the last few years, I've become a big proponent of Smile Cards. The premise behind these small cards is simple: do an anonymous act of kindness and leave a card behind, inviting the recipient to pay-it-forward. If he/she does, the chain keeps going, resulting in "ripples" of kindness radiating out. Smile Cards are wonderful in ways I cannot count. Small, simple, humble -- yet powerful, because one act of kindness can be the start of a long chain. But for all these reasons, the main reason why I use them is the subtle change that has begun to occur in the way I think. Recently, I was on a plane reading an intriguing financial book my friend had given me. As o... posted on Sep 11 2011 (23,463 reads)

Arunachalam Muruganantham decided he was going to do something about the fact that women in India can’t afford sanitary napkins, he went the extra mile: He wore his own for a week to figure out the best design.   When Arunachalam Muruganantham hit a wall in his research on creating a sanitary napkin for poor women, he decided to do what most men typically wouldn’t dream of. He wore one himself--for a whole week. Fashioning his own menstruating uterus by filling a bladder with goat’s blood, Muruganantham went about his life while wearing women’s underwear, occasionally squeezing the contraption to test out his latest iteration. It resul... posted on Jan 26 2012 (19,226 reads)

Pablo Picasso, the Spanish artist, was a schoolboy, he was terrible at math because whenever the teacher had him write a number on the chalkboard, he saw something different. The number four looked like a nose to him and he kept doodling until he filled in the rest of the face. The number 1 looked like a tree, 9 looked like a person walking against the wind, and 8 resembled an angel. Everyone else in the classroom saw numbers on the chalkboard; Picasso perceived a variety of different images. The connection between perspective and creative thinking has to do with habituation and over-familiarization. Over-familiarization with something ( an idea, a procedure, a system ) is a tr... posted on Mar 4 2012 (49,539 reads)

Lori Stokes of North Carolina One Thursday night, I went to eat dinner with a friend and I heard a tiny kitten meowing near the side of the house as I opened the door to go in.  My friend had no pets because she did not like cats; she said they gave her “the creeps.”  As I went in the door, I told her “I hear a kitten.”  She said, “No, it’s your imagination.” Being a kitty person, I knew better. I ran outside and found the baby.  He was all soaking wet.  The house had been power washed earlier but no one knew there was a baby kitty over in the bushes or that he h... posted on Mar 12 2012 (20,092 reads)

to life on the screen. For naked-eye skies we started with the still photographs of Akira Fujii, regarded as the world's foremost wide-angle astrophotographer, then "twinkled" their brighter stars by applying pseudorandom algorithms developed at the digital-processing houses Form in Los Angeles and Video Arts in San Francisco and by our special effects artist, Don Davis. (The digital post-processing wizards started with theoretical models, while Don simply made de-focused video images of Sirius, the brightest star in the sky, then reverse-engineered its twinkles to apply them to the stars in the photos.) Telescopic views of brighter objects such as the Moon and the planets w... posted on Apr 2 2012 (7,489 reads)

fixing and serving represent three different ways of seeing life. When you help, you see life as weak. When you fix, you see life as broken. When you serve, you see life as whole. Fixing and helping may be the work of the ego, and service the work of the soul. Service rests on the premise that the nature of life is sacred, that life is a holy mystery which has an unknown purpose. When we serve, we know that we belong to life and to that purpose. From the perspective of service, we are all connected: All suffering is like my suffering and all joy is like my joy. The impulse to serve emerges naturally and inevitably from this way of seeing. Serving is different from helpin... posted on Apr 16 2012 (103,094 reads)

Simplicity has become a “modern classic” because it gives voice to ways of living that are vital for building a workable and meaningful future.  As we awaken to an endangered world, people are asking, “How can we live sustainably on the Earth when our actions are already producing dramatic climate change, species extinction, oil depletion, and more?”  For a generation, a diverse subculture has grappled with these concerns and, in the United States and a dozen or so other “postmodern” nations, this subculture has grown from a miniscule movement in the 1960s to a respected part of the mainstream culture in the early 2000s.  G... posted on May 1 2012 (35,227 reads)

is a list of 15 things which, if you give up on them, will make your life a lot easier and much, much happier. We hold on to so many things that cause us a great deal of pain, stress and suffering – and instead of letting them all go, instead of allowing ourselves to be stress free and happy – we cling on to them. Not anymore. Starting today we will give up on all those things that no longer serve us, and we will embrace change. Ready? Here we go:   1. Give up your need to always be right.There are so many of us who can’t stand the idea of being wrong – wanting to always be right – even at the risk of ending great relationships or causi... posted on May 10 2012 (565,689 reads)

for food — whether it's ferreting rare mushrooms in the woods,picking abundant lemons from an overlooked tree, or gathering berries from an abandoned lot — is all the rage among the culinary crowd and the D.I.Y. set, who share their finds with fellow food lovers in fancy restaurant meals or humble home suppers. But an old-fashioned concept — gleaning for the greater good by harvesting unwanted or leftover produce from farms or family gardens — is also making a comeback during these continued lean economic times. In cities, rural communities, and suburbs across the country, volunteer pickers join forces to collect bags a... posted on May 12 2012 (12,305 reads)

Graduation Speech Gets Standing Ovation: 2012's Baccalaureate speaker at the University of Pennsylvania was an unconventional choice for an Ivy League school. To address their newly-minted graduates, aspiring to dazzling careers, they picked a man who has never in his adult life, applied for a job. A man who hasn't worked for pay in nearly a decade, and whose self-stated mission is simply "to bring smiles to the world and stillness to my heart". This off-the-radar speaker launched his address with a startling piece of advice. Following up with four key insights gleaned from a radical 1000 km walking pilgrimage through the villages of India. As he closed his on... posted on May 14 2012 (398,091 reads)

Just head over to the park. Seattle's new food forest aims to be an edible wilderness. (Photo: Buena Vista Images/Getty Images) Seattle’s vision of an urban food oasis is going forward. A seven-acre plot of land in the city’s Beacon Hill neighborhood will be planted with hundreds of different kinds of edibles: walnut and chestnut trees; blueberry and raspberry bushes; fruit trees, including apples and pears; exotics like pineapple, yuzu citrus, guava, persimmons, honeyberries, and lingonberries; herbs; and more. All will be available for public plucking to anyone who wanders into the city’s first food forest. “This is totally innovativ... posted on Jun 8 2012 (35,423 reads)

a sunny Saturday morning, and my wife and I turn into a residential neighborhood of Santa Rosa, California – the only sign of commerce is a beleaguered shopping mall a few hundred feet away. I glance down at my GPS to make sure this is where we want to be and in doing so I almost pass my destination. There it is tucked away to the left, sandwiched between two homes: Worth our Weight (W.O.W) The whimsical name brings to mind a weight-loss program or some sort of preemptive apologetic reassurance for long lines. This restaurant has neither. The front is clean, simple and inviting, with large colorful posters on the front window explaining the mission of W.O.W. ... posted on Jun 27 2012 (11,994 reads)

has become a public health issue. New research suggests moment-to-moment awareness does a better job of helping people control their weight than any diet. Deborah Hill used to think she was skinny. Her 5 foot 9 inch frame could take on a lot of weight without making her look out of shape. But last year she was shocked to discover that she weighed over 210 pounds, which classified her as medically obese. “It was just crazy,” says Hill. “I’d never had a problem with weight.” Hill is one of a growing number of Americans—over 35 percent, according to the Center for Disease Control—who are considered obese, having a body mass index ... posted on Jul 28 2012 (19,787 reads)

at my repeated requests to have him pull over so that I could take more pictures of these gorgeous works of art. To him, they were as ordinary as a palm tree to a Floridian, or an oak tree to one of us Midwesterners. When I got back home, I started to put my camera away in the drawer where it's safely kept until the next recital or birthday cake moment. But then I thought twice. It struck me that when I travel to new places, I always pull out my camera to capture novel and interesting images. I take time, even in my own amateurish way, to look at objects straight on and from the side, and I'm often surprised by the beauty and uniqueness revealed through the camera's lens. ... posted on Aug 1 2012 (14,481 reads)

Berry may not quite be a household name. But I, for one, mention his name on a regular basis in my house, while traveling around the country, and when talking with neighborhood friends about produce, local happenings, or politics.   Wendell Berry is a farmer, writer, and preservationist from Kentucky. He splits his time between three quiet activities: 1) writing fiction, poetry, and essays, putting pen to paper (quite literally) in a tiny hut on the Kentucky river; 2) working his farm; and 3) engaging in non-violent civil disobedience supporting various humanitarian or agrarian causes. He has spoken out in his 76 years against wars, corporate corruption, nuclear p... posted on Aug 15 2012 (14,622 reads)

Grass   During the second part of our South India trip where we spent three or so days with Ragu and Nisha on their farm near Coimbatore. I've been dreading writing this post because there is so much I want to capture about the experience, and I'm a bit at a loss on how to organize my thoughts and give it all the justice it deserves. The best I can muster is to break my reflections into mini-blogs (blogbites? bloggets? blots?) on particular topics. So here we go: Ragu and Nisha I am so inspired by the path they have taken in their lives. Both were high-flying professionals in Silicon Valley (Ragu a marketing whiz, Nisha a hardcore so... posted on Aug 23 2012 (26,137 reads)

— you are already perfect. Other people are also just as perfect, and don’t need improvement. You just need to appreciate them for who they are. The moment we are living in is not a stepping stone to something better — it is exactly wonderful, and we have already arrived at the perfect moment.   The Contented Life It might be useful to look at what life would be like if you learned to be content: 1.  Self image. We compare ourselves with the images in our head of perfection — movie stars, models in magazines, other people who seem to have it all together — and we can never measure up to those perfect images. But those images a... posted on Sep 8 2012 (37,419 reads)

all began with gratitude. …And maybe some sneakers and paint. He goes by the name Peace Artist, and he spent the past year running 6,000 miles from Seattle to San Diego to Savannah, Georgia. He ran until given shelter, fasted until given food. He carried no money, only art supplies, to create and gift original works of art along the way. He never asked for anything, yet he received so much in return. In the entire year of his journey, Peace never missed a single meal. Sometimes, that meal came in the form of raspberries or dandelion greens growing by the side of the road, or apples from a tree. But more often, he was approached by strangers, curious and intrigued b... posted on Oct 12 2012 (38,487 reads)

a sweet twist to this lemonade stand story that will quench your thirst to take a stand to help elevate your community and humanity. Take a sip and read on….         Sometimes the best life lessons can be learned from kids.  Kids like Miss Vivienne Harr of Fairfax, Calif. Vivie, as she likes to be called, is a personality-full-cup-runneth-over, 8-year-old philanthropy phenom who set up a lemonade stand – or what I like to call Lemonade Stand 2.0. Vivie was inspired to take a stand against slavery after seeing an installation on slavery by Lisa Kristine, a photographer who captured these authentic, haunti... posted on Oct 21 2012 (18,833 reads)

photographer Sam Beam and his buddy Josh Brinkin were out four wheeling and testing an iPhone helmet cam mount in a remote area outside of Albuquerque, New Mexico when they spotted some ravens and vultures near a known watering hole. They rode in for a closer look and were jolted by the sight of a bull calf, barely alive, still next to the body of a cow assumed to be his mother.  She had been deceased for days and he had evidently been left to wither in the ultimate act of cruelty. But it appears the universe had other plans for this little one, big plans… “This little guy had his mouth, eyes and e... posted on Nov 6 2012 (17,707 reads)