by Frank McKenna We long to find more joy in our daily pursuits even though life has taught us it’s not so easy. New discoveries in neuroscience offer insight into how we can develop a brighter state of heart and mind. The First Step on the path to finding happiness is to open the mind to alternative ways of thinking about life. While much of our focus in the West has been toward comfort and the acquisition of worldly goods, in Eastern countries your status as a human being traditionally comes first. So instead of being greeted by “What are you up to these days?” or “How’s it going with your to-do list?” you may be asked in Muslim cou... posted on Aug 29 2017 (20,356 reads)

a piece with no color,” Joyce said. “Most of us who knew her thought it as a letting go of her life. I think she related to colors in the way all of us do. But who knows? We could not ask.”  This question is interwoven throughout Joyce’s book, repeated again and again in distinct yet familiar forms. Who was Judith Scott? Without words, can we ever know? How can a person who faced unknowable pain alone and in silence, respond only, unimaginably, with generosity, creativity and love? “Judy is a secret and who I am is a secret, even to myself,” Joyce writes.  Scott’s sculptures, themselves, are secrets, impenetrable heaps w... posted on Sep 21 2017 (12,004 reads)

fees for my children’s education, subconsciously, I am telling myself that I am done — the school now has to do its job. I had to catch and correct my own transactional thinking every time community events required my participation. What truly inspired me though was the metric this school used in its annual fund-raisers. The school uses tuition fees to pay the salaries of the teachers. However, that isn’t enough for the functioning of the school — it relies on the generosity of the families who send their children here to raise its operating budget. People of greatly different backgrounds attend this school, and it is quite easy to pay much more attention to th... posted on Oct 17 2017 (14,937 reads)

for us. It’s a huge subject and so complex. The Prime Minister of Australia once turned to the Aborigines in Parliament and said to them "I'm sorry what we have done in Australia to your people." I just so badly would like to see Netanyahu do the same to the Palestinians. I guess I'll wait a while before he can deliver that speech. Shiv: How we can support you and your work? Yoav: I have to thank you as this has been a wonderful opportunity, and I appreciate your generosity.  I always tell people to do a Sulha in your town. Anyone can locate five Muslims or Palestinians, the Jews are always available, and the Christians are interested as well. Put togethe... posted on Sep 18 2017 (8,421 reads)

door, yet Bob welcomed us like old friends. He spent more than an hour detailing his philosophy and how he came to live out of this aging steel box for the better part of a decade. In short, he believes that sending out positive thoughts and actions literally changes the world around us. One need not look far for proof that this world can use all the positivity it can get. Through his talks to various groups, and students in particular, he stresses the tremendous impact that empathy and generosity can have on both the giver and receiver. While a million deeds takes a lifetime to finish, they include spiritual as well as physical acts. Just as important as holding a door or offering a... posted on Sep 29 2017 (14,116 reads)

the resources that you mentioned to all the people on this call. Before I close with a minute of gratitude, I wanted to say that it felt like speaking with you I wasn't just speaking with you. I felt like the spirit of all the people that you helped transition, all the care workers that you worked with, your wife who prompted you to write the book and get these messages out in the world was with us. Thank you for bringing them all into this conversation and enriching our lives through your generosity Frank.  Frank:  They're my true teachers. ... posted on Jan 26 2018 (31,986 reads)

cloth bag he always carried when we took a walk. It might sound self-centered, but during one of our summer wrap-ups, I asked him, “Hey, can I have one of those bags?”      “Sure," he said, "You can have this one," an old bag made of denim.      And I still have it, all beaten up. His father was a clothier and so he knew about the value of clothes. But a lot of what he had was given to him. Basically, he lived on people’s generosity. I might see him wearing a pair of bright blue Alaskan canner pants and a Chinese-looking hat with tassel cords. He favored things that were rough-cut and spoke of life-immersion. RW: &n... posted on Nov 17 2017 (14,476 reads)

sure more than even I’m aware of. I was not a religious person. I don’t think I’ve ever been, actually. I was born and grew up in New Orleans and was living a very fast life at the age of eleven, twelve and thirteen. I mean it was so intense I felt that it was almost over with at that point. But I was being taught by Christian Brothers and I noticed how generous and joyful they were and I got inspired, like many young adolescents, by the adults in my life. There was a generosity and kind of an otherworldliness that was almost childlike, which was very attractive to me. So I wanted to be like them. And they said, well, we’re looking for vocations, and you can ... posted on Oct 25 2017 (11,613 reads)

what are a few of the things that those people all seem to share? Dan: One of them would be curiosity.  They follow their noses, they remain interested in stuff, even if they know a lot of stuff—especially if they know a lot of stuff.  One of the consequences of knowing a lot of stuff is you realize how little you know, and so, there’s a lot more to be curious about. The second thing is that, not uniformly, but in many, many cases, there’s an element of generosity to these folks that might surprise you. They’re willing to help other people out, they’re not people who pull up the ladder once they get on the top. And the third thing is t... posted on Dec 19 2017 (10,924 reads)

without judgment because if you have any tone of voice or nonverbals that indicate judgment, you’re going to crash and burn. If you can validate others just by seeking to understand the human being in front of you, you’re building that affiliation and demonstrating that value. Knowledge@Wharton: The final one, which seems very simple, is to be generous. Dreeke: There are lots of ways to be generous, and the key is to understand how the other person wishes you to demonstrate generosity. [Many] people just want your time, so be generous with your time. Everyone has different resources. Understand what your resources are and be generous with those resources for other people... posted on Feb 5 2018 (12,723 reads)

and routinely with young people. That is what I was trying to do with my kids. One thing I learned with teaching and learning about the Secret Kindness Agents, and doing that with my students, is the story of the two wolves. Do you know that story? It is a Cherokee legend. I found it on the First Nations website. A grandfather is speaking with his grandson. He tells his grandson, “I have these two wolves always fighting within me. There is a good wolf, full of kindness, and generosity, and gratitude, and compassion, and then a bad wolf, full of anger, and jealousy, and resentment, and they are always fighting each other.” The grandson asks him, “Well grandfat... posted on May 6 2018 (9,226 reads)

no matter what is going on. My work as a leader, my work as an activist, my work as a mother, a community member is to create the conditions so that people remember what it's like to be a good team member. Remember what it is like to work in community. And for me, the most important obligation of those who take on this beautiful title of Warrior for the Human Spirit is that we have to be the ones, through our own practice and training, who actually embody the best of human qualities: generosity, kindness, intelligence, sanity, and that we have to be a clear and present embodiment of the best of human nature. TS: Now you mentioned, Meg, that you've studied this pattern ... posted on Mar 29 2018 (27,873 reads)

tend to exist at the expense of each other. If one is strong in feeling, one is likely to be inferior in thinking -- and vice versa. Our superior function has given us science and the higher standard of living -- but at the cost of impoverishing the feeling function. This is vividly demonstrated by our meager vocabulary of feeling words. If we had the expanded and exact vocabulary for feeling that we have for science and technology, we would be well on our way to warmth of relatedness and generosity of feeling. ... posted on Feb 4 2018 (27,309 reads)

there a secret to happiness? Is happiness spending time with loved ones, or spending time alone in nature? Is it losing yourself as you dance to music, or finding yourself while quietly meditating? The secret to happiness is actually all of these things and more, and it varies from country to country and culture to culture. According to the annual World Happiness Report, Norway is the happiest country, scoring highly in its approach to caring, freedom, generosity, honesty, health, income and good governance. Meanwhile, the Happy Planet Index ranks Costa Rica as the happiest country on Earth. While opposites when it comes to climate, the two ... posted on Feb 21 2018 (21,334 reads)

no matter what is going on. My work as a leader, my work as an activist, my work as a mother, a community member is to create the conditions so that people remember what it's like to be a good team member. Remember what it is like to work in community. And for me, the most important obligation of those who take on this beautiful title of Warrior for the Human Spirit is that we have to be the ones, through our own practice and training, who actually embody the best of human qualities: generosity, kindness, intelligence, sanity, and that we have to be a clear and present embodiment of the best of human nature. TS: Now you mentioned, Meg, that you've studied this pattern ... posted on May 17 2018 (16,440 reads)

welcome them! There's a submission portal on our website where people can spontaneously submit stills and video. When we publish them on social media, we always credit the photographers/authors. The whole model is to disseminate. If we held it close, it wouldn't benefit anyone. So we disseminate as much as possible, and if a piece is particularly meaningful or impactful, we will spend money to promote it. Preeta: Dr. Fryburg, so many times when people talk about acts of kindness and generosity, it comes across to people who are left-brain dominant, like scientists, as quaint, cute, or sweet. I wonder how receptive scientists, academics, and physicians are to how you're expend... posted on Feb 27 2018 (15,109 reads)

love, life, nature, and all the unseen, unknown, and dreamed in between. Hale lives on planet Earth with her rescue dog, Banana. From the slumbering snail to the purposeful gentleness of the honeybees at work to the dance of the leaves in the whispering breeze, Hale beckons eye, heart, and mind to drink in the glorious aliveness of the world with a generous curiosity, evocative of Simone Weil’s assertion that “attention is the rarest and purest kind of generosity.” What emerges is a mirthful modern-day counterpart to Thoreau’s celebration of nature as a form of prayer. Playful levity and vibrancy carry the deeper soulfulness of... posted on Jun 16 2018 (7,166 reads)

even merely witnessing them, also increases levels of oxytocin, a hormone with health benefits as diverse as lowering blood pressure, promoting good sleep, and reducing cravings for drugs such as cocaine and alcohol. That oxytocin should have so many health benefits is not so surprising when we recall its central role in stimulating uterine contractions during birth, the letdown of milk during lactation, the pleasure associated with orgasm and pair bonding. Acts of generosity and compassion also appear to be good for mood. A2010 study showed that while people with money tend to be somewhat happier than those without it, people who spend money on others repo... posted on Jul 19 2018 (20,679 reads)

in a 21-Day Kindness Challenge. During a 21 day period 5000 people from all over the world performed an act of kindness every day, totalling almost 11,000 transformative actions! The first day of the challenge I decided to buy a cake and gift it to someone random on the street. I wanted it to be anonymous so I needed to enlist a partner in kindness. The first person I met was José Juan! He gave away the cake and since then we have been connected in many adventures of service and generosity, including community experiments like Awakin Circles (which we started in his home after our chance meeting) or experiential retreats like Reloveution. José Juan is a permanent sourc... posted on Sep 2 2018 (15,427 reads)

change so quickly it’s stunning.” Gratefulness can drive social action. Gratefulness not only changes your life, but also extends beyond your intimate sphere. It gives rise to compassion, kindness, forgiveness, and empathy, and thus informs how we treat others and how we act in the larger world. Gratefulness makes us better citizens, according to Kristi—more concerned about the well-being of others and the planet. “We open the door to that generosity of our heart, and find we’re able to impact the world in a much different way,” she reflects. “For me, because I’m an environmentalist, when I feel grateful for the&... posted on Oct 17 2018 (22,932 reads)