How to Build Trust and Lead Effectively, by Knowledge@Wharton
expert Robin Dreeke and co-author Cameron Stauth talk about their book on building trust. Building good teams starts with having strong relationships based on a foundation of trust. But how does one develop that trust at work or in life? Counterintelligence expert Robin Dreeke, who spent decades as a senior FBI agent, knows how to make strangers trust him enough to be recruited as spies. And it’s not about deception or being a ‘yes’ man. In the book, The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert’s Five Rules to Lead and Succeed, Dreeke and co-author Cameron Stauth share simple steps to generating trust from all sorts of people. T... posted on Feb 5 2018 (12,627 reads)

Jean Vanier: The Wisdom of Tenderness, by Unknown Yet
following is the audio and transcript of an onbeing.org interview between Krista Tippett and Jean Vanier. May 28, 2015 KRISTA TIPPETT, HOST: It took me a while to put a name to the rare quality that is palpable in Jean Vanier’s life and presence. It’s a wisdom of tenderness. He’s a philosopher and a Catholic social innovator and simply one of the great elders in our world today. The L’Arche movement, which he founded, centered around people with mental disabilities, is celebrating its fiftieth anniversary this month. And, Jean Vanier has just won the Templeton Prize. He has devoted his life to the practical application of Christianity’s most... posted on Feb 23 2018 (12,599 reads)

Margaret Wheatley: Warriors for the Human Spirit, by Tami Simon
Wheatley is a writer and management consultant who draws upon systems analysis, chaos theory, and other diverse fields of study to inform her work. She is the author of Leadership and the New Science and Who Do We Choose to Be?, among others. In this episode of Insights at the Edge, Tami Simon talks with Margaret about the cycles of life and history, especially as they apply to the chaotic contemporary world. Margaret emphasizes that we need to see our present moment with clear eyes, even if doing so might court despair. Tami and Margaret speak on the need to create "islands of sanity" within our communities and what it means to become a warrior for the... posted on Mar 29 2018 (27,692 reads)

Warriors for the Human Spirit, by Tami Simon
Simon: This program is brought to you by SoundsTrue.com. At SoundTrue.com you can find hundreds of downloadable audio learning programs, plus books, music, videos and online courses and events. At SoundsTrue.com, we think of ourselves as a trusted partner on the spiritual journey, offering diverse, in-depth, and life-changing wisdom. SoundsTrue.com: many voices, one journey. You're listening to Insights at the Edge. Today my guest is Margaret Wheatley. Meg is an American writer and management consultant who studies organizational behavior, her approach includes systems thinking, theories of change, chaos theory, leadership and the learning organization—partic... posted on May 17 2018 (16,320 reads)

How to Help Teens Find Purpose, by Patrick Cook-Deegan
I was 14 years old, I boarded a plane for a weeklong backpacking trip in the Rocky Mountains. I had already been to the Rockies a few times with my parents, but this time I was headed out to a “primitive skills week,” run by the Aspen Center for Environmental Studies. For a week, we were to live as close to the land as possible. We crafted our own bowls and knives, made fires with bow drills, caught fish with our own hands, and stalked elk for hours. I remember coming over a mountain pass and looking down at what looked like hundreds of ants moving around in a beautiful open meadow. As we started coming down the hill I realized they were elk—hundreds of elk sca... posted on Feb 16 2018 (268,381 reads)

Toward a New Conception of God, by Jacob Needleman
the present highly publicized debates about the nature and the existence of God, both sides tend to treat God as a purely external entity said to be accessible only by faith—faith, in this case, defined merely as belief unsupported by evidence or logic. Entirely missing from these debates is the idea of God as a conscious force within the human psyche which is accessible through deep self-examination. A study of the psychological disciplines at the heart of all the great spiritual traditions of the world shows us, however, that the process of precisely guided self-examination brings about a knowledge that is as rigorous and as supported by evidence as anything science has to offer. ... posted on Aug 2 2018 (13,910 reads)

Bring Your Whole Self to Work, by Mike Robbins
Your Whole Self to Work: How Vulnerability Unlocks Creativity, Connection, and Performance (Hay House Inc., 2018, 224 pages). Portions of this essay are excerpted from the book with permission from the publisher. Have you ever wanted to speak up about an issue or situation at work, but were afraid to? Or wanted to share something about yourself, but worried people might judge you? Or pretended to understand something professionally that you really didn’t? If you’re anything like me and most of the people I know, you could easily answer yes to some of these questions. However, to truly succeed in today’s business world, we must be willing to bring our&nb... posted on Sep 30 2018 (8,205 reads)

The Boy Who Wanted to Go to School, by Maria Henson
Shimelash (’20) is kneeling on a dirt floor near an open doorway where a plastic bottle filled with holy water is suspended by a string to bless all who enter this home in the Ethiopian highlands. Because Wubetu is here, the four children of this house are especially blessed today. Their mother, Wubetu’s friend Abeju Messele, is tending a fire in the corner. She crushes coffee beans with a long pestle to prepare coffee for guests, an ancient and ongoing ritual of hospitality in Ethiopia. The smoke mixes with the fragrance of coffee beans to fill the room, cold and damp during these rainy months, leaving children with perpetually runny noses and shoulders wrapped... posted on Nov 13 2018 (19,737 reads)

Unlearning Together, by Martin Winiecki
perception, thinking, effortless achievement and healing are inherent to life—they happen by themselves. When we observe children learning to walk or speak, ecosystems regenerating themselves, or animals self-organizing, we notice there’s a masterful way of functioning that’s fundamentally different from our dominant culture. Encaged in a reality bubble of fear and separation, as Westerners in particular, we’ve culturally barred ourselves from life. True unlearning is the process of bidding farewell to such detrimental cultural programming, fostering imagination and awe in relation to life, discernment and empathy in relation to our world, and community and ... posted on Dec 30 2018 (8,158 reads)

Thinking About New Year's Resolutions?, by Ted Fischer
end of the year is always when we reflect on what we have done and what we have left undone. And, of course, it’s time to start thinking about those resolutions for the new year and what we will do differently. Our New Year’s resolutions usually target minor vices—eat fewer snacks, drink less, stop smoking, exercise more—whatever your particular self-admonitions may be. But it is too easy to get lost in the particulars—and in the negatives. In setting out our resolutions, we should first step back and take stock of what we really want, what we consider the good life to be, and then think about how best we might achieve it. Well-being is more than ju... posted on Dec 31 2018 (7,303 reads)

SuperBetter: A Healing Game, by ted.com
a gamer, so I like to have goals. I like special missions and secret objectives. So here's my special mission for this talk: I'm going to try to increase the life span of every single person in this room by seven and a half minutes. Literally, you will live seven and a half minutes longer than you would have otherwise, just because you watched this talk.  Some of you are looking a little bit skeptical. That's okay, because check it out -- I have math to prove that it is possible. It won't make much sense now. I'll explain it all later, just pay attention to the number at the bottom: +7.68... posted on May 10 2019 (17,522 reads)

The Emotional Life of Animals, by Marc Bekoff
article from the YES! Media archives was originally published in the Spring 2011 issue of YES! Magazine. Scientific research shows that many animals are very intelligent and have sensory and motor abilities that dwarf ours. Dogs are able to detect diseases such as cancer and diabetes and warn humans of impending heart attacks and strokes. Elephants, whales, hippopotamuses, giraffes, and alligators use low-frequency sounds to communicate over long distances, often miles. And bats, dolphins, whales, frogs, and various rodents use high-frequency sounds to find food, communicate with others, and navigate. Many animals also display wide-ranging emotions, including joy, happiness, empat... posted on Nov 26 2019 (6,653 reads)

When I Wrote My Mom a Thank-You Letter, by Nancy Davis Kho
the waning days of 2015, I decided to mark a milestone birthday by simply saying “thank you.” My plan was to write one letter each week of that year to someone who had helped, shaped, or inspired me on the road to the person I am today. Nothing fancy: just one gratitude letter at time. I later called this letter-writing spree my Thank-You Project—and it would change my life in a profound, positive, and lasting way. I have discovered that writing a “gratitude letter” is one of the most common prescriptions from researchers looking for a way to elevate gratitude levels in their everyday lives. In fact, that’s often how scientists test their theories: T... posted on Dec 9 2019 (8,675 reads)

The Way of the Heart, by Cynthia Bourgeault
the Christian esoteric tradition, a path beyond the mind Put the mind in the heart…. Put the mind in the heart…. Stand before the Lord with the mind in the heart.” From page after page in the Philokalia, that hallowed collection of spiritual writings from the Christian East, this same refrain emerges. It is striking in both its insistence and its specificity. Whatever that exalted level of spiritual attainment is conceived to be—whether you call it “salvation,” “enlightenment,” “contemplation,” or “divine union”—this is the inner configuration in which it is found. This and no other. It le... posted on Apr 10 2021 (8,968 reads)

How Nature Helps Us Heal, by Leif Hass
one silver lining to the pandemic: with gyms, museums, and stores closed, many of us were forced to spend more time outside. I was able to ditch my car and more safely pedal the 3.5 miles on pedestrian-friendly streets to work at Alta Bates Summit Medical Center in Oakland, where I work practicing hospital medicine. One morning last spring, I was reflecting on how good the ride outside made me feel when I walked in to see a 68-year-old patient with several significant behavioral and medical problems. Before I could say a thing, he jumped in as if in mid-conversation. “Dr. Hass, I can’t thank you enough. I swear that prescription you gave me mid-COVID lockdown s... posted on Oct 25 2021 (6,775 reads)

What I Regret Most Are Failures of Kindness, by George Saunders
through the ages, a traditional form has evolved for this type of speech, which is: Some old fart, his best years behind him, who, over the course of his life, has made a series of dreadful mistakes (that would be me), gives heartfelt advice to a group of shining, energetic young people, with all of their best years ahead of them (that would be you). And I intend to respect that tradition. Now, one useful thing you can do with an old person, in addition to borrowing money from them, or asking them to do one of their old-time “dances,” so you can watch, while laughing, is ask: “Looking back, what do you regret?” And they’ll tell you. Sometimes, as you ... posted on Feb 11 2023 (50,900 reads)

Unlocking Multiple Forms of Wealth, by Nipun Mehta
of today's society is designed through the lens of financial wealth, but is our world richer for it? Nipun Mehta uses that question as a springboard to make a compelling case for alternative forms of wealth that are often overlooked -- like time, community and attention. Drawing on his personal journey with ServiceSpace, as well as fascinating research and real-world examples, below is the transcript of an inspiring TEDx talk that invites listeners to consider a catalytic question: what forms of wealth do we care to amplify?] Decades ago, one of my friends was volunteering with Mother Teresa in Calcutta, India, and one of these major donors walks into the place, checks ... posted on Apr 19 2016 (51,942 reads)

Pilgrimage Up Longs Peak, by Jane Wodening
remember driving to the foot of the mountain shortly after dawn and coming to a curve in the road where there was a good view of it, massive, majestic, magnificent. “We’re going to climb THAT?” I thought, “Lord save us.” But there was the parking lot, full, the big sign and the path into the woods. Hundreds, maybe thousands of people climbed it every year. Sort of a Twentieth Century pilgrimage, backpacker-style, a test of strength and nerve in a place where the world can only be admired. There wasn’t much to speak of below timberline. There as the path, well-trod, the tunnel of trees, there were flowers and birds, and people pleasant, greeting us, qu... posted on Jun 19 2023 (2,932 reads)

Welcoming the Gifts of Anxiety, by Karla McLaren
are gifts in anxiety? Yes! People are often very surprised to learn that anxiety contains specific gifts, because anxiety is usually described only in terms of disorder or disease. However, at its most subtle level, anxiety (which is related to fear) helps you plan for the future and complete important tasks. Really! When I look at the problem of nuance, I see that so many of us are taught to identify emotions only when they’re in a heightened state. This means that when we think of anger, we tend to think of rage rather than the calm boundary-setting skills that nuanced anger brings to us. Or when we think of fear, we tend to think of extreme alarm rather th... posted on Oct 5 2023 (19,451 reads)

Love and Philosophy Between Prison Walls and Ivory Towers, by Awakin Call Editors
1987, while teaching a class at MIT [the Massachusetts Institute of Technology] on nonviolence, philosophy lecturer Lee Perlman had a novel idea: Why not take the students to a prison, to talk with men who had committed extreme forms of violence?  Needless to say,” an MIT publication reported, “the experience was an eye-opener for students — a powerful way to help them understand, at a visceral level, the nature of violence. And it also sparked Perlman’s lifelong professional and personal interest in the prison system.” What follows is the edited transcript of an in-depth Awakin Calls interview with Dr. Perlman. You can listen to the recording ... posted on Dec 28 2019 (6,974 reads)