A house cleaning drop-out, Jon Foy, won the directorial award at the Sundance Film Festival for his homemade documentary, Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles. During the 5 year odyssey of making his film, he learned how to write, shoot, and edit, mostly in the bedroom of a shared group house in West Philadelphia.
17 years ago, a retired couple in Utah started making handmade wooden toys for poor and sick children. The little cars and trucks were received so enthusiastically in the local hospital, a workshop was set up which has since delivered more than 1.1 million toys to kids around the world -- a place where volunteers come to laugh and give their time in an effort to make kids happy around the globe.
The 86th Academy Awards will be a celebration of movie heroes, the producers announced this week. The theme for the March 2 live broadcast, hosted by Ellen DeGeneres, will honor big-screen real-life heroes, like "Gandhi" and "Erin Brockovich," as well as super heroes and animated heroes, both past and present.
Muscular dystrophy robbed Nick Torrance of his ability to walk and open his locker at school. Fortunately, Nick's high school classmates cared enough to used their robotics ingenuity to create an automatic locker opener.
Are you getting caught in the middle of relationship squabbles? Do you feel anxiety or fear around the economy, your job, or your personal level of success? Such drama always drains your energy and impacts your personal effectiveness. To put an end to the negativity and energy drain, a good friend of mine, Marlene Chism has a new book that helps you Stop The Drama.
In this delightful family movie based on a true story, a family of gray whales, stranded beneath the ice near the northern-most Alaskan town of Barrow, brings together old foes in an inspiring rescue operation that catches the attention of the whole world.
Most people think the world is more violent than ever, with more wars and murders, but in reality, we've never had it so peaceful. That's the thesis of a new book by prominent Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker. It uses graphs and statistics to reveal dramatic reductions in war deaths, family violence, racism, rape, and murder.
It's not just an "old adage" that tells us laughter is the best medicine these days. Scientists, doctors, mental health professionals, and patients themselves call humor a remedy for any ailment -- at least temporarily. In the book, 20 Things People with Cancer Want You to Know, the #1 statement in a recent survey of more than 600 survivors is, "I need to laugh – or just forget about cancer for a while." Now there is a resource and you can contribute to the funny file.
Not since the cute, yellow HIV-positive Muppet premiered in 2009 on Sesame Street in South Africa has a new character from the Workshop taken such a lead role in educating kids about a societal woe. The furry 7-year-old girl named Lily, will appear first tonight on an hour-long PBS special to raise awareness of the issue of hunger in America.
Optimism is something Hanks has never been shy about bringing to his movies, whether it is Forrest Gump's naïve faith in people or the dogged determination to survive in Cast Away, In his new film, Larry Crowne, opening Friday, he goes back to Community College after losing his job. Searching for something positive, that is what he finds.
"42" is an inspirational and ultimately uplifting drama about perseverance in the face of turbulent opposition. And the greatest credit to writer-director Brian Helgeland is that none of this is shown through grand melodramatic movie monologues, but through simple restraint on the screen.
CIA spies are the good guys for a change in Argo, Ben Affleck's shrewd reconstruction of a heroic real-life mission aimed at retrieving six Americans from Tehran during the 1979-1980 Iran hostage crisis. There's not a single gunshot fired over the course of the film and Affleck delivers an uplifting portrait of one mind-blowing chapter of the Agency's legacy.
An acclaimed author and journalist, Lori Hope, used a very personal challenge -- her own cancer diagnosis -- to create a practical guide for people who want to comfort and support a friend with cancer, but don't know what to say. After extensive interviews, the #1 statement that people with cancer want others to know, "I need to laugh – or just forget about cancer for a while."
For 91 years, James Henry, a lifelong fisherman, did not know how to read and write and carried the shame of not being able to order from a menu. Now 98, the Mystic, Connecticut man has changed that and penned a memoir full of short stories from his life at sea.
Valentine's Day can be the bane of any person's year. It can fling daggers of loneliness, rather than gentle arrows from Cupid. Instead of dreading another February 14th, use the science of mindfulness to make a healthy relationship resolution and rewire your brain for love.
Among all the fantastical superhero figures parading at this year's Comic-Con was the elegant and modest Congressman John Lewis, who has earned the moniker hero in real life. His incredible life story is now a graphic autobiography entitled March.Read More
Can you remember how good it feels when someone tells you how wonderful you are, or when you receive an unexpected thank-you gift in the mail? But, how can we sustain those feelings of happiness longer and more consistently on our own. Author Judith Umlas says we can actually have those feelings more abundantly when we make a point to acknowledge others. Studies show why it is beneficial for us to give positive acknowledgment to our fellow human beings.
In his new book What Addicts Know: 10 Lessons from Recovery to Benefit Everyone, Christopher Kennedy Lawford writes, I've dealt with a wide variety of individuals afflicted with the disease of addiction, and in my estimation they are the most interesting, fascinating, and gifted people I've come across. Yet, they are also the most challenging. Addicts are deviously manipulative and self-absorbed. Their illness causes suffering and pain for themselves, their loved ones, and the rest of society. Yet from their struggle comes an opportunity for all.
After years of fruitless searching, Facebook -- along with a maiden name -- delivered the keys to a long-awaited meeting Tuesday at a restaurant in Florida. When Stephanie Phillips and her mother first saw each other, the two hugged with tears in their eyes for a long time, not letting go.
U.S. retailers are extending deals into Cyber Monday and beyond to try to sustain a 13 percent gain in Thanksgiving weekend sales.
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Happiness is a mindset, a conscious choice we make every day