Katy Milkman: How to Change
"In her new book, How to Change, Katy Milkman offers simple yet profound insights about why better understanding our own internal obstacles--such as laziness, procrastination, forgetfulness, or our tendency to favor instant gratification over long-term rewards--is key to changing ourselves for good. Too often, books deliver one-size-fits-all approaches to common goals, like getting in shape or eat... posted on Jan 19 2023, 2,137 reads

What Does Justice for Animals Look Like
"Should a hummingbird be able to be a plaintiff in court? According to philosopher Martha Nussbaum, the answer is yes. In her new book, Justice for Animals: Our Collective Responsibility, the distinguished professor of law and philosophy at the University of Chicago offers a new theory of animal justice that is meant to inform our law and policy. Her theory is based on the "capabilities approach,"... posted on Jan 18 2023, 2,509 reads

Caverly Morgan: The Heart of Who We Are
"When Caverly Morgan reentered society after eight years as a Zen monk, she was confronted with a question many of us are asking these days: Considering the enormity of the problems before us, how can one individual's spiritual practice make a tangible difference in our world? Tami Simon speaks with Caverly about her new book, The Heart of Who We Are, and the connection between self-realization an... posted on Jan 17 2023, 2,973 reads

Awe: The New Science of Everyday Wonder
""Music," the trailblazing composer Julia Perry wrote, "has a unifying effect on the peoples of the world, because they all understand and love it... And when they find themselves enjoying and loving the same music, they find themselves loving one another." But there is something beyond humanistic ideology in this elemental truth --something woven into the very structure and sensorium of our bodie... posted on Jan 16 2023, 3,661 reads

Two Types of Heartbreak
"A disciple asks the rebbe: Why does Torah tell us to place these words upon your hearts? Why does it not tell us to place these holy words in our hearts? The rebbe answers: It is because as we are, our hearts are closed, and we cannot place the holy words in our hearts. So we place them on top of our hearts. And there they stay until, one day, the heart breaks and the words fall in. The following... posted on Jan 15 2023, 3,245 reads

Window of Possibility
"We call our galaxy the Milky Way. There are at least 100 billion stars in it and our sun is one of those. A hundred billion is a big number, and humans are not evolved to appreciate numbers like that, but heres a try: If you had a bucket with a thousand marbles in it, you would need to procure 999,999 more of those buckets to get a billion marbles. Then youd have to repeat the process a hundred t... posted on Jan 14 2023, 2,061 reads

The Just Listen Project
Toussaint Bailey, a "husband, father, son, brother, executive and Black man in America," like so many others, has experienced daily the pain of racism. His sense of rage, sadness and confusion became more prominent after overtly racist events of the past few years. Struggling with how to continue to function as a Black CEO in a nearly all white firm, he had for the first time an authentic, raw con... posted on Jan 13 2023, 1,729 reads

How to Question Your Own Decisions
"When the Nobel Prizewinning physicist Arno Penzias was asked what led to his success, he explained that he made a daily habit of asking what he called "the jugular question." Penzias said, The first thing I do each morning is ask myself, Why do I strongly believe what I believe? Penzias felt it was critical to constantly examine your own assumptions. And this is important to do whenever making de... posted on Jan 12 2023, 2,074 reads

Into the Middle of Nowhere
"This film captures the wonder of childhood as 3 to 5-year-olds explore and test the boundaries of reality through play and imagination at an outdoor nursery in Fife, Scotland."... posted on Jan 11 2023, 2,286 reads

Ikebana and the Jedi Model
"The Japanese traditional arts including ikebana have adopted the apprenticeship model [of the Jedi]. Once you enter the world of ikebana, you are trained under one certain master for at least several years and if the master thinks you are ready to be a master, which is called "shihan" in Japanese, the master recommends you to the board of masters which would approve you as shihan. If approved, yo... posted on Jan 10 2023, 2,094 reads