The Dumpster
"'We can't use these. They look like heirlooms!' Gina, a guest at my holiday gathering, holds up one of the elaborately embroidered napkins from the buffet table. 'Where'd you get them?' 'Out of a dumpster. The tablecloth and those candleholders were in there, too.' 'You can't be serious! Why would they be in a dumpster?' The shock in her voice carried across the room, and others looked up. It's c... posted on Sep 17 2011, 5,847 reads

The Man Who Builds Bridges & Saves Lives
More than 13 years after his parents drowned in a flash flood, David Kakuko is at the Moruny River, building a bridge that might have prevented their deaths. The hanging footbridge will provide safe passage over the Moruny, a frequently flooded waterway in West Pokot, Kenya. "Before the bridge, there [were] so many people, so many who lost their lives," said Kakuko, 32. "I know, because I have no ... posted on Sep 16 2011, 3,137 reads

Blooming in the Whirlwhind
"'Conduct your blooming in the noise and whip of the whirlwind.' Strange message in a stranger place. I don't know who said it, but this pronouncement suddenly appeared on a huge wall of the 59th St. subway tunnel connecting the Lexington Avenue trains to the N and R lines. For many months I'd passed the area, which was roped off and covered over with heavy paper -- reconstruction in progress. Wha... posted on Sep 15 2011, 2,972 reads

How To Build A Beautiful Company
In the early 1970s, Bill Witherspoon lived for months in a school bus parked in the Oregon desert. A hundred miles from the nearest town, he spent day after day painting the sky and the clouds. He later sold his work for tidy sums. Witherspoon would spend the rest of his life alternating between painting and launching companies. When Witherspoon, then 60, launched The Sky Factory in 2002, he wonde... posted on Sep 14 2011, 11,026 reads

Feeding the World From A Garden Shed
The corrugated tin hut crouching in the undergrowth, dwarfed by dripping firs, looks like a wartime relic nobody could be bothered to clear away ... a sign reading "Mary's Meals" has been stuck above the doorway. To Magnus MacFarlane-Barrow, his father's shed in Dalmally, Argyll, has acquired a talismanic significance. It's where he stockpiled food and clothes for Bosnian refugees in the 1990s -- ... posted on Sep 13 2011, 3,577 reads

Planning & Other Paths To Less Stress
A recent survey by psychologist and self-help author Robert Epstein found that 25% of our happiness hinges on how well we're able to manage stress. The next logical question is, of course, how best can we reduce our stress? The stress management technique that worked best, according to the survey: planning. In other words, "fighting stress before it even starts, planning things rather than letting... posted on Sep 12 2011, 8,806 reads

The Ripple Effect of Kindness
"Over the last few years, I've become a big proponent of Smile Cards. The premise behind these small cards is simple: do an anonymous act of kindness and leave a card behind, inviting the recipient to pay-it-forward. If he/she does, the chain keeps going, resulting in "ripples" of kindness radiating out. Smile Cards are wonderful in ways I cannot count. Small, simple, humble -- yet powerful, becau... posted on Sep 11 2011, 22,817 reads

10 Strategies for Reducing Prejudice
UC Berkeley professor Rodolfo Mendoza-Denton provides research-based tips for overcoming prejudices based on differences. Here are his top ten strategies, summarized: Travel (somewhere that challenges your worldview); Take a course on prejudice; If you value egalitarianism, recognize that unconscious bias is no more "the real you" than your conscious values; Laugh a little -- smiles and happiness ... posted on Sep 10 2011, 17,329 reads

Where Children Sleep: A Poignant Photo Series
'Where Children Sleep' is a remarkable series capturing the diversity of and, often, disparity between children's lives around the world through portraits of their bedrooms. Kenyan-born, English-raised, Venice-based documentary photographer James Mollison explores the topic with poignancy. The project began on a brief to engage with children's rights and morphed into a thoughtful meditation on pov... posted on Sep 09 2011, 44,226 reads

A Storyteller of the Streets
Most people have never walked down the street and looked for homeless people before -- most look the other way. But not Mark Horvath. A former Hollywood insider, Horvath has been a drug addict, con artist and, for a brief period, homeless. He says he's left that life behind, and these days, he's drawing on his past to inspire his Web site -- Invisiblepeople.tv. The site is a collection of YouTube-... posted on Sep 08 2011, 4,994 reads