Lauren Child, one of the world best known children’s authors and the creator of Charlie and Lola is donating the royalties from her best-selling book “That Pesky Rat” for three years to UNESCO’s Programme for the Education of Children in Need.

UNESCO created the Programme for the Education of Children in Need in 1992 to offer a future to vulnerable children through education. Since its creation, over US$33 million has been raised in private funds and these have been fully and directly invested into immediate support for over 332 projects in 92 countries worldwide.   Read more...

More than 300 colleges and universities give degrees in Peacebuilding and Peace Studies. The current spectrum of our peacebuilding expertise includes leading edge technologies in the fields of conflict resolution, peer mediation, post-conflict reconstruction and many other forms of alternative dispute resolution (ADR). Regrettably, current policy-making tends toward reactive, not proactive, approaches to reducing violence. We typically wait until violence has occurred and then ask our already over-taxed police and military to address these symptoms of violence through activities such as imprisonment of offenders and engagement in armed conflict. While such suppression of symptoms is vital, it is incomplete and must be augmented by stronger preventative measures, with a specific focus on the identification and treatment of root causes.

Please join us in saying, "I Stand for Peace." Help us save lives, save money, and save our country for future generations.   Read more...

Try this experiment for a week - or even just a day: Fix your plate as you normally would, but before you eat, take the time to determine how many servings of food you are taking in. You may be surprised to find out that you are ingesting 3-4x the recommended servings.   Read more...

“You will need to marry five men then."

Said Mama, with a poker face and without looking at me. She kept knitting calmly while I sat there with my mouth agape. I looked at her expressionless face and noticed the suppressed smile hovering at the corner of her mouth. From her face, I gauged that she was aware of my torrent of questions that she knew would follow her declaration, and was waiting for me to speak first.

This happened some two decades ago, when arranged marriages were quite prevalent in India and mama told me that they have looked for a match and I must be prepared to get married soon.   Read more...

Life shows “me” that “Eyes” and “Me’s” don’t really matter. What so called individuals want isn’t what happens, what needs to happen and what makes us happy. Happiness seems to fall on to people, in unexpected moments, in unexpected ways and certainly not when worked on by “I’s”.   Read more...

This is a call for license plates from around the world! If you see a license plate bearing witness to peace in any aspect, will you send it to me please at SeedsDrCorso@comcast.net? We want to see if we can get them from all 50 states of the U.S.A. and all the countries of the world. So far, we’ve covered Virginia and Massachusetts.   Read more...

Waves of information overload the senses. Awkward truths encourage many to get comfortably numb. Then technology lands us in a strange place, some off-beat world, where legislators sit stunned into silence as the whole of society turns itself upside down.

Now we think sideways and sort by opportunity. We talk in metaphors, because the source-code for public discourse has been hijacked by fanatics. There are no procedures for these circumstances, no maps for these territories. A mediated reality has infused us with simultaneously a sense of loss and a sense of excitement. It is as though the moment has gripped us and won’t let go.   Read more...

Some days, you just won’t feel like working out. Maybe you haven’t been able to get as much sleep as you need or you've been having some stress at work or in your personal life. No matter the reason, sometimes you just aren’t in the mood for moving and sweating. Whenever this happens to you, try these strategies for working up the desire to hit the gym:

Remind Yourself of Your Goals - Start thinking about why you started exercising in the first place and what the end results will be. Do you want to lose a certain amount of weight? Get more toned? Have more energy? A quick reminder of why exercise is important to you can be just the motivation that you need to eek out another set of reps.   Read more...

When I gave motivational speeches to nuclear scientists many years ago, I used to ask them all a question.

Do you think world peace is a good idea?

To a person, they all thought it was rhetorical—every single time. I had to assure them that I didn’t ask rhetorical questions, and I always asked it aloud a second time.

Do you think world peace is a good idea?

A mixed alto and soprano rumble usually began in the room amongst the women present, those who carried into life the sons and daughters who might have to go to war in a world crisis. Then the men in the room would jump on the theoretical bandwagon and agree. The rumble got some tenor and basso notes.   Read more...

Sasaya is a small rural village in Northeastern Japan. It consists of one street with houses on both sides. Behind these long narrow homes runs a river, which considerately divides itself to flow on both sides of the street. The water is crisp and cool, coming straight off the mountain. Locals use it as is for drinking and cooking. And since it never freezes, despite the rugged winters in that area, it is appreciatively used year round.

Behind this small fast-flowing river are huge vegetable patches bursting with summer produce that bring tomatoes and cucumbers, onions and squash, daikon and potatoes to the family table. Since the one and only supermarket is a long drive away, homegrown food is a fact of life, as it has been for centuries.   Read more...