Awakin.org

Born at the Gandhi Ashram, in India, Jayesh Patel's journey of service is exemplary in every imaginable way. His father, Ishwar Patel, revolutionized the face of sanitation in the country, building 400 thousand toilets for the underprivileged communities and igniting more than a 100...

Anjali Desai is a polymath. Originally from Houston, Texas, she came to India in 2003 as an Indicorps Fellow. Her two-year fellowship on community development and women's empowerment turned into nine years and counting in India. She has worked on earthquake relief projects, been a...

Christopher and his daughter Aubrey's mission is to generate altruism in others. They do this through their labor of love project, lovelist.org In their own words, "There are many people who need things. While we help people based on situational need, we primarily focus on people...

Nearly five years ago, Sara was facing an unwanted divorce, taking care of her 18-month old daughter, and looking for a job during the economic fallout.  As she says, "I was depressed, and quite frankly, I was a mess."  Her picture-perfect life had been turned upside down, so...

Amit Dungarani is many things to many people.  To a valedictorian friend who grew up in his Arizona neighborhood, Amit is "one of the smartest guys I know."  To a six-year-old friend, he is the one who drives 4 hours to make the birthday cake celebration.  To his...

Thuy Nguyen has been practicing Chinese Medicine for 15 years. Through her experience, she has developed a simple but profound understanding of medicine and healing: that we are sick from the notion of separation -- from our bodies, from one another, from nature, from the present moment, from...

KindSpring has created a series of 21-Day Challenges designed to help individuals and groups grow in values that help create positive change. Irrespective of profession, age, culture or geography, when we commit to cultivating certain values we unleash a ripple effect that has the power to...

Aditi Chokshi is a remarkable "love warrior" of depth and character in the ServiceSpace ecosystem.  A management consultant at Bain & Company in San Francisco, where she advises a number of social sector and retail clients​, Aditi has spent eight years working on grassroots...

Having lived across the globe-- in places like London, Stockholm, California, Montreal, Oman, and now Dubai, Natasha Rockstrom is a global citizen with a passion to ignite generosity in all around her. It all began from the seeds of a business school social experiment,...

The first thing you'll notice are her shining eyes. Anne Veh is an incredible force of love. An artist, curator, mother, wife, seeker, convener of school kindness circles, interviewer extraordinaire, eternal kindergartner (a la eternal kindergarten teacher, Betty Peck),...

Ferial Pearson is an instructor at the University of Nebraska at Omaha in the College of Education and a former teacher in the Omaha Public Schools. She is the founder of The Secret Kindness Agents project. Ferial was a teacher at Ralston High School in Nebraska in 2012 when the news came from...

Liam Chai carries a depth of presence that transcends his 23 years. In 2011, while on track to study medicine, he began reading the writings of visionaries like Gandhi, Lao Tzu, Thoreau, and Fukuoka -- and found himself grappling with questions and new perspectives that...

Makala Kozo Hattori is a healer, counselor, host and writer who was diagnosed with stage 2 colorectal cancer in July 2015. Rather than pursue traditional Western medicine’s allopathic treatments, he chose a path of natural medicine, diet, spiritual practices, and relational healing....

"I'm here to help make the world more beautiful, inside and out." San Francisco Bay Area artist, Robert Bengtson, expresses his love for beauty through the mediums of photography, interactive art, wood, metal, plaster... and puts his creativity into inspiring the human spirit....

Jose Ramon Gonzalez (“Joserra”) is a service-hearted generosity entrepreneur, meditator, and activist for the common good. With his witty humor and kind heart, Joserra has a profound ability to connect with just about anyone he meets. Born in Burgos, Spain, a town placed in the...

What would happen if schools focused on kindness and gratitude before achievement and academics? This is a question that Andy Smallman not only entertained, but also acted upon. In 1994, Andy with a group of dedicated parents and their children started Puget Sound Community School [PSCS]...

"Getting sober, 18 years ago, was the most important catalyst and spiritual change in my life. I remember looking down at my dogs and seeing their utter dependency and need for me to be present, and without hesitation, I got up and poured my drink down the sink and never looked back."...

As a diamond merchant and savvy businessman in Surat, India, Parag Shah used to look for R.O.E. -- return on equity. While running one of the most successful companies in the industry at its peak, Parag felt that his cup of gratitude overflowed, and so he started doing lots of...

We live in a world where news stories are riddled with negativity; wars, crashes, political and social strife fill our living rooms and enter our most personal of space, our homes.  What are the implications for our neurological and physical health to be exposed to such negative news, and...

Once again this summer Service Space hosted a 10-week internship for students, with ages ranging from beginning high school to upperclass-persons in college! Each week, the interns were given readings and reflections, opportunities for silence, and experiments involving various personal...

Shamash Alidina, one of the UK’s most well-known mindfulness experts, is an accomplished mindfulness teacher, coach, speaker and author.  He is author of the international bestseller Mindfulness For Dummies, and more recently, of The Mindful Way through...

“Holiness is everywhere. It abides hidden in the infinite ordinary and seeks expression through our intimate recognition of it.” -- Bonnie Rose   As a former registered nurse, actress, and opera singer, Bonnie Rose's career trajectory has been anything but...

Everyone is an invited guest of the universe. Lobsang Phunstock tells the children of his community this frequently. But the message he received at a young age was the opposite: he was an uninvited guest of the universe. His mother was very young when she gave birth to him in the state of...

Around the age of twenty-two, a near death experience transformed Dr. Michael Penn into a seeker. Following this profound encounter with his own mortality, he began an extensive study of sacred texts and the works of the founders of the world’s religions. Today Professor Penn is a...

Melissa Stephens is a spirited elementary and middle school teacher with 24 years of classroom experience, a wife, and mother of three children. A woman of many talents, she currently serves as Student Activities Director, 5th grade Enrichment Teacher, 8th grade Leadership Coordinator, and 7th...

Ashima Goyal is an "ordinary" heroine who channels her talents and wide-ranging training to serve extra-ordinarily in small and large ways. A writer, an editor, a socio-emotional learning educator, an artist, a community-builder (and visionary behind Romania's first Karma...

Dallas-based therapist, activist, writer, community leader and speaker Michelle Kinder examines and teaches conscious leadership “from the inside out.” She offers practical, achievable steps for parents, teachers and others to support children’s social-emotional health, and for...

Shelly Ehler may be best known for her appearance on Shark Tank, but her lesser-known story of inner transformation that followed its airing is deeply enriching. On the surface, Shelly is an inspiring entrepreneur who took a simple idea, believed it with all her heart, and brought it to life. If...

Pavithra Sundareshan was 22 years old when, together with her husband and business partner, she started Vindhya, a business process outsourcing organization in Bangalore, India, which may be the first and only for-profit enterprise in which the majority of employees are people with disabilities...

Brian Conroy is a gifted storyteller who comes alive when he sees people of diverse faiths, races, and backgrounds working together. Founder of the Buddhist Storytelling Circle, a group of storytellers from the Berkeley Buddhist Monastery who perform at interfaith gatherings, he first encountered...

How can today’s Youth face the uncertain world while staying true to their values? How can Youth lead by example, by “Being The Change”? What practices or inner cultivation help nurture resilience and conviction to operate from their natural self?   Join us as we...

When entrepreneur and “love activist” Ryland Engelhart was feeling hopeless about the damage human beings were doing to the planet, there was a solution so obvious that it was practically hidden beneath his own two feet: the soil. Upon discovering that healthy food heals the soil that...

Join us on this heartful conversation with these 2 incredibly inspiring icons as we explore their inner journeys along with some stories and insights from their incredible work at Goonj.     Goonj’s work over last 2 decades has been instrumental in strengthening the...

Prahlad Singh Tipanya is a name that needs little introduction as one of the most compelling folk voices of Kabir in India today. He sings in the Malwi folk style from Madhya Pradesh and has an incomparable ability to sing and explain the words of Kabir, making them easily accessible to the...