Sherwin Nuland was known affectionately as Shep by my family. He and my father were young roommates – physicians-in-training in London in the late 1950s.

In my work with social justice advocates across the world, I’ve noticed that those who are most passionate and committed approach challenges with a heart of compassion.  Which is why I loved writing about Maggie Doyne for Huffington Post this week. Maggie is a 27-year-old woman from NJ who first set off to see the […]

For the past 85 years, my family has been handing down the skeletal remains of someone we call Felix. While this may sound sinister or downright peculiar, let me assure you that Felix holds a cherished position in our family. He’s a silent but reliable teacher and a master at imparting lessons of impermanence…

In the days before class, I found myself going through all of my possessions, clutching photos of family, friends and places, wishing the teacher had asked for 10 things instead of 5. But being the ever-dutiful student, here are the 5 I came up with…

I longed to be grounded once again in the reality of my everyday life. The familiar messiness. These very piles of paper. My work. The cacophony of street noises on my New York block. The personalities that drive me to distraction.

In the 1940s, Robert Stephenson Smyth Baden-Powell — who was credited with founding the Scout Movement — wrote a letter found in his desk drawer after his death. Within it was his now-famous advice to Scouts around the globe: “Try and leave this world a little better than you found it.”

By the time I was in my mid-twenties, I was so hopelessly addicted to travel that I vowed to combine it with my ideals – vaguely defined as anti-poverty and women’s rights – and somehow cobble together a career out of it. As part of my jobs, I traveled to Bangladesh, Thailand, Kenya, Egypt, Israel, Palestine, Peru. I loved being invited into the lives of locals…

Like unexpected money found in last season’s coat pocket, I discovered a scrap of paper in my wallet this morning. It’s a quote I must have torn out of a magazine and tucked away for a rainy day, by Charlotte Joko Beck. On this gray day that’s neither winter nor spring, when my mood seems to match the weather, I’m glad to have found it…