not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.” - Buddha Have you ever lost yourself in your work, so much so that you lost track of time? Being consumed by a task like that, while it can be rare for most people, is a state of being called Flow. In my experience, it’s one of the keys to happiness at work, and a nice side benefit is that it not only reduces stress but increases your productivity. Not bad, huh? When I wrote about called The Magical Power of Focus, I promised to write more about how to achieve Flow, a concept that is very much in vogue right now and something mo... posted on Apr 30 2012 (34,839 reads)

Einstein’s was estimated at 160, Madonna's is 140, and John F. Kennedy’s was only 119, but as it turns out, your IQ score pales in comparison with your EQ, MQ, and BQ scores when it comes to predicting your success and professional achievement. IQ tests are used as an indicator of logical reasoning ability and technical intelligence. A high IQ is often a prerequisite for rising to the top ranks of business today. It is necessary, but it is not adequate to predict executive competence and corporate success. By itself, a high IQ does not guarantee that you will stand out and rise above everyone else. Research carried out by the Carnegie Institute of Techn... posted on May 5 2012 (79,356 reads)

the price of a fancy cup of coffee, Dr. Russell Dohner has cared for Rushville, an Illinois town of 4,300 people, for more than half a century, delivering 3,500 babies, and never taking a vacation — or even an entire day off. Rushville, Ill., is the kind of place where backyards have gardens instead of grass, and sunflowers wave in the wind. A tiny town, just 4,300 people, named for a doctor and settled by the men who marched back from the War of 1812. Rushville was built on government land, halfway between St. Louis and Chicago, as a gift to veterans. Those who did not come back got a statue on the courthouse square and were called heroes. “In a mercenary wo... posted on May 11 2012 (27,821 reads)

humble. Stay close to the earth. That's at the core of this existence, I was told. And so, for years, I've wrestled with living the "less-is-more" life in a world that seems to be busting at its seams — in every way — financially, physically, psychologically. That sentiment tends to get lost in the "more-bang-for-your-buck" schemes, the two-for-one offers. There's a need, it seems, to acquire and expand. And it's not just in our personal and material lives. Startups want to scale — that's the most critical stage for them. How do we expand? How do we robotize it so we can speed up the process? Nonprofi... posted on May 22 2012 (15,734 reads)

your life can seem a incredibly tough and complicated thing, especially if you’ve failed a great number of times (like I did), found it too hard, and resigned yourself to not changing. But I found a way to change. And I’m not any better than anyone else, not more disciplined, not more motivated. I just learned a few simple principles that changed my life. I’ve written about them many times, but realized they’re spread out all over the site. Here is how I changed my life, in a nutshell. tl;dr The four lines you’re looking for are at the bottom. How I Started Running In 2005 I was sedentary, and couldn’t for ... posted on May 21 2012 (46,554 reads)

descriptions of Albert Einstein’s thinking process were discovered in his correspondence with his close friend Maurice Solovine, who was a student of philosophy. One day Solovine suggested reading and debating the works of great authors. Einstein agreed enthusiastically and soon mathematician Conrad Habicht became involved in what was to be known as the "Olympia Academy." Often their meetings, held in Einstein's flat, would last until the early morning hours where the three discussed issues while eating hard boiled eggs and smoking pipes and cigars.   Among the topics that intrigued them was thinking and believing. How do we think? Why ... posted on May 23 2012 (39,202 reads)

his book, “To Bless the Space Between Us,” John O’Donohue describes an experience he had when he was a young priest visiting a group of nuns.  He was asked by one of the older women to offer her a blessing.  After he finished, he knelt down in front of her, and similarly asked her for a blessing.  She was completely taken aback by this because, apparently, no one had ever asked her for such a thing.  It’s odd to live in a world where some people, but not all people, feel worthy of offering blessings.  To change this inequity, O’Donohue encourages all of us to rediscover our power to bless one another. I’ve become ench... posted on Jun 25 2012 (23,209 reads)

in the coffin of the miser; this is the man who could never be satisfied with riches; but see now a few boards enclose him, and a few square inches contain him. . . Behold the consequences of intemperance in the tomb of the glutton; see his appetite now fully satiated, his senses destroyed and his bones scattered. These messages are clear. We cannot hide from death. Its embrace will consume our social existence entirely. Job titles, social position, material possessions, sexual roles and images--all must yield to death. This does not mean that we should abandon our material and social existence. Rather, it means that in consciously honoring the fact of our physical death, we are there... posted on Jun 7 2012 (38,040 reads)

is an old Zen story about a man riding a horse, galloping frantically down a path. His friend, who is sitting by the side of the road, calls out "Where are you going?" The man replies: "I don't know. Ask the horse!" When we build our tools, we often depend on metrics to guide our development. We keep graphs of unique visitors and pageviews and watch them closely. This keeps us honest. It's hard to convince anybody that we're building a useful tool if our metrics show that nobody is using it. But we must take care when we use metrics. Metrics can be like the horse in the old Zen story. Once we decide on them, they have a habit of setting t... posted on Jun 12 2012 (13,887 reads)

Stranger,   I think we need to talk.   My mom always told me never to talk to you, even if you offered me candy. The news tells me not to trust you–that you will kidnap, rape, rob, or kill me given half the chance.   But I never believed those lies. I know you’re just like me, trying to make your world turn as best as you can. I know you have dreams, ideas, and favorite recipes just like me. You might even have some insight to share that will make my life better. Maybe you know my future partner. Maybe you know the solution to something I’ve been trying to figure out for a long while.   Sometimes... posted on Jun 22 2012 (13,434 reads)

story that I do not want to sell Yesterday a friend who'd just returned from a cross country motorcycle expedition shared many stories with us. One of them was about a couple who settled in a tribal hamlet twenty five years ago. And they...  Well, I am not going to tell you the story.  By telling you the story in almost the same manner it was told to me -- fast paced, information packed with one or two punch lines, all within a minute -- I would be doing a disservice to the subject of the story, to myself and to you, the reader/listener. When I suggested this to my friend, he said that his first version is only a hook (he used to be a radio DJ). Narrated... posted on Jul 10 2012 (15,723 reads)

Tan (widely known as Meng) was among the earliest engineers to be hired at Google. He and his team worked on ways to improve the quality of the site's search results and also played a key role in the launch of mobile search. When Google allowed engineers to spend 20% of their time pursuing their passion, Meng decided to spend his time on a cause dear to his heart: Launching a conspiracy to bring about world peace. The conspirators could well be called the compassionati.  Meng believes that world peace can be achieved -- but only if people cultivate the conditions for inner peace within themselves. Inner peace, in turn, comes from nurturing emotional int... posted on Jul 11 2012 (21,892 reads)

time I watch it, I get goosebumps. The one-minute "Power of One" video combines evocative visuals of people who've impacted the world by working toward the greater good, inspiring us by their example. Gandhi. Mother Teresa. Ruby Bridges (the first black child to attend an all-white elementary school in 1960). It's amazing that our interpretation of experiences can generate such a visceral response. The fact that we get goosebumps when we are inspired or afraid is one of many everyday indicators of just how deeply and intricately connected our minds and bodies are. In fact, the mind and body are an intertwined whole -- and there is great wisdom in the totality o... posted on Jul 12 2012 (17,024 reads)

long as I confine my activities to social service and the blind, they compliment me extravagantly, calling me 'arch priestess of the sightless,' 'wonder woman,' and a 'modern miracle.' But when it comes to a discussion of poverty, and I maintain that it is the result of wrong economics—that the industrial system under which we live is at the root of much of the physical deafness and blindness in the world—that is a different matter! It is laudable to give aid to the handicapped. Superficial charities make smooth the way of the prosperous; but to advocate that all human beings should have leisure and comfort, the decencies and refinements of li... posted on Jul 16 2012 (35,489 reads)

Eaton wanted to celebrate his birthday on June 11 in a big way, so he turned to his friends for ideas -- ended up marking the day with random acts of kindness, including handing out free money to people passing by.  "I asked a bunch of my friends on Facebook what should I do on my 65th and I got a whole long list of stuff," he told KFOR-TV. "And one of my friends said, 'Why don't you do 65 random acts of kindness?'"  So that's exactly what he did, spending 65 minutes standing on the corner of NW 39th Street and May Avenue in Oklahoma City, handing out $5 bills to people who passed by. He told his Facebook fri... posted on Jul 19 2012 (23,533 reads)

and she loved a boy very, very much– even more than she loved herself.’ ~Shel Silverstein, The Giving Tree There is no such thing as stress-free parenting. A reader requested that I share my thoughts on stress-free parenting, as the father of six kids. And while I have learned a lot about being a dad, and finding joy in parenthood, I also know that stress-free parenting is a myth. Parents will always have stress: we not only have to deal with tantrums and scraped knees and refusing to eat anything you cook, but we worry about potential accidents, whether we are ruining our kids, whether our children will find happiness as adul... posted on Jul 24 2012 (83,205 reads)

is a vitally important shift underway in how we think about progress. Growing numbers of economists, political leaders and expert commentators are calling for better measures of how well society is doing; measures that track not just our economic standard of living, but our overall quality of life. This shift also mirrors the way many of us are feeling too: that the modern consumer economy has failed to deliver fair outcomes and fulfilling lives. In recent decades our lives have become increasingly orientated in the service of the economy, rather than the other way around. Yet economic growth is really just a means to an end; it only matters if it contributes to social... posted on Jul 25 2012 (16,285 reads)

an ancient parable, three masons are sitting in a row, all chipping away at large blocks of stone. A woman observing them is curious about what they're up to. She asks the first man what he's doing, to which he responds, "I'm chipping away at this block of stone." Indeed, she thinks. She questions the second man similarly, who says, "I'm working to feed my family." Also true, reflects the woman. Finally, she questions the third mason, who responds, "I'm helping to build a beautiful cathedral." It's a powerful perspective -- holding within it a value for collaboration, agency, creativity, and meaning. What if we all could see ... posted on Jul 31 2012 (21,981 reads)

by Sarah Loeb of Pennsylvania I feel like I have experienced a truly blessed event. A member of my feral colony, usually one of the friendlier cats, got a plastic jar stuck on his head. His entire head enveloped in hard plastic, he was completely unable to eat or drink. I first saw him this way on a Saturday night. I spent hours trying to get him to trust me to get close enough so that I could remove the jar. But, completely vulnerable and positively panicked, the cat was far too skittish to permit me to get near. The next evening, I tried throwing a towel, then a heavy blanket over him in order to disorient him, hoping that might allow me to get a solid grasp, but the cat... posted on Aug 5 2012 (24,519 reads)

of us want to be happy and stay that way, and research from positive psychology has shown that making a habit of certain day-to-day activities—like expressing gratitude, exercising, or performing acts of kindness—can help us get there. But few researchers have considered how to identify an activity that’s best suited to your particular personality and lifestyle. Sonja Lyubomirsky, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Riverside, started to explore these questions in her 2007 book, The How of Happiness. Now, Lyubomirsky and a graduate student of hers, Kristin Layous, are zeroing in on why some activities may&nb... posted on Aug 13 2012 (25,012 reads)