# Inspiring

Former Businessman Turns to Comic Books to Create Positive Change Through Inspiring Stories

Sensing a mid-life crisis, a successful 35-year-old Japanese businessman quit his job believing it was time to do something positive with his life instead of just making money. He turned to what he loved most, manga (or anime), the graphic comic book novels popularized by Japanese animators. Normally the medium for superheroes, he uses manga to tell tales of real life heroes, such as the Dalai Lama and Ghandi, to create positive change within young people and society.

# Inspiring

Chicago-area Firefighters Help Latin America

A year ago, an earthquake in southern Chile devastated towns, flattening fire stations and equipment that could have been used in the rescue efforts. This week, an Illinois pastor has mobilized 10 Chicago-area firefighters who will travel to the South American country to train about 100 firefighters, bringing along discarded but usable firefighting gear.

# Inspiring

Medical Miracle as Adopted Son Gets to Repay Mom With a Kidney

Facing 7 or 8 years on the organ donor waiting list, an ailing Massachusetts mom, having exhausted all possibilities for kidney matches with blood relatives, found her miracle organ match in her grown adopted son from El Salvador.

# Inspiring

Meditation Class Helps Lower Violence at Alabama Prison

A prison outside Birmingham has become the model for a meditation program that officials say helps inmates learn the self control and social skills they never got in the outside world. About 10 percent of the prison's inmates have completed the program, which really works.

# Inspiring

President Obama Honors 15 Presidential Medal of Freedom Recipients

Today, President Barack Obama named fifteen recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Nation's highest civilian honor. The Medal of Freedom is presented to individuals who have made especially meritorious contributions to the security or national interests of the United States, to world peace, or to cultural or other significant public or private endeavors. Mr. Obama described the annual awards as one of his favorite duties.

# Inspiring

How Yoga is Transforming a Kenyan City

In Nairobi, the Africa Yoga Project is training HIV+, poor, and disabled citizens to be yoga instructors, creating jobs and changing lives. Most of the 3,000 weekly students are aged 16-30, living on about $2 a day, and many live in Nairobi slums with HIV/AIDS.

# Inspiring

Amazing Photo: Egyptians Send Support to Wisconsin Protestors

A photo uploaded to his Twitter account by Zack Farley shows a demonstrator in Egypt holding a sign that reads, Egypt Supports Wisconsin Workers. Standing amidst Egyptian flags waved in support of his people's victory over an oppressive regime, the young man's yellow sign sums up the modern internet age: One World, One Pain.

# Inspiring

A Moving Look at Japanese Kids and their Homeroom Teacher

In the award-winning documentary Children Full of Life, a fourth-grade class in a primary school in Kanazawa, northwest of Tokyo, learn lessons about compassion from their homeroom teacher, Toshiro Kanamori.