Eckhart Tolle: The Easier Path, by Spirituality & Health Magazine
renowned spiritual teacher on getting stuck in the future and saving the planet. To the uninitiated, Eckhart Tolle might be mistaken for a nature photographer. His persona—a soft German-accented voice, a boyish visage, his love of vests—doesn’t exactly scream, “guru!” Yet Tolle is one of the world’s most popular spiritual teachers and a literary powerhouse whose best-selling books The Power of Now and A New Earth have influenced millions. Born in Germany, educated at the universities of London and Cambridge, and now a resident of Vancouver, Canada, Tolle writes and lectures on the evolution of human consciousness. His work syn... posted on Jun 23 2013 (84,319 reads)

What Is It to Be Intellectually Humble?, by Robert Roberts
human beings are seekers. We seek love, wealth, security, power, happiness, and recognition. We also seek knowledge. Aristotle said, “All people by nature desire to know.” The desire to know can be very ambitious, like that of the scientists who sought to solve the structure of the DNA molecule, or rather modest. It can be enormously satisfying to know and understand things. What does it take to have intellectual success—to come to know and understand something challenging? Well, you need some raw intelligence and memory, and you need to work hard and persevere when it doesn’t come easily. You’ll be better off if you’re surrounded by learned people ... posted on Jul 10 2013 (34,841 reads)

35 Scientific Concepts That Will Help You Understand The World, by Aimee Groth
order to sharpen our reasoning skills, we must have a good grasp of our own cognitive biases, as well as the basic laws of the universe. But in a dynamic world, new laws are constantly emerging. The editors over at Edge.org asked some of the most influential thinkers in the world — including neuroscientists, physicists and mathematicians — what they believe are the most important scientific concepts of the modern era. The result is "This Will Make You Smarter: New Scientific Concepts To Improve Your Thinking," a compilation of nearly 200 essays exploring concepts such as the "shifting baseline syndrome" and a scientific view ... posted on Aug 5 2013 (592,981 reads)

Don't Make the Right Decision; Make the Decision Right, by Adam Grant
do you make your choices? Here are a few statements from a decision-making survey created by my colleague, Barry Schwartz. Take a moment to think about whether you agree with them: - I never settle for second best. - When I’m in the car listening to the radio, even if I like the song, I often check other stations to see if something better is playing. - I’m a big fan of lists that rank things: the best movies … the best graduation speeches … the best-looking professors. - I treat relationships like clothing: I expect to try on a lot before I find the perfect fit. These statements reflect being a maximizer—someone who always looks for the bes... posted on Aug 10 2013 (64,900 reads)

Balancing the Brain Toward Joy, by David Kupfer
years ago, at 37, Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, a Harvard-trained neuroanatomist and spokeswoman for the Harvard Brain Tissue Resource Center, had a stroke that traumatized her left hemisphere. Through the eyes of an ever-curious brain scientist, she felt her mind completely deteriorate to the point that she could not walk, talk, read, write, or recall the incidents of her life. Several weeks later, she underwent major brain surgery to remove a golf-ball-sized blood clot that was applying pressure on the language center in her brain’s left hemisphere. During her eight-year recovery, her mother was her chief caregiver. Initially, Taylor did not know who she was and had no recollectio... posted on Aug 21 2013 (44,413 reads)

Six Habits of Highly Empathic People, by Roman Krznaric
you think you’re hearing the word “empathy” everywhere, you’re right. It’s now on the lips of scientists and business leaders, education experts and political activists. But there is a vital question that few people ask: How can I expand my own empathic potential? Empathy is not just a way to extend the boundaries of your moral universe. According to new research, it’s a habit we can cultivate to improve the quality of our own lives. But what is empathy? It’s the ability to step into the shoes of another person, aiming to understand their feelings and perspectives, and to use that understanding to guide our actions.... posted on Aug 25 2013 (230,262 reads)

Bend that Arc of Justice, by Larry Brilliant, M.D.
Moral Arc of the Universe Bends Towards Justice, But It Will Not Happen on Its Own Skoll Global Threats Fund president Larry Brilliant was the commencement speaker at the Harvard School of Public Health's commencement yesterday. Here's the text of his speech as prepared for delivery (Cross-posted from the Skoll Global Threats Fund blog). Graduating students of the class of 2013, and your families and partners and friends... Distinguished members of the faculty. All of the entire School of Public Health community Thank you for inviting me to speak to you today. It's a pleasure to see some familiar faces and friends here today. I'm happy to see John Brownstei... posted on Oct 25 2013 (18,091 reads)

The Neuroscience of Why Gratitude Makes Us Healthier, by Ocean Robbins
world is pretty messed up. With all the violence, pollution and crazy things people do, it would be easy to turn into a grouchy old man without being either elderly or male. There's certainly no shortage of justification for disappointment and cynicism. But consider this: Negative attitudes are bad for you. And gratitude, it turns out, makes you happier and healthier. If you invest in a way of seeing the world that is mean and frustrated, you're going to get a world that is, well, more mean and frustrating. But if you can find any authentic reason to give thanks, anything that is going right with the world or your life, and put your attention there, then statistics say you'... posted on Oct 30 2013 (353,381 reads)

The Thinking Habit That Changed My Life, by Leo Babauta
remember one evening, when my life was pretty different and I was overweight and deeply in debt and a smoker and had such a hard time changing things … I wasn’t feeling too good about my life. I felt horrible about myself, and wondered why I was stuck. I felt hopeless and helpless, and generally depressed about the state of things around me. Then I looked up at the sky, and saw the stars set in a deep blue-black canvas. And I thought, what a miracle life is. And I resolved to mentally list the things I had in my life that were good. My list of good things was something like this: - I had a wonderful wife - I had 5 amazing children (now 6) - I had... posted on Dec 14 2013 (83,821 reads)

The Art of Constructive Daydreaming, by Maria Popova
science of why fantasy and imaginative escapism are essential elements of a satisfying mental life. Freud asserted that daydreaming is essential to creative writing — something a number of famous creators and theorists intuited in asserting that unconscious processing is essential to how creativity works, from T. S. Eliot’s notion of “idea incubation” to Alexander Graham Bell’s “unconscious cerebration” to Lewis Carroll’s “mental mastication.” In the 1950s, Yale psychologist Jerome L. Singer put these intuitive observations to the empirical test as he embarked u... posted on Dec 8 2013 (25,559 reads)

From The Story of Stuff To The Story of Solutions, by Annie Leonard
final film in the “Story of Stuff” series asks, What if the goal of our economy wasn’t more, but better—better health, better jobs, and a better chance to survive on the planet? In an ad for a major phone company blanketing TV this year, a circle of doe-eyed children is asked: "Who thinks more is better than less?" You know the one—an eager kindergartener answers, "We want more, we want more," before the commercial voice intones, "It's not complicated..." To economists, there's no distinction between money spent on stuff that makes life better and money spent on stuff that makes life worse. When it comes... posted on Nov 21 2013 (27,469 reads)

Are You Living Your Eulogy or Resume?, by Arianna Huffington
I want every American to see how these men and women lived," President Obama said Sunday, eulogizing the 12 men and women killed in the Washington Navy Yard shooting. He spoke of volunteers who made time to give back to their communities, like "Frank Kohler, giving dictionaries to every third-grader in his county," and "Marty Bodrog, leading the children's Bible study at church." There were fathers like Mike Ridgell, "coaching his daughters' softball teams and joining Facebook just to keep up with his girls, one of whom said he was always the cool dad." There were mothers like Mary Francis Knight, "devoted to her daughters ... who h... posted on Dec 4 2013 (60,348 reads)

My Mother's last words to me, by Sohaib Alvi
wrote this a few days after my mother passed away today on October 2, 1989. I have carried it with me since not knowing if what I wrote was meant only for me. As the memories of that night flood me again, I feel that the heaviness of carrying it for so long has made me weak. I also don’t know when I might join her (and my dad), and this true story will go down with me. I suppose by sharing this with you I can tell you what a fine woman she was, and how all she had in her heart and on her mind, was the other person. Perhaps my mom’s last words deserve a wider audience…especially of sons for we have no idea what goes on in a mother’s heart, even when we think w... posted on Feb 19 2014 (40,346 reads)

How To Stay Sane: The Art of Revising Your Inner Storytelling, by Maria Popova
stories give shape to our inchoate, disparate, fleeting impressions of everyday life.” “I pray to Jesus to preserve my sanity,” Jack Kerouac professed in discussing his writing routine. But those of us who fall on the more secular end of the spectrum might need a slightly more potent sanity-preservation tool than prayer. That’s precisely what writer and psychotherapist Philippa Perry offers in How To Stay Sane (public library; UK), part of The School of Life’s wonderful series reclaiming the traditional self-help genre as intelligent, non-self-helpy, yet immensely helpful guides to modern living. At the heart of Perry’s argument &mdash... posted on Feb 11 2014 (36,827 reads)

Why Are We So Wired to Connect?, by Jill Suttie
new book outlines the evidence for the primacy of social connections in our lives, and presents guidelines improving workplaces, schools, and personal well-being. Why is loneliness so painful? Why do we care how others treat us? And, why do we spend so much time perseverating on past and future relationships? These are some of the questions addressed in Matthew Lieberman’s new book, Social: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Connect. Lieberman, a social neuroscientist at the University of California, Los Angeles, outlines the fascinating neurological evidence for the primacy of social connections in our lives, and presents guidelines for how we can use this information to improve our ... posted on Feb 24 2014 (20,904 reads)

How To Foster Generosity In Students, by Vicki Zakrzewski
suggestions for keeping your students’ holiday spirit going throughout the year. With the holidays upon us, many teachers use this time to encourage students to express the spirit of generosity and kindness—and with good reason: it’s not only a selfless way to help others, research suggests it can also help them enhance their own relationships, health, and happiness. But encouraging the spirit of giving among your students doesn’t have to start and end with holiday-time. The key, though, is for teachers to create a classroom environment that fosters children’s natural altruistic tendencies—which researchers have documented in children a... posted on May 16 2014 (15,144 reads)

How Social Connections Keep Seniors Healthy, by Jill Suttie
we age, we tend to shed family and friends—which can hurt our mental and physical health. How can we design communities for seniors that facilitate social connections? Vonda is an energetic 73-year-old woman with a friendly smile and a sharp wit. For the last two decades she’s been living in an intentional farming community called “Potluck Farm” with other individuals and families on 170 acres in rural North Carolina.  Vonda Frantz (foreground, in pink shirt) putting the roof on the common house for Potluck Farm's new Elderberry community. But recently, she realized something: She’s getting older. Though she loves the farm, l... posted on May 8 2014 (19,068 reads)

The Dalai Lama On Why I Laugh, by The Dalai Lama
have been confronted with many difficulties throughout the course of my life, and my country is going through a critical period. But I laugh often, and my laughter is contagious. When people ask me how I find the strength to laugh now, I reply that I am a professional laugher. [...] The life of exile is an unfortunate life, but I have always tried to cultivate a happy state of mind, appreciating the opportunities this existence without a settled home, far from all protocol, has offered me. This way I have been able to preserve my inner peace. If we are content just to think that compassion, rationality, and patience are good, that is not actually enough to develop the... posted on Jun 27 2014 (64,242 reads)

Social Science's 10 Findings on Facebook, by Katherine Thorson
science is just beginning to understand how Facebook has changed our social lives since it was born ten years ago. Over the past ten years, Facebook has added a new dimension to the social lives of over a billion people—and together with other social media like Twitter and Instagram, it has created an entirely new category of social ties. Given their popularity, social media have become the topic of a growing body of research in the social sciences. For Facebook’s tenth birthday, I collected ten discoveries this research has yielded. If you’re on Facebook, then these studies apply to you! 1. Facebook might increase dissatisfaction with your life. Th... posted on Nov 16 2014 (29,046 reads)

Good Night Margaret: A Love Story Against The Odds, by Melissa McGlensey
conquers all, and few people better understand that than the couple in this poignant film. The 11-and-a-half-minute-long New York Times documentary, entitled, "Good Night Margaret," shows a glimpse into the lives of Margaret "Muffi" Lavigne and Chris Plum. Both Lavigne and Plum have muscular dystrophy, and the two met and fell in love at the Hospital for Special Care in New Britain, Connecticut. "I realized all the suffering in the hospital led up to me meeting her," Plum says in the film, "and finding the love of my life, and really finding true happiness." Watch their touching love story above, which will have you reaching for... posted on Sep 8 2014 (19,839 reads)