If you insist on....

....continually looking over your shoulder, you will see whatever is threatening to sneak up on you from behind. You won't, though, be alert to any danger that lies ahead. We live in a world full of stable doors that have all been locked, long after their various horses have bolted. Meanwhile, new difficulties, as yet unlegislated for, wait to arise.

As with problems, so with opportunities. Why plough the same old tired furrow, when a new one can be dug? Go exploring.

Hem your blessings with thankfulness so they don't unravel.

What beats in the....

....very essence of your heart? When we strip away all pomp and pretence, all attitude and expectation, all pride, fear and foolishness, what do we find? Who do we discover? Are you a mortal or a deity? Are you part of the infinite and the eternal? Or are you trivial and temporal?

And if, as in truth you must be, you are some glorious combination of both, is it not only right and fair to at least acknowledge the existence of the higher spirit that dwells in your soul? It knows what you need. Let it advise you.

Much of your pain is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self.  

(Kahlil Gibran)

For this you have to be....

....totally focused.  Before you is a crystal ball. Gaze intently into it. You should notice that there are two images in the reflection. They conflict and contrast. One is almost a 'negative' of the other. So which is the true picture? Which should you trust? 

The answer, of course, is that you are seeing a point of choice in the distance. Go one way, and things will go well. Go another and they might not be quite so satisfactory. And which choice should you make? The one that leads away from fear and towards hope. 

It's amazing what ordinary people can do if they set out without preconceived notions.  (Ben Stein)

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Quite a few years ago....

....there was a famous guy called Horace.  A poet, by all accounts; and so famous that we don't need his surname to know who we're referring to.  (And there, any similarity to Kylie begins and ends!)  He's reputed to have said - 'A good scare is worth more than good advice.'  He also coined the phrase, 'Carpe diem' or, 'seize the day'. Properly translated it means, 'pluck the day.' Presumably, rather like a harp. Not bad advice, at all.

What's to be scared of?  Tune in to any opportunity.

Don't simply let in everyone that passes by. Don't simply pass by everyone that lets you in.

Be selective....

It can be a tough call....

....but we should never feel afraid of or horrified by any event or experience that has happened in our past. We can, of course, look back with regret, even disbelief. But we must find some way to move on in a good spirit, for our own sake. We need the ability to let go far more than we need to hang on to anything. 

Nothing lasts forever.  We all know that.  Even those who resist change with a determination that can often astound, know that.  It may well be that current circumstances, for some, are the fledgling signs that you are being blessed with a chance to free yourself, finally, from something that has been all too hard to shake off.   Would you not be in for major gains, if this were so?  

People don't care how much you know until they know how much you care.     (Mark Twain)

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.

The past is....

....a cancelled cheque. The future is a promissory note. The present is the only hard cash that we have, so we should spend it wisely.   That's what the wise people say. Tis true that we should make the most of the moment. It can't be good to dwell too long on dreams or memories. But that does not mean that if we perceive potential in a proposition or a plan, we cannot invest energy into it.

Faith is a kind of energy. It helps make tomorrow sweeter and it makes today more palatable too. Invest some.

Faith is like Wi-Fi. It's invisible, but it has the power to connect you to what you need.

Every so often....

....we all feel exhausted. We suspect we have reached the end of our tether. We fear that the future is not our friend. We run out of enthusiasm, faith and imagination. Then suddenly, we hold one key conversation and receive a single, simple piece of news. 

That changes everything.

You must do the things you think you cannot do.  (Eleanor Roosevelt)

Some things seem strange....

.....at first.  (Maybe the word 'some' should be replaced by 'many'.)  We blink in disbelief. We do our best to carry on as we were doing before. We will try not to see - or to talk or to think about whatever makes us feel so uncomfortable. Yet it is not always the case that we 'blank out' bad things whilst recognising good ones.

Weirdly, we often can't see the most amazing opportunities whilst being all too keenly aware of grudges or grievances.

Write injuries in sand, kindnesses in marble.   (French Proverb)

We all know how hard....

....it is to put our true feelings into words. Most of us just don't bother to try. We feel that it's really rather like using a shoelace to open a tin. Persistence is not going to make the difference. Yet, every so often, we somehow find ourselves able to share those crucial but elusive experiences. We become better able to communicate, to explain, to speak clearly and to listen with sensitivity.

It's at these times when bridges can be built with solid foundations.

Compassion and love are precious things in life. 
They are not complicated: they are simple, but difficult to practice.

Our best is all we can ever do....

....And how do we do that? Well, we certainly don't achieve it by worrying about whether we could be doing better. When we try too hard, we spoil things. We create unnecessary complications. We reopen wounds that are best left alone and given time to heal. When you want to solve a particular problem to the highest possible standard, you still need to remember where to show respect and draw the line.

Always remember the do as you would be done by ethos.  A few minutes of careful thought are worth hours of aimless effort.










A religion that costs nothing, does nothing.

Everything stems from it....

Judgement is like....

....a sharp blade. You can use it to dissect any situation, attitude or development. You have to be very careful, though, not to let it cut you. Compassion can seem, by comparison, like a much less effective tool. There is, though, no way in which it can ever harm you - or anyone else.

And if only it is applied often enough, and sincerely enough, it can actually achieve far more than any amount of analysis.

The brick walls aren't there to keep us out, the brick walls are there to give us a chance to

show how badly we want something.   (R Pausch)

Breathe in, bite the bullet and....

....they say - well, I just had to type those words, didn't I? -

They say, 'You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time.' Oh, the things they say and the confidence with which they say them. Anyone would think that they knew why they were saying it. But how can they know? They are just guessing. And here's one sure-fire way in which you can keep an infinite number of people eternally fooled. Just fool yourself, good and proper.

Better yet, don't do any of that. Just embrace the truth.

If it is not right, do not do it; if it is not true do not say it.     (Marcus Aurelius)

Professional people - smart, confident....

.....or so we suppose when judging books by their covers.  Rarely do we imagine that they have pressing, hidden emotional needs. And when we see others who appear to be on the edge of despair, we find it hard to envisage how, with a little recovery, they might equally adopt responsible roles in society. The truth is that we are all performing a bit of a balancing act.

We can often be keenly conscious of our vulnerability and our strength. As long as you are afraid of neither, you can chose between either!

Loyalty to a petrified opinion never yet broke a chain or freed a human soul   (Mark Twain)

Perfection isn't required....

We try hard not to....

....become upset or irritated. We know that some topics of conversation are bad for our blood pressure and that the very mention of a particular, contentious situation can be enough to bring forth an avalanche of exasperation. But, we cannot create a fortress and live within it. Sooner or later, our journey through life will inevitably take us into close contact with the very force or factor that is most likely to provoke an adverse reaction.

But you really don't have to respond in the most obvious way.

The only thing more expensive than education, is ignorance.     (Benjamin Franklin)

We must all be wary....

....of oversimplification. We should be suspicious of sound-bites and sceptical of slogans. Why take a complex, multifaceted situation, intricately woven from many separate strands, delicately painted in 50,000 subtly different shades of grey and reduce it all to one swift stroke of a thick black marker pen?

Whether that's a cross or a tick, it is a cheapening; an insult to the intelligence and an abuse of a natural sensitivity that every human being is born with. Be open to deeper explanations.

The salvation of mankind lies only in making everything the concern of all.  (Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn)

Be determined....

Think of a seriously bad....

....song that has reached the top of the charts. Think of some of the dreadful films that have taken the box-office by storm. And what about some of the ludicrous people who have been elected by millions to serve in the highest office of the land. (In each of those categories, there's a lot to choose from.)  Well there you go - so much for popular taste. So much, too, for going along with what everyone else seems to think is a good idea at the time.

Every so often, we all have to challenge convention.

Indiscriminate tolerance and indiscriminate condemnation are not two opposites:

they are two variants of the same evasion.     (Ayn Rand)

There used to be....

....two sides to every story. Now, though, we have the internet and we can discover endless perspectives. We all see things differently, yet we all feel our own point of view is correct. To protect ourselves from the stress of encountering a conflicting opinion, we develop a special kind of insensitivity. We listen, but we do not take any of it in.

 So, our own prejudices survive intact.

When you stop chasing the wrong things you give the right things a chance to catch you.

Think of those....

....elaborate movie sets of yesteryear. They are so convincing, aren't they?. Those building fronts and street scenes. Then, you peek behind and it's all a façade. A flimsy piece of painted wood propped up like a giant picture. Just like life, really. It all seems so solid. Everything appears to be cast in concrete.

Yet if you want to, you can alter almost anything.

Change begins at the end of your comfort zone.

How do you reach....

....a state of happiness? How do you become truly comfortable? How do you fill your heart with so much enthusiasm that you can overcome any obstacle, override any negative development, overthrow any unhealthy habit pattern? By relaxing. By trusting. By making a real effort not to get stuck in old fears. By trying hard not to get emotionally drawn into new dramas.

But mainly, by asking/praying for the ability to be appreciative of all that's so wonderful in this world!

             

We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when

men are afraid of the light.   (Plato)

You've definitely had one.....

......but have you had both?

Please join me....

.....in giving three cheers for minimalism! Ummm, maybe, on reflection, it had better be one cheer. Let us all drink.....to moderation. If, one way or another you are feeling a little restricted, you may want to do a lot even if it is clear that you can only do a little. This, though, can be more than enough.
Sometimes it is through the ability to hold back wisely that you are can start to achieve success.

It is quality not quantity that counts

The face is the mirror of the mind, and eyes without speaking confess the 

secrets of the heart.     (St. Jerome)

All of us are told....

....about what we are supposed to feel, how we are supposed to be... and what it wants us to want. It subjects us to a barrage of subtle - and not so subtle - persuasion. Adverts blare out at us. TV shows and movies beckon to us. People around us whisper in our ears or indicate, through their expressions, whether they approve of our behaviour. Then you have those who tell you how to think and react.   In all this, it is hard to know who we truly are and what we genuinely require.

Hard but not impossible.

Each person must live their life as a model for others.   (Rosa Parks)

Fancy building your own ark?......

Life is full of issues....

....that we don't especially want to think about or deal with. In fact, life itself is one of those things! You can't look closely at the subject for very long before you find yourself having to acknowledge and remember that it doesn't last forever. Few of us though, really want to think about that. Yet reality, though, doesn't disappear when you ignore it. It just steps aside politely for a while. Sooner or later, you have to face and embrace it, boldly.

 

The only way to overcome a fear or concern is to face it.

Only when we are no longer afraid do we begin to live.  (Dorothy Thompson)

It's time to find out what 'they' say....

....They say, 'If it isn't broken, you shouldn't try to fix it.' Well, that's good advice as far as it goes but, sometimes, people persuade themselves that something isn't really broken, even when it is lying in pieces right in front of their very eyes. Through some misplaced fear of making things worse, they walk away from their chance to make them a whole lot better.

If you get an opportunity to repair some damage that's been done; to do that successfully, you must begin by entering the painful process of recognising the full extent of the wound or the break. If you can do that without pity, fear, regret or resentment, you can really do some healing.

You can’t change what has already happened so choose to look ahead instead of behind you.

There are often times....

......in our lives when we mull over how much we would like to tell someone if only we felt that they would listen. And, of course, there's always the flip-side to that -  how much they might wish they could communicate similar information to us. There are things we don't say because we feel we mustn't say them, because we fear we will betray confidences, because we suspect we may be judged harshly or perhaps just because we simply don't know how to find the words. 

When we are willing to engage in a gentle, honest, non-judgemental chats in which you pay close, caring attention to someone's deepest fears and feelings a brave breakthrough should occur and a deeper understanding reached.

The greater part of human pain is unnecessary. It is self-created as long as the 

unobserved mind runs your life.      (Eckhart Tolle)

As always, it's your decision but....

Many years ago....

.....there was someone by the name of Gershwin who wrote well known songs. These are words from one of his songs - 'They all laughed at Christopher Columbus / When he said the world was round... But ho, ho, ho! / Who's got the last laugh now?'

History is full of great tales about things that people once thought impossible but which turned out to be perfectly viable. It is, of course, also full of salutary tales involving unrealistic expectations.

But every so often in life, we all have to reach for our dreams - no matter how far-fetched other people consider them to be.

True love is like ghosts which everyone talks about but few have seen. 

 (Francois de La Rochefoucauld)

Isn't this why we're here?....

We all need....

.... to wrap ourselves in comfort blankets from time to time. We listen to our favourite songs, eat familiar foods, or read authors whose style we find generally reassuring. 

Life does what it can, though, to tempt us out into the great unknown. It will let us rest for a while in a haven of our own creation - and it knows that we will never grow if we are never challenged. There are, at times, factors that we very much wish were different. The way to change them, is to start doing things differently.

Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase.   (Martin Luther King Jr)

Some people are....

....very attractive, but not particularly photogenic. You have to be in their company before you realise how attractive they are. Others have the look, but not the spirit. The camera shows you more than there actually is to see. As with individuals, so with situations. Some jobs sound terribly glamorous but if you actually had to do them all day, the novelty would soon wear off.

When something happens to highlight the difference between a fantasy and a reality, we should be glad when it becomes apparent.

Gratitude is a quality similar to electricity: it must be produced and discharged and used up

in order to exist at all.   (William Faulkner)

Real wealth....

Please permit me to give you....

.....something to ponder on - How open is your mind? How hopeful is your heart? How full of opportunity is your future? Prepare to find out. You need to believe in yourself to the point where you feel strong enough to explore some avenue you might normally be afraid to go down. 

Fearful people tend to think narrow thoughts and lead lives which are not as productive as they could be. They don't stray far from their familiar paths they rarely make incredible discoveries.

Love is sharing each others dreams and working together to banish the nightmares

In fear of ruining....

....your weekend, I shall type those immortal words - They say.......   Still with me?  Good.

They say you can't judge a book by looking at its cover. The question has to be, is this old maxim true? Perhaps someone should produce a book with a cover that says, How To Judge Books By Their Covers. That should confuse quite a few people. 

We read so much significance into labels, that we hardly notice contents. Wherever we see style, we assume there must be substance. Be careful about the conclusions you come to. 

Look beyond the obvious and you will yet manage to reveal a true hidden treasure.

There is no charm equal to the tenderness of the heart.    (Jane Austen)

Happy to stay put?....

It's time to be bold and brave....

....and have another 'they say....' moment.  They say, 'success breeds success'. But success can sometimes create overconfidence. Great errors can and are made by the victorious. The defeated tend to be more careful. Failure is a wonderful teacher. When we get it wrong, and we work out why we got it wrong, we can then see how to get it right.

As long as we learn from our mistakes, success will never be far away. And it will taste all the sweeter if it replaces the sourness of disappointment.

Improve your spare moments and they will become the brightest gems in your life.  

( Ralph Waldo Emerson)

I suddenly had this.....

....burning desire to have one of those 'they say....' moments, so here goes -

They say, 'You live and learn.'   Amazingly, 'they' are quite right. We all do. But we do not all necessarily do it in this order. The trouble with doing it the other way round is that by the time you have finished doing all that learning, you are not in much of a mood to enjoy a whole lot of living. Then again, when you do the living bit first, the learning part can become even more difficult.

Sometimes, though, we are fortunate. We get a chance to learn and live simultaneously.

It is perilous to live for people’s praise.  (Tolstoy)

Time for one of those....

.....different types of blogs.

After being shocked yesterday by the truly un-Christian reaction by a nun, Sunita asked me if I'd wondered why it was that so many orphanages are set up in and around Lahore, and probably throughout the country? 

I had innocently assumed that it was down to need, especially as you're classified an orphan by the death of your father.  I had, I confess, been more than a little surprised by the type of people who set them up.  Effectively anyone who can breathe unaided.  Looking after the overall well-being and welfare of children, especially vulnerable children, is an immense responsibility; extremely challenging; resource draining; yet ultimately highly rewarding  And yet none of this seemed to register very high.   Anyway, how wrong was I?

Sunita tells me that the majority are set up by people who are unscrupulous to a fault, and have no desire to assist anyone but themselves.  They probably are incapable of truly working for a living.  They discover what wealthier countries will throw money at, move into that niche, pocket as much as they can; then get the hell out without giving the children a second thought.  Orphanages close and children who had felt some level of safety and security for a reasonable length of time, have it all disappear on the wind before their very eyes.

I heard her words. Probably did an impression of a fish out of water.  But still struggle to comprehend what she'd just said.  Oh, and many will tell you that they are Christian.  Mind numbing.  Innocents used as a tool to extort money. 

When you don't take a stand against corruption you tacitly support it.    (Kamal Haasan)

You may have heard....

.....the saying - once bitten, twice shy.  Well, it's rooted in great wisdom. Yet, just as a root is not the ultimate manifestation of a plant's natural potential, the saying stops short of the full message it ought to convey. Once we have been bitten by anything, we are definitely more likely to avoid the possibility of this happening again in the same way.

But that doesn't mean we should live in fear of any situation that happens to have some teeth.  Don't let an old fear prevent positive progress.

Sweetness walks with bitterness.  (Nigerian Proverb)

The simplest things....

....are often the most satisfying. Does that mean, then, that there is no merit in a complicated plan or an intricate arrangement? Well, let's put it this way. If, at the heart of the situation, there is something simple and genuine, everything can become as convoluted as it cares to be. Problems arise only when there's a great interconnecting web of explanation and justification surrounding an effectively empty space. 

Keep emptiness at bay. Stick with what you know has depth and merit.

Nothing great in the world has ever been accomplished without passion. 

(Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel)

A life without....

....challenge would be a life without excitement. Want adventure, interest, intrigue, intensity and involvement? Then you've got to have a few problems. And there needs to be moments when these worry you so much that you are ready to take the kind of drastic action that you'd never contemplate in a more peaceful easy situation. Of course something may be 'too much' at the moment. If it weren't, you wouldn't react, learn and plan for change.

Be glad of what's wrong and your chance to put it right.

Listen to your heart. Because, wherever your heart is, that is where you'll find your treasure.

Everyone I've ever met....

.....acts as if they are a permanent fixture on this spinning lump of rock.  We have enough reminders to the contrary but we steadfastly ignore them.  We choose to forget that every moment is precious. That's precisely why we can't afford to sit around wondering what to do with every moment. And it is also precisely why nobody has any right to waste your time, for they are wasting your life.

We need to live life, not just think about living life. We need practice far more than we need theory, passion much more than analysis.

The more you think about what needs doing, the more daunted you will start to feel. So don't think. Just get on with it. Do what must be done and you will achieve it before you realise it is impossible!

“You are not free until you have no need to impress anybody.”

Fear is not....

....always a bad thing. Sometimes it is appropriate for us to feel afraid of something or someone. We may need to be alerted to a real danger. Sometimes the fear is false, in so far as there is no threat. Still, though, our experience of anxiety is enabling us to see how important a particular situation is. We feel the fear because we realise the challenge we are about to rise to. 

There is nothing wrong with fear. There is, though, something wrong with letting fear get the better of you.

Fear is the cheapest room in the house.  I would like to see you living in better conditions.  

(Hafiz of Persia) 

I suspect the majority....

....of us know the famous fairy stories.  If not know then, certainly have heard about them.  I sometimes think that children's storytellers of ancient times have a lot to answer for. All those fairy godmothers and happy-ever-afters. All that honest endeavour rewarded, and evil greed thwarted. What a pity the world isn't really like that. Why isn't it?

Because we all think of ourselves as the innocent heroes, even when we happen to be acting as polar opposites. None of us ever says, 'I'm being bad now.' We have our justifications and we believe in them. The thing is that there can never be true progress unless you are honest with yourself.

Bad times have a scientific value. These are occasions a good learner would not miss.
(Ralph Waldo Emerson)

Love, peace, forgiveness....

....and goodwill. Why should this be such an elusive goal? Perhaps it is explained by the way that so many people are greedy, selfish and insensitive. Perhaps the world is populated by people who aren't very nice to know and so can hardly be expected to behave any better. 

Actually, few of us are that bad but it is this very tendency to see fault in others that feeds a vicious cycle of alienation? 

Let go of some of what you disapprove of and watch how the world becomes a much sweeter place.

Every exit is an entry somewhere else.    (Tom Stoppard)