The Dash Between The Years
"While busy with work and deadlines and feeling somewhat under pressure, I was sent an advertisement for some inspirational books, one of which included the poem below. When I first glanced at the title, I assumed it was a poem about the race and rush of life, but as I read on it stopped me dead in my tracks and brought tears to my eyes. I had just snapped at a family member and didn't take notice... posted on Mar 26 2012, 11,520 reads

A Chinese Living Water Garden
Water is art activist Betsy Damon's passion. She was studying sacred springs in China when she began meeting individuals interested in water from a variety of angles: medicine, hydraulic engineering, spirituality. This unique collaboration led to an invitation to review a major water project in Chengdu, the capital city of Sichuan. Because of her critique, the project was actually scrapped. But th... posted on Mar 25 2012, 7,950 reads

The Empathic Civilization
We humans are soft-wired for sociability and affection, wanting to belong and to empathize. The question is "Can we extend our empathy to the entire human race and biosphere?" Bringing in recent insights from fields like neuroscience to anthropology, author and social thinker Jeremy Rifkin's maps out a solution in a stunningly visual and cohesive way. In this ten-minute video, he defines the empat... posted on Mar 24 2012, 4,249 reads

Recovering the Heart of Medicine
"Our modern view of disease is that disease is centered in the body. The older view of disease is that it is soul loss, a loss of connection, of meaning, of purpose, of essence. If this is so, the real task of the medical system is to heal soul loss, to aid in the retrieval of the soul. What is needed is not to develop more of a spiritual practice or to go to church more. Our task is to recognize ... posted on Mar 23 2012, 50,968 reads

An Ordinary Magical Life
"I met Shelagh Gordon at her funeral. My sharpest impression of her that day, as mourners in black pressed around me, was of her breathtaking kindness. Shelagh was freshly-in-love thoughtful. If she noticed your boots had holes, she'd press her new ones into your arms. When you casually admired her coffeemaker, you'd wake up to one of your own. A bag of chocolates hanging from your doorknob would ... posted on Mar 22 2012, 0 reads

10 Points on the Science of Spreading Good
"Good deeds are contagious. We naturally imitate the people around us, we adopt their ideas about appropriate behavior, and we feel what they feel. Acts of charity are no exception. In our 2010 generosity experiment, we showed that every extra dollar of giving in a game designed to measure altruism caused people who saw that giving to donate an extra twenty cents. Furthermore, the network acts lik... posted on Mar 21 2012, 46,003 reads

Meditation: A Compass and a Path
"When I started meditation in the 1970s, people like my parents would say that 'Meditation is staring at your navel. It's self absorbed.' I'd been through medical school and I'd say that when you're in medical school, you go in a room, you close the door and you don't come out for four years. But no one says that's selfish. Everyone knows that it is preparation to do something valuable for society... posted on Mar 20 2012, 34,609 reads

From Selling to Serving
"The topic for this week's meeting was: 'What are you doing to keep your business going in these crazy-making economic times?' Several people said they have upped the number of cold calls they're making; others talked about creative ways they're using social networking to market themselves. Some are revamping their web sites and blogs; a few are exploring new business ideas, as they worry that the... posted on Mar 19 2012, 40,822 reads

Broken Bodies, Broken Minds, Amazing Spirits
"Yesterday I went to the nursing home to visit my step mom's grandma. She just got out of the hospital recently where she underwent some serious operations. I wanted to surprise her after work so I stopped by for a quick visit. When I got there she was happy to see me. We hugged, kissed and exchanged greetings. Then I heard a woman crying. It was my great grandma's roommate. The curtain was drawn ... posted on Mar 18 2012, 5,805 reads

A Lost 5-yr-old Finds Family 25 Years Later
One day in 1987, 5-year-old Saroo Brierley spent the afternoon begging for change with his brother at a local train station. When it was time to go home, the boys boarded what they thought was the correct train. They were wrong. Exhausted, the young brothers fell asleep, only to wake up 10 hours later on the other side of India, hundreds of miles away from their family. 25 years later, using littl... posted on Mar 17 2012, 17,732 reads