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27 September 2022
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Simple and Profound
Thoughts
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Treat the other
person's faith gently; it is all he or she
has to believe with. Others' minds were created for their
own thoughts, not yours or mine.
Henry S. Haskins
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Enthusiasm
is one of life's greatest qualities, but it must be
practiced
to become a dominant factor in one's life. There is
real magic in enthusiasm. It spells the difference
between mediocrity and accomplishment.
Norman
Vincent Peale
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Nothing
is a waste of time
if you use the experience wisely.
Rodin
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The
salvation of people is through love and in love.
Viktor Frankl |
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As
Ye Sow
Earl
Nightingale
The human mind is much like a farmer’s land. The land gives
the farmer a choice. He or she may plant in that land whatever he
chooses. The land doesn’t care what is planted.
It’s
up to the farmer to make the decision. The mind, like the
land, will return what you plant, but it doesn’t care
what you plant. If the farmer plants two seeds, one a
seed of corn, the other nightshade, a deadly poison, then waters and takes care of the land, what will happen?
Remember, the land doesn’t care. It will return poison in just as
wonderful abundance as it will corn. So up come the two
plants, one corn, one poison as it’s written in the
Bible, “As ye sow, so shall ye reap.”
The human mind is far more fertile, far more incredible and
mysterious than the land, but it works the same way.
It
doesn’t care what we plant-- success or failure.
A
concrete, worthwhile goal, or confusion,
misunderstanding, fear, anxiety, and so on. But what we
plant it must return to us.
The problem is that our mind comes as standard equipment at
birth. It’s free. And things that are given to us for
nothing, we place little value on. Things that we pay
money for, we value.
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The paradox is that exactly the reverse is true.
Everything
that’s really worthwhile in life came to us free such as
our
minds, our souls, our bodies, our hopes, our dreams, our
ambitions, our intelligence, our love of family and
children and friends and country. All these priceless
possessions are free.
But the things that cost us money are actually very cheap and
can be replaced at any time. A good person can be completely
wiped out and make another fortune. They can do that several
times. Even if our home burns down, we can rebuild it. But
the things we got for nothing, we can never replace.
Our mind can do any kind of job we assign to it, but generally
speaking, we use it for little jobs instead of big ones.
So decide now. What is it you want? Plant your goal in
your mind. It’s the most important decision you’ll
ever make in your entire life.
Do you want to excel at your particular job? Do you want to
go places in your company or in your community? Do you
want to get rich? All you have got to do is plant that
seed in your mind, care for it, work steadily toward your
goal, and it will become a reality.
It not only will, but there’s no way that it cannot. You see,
that’s a law like the laws of gravity. If you get on top of a building and jump
off, you’ll always go down and you’ll never go up.
And it’s the same with all the other laws of nature.
They
always work. They’re inflexible. Think about your goal
in a relaxed, positive way. Picture yourself in your
mind’s eye as having already achieved this goal. See
yourself doing the things you will be doing when you have
reached your goal.
Every one of us is the sum total of our own thoughts.
We are
where we are because that’s exactly where we really want
or feel we deserve to be, whether we’ll admit that or
not. Each of us must live off the fruit of our thoughts in
the future, because what you think today and tomorrow and
next month and next year will mold your life and
determine your future. You’re guided by your mind.
I remember one time I was driving through eastern
Arizona and I saw one of those giant earthmoving machines
roaring along the road with what looked like 30 tons of
dirt in it. It was a tremendous, incredible machine and
there was a little man perched way up on top with the
wheel in his hands, guiding it. As I drove along I was
struck by the similarity of that machine to the human
mind. Just suppose you’re sitting at the controls of
such a vast source of energy. Are you going to sit back
and fold your arms and let it run itself into a ditch?
Or
are you going to keep both hands firmly on the wheel and
control and direct this power to a specific, worthwhile
purpose? It’s up to you. You’re in the driver’s
seat. You see, the very law that gives us success is a
double-edged sword. We must control our thinking.
The same
rule can lead people to lives of success, wealth,
happiness, and all the things they ever dreamed of, can lead them into the gutter. It’s
all in how they use it, for good or for bad. That is
The Strangest Secret!
Do what the experts since the dawn of recorded history have
told us to do: pay the price, by becoming the person you
want to become. It’s not nearly as difficult as living
unsuccessfully.
The moment you decide on a goal to work toward, you’re
immediately a successful person and you are then in that
rare group of people who know where they’re going.
Out
of every hundred people, you belong to the top five.
Don’t concern yourself too much with how you are going
to achieve your goal. Leave that completely to a power
greater than yourself. All you have to do is know where
you’re going. The answers will come to you of their own
accord, and at the right time.
Start today. You have nothing to lose, but you have your
whole life to win.
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It's Not That Big of a Deal (an excerpt)
Elizabeth Lombardo
In addition to personalizing "failure" and
mind reading, perfectionists often minimize their
achievements. They rarely give themselves
credit--or at least not for too long. So, rather
than rating themselves on the "I'm perfect versus
I'm a failure" scale, they rate themselves on the
"I'm okay versus I'm a failure" scale.
And their criteria for "okay" are their high
standards. But even when they do achieve their
high standards, perfectionists rarely say, "Wow,
I did that perfectly." Instead they think,
"It was okay. Now I need to focus on my
next goal," with minimal time spent reflecting on
what already has been achieved.
Remember Annie, who wanted to lose weight?
About two months into our working together, she
informed me she'd dropped fifteen pounds.
"Wow," I said. "That's really
terrific."
"Yeah," she replied. "But I still
have at least twenty-five more to go. I'm not
even halfway there. . ."
Can you relate? Do any of the items below
sound familiar to you?
* Are there times when, after an achievement,
you're happy temporarily, but then you turn your focus
on the next goal, discounting your success?
* When someone congratulates you on a
success, do you try to change the subject?
* When someone says, "Wow, great
job!" do you answer, "Yeah, but. .
."? As in, "Yeah, but I still have so
much more to do"? Or, "Yeah, but it
wasn't that hard; anyone could have done it"?
* Are you uncomfortable when others
celebrate your successes?
Why do perfectionists do this? There are two
main reasons. First, we do not want to celebrate
something until it's complete--perfectly done.
Extreme thinking makes it feel inappropriate to
applaud something that's unfinished. Second, we
don't like to "brag." Extreme-thinking
perfectionists often think, "If people make a big
deal over what I've done, then I'll be seen as a
show-off. I don't want people to think I'm still
boasting."
What if you changed your extreme thinking to stop
minimizing your achievements? Is it possible to
be proud of what you have done, even if there is still
more you'd like to do?
Say a friend wanted to become a medical doctor.
When she received her bachelor's degree, would you
say, "Yeah, but you still have to go to medical
school"?
No way. You would celebrate with her and
encourage her to keep up the same incredible work she
had been doing.
So, then, what if you did the same for yourself?
And what would it be like if you could actually
appreciate and feel proud of yourself for what you've
done--without being boastful? I bet it would
feel pretty good!
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Practice
giving things away, not just things you don't care about, but
things
you do like. Remember, it is not the size of a gift, it is its
quality and the
amount of mental attachment you overcome that count. So don't
bankrupt
yourself on a momentary positive impulse, only to regret it later.
Give thought
to giving. Give small things, carefully, and observe the mental
processes
going along with the act of releasing the little thing you liked.
Robert A.F. Thurman
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Release
I've
always had a difficult time understanding the
concept of release. After all, most of my role
models in life while I was growing up seemed to
dedicate themselves to holding on to things--holding
on to anger and resentment and memories of things
that other people did "to" them. Now
that I'm older I can see in hindsight just how
unhappy these people were, but when I was younger
their behavior seemed quite normal to me.
The
concept of releasing can be one of the most
important ideas that you'll ever explore. If
you want to call it "letting go," you'll
still have the main idea in place. Release is
the opposite of allowing something to control you by
its simple presence in your life. Did someone
offend you yesterday? Are you still feeling
angry about it, and snapping at other people because
of your anger? Well, then, that offensive
remark or action from yesterday is controlling your
behavior, and you're allowing it to do so. Did
someone leave your town and you miss them so much
that your behavior is affected negatively because
you're missing them? In this case, too, that
person's absence is controlling your behavior, and
you're allowing it to do so.
You're
allowing these things to control you because you're
not willing to release them. It's somehow
safer--though very unpleasant--to hold on to
them. Some people might even say that you need
them.
It's
important, though, that you consider releasing them
from your life, from your mind, and from your
spirit. If you're able to do so, then you give
yourself a higher degree of freedom in your
life--freedom to face each present moment for
exactly what it is, rather than seeing it through
the filters of your anger or resentment.
A
really good example of this was my desire for a
relationship. This was something that I simply
wasn't able to release from my life, and it affected
me for years in negative ways every time I went out
on a date or tried to get to know a woman. The
desire was so strong that I spent a lot of time and
energy trying to fulfill that desire, and the
results usually weren't very positive. The
result of trying to make things happen usually was
stress and tension--and no relationship.
Finally,
though, I realized just how much pressure I was
putting on other people because of my efforts to
fulfill my desires. I finally released that
desire, and I told myself that I would just let life
take its course without trying to control it in my
favor. After I did that, I suddenly found
myself acting much more relaxed in the presence of
women, much more willing to just let things
happen. Within six months, I met the woman I
would eventually marry. I know that I was able
to develop a relationship with her only because I
never tried to force a relationship to happen
between us.
We've
all heard the saying that tells us if we love
something, we should set it free. If it comes
back to us, it was meant to be with us; otherwise,
it was meant to be on its own. I would say
that we should set everything free--things that we
love, things that we dislike, even things that we
hate. If we can release the judgment of loving
or hating, if we can allow things simply to be as
they are without trying to control them or without
letting them control us, then we're releasing things
that can be detrimental to us.
One
of the greatest beauties of releasing things is the
fact that when we do so, we create more room inside
of ourselves for other things, more positive things
(as long as we choose to fill those spaces with
positive things). In my case, I filled the
times that I had been obsessing about a relationship
with things like climbing mountains and going for
long walks. The important thing about this
concept is that until we release negative things,
there won't be room for other, more positive things.
And
the more you fill your life with the positive, the
less room there is inside of your spirit for the
negative.
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More
on letting go.
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If
some great Power would agree to make me think always what
is true and do what is right on condition of being turned into a
sort of clock, I would instantly close with the bargain. The
only
freedom I care about is the freedom to do right; the freedom
to do wrong I am ready to part with.
Thomas Henry
Huxley
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Two
friends were walking through the desert. During some point
of the journey they had an argument and one friend slapped the
other one in the face.
The one who got slapped was hurt, but without saying anything,
wrote in the sand: "Today my best friend slapped me in the
face."
They kept on walking, until they found an oasis, where they
decided to take a bath. The one who had been slapped got
stuck in the mire and started drowning, but the friend saved
him.
After he recovered from the near drowning, he wrote on a stone:
"Today my best friend saved my life."
The friend who had slapped and saved his best friend asked him,
"After I hurt you, you wrote in the sand and now, you write
on a stone. Why?"
The other friend replied, "When someone hurts us we should
write it down in sand where winds of forgiveness can erase it
away. But when someone does something good for us, we must
engrave it in stone where no wind can ever erase it."
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I have three precious things which I hold fast and prize.
The first
is gentleness; the second is frugality; the third is humility,
which
keeps me from putting myself before others. Be gentle and
you
can be bold; be frugal and you can be liberal;
avoid putting
yourself
before others and you can become
a leader among people.
Lao Tzu
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