My Daughter's Noble Sacrifice
"My wife called,"How long will you be with that newspaper? Will you come here and make your darling daughter eat her food?" I tossed the paper away and rushed to the scene. My only daughter Sindu looked frightened. Tears were welling up in her eyes. In front of her was a bowl filled to its brim with curd rice. Sindu is a nice child, quite intelligent for her age. She has just turned eight. She pa... posted on Jan 15 2013, 11,428 reads

15 Serious Games Aiming to Change the World
Using games for purposes other than entertainment is nothing new. There are war games, educational games, throne games. But a new class of games has sprung up in recent years, designed to create awareness and raise support for a variety of global issues. Such serious games seek to harness the power of competition and/or novelty to attract players and get the word out for a good cause. Here are 15 ... posted on Jan 14 2013, 35,229 reads

The Generosity Paradox
Generosity is paradoxical. Those who give, receive back in turn. By spending ourselves for others' well-being, we enhance our own. In letting go of some of what we own, we better secure our own lives. By giving ourselves away, we ourselves move toward greater flourishing. This is not only a philosophical or religious teaching, it is a sociological fact.... posted on Jan 13 2013, 14,504 reads

Curry Without Worry: Food from the Heart
"The founder of Curry Without Worry, Shrawan Nepali, has shoulder length salt and pepper hair, brown eyes that sparkle like he's about to break into a smile, and a lightness to him, as if he seems to defy gravity...They feed approximately 250 people in San Francisco, and 300 in Katmandu, Nepal every Tuesday night. Kerry Adams, a man waiting in line, told me, "Not only is the food here healthy and ... posted on Jan 12 2013, 13,544 reads

The World Needs More Love Letters
Finding a letter of encouragement in the mail or tucked unexpectedly in the unlikeliest of places is sometimes all we need when in doubt or feeling down on our luck. And imagine receiving this note anonymously, as if some magical force out there knew just what you needed to hear and wanted you to know that you haven't been forgotten. In the fall of 2010, in the midst of her own depression and lon... posted on Jan 11 2013, 26,095 reads

Naomi Shihab Nye On Kindness
The poems of Naomi Shihab Nye have an uncanny way of showing up at exactly the right moment to summon you below the surface of your life. The child of a Palestinian father and an American mother, her poems speak a language deeper than culture, history or religion. Through the portal of the everyday -- a grocery store, an olive press, the headlines -- she draws us into the most profound questions a... posted on Jan 10 2013, 27,041 reads

The Power of Whimsy
Public spaces serve multiple functions for society and, more and more, they are being utilized in ever-creative ways. In many of these cases, whimsy seems to be at the heart of the matter, even if it is not the main driver. For instance, in a bid to improve public health by encouraging more people to use the stairs instead of the escalator, The Fun Theory (a Volkswagen initiative) transformed a se... posted on Jan 09 2013, 21,496 reads

14 Year-Old Gets Photos of Space
A Lego man encased in a homemade weather balloon ended his journey to the edge of space on a New Hampshire driveway, bringing with him a trove of atmospheric data as well as stunning images of the curvature of the Earth. The balloon, which landed on August 25, is the brainchild of a 14-year-old student named Jack Miron from Bedford, New Hampshire. He didn't know that NASA is using this technology ... posted on Jan 08 2013, 10,890 reads

Bill Gates vs. Mother Teresa
"Two days ago, I was in China, speaking to a bunch of influential business leaders. One of them posed a challenge: "You speak about Vinoba Bhave, the spiritual heir of Gandhi, and how he walked 80K kilometers across India and inspired people to donate 5 million acres to their neighbors. Yes, it might've been an unprecedented feat in the history of mankind, but really, how many people remember Vino... posted on Jan 07 2013, 72,611 reads

A Man Who Gave Away His Home To a Family in Need
A 51-year-old man is moving back in with his parents so a homeless family can live in his house instead. Tony Tolbert's offer is good for one full year. According to CBS, the spare bedroom in his childhood home in Los Angeles frequently went to people in need, which inspired his own version of the act. "You don't have to be Bill Gates or Warren Buffet or Oprah," Tolbert, a Harvard-educated attorne... posted on Jan 06 2013, 47,447 reads