How laughter can keep you on your spiritual path
Carmel Wroth | August 2009 issue Photograph: Money Sharma/EPA/Corbis A few years ago, I traveled throughout India looking for spiritual inspiration. Naturally, I wasn’t the first person to have done this. At all the temples, ashrams and holy mountains, I found crowds of Westerners looking for Read More...
How laughter evolved and how it makes us human
Blaine Greteman | August 2009 issue Two Neanderthals walk into a bar, order drinks, sit down and listen to the chattering, laughing crowd. Suddenly, one turns to the other and whispers, "Try to stay cool, but this sounds like one of those Homo sapiens joints." How would a Neanderthal know he was Read More...
Happiness is overrated
Paulo Coelho | August 2009 issue What is happiness? This is a question that has not bothered me for a long time, precisely because I don’t know how to answer it. I am not the only one. Throughout the years, I have lived with all sorts of people: rich and poor, powerful and mediocre. In the eyes Read More...
The art of receiving
Receiving is harder than giving, but can lead to even greater personal and spiritual growth. Hilary Hart | December 2008 issue During a visit to Paris, my mother bought me a gift and dropped it in the mail. I didn’t receive it very well. I tore away the brown paper packaging and, at the first Read More...
“You can be a tree”
Cynthia Beal, founder of the Natural Burial Company, thinks we should all become bushes, meadows or trees after we die. Marco Visscher | November 2008 issue What’s wrong with conventional burial? “Conventional burial typically has us preserved in formaldehyde-based fluid, packed in one box Read More...
Discuss your experiences with fighting cancer
David Servan-Schreiber, author of Anticancer: A New Way of Life, on diet, exercise and taking life seriously. Ode Editors | November 2008 issue What dietary choices do you recommend to help prevent cancer? “Instead of eating a plate of animal protein with a few vegetables, do it the other way: Read More...
“If you are not sure where you are going, it is possible you are on the right road”
James Geary | October 2008 issue Roads are our oldest artifacts. We create them instinctively, inadvertently, simply by going to and fro upon the Earth and walking up and down on it. With every step, wherever we turn, we either find a road or make one. Roads don’t go anywhere, though. Once Read More...
Heaven on earth
Who talked us into believing you have to die in order to live? Tijn Touber | October 2004 issue The notion of “detachment” is a central theme of nearly every spiritual or religious tradition. And in fact in many traditions, such as Buddhism, it is the primary goal. I, too, spent 16 years Read More...
With Socrates on the sofa
Why the philosopher has as much to offer as the therapistJurriaan Kamp | December 2004 issue German philosopher Gerd Achenbach was concerned about the growing group of people who subjected themselves to endless analysis of their mental problems, which didn’t seem to make any difference. He Read More...
Miracle on Elm Street
A happy reminder that hope still reigns in the worldJay Walljasper | November 2004 issue I am sitting right now in what I jokingly refer to as Ode’s Western Hemisphere Editorial Headquarters, a/k/a the back bedroom of my house in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA. At least that’s what I called it Read More...