Feeling unappreciated? Sick of wasting time on mindless things? Release your inner Pigeon of Discontent.

Their religion forbids a traditional prom, but an all-girl dance allowed these girls to really let their hair down. Literally.

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The Life-Lifter: Seeing-eye dogs are awesome. But what's even more awesome is when a labrador is the seeing-eye dog for...a golden retriever.

Photo: Courtesy of Harmony Books

Before a run or jog, does your typical warm-up involve queuing up a fast-tempo playlist and setting the volume level to "block-out-the-world"?

There's nothing wrong with that, but for variety's sake, you might want to try tuning in to a different kind of audio during your next workout--like your breathing, and the sound of your feet hitting the ground, and the swish of your arms. Sakyong Mipham, the Tibetan lama and leader of the Shambhala Buddhism community, is (naturally) a strong advocate of this kind of in-the-moment workout. The Sakyong (his title means "the king" in Tibetan) may spend a fair amount of time on a prayer mat, but he's also an athlete who has completed nine and a half marathons, and his recently-published book, Running With the Mind of Meditation, serves as a guide for integrating elements of meditation into the physical act of running.

Basically, the Sakyong advocates tuning into how the run makes us feel (even if the answer is, "pretty crappy"), and claims this will help strengthen powers of concentration, bring clarity and calm to our day, and might even bring us a little closer to enlightenment. Considering the Sakyong's fitness level and appearance (he's nearing 50, but looks much younger, as you can see in the photo to the left), he's definitely on to something, whether it be running, meditation, or doing both at once.

We figured that it might be kind of tricky to skim the Sakyong's book while pounding the pavement, so we asked him to create a mini-meditation that you can listen to on your computer while stretching, on your iPhone while you're on the road. As the Sakyong says, "Let's go for a meditative run."

Keep reading:
Meditate while you work out
More mini meditations you can incorporate into your day

Photo: Thinkstock

Okay, don't be disappointed: when motivational speaker and business consultant Marcus Buckingham talks about the "teacup generation," he does not actually mean "a generation of tiny adorable people, kind of like teacup poodles." (I know, that would be really cute.) 

Photo: Robert Trachtenberg

We all know that the way you treat your body can have a big impact on your health and longevity, regardless of the date of birth printed on your driver's license. The same is true when it comes to your money. If you think financial maturity is something that develops naturally as the years pass, it's time for a wake-up call.  

Today's thank you game challenge is to thank someone who is having a hard day or difficult time right now.
 
I would like to thank my Co-Presidents of OWN Sheri Salata and Erik Logan working hard to build a network and consistently make the next right move. I would like to thank Alex, a young woman I met at the vet at midnight 2 months ago.  Her house had burned down and her cat was burned in the fire.  She was there to put her cat down. I was there because my dog had eaten chocolate. The day before her mother had wrecked her car. So she was homeless, car-less and without her beloved cat of 8 years. And yet had the wisdom to say "the Universe must really want me to release attachment to things."
 
I would also like to thank my friend and younger big brother Tyler Perry; his backlot studio was damaged by fire last night. His attitude in the midst of it all was calm and feeling blessed no one was injured. Real Grace under fire.

—Oprah

Photo: Thinkstock

“Record my voice, so that when I get killed at least you’ll have something of me.” This, from Meena, an Afghan teenager who is confined to her home  -- but who writes poetry in secret. The New York Times Magazine's chilling, must-read essay on Meena and other Afghan women like her offers a little perspective into the ways in which we express ourselves. So many of us take for granted things like communicating our opinions, being able to write our own truths -- our frustrations with creating so often have to do with not finding the right word, not with the threat of death should we be discovered.

But Meena and others like her have found that secret literary groups, where they phone in poems for literate women to transcribe, allow them to express themselves -- their frustrations at their controlled existences, at being forced to marry people they don't want to, or not having access to education or ways to support themselves. In Meena's case, tradition dictates that she marry one of her dead fiancé's brothers. According to the Times: "She doesn’t dare protest directly, but reciting poetry to Amail allows her to speak out against her lot...Pashtun poetry has long been a form of rebellion for Afghan women, belying the notion that they are submissive or defeated."

Can you imagine it -- really imagine it -- not being allowed to so much as express an opinion? Can you imagine the release you would feel, finally having a chance, through poetry, to communicate -- even if it had to be shrouded in metaphor and mystery? These women (the poets, the scribes who help them) are truly brave. But they also remind us of the power of art -- whether it's poetry or music or dance or whatever it is -- to say the unsayable. In this case, literally.

Read More:
Afghan Girls Who Box for Sisterhood
The Age-Old Art of Spoken Poetry

Photo: Thinkstock

As many of us prepare to commemorate the Mexican army's unlikely victory over French forces at the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862 (...slash....happily take any excuse to eat tacos and drink margaritas), two new mobile phone apps have just launched that'll help you throw an impressive Cinco de Mayo bash. Even if you don't use them to help you assemble a spread in honor of the holiday, they're great entertainment.

Rick Bayless Mexican Essentials ($2.99) is an iPhone app with 35 recipes from south-of-the-border expert Rick Bayless for starters, "light meals" like tacos and tamales, dinners, "basics" (beans, rice, tortillas) and desserts. An alphabetized ingredient list explains items from achiote seasoning paste to vanilla (the Mexican variety, naturally), with audio pronunciations. The app's best feature, though is its 40 instructional videos, in which Bayless gives demonstrations of the stuff that great Mexican dinners are made of, like knowing where to press on an avocado to figure out if it's ripe, or how to know when to flip a tortilla to cook on the other side.

Photo: Thinkstock

Even if you are one of those tortured people who somehow manages to survive this Earthly existence without HBO (like me), you've probably heard people rhapsodizing about Lena Dunham's new show Girls. Constantly.

Well, here's a fresh take: In this LA Review of Books essay, Jane Hu discusses the role of hunger in Girls. Hu writes, "Eating is, after all, about as universal as it gets...hunger, in all its manifestations, drives Girls." Significantly, Hu points out, the girls in Girls tend to snack. They consume not grownup meals but cupcakes in the bathtub, Gatorade after sex, Luna Bars and SmartWaters. Hu writes, "Snacks are by definition inessential, unstructured, and irregular: you never know when the next one might come. The snack does not offer satisfaction or closure; in fact, it demands a more responsible future that might justify the present indulgence."

Hey, I love a  cupcake in the bathtub as much as anyone, but I hate that weird emptiness you get when a snack has taken the edge off of hunger enough to keep you from eating some food that would actually sustain you -- and Hu's essay has awakened me to the symbolic nature of this sort of snacking. If food is meant to be the fuel that helps our bodies and brains develop, if well-balanced meals at the dinner table are markers of adulthood and family, then snacks are evidence of a reluctance to grow up.  What about you, in your own life? Are you snacking, rather than fueling your life with an entire meal -- either in terms of food, or in some larger, metaphorical sense?

Read More:
Why Grown Children Are Moving Back Home
Bridesmaids and the Rise of the Girl-Woman