Starfish Story

"Now is no time to think of what you do not have. Think of what you can do with what there is."

Ernest Hemingway

From his book "The Old Man and the Sea"

This makes me think of so many things... there is big opportunity in change

To all of you that I send quotes to each week, thanks for reading them and I hope you have enjoyed them and will continue to. However, I am not able to keep my views out of my comments anymore... you may have noticed lol. I feel I should let you know that I will not be editing my comments as much... it takes too much time and it waters down my thoughts...  as always if you'd rather not get these just reply and tell me so.

This quotes says to me that it is not useful to think of the world we are losing. Our world is changing whether we admit it yet or not. The things we take for granted will not be free forever. The Earth is not responsible to supply us with an endless supply of water, breathable air, food and shelter. Exploiting her resources to give us the lifestyle, convenience and luxury we are accustomed to is not sustainable. It is time to recognize that and think about what we can do for the world rather than how much more we can take. 

These are troubled times, yet the opportunities for change are great. There are many small things we can do that will accumulate and make a difference. Our government is stuck playing politics, protecting their interests and floundering to maintain a status quo that is marginalizing many segments of our people, leading us to domestic and international conflicts and distracting us from doing anything. We cannot wait for anyone to tell us what to do!

Here's a favourite story of mine that I was reminded of this week and is encouragement for when we feel our efforts are too small to make a difference.

Cheers

Jeanne

https://eventsforchange.wordpress.com/2011/06/05/the-starfish-story-one-step-towards-changing-the-world/ 

 

The Starfish Story: one step towards changing the world

By Peter Straube

You may have heard this one, but I find that it doesn’t hurt to be reminded of it every once in a while.  First let me tell you the story, and then we can talk about it.
Once upon a time, there was an old man who used to go to the ocean to do his writing.He had a habit of walking on the beach every morning before he began his work. Early one morning, he was walking along the shore after a big storm had passed and found the vast beach littered with starfish as far as the eye could see, stretching in both directions.
Off in the distance, the old man noticed a small boy approaching.  As the boy walked, he paused every so often and as he grew closer, the man could see that he was occasionally bending down to pick up an object and throw it into the sea.  The boy came closer still and the man called out, “Good morning!  May I ask what it is that you are doing?”
The young boy paused, looked up, and replied “Throwing starfish into the ocean. The tide has washed them up onto the beach and they can’t return to the sea by themselves,” the youth replied. “When the sun gets high, they will die, unless I throw them back into the water.”
The old man replied, “But there must be tens of thousands of starfish on this beach. I’m afraid you won’t really be able to make much of a difference.”

The boy bent down, picked up yet another starfish and threw it as far as he could into the ocean. Then he turned, smiled and said, “It made a difference to that one!”

adapted from The Star Thrower, by Loren Eiseley (1907 – 1977)

We all have the opportunity to help create positive change, but if you’re like me, you sometimes find yourself thinking, “I’m already really busy, and how much of a difference can I really make?”  I think this is especially true when we’re talking about addressing massive social problems like tackling world hunger or finding a cure for cancer, but it pops up all of the time in our everyday lives, as well. So when I catch myself thinking that way, it helps to remember this story.  You might not be able to change the entire world, but at least you can change a small part of it, for someone.
They say that one of the most common reasons we procrastinate is because we see the challenge before us as overwhelming, and that a good way to counter that is to break the big challenge down into smaller pieces and then take those one at a time–like one starfish at a time.  And to that one starfish, it can make a world of difference.

“A single, ordinary person still can make a difference – and single, ordinary people are doing precisely that every day.”
— Chris Bohjalian, Vermont-based author and speaker  

Unfinished songs

"I write every day. I walk around in silent conversation with my latest unfinished songs."

Gord Downie, 

The Tragically Hip

I think we all walk around with our own songs playing in our heads, I know I do and last night I was trying to remember what my unfinished songs were 10 years ago and if they are the same now. Funny how many are still unfinished... 

Listening to music, especially music with lyrics as thoughtful, relevant, beautiful as the Tragically Hip's is a release from my own songs and fears and longings for a more caring, sharing world. Thanks to these and all musicians who work so hard to get their songs out. 

Here's a quote I've used before... a little bonus from the Hip

“With illusions of someday casting a golden light
No dress rehearsal, this is our life.”          From: "Ahead By A Century” – The Tragically Hip (Trouble At The Henhouse, 1996)

For the people who are getting this weekly quote for the first time please enjoy, no response necessary unless you feel the urge.

If you want off this list just email me back. If there is anyone you think would enjoy getting this weekly quote, which is, hopefully, a thought provoking and positive message on Thursday mornings pass this on or have them send me a message.

Cheers

Risk

"The person who risks nothing does nothing, has nothing, is nothing, and becomes nothing. He may avoid suffering and sorrow but he simply cannot learn and feel and change and grow and love and life.”

    Leo Buscaglia

I was introduced to Leo Buscaglia's books by my cousin at a time when I was feeling alone and lost. I read her dog eared and note filled copy of "Living, Loving and Learning"  again and again. His stories remind me that love and caring can make a difference and that is a reason for living when it feels like fear is overwhelming and joy is a selfish thing in the face of the misery everywhere. Cheers Jeanne

From: www.leobuscaglia.com

Biography

Leo F. Buscaglia (1924 -1998)

Buscaglia was teaching in the Department of Special Education at the University of Southern California in the late 1960s when one of his students committed suicide. She had been one of the sets of "kind eyeballs" he always looked for in the large auditorium, because her responses showed him that at least one student was hearing what he said, so the news that she killed herself had a great impact on him. ["What are we doing stuffing facts into people and forgetting that they are human beings?"] This incident led him to form a non-credit class titled Love 1A. There were no grades. (How could you potentially fail someone in this class? That wouldn't be very loving!) The class led to lectures and a manuscript loosely based on what was shared in those weekly classes. The book found a publisher - and an author surprised to find that the simple title LOVE had never previously been claimed, allowing him to say "I have the copyright on LOVE!" Buscaglia said he never taught this class, only facilitated it, adding that he learned as much as anyone. Someone from a Public Broadcasting System affiliate heard one of his talks and arranged to tape a later presentation, eventually showing it during a pledge drive. The response was so strong that it was presented to the national office for consideration. There was great resistance, because a professor simply standing at a podium lecturing was considered old-fashioned, something from the old days of "educational television." Still, the message and delivery were so compelling that they gave it a try, and Leo Buscaglia's warm presentations touched viewers' hearts through the cool medium of television nearly as effectively as they did in person. He has been called the "granddaddy of motivational speakers" on television. His simple message delivered in a dynamic style made him a popular guest on television talk shows, as well as on the lecture circuit. At one time five of his books were on The New York Times Best Sellers List simultaneously.

Life is our greatest possession and love its greatest affirmation.

A Cheerleader for Life

Leo Buscaglia was a cheerleader for life. "Life is a banquet," he would say, quoting from the movie "Auntie Mame," " and most poor fools are starving to death." He was most closely associated with the topic of love and human relationships, emphasizing the value of positive human touch, especially hugs.

This association with hugging became his trademark at lectures, where thousands of people would stand patiently waiting to hug him after a presentation. It was not uncommon for him to give a talk of about an hour, then stay afterwards signing books and hugging for at least twice that long. This came about when someone spontaneously offered him a congratulatory hug following an early speech. A line formed, and it became an anticipated part of future events. Time restraints on occasion would dictate that those towards the end of the line would have to choose between a hug and an autograph. Nearly all chose the physical connection with this inspiring speaker. And he almost never left until he met everyone in line. Should someone be left out because they hadn't pushed to the front? Those would have been people he would have missed experiencing, he said, and that would have left him a lesser person.

Biography

Born in Los Angeles, Felice Leonardo Buscaglia (he later inverted the initials) was the youngest of four children of Italian immigrants. He was raised Roman Catholic, and was influenced by Buddhism in his adult life. The combination of physically demonstrative love of life learned from his Mediterranean parents combined with the inner reflection learned from travels and studies in Asia served him well.

His childhood is well known to his listeners and readers; it provided many fable-like experiences that he shared throughout his work. Readers from many diverse cultures identified with these stories, being reminded of elements of their own upbringing. So many letters to him started similar to this: "Dear Leo, I hope I can call you that rather than Dr. Buscaglia because I feel as if I know you, as if we are friends." His "Mama stories" continue to be quoted by fans. [When someone would identify themselves to him as a "fan," he would invariably reply, "Don't be a fan. Fans are fickle and will soon drop you for something else. Be a friend. You can count on friends.") While other children were playing chase games, little Leo was playing school, always casting himself as the teacher, and always with willing pupils.

He served in the U.S. Navy in World War II. The slender young sailor did not see combat, but he certainly saw its aftermath in his duties in the dental section of the military hospital, helping to reconstruct shattered faces. Using the benefits of the G. I. Bill, he was able to go to the private University of Southern California after the war. His association with USC is somewhat unique in the academic world. He received his bachelor's, master's and doctorate degrees there, and later became a faculty member. Upon his retirement, the university president named Buscaglia Professor at Large, an honorary title held by only one other person at that time. His non-credit Love 1A class was right for the times when it began in the late 1960s. He prepared a talk for educational conferences based on these sessions, which he wanted to call simply "Love".

The reaction to both his dynamic, evangelical delivery and the content was like nothing ever seen in educational circles, and Buscaglia became a popular educational conference presenter. This exposure led to speaking requests by colleges, and by other professional and business organizations.

Once these heartfelt talks were seen on national television they became the largest single money generators for PBS through much of the 1980s. While these presentations paved the way for many motivational speakers on PBS after him, Buscaglia never considered himself one of them. He was simply a teacher whose classroom had become the world.

Over eleven million copies of his books had been purchased in the U.S. by the time of his death by heart attack in 1998. Approximately 24 editions are available throughout the world. He was very pleased and surprised by the strong sales in Italy. He never imagined Italians would need an American to remind them of the importance of food, family, sharing and love of life, because he had learned these things from his Italian parents.

The study of love brought him to the study of life. "To live in love is to live in life, and to live in life is to live in love." But this should never be done passively. He wrote, "It's not enough to have lived. We should determine to live for something. May I suggest that it be creating joy for others, sharing what we have for the betterment of personkind, bringing hope to the lost and love to the lonely." Only you will be able to discover, realize, develop and actualize your uniqueness. And when you do, it's your duty to then "give it away."

Written by Steven Short

Excerpted with permission from HOW TO GET A LIFE, edited by Lawrence Baines, Ph. D and Daniel McBryer, Ph.D, 2003 by Humanics: www.humanicspub.com

About the Foundation

Many years ago, while traveling in Hong Kong, Leo Buscaglia met a Chinese refugee who, with his family, lived in extreme poverty. The young refugee's name was Wong. In order to find work, Wong needed to learn English. Dr. Buscaglia paid Wong's tuition to an English-language school.

Years later, Wong wrote to Dr. Buscaglia. By then he was sufficiently employed to get his family out of the refugee camp. He was also prepared to pay back what he saw as his "debt." Instead, Dr. Buscaglia encouraged him to find another determined person such as himself and to give the money, with love, from Wong and Leo, with the hope that in this way it might touch many lives.

In 1984, Dr. Buscaglia founded the Felice Foundation. (The name has since been changed to the Leo Buscaglia Foundation to honor Dr. Buscaglia.) He established the Foundation to give special aid and attention to those who have dedicated themselves to the betterment of personkind through the dynamics of helping one another. As in his experience with Wong, the Foundation is structured around the dynamics of sharing and giving, and influencing others to do the same, the roles of helper and helped constantly interchanging.

Foundation Homepage

Mission

The mission of the Leo Buscaglia Foundation is building community spirit by helping people to help others.

Change

"When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves."

Viktor Frankl

April mornings and signs of spring... inspiration for miracles

Cheers

Jeanne

Obituary: Viktor Frankl

• Morton Schatzman
• Friday 5 September 1997 00:02 

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/obituary-viktor-frankl-1237506.html  

The Austrian psychiatrist and psychotherapist Viktor Frankl is best known for tracing suffering to a failure to find meaning and a sense of responsibility in life. He once said that the meaning of his life was to help others find the meaning in theirs. The Will to Meaning (1969) is the title of one of his books.

He was born in Vienna in 1905. The house he first lived in was diagonally across the street from where the psychotherapist Alfred Adler had lived for a time. Thus, Frankl mused, the "birth" of his logotherapy, the "third Viennese school of psychotherapy", Freud's being the first, took place near that of the "second" Viennese school - Adler's "individual psychology".

Frankl's father worked his way up from parliamentary stenographer to director at the Austrian Ministry of Social Affairs. He was to die in the Theresienstadt concentration camp from starvation and pneumonia. Frankl's mother was descended from a Prague patrician family. Among her ancestors was the 12th-century Jewish Bible and Talmud scholar Rashi, and Rabbi Low of Prague. She was gassed at Auschwitz.

Frankl wrote in his Recollections: an autobiography (1995) that he decided to become a physician at three years old. At about the age of four he was "startled by the unexpected thought" that one day he would have to die. What troubled him then, as it did throughout his life, was not the fear of dying, but the "question of whether the transitory nature of life might destroy its meaning". Eventually he decided that it did not, because "nothing from the past is irretrievably lost . . . Whatever we have done, or created, whatever we have learned and experienced - all of this we have delivered into the past. There is no one, and nothing, that can undo it."

He was still in high school when his childhood wish to become a physician became more focused and, under the influence of psychoanalysis, he became interested in psychiatry. He saw his talent as a psychiatrist as related to a "gift" he had as a cartoonist. As a cartoonist, he said he could "spot the weaknesses" in a person. But as a psychiatrist, or "rather as a psychotherapist", he could see "beyond the actual weaknesses" and "recognise intuitively some possibilities for overcoming those weaknesses". He could see the "potential for discovering a meaning" behind someone's misery, and thus turn "an apparently meaningless suffering into a genuine human achievement". He believed that this was the core of his approach to psychotherapy, which came to be known as logotherapy.his teens, Frankl became interested in philosophy and started to lecture on the meaning of life. He formed a relationship with Alfred Adler, but fell out with him within a few years. Aside from his medical degree, Frankl also had a doctorate in philosophy. His "dear colleagues in Vienna", he commented, "instead of saying Frankl is twice a doctor", would say "he is only half a physician".

He began his private practice of psychiatry and neurology in 1937, and soon became the chief of neurology at the Rothschild Hospital in Vienna. He waited for years until his quota number to emigrate to the United States came up. Finally, shortly before Pearl Harbor, the American Consulate gave him a visa. He knew his parents were fated to be deported to a concentration camp. The visa applied only to him. Should he leave them behind? He took a walk and awaited a "hint from heaven". At home his father had picked a piece of marble from the rubble of a burnt-down synagogue. On it was chiselled part of the Ten Commandments, in particular a letter that could have come only from the commandment "Honour thy father and thy mother". Frankl decided to let the visa lapse.

While still in Vienna he met his first wife, Tilly Grosser. They were among the last Viennese Jews to get permission from the National Socialist authorities to wed. Jews were forbidden to have children even if they were married, and Tilly had to sacrifice the foetus she was carrying. Frankl's book The Unheard Cry For Meaning (1978) was dedicated to their unborn child.

Nine months after marrying, in 1942, they were at the Theresienstadt concentration camp. Tilly had a two-year exemption from transfer to Auschwitz as she was working in a munitions factory, which was important to the war effort. However, Viktor was called up for "Transport East" - which they knew meant Auschwitz. He tried to persuade her not to join his transport. However, without his knowledge she volunteered. She went on the train with him to Auschwitz - and died there.

At Auschwitz, Dr Joseph Mengele selected him for the left queue, headed for the gas chambers. However, Frankl recognised no one in that queue. He saw a few of his young colleagues in the right queue, and switched to it behind Mengele's back. At the time he did not know he had saved his life.

In the camp he survived a typhus infection. He came to believe that those inmates who "were oriented toward the future, toward a meaning waiting to be fulfilled" were more likely to survive. He believed he owed his own survival in part to his resolve to reconstruct a manuscript he had written before Auschwitz, and lost there - a book he later called The Doctor and the Soul (1945).

He spent a total of three years in four camps. At a lecture after the war he said:

I repeatedly tried to distance myself from the misery that surrounded me by externalising it. I remember marching one morning from the camp to the work site, hardly able to bear the hunger, the cold, and pain of my frozen and festering feet, so swollen . . . My situation seemed bleak, even hopeless. Then I imagined that I stood at a lectern in a large, beautiful, warm and bright hall. I was about to give a lecture to an interested audience on "Psychotherapeutic Experiences in a Concentration Camp" (the actual title I later used . . .). In the imaginary lecture I reported the things I am now living through. Believe me, ladies and gentlemen, at that moment I could not dare to hope that some day it was to be my good fortune to actually give such a lecture.

As well as losing his parents and wife in the camps, he also lost a brother in Auschwitz. A sister, who had gone to Australia, survived. After the war he served for 25 years as head of a neurology department at the Viennese Polyclinic Hospital.

He dictated his best-known book, Man's Search for Meaning (1945), in nine days, and published it at first anonymously. Translated into 24 languages, it distils Frankl's approach to psychotherapy. He wrote that he had wanted to "convey to the reader by way of concrete example that life holds a potential meaning under any conditions, even the most miserable ones". He wished to demonstrate the point in a situation "as extreme as that in a concentration camp". If he wrote down what he had gone through "it might be helpful to people who are prone to despair". He believed that life holds a potential meaning under any conditions.

One of his logotherapeutic maxims is "Live as if you were already living for the second time, and as if you had made the mistakes you are about to make now". This "fictive autobiographical view of one's life" is meant to heighten one's sense of responsibility.

He admonished his students:

Don't aim at success - the more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued. It must ensue, and it does so only as the unintended side effect of one's personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of surrender to a person other than oneself . . .

While being forced to march in a concentration camp, a thought "transfixed" him. He "saw the truth as it is set into song by many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth - that love is the ultimate and highest goal to which man can aspire." Then he "grasped the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: the salvation of man is through love and in love".

Viktor Emil Frankl, psychiatrist and psychotherapist: born Vienna 26 March 1905; married 1941 Tilly Grosser (deceased), 1947 Eleonore Schwindt (one daughter); died Vienna 2 September 1997.

One Soul

What can you ever really know of other people's souls — of their temptations, their opportunities, their struggles? One soul in the whole of creation you do know: and it is the only one whose fate is placed in your hands. If there is a God, you are, in a sense, alone with Him.  C.S. Lewis

What can we know of other people's souls? For that matter can we ever truly know our own? 

C.S. Lewis

Born: November 29, 1898 
Belfast, Ireland 
Died: November 24, 1963 
Oxford, England 
Irish writer, novelist, and essayist

The Irish novelist and essayist C. S. Lewis was best known for his essays on literature and his explanations of Christian teachings.

Early life and education

On November 29, 1898, Clive Staples Lewis was born in Belfast, Ireland. He was the son of A. J. Lewis, a lawyer, and Flora August Hamilton Lewis, a mathematician (expert in mathematics), whose father was a minister. At four years old he told his parents that he wanted to be called "Jack" Lewis, and his family and friends referred to him that way for the rest of his life. Jack's best friend as a boy was his older brother Warren. They did everything together and even created their own made-up country, Boxen, going so far as to create many individual characters and a four-hundred-year history of the country.

Lewis's mother, who had tutored him in French and Latin, died when he was ten years old. After spending a year in studies at Malvern College, a boarding school in England, he continued his education privately under a tutor named W. T. Kirkpatrick, former headmaster (principal) of Lurgan College. During World War I (1914–18), which began as a conflict between Austria-Hungary and Serbia but eventually involved much of Europe, Lewis served as a second lieutenant in the English army, interrupting his career as a scholar that he had begun in 1918 at University College, Oxford. Wounded in the war, he returned to Oxford, where he was appointed lecturer at University College in 1924. In 1925 he was appointed fellow (performing advanced study or research) and tutor at Magdalen College, England, where he gave lectures on English literature.

C. S. Lewis. 
Reproduced by permission of

AP/Wide World Photos

.

Published works

In 1926 Lewis's first publication, Dymer, appeared under the pseudonym (fake writing name) Clive Hamilton. Dymer revealed Lewis's gift for satire (a work of literature that makes fun of human vice or foolishness). The Pilgrims' Regress, an allegory (an expression of truths about human existence using symbols) published in 1933, presented an apology for Christianity. It was not until the appearance of his second allegorical work, The Allegory of Love (1936), however, that Lewis was honored with the coveted Hawthornden prize.

The Screwtape Letters (1942), for which Lewis is perhaps best known, is a satire in which the devil, here known as Screwtape, writes letters teaching his young nephew, Wormwood, how to tempt humans to sin. Lewis published seven religious allegories for children titled Chronicles of Narnia (1955). He also published several scholarly works on literature, including English Literature in the 16th Century (1954) and Experiment in Criticism (1961).

Although Lewis went on to publish several works involving religion, he had lost interest in it early in life and only later "converted" to Christianity, joining the Anglican Church. His autobiography (the story of his own life), Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life, fails to explain what happened in his childhood. His headmaster in boarding school, a minister who urged him to "think" by hitting him, may have contributed to this change.

Read more: https://www.notablebiographies.com/Ki-Lo/Lewis-C-S.html#ixzz5mloZUO9x  

Forms of fear

“Unease, anxiety, tension, stress, worry – all forms of fear – are caused by too much future, and not enough presence. Guilt, regret, resentment, grievances, sadness, bitterness, and all forms of non-forgiveness are caused by too much past, and not enough presence.” 

Eckhart Tolle  

Last night I woke up in the middle of the night worrying about random things that will never get solved by worrying. There is not one of them that time will not make insignificant.  These things were in my only in my mind ...  as things to worry about ... and I could have enjoyed being comfortable in my bed. But that was then and this is now

Cheers

Jeanne

About Eckhart Tolle

http://www.oprah.com/oprahsbookclub/eckhart-tolles-biography  

Best-selling author and spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle has been inspiring readers since he wrote the number one New York Times best-seller The Power of Now. Eckhart Tolle was born in Germany and educated at the Universities of London and Cambridge. At 29, he says a profound inner transformation radically changed the course of his life. He spent the next few years devoted to understanding, integrating and deepening that transformation, which he says marked the beginning of an intense inward journey. While in London, he also began to work with individuals and small groups as a counselor and spiritual teacher. Since 1995, he has lived in Vancouver, Canada. The Power of Now made its American debut in 1999 and has since been translated into 33 languages.

Eckhart is not aligned with any particular religion or tradition. Through his writing and seminars, his simple yet profound teachings have already helped countless people throughout the world find inner peace and greater fulfillment in their lives.

At the core of his teachings lies the transformation of consciousness—a spiritual awakening that he sees as the next step in human evolution. An essential aspect of this awakening consists of transcending our ego-based state of consciousness. This, he says, is a prerequisite not only for personal happiness but also for the ending of violent conflict endemic on our planet.

Read more about his transformation and what it means at

https://www.eckharttollenow.com/article/Eckhart-Tolle-Oprah-Winfreys-Favorite-Guru

Here is another interesting read for those interested

https://www.eckharttollenow.com/article/Spirituality-And-The-Christian-Tradition  

Criticism

"Let the refining and improving of your own life keep you so busy that you have little time to criticize others."

H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

Whew, how cool is this!! Imagine if criticism was not allowed, only encouragement to refine and improve..

Cheers Jeanne

PAST & PRESENT

---

Jackson Brown was born and still lives in Middle Tennessee. His numerous books are in 35 languages and read throughout the world claiming 158 weeks on the New York Times Bestseller list. It is sometimes noted that he graduated from a prestigious university and is the recipient of one of their most distinguished awards but, who knows? If you were to phone the administration office, they would probably deny that he ever attended. It seems hard feelings still linger regarding Mr. Brown’s insistence that the campus clock tower he pledged to help fund be in the shape of a 300-foot ukulele.

Currently, Mr. Brown writes in a remote log cabin high on Hatchet’s Ridge in the foothills of the Smoky Mountains. There he retreats to observe, ponder, resharpen No. 2 pencils and train his parrot to squawk, “One more step and I’ll shoot.” Should you want to visit, get an early start. Take the gravel road east out of Crowell Corners to the end. There it becomes a dirt road switch-backing up the ridges. A hand-lettered sign nailed to a hickory tree teasingly identifies these last fifteen miles as Broken Axle Trail. The cabin is not the first or second on this dusty corkscrew but the third. You’ll think you’re almost there, but you’re not. And count the creeks. You’ll cross two. The first on a tricky two-plank bridge. The second, unfortunately, offers no bridge at all. Now look for the weathered tin roof and the trellised front gate crowned with honeysuckle.  Pay no attention to the dogs Dan, Hoover and Hot Ticket asleep on the front porch couch; Hoover hasn’t bitten anyone in years. But be careful where you step. The copperheads, rattlesnakes, and wild hogs love this bit of heaven as much as Mr. Brown does.

P . S .   As Mr. Brown instructs in one of his books, "Don't believe everything you read."

Back to homepage

 

Copyright 2007 by H. Jackson Brown, Jr. 

From Wikipedia:

Biography[edit]

Brown was born in 1940, in Middle Tennessee, where he still lives as of 2018. Before becoming a writer, he acted as a creative director of an advertising agency in Nashville. He graduated from Emory University in 1962 and was a member of Sigma Chi Fraternity.^[5] In 1991 he was honored as a "Significant Sig", an award given by the organization to its notable members.^[5]

Brown first published A Father's Book of Wisdom, which was quickly followed by P.S. I Love You, a collection of sayings and observations from his father and mother. The latter contains the famous quote on travel (see below) which is often misquoted^[6] as having been said by Mark Twain. Both were very popular and led to Life's Little Instruction Book, which was originally written as a going-away present for his college-bound son, Adam.^[7] This book contained 511 reminders about "how to live a happy and rewarding life" and became a best-seller worldwide. It has logged more than two years on the New York Times best-seller list, including more than a year at the number one spot. Life's Little Instruction Book was the first book to ever occupy the number one spot on the New York Times best-seller list in both paperback and hardback formats simultaneously. Live and Learn and Pass It On followed and also became a New York Times best-seller. "Live and Learn and Pass It On," was co-authored with his wife Rosemary C. Brown, who is herself an author with books like Rosemary Brown's Big Kitchen Instruction Book.

Brown's books have been translated into 35 languages. They have spawned calendars, posters, apparel items, daily journals, greeting cards, audiocassettes, screensavers and even fortune cookies.

Sharpen the axe!

“Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.”

Abraham Lincoln

Warning!!! Normally I send these quotes before reading the morning newspaper, but today was different...

I read a very disturbing story in the paper today about mineral resources in Ontario's Far North. It seems to me that there is a lot of axe sharpening going on by government, corporations, and other profit making interests to prepare for the extraction of those resources. By the time the tip of the iceberg shows with the roads and infrastructure construction that axe will be really sharp and ready to cut through all but their own interests. And I wonder at the power of the dollar that is driving this sharpening and the sugar coating of it to make us average people think its okay. Sure in the short term industry and jobs and development will provide a seeming net positive for society, but resource extraction almost always seems to follow a bell curve and once the rich are richer from bleeding the environmental and human capital they will take their axe somewhere else and we will be left with a fallen tree that has been sucked dry of all its life giving properties.  

Is it human nature to need to dominate everything including the planet we live on? ... Will we realize before it is too late that this need is destroying the life giving resources the Earth supplies us with ...How ironic that in our egotistical quest for ever more things we have created the machine that will destroy us.

I am hoping that the "axe" that propelled us into mindless consumerism and feeling that we need to "protect" whatever we have been blessed with from "them" is becoming duller from gross overuse. And that soon that wearing away of the surface will expose the plastic underbelly of the sharp steel; that the "them" is not even the corporations and manipulating governments that are exploiting "us", these monoliths actually are a creation of "us's". The "them" we fear is any "us" that is a little different than "us" and they have the same fears so the circle is in perpetual motion and our own creations are feeding it. 

I really hope there are a lot of other axes being sharpened and that we "the people" get over ourselves and our mindless fears that make us think our individual security is even possible if we don't look after the security of "the whole".

There is absolutely a lot we can do as individuals. There are millions of "one of Us's" but each 'one' is an integral part of the problem and a key to the solution. It would take a shift in our thinking and would be uncomfortable in the short term but, like quitting smoking; the benefits would go a long ways to improving our health and the health of our planet. 

We could take baby steps right now to sharpen our own axes! So simple, and not overwhelming if we use Abe's advice and have the patience and faith to persevere. The first step is the hardest, just like quitting smoking, the first days are the hardest and the change in our mindset does not happen over night, it happens with the first step and then the next comes. 

Like reducing plastic. Working ourselves towards eliminating single use items by refusing, returning and reusing. 

Like choosing not to buy something we don't need and give those dollars to somewhere that is actively trying to make positive change.

Like looking deeply at what we are supporting as individuals; is if for the good of what we believe in?

Like helping people anywhere and everywhere. Being conscious of our impact, deeply caring for ourselves and our world, kindness and non judgment may be the axes that can topple our addictions to greed, fear and hatred.

Cheers

Jeanne