December
is here, and it's time for the first issue of the
month of our e-zine!
We thank you much for dropping by, and we hope that
you enjoy this issue.
Take good care of yourself this month, and please
make it a month to remember!
Hair grows at the rate of about half an inch a
month. I don't know where he got his
facts, but Mr. Washington came up with that one
when we were comparing barbers. That means
that about eight feet of hair had been cut off
my head and face in the last sixteen years by my
barber.
I hadn't thought much about it until I called to
make my usual appointment and found that my
barber had left to go into building
maintenance. What? How could he do
this? My barber. It felt like
a death in the family. There was so much
more to our relationship than sartorial
statistics.
We started out as categories to each
other: "barber" and
"customer." Then we became
"redneck ignorant barber" and "pinko
egghead minister." Once a month we
reviewed the world and our lives and explored
our positions. We sparred over civil
rights and Vietnam and lots of elections.
We became mirrors, confidants, confessors,
therapists, and companions in an odd sort of
way. We went through being thirty years
old and then forty. We discussed and
argued and joked, but always with a certain
thoughtful deference. After all, I was his
customer. And he was standing there with
his razor in his hand.
I found out that his dad was a country
policeman, that he grew up poor in a tiny town
and had prejudices about Indians. He found
out that I had the same small-town roots and
grew up with prejudices about Blacks. Our
kids were the same ages, and we suffered through
the same stages of parenthood together. We
shared wife stories and children stories and car
troubles and lawn problems. I found out he
gave his day off to giving free haircuts to old
men in nursing homes. He found out a few
good things about me, too, I suppose.
I never saw him outside the barber shop, never
met his wife or children, never sat in his home
or ate a meal with him. Yet he became a
terribly important fixture in my life.
Perhaps a lot more important than if we had been
next-door neighbors. The quality of our
relationship was partly created by a peculiar
distance. There's a real sense of loss in
his leaving. I feel like not having my
hair cut anymore, though eight feet of hair may
seem strange.
Without realizing it, we fill important places
in each other's lives. It's that way with
a minister and congregation. Or with the
guy at the corner grocery, the mechanic at the
local garage, the family doctor, teachers,
neighbors, co-workers. Good people, who
are always "there," who can be relied
upon in small, important ways. People who
teach us, bless us, encourage us, support us,
uplift us in the dailiness of life. We
never tell them. I don't know why, but we
don't.
And, of course, we fill that role
ourselves. There are those who depend on
us, watch us, learn from us, take from us.
And we never know. Don't sell yourself
short. You may never have proof of your
importance, but you are more important than you
think.
It reminds me of an old Sufi story of a good man
who was granted one wish by God. The man
said he would like to go about doing good
without knowing about it. God granted his
wish. And then God decided that it was
such a good idea, he would grant that wish to
all human beings. And so it has been to
this day.
We
have some
inspiring and motivational books that may interest you. Our main way of supporting this site is
through the sale of books, either physical copies
or digital copies for your Amazon Kindle (including the
online reader). All of the money that we earn
through them comes back to the site
in one way or another. Just click on the picture
to the left to visit our page of books, both fiction and
non-fiction!
Goethe made a rather profound statement when he said,
"If I treat you as you are, you will remain as you
are. If I treat you as if you were what you could
be, that is what you will become." Those words
of long ago express in a unique way what love is
about. As I reread them for the umpteenth time, I
think of the love in a family and the way we see each
other. Looking at your mate as alive, well, and
alert rather than nosy, or seeing him or her as exercising
good judgment and thrift instead of being shallow and
stingy, will have a profound impact on your
relationship. If you think of your mate as being
expressive instead of talkative, and if you consider him
or her sensitive and caring rather than touchy, your
respect and admiration for your mate will grow, and you
will develop a deeper love, appreciation, and
understanding of him or her.
When you take that approach, you will have mastered one of
the great lessons of life--namely, that when you love
someone, you do not react to the symptoms of behavior, but
you respond to the need that your mate might have.
In this process you will learn that love will always give
you the benefit of the doubt. Over a period of time
you will realize that you do that not because you want to
do what is right, but because you have become that kind of
person.
The
underlying message behind all of this is that you can
change, and in the process you will have a substantial
influence on the life of the other person. Each of
you will win, and as a couple, you will win. That's
the way to beat the daily grind.
If
He Can, You Can
Kacey McCallister lives in Keizer, a suburb of Salen,
Oregon. He plays basketball, and in baseball he has
been catcher and covered positions at first base and in
the outfield. His play was so spectacular that a
Little League team in North Carolina dedicated its season
to him, and disabled Boy Scouts in Georgia were inspired
by him. People all over America have been inspired
by Kacey, who lost both legs at the hip when he was run
over by a truck a few years ago.
He does all of those things by propelling himself with his
arms. He has a tremendous attitude and a
determination to live as any other youngster wants to
live, and the nation is applauding him. CNN sent a
crew to the family's home to do a story on him.
Kacey said he was more motivated than ever: "I
want to show them that I really can do all this
stuff."
In today's world when too many people complain about
everything, here's a role model who is determined to make
the most of life. Where do his drive, commitment,
and enthusiasm for life come from? I suspect his
mother and father are much of the source of his
inspiration. Instead of spoiling him by catering to
his whims and allowing him to feel sorry for himself,
they've made the wise choice of encouraging him to believe
in himself and letting him do everything he can do, while
still being available to help when it is required.
That's love in action, and the results are spectacular.
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.
Be
aware of wonder. Live a balanced life-- learn some
and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance
and play and work every day some.
I
was having a cup of coffee the other day when I saw
something nice--a young mother came in with her two
young kids and sat down with them for what looked to
be a nice time out with them. She bought them
something to eat and drink and everyone settled
in--and then she pulled out her cell phone and
called a friend to chat. What had seemed to be
some nice "togetherness" time turned into
her ignoring her kids while she talked on the phone
with a friend.
Last
week my wife and I were taking a walk when we saw a
young girl outside a store hanging out with her
boyfriend. They were hugging and talking to
each other in that clinging way that many
16-year-olds have, paying attention only to
themselves and each other. Unfortunately, two
little kids about five or six years old were sitting
on a short retaining wall nearby, looking on.
The girl obviously was babysitting, and she had
brought the kids to the store so that she could meet
with her boyfriend.
Pay
attention. It's all about paying attention.
Attention is vitality. It connects you with others.
It makes you eager. Stay eager.
Susan Sontag
It
was sad for me to see these two instances, for I
know that they aren't exactly uncommon.
Unfortunately, many people aren't willing or able to
pay undivided attention to kids, or to anything else
in their lives for that matter. Many people
aren't able to focus entirely on work when they're
at work, and others aren't able to focus on school
when they're there. It isn't always a question
of attention deficit disorders, either--it's a
question of choice.
The
woman in the cafe chose to be on the phone with a
friend rather than sit and talk with her kids.
The girl who was babysitting chose to pay attention
to her boyfriend and ignore the kids. These
were only public occurrences--how often are kids
ignored while the parents do things that they want
to do, either at home or in the car or while on
vacation? How often do people choose to surf
the Internet and leave the job they're getting paid
to do undone for the moment? How often are we
thinking of other things while having a conversation
with someone? How often do we try to do two or
three jobs at a time, instead of focusing all of our
attention on one particular task?
And
how often do we put other people, ourselves, and our
loved ones in significant danger (study after study
backs up this claim) by talking on cell phones,
reading, eating, or even watching movies while we're
driving our cars, rather than paying undivided
attention to our driving?
Mindfulness
means
paying attention
in a particular way;
on purpose,
in the present moment,
and nonjudgmentally.
Jon
Kabat-Zinn
In his book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance,
Robert Pirsig mentions a trip to a mechanic's shop, and
finding out that part of the reason that they did lousy
work there was because they had a radio blaring loud music
in the shop, which kept the mechanics there from focusing
completely on the task at hand. The people who
worked there were more interested in finishing the day and
going home than they were in doing a very good job, and
because of that, the jobs they did were quite poor.
Dividing
our attention almost always means that the results
of our actions are less effective than they would be if
we were to give our undivided attention.
Undivided attention helps us to be completely
present in the moment, and it helps us to see more
of and learn more about whatever we do. It
helps us to achieve results that most of us only
dream of, yet most of us truly never have learned
what it means to give our undivided attention.
We've grown up in cultures that seem to value
accomplishment of many things over all else, and we
reward people who split their attention and efforts
between several tasks.
Personally,
I have a very difficult time giving my undivided
attention--it takes a great deal of effort on my
part to keep focused on just one thing at a time,
but I do try, with varying degrees of success.
One promise that I've made to myself, though, is
always to do my best to stay completely focused when
I'm with kids, for there are few things more
important in young people's lives than to be with
adults who are willing to give them their undivided
attention. Such attention gives them the
unmistakable message that they're worth that
attention, that someone is interested in them for
exactly who they are. Giving them only part of
my attention can send the message that there are
other things more important than them.
It's
been important to me to practice paying
attention. Sometimes I stop and look at
something for a while, and I try to recognize the
other thoughts that come into my mind while I'm
looking. If I'm looking at a flower, for
example, and I start to think about a letter that I
have to write, I do my best to recognize that
thought and push it out of my mind by re-focusing on
the flower, or some particular part of the
flower. I try to see parts of the flower that
I've never noticed before, and I look for patterns
that might have escaped me. This practice
helps me when I'm talking to friends and thinking
about all I have to do today--I do my best to
refocus on our conversation, leaving that stuff for
later.
Mindfulness
can be summed up in two words:
pay attention. Once you notice what you’re
doing, you have the power to
change it.
Michelle
Burford
This type of attention is an important element of
meditation, for example. One of the most common ways
of entering a meditative state is to focus on your own
breathing, with the goal of eventually noticing nothing
else but the breathing, trying to empty the mind of the
many distracting thoughts that keep us from the centers of
our being, that part of us that is truly who we are.
We
hear a lot about "living in the present
moment," and I'm completely convinced that the
only way we truly can do so is by learning how to
give our undivided attention to whatever it is that
deserves that attention right now. Once we
divide it, we lose out on much of what is bright and
beautiful, right here, right now.
It took a lot of effort for me not to go
over and talk to those little kids who were being
ignored by their mother in a public place, just to
say hi. And
I know that I would have been the one to benefit the
most from that conversation--just as the mother
could have benefited greatly from paying some attention to
her children.
When you have worn out
your shoes, the strength of
the shoe leather has
passed
into the fiber of your body.
I measure your
health by
the number
of shoes and hats
and clothes you have worn out.
So much of life involves risk
and the possibility of failure.
If you are not afraid of failure,
you will take many more risks
in your life.
The more risks you take,
the more alive you will feel.
You are afraid of failure
because you fear rejection.
The moment you give up seeking
acceptance from others,
your fear of rejection will disappear.
And with it, the fear of failure.
It is essential that our love be
liberating,
not possessive. We must at all
times give
those we love the freedom to be themselves.
Love affirms
the other
as other. It does not
possess and manipulate
another as mine. . . .
To love is
to liberate. Love and
friendship
must empower those we love to become
their
best selves, according to
their own lights and visions.
John
Powell
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).
™
