eighty years later, war continues to upend children's lives in Ukraine, Yemen and elsewhere. In January, UNICEF projected that 177 million children worldwide would require assistance due to war and political instability in 2022. This included 12 mi... posted on May 28, 3742 reads

Why Rivers Should Have The Same Rights as Us
Who is water? This question presents a fundamental change in thinking by giving legal personhood to water and will transform our approach to water as a culture. In this TED talk, Kelsey Leonard argues that water needs legal rights just as people do. Leonard is a legal scholar and scientist in the the Shinnecock Nation--an indigenous tribe of people in the state of California, USA. Her tribe believ... posted on Jun 10, 1207 reads

Returning to the Art of the Unknowable
"Colin Tudge is a science writer and broadcaster who is best known for his work on agriculture and the environment, with books such as 'Feeding People is Easy' and 'The Variety of Life'. His latest publication, 'The Great Rethink,' advocating a radically new approach to food production, was reviewed by Beshara Magazine last year. In this article, he argues that at the root of our contemporary prob... posted on Jun 27, 1855 reads

Perceptual Intelligence: Gathering Deep Knowledge
"One cannot know a forest by walking it only once. It takes several full cycles of the seasons, and regular explorations during that time, preferably daily, to even begin to know a place. Where are its berry trees and when are the berries ripe? Where are its meltwater ponds in the spring? Where is the nearest raccoon den, and how often do you normally see them out and about? When do the maple tree... posted on Jul 18, 2104 reads

The Egg: A Short Story By Andy Weir
"You were on your way home when you died.
It was a car accident. Nothing particularly remarkable, but fatal nonetheless. You left behind a wife and two children. It was a painless death. The EMTs tried their best to save you, but to no avail. Your body was so utterly shattered you were better off, trust me.
And that's when you met me.
"What...what happened?" You asked. "Where ... posted on Jul 25, 16636 reads

Peter Singer: The Life You Can Save
"Say you're walking past a shallow pond and see a child drowning. Would you try to rescue the child?
That's the famous "drowning child" scenario that Peter Singer, the Australian philosopher, presented in his 1972 article "Famine, Affluence, and Morality." He points out there could be some minor inconveniences -- you'd get wet and muddy and would probably have to change your clothes. But, o... posted on Aug 10, 2387 reads

This Rising Up
This Climbing PoeTree music video highlights modern day freedom fighters and champions of justice by celebrating the beauty, power, talent, brilliance and humanity of Black people. Through powerful lyrics, music and dance, it is a triumphant acknowledgement that dignity, safety and self determination are all necessary to overcome dehumanizing terror and to ensure that justice prevails.... posted on Aug 13, 1460 reads

Beauty in the Natural World
"Do we always prefer the harmonious to the discordant, whatever that distinction might look like to us? It is not my place to say that the music youre listening to sounds terrible. On that note, harmony is very much its own kind of beautiful, and it looks and feels like different things to all of us. For me, harmony is found in the way tree branches will sometimes grow curving around to hold each ... posted on Sep 4, 1841 reads

Charles Foster: Against Nature Writing
"There's a wood near us. I can't see the wood for the words. Probably the wood is wonderful. My intuition tells me it is. But unless intuition is knowledge, I really don't know. And even if intuition is knowledge, all that I get from my intuition is the generic assertion, "This wood is wonderful." I cant see any particulars. I can't get an uninterrupted view of a flower petal or the hair on a cate... posted on Sep 10, 1468 reads

The Power of the Bittersweet
"The bittersweet is...an authentic and elevating response to the problem of being alive in a deeply flawed yet stubbornly beautiful world. Most of all, bittersweetness shows us how to respond to pain: by acknowledging it, and attempting to turn it into art, the way the musicians do, or healing, or innovation, or anything else that nourishes the soul. If we don't transform our sorrows and longings,... posted on Sep 17, 2054 reads

Peace Pilgrim: A Life of Service
"On January 1, 1953, at age 44, Mildred Lisette Norman changed her name to Peace Pilgrim, put
on a pair of canvas sneakers, donned dark blue slacks, blouse, and a tunic--on which she had
sown her new name--and set out to walk the length of the country leaving from Pasadena, CA...She would walk non-stop for the next 28 years, weaving back and forth across the country, and
makin... posted on Sep 25, 2354 reads

Merlin Sheldrake: Entangled Life
"Merlin Sheldrakes book Entangled Life [1] has rather taken the world by storm since it was published in 2020, appearing on the best-seller lists in both the UK and USA. Subtitled How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds and Shape Our Futures, it constitutes a comprehensive overview of our current scientific understanding of fungi, from the extraordinary hidden networks of the wood wide web to... posted on Nov 3, 2005 reads

Truth and Reconciliation
Lis Cox, videographer and activist, is on a one woman mission to try to ensure that there is a future for young people. Drawing on successes of protests in the 1960's and 1970's, this video inspires young people and people of all ages to unite in protest against climate problems, police brutality and racism. She quotes from the Civil Rights Movement in the United States, saying, "You're either on ... posted on Nov 4, 987 reads

Ross Gay: Inciting Joy
"Now that weve defined joy, and concluded it is important, there are two guiding inquiries in this book. First, I mean to investigate what practices, habits, rituals, understandings you know, the stuff we do and think and believemake joy more available to us. What in our lives prepares the ground for joy. I mean to try to find out, in other words, what incites joy. And second, I intend to wonder w... posted on Nov 22, 2013 reads

Satish Kumar: In Service of Humanity and Mother Earth
In 2020, a dialog was held at Plum Village with environmental, and multi-faith peace activist Satish Kumar. What follows are two excerpts from that evening, the first titled, "Activism -- Caring without Burning Out," and the second, "Encouragement to Young Activists -- on Anger, Love and Grief." In these excerpts Kumar shares "how he has been able to find an inexhaustible source of energy to conti... posted on Nov 28, 1570 reads

Danusha Lameris: Intimacy with the Marrow of Life
Danusha Lameris's poems have been called "wise, direct, and fearless" (American poet Dorianne Laux). She began writing poetry, as she believes many people do, from a place of heartbreak, and not knowing what to do with it. Her first book of poems, The Moons of August, came on the heels of a rapid succession of deep losses in her early 30s. "I've buried a lover, a brother, a son," she writes early ... posted on Nov 29, 2980 reads

Don't Treat Your Life as a Project
"The idea that we narrate our lives to ourselves, and that doing so is part of living well, is sufficiently commonplace that its most vocal critic, the philosopher Galen Strawson, could describe it as "a fallacy of our age." He lists an impressive roster of advocates, including the neurologist and author Oliver Sacks ("Each of us constructs and lives a 'narrative'...this narrative is us"), the psy... posted on Dec 1, 2203 reads

George's Best Friend: A Christmas Story
A new neighbor moved in next door. His name was George, and he was an older gentleman. He always nodded a greeting when he saw us. It was around Thanksgiving when we saw him park in his space near ours. We were bringing in groceries, and my mom asked him if he had plans for the holiday. When he said no, that he would spend it alone, my mom mentioned her open house on Christmas Eve. 'Please join us... posted on Dec 25, 19332 reads

On Hope: A Conversation with Jacob Needleman
"When we're in touch with another kind of consciousness, or level of understanding, that is what brings hope. It's not because it hopes for money or pleasure, or anything like that. Yes, that's a possible part of it. But it's the element--maybe even the most essential part of ourselves as human beings--it's this part that can be awakened by great ideas that speak about great questions of meaning, ... posted on Dec 26, 1825 reads

Pico Iyer: The Craft and Life of a Restless Writer
"As Time magazines travel correspondent since 1986, Pico Iyer has visited nearly every corner of the globe in search of the astonishing, remarkable, bizarre, and profound. Hes the author of bestselling books including Video Night in Kathmandu and The Global Soul: Jet Lag, Shopping Malls, and the Search for Home. In this interview he discusses writing, cultural taboos, stillness, Alaska, and places... posted on Dec 28, 1942 reads

Finding Fulfillment in a Purpose Larger than You
"Tami Simon speaks with author and activist Lynne Twist about her new book, Living a Committed Life, and discovering the role we each must play to usher in a new era for humanity. Tune in for an inspiring discussion of strengthening your possibility muscle; the power of disruption; the breakthroughs hidden in the breakdowns; choosing to tell a new story; the relationship between pain and joy; the ... posted on Dec 31, 4189 reads

Lissa Rankin: Sacred Medicine & The Mysteries of Healing
"I write a lot in Sacred Medicine about the paradoxes of healing and one of them is to be clear in your intention to heal, to do whatever's in your power to change your life, and go for it. And don't be passive, make it happen. Let go of attachment to outcomes, surrender to what is, accept the limitations that sometimes we're limited, we're not limitless. Sometimes just being able to accept those ... posted on Aug 28, 3720 reads

Patterns of Extraction
"A new series of aerial images from photographer Edward Burtynsky reveals sites of displacement, erasure, and extractionall, at first glance, sublimeacross five African countries. From the breathtaking expanse of the Sishen Iron Ore Mine to the controlled might of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, a story of reshaped and redefined landscapes emerges. Burtynsky makes visible the scope of human i... posted on Jan 22, 1548 reads

The Book of Vanishing Species
"If you were to take a teaspoon of water from the ocean and look at it under a microscope, you would see many shapes -- possibly millions, mostly translucent -- of varying sizes and colours. Little spheres, tubular bodies with drooping tendrils, circles within squares, squares within circles; triangles, rectangles; spiralling helixes, some bristly, some hooked, some frilled; oval wreaths, concerti... posted on Jan 29, 1557 reads

The Art of Budo
"In my lifelong spiritual quest, I have read hundreds of sutras; plowed through pages and pages of philosophical texts; grappled with koan collections; analyzed thousands of poems; searched through biographies; meditated for hours; and interacted with many teachers, good and bad. However, I have gained the most from the contemplation, appreciation, and inspiration of the "ink tracings" of the grea... posted on Feb 1, 1905 reads

Separation Without Separateness: A Day That Changed My Life
"I had been living in London. It was Sunday, July 27, 1980...a day that changed my life forever. I got up before dawn and went for a long, slow, easy run in Hyde Park. When I returned, I picked up the Sunday Times and went into my flat. After showering, I was thumbing through the newspaper, and when I got to page fourteen, I saw a headline in the education section: "How the Universe Hangs Together... posted on Mar 15, 4125 reads

June Jordan's Legacy of Solidarity & Love
To fulfill a humanities requirement at UC Berkeley, Sriram Shamasunder wandered into, "Poetry for the People," a course conceived and taught by the late poet-activist June Jordan. He had no way of knowing then, what a profound impact Jordan would have on the trajectory of his life. Shamasunder writes," June was both tender and fierce. At first, she was mostly someone I admired at a distance in t... posted on Feb 14, 3320 reads

The Light That Bridges the Dark Expanse Between Lonelinesses
"The longer I live, the more deeply I learn that love -- whether we call it friendship or family or romance -- is the work of mirroring and magnifying each others light. Gentle work. Steadfast work. Life-saving work in those moments when life and shame and sorrow occlude our own light from our view, but there is still a clear-eyed loving person to beam it back. In our best moments, we are that per... posted on Feb 19, 7163 reads

Dying to Make a Living
For generations coal miners have risked their health and safety to be able to provide for their families. Eastern Kentucky has been irrevocably changed by mining and its collateral damage on individuals and the environment. Through their music, the Appalachian duo, The Local Honeys, shines a light on how the long held traditions of folk music and activism combine to provide hope and healing.... posted on Feb 24, 1578 reads

A Higher Level of Conscious Engagement
"The challenge for both moral and social activists is to avoid getting spun out by the need to change dysfunctional human behaviors and unjust systems. They should seek to avoid corrosive judgmentalism: When exuberance for justice leads to the demonization of others, more injustice is being perpetrated. Constant unresolved anxiety, frustration, anger, and even outrage can lead not only to burnout,... posted on Mar 3, 2457 reads

Dakota 38: One Filmmaker's Ride of a Lifetime
In 2005, Native spiritual leader and Vietnam veteran, Jim Miller had a dream of arriving on horseback at a riverbank in Minnesota and seeing 38 of his Dakota ancestors hanged. At the time, Jim was unaware of the largest mass execution in United States history, ordered by Abraham Lincoln. Richard Whittaker writes, "I remember Silas telling us about meeting a Native American elder [Miller,] who talk... posted on Mar 4, 1633 reads