Monthly Archives: January 2026

Making A Difference: Taking Action

Making A Difference: Taking Action is a Choice

And that Choice is Available to Us Every day

By Zoe Leitner, age 18, New Jersey.

I have a history of taking action. I believe that action is the most honest form of belief. Conviction means little unless it alters how we behave—what we build, what we interrupt, and what we refuse to ignore. Awareness is only a beginning; agency begins when we decide to respond.

My understanding of action began somewhere ordinary: the kitchen. For my mom and me, baking together, mostly chocolate, was routine, almost background noise. But in 2020, I realized that familiarity could be a tool for change. I started selling over 600 hot chocolate bombs in my community, raising more than $4,000 and reaching over 80 families. I didn’t do it to seek recognition, but in response to what I saw around me: needs that could be met, even in small ways.

The project worked not because of novelty, but because it was accessible. Participation didn’t require prior experience, complicated forms, or large commitments. Anyone could contribute in a meaningful way. It was easy to understand, easy to engage with, and immediately relevant to the people it aimed to serve. What mattered most was how the money was used afterward. Instead of deciding what organizations might need, I asked them. Jackets instead of cash. Food instead of flyers. Listening reshaped my understanding of service: meaningful help begins with attention, not assumption.

That lesson stayed with me. In 2023, I founded Chocolate4Charity, a nonprofit that channels my love of baking into meaningful impact. Through partnerships with Pink Jewels Boutique, David Chad Beauty Parlor, Nicole Nicosia Hair, and Smith & Company Gifts, we’ve sold over 800 boxes, raising nearly $10,000 for causes I care deeply about: $3,000 to the Mark Schonwetter Holocaust Education Foundation, $3,500 to the Montclair Animal Shelter, $1,000 to MIB Agents Pediatric Cancer Research, and 200 chocolate boxes donated to Comfort Zone Bereavement Camps.. Over 80 students have joined me in volunteering, packaging, and delivering chocolates, discovering firsthand how small actions ripple outward. Each box doesn’t just deliver chocolate; it gives people a chance to contribute, participate, and see the real impact of their efforts.

Chocolate is the vehicle, not the focus. Some causes reflect my family’s history. Supporting Holocaust education honors my great-grandparents, Holocaust survivors, and my grandparents, immigrants, whose experiences shaped my understanding of responsibility. Other causes reflect friendship, grief, and compassion, such as supporting a peer battling cancer, helping children navigate loss, and advocating for animal rights.

The most important measure of success is not the money raised but the number of people who participate. Many people want to help but hesitate because they do not know where to begin. Chocolate4Charity offers an accessible entry point through packaging chocolates, sharing a cause, or delivering donations. I have watched classmates who rarely speak up—over 80 in total—discover a sense of purpose simply by stepping into action. Real impact begins not with grand gestures but with invitations that inspire others to act.

In 2025, I was honored as a Top Upstander at an event organized by a library in Montclair, New Jersey, in collaboration with children’s book author Dr. Janice Cohn. The recognition was meaningful, but I do not see it as a title or an accolade. To me, being an Upstander is deliberate. It is the refusal to remain passive once you notice something that needs attention. It is the choice to respond, even when the right path is unclear or imperfect.

This understanding resonates with a message Dr. Janice Cohn often shares: “Light a tiny candle.” Action is not about being seen; it’s about aligning belief with our behavior. It is found in everyday decisions—listening, offering help, stepping forward when silence would be easier. That philosophy continues to guide my work with Chocolate4Charity and in other parts of my life.

Being an Upstander, like any meaningful action, is not a single moment. It’s a practice, a habit, and a commitment to notice what others might overlook. In that sense, recognition matters less than the choices that lead to it. Action remains its own reward.

Action began in a kitchen for me, with melted chocolate and a question I could not ignore: What will I do with what I see? That question has guided every choice I’ve made since that first chocolate, and to the moments when I have chosen to speak, listen, and act.

Meaningful change requires aligning belief with behavior, noticing what needs attention, and inviting others to work with you. Real impact is rarely sudden or dramatic. It is built from small, intentional acts that ripple outward, shaping communities, relationships, and lives in ways that are often invisible, yet enduring.

I truly believe taking action is a choice, and that choice is available to us every day. That’s where responsibility begins, and that’s where belief becomes real!

—Zoe Leitner, Age 18, New Jersey.

One Wrong Thing

By Alexa Dunsche, age 13, New York.

Don’t be quiet at school
otherwise people won’t like you;

be kind
but don’t be too kind otherwise it’ll come off as desperate;

you have to keep up with your work
but don’t go too far ahead otherwise you are a “goody two shoes”;

you have to be yourself
but you also have to be what other people want you to be in order to fit in;

“Aren’t you the quiet kid in school?”

you have to be nice to everyone
even if they don’t treat you right;

“I have to be quiet because if I stand up for myself,
I will get shut down”;

you have to be loud and proud
otherwise no one will hear you;

“You are doing everything wrong!”

you have to smile for the picture
even if where you are smiling is purgatory;

you have to keep your cards close to your chest
but not too close otherwise people will think you are hiding something;

you can’t dress in black otherwise people will think you are emo
but you can’t dress too colorful either, otherwise people will look at you
like a little kid;

you have to follow the trends
but you can’t be too invested in them because it’s not cool the next day;

“I’m trying!”

you have to stay and not cry
because if you do, they will get pleasure;

you have to be perfect.
you just have to be.

if you make one little mistake,
you’re a failure;

one bad mark
can damage your grade forever;

one misstep
can send you to the hospital with a cast on your leg;

one wrong move
and you lose the game;

one new friend
and you lose the whole friend group;

one public embarrassment
and no one can be seen with you;

one wrong thing
not the whole story

By Alexa Dunsche, age 13, grade 7, New York. Alexa adds: “This poem came from the pressure I feel to be perfect, and how one wrong move can feel like it ruins everything. In the moment, I felt like each mistake I made erased everything else. Writing this poem helped me realize it doesn’t have to be that way. One wrong thing can feel huge, but it doesn’t define who you are.”

Imagine…

“Just a tiny candle we lit. It wasn’t much. But it was something.”
—Gary Svee, an editor at the Billings Gazette, 1994.

The quote above appears on the cover of the new edition of my book, The Christmas Menorahs: How A Town Fought Hate.

The book recounts the true story of the extraordinary 1993 holiday season in Billings, Montana, when the town took a united, courageous stand against hate and bigotry. The citizens of Billings were perplexed by the national attention their actions received. “Just a tiny candle we lit,” said Gary Svee, an editor at the Billings Gazette.

And yet…imagine how different our country (and the world) would be if people in every community just “lit a tiny candle” against hate and injustice.

Now imagine if the actions of all young people, who “lit a tiny candle” were recognized and honored.

At a time when the problems and challenges of young people today are routinely discussed, imagine if the actions of young people who have shown moral courage and compassion on behalf of others could be routinely highlighted.

In December 2025, my town library in Montclair, New Jersey, presented a special holiday event that celebrated some of Montclair’s young Upstanders and featured a reading of portions of The Christmas Menorahs, along with an excerpt from the acclaimed 1995 PBS documentary, Not In Our Town, which cinematically tells this story of how the people of Billings took a strong stand against hate and bigotry.

The book reading and film were meant to inspire the audience. But much inspiration came from hearing about the actions of the young people who were being honored.

What makes a child or adolescent an Upstander? Is it a dramatic, brave, morally courageous act? Is it less dramatic, quieter acts of compassion and kindness towards others in need, or can being a true Upstander encompass both—or either?

The research shows that when children and adolescents stand up for—and take actions to help—others in need, it can help them as well by enhancing their self-esteem, lowering their stress and anxiety, and even improving their academic performance.

That’s why it’s important for communities (whether those communities are schools, houses of worship, or towns) to recognize and honor young Upstanders. This could be for actions taken on behalf of other Americans or on behalf of people around the world.

My book, Freedom Pancakes For Ukraine, published in 2024, tells the story of a Ukrainian refugee boy, displaced by the current war in his country, and an American girl who wanted to find a way to help the Ukrainian children.

One of the reasons I wrote it was to encourage American children and adolescents to realize that they can counteract their feelings of helplessness when hearing about war and injustice by taking positive action and making a difference, however small they may think that difference is.

Time magazine recently named its 2025 “Kid of the Year.” The winner featured on its cover, Tejasvi Manoj, used her exceptional computer skills and her “on-site” experts—her parents—to create an extraordinary website, Shield Seniors, which will help protect countless seniors from consumer scams.

My dream is to have a national movement to encourage young people to stand up and help others. They don’t have to possess exceptional skills or expertise since every young person has the ability to help another human being in some way. They may not end up on the cover of Time magazine, but their actions should be recognized and honored.

During these difficult, divisive times, let’s encourage thousands of “tiny candles” to be lit by young people on behalf of those in need. It will be good for them, as well as for the people they stand up for, and thus help make our world a better place for all.

You may also be interested in the article I have written for young people, in Skipping Stones magazine about Upstanders.

Dr. Janice Cohn is a psychotherapist and children’s book author. She can be contacted at: janice@drjanicecohn.com. The Christmas Menorahs: How A Town Fought Hate, this 30^th Anniversary edition was a winner of the 2025 Skipping Stones Book Awards. You can read a review of the book here.

On Being An Upstander

A lot has been written and discussed about the problems and challenges that many of you face as you try to navigate a difficult, complex world.

But in my view, there hasn’t been nearly enough focus on those of you who—despite your challenges—have taken a stand to make the world a better place by courageously combating hate, bigotry, and bullying, and showing kindness and compassion toward others.

I’m Dr. Janice Cohn, a psychotherapist and book author, who writes about “Upstanders” of all ages, people who have shown exceptional moral courage. A number of young Upstanders were honored at our local public library in Montclair, New Jersey, this past December, in a moving celebration called “The Courage to Care.” The event’s title acknowledged that it’s not always easy to take a stand on behalf of what’s right or to extend a hand of kindness and compassion toward others. Often, it’s easier to do nothing. But many young people in my town (as I’m sure is true in your town) decided to take action. For example:

Twelfth grader Zoe Leitner started a non-profit, Chocolate for Charity, that raised thousands of dollars for a local woman’s shelter, a bereavement camp, Holocaust education, and more.

Seventh grader Wells went out of his way to make a new student to our country feel welcomed by bringing him into his friend group and inviting him in their daily outings.

When eleventh grader Anna learned that SNAP benefits for families would be suspended, she organized a food drive at her school, made posters to publicize it, and delivered the collected food to a local food pantry.

Now think about what you might do, or what other young people could do. How might you stand up for others too? And how can you help to spread the word about the importance of Upstanders?

Please take a look at my article, Imagine… on the Skipping Stones website and see if that gives you any ideas.

Dr. Janice Cohn can be reached at janice@drjanicecohn.com Dr. Cohn has authored several books, including The Christmas Menorahs: How A Town Fought Hate (this 30^th Anniversary edition was a winner of the 2025 Skipping Stones Book Awards. You can read a review of the book here).

A Longing for Unity in a Fractured Time

A meaningful encounter with Swami Vivekananda in Chicago
By Anu Prabhala, Maryland.

With everything unfolding in our nation and across the world, I found myself longing—almost aching—for a message of unity. I have never encountered that idea expressed more beautifully or more boldly than in Swami Vivekananda’s address at the World Parliament of Religions in Chicago in 1893.

What he offered was not a soft call for tolerance, but a radical reimagining of unity itself: unity across religions, yes—but also between science and philosophy, reason and faith, intellect and intuition. His words dissolved borders we insist on keeping rigid—between belief systems, nations, even between what we call perfection and imperfection—revealing them instead as expressions of a single, indivisible truth.

At the heart of his message was a simple yet demanding idea: happiness does not arise from narrowing identity, but from expanding it. As Vivekananda put it, “Happiness comes best from universal consciousness.” And to reach that expansiveness, he insisted, we must loosen our grip on the anxious, isolated self: “To gain universal individuality, this miserable little-person individuality must go.”

More than a century later, the address endures—not only for its philosophical clarity, but for its quiet poetry and moral courage.

Photo: Swami Vivekananda in Chicago, 1893 (handwritten words say, “one infinite pure and holy—beyond thought beyond qualities I bow down to thee”). Credit: The Art Institute of Chicago.

When Two Worlds Quietly Merged:
I felt the full weight of that courage standing in Fullerton Hall at the Art Institute of Chicago, where Swami Vivekananda delivered his world-altering address—just one floor below George Seurat’s Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, one of my favorite paintings of all time. In that moment, two long-standing currents of my life converged: my love of art, particularly French painting, and my grounding in Vedanta, a philosophy that feels like a pair of well-worn jeans: real, practical, comforting, and quietly accepting.

Art and philosophy, France and India, my adopted country and my birthplace—under one roof, they did not compete. They conversed.

That is what happens, I have learned, when we allow the world to shape us: the Self expands to make room for more of humanity, not less.

Humble Rooms, World-Altering Ideas:
The room itself was modest—neither grand nor theatrical. Its restraint felt fitting. History reminds us repeatedly that transformative ideas rarely announce themselves with spectacle. Mahatma Gandhi, a failed lawyer, reshaped a nation. Franz Kafka, an anxious bureaucrat, altered world literature. John Harrison, a self-taught carpenter, solved the longitude problem that changed navigation forever.

Photo: Fullerton Hall’s podium, where Swami Vivekananda delivered his address in 1893.

And Swami Vivekananda—a nearly penniless, 30-year-old monk from India—arrived in America after a long sea voyage to speak at what was then a radical gathering: a Western, Christian, male-dominated Parliament of Religions. His courage lay not just in showing up, but in declaring—without apology—that no single tradition owned the truth.

As he told the audience plainly, “If anyone here hopes that his unity will come by the triumph of any one of the religions and the destruction of the others, to him I say, ‘Brother, yours is an impossible hope.’”

Plurality as Sacred Truth:
For Swami Vivekananda, the universe’s beauty lay precisely in its plurality—in many paths converging toward one reality. He captured this vision with enduring grace:

“As the different streams, having their sources in different places, all mingle their waters in the sea… so the different paths which men take all lead to Thee.”

In a world increasingly fractured by certainty and fear, his tone feels almost maternal—firm, reassuring, deeply confident in the human spirit. From his very first words—“Brothers and sisters of America”—he transformed a formal assembly into a human family, drawing a standing ovation that lasted nearly two minutes.

Unity, for him, was not sentimental. It was a moral necessity.

He explained this idea through an image as simple as it was profound: a seed planted in the earth. Surrounded by soil, air, and water, the seed does not become any one of them. It grows according to its own law—assimilating what it needs while remaining true to its nature. So too, he argued, with religion, each tradition must grow in its own way, enriched by others, yet never erased by them. It was this insistence on growth and individuality rather than imitation that gave his words such enduring force.

A Childhood Trained in Coexistence:
His message resonated deeply with my own upbringing in Dadar Parsi Colony in Mumbai, where a Zoroastrian agiary, Hindu temples, and a mosque existed within a few hundred feet of one another. You prayed to your own gods, and then, as children, we came together to play. Coexistence required no explanation.

That innocence was shaken during the Hindu–Muslim riots of the 1990s, when curfews confined us indoors for weeks and fear fractured neighborhoods that had once lived generously with difference. It was my first encounter with how easily love for the divine can be manipulated into division.

That is why Vivekananda’s message feels so urgent today. He reminded the world that faith is not defined by labels, but by a deeply human plea for meaning, reassurance, and strength in moments of vulnerability. Faith, in that sense, speaks a universal language.

He said, “So long as there is such a thing as weakness in the human heart, so long as there is a cry going out of the heart of man in his very weakness, there shall be a faith in God.”

What he seemed to suggest was that true faith is not defined by religious labels at all, but by a deeply human plea—for meaning, for strength, for reassurance in moments of vulnerability. In that sense, faith speaks a universal language, capable of being heard by many names.

Not Belief, but Becoming:
Vivekananda also offered a quiet corrective: religion, he argued, is not about struggling to believe doctrines, but about realizing truth—about being and becoming. What mattered was not the form of God one worshipped, but the character one cultivated. Did faith enlarge the heart? Did it make room for others? Did it foster harmony?

In his vision, religion was not about believing in God. It was about becoming more fully human—again and again, with tolerance and acceptance at the center of the effort.

Perhaps that is why his words endure. In a fractured world, Vivekananda reminds us that unity is not an idea to defend, but a way of being to practice—and that only through a serene soul can we truly see the beauty of the world, and our place within it.

Let us learn to see beauty in unity. It is the only way humanity sustains itself.

Meaningfully yours,
Anu Prabhala

PS: Swami Vivekananda delivered a series of six speeches between September 11 -27, 1893 at the World Parliament of Religions in Chicago. Read a transcript of all six speeches here. Here’s an audio recording of his first speech (~28 minutes) delivered on September 11th, 1893.

Bio: Anu Prabhala is a senior consulting writer at the World Bank and a former French instructor who has spent her career working with nonprofit organizations in international development. Inspired by Vedanta, her personal writing explores travel and cross-cultural encounters as pathways to understanding beauty, wisdom, and our shared humanity.

This article, reprinted with permission from Anu’s Substack, Imperfectly Perfect, is part of a chapter from her forthcoming travel memoir, Imperfectly Perfect: Love Letters to the World | A Travel Memoir of Beauty, Scars, and the Human Spirit. To stay informed on the publication of the book, you can subscribe to Anu’s Substack at https://imperfectlyperfect.substack.com/subscribe (Subscription is free; choose “no pledge”).

Poems by Youtao Cao

Poems by Youtao Cao, Age 9, Japan

1. The Sea Keeps Its Own Time

The sea never hurries.
It breathes in slow, patient rhythm—
a pulse older than language,
older than the gulls that cry
over its restless shoulder.

Some mornings it shines like forgiveness,
all silver and soft-spoken.
Other days it roars,
throwing salt and grief against the shore
as if to remind the land
how fragile it really is.

I stand at its edge,
barefoot in the cold sand,
and it tells me nothing—
no secrets, no promises,
just the steady truth of motion:
come and go, come and go.

And maybe that’s enough—
to know that even when I leave,
the sea will still be breathing,
keeping its own time,
unbothered,
endlessly alive.

2. Joy, Unscripted

Joy doesn’t always arrive
with trumpets or fireworks—
sometimes it tiptoes in
soft as breath on a mirror.
It’s not always loud.
Sometimes it’s the silence
after the rain,
when the world smells like hope
and everything feels newly forgiven.
Joy lives
in a cracked joke between friends,
in a song you forgot you loved
playing in a store you weren’t supposed to enter.
It’s in the way your dog looks at you
like you’re the best poem ever written.
It’s that rush
when the sun breaks through gray clouds
and paints gold on your skin.
It’s finishing the last page
of a book that understood you
before you understood yourself.
Joy doesn’t wait
for a perfect moment.
It grows like weeds
between sidewalk cracks—
wild, stubborn, and free.
So maybe joy isn’t a destination.
Maybe it’s the way you walk the road—
barefoot,
arms wide,
laughing at nothing,
and everything.

3. Where the River Thinks

Poetry is the wind through pine,
A hush before the storm,
It carves the cliffs like patient time,
That sets the silence warm.

It’s rain that knows the weight of stone,
A leaf that writes the air,
A spark the mountain keeps alone,
But always longs to share.

It blooms where language loses shape,
Where roots outgrow the ground—
Poetry is nature’s secret tape,
Wound tight, then gently unwound.

4. Sunlit Shore

The waves come dancing, soft and slow,
Their laughter chimes in tones of gold.
The sand remembers every toe—
A map of footsteps, warm and old.
The breeze is sweet with salt and sun,
It hums lullabies to seashells white.
The tide brings gifts at break of dawn—
A starfish, smooth as morning light.
Oh, stretch your hands to catch the sky,
Let summer paint you bright and free.
The ocean sings—just listen nigh—
It’s singing songs of peace and glee.

5. The Birch’s Whisper

Silver light drips through the canopy,
a thousand suns trembling on dewy grass.
The river hums in fractured tongues,
carving secrets into smooth obsidian.
Wind unties the mountains’ knots,
scattering snow like forgotten letters.
A fox pauses in the firelight,
ears twitching to the earth’s slow pulse.
Dawn spills from a cracked acorn,
growing roots where my shadow blurs.
The world exhales—
and I am caught in its breath.

All five poems were written by by Youtao Cao, age 9, Japan. He adds: “I am a multilingual writer currently living in Tokyo, Japan. At home, I speak Chinese. I study in English at an international school and am also learning French and Japanese.
“I have a deep love for reading and writing in English. So far, I have read over 500 English books—more than 100,000 pages in total—and I especially enjoy stories and poems that explore memory, identity, nature, and emotion.”

Art by Youtao Cao, age 9, Japan

A New Year’s Message, 2026

Amma’s New Year Message for 2026

Amma, the world-renowned spiritual teacher and a humanitarian leader from India, shared her thoughts on the current state of humanity as we welcome the new year. Her talk attended by several thousand residents and international visitors at her center in Kerala (South India) was broadcast live on YouTube. She included many illuminating stories and sublime points to help us grow spiritually, and to make our lives better. To conclude her remarks she urged everyone to follow these 12 suggestions, if we are serious about improving ourselves, our family life, and our the world. While she spoke in her native tongue of Malayalam, it was simultaneously translated in several European and Indian languages. We are pleased to share her suggestions (exhortations) with a few minor edits.

—editor

1. Since time cannot be postponed or carried forward into the future, use it with the utmost care. Create a daily routine and adhere to it as much as possible, with discipline.

2. Write down your personal weaknesses and negative habits on paper. Dedicate one specific day each week to consciously work on overcoming each of them.

3. Strive to be more mature and refined today—at least in one aspect of life—than you were yesterday.

4. Spend a little time each day cultivating awareness of nature. In your imagination, embrace and love all of creation.

5. Awaken the selfless love within you. Let love express itself through you every day. Care for at least one plant with devotion each and every day.

6. When praise or blame, victory or defeat comes your way, reflect deeply and remind yourself that your true Self transcends all of these.

7. Nurture the virtue of forgiveness. Generously forgive the mistakes of others—and learn to forget them as well. This will help both you and your relationships with others.

8. Every day, devote at least a short period to performing your actions with complete awareness and presence.

9. Use all natural resources with mindfulness and care. In life, place greater emphasis on what you have been able to give, rather than on what you have received.

10. Cultivate humility and simplicity. Respect the opinions of others and move forward through cooperation and mutual understanding.

11. Meditate on the form of your Guru—your spiritual teacher (if you don’t have one, you can meditate on supreme consciousness or the flame of a candlelight) for sometime each day. Then remain silent for a while, resting your attention in your own true nature.

12. Cultivate an attitude of gratitude for the blessings you have received in life. Also, learn to accept personal responsibility for your mistakes, sufferings, and losses—what could you have done differently to avoid them?

What we need is not a mind that revels in the little, but a mind that seeks the sublime. Awaken. Elevate yourself. And uplift others as well.

In A Winter Wonderland

The winter is here, and there is snow.
I hope for a white Christmas this year.
It’s freezing; the temperature is low.
I want to go outside, but “No, no, no!”
I forgot my jacket, “Oh dear!”
The winter’s here, and there’s snow.
Through the windows I see Christmas trees that glow.
Now is the time of good wishes and cheer.
It’s freezing; the temperature is low.
The winter’s here, and there’s snow.
Sitting inside with hot chocolate, watching a holiday show.
For me, winter is nothing to fear.

By Neila Ebadian, age 11, Washington.