Good
day, and welcome to our newest issue! We hope
that all is well in your world,
and that you're enjoying this new year that we've
been given. Please make your
day very special, and make your week the best week
you've had in a while!
It is up to you!
Wrote
the poet and mystic Maeterlinck: "The thoughts
you think will irradiate you as though you are a
transparent vase." We radiate what we are
and so it is more important to be than to get,
to become than to possess. People tune
in to our inner wave length. There is much wisdom in
the old Hindu saying: "Beware, beware, what
goes forth from you will come back to you."
As
a boy I learned a little rhyme that I have never
forgotten: "Don't be a veneer stuck on with
glue, be solid mahogany all the way through." Our
first task then, in living with ourselves, is to be
ourselves, to be genuine and sincere, to go forth to
others as the persons we truly are without sham or
pretense. Beyond this our task is to grow in mind
and spirit.
While
driving on the Ohio Turnpike I saw a sign exhorting
drivers: "Stay Awake, Stay Alive,"
it cried. These words, it seems to me, have even
deeper significance as a way of life. The more awake
we are to what goes on around us the more alive we will
be. Being wide awake opens the way to experiencing
the infinite riches of body, mind, heart and spirit.
We
do not sufficiently use the senses God has given us.
The magazine ETC, the quarterly review of the
International Society of General Semantics, devoted a full
issue to the subject of LSD and other psychedelic drugs.
Editor
S.I. Hayakawa made this vital point: "Most
people haven't learned to use the senses they
possess. I not only hear music, I listen to
it. I find the colors of the day such vivid
experiences that I sometimes pound the steering wheel with
excitement. And I say why disorient your beautiful
senses with drugs and poisons before you have half
discovered what they can do for you?"
The
great mystics did not fog up the windows of heaven with
drugs. They did not distort their visions with
poisons. They found their own senses and their
perceptive ad intuitive powers sufficient to experience
the Presence of God.
To
make the most of ourselves we must become aware of the
miracles all around us. We must open our eyes, ears,
minds, hearts, spirits. We must think about great
ideas such as space illimitable, time everlasting, energy
inexhaustible. You have the magic power within
yourself to broaden your horizons, to lift your
consciousness, to live more abundantly.
To
learn to live with ourselves we must often get away by
ourselves so we can find quiet, solitude, and time to
think and meditate.
The
poet Robert Frost stressed the importance of
separateness. He told a group, of which I was a
part, that we must be careful that we do not homogenize
society as we homogenize milk. . . so the cream at the top
disappears. The heart and the lungs work together,
he explained, but they are also separate organs. A
person, he said, should endeavor to achieve separateness
in his or her thinking, even amidst the pressures of the
crowd. And often we may experience a greater feeling
of togetherness with people when we are separate and
alone, rather than with others. We must learn to
live together, but we must not lose the precious gift of
separateness.
The
growth of the self, however, is not accomplished only in
solitude and isolation. Aloneness must be balanced
with contacts with people and the world. There is
need to try out our ideas on others, to sharpen our minds,
to contend with those who disagree with us. We can
learn from our enemies as well as our friends, and often
those who are hardest on us contribute more to our growth
than those who make things easy for us.
I
have always liked these words attributed to Walt
Whitman: "Have you learned lessons only of
those who admired you and were tender with you and stood
aside for you? Have you not learned great lessons
from those who braced themselves against you, and disputed
the passage with you?"
The
self needs the spur of conflict, competition, even defeat,
for out of those come strength and character.
Heed
these words by Epictetus: "So when the crisis
is upon you, remember that God, like a trainer of
wrestlers, has matched you with a tough and stalwart
antagonist--that you may be a winner at the Great
Games."
The
art of living with ourselves also requires that we be
resilient and flexible so we will not break ourselves
against the hardness of life. I learned this
important lesson from a naturalist in Bryce Canyon,
Utah. I asked him about the gallant lone pines on
the mountaintops that survive the full sweep of wind and
storm.
I
was told that the pines are called Limber Pines. To
demonstrate, the naturalist took a branch of a Limber Pine
and tied it into a knot. In a few minutes he untied
the knot and the branch immediately sprang back to its
original position.
It
is not through never bending that the trees survive.
It is in never failing to spring erect again after the
gale has passed that victory is achieved.
Resiliency
is also an important factor in the art of living with
ourselves. The winds of life--the conflicts,
pressures, changes--will bend us, but if we have
resiliency of the spirit they cannot break us. To
courageously straighten up again after our heads have been
bowed by defeat, disappointment and suffering is a supreme
test of character.
To
learn to live with ourselves, to make the most of
ourselves, to achieve wholeness of personality, to grow
into more effective human beings--this is the first vital
step in the art of living.
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Following are six behaviors that increase
self-esteem, enhance your self-confidence, and
spur your motivation. You may recognize some of
them as things you naturally do in your
interactions with other people. But if you
don’t, I suggest you motivate yourself to take
some of these important steps immediately.
First, greet others with a smile and look them
directly in the eye. A smile and direct eye
contact convey confidence born of self-respect.
In the same way, answer the phone pleasantly
whether at work or at home, and when placing a
call, give your name before asking to speak to
the party you want to reach. Leading with your
name underscores that a person with self-respect
is making the call.
Second,
always show real appreciation for a gift or
compliment. Don’t downplay or sidestep
expressions of affection or honor from others.
The ability to accept or receive is a universal
mark of an individual with solid self-esteem.
Third,
don’t brag. It’s almost a paradox that
genuine modesty is actually part of the capacity
to gracefully receive compliments. People who
brag about their own exploits or demand special
attention are simply trying to build themselves
up in the eyes of others—and that’s because
they don’t perceive themselves as already
worthy of respect.
Fourth,
don’t make your problems the centerpiece of
your conversation. Talk positively about your
life and the progress you’re trying to make.
Be aware of any negative thinking, and take
notice of how often you complain. When you hear
yourself criticize someone—and this includes
self-criticism—find a way to be helpful
instead of critical.
Fifth,
respond to difficult times or depressing moments
by increasing your level of productive activity.
When your self-esteem is being challenged,
don’t sit around and fall victim to
“paralysis by analysis.” The late Malcolm
Forbes said, “Vehicles in motion use their
generators to charge their own batteries. Unless
you happen to be a golf cart, you can’t
recharge your battery when you’re parked in
the garage!”
Sixth,
choose to see mistakes and rejections as
opportunities to learn. View a failure as the
conclusion of one performance, not the end of
your entire career. Own up to your shortcomings,
but refuse to see yourself as a failure. A
failure may be something you have done—and it
may even be something you’ll have to do again
on the way to success—but a failure is
definitely not something you are.
Even
if you’re at a point where you’re feeling
very negatively about yourself, be aware that
you’re now ideally positioned to make rapid
and dramatic improvement. A negative
self-evaluation, if it’s honest and
insightful, takes much more courage and
character than the self-delusions that underlie
arrogance and conceit. I’ve seen the truth of
this proven many times in my work with athletes.
After an extremely poor performance, a team or
an individual athlete often does much better the
next time out, especially when the poor
performance was so bad that there was simply no
way to shirk responsibility for it.
Disappointment, defeat, and even apparent
failure are in no way permanent conditions
unless we choose to make them so. On the
contrary, these undeniably painful experiences
can be the solid foundation on which to build
future success.
* * * * *
Reproduced with permission from the Denis
Waitley Newsletter.
Living
Life Fully, the e-zine
exists to try to provide for visitors of the world wide web a
place
of growth, peace, inspiration, and encouragement. Our
articles
are presented as thoughts of the authors--by no means do
we
mean to present them as ways that anyone has to live
life. Take
from them what you will, and disagree with
whatever you disagree
with--just know that they'll be here for you
each week.
There
is only one way to happiness and that is to cease worrying
about things that are beyond the power of our will.
Epictetus
A
Piece of Advice
I'm
always amazed when I hike down into the Grand Canyon
and see the ways that people decide to hike. I
see all sorts of clothing and shoes, from flip-flops
to dress pants to high heels to dresses that
definitely weren't made for hiking. Many of
these people already are a mile or two down the
trail and haven't yet turned around to make the
grueling trip up to the top, so they still
haven't learned about the mistakes that they're
making.
I'm
also amazed at the incredibly small amounts of water
that people bring with them. I've seen entire
families of five or six people with just one small
water bottle between them. Many people go down
a mile or two without any water at all--after all,
they can buy water when they get back up to the
Village.
All
of these people are ignoring well-publicized advice
from people who have a lot of experience in dealing
with the results of people hiking into the Canyon
poorly prepared. There are signs and posters
all over the place telling people to bring plenty of
water and to dress appropriately, but while many
people take the warnings seriously, many others
ignore them completely. I recently saw a
couple with two kids stop at a sign on one of the
trails that warns about not taking water.
"They could use our pictures for that
sign," the woman said to her husband.
"Right down to the not having any
water." She seemed to think it was pretty
funny, but their two kids looked pretty thirsty and
weren't laughing.
Quite
a few people get extremely sick each year, and some
even die for one simple reason--they've chosen to
ignore advice from people who truly know what
they're talking about and who truly care about other
people's well-being.
Why
is it so easy for us to ignore advice? I know
that in my life, I've gotten a lot of advice from
people who really weren't qualified to give
advice. Most of them give it because they
think that their ways of doing things somehow are
the best, and that others would be well off to do
things the same way. Most of it is well
intentioned, but when people don't take into
consideration that each of us must find our own ways
in life then their advice simply falls flat.
I've received relationship advice from people who
have terrible personal relationships, money advice
from people on welfare, professional advice from
people who aren't very well regarded in their
professions, and marriage advice from people who
never have been married. As the amount of
advice grows, it becomes easier and easier to take
it with that grain of salt and ignore it, choosing
instead to follow my own ideas about how something
should be done or searching out more credible
sources of advice.
But
doctors who have dealt extensively with emphysema or
lung cancer patients advise us not to smoke--and
still many people choose to smoke. People who
have dealt with the horrible effects of alcoholism
advise us not to drink to excess, yet many people
still choose to turn to drink as a way to
"escape" their problems or
situations. Law officers who have dealt with
the mangled bodies in car wrecks advise us not to
exceed the speed limit and not to tailgate and not
to drink and drive, yet many people do all those
things every day, ignoring the advice they've been
given by people who know what they're talking about
and who care about it.
Some
people regularly ignore advice because they feel
that by taking it, they're giving other people some
sort of control over their lives. This is
untrue, though--no one has power over our lives or
over who we are. We may allow people to have
influence over us, but that doesn't give them any
power over who we are as human beings.
Personally,
I know that I don't have enough time on this planet
to study and to learn everything there is to
know. Therefore, I want to take advice from
people who know much more than I in areas outside of
my expertise. I try to take the advice of
doctors concerning food and nutrition and exercise,
and I try to take the advice of financial experts
when I need to figure out what to do with my
money. I try to take the relationship advice
of and follow the models of people who have happy,
successful relationships. And I try to make
sure that any professional advice that I follow
comes from someone who is successful and well
respected in the field.
We
get advice all the time, even from people we don't
know--marketers and advertisers, for example, who
advice us to buy things or to use certain
services--and every time we get advice we face a
decision whether or not to follow it. Many
people are losing their houses now because they took
the advice of lenders to take out variable interest
rate loans--even though the lenders giving the
advice had much to gain when their customers
followed it and took out such a loan.
We
can become effective at taking advice by asking
ourselves some simple questions when we get
it. Who's giving it? If this person
isn't an authority on the subject, has no real
interest in me as a human being, or will gain
personally if I take the advice, then I want to
think twice or thrice before taking it. Does
it concern something that concerns me? Someone
may be advising me to buy stock in a certain
company, but since I'm not actively involved in the
stock market and I've done no research on it, then
this advice is irrelevant to me. What can
happen if I don't follow it? If I don't take
water into the Canyon, there could be some very
serious health-related consequences. If I
don't buy a new stereo for my car, the consequences
most certainly will be limited.
Taking
advice--or not taking it--is simply a matter of
choice. But let us choose intelligently, with
full consciousness of what we're doing and where it
may lead us. Only then can we say that we're
doing the most with the lessons that so many other
people have learned in their lives.
The
rhythm of walking generates a kind of rhythm
of thinking, and the
passage through a landscape
echoes or stimulates the passage
through
a series
of thoughts. This creates an odd consonance
between
internal
and external passage, one that suggests that
the
mind is also a landscape
of sorts and that walking is
one way to
traverse it. A new thought often
seems
like a feature of the
landscape that was there all along,
as though
thinking were
traveling rather than making.
Rebecca Solnit
Tomorrow
Edgar
Guest
He was going to be all that a mortal should be tomorrow.
No one should be kinder or braver than he tomorrow.
A friend who was troubled and weary he knew,
Who'd be glad of a lift and who needed it, too;
On him he would call and see what he could do, tomorrow.
Each
morning he stacked up the letters he'd write, tomorrow,
And thought of the folks he would fill with delight,
tomorrow.
It was too bad, indeed, he was busy today,
And hadn't a minute to stop on his way;
More time he would have to give others, he'd say, tomorrow.
The
greatest of workers this man would have been, tomorrow.
The world would have known him, had he ever seen tomorrow.
But the fact is he died and he faded from view,
And all that he left here when living was through
Was a mountain of things he intended to do, tomorrow.
Remember
the Small Things
Some of my sisters work in Australia. On a
reservation, among the Aborigines,
there was an elderly man. I can assure you that you
have never seen
a situation as difficult as that poor old man's. He
was completely ignored
by everyone. His home was disordered and dirty.
I
told him, "Please, let me clean your house, wash your
clothes, and
make your bed." He answered, "I'm okay like
this. Let it be."
I
said again, "You will be better still if you allow me
to do it."
He
finally agreed. So I was able to clean his house and
wash his clothes. I discovered a beautiful lamp, covered with dust. Only
God knows
how many years had passed since he last lit it.
I
said to him, "Don't you light your lamp? Don't
you ever use it?"
He
answered, "No. No one comes to see me.
I have no need to light it. Who would I light it
for?"
I
asked, "Would you light it every night if the sisters came?"
He
replied, "Of course."
From
that day on the sisters committed themselves to seeing him
every evening. We cleaned the lamp, and the sisters
would light it
every evening.
Two
years passed. I had completely forgotten that
man. He sent
this message: "Tell my friend that the light she
lit in my life
continues to shine still."
I
thought it was a very small thing. We often neglect small things.
I
got a simple rule about everybody.
If you don't
treat me right--shame on you!
Louis
Armstrong
Yes, life
can be mysterious and confusing--but there's much of life that's
actually rather dependable and reliable. Some principles apply
to life in so many different contexts that they can truly be called
universal--and learning what they are and how to approach them and use
them can teach us some of the most important lessons that we've ever
learned.
My doctorate is in Teaching and Learning. I use it a lot when I
teach at school, but I also do my best to apply what I've learned to
the life I'm living, and to observe how others live their lives.
What makes them happy or unhappy, stressed or peaceful, selfish or
generous, compassionate or arrogant? In this book, I've done my
best to pass on to you what I've learned from people in my life,
writers whose works I've read, and stories that I've heard.
Perhaps these principles can be a positive part of your life, too! Universal Principles of Living Life Fully. Awareness of
these principles can explain a lot and take much of the frustration
out of the lives we lead.
Explore all of our
quotations pages--these links will take you to the first page of each
topic, and those pages will contain links to any additional pages on
the same topic (there are five pages on adversity, for example).
™
