of both parties are met––which, fortunately, usually happens in share situations, according to Paul Zak––trust will naturally develop. This experience of trust leads to more personal happiness, according to John F. Helliwell, Professor Emeritus of Economics at the University of British Columbia. Helliwell, who studies the social contexts of happiness, has found that “trustworthiness and trust…appear independently and robustly related to happiness and life satisfaction”, and as we experience trust in more domains in our lives, the happier we are. In fact, trust is so important for happiness that when researchers at the University of Cambridge... posted on May 21 2013 (26,065 reads)

freak accident involving a ceiling fan may have taken Su Meck’s memory of everything that happened for the first 22 years of her life, but it did not rob her of her determination.  Since the accident that left her with amnesia, the 45-year-old from Gaithersburg, Md., has had to relearn how to walk, talk, read, write and drive. But Meck, whose identity was once as a mother and homemaker, carved out a place for herself as a college student. She went from having been reduced to the mental capacity of a young child to graduating from Montgomery (Md.) College with honors in May, earning an associate degree. “It was very confusing to me because everybody was telling me who I w... posted on Oct 23 2011 (9,679 reads)

bill. The Seed Just as dramatic is the struggle for the seed. More than 1,000 independent seed companies were swallowed up by multinationals in the past four decades, so today just three—Monsanto, DuPont and Syngenta—control about half the proprietary seed market worldwide. Fueling the consolidation were three Supreme Court rulings since 1980—including one in 2002, with an opinion written by former Monsanto attorney Clarence Thomas—making it possible to patent life forms, including seeds. And in 1992 the Food and Drug Administration released its policy on genetically modified organisms, claiming that “the agency is not aware of any information showing... posted on Nov 1 2011 (12,455 reads)

exam.  What would they find? My vet examined him and when he was done he told me that the ear infections were the worst he had ever seen and he was almost positive this old guy was totally deaf as a result.   We discussed all the heath issues and he asked me what I wanted to do. He told me that right now he couldn’t see anything wrong that couldn’t be treated and that he felt the dog could fully recover without too much stress or pain and have a good quality of life but he warned me that because of his advanced age, even if we decided to treat all his issues, this old boy may only have six months or maybe a year left and it was up to me.   He saw me hes... posted on Nov 19 2011 (105,556 reads)

all this material Sergio  had the idea of opening a museum to help him get some additional funding for the schools he was building in the communities, as well as to pay for the medicine he needed to treat his patients. Today, this museum is also a walk-in medical clinic, which is open every day except one. On Sundays, he visits the homes of those who are too incapacitated to come to his clinic. Don Sergio never stops, hence the title of a recently released documentary about his life, “El Andalon”, meaning, in Spanish, somebody who’s always on the go. The first time I peeked through the half-opened door of Don Sergio’s unadvertised museum/clinic,... posted on Jan 22 2012 (19,143 reads)

from the old directions and practicing the new way home, you strengthen a new neural pathway and the old neural pathway weakens. It's a good thing our brains can change, or we would still be pulling up to our childhood home.   Similar to physical skills like driving, the brain also forms neural pathways in learning and practicing emotional skills. Your emotional responses to experiences in your world are the result of well-worn neural pathways that developed over your lifetime. While our genes influence our temperament, research has demonstrated that our environment and our own mind can physically alter our brains and thus our emotional responses. This means that e... posted on Apr 23 2012 (135,523 reads)

the life of each and every one of us, there is a defining moment, one after which we know that our lives will never be the same.  For me, 9/11 was that moment.  I had by that time embarked in earnest on a search for self, leaving behind a lucrative marketing career, and committed to creating a life with meaning, one that went beyond material and professional success. Longing to trust my intuition over my logic, I followed what I believed were omens to Egypt. I meditated in many mosques and, one night, atop the Great Pyramid of Giza. I sat in the desert, and tried to listen to its whispers. I sensed a familiarity there that went beyond words, as if I had come home, and tha... posted on Jul 22 2012 (12,149 reads)

through the practice of mindfulness and meditation. Working with Zen masters, meditation teachers, psychologists and even a CEO, Meng created a seven-week personal growth program named -- what else -- Search Inside Yourself (SIY). Launched in 2007, Google has had more than 1,000 employees go through SIY with startling results. Participants rate the program at 4.7 on a five-point scale. Anecdotal feedback, among other comments, from many participants is that this program "changed my life." Meng then decided to open-source the SIY program by making its principles and components available to companies everywhere. He has written a book titled, Search Inside Yourself: ... posted on Jul 11 2012 (21,327 reads)

Kentucky. He splits his time between three quiet activities: 1) writing fiction, poetry, and essays, putting pen to paper (quite literally) in a tiny hut on the Kentucky river; 2) working his farm; and 3) engaging in non-violent civil disobedience supporting various humanitarian or agrarian causes. He has spoken out in his 76 years against wars, corporate corruption, nuclear power plants, the death penalty and abortion, coal mining practices, mountain top removal, and other issues of land and life. Although he doesn’t fit squarely into any one political category, just last month, President Obama awarded him the National Humanities medal. Berry is a truth-teller of the storytelling va... posted on Aug 15 2012 (14,447 reads)

go that finally allows us to be at peace. It is an acceptance of what happened along with a choice to stop dragging the unhappy past into the present. It is the experience of moving through blockages that keep us from being alive right now. It is for you way more than anyone else. Byron Katie says, “Things don’t happen to you; they happen for you.” When limiting stories are put to rest, we are able to see the lesson, the offering from them, that deeply enriches our life experience. Let’s clear up two misconceptions about forgiveness. + When you release your attention from your grievance story, you are not condoning the other’s behavior. ... posted on Jun 7 2021 (60,686 reads)

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 and revelations of the soul. In addition to writing poetry, Nye writes fiction, essays and children’s books, and has edited several anthologies.  KIM ROSEN: What do you feel is the role of poetry, especially in these times? NAOMI SHIHAB NYE: Poetry helps us imagine one ano... posted on Jan 10 2013 (27,029 reads)

your deep heart, opening as the entire moment, and giving what you most deeply desire to give, without waiting.” ~David Deida Just for a minute, can we please stop frantically trying to control, plan, and delude ourselves into thinking we know what we don’t know? Do you spend your time preparing for every possible outcome and worrying about all the negative consequences that could befall you? We are so afraid to let go, to just be, to allow the unfolding of this marvelous life without getting in the way. This fear keeps us paralyzed and stuck. And longing for the peace that is possible – if only we would put down all the efforts we make to know. There is no g... posted on Jan 29 2013 (30,564 reads)

some reason, the control freak in me kept her mouth shut. Miraculously I had enough sense to stand aside and let my child give as her heart felt lead.   Last Christmas, my daughter spent hours wrapping barely-used bottles of lotion, tiny hotel shampoos, and gently-used books. She then declared she wanted to distribute the colorful packages to homeless people in the downtown area on Christmas Eve. Her very first recipient was a frail, elderly woman with sad eyes who clutched her life possessions in a ripped trash bag. It wasn’t until I watched this woman’s face completely transform by the mere sight my pint-sized-gift-bearer that I got over myself.   ... posted on Feb 9 2013 (25,163 reads)

faith. But it is also a relatively recent idea in the West which dates from the 17th and 18th centuries, a time that ushered in a dramatic shift in what human beings could legitimately hope to expect in and from their lives. People prior to the late 17th century thought happiness was a matter of luck or virtue or divine favor. Today we think of happiness as a right and a skill that can be developed. This has been liberating, in some respects, because it asks us to strive to improve our lots in life, individually and collectively. But there have been downsides as well. It seems that when we want to be happy all of the time, we can forget that the pursuit of happiness can entail struggle, sac... posted on Mar 7 2013 (13,356 reads)

They would last for an hour sometimes, and sometimes for days or even weeks then he would sink back down into that horrible place. When he was sick, I protected him fiercely. I didn’t want anyone to see him like thatI had faith that someday he would recover but man oh man it was lonely I wished every single day that I could just walk around with a sign like this... because on the outside I looked like I had EVERYTHING GOING FOR ME I looked like I might just have a perfect life but I was hiding a very painful secret… Well, a lot of other things happened too. You can imagine what might happen over the years while we have a 7 acre farm, a pretty big internation... posted on Mar 19 2013 (74,222 reads)

the past ten years there has been an escalating interest in happiness. Hundreds of books and studies have emerged to guide us toward finding the good life, but achieving personal happiness is only a part of the equation. When happiness is partnered with well-being and sustainability it takes on a whole new dimension: sustainable happiness. Sustainable happiness takes into account that happiness is interconnected with other people, other species, and the natural environment by a remarkable web of interdependence.  This means that our daily actions and decisions contribute to—or detract from—our own well-being, and that of others. Sometimes things that make us h... posted on Mar 29 2013 (41,260 reads)

for many years. How have your own spiritual path and your evolution as a poet been interwoven? Does your Zen practice teach you about writing poetry? Does your writing teach you about Zen? They are left foot and right foot. Zen is the taste of your own tongue in your own mouth. It’s a way to find something very simple that’s already present within you—a subtler, sharper, nondistanced, and nondistancing awareness. Everything else emerges from this intimacy with your own life, this opening into attention. We become the instruments of our lives and become part of the orchestra of the larger existences that our lives in turn are part of. The same basic attention and ... posted on May 23 2013 (16,822 reads)

at exfoliating the imagery of that, that idea of surrender. I don't help him, I don't make up the images with him, I may be guilty of that sometimes, but I can't think of one right now. TS: You mentioned that you didn't even hear Rumi's name until you were in your late 30s. I'm curious, when you heard his name or you read your first Rumi poem, did you immediately go up into flames or something like that? CB: [Laughs] TS: I mean, the karma of your life was about to be forever changed. CB: That's certainly true, but not exactly the first one. That was a Robert Bly conference, where he thought it would be a great afternoon writing exe... posted on Dec 29 2013 (35,348 reads)

neuroscientists have identified a 10-section “empathy circuit” in our brains which, if damaged, can curtail our ability to understand what other people are feeling. Evolutionary biologists like Frans de Waal have shown that we are social animals who have naturally evolved to care for each other, just like our primate cousins. And psychologists have revealed that we are primed for empathy by strong attachment relationships in the first two years of life.  But empathy doesn’t stop developing in childhood. We can nurture its growth throughout our lives—and we can use it as a radical force for social transformation. Research in ... posted on Aug 25 2013 (229,098 reads)

She cut her first tooth on a rubber giraffe. Our world is different, zoologically speaking — less straightforward and more grisly. We are living in the eye of a great storm of extinction, on a planet hemorrhaging living things so fast that half of its nine million species could be gone by the end of the century. At my place, the teddy bears and giggling penguins kept coming. But I didn’t realize the lengths to which humankind now has to go to keep some semblance of actual wildlife in the world. As our own species has taken over, we’ve tried to retain space for at least some of the others being pushed aside, shoring up their chances of survival. But the threats agains... posted on Sep 5 2013 (14,393 reads)