Lungs of a Smoker
When she became a flight attendant, her colleagues told her three things: you are going to meet the most interesting men, travel to exciting places and have the lungs of a smoker, even if you never smoke. The last one struck her. It especially hit her when her colleague, Norma Broin, was daignosed with lung cancer. Patty, immediately, launched a relentless crusade against smoking on airplanes ... posted on May 4, 1205 reads

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National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University reported this week that teens consumed 25 percent of all alcohol consumed in the U.S. Furthermore, 87% of adults who drink had their first drink of alcohol before age 21.... posted on Mar 6, 1380 reads

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To produce a single hamburger patty takes as much fossil fuel as it does to drive a small car 20 miles, and uses enough water for 17 showers.... posted on Jan 11, 669 reads

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At 100 years of age, Harold Fisher is still going strong – in fact, he's continuing his work as an architect of churches, a profession that he still finds fun and stimulating after 85 years. ... posted on Jan 17, 749 reads

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A good laugh can be beneficial in all sorts of ways. Laughter brings a sense of well-being, reduces stress, strengthens the immune system, improves likability, and is just plain fun! These are some of the reasons behind the Laughter Club, which is making its way around the world.... posted on Jan 25, 600 reads

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Independent studies show that children who learn piano tend to do better in school. This is attributed to the discipline, eye-hand coordination, social skills building, learning a new language (music) and the pleasure derived from making your own music.... posted on Feb 19, 466 reads

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Steve Dinan's Consciousness Timeline lists various key books and events that demarcate the growing Western interest in the nature of consciousness, from William James to Freud to Huxley to Yogananda to Allan Watts to Ken Wilber.... posted on Mar 29, 575 reads

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To the question "Have you realized your dreams?" 5% of those who made $15,000/yr said yes. When the same question was asked to those who made $100,000/yr, 6% said yes. (from Here and Now in the 90's, by Ram Dass)... posted on Mar 5, 1315 reads

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The Kiwi, national bird of New Zealand, can't fly, lives in a hole in the ground, is almost blind and lays only one egg each year. Yet it has survived for 70 million years. (Source: San Diego Zoo)... posted on Apr 3, 1226 reads

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A free encyclopedia? In 2001, a collaborative project started to produce a complete encyclopedia from scratch. No one owns the projects and anyone can contribute to it. To date, close to 30,000 articles have been added.... posted on Mar 23, 1258 reads

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Three 10-year studies concluded that emotional stress was more predictive of death from cancer and cardiovascular disease than smoking; people who were unable to manage their stress had a 40% higher death rate than non-stressed individuals. ... posted on Mar 9, 957 reads

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Officer Eduardo Delacruz refused a sergeant’s order to arrest a homeless man found sleeping in a Manhattan parking garage. He was slapped with 30 days of unpaid suspension. However, the homeless teamed up in support -- they collected 3000 dollars (officer's salary for that month) for Eduardo, most chipping in with nickles and dimes!... posted on Feb 26, 1076 reads

Passing It On
Everyone under 16 is planting a new tree in Britain. The UK is one of the least wooded countries in Europe, with just 12% of its landscape covered with trees, and a new planting campaign plans to change that while educating the younger generation. The goal is 12 million new trees within the next five years.... posted on Sep 29, 1413 reads

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A severe housing shortage on their reservation and the chance to win a national competition prompted a group of Native American, middle-school girls in Montana to develop a way to build a study hall out of straw. They won.... posted on Apr 5, 1151 reads

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The Campaign for Courtesy in the United Kingdom launched its national 'Day of Courtesy' on October 4 with the theme that better manners would greatly reduce the cost of the National Health Service. The Campaign is suggesting that people should slow down, try harder to listen to others and relax their faces into a smile.... posted on Oct 23, 1172 reads

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One in five of the world's people -- 1.2 billion -- live on less 1 dollar/day. 56% of the developing world lacks basic sanitation, and more than 50 countries have lower real per capita incomes today than they did a decade ago. ... posted on Mar 22, 466 reads

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Fewer than 100 people in the world have ever reached the highest peaks of the seven highest mountains. Erik Weihenmayer just joined that elite group. And, incidentally, he’s blind. ... posted on Oct 30, 1030 reads

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Can grown ups and kids have a good time together? Yup! August 4th 2002 is National Kids Day:... posted on Jul 24, 1245 reads

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Today, 1 in 4 Americans will eat a fast-food meal. Americans spend more money on fast food than on higher education, personal computers, computer software or new cars. Every month more than 90 percent of American children eat at McDonald's; the average American eats three hamburgers and four orders of french fries every week. But Eric Schlosser show why most don't know what goes behind the making... posted on Apr 4, 1304 reads

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Shaheen Mistry took a routine family vacation to India, about 13 years ago. She ended up visiting the slums of Mumbai and never left. With the help of volunteers, she started a school for the slum children; what started with 10 kids now is a full school with over 1000 children.... posted on Aug 10, 1279 reads

Give and Receive
This year, Physicians for Human Rights will hand out their annual Navin Narayan HHR Student Achievement Award. Navin Narayan was a rare young man that dedicated his life to service even as he was struggling with cancer.... posted on Mar 2, 1045 reads

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Are all athletes insensitive and overpaid? Not if you're looking at Delvar Barrett. He's a big -- big-hearted too -- college basketball player who brought his nearly blind mother to college with him, so he could take care of her.... posted on Jan 22, 1481 reads

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The world of nature is so small and interdependent that a butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazon rainforest can generate a violent storm on the other side of the earth. Physicists call this the "Butterfly Effect."... posted on Mar 15, 2199 reads

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Happy people are three times less likely to get a cold, according to researchers who squirted cold virus up the noses of volunteers. Psychologist Sheldon Cohen and his colleagues at Carnegie Mellon University, Pennsylvania, also found that the positive thinkers who do develop symptoms complain about them less.... posted on Aug 6, 1090 reads

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Dot-coms went dot-bomb in the economic downturn over the last couple years. But now, those techy-giants and executives are looking another way -- the nonprofit sector. An increasing percentage of people from the Internet generation are trying to channel their energies to do good!... posted on Aug 13, 1029 reads

A Daily Dose of Kindness
He lost his wife, as a result of a terror attack at Sbarro restaurant in Jerusalem. His response? Kindness. In fact, he called his organization "Partners in Kindness". It's aim is to encourage people around the world to do an act of kindness each day. Their first project is called A Daily Dose of Kindness. Each day people report acts of kindness and it's shared anonymously with others.... posted on Oct 23, 1513 reads

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Microsoft and other businesses are helping minorities gain the skills they need to enter the technology workplace.... posted on Nov 19, 636 reads

Ecosandals Out of Kenya
Matthew Meyer, founder of Ecosandals.com, decided to start a business in Korogocho after seeing Kenyan poverty firsthand when he went to Nairobi in 1992 during his junior year in college. He came up with the Ecosandals concept after noticing that others liked the locally made tire sandals shoes and thought the cheap alternative to factory-made shoes might have an international appeal. Within 36 ho... posted on Jul 1, 1305 reads

Lesser TV, Better Health
The amount of television watched as a child is directly related to the risk of health problems as an adult, new research shows. Researchers estimate that 17 percent of overweight, 15 percent of poor fitness, 15 percent of elevated cholesterol, and 17 percent of current smoking in 26-year-olds could be attributed to watching more than 2 hours per day of television.... posted on Jul 22, 1007 reads

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Dr. Masaru Emoto, a researched in Japan, did an experiment in 1994 that now proves that thoughts affect physical matter. Through repeatable experiments, he demonstrated that human thoughts and emotions can alter the molecular structure of water. Check out his amazing pictures of the molecules when someone says "you make me sick" vs. "thank you":... posted on Jun 11, 1240 reads

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If you're the richest man in the world, what would be the most satisfying part of your life? Well, Bill Gates says it's having kids and playing with them!... posted on Jul 11, 1424 reads

Chirping Birds
The chirping of two pet canaries from beneath the rubble of a destroyed house in Bam saved two children after the birds attracted the attention of rescue workers, Iran's official news agency reported Tuesday. "The two children were stuck in the debris next to their broken bird case," the IRNA news agency said. "After hearing the birds singing, rescue workers went to the location and were removing ... posted on Jan 15, 1248 reads

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The Canadian Ministry of Fisheries and Oceans recently announced that it has authorized the killing of 975,000 harp seals during the next three years. ... posted on Mar 24, 1366 reads

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It doesn't look like much. A drab, gray piece of plastic, about five inches long and three inches wide. Yet this "simputer" may hold the key to bringing information technology to Third World countries. Among other things, the Simputer will translate text into a local dialect so even illiterate rural communities can leverage the power of web!... posted on Apr 23, 962 reads

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Rick Woodbury starts every morning with silent meditation in a small Tibetan Buddhist temple in Spokane. His prayers call for an end to sickness, war and suffering, but since he doesn't know how to do those things, he decided instead to create an environmental traffic-busting car. ... posted on Jul 31, 1005 reads

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Albertsons, Inc. has announced that over the next twelve months the company's associates and their families plan to contribute at least one million volunteer hours!... posted on Jun 26, 510 reads

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For a modern tour of an ancient perspective on the causes of all our suffering and the path to liberation, visit this interactive tour of the Wheel of Life.... posted on Mar 30, 515 reads

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The U.S produces 19% of the world's trash. The annual contribution includes 20 billion disposable diapers, 2 billion razors and 1.7 billion pens. (Source: E-magazine)... posted on Apr 13, 634 reads

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Recycling one ton of paper saves: 17 trees, 6953 gallons of water, 463 gallons of of oil, 587 pounds of air pollution, 3.06 cubic yards of landfill space, and 4077 kilowatt hours of energy. ... posted on Dec 27, 1061 reads

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18 million courses of antibiotics are prescribed for the common
cold in the US per year. Too bad colds are caused by viruses. 50
million unnecessary antibiotics are prescribed for viral respiratory infections. Source: Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention (CDC)... posted on May 10, 531 reads

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Homeopathy is based on the idea that "like cures like" and that administering a highly diluted form of the substance causing the illness will stimulate the body to recover its health. Recent research by chemists in South Korea supports that counter intuitive premise.... posted on Jun 20, 740 reads

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If every commuter carried just one more passenger daily, we'd save 600,000 gallons of gasoline and keep 12 million pounds of pollution out of the atmosphere every year. Source: Sprint ... posted on May 1, 2182 reads

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Every person in the United States receives junk mail that represents the equivalent of one and a half trees a year. Source: Environmental Systems of America
... posted on Apr 27, 937 reads

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The three wealthiest people (and their families) in the world have more assets than the combined wealth of the 48 poorest countries. (Source: United Nations)... posted on May 24, 827 reads

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Later this month, watch as five planets - Venus, Jupiter, Mercury, Saturn, and Mars - will all line up.
... posted on Apr 23, 449 reads

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As a child in Singapore, William Tan had to be carried around on someone's back. Having lost his legs to polio, and too poor to afford a wheelchair, he built up a determination to conquer this disease. Now, a student at Harvard, William is in a race to save children from polio.... posted on Apr 26, 934 reads

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War may be raging in the Middle East, but in this New York neighborhood, Jews and Muslims are getting along just fine.
... posted on May 2, 1246 reads

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Have you heard the parable of the blind men and the elephant?
... posted on May 16, 476 reads

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Saddened to hear that foster kids had to carry their belongings in trash bags, 9-year old Aubyn Burnside decided it was time for a change. She founded Suitcases For Kids and has so far collected 25,000!... posted on May 11, 684 reads

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Kevin is ready to be "caught" being kind. He's been hoping all month. That's what happens at Rosewood Elementary School in March. Benevolent spies are everywhere, watching for kindness, catching and rewarding it when a good deed occurs.... posted on May 9, 1289 reads