Every Sunrise a Painting: Brain-tumor survivor's daily ritual, by Laura T. Coffey
seek out Debbie Wagner’s artwork to mark key milestones, memorialize loved ones No two sunrises are ever the same. Each day’s spectacle in the sky is altered by particles in the atmosphere, the tilt of the Earth, the lengths of different waves of light. Debbie Wagner knows this better than almost anyone else. With earnest devotion, she has risen in the darkness more than 2,200 times so she could observe and paint the sunrise. She’s rarely missed a morning since December 2005; for Wagner, the daily ritual is sustaining. “As a brain-tumor survivor, I lost so many of the loves I had, like reading and writing and mathematics,” said Wagn... posted on Feb 6 2012 (17,638 reads)

The Sweet Spot between Doing and Being, by Viral Mehta
is a simple yet profound metaphor that a childhood mentor of my mom's shared with her decades ago: "When one foot walks, the other rests." It's the way all of nature works, a beautiful reminder that everything is in ebb and flow, engaged in cycles and rhythms. Our own bodies follow natural patterns, recuperating every night and preparing for the next day's activity. With music as well, the structure imposed by notes inherently depends on the unstructured space supporting it. The notes and the space between them come together to create music. As a culture, though, we give more importance to creating notes and relatively little to the space between them. Bet... posted on Feb 28 2012 (30,175 reads)

Profit vs. Principle: The Neurobiology of Integrity, by Brandon Keim
your better self rest assured: Dearly held values truly are sacred, and not merely cost-benefit analyses masquerading as nobel intent, concludes a new study on the neurobiology of moral decision-making. Such values are conceived differently, and occur in very different parts of the brain, than utilitarian decisions. “Why do people do what they do?” said neuroscientist Greg Berns of Emory University. “Asked if they’d kill an innocent human being, most people would say no, but there can be two very different ways of coming to that answer. You could say it would hurt their family, that it would be bad because of the consequences. Or you could take the Ten Comm... posted on Feb 29 2012 (19,138 reads)

How to Support Teens in Listening, by Ricky Knue
are quick to connect with each other by telling stories and passing along gossip via texting and social media.  But students have lost the art of listening face to face by hiding behind the veil of anonymity. They talk at each other (of course, we adults do this too). As a public high school teacher, I clearly see a need for teens to learn to listen intently.    In fact, few of us in modern society know how to listen.  Henning Mankell’s recent piece on DailyGood only reiterated today’s penchant for incessant white noise chatter.  In the African parable retold by Mankell, our two ears and one mouth are a reminder that we are designed to l... posted on Feb 25 2012 (19,105 reads)

3 Little Monks and a Moment of Truth, by Pavithra Mehta
is Ankur I was introduced to him about seven minutes before the start of a meditation gathering in a modest Mumbai home. "This is Ankur," our host Sachi had said, with the catching enthusiasm she’s known and loved for, "He's an amazing photographer and has recently gone totally ‘gift economy’." For the uninitiated, in this context the term gift economy means a system in which people do not charge for their services, but rather offer them up in the unconditional spirit of a gift, inviting recipients to “pay-forward” what they wish from their heart. It represents a broader shift, a movement if you will, from; transaction to trus... posted on Mar 13 2012 (40,223 reads)

The Recovery of the Sacred, by Rachel Naomi Remen, MD
Naomi Remen, MD, is co-founder and medical director of the Commonweal Cancer Help Program and founder and director of the Institute for the Study of Health and Illness (ISHI) at Commonweal. ISHI is a training institute for health professionals who wish to serve people with life threatening illness and take a more relationship-centered approach to the practice and teaching of medicine. The institute's approach is based upon experience with over 600 people with cancer who have participated in Commonweal's programs and on Dr. Remen's 20-year experience counselling people with cancer and those who love them. In addition to being a physician for 30 years, Dr Remen h... posted on Mar 23 2012 (51,827 reads)

Five Poverty-fighting Women to Watch, by Kyla Springer
five women are fighting poverty in a serious way, but they’re not handing out aid. We hope to see them scale up their models this year and make an even bigger impact. Leila Janah - Leila knows that what poor people really want is a job—steady income that pays for food, school and medicine. But American companies that "outsource" work to poorer countries aren't exactly popular right now. To Leila, the concept of “microwork” isn’t exactly outsourcing, either. She founded Samasource, a social enterprise that takes simple, computer-based tasks from companies like Intuit, Google and LinkedIn and turns them into jobs for poor peopl... posted on Mar 28 2012 (17,159 reads)

Life as a Conscious Practice, by Leo Babauta
is Practice." ~Pele When we learn a martial art, or ballet, or gymnastics, or soccer … we consciously practice movements in a deliberate way, repeatedly. By conscious, repeated practice, we become good at those movements. Our entire lives are like this, but we’re often less conscious of the practice. Each day, we repeat movements, thought patterns, ways of interacting with others … and in this repeated practice, we are becoming (or have already become) good at these things. If you constantly check Facebook or Twitter, that is practice, and you are forming that habit, though it’s usually not with too much awareness. When you s... posted on Apr 3 2012 (32,624 reads)

Why Leaders Must Feel Pain, by Peter Bregman
was on a plane, flying back to New York from California where I'd spent the week in an intense workshop, The Radically Alive Leader, led by Ann Bradney. In the aisle across from me, a mother was sitting with her two daughters, one about five years old, the other about seven. I happened to look over as the mom was working with the younger daughter on a math problem. I listened for a moment and soon found it hard to breathe. She was furious at the girl for not knowing the answers to her math problems: "Why don't you know that? What are you learning in school? All you do is watch TV!" The little girl began to cry. When she did, her mom's fury escalate... posted on May 7 2012 (26,025 reads)

Gleaning for the Greater Good, by Sarah Henry
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 (12,271 reads)

Rediscovering the Lost Art of Blessing, by Karen Horneffer Ginter
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 (23,146 reads)

What Death Can Teach Us About Life, by Duane Elgin
is an important ally for appreciating life. I am not referring to a morbid preoccupation with death. Rather, I mean the felt awareness of our finitude as physical beings -- an honest recognition of the short time we have to love and to learn on this earth. The knowledge that our bodies will inevitably die burns through our attachments to the dignified madness of our socially constructed existence. Death is a friend that helps us to release our clinging to social position and material possessions as a source of ultimate security and identity. An awareness of death forces us to confront the purpose and meaning of our existence, here and now. Those who have had near-deat... posted on Jun 7 2012 (37,601 reads)

The Relationship Between Gifts & Community, by Charles Eisenstein
I go and ask people what is missing from their lives, the most common answer (if they are not impoverished or seriously ill) is "community." What happened to community, and why don't we have it any more? There are many reasons – the layout of suburbia, the disappearance of public space, the automobile and the television, the high mobility of people and jobs – and, if you trace the "why's" a few levels down, they all implicate the money system. More directly posed: community is nearly impossible in a highly monetized society like our own. That is because community is woven from gifts, which is ultimatel... posted on Jun 13 2012 (27,422 reads)

How To Speak More Wisely, by Peter Bregman
had been three weeks since my throat started to feel sore, and it wasn’t getting better. The pain was most acute when I spoke. So I decided to spend a few days speaking as little as possible. Every time I had the urge to say something, I paused for a moment to question whether it was worth irritating my throat. This made me acutely aware of when and how I use my voice. Which led me to a surprising discovery: I spend considerable energy working against my own best interests. And if my experience listening to others is any indication, so do you. In my observations, we speak for three main reasons:     1. To help ourselves     2. To help others ... posted on Jun 16 2012 (52,650 reads)

Three Qualifications for the New Politician, by James O'dea
are plenty of politicians who genuinely desire to serve their communities and nations with humility and integrity, dedicating their lives to the cultivation of a wisdom that will benefit society at large; sadly, they are a minority.   Mostly, the perception of those who crowd public office is that they are divisive, immature, and generally egotistical and opinionated. On the less destructive side of the scale, our politicians tend to be caught in corrosive partisan games and dedicated to exaggerating the failings of others: caught in a web of narrowly designed agendas they are seen to be graphically ineffective in responding to the complex needs of evolving societies. T... posted on Jun 23 2012 (15,038 reads)

What A Plant Knows, by Maria Popova
I was planting my seasonal crop of tomatoes last month, a good friend (and my personal gardening guru) informed me that they liked their leaves rubbed, “like petting a pet’s ears,” which I received with equal parts astonishment, amusement, and mild concern for my friend. But, as Tel Aviv University biologist Daniel Chamovitz reveals in What a Plant Knows: A Field Guide to the Senses (public library), that might not be such a crazy idea after all. Plants, it turns out, possess a sensory vocabulary far wider than our perception of them as static, near-inanimate objects might suggest: They can smell their own fruits’ ripeness, distinguish b... posted on Jun 30 2012 (15,111 reads)

What I've Learned About Learning, by Leo Babauta
learn more by looking for the answer to a question and not finding it than we do from learning the answer itself.’ ~Lloyd Alexander I am a teacher and an avid learner, and I’m passionate about both. I’m a teacher because I help Eva homeschool our kids — OK, she does most of the work, but I do help, mostly with math but with everything else too. I also teach habits, writing/blogging, simplicity and other fun topics in online courses. I’m a lifelong learner and am always obsessively studying something, whether that’s breadmaking or language or wine or chess or writing or fitness. Here’s ar... posted on Jul 1 2012 (22,038 reads)

Hugs Around the World: A Sister's Legacy of Love, by Gretchen
living through an experimental cancer treatment my sister Barb was left unable to work. When she was offered the opportunity to do a mission trip in India if she could come up with $3,000 - she was left thinking there was no way she could go. No way to raise the funds. She asked me to brainstorm with her as to ways she could raise money. "The only thing I can do is hug," she told me - and thus her adventure began.   I designed a "Hugs Around the World" card for her which she used to solicit donations. For any amount donated, she promised to hug a person in India. On the back of the cards the donor could write their name, below which it said “..... posted on Jul 18 2012 (16,341 reads)

A Bicycle Nomad Prepares for Re-entry, by Manjula Martin
was gone for almost a year, all told. I was on a bike, in a tent, most of that year. Before leaving, I had tucked into the deepest corner of my back pannier my house keys, small jangling embodiments of a fact that served as both security blanket and threat throughout my 3,500 mile bike ride: eventually, I would go back home. When you’re in constant movement, stationary life becomes an image from memory. You can be so strung out on the curve of the road it doesn’t hit you quite right to be in a room. A room with a door is even weirder. When you walk into the room called your room, the air has a hazy shadowiness to it. It f... posted on Jul 26 2012 (13,234 reads)

Better Eating through Mindfulness, by Jill Suttie
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 (19,718 reads)