If you do the right thing.....

....while everyone else does the wrong thing, what difference is it going to make? What is the point in trying when so many others are being so careless and apathetic? (So many people prefer to do what's easy, not what's right.)  There is, of course, every point. Not only do we feel good when we reach within ourselves for wisdom, perspective and honourable motivation, we inspire others to do the same.

Be an example today.

There's no greater role model, in my view, than Jesus Christ. It's just a shame that most of the people who follow him and call themselves Christians act nothing like him. (Bill Maher)

If you ask anyone for the reasons....

...behind their decisions, most will give the explanation that they suspect will make them sound most sensible. Rarely, though, do those answers reflect the real story. Our biggest choices and preferences are generally influenced by emotions and instincts. We fear that if we confess to these we may sound immature so we keep quiet about them.

If, though, you want to help someone see a situation from a different point of view, you need to first discover what's truly motivating them.

Maturity doesn't mean age; it means sensitivity, manners, and how you react.

Why do we think....

....we are supposed to have all the answers? Clarity is a wonderful thing to feel but a terrible thing to feign. When we pretend to know what's happening, we don't just rob ourselves of the ability to truly understand, we rob others too!

We dig the hole of illusion even deeper.

Real knowledge is to know the extent of one's ignorance.  (Confucius)

Some people will say.....

.... or do almost anything if they think that it will gain them more money, more love or more respect. It's all rather sad, to say nothing of counter-productive. Money earned through insincere action is soon wasted on unnecessarily indulgence. Love attained through a false promise is soon lost. Recognition given to an empty gesture is rapidly replaced by criticism. 

If there is ever pressure on you to lower a standard or to compromise an important principle, the apparent reward is probably not really worth having.

Humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less.  (C S Lewis)

Let's start the week....

....with some words from a well known song - well, it was well known once upon a time..!!!

Grab your coat, and grab your hat, leave your worries on the doorstep, just direct your feet...' The thing is, though, what if the street has no sunny side? What if dark clouds are hovering overhead? What if it never stops raining? Well, perhaps that should be 'sunnier'. Or perhaps it should just be 'least bleak'.

One side of any 'street' will always present a more attractive proposition than the other, even if the difference is only slight. Pick the best option you can identify, and don't worry.

There is no success without hardship    (Sophocles)

If we didn't have rule books....

....where would we be? How confused our lives would soon become without patterns to follow, expectations to live up to, tried and tested formulae to apply and repeat. Thanks to all these habits, established so long ago, none of us really has to think very much.

But sometimes, the most important thing we can ever do is stand outside a situation for a moment and try to see it from a distance while we stop and think.





Don't find fault, find a remedy.  (Henry Ford)

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's greatest work....

...was arguably the blueprint for many other fictional detectives - Sherlock Holmes.  (Let's not mention that he also gave credence to the Cottingley Fairies pictures.   Oops, I just did mention it.)  Where was I?  Ah yes, good old Sherlock has planted, in the mind of every would-be detective, the idea that all mysteries can eventually be solved. We seem to forget that he is a fictional character and his exploits have been carefully engineered. We try to emulate him. We gather up our clues. We study our suspects. We weigh up motive and opportunity.

But somehow we forget that real life is illogical.

Trust is like an eraser, it gets smaller and smaller after every mistake.

It would be silly in the extreme.....

.....to measure age purely by the clock or the calendar alone. There are some children who are wise beyond their years. And there are some so called adults who still, given half a chance, bicker like squabbling toddlers.  (I kinda think I've met quite a few of them!!) Nor is it ever wise for us to equate wisdom with chronology. 

No matter how old someone is, they can always make a new discovery that changes everything for the better if only they are willing to keep an open-mind.

Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little. 

(Edmund Burke)

All too often this world....

....seems like a crazy place. How crazy are we that, even when we can see how crazy it is, we still seek our place within it? We still seek sanity, strive for order and look for something that will make sense of the nonsense. Only one thing though, really makes this world go round and it is not money. It is love, compassion, sympathy, sensitivity, respect.

That's what we're here to feel, to share and to show. And when we do, all becomes meaningful.

You can do anything if you have enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is the yeast that makes 

your hopes rise to the stars.    (Henry Ford)

Chances are that you....

....are very clever, but intellect is not everything. People who are extremely adept with words and numbers, often sorely lack basic common sense. Nor is a high IQ any indication of a high EQ. Who on earth wants an overdeveloped brain and an underdeveloped heart?

If life offers you a golden opportunity to become more emotionally well-rounded and to make choices that confirm the depth of empathy and understanding that you are capable of showing; rise to that challenge. It is the only one that matters.

Living at risk is jumping off the cliff and building your wings on the way down.  (Ray Bradbury)

And the greatest teacher is?....

......Experience, of course.  And when the lesson that needs to be learned is important enough, it hardly matters whether that experience is positive or negative. When we look back on all the events that seem to confirm our wisdom, we have to wonder whether these have helped us or just conditioned us to remain upon a path that is so straight and narrow that it offers no scope for discovery. 

Through looking at what has gone wrong in the past, you stand the best chance of making things right in the future.

Life is like playing a violin solo in public and learning the instrument as one goes on. 

 (Samuel Butler)

You can argue with....

....the past as much as you like. It won't respond. It can't change. It can't even argue back! Happily, though, you don't have to resolve your differences with it. You can remain uncomfortable about anything that has taken place before now. This won't do you any harm as long as you don't carry the dispute forward.

The future doesn't need to be argued with. It needs to be cajoled, coaxed and persuaded. You can talk it into agreeing with you and, through that process, you can turn it into something you like.

Progress lies not in enhancing what is, but in advancing toward what will be.    (Khalil Gibran)

There are some that think....

.....stability is something you get through prudence. If you don't rock the boat, they argue, the boat will be less inclined to rock you. (And you know how you are viewed if you do rock the boat from time to time.)

But how can you truly hope to create an island of conviction in the ocean of uncertainty? The best you can hope to accomplish is a psychological surfboard that lets you ride the waves of chaos, rather than be continually submerged by them.

To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.  (Winston Churchill)

People who exercise every day....

....grow stronger. People who regularly practise a skill become more adept. People who eat a lot become capable of eating more. People who indulge their anger grow irritable. People who frequently criticise others find ever more reasons to be critical.

Our thoughts and feelings are like seeds. We reap what we sow. What are you now giving a lot of time and attention to? Is it a negative activity or a positive one? Invest your energy wisely.

Throughout the centuries there were men who took first steps down new roads armed

with nothing but their own vision.      (Ayn Rand)

    

Loving someone....

..... or knowing that they love you is not a licence to abuse or antagonise them. It is never okay to hurt someone's feelings, just because you suspect that you will be 'safe', even if you do.

 

We all need to learn to show each other more respect and to treat the people we are closest to with the same degree of deference and civility that we might show to a stranger.

To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering.    (Friedrich Nietzsche)

Why are some people....

....more successful than others? Is it a matter of talent? Not necessarily. Some highly-gifted individuals never have their abilities recognised. Others, with less skill but more self-confidence, receive all the awards. Is it down to contact and connection? Perhaps, but there are failures, even among the famous. And some do genuinely rise from obscurity to reach great heights.

The single most important ingredient you require in any recipe for success is faith.

Things gained through unjust fraud are never secure  (Sophocles)

Imagine that you are feeling....

hungry, and that it won't take too much to satisfy the hunger.  So, you opt for a bowl of breakfast cereal.   But what if someone were to offer you a gourmet meal, cooked to your specific dietary requirements?  Why might you turn it down? Perhaps you'd fear becoming beholden to the supplier of this food or you'd just prefer to accept the simpler, speedier solution.

As with food, so it is with many other pressing needs. At times there's the possibility of exceeding an expectation if you're willing to be adventurous.

To believe in something, and not to live it, is dishonest.    (Gandhi)

If somebody offered you....

....a glass of wine, at the right time in the right place, you may decide to accept. ( I wouldn't because I've yet to find a wine I like.  Such a shame, isn't it!)  If someone hands you a bottle and orders you to drink it all, right away, you have to refuse, regardless of who they are. Those are the extremes, somewhere in the middle is the grey area. It can often be hard to know whether we are being cajoled or coerced. Sometimes, people play on our sense of obligation. Sometimes, we just trick ourselves into feeling that something must happen because we don't want a fight.

You can't do only what you want to do, but you definitely mustn't do what you feel it's wrong to do.

Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former.

If we are not careful....

....we can spend our whole lives doing the things that others want us to do. If we are sensitive, we can soon tell what others around us need. And if we're kind, we will naturally want to help out where we can. Soon, though, if we carry on in this way, our independence will evaporate.

People don't mean to keep on taking until we have nothing left to give - well, most don't - but unless they are told to stop, they will accidentally keep on.

No accurate thinker will judge another person by that which the other person's enemies

say about him.    (Napoleon Hill)

As if we don't have enough.....

.... to test and try in our daily lives, we have our own imaginations to contend with. These ensure that we can never fully relax. Always, there is something to be nervous of. No matter what the scenario, we are capable of conjuring up negative associations. Or of seeing within it a pessimistic possibility.

Worse, our imagination will often insist that it is not even talking to us - that it is, in fact, the voice of common sense.

To love means loving the unlovable. Faith means believing the unbelievable.  Hope means hoping when everything seems hopeless. (G.K.Chesterton)

Isn't it fun to be judgemental

......It is not just our friends and loved ones that we approve or disapprove of. We can even find ourselves glancing at strangers and forming opinions about them. From their looks, their clothes, their body language, we decide what it is that they may be guilty of - or very occasionally, if we are feeling generous, deserving of praise for. But the point is, we don't know. We really don't know.

And when we think we probably do know, that is when we are most likely to be wrong!

Someone is praying for the things you take for granted.

Contrary to how it may seem at times....

....nothing lasts forever. Some things, though, drag on for a seriously long time. We assume they will never change. The moment we adopt this attitude, we lose some of our ability to make a difference. That's fine if we are happy with things as they are. But if we really would like to have a different experience, we must never decide that it isn't possible.

Complacency can put you in danger of missing an amazing opportunity which may fall right into your hands if you reached out to grab it.

Live your life and forget your age.  Do not regret getting older.  It is a privilege denied to some.

A hard heart is....

....a heavy heart. A closed mind is a mind no longer free to float on the ocean of possibility. Whilst there is always a danger that we can let ourselves drift too far or be receptive to those who might seek to take advantage of our generous spirit, we often do ourselves far more damage when we strive to protect ourselves. It is one thing to draw a line and try never to cross it again. It is another to build a wall or create a defensive barrier that leaves you isolated and imprisoned.

Kindness is a key to comfort.

The disease of B.S.E is widespread. B.S.E....... Blame Someone Else

Money can't buy you love....

....they say.  Well, this happens to be a rare occasion when 'they' are quite right.  Neither can it buy you good health, well-being, a clear conscience, a sense of humour, taste, style, discrimination, wit, wisdom, intelligence. (How long a list would you like?  Please feel free to add to it.)

How strange. These are all the things that hardly anyone in the modern world seems to care about any more. But that's because, as money can't buy them, manufacturers can't make them, so advertisers can't sell them.

The 3 great mysteries: air to a bird, water to a fish, mankind to himself.    (Hindu Proverb)

There was once a Pope called....

....Alexander.  I don't know if he followed any religious doctrine, but he (Alexander Pope) was a poet.  He once remarked - 'Hope springs eternal in the human breast'.  Hope, observed Pope, cannot help but bounce back, even when it is seriously squashed. The most that its enemies can do, is pile so much weight upon it that it takes some while to recover. If you really want to get the better of hope, you had best attack it swiftly while its defences are down.

If you have found yourself a little lacking in your life lately, that's what must have happened.

To revive it, just create a little space in which there is less pressure.

First we form habits, then they form us. Conquer your bad habits, or they'll eventually conquer you. (Rob Gilbert)

Imagine that you are....

.....standing in someone else's shoes. It's easy to find fault with another person's actions, but there may be good reasons why they feel what they feel and want what they want. Arguing against this won't help you make your case.

If you hope to communicate an alternative idea, you should consider which words and suggestions would be most persuasive. You can't make false promises nor can you say something that isn't true. But sweetness and sensitivity will take you a long way in the right direction.

To avoid facing our emotions we often keep either busy doing or busy thinking. In order to find tranquillity in life, face the way you feel.

Very little in this world....

....is ever truly cut and dry. We humans strive to give name, form and structure to factors that are, by nature, nebulous. In the process, we limit our potential and reduce our ability to be wise. 

Be open-minded.

To make no mistake is not in the power of man; but from their errors and mistakes the wise and good learn wisdom for the future.  (Plutarch)

We can deny it and we may not like it.....

....but the past catches up with us all, regardless of whether we run from it or stand still and wait. Many might say this is enough and there is no point in tempting fate by turning around and walking back towards it, fixing the past in the eye and saying, 'Hello. Are you looking for me?' But when we show such courage, we are inevitably rewarded.

If you now feel ready to square a circle, right a wrong, face a fact and create a more stable foundation for a future of better co-operation, then why shouldn't that all start to happen now.

I can't change the past, but one person can change the future - anything can happen  (Paul Mooney)

Why limp through....

....the door to the future, clutching a big bag of clothes that don't suit you, dragging behind you a cart of other people's problems that they have asked you to help carry? The door is only so wide. With all that baggage, you may not pass through.

You may have to wander round in a kind of eternal version of yesterday... until or unless you put down what you no longer need.

Some people will always mistake kindness for weakness.

Who has seen the wind....

....neither you nor I, but when the trees bow down their heads, the wind is passing by.' There are so many invisible forces at work in this world. We detect their presence by the reactions they create or the dramas they give rise to. Just because something is subtle, though, it does not mean that it is not powerful.

A small smile or a gentle gesture of goodwill can have an enormous effect - even if it is not fully acknowledged or appreciated.

There is as much greatness of mind in acknowledging a good turn, as in doing it.  (Seneca)

When things are going the way we want.....

....them to, we get an urge to celebrate. That's natural but it is not always appropriate. Energy directed towards festivity is energy diverted away from efficiency. Also, victory and failure are two sides of one coin. Those who care too much about winning also tend to worry too much about losing.

What we really need to care about is 'learning.' If this is our priority, we can enjoy life regardless of what it seems to be giving (or taking) from us.

Flowers often grow more beautifully on dung-hills than in gardens that look beautifully kept.    
(Saint Francis de Sales)

I have discovered that....

....there's a group of highly paid scientists who have studied the fierce competition between mice.  We now know that they argue about whose whiskers are longest, and whose noses twitch the most. I confess, I'm only kidding.  But even if those little creatures do all of the above, to us they are still just mice.

We humans also spend a lot of time weighing ourselves up against others. We wonder what they've got that we haven't... and vice versa. Yet the only people on this earth who are truly worth looking up to, are the one's who don't look up to (or down on) anyone.

If this was the last day of your life, would you spend it the way you’re spending today?

Many of us....

.....are familiar with Murphy's Law - but you may have given it another name.   Few of us, though, know that Mr Murphy later issued an amendment and an addendum.

'Actually,' he said, 'it is not that anything that can go wrong will, just that it probably will and we had best be prepared.' He then added, 'Anyway, sometimes even when things do go wrong, it turns out to be for the best.'

At this point, the tape recorder he was speaking in to exploded and thus his message never reached the wider world.

Time is equal to life; therefore, waste your time and waste of your life, or master your time

and master your life.   (Alan Lakein)

With the passing of time, I've come to realise....

....that there may be no such thing as true neutrality. No matter how much we may strive for objectivity, detachment and the enlightened wisdom that only impartiality can provide, we soon get edgy when vested interests crop up. How can we swallow back our feelings when a matter that is under discussion involves people we love or principles that we care about?

Yet some ideals, even if they can never be totally attained, are worth striving for nonetheless. The very act of aspiring to a higher plane, will put you on one.

Ultimately the happiest unions have less to do with perfect partners

and more to do with our inner self-worth.

Been a while, hasn't it?....

.....So without any further ado -

Don't you just love it when people talk about 'being in control'.  (My personal, inner, response is usually - not of me you're not - and then allow myself a wry smile.)  It's a strange notion. Very few of us are in control of very much, least of all ourselves! We can't entirely control our own appetites, let alone our thoughts and feelings. If we can't manage that, how can we ever be expected to make anything in the wider world behave according to our wishes?

What are our wishes anyway? What do you want? Are you entirely in agreement with yourself, at the moment? Deal with that first; the rest will come.

Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art.  It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things that give value to survival.   (C S Lewis)