Posted: under "LOVE is LOVELY", Inspirationals.
Tags: age, anxiety, appreciation, bank, beauty, belief, blessings, bliss, blossom, blossoms, body, breakfast, bridge, burden, bus, cancer, care, check, children, clinic, color, colors, compassion, concern, courage, cross, delight, depression, dinner, doctor, duty, elderly, era, exam, example, exercise, eyes, faith, family, favor, feeling, feelings, fish, fishing, flowers, food, friends, funds, garden, gift, God, granny, gratitude, grown ups, gynecologist, happiness, health, heart, Heaven, highway, home, hospital, House, humanity, husband, imagination, inspiration, job, journey, joy, knowledge, labor, language, laughter, learning, letter, life, lifestyle, lifetime, love, mail, man, memories, mind, moment, money, morning, mountain, movement, neighbor, noise, nurse, office, others, pain, passenger, path, patient, perception, period, physician, plant, plants, present, quiz, relaxation, rest, road, role model, seniors, size, skin, sleep, smiles, snack, snacks, son-in-law, soul, sound, specialist, spirit, strength, stress, success, sugar, summer, sunshine, support, surgeon, surprise, task, test, thankfulness, thought, time, token, travel, treatment, trials, trip, vegetable, vegetables, veggie, veggies, vehicle, voice, weight, wife, woman, wonder, words, work, worries, worry
.
The Rented Room
================
.
Our house was directly across the street from the clinic
entrance of Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. We lived
downstairs and rented the upstairs rooms to outpatients at the
clinic.
.
One summer evening as I was fixing supper, there was a knock at
the door. I opened it to see a truly awful looking man.
.
“Why, he’s hardly taller than my eight-year-old,” I thought as I
stared at the stooped, shriveled body. But the appalling thing
was his face, lopsided from swelling, red and raw.
.
Yet his voice was pleasant as he said, “Good evening. I’ve come
to see if you’ve a room for just one night. I came for a
treatment this morning from the eastern shore, and there’s no
bus ’til morning.”
.
He told me he’d been hunting for a room since noon but with no
success, no one seemed to have a room. “I guess it’s my face…
I know it looks terrible, but my doctor says with a few more
treatments…”
.
For a moment I hesitated, but his next words convinced me,
“I could sleep in this rocking chair on the porch. My bus
leaves early in the morning.”
.
I told him we would find him a bed, but to rest on the porch.
I went inside and finished getting supper. When we were ready,
I asked the old man if he would join us. “No thank you.
I have plenty.” And he held up a brown paper bag.
.
When I had finished the dishes, I went out on the porch to talk
with him a few minutes. It didn’t take a long time to see that
this old man had an oversized heart crowded into that tiny body.
.
He told me he fished for a living to support his daughter, her
five children, and her husband, who was hopelessly crippled from
a back injury.
.
He didn’t tell it by way of complaint; in fact, every other
sentence was prefaced with a thanks to God for a blessing.
.
He was grateful that no pain accompanied his disease, which was
apparently a form of skin cancer. He thanked God for giving him
the strength to keep going.
.
At bedtime, we put a camp cot in the children’s room for him.
When I got up in the morning, the bed linens were neatly folded
and the little man was out on the porch.
.
He refused breakfast, but just before he left for his bus,
haltingly, as if asking a great favor, he said,
.
“Could I please come back and stay the next time I have a
treatment? I won’t put you out a bit. I can sleep fine in a
chair.” He paused a moment and then added, “Your children made
me feel at home. Grownups are bothered by my face, but children
don’t seem to mind.”
.
I told him he was welcome to come again.
.
And on his next trip he arrived a little after seven in the
morning. As a gift, he brought a big fish and a quart of the
largest oysters I had ever seen. He said he had shucked them
that morning before he left so that they’d be nice and fresh.
.
I knew his bus left at 4:00 a.m., and I wondered what time he
had to get up in order to do this for us.
.
In the years he came to stay overnight with us, there was never
a time that he did not bring us fish or oysters or vegetables
from his garden.
.
Other times we received packages in the mail, always by special
delivery; fish and oysters packed in a box of fresh young
spinach or kale, every leaf carefully washed.
.
Knowing that he must walk three miles to mail these and knowing
how little money he had made the gifts doubly precious.
.
When I received these little remembrances, I often thought of a
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Mar 25 2012
Posted: under "YUMMY FOOD FOR THOUGHT".
Tags: action, aid, appreciation, attitude, beauty, behavior, bliss, care, character, cheer, contribution, courage, deed, deeds, discipline, donation, example, food, gratitude, happiness, heart, honor, impression, influence, joy, life, lifestyle, lifetime, love, man, might, model, moral, neighbor, others, personality, power, reward, riches, role model, smiles, soul, spirit, strength, sunshine, thought, title, values, wealth, woman
><><><><><><><><><><><><><
.
——————————
It’s not the honors
and not the titles
and not
the power that is of ultimate importance.
It’s what resides inside.
.
- Fred Rogers
——————————
Mar 07 2012
Posted: under "Life is precious handle with PRAYER!", "When You're Down to Nothing God's UP to Something", "YUMMY FOOD FOR THOUGHT".
Tags: anxiety, appreciation, beauty, blessings, bliss, burden, cloud, clouds, cross, depression, food, happiness, journey, joy, life, load, man, pain, prayer, storm, stress, struggles, sunshine, thought, weight, woman
.
” WE MUST GO THROUGH THE
.
STORM
.
TO APPRECIATE THE
.
SUNSHINE”
Mar 11 2011
Posted: under Advice & Tips, Inspirationals.
Tags: action, advice, America, appreciation, attitude, behavior, bliss, dad, dinner, earth, entertainment, family, father, food, fun, funtime, game, golf, happiness, idea, inspiration, jewelry, joy, knowledge, language, laughter, learning, leisure, life, love, man, money, mother, parents, partner, recreation, rejoicing, smiles, television, time, tips, universe, woman, words, world
.
At one time, Bangkok television aired the American situation comedy
LaVerne and Shirley. For whatever reason, officials there believed
that a disclaimer was necessary for the Thailand audience, so this
subtitle was added to each show: “The two women depicted in the
following episode are from an insane asylum.”
.
Personally, I’m thankful there is a little silliness in the world.
And I don’t mind not acting like everybody else. Like the
“irrepressible” educator and speaker Leo Buscaglia once said: “I don’t
mind if people think I’m crazy. In fact, I think it’s great! It
gives me tremendous latitude for behavior.”
.
Buscaglia knew how to laugh. And I think knowing how to laugh and
have fun is an important part of living.
.
Someone asked me what I do for fun. I felt I should answer with
something others enjoy, like golf or skiing. But my idea of fun is
not usually associated with entertainment and recreation. It is more
about squeezing as much enjoyment into every day as I can. Instead
of looking for something fun to do, I try to make whatever I do a
little more fun. And if I can’t always do things I enjoy, I can
learn to enjoy more of the things I do.
.
I like the word “enjoyment” because it has “joy” inside of it. So
does the word “rejoice.” And rejoicing is a way to find enjoyment of
life.
.
Speaking of Leo Buscaglia, he used to tell a story about his mother
and their “misery dinner.” It was the night after his father came
home and said it looked as if he would have to go into bankruptcy
because his partner had absconded with their firm’s funds. His
mother’s response was to sell some of her jewelry to buy food enough
for a grand feast. At first, other members of the family scolded her
for it. But she told them that “the time for joy is now, when we
Posted: under "A Slice Of Life", Advice & Tips.
Tags: achievement, activities, advice, appreciation, beauty, bliss, boss, champagne, choices, computer, contribution, control, couple, day, desire, difference, dinner, donation, dreams, earth, experiences, family, focus, friends, future, gift, goal, halloween, happiness, health, home, husband, inspiration, internet, job, joy, kindness, laughter, lessons, life, love, man, moment, money, nature, online, relationships, secrets, smiles, sports, spouse, success, tips, today, Valentine's Day, wife, wine, woman, work, world
.
How to Be Happy
================
.
Find joy in the people and places around you!
.
Last night, I had dinner with a friend who has everything I
want: a beautiful brownstone house filled with expensive
furniture, a smart and funny husband, an adorable baby girl and
a published novel.
.
She just told me that she’s miserable.
.
“I know it’s terrible,” she said. “I have nothing to complain
about. But I’ve always been miserable. I get it from my mother
— she was a real grump.”
.
I was surprised; I had always thought she was happy. Not that I
ever asked her. Of course she’s happy, I figured, she has all
the toys. This deduction is a common mistake, says David Niven,
Ph.D., author of “The 100 Simple Secrets of Happy People.”
.
“One thing that continually shocks people is that the events of
a person’s life have little to do with how happy he or she is,”
says Dr. Niven.
.
Rather, as my friend suspected, genetics is about 50 percent
responsible for our level of happiness, says Mihaly
Csikszentmihalyi, Ph.D., author of the groundbreaking book
“Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience.” Fortunately, we
have a significant amount of control over the other half.
.
Here are some ways to tend to your mental health and happiness
today:
.
Appreciate the moment:
Many of us view happiness as a future state: something we’ll
achieve when we get that great job, beautiful home or handsome
husband. And while we do often feel quite elated when we attain
these goals, the bliss is usually short-lived — and quickly
followed by a desire for something else, whether it’s more
money, a renovated kitchen or flowers on Valentine’s Day.
“That’s why winning the lottery or getting a promotion doesn’t
work.
.
You’re always looking toward the next step,” explains Dr.
Csikszentmihalyi. To break that looking-ahead cycle, you need
to cultivate an appreciation of your life as it is now —
dissatisfying job and all.
.
Csikszentmihalyi says people have a natural tendency to think
about what’s not working in their lives and ignore the good
stuff. So make a list of everything that you love about your
life — Thursday-night Chardonnays with the girls, the nature
trail nearby, the way your two-year-old looks in her Halloween
costume — and then remind yourself to really savor them.
.
Give yourself a higher calling:
Csikszentmihalyi says that people are happy when they feel that
they are contributing to something greater than themselves,
whether through their job, family or community. “Happy people
don’t ruminate about themselves and their problems. They say,
Life is short. I’d better do something useful.” But you don’t
have to have a large family or a job vaccinating orphans in
order to lead a fulfilling life.
.
Take the real-estate agent I know. Truly invested in helping
people find the right home, he will often steer prospective
tenants away from listings he considers subpar, depending upon
their needs and desires. If he was strictly out for his
commission, he wouldn’t get nearly the same job satisfaction
(and, in the long run, he probably wouldn’t make as much money,
either). So think about the ways you can transform your
perspective of your daily tasks.
.
Build small acts of kindness into your day:
You can always build small acts of kindness into your day, such
as giving up your seat on the bus, putting a quarter in a
stranger’s ready-to-expire parking meter or clicking on The
Breast Cancer Site (www.thebreastcancersite.com), where you can
help fund mammograms for poor women. These things do make a
difference in others’ lives. You flow, girl (or guy).
.
Find your flow:
We’ve all had those moments when things feel completely right in
our world. Perhaps you were cross-country skiing through a
beautiful ice-coated forest or creating a scrapbook of snapshots
and ticket stubs from your trip to Los Angeles. You spent the
day completely immersed in the activity, and when you finally
looked at your watch, you were startled to realize how much time
had passed.
.
Csikszentmihalyi says these moments of complete absorption are
when people are happiest, a state he calls “flow.” “These are
the moments people treasure in their lives, and the more of them
you get, the better off you are,” he says.
.
To find your flow, first get a hobby — an activity you do for
pure enjoyment. Think about the stuff you loved to do as a kid
— ballet lessons, pottery, pickup basketball — and then just go
with it.
.
Examine your options:
One crucial difference between happy people and unhappy people
Posted: under "A Slice Of Life", Inspirationals.
Tags: appreciation, bliss, child, dad, education, father, Father's Day, gratitude, happiness, honor, humor, inspiration, joy, kindness, learning, lessons, life, love, man, memories, moment, parent, quotes, smiles, teacher, teaching, world
.
”A Father is someone you look up to no matter how tall you
are.”
–Anon.
.
Father’s Day reminds me of the many reasons I have to thank my
dear Dad.
..
I’m a lucky son… I have one of the greatest dad around. My
father is compassionate, loving and kind. He adores all children
and animals. He tries to see the good in everyone and goes out
of his way to rescue struggling flies from drowning in his
swimming pool.
..
Looking back, I know I received an unusual education from my dad.
Dad had to figure out his place in my life. He grabbed precious
moments, such as the time our basement flooded, to teach me
about water pressure and drainage systems. Dad’s lessons were
unusual, unorthodox, and seemed to have little relevance to my
future — kind of like my bachelor of arts degree.
..
Actually, the more I compare Dad’s teaching and my degree, the
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Jun 17 2010