Do you remember the tale of Red Riding Hood?....

....You do?  That's good, but here's a line from Snow White!!  'Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?'   (Me?  Awkward?  As if...!!!) 
Anyway, what a ridiculous question that was.  No wonder the wicked witch was such a nasty piece of work. Even her own reflection had a poor opinion of her. Although... in a strange way... we all have bits of ourselves that we don't much like. Physical attributes that we might prefer to change. Attitudes we wish we could alter.

It's one thing to identify room for improvement and another to lose self-respect.

Let your dreams be bigger than your fears and your actions be louder than your words.

In days of yore....

....before the breathalyser, the police had another way to see if a driver was drunk. They would say, 'get out of your car and walk in a straight line.' An inability to do as much was considered evidence of incapacity.
But it is not just alcohol that can influence us to steer a confused and meandering path through life. Diversions and distractions, positive and negative alike, can make us deviate from our missions.

Often our challenge is to remain straight and sober enough to see the difference between what is truly important and what is not.

A friend is someone who reached for your hand and touched your heart.

When we borrow....

....from the bank, we have to pay them back more than we took. When we place our funds into a saving account, we expect a reward for our investment. And if our financial situation is neutral, with neither debits nor credits to consider, well, that is not necessarily the kind of economic heaven that some people might imagine. 

As with money, so with affection, attention, energy, indeed, any process that requires a degree of give and take. As long as arrangements are moderate, not extreme, all will be well.

A good garden may have some weeds.   (Thomas Fuller)

Move in any direction....

....you care to, but go there gently. Lose that angry edge. Ignore that sense of urgency. We inhabitants of earth in the 21st Century face more social, material and mental pressure than any other humans who have ever dwelt on this planet. We encounter sources of potential stress from the moment we wake up to the moment we go to sleep. 

There's only one way to cope with it all. By refusing to let it get to us. 

I wish they would only take me as I am.   (Vincent Van Gogh)

How is it that....

....colour television ever caught on?  After all, most people seem resolutely determined to view the world in black and white. They want clear-cut, simple, unambiguous answers to even the most complex questions. They yearn for rights and wrongs that they can easily relate and react to. It is a very natural human thing to seek certainty but it is often, too, a dangerous and divisive quest.

If something now is unclear, that is most likely because it is multi-faceted. Seek a deeper understanding, not a swifter resolution.

If you fail to respect your dreams and goals, those around you will do the same.

You have to at least aim for it....

It's one thing....

....to drift with the tide because you are happy to leave your fate to the twin protectors of serendipity and synchronicity. It's another to be passive because you dare not make a decision. In your heart you most likely know what you want. Are you loath to admit it?  Do you feel as if you dare not reach for a dream; or that you do not deserve to have a wish fulfilled?

Your boat has a rudder, an engine and a compass. You are not obliged to use any of these, but remember, you are entirely entitled to employ all three!

  

              

The most powerful weapon on earth is the human soul on fire.

Two horses run....

....neck and neck to a photo finish where one is seen to have beaten the other by a nose. Is that really the way of the world? We can have only one winner? Actually, such a belief system is for losers! Real winners, surely, would have come up, long ago, with a more refined, sensitive and intelligent way of evaluating success or failure. Isn't the competitive culture terribly Neanderthal? 

Don't go the way of the dinosaurs.  Uphold a value system based on something smarter than silly numbers.

The words that enlighten the soul are more precious than jewels.    (Hazrat Inayat Khan)

Mother Teresa's words....

....'Every time you smile at someone, it is an action of love, a gift to that person, a beautiful thing'. 

She wasn't interested in complicated arguments and debates. All she ever wanted to do was help make the world a lighter, brighter, happier place. She understood the power and importance of a gentle gesture.

So can we.

Look back and smile on perils past.   (Walter Scott)

I suppose we could....

....argue that the world divides up into two types of people. Some would call them the pots... and the kettles! Or, if you prefer, the hypocritical and the inconsistent. We are all as bad as each other. We all look suitably horrified and outraged when we discover other people's glaring contradictions. And we all manage to turn a convenient blind eye to our own, equally bad, double standards.

The grass may be always greener on the other side of the fence, but the snow always tends to be whiter on our own side of it.

Don't expect to enjoy the cream of life if you keep your milk of human kindness 

all bottled up.

People talk about....

....'being in control'. That'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.

To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on

 creating oneself endlessly.  (Henri Bergson)

Why go to all the trouble....

....of 'walking your talk' when you can just talk your walk? Sit still in your chair and announce, in a convincing tone of voice, that you are striding out to reach your destination. Describe the effort you are going through; the stress and strain on your legs; the bunions on your feet that you are getting from covering so many miles. That's what virtually everyone I know of does, and many more besides; and they seem to get clean away with it, so it must be a viable policy, mustn't it?

If you really want to get somewhere, though, stand up and start moving.

The mind ought sometimes to be diverted that it may return to better thinking.   (Phaedrus)