16 August 2022
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Simple and Profound
Thoughts
(from simpleandprofound.com) |
The
world was not left to us by our parents;
it was lent to us by our children.
African
Proverb
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Children are like wet cement.
Whatever falls on them
makes an impression.
Haim Ginott
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Our
dilemma is that we hate change and love it at the same time;
what we really want is for things to remain the same but get
better.
Sydney
J. Harris
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Sometimes I
think that just not thinking
of
oneself is a form of prayer. . .
Barbara Grizzuti Harrison |
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Step off the
Edge
John Marks Templeton
The eagles that live in the canyons of the state of
Colorado in the United States use a special kind of stick
with which to build their nests. A female eagle can
sometimes fly as many as two hundred miles in a single day
in order to find a branch from an ironwood tree. Not
only are the ironwood sticks as strong as their name
suggests, but they also have thorns that allow them to
lock together so the nest can set securely on a ledge high
up in the canyon. After building the nest, the eagle
pads it with layer upon layer of leaves, feathers, and
grass to protect future offspring from the sharp thorns of
the ironwood.
In her preparations, the female eagle goes to great
lengths to promote the survival of the birds she will
hatch. This interest in their survival extends well
beyond their birth, although the expression of that
interest changes. As the young eagles grow, they
begin to fight for space in the nest. The chicks'
demands for food eventually become such that the mother
eagle is unable to fulfill their needs. She
instinctively knows that in order to survive, her brood is
going to have to leave its nest.
To encourage the young eagles to fend for themselves, the
mother pulls the padding out of the nest so the thorns of
the ironwood branches prick the young birds.
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As their
living conditions become more painful, they are forced to
climb up on the edge of the nest. The mother eagle
then coaxes the young eagles off the edge. As they
begin to plummet to the bottom of the canyon, they wildly
flap their wings to brake their fall, and end up doing
what is the most natural thing in the world for an
eagle--they fly!
As human beings, we may often find ourselves in a similar
situation. When our lives can no longer provide us
with the growth we desire and change must take place, we
may need to leave safety and familiarity behind and
journey into unknown territory. Just as the baby
eagles are reluctant to leave the nest, we may also resist
change. Even though the conditions may not be
pleasant, we sometimes make an effort to tolerate the
increasing discomfort because we're afraid of the
unknown. But if your ship is tied up at the dock, it
doesn't matter how you turn the rudder--the ship isn't
going anywhere!
Many times unpleasant conditions in our lives tell us that
we are ready to move on and experience new areas of our
potential. While our fear of the unknown might
temporarily increase our tolerance of an uncomfortable
situation, life's circumstances may likely get thorny
enough that, like the growing eagles, we'll be coaxed into
moving on. We can trust life and move ahead into new
experiences with confidence because, in a wonderful way,
we live in a friendly universe--a universe designed to
support us and our activities. Dr. Irving Oyle
recognized this when he commented, "The universe is
not opposed to our best interest."
Have you ever said to yourself, "I've wanted to do
something like this, but never quite had the
courage"? Take a look at the urge within your
being that may be prompting you to step forward.
When the time comes to venture out and accept new
challenges, remember that everyone has an innate ability
not only to survive but to prosper. We are designed,
by God, with the possibility to achieve high levels of
success and to enjoy fulfillment and satisfaction in
life. This means we do not have to settle for less
than we're capable of, unless that is our choice. . . .
So often, we have within our grasp a whole new way of life
and fail to explore it. Why? Could one reason be
that we may not be secure enough in who and what we are to
release the pioneering spirit? An interesting thing
is that we do have our life to live over. Every day
life comes for us to live a new experience. Over and
over, around the calendar, twenty-four new hours present
themselves to us. Perhaps we could ask ourselves,
regardless of our age, "Have I really lived all my
years, or has each year been one day lived over and over
again?"
Within each of us are resources that can be realized only
when we climb to the edge of the nest, slip off into the
air--and fly!
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Transformation
Kent Nerburn
I can measure my life by the moments when art
transformed me--standing in front of Michelangelo's
Duomo pieta, listening to Dylan Thomas read his
poetry, hearing Bach's cello suites for the first
time.
But not only there.
Sitting at a table in a smoky club listening to Muddy
Waters and Little Walter talk back and forth to each
other through their instruments; listening to a tiny
Japanese girl play a violin sonata at a youth symphony
concert; standing in a clapboard gift shop on the edge
of Hudson Bay staring at a crudely carved Inuit image
of a bear turning into a man.
It can happen anywhere, anytime. You do not have
to be in some setting hallowed by greatness, or in the
presence of an artist honored around the world.
Art can work its magic any time you are in the
presence of a work created by someone who has gone
inside the act of creation to become what they are
creating. When this takes place time stands
still and if our hearts are open to the experience,
our spirits soar and our imaginations fly unfettered.
You need these moments if you are ever to have a life
that is more than the sum of the daily moments of
humdrum affairs.
If you can create these moments--if you are a painter
or a poet or a musician or an actor--you carry within
you a prize of great worth. If you cannot create
them, you must learn to love one of the arts in a way
that allows the power of another's creation to come
alive within you.
Once you love an art enough that you can be taken up
in it, you are able to experience an echo of the great
creative act that mysteriously has given life to us
all.
It may be the closest we can get to God.
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Our
very first problem is to accept our present circumstances
as they
are,
ourselves as we are, and the people about us as
they are.
This is
to adopt a realistic humility without which no
genuine advance can
even
begin. . . . Provided we strenuously
avoid turning these realistic
surveys of the
facts of life into
unrealistic alibis for apathy or defeatism, they
can be
the sure
foundation upon which increased emotional health
and therefore spiritual progress can be built.
As
Bill Sees It
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Words of Discouragement
I've been in the classroom with many, many students
over the years. Some of them I remember quite
well; others I don't remember at all. That's
just the way it is--some students burn their ways
into my memory, others do their best to remain
anonymous and not call any attention to
themselves. I tend to remember the high school
students better than the college students, as they
were generally in my classes every day for an entire
year, while at college I tend to be able to work
with students two or three times a week for fifteen
weeks.
I remember some students because of the problems
they caused, but I remember others because of their
effort or their skill or simply their
personalities. There are some, of course, that
I remember because of some specific incident, and
Antoinette was one of those.
She was one of the college students with whom I
actually got to work with for two semesters in a
row. She was in my Composition 101 course, and
then took the 102 course with me in the
spring. It's not something that's unheard of,
of course, but just something that doesn't happen
with everyone. I like it when I can work with
students a second semester because I know that my
references to what we covered in the first semester
make sense to them, and because I get to know them
quite a bit better--and I've met very few students
who aren't worth the time and effort to get to know
better.
The moment that I most remember with Antoinette
happened during office hours during the second
semester. Over the course of six months she
had become an extremely good writer--she was able to
develop her ideas clearly and concisely, leaving her
reader with no doubts at all about her message or
her credibility. Her papers were extremely
well organized and her paragraphs were very strongly
developed. Her voice was friendly but
respectful, and her tone was always
appropriate. In short, her papers were a joy
to read.
At that meeting, though, she told me something that
surprised me and angered me. She was looking
at the final draft of her persuasive essay, and she
said, "I wish I could go back and tell one of
my high school English teachers what you just told
me."
"Why's that?" I asked, curious.
"Because he told me that I would never be a
good writer."
In short, this high school teacher of hers had told
her, when she was merely fifteen or sixteen years
old, that while she may someday be a decent writer,
she never would be a very good writer. I
couldn't even imagine what kind of message that was
to a young person of her age--and what an incredibly
short-sighted and flat-out wrong thing to tell her.
Was he trying to make her a better writer by getting
her angry? Was he simply an uncompassionate
person who was frustrated at his own lack of
success, and who felt the need to belittle his
students in order to make himself feel better (and
trust me--there are far more people like this in our
schools than you want to believe)? No matter
what he was or what his problems were, I was really
proud of Antoinette at that moment, for she hadn't
let his negative message of impossibility keep her
from becoming an extremely good writer, and I was
very glad of her success.
I, too, at that moment would have loved to have some
words with that teacher.
That moment was very important to me because it
reinforced many of my feelings about teaching and
about relating to young people. I never want
to be the teacher who tries to use discouragement as
either a motivational tool or a damaging tool.
I don't want to be the teacher who tells students
what they can't do or what they won't be able to
do--because I really have no idea what those things
may be. I see such a small part of who the
students are and what they're able to do that I
simply can't make general statements about what
they'll be able and unable to do in their
futures--all I can do is respond to what I see in
front of me and tell them how that rates as far as
the requirements of our particular course are
concerned.
I absolutely do believe that it's important to be
honest rather than always kind and
encouraging--telling a mediocre high school
basketball player that he can become a professional
player if she wants to can be cruel rather than kind
or helpful. But if there's a modicum of doubt,
if there's no real way of knowing what will happen
in the future, then it's important that we be
encouraging to our young people rather than
discouraging. Encouraging them to become the
best player they can, even if they never reach a
professional level, can be much more productive and
helpful and can show them that you care enough not
just to encourage, but to be honest with them.
There's at least one high school teacher out there
(if he's still alive) who completely misread the
evidence before him and because of that gave a
student an extremely unjustified message of
discouragement and impossibility. Fortunately,
she didn't let his message keep her from doing
exactly that which he said she couldn't do, and she
felt a great deal of pride and accomplishment in
doing so. But I couldn't help but notice the
hurt that was within her, even as she acknowledged
what she had accomplished. Her response was
not to celebrate and feel good about what she had
done--her response was to begin the healing process
of the hurt that he had caused her.
I never want to be that kind of person, nor that
kind of teacher. We never know how much harm
our discouraging words can do, and that meeting with
Antoinette taught me that I don't want to be a
person doing harm, no matter what my intentions may
be.
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If
you limit your actions
in life to things
that
nobody
can possibly find
fault
with, you will not do much.
Charles
Lutwidge Dodgson
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A Prayer for the World's Children
Ina Hughs
We pray for children
who sneak popsicles before supper,
who erase holes in math workbooks,
who can never find their shoes.
And we pray for those
who stare at photographers from behind barbed wire,
who can't bound down the street in a new pair of sneakers,
who never "counted potatoes,"
who are born in places where we wouldn't be caught dead,
who never go to the circus,
who live in an X-rated world.
We pray for children
who bring us sticky kisses and fistfuls of dandelions,
who hug us in a hurry and forget their lunch money.
And we pray for those
who never get dessert,
who have no safe blanket to drag behind them,
who watch their parents watch them die,
who can't find any bread to steal,
who don't have any rooms to clean up,
whose pictures aren't on anyone's dresser,
whose monsters are real.
We pray for children
who spend all their allowances before Tuesday,
who throw tantrums in the grocery store and pick at their
food,
who like ghost stories,
who shove dirty clothes under the bed and never rinse out
the tub,
who get visits from the tooth fairy,
who don't like to be kissed in front of the carpool,
who squirm in church or temple and scream in the phone,
whose tears we sometimes laugh at and whose smiles can
make us cry.
And we pray for those
whose nightmares come in the daytime,
who will eat anything,
who have never seen a dentist,
who aren't spoiled by anyone,
who go to bed hungry and cry themselves to sleep,
who live and move, but have no being.
We pray for the children who want to be carried and for
those who must,
for those who never give up and for those who don't
get a second chance, for those we smother. . . and for
those who will grab the hand of anyone kind enough to
offer it.
Amen
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People often
become what they believe themselves to be. If
I believe I cannot do something, it makes me incapable
of
doing it. But when I believe I can, then I acquire the
ability to do it even if I didn't have it in the beginning.
Mohandas
Gandhi
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