Frasz is a food entrepreneur. She wants to recycle food, taking the food that’s not consumed and putting it into the hands of those who cannot afford it. She wants companies to stop wasting so much food – at the grocery story and in restaurants. She wants us all to be aware of how much we’re throwing in the dustbin. Too idealistic? Frasz would argue otherwise. Hear her talk about her passion –FoodShift. How much waste is there currently in the US and how accurate are these figures? 40% of all the food produced in the US is wasted. This figure is from national experts on food waste – author, Jonathan Bloom wrote “American Wasteland: H... posted on Dec 3 2014 (18,957 reads)

humans are born selfish? Think again. Dacher Keltner reveals the compassionate side to human nature. Humans are selfish. It’s so easy to say. The same goes for so many assertions that follow. Greed is good. Altruism is an illusion. Cooperation is for suckers. Competition is natural, war inevitable. The bad in human nature is stronger than the good. These kinds of claims reflect age-old assumptions about emotion. For millennia, we have regarded the emotions as the fount of irrationality, baseness, and sin. The idea of the seven deadly sins takes our destructive passions for granted. Plato compared the human soul to a chariot: the intellect is the driver and the ... posted on Nov 5 2014 (22,666 reads)

is a tool that helps us read and respond to upsetting social situations. But how can you stop it from getting out of hand? Anger is in itself neither good nor bad—it’s what you do with it that matters. Anger is best viewed as a tool that helps us read and respond to upsetting social situations. Research overwhelmingly indicates that feeling angry increases optimism, creativity, effective performance—and research suggests that expressing anger can lead to more successful negotiations, in life or on the job. In fact, repressing anger can actually hurt you. Dr. Ernest Harburg and his team at the University of Michigan School of Public Health spent se... posted on Nov 23 2014 (28,739 reads)

not hard to bring a little more equality into each others' lives. Kerry Morrison interviews homeless veteran John Watkins in the Hollywood Hills. Hollywood was one of the first communities to join the 100,000 Homes Campaign. Watkins has been provided with housing. Photo by Rudy Salinas at Path. 1. 100,000 homes so far Teams of volunteers across the country hit the streets early in the morning to put a name and a face to the long-term homeless in their communities. The volunteers started canvassing at 4 a.m., combing the streets to gather names, photographs, and stories of the people sleeping there. They searched for the people at the highest risk of dyin... posted on Nov 20 2014 (19,406 reads)

knew that one day maps would become obsolete, unwanted, unloved, languishing under piles of telephone books, VCRs and reams of writing paper? To unfold a map is to unfold adventure. Listen carefully as you smooth out those well-worn creases and you will hear the snapping of sails over a perfect blue ocean. Close your eyes and you will feel the steady, increasing rhythm of a train leaving the station. Your map is your ticket. To sit before an unfolded map, tracing out uneven lines of untouched road, is to feel small and humble. This world is large, barely knowable, our time here already running out. I have loved maps since I was a little girl and my days were fil... posted on Nov 11 2014 (23,530 reads)

millions of people around the world any kind of travel remains an impossible dream. And not just travel for fun or relaxation, but the few kilometres from a village to a school or health clinic. For many the inability to travel is a matter of survival. A vast number of people across Africa live in isolated villages, hours from the nearest small town. Without transport, or any way to travel, they are cut off. Without any way to travel to them not only is it impossible to reach them in an emergency, but it is also impossible to make sure they receive the basic, preventive health care that will keep them will. Babies go unvaccinated, women do not sleep under bed nets, and mothers give ... posted on Nov 19 2014 (10,598 reads)

weeks ago, a few of us visited an elderly Gandhian couple in Baroda -- Arun Dada and Mira Ba. Now in their 80s, their entire life has been rooted in generosity. As students of Vinoba, they have never put a price tag on their labor. Their presence speaks to a life-long practice of equanimity, trust and compassion. And so do their stories. "Nine years ago, we were gifted this house," Arun Dada told us. The week they moved in, they discovered that their neighbor was a drunkard, prone to fits of violence. Just a couple days after their move, they noticed that their front-yard was filled with food items and alcohol. It turned out that the neighbor also ran a catering bus... posted on Nov 27 2014 (36,237 reads)

is a kindness that dwells deep down in things; it presides everywhere, often in the places we least expect. The world can be harsh and negative, but if we remain generous and patient, kindness inevitably reveals itself. Something deep in the human soul seems to depend on the presence of kindness; something instinctive in us expects it, and once we sense it we are able to trust and open ourselves. Here in Conamara, the mountains are terse and dark; left to themselves they would make for a brooding atmosphere. However, everywhere around and in between there are lakes. The surface of these lakes takes on the variations of the surrounding light to create subtle diffusions of color. Thus th... posted on Nov 28 2014 (47,929 reads)

... posted on Dec 5 2014 (137,516 reads)

in those wondrous moments we realize there is more to life than we can possibly imagine. It is a whisper of feeling, almost intangible. Yet it is powerful. Suddenly you are in a different space. You feel almost weightless. The air is still, your breathing is slow, but what you are experiencing is clean and clear. You have been touched by a moment of pure grace One recent summer evening I was eating dinner with my sisters and mother. Music was playing—the aria “Song to the Moon” from Antonín Dvorak's Rusalka. I suddenly became aware of the incredible sweetness of the singer’s voice. My sister, Annalisa, who trained in opera, told us the se... posted on Dec 28 2014 (29,560 reads)

Seinfeld is one of the most successful comedians of all-time. He is regarded as one of the “Top 100 Comedians of All–Time” by Comedy Central. He was also the co–creator and co–writer of Seinfeld, the long–running sitcom which has received numerous awards and was claimed to have the “Top TV Episode of All–Time” as rated by TV Guide. According to Forbes magazine, Seinfeld reached his peak in earnings when he made $267 million dollars in 1998. (Yes, that was in one year. No, that’s not a typo.) A full 10 years later, in 2008, Seinfeld was still pulling in a cool $85 million per year. By almost any measure of wealth, popu... posted on Dec 31 2014 (74,931 reads)

how the happiness levels of students in our online course vary depending on where they live. To what extent is happiness related to where you live? Which countries have the most—and least—happy residents? Are residents of wealthier countries happier? These are some of the questions we considered when analyzing data from the survey we presented to the 112,000 students who registered for our online course, “The Science of Happiness.” So far, more than 40,000 students, hailing from over 200 countries and areas of sovereignty around the world, have taken the survey. Previously, we reported on how students’ happiness levels relate to factors like age an... posted on Jan 9 2015 (35,346 reads)

do you do when you have too many ideas and not enough time? Or similarly, what about when you have too many tasks and not enough energy? As an entrepreneur, I feel like I’ve been battling this issue for awhile. There is always another opportunity to chase or a new product idea that sounds exciting. For a long time, I felt guilty about ignoring good ideas that came my way and so I kept adding more to my to-do list. However, during a recent conversation with Travis Dommert, I learned about a new strategy for dealing with the issue of having too many ideas and projects. It all comes down to treating your life like a rose bush. Let me explain what Travis taught me… ... posted on Dec 11 2014 (29,304 reads)

Children, I know that this world must often seem confusing to you. It's noisy, dirty and filled with adults scurrying about their busy lives without noticing you all that much sometimes. It's filled with rules and people telling you what to do, mostly without asking what you want to do. It's also a world where adults teach you about all of the dangers around you, but not as much about the wonderful, beautiful things. You see, things weren't quite like this when we were kids. We had our rules and dangers, to be sure, but nothing like the ones you face today. Back then (which is not really that long ago), people talked to each other more, neighbors knew one... posted on Dec 14 2014 (24,008 reads)

all experienced that moment when something shifts. Often times it’s triggered by the smallest of things. A smile that disarms. A friendly greeting. A grateful pause before a meal. An unexpected compliment, surprise gift, thank-you card, or phone call from an out-of-touch friend.  These micro-moments of lived intention-- small exchanges of kindness, tiny catalysts of gratitude, or brief seconds of mindful attention-- hold incredible potential to transform the trajectory of a day, week, year, or even a life. We notice this a lot around New Years. Whether it’s weight loss, giving up smoking, deepening mindfulness, or any other personal goal, each January 1s... posted on Dec 19 2014 (27,143 reads)

new studies point toward three benefits to cultivating moment-to-moment awareness in the workplace. Research says mindfulness works for individuals. But does it work in the bottom-line-driven workplace, or is it just a frivolous feel-good program? This is the question tackled in a growing number of studies. Here are three ways, based on four recent studies, that cultivating moment-to-moment awareness might improve workplaces. Meditation might build self-confidence in leaders Our Mindful Mondays series provides ongoing coverage of the exploding field of mindfulness research. A.D. Amar and colleagues at the University of Westminster measured the self-perception of leadershi... posted on Jan 16 2015 (28,396 reads)

a homeless man offered a college student in England all the money he had so she'd be able to get home safely, the woman is paying it forward -- in a massive way. Throughout the past few days, Dominique Harrison-Bentzen has raised almost $50,000 for the good Samaritan and for other homeless individuals in her community.  The story begins in early December. It was about 3 a.m. and Harrison-Bentzen was panicking. “I came out after a student night out … [and] realized I didn’t have any battery on my phone, I’d lost my friends,” the 22-year-old told BBC Radio 5. She’d also lost her bank card, she discovered, and she had no money. “How ... posted on Dec 24 2014 (23,215 reads)

simplicity has a long history, we are now entering radically changing times—ecological, social, economic, and psycho-spiritual—and we should expect the worldly expressions of simplicity to evolve and grow in response. For more than thirty years I’ve explored the “simple life” and I’ve found that simplicity is not simple. I’ve encountered such a diversity of expressions of the simple life that I find the most accurate way of describing this approach to living is with the metaphor of a garden. A Garden of Simplicity To portray the richness of simplicity, here are ten different flowerings of expression that I see growing in the “gar... posted on Jan 5 2015 (72,096 reads)

all these abusers and batterers and child molesters up and put them behind bars." He thought this was hilarious. He pats my knee. He’s, "Okay, okay, you just meditate."  Immediately after leaving him, within the next few weeks went and sat a ten-day Vipassana Course, the Goenkaji Style Vippasana Course, and it was the hardest and best thing I had ever done in my life.  That body-based experience of feeling in my body where my anger resides, healing when images and memories of the terrible things that had been done to me came to my mind. That Vipassana scanning, that body scanning, was incredibly powerful for me to really be able to dissect where in m... posted on Jan 27 2015 (44,779 reads)

child psychiatrist and trauma specialist uses brain science to transform public education in high-poverty schools cross America. Watch a video about Dr. Pamela Cantor A few weeks after September 11, 2001, Pamela Cantor, then 53, received a call from the New York City Board of Education asking her to lead a team to assess the emotional impact of the attacks on the city’s public school children. As a child psychiatrist specializing in trauma for nearly two decades, she welcomed the opportunity. However, what she discovered from her team’s assessment surprised her. “From lower Manhattan to the Bronx, most of the children I met were traumatized less ... posted on Feb 4 2015 (38,422 reads)