Tag Archives: books

An Oldie But Goodie

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Getting The Most Out of Life. A selection of personally helpful articles from past issues of The Readers Digest is the sub-title of this book, published in 1955. It belonged to my mother and has been in my possession since her death in 1972.

Because I love to learn life lessons every day, books like this keep me on the right track. Among its many chapters is one written by A. Cressy Morrison (1864-1951) an American chemist and one time president of the New York Academy of Sciences. The thought provoking chapter is called Seven Reasons Why A Scientist Believes In God and is condensed from his book “Man Does Not Stand Alone”. Morrison makes a compelling case. “By unwavering mathematical law we can prove that our universe was designed and executed by a great engineering Intelligence.”

Other chapters include:

When It’s Best to Forget…W.E.Sangster “No man should hope to forget the wrong things he’s done till he has done also whatever he can to put them right.”

Stop Worrying…A.J.Cronin “For worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow; it only saps today of its strength”.

On Being A Real Person…Harry Emerson Fosdick, D.D. “The central business of every human being is to be a real person.”

Three Steps to Personal Peace…Norman Vincent Peale, D.D. “As Thomas Carlyle said; ‘Silence is the element in which great things fashion themselves.'”

Your Mind Can Keep You Young…George Lawton “At 80 you can be just as productive mentally as you were at 30–and you should know a lot more. Older people frequently suffer some loss of memory, but creative imagination is ageless…take an interest in the world around you and make a point of learning at least one new thing every day.”

I have gleaned a lot from this book over the years and, believe it or not, it is still available. I saw it on Amazon for various prices depending on its condition. It really is an oldie but goodie.

 

 

 

More Life Lessons

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Life is about learning. Here are some gems from Elisabeth Kubler Ross from her book Life Lessons:

Our lessons in life involve working on our smallness, getting rid of our negativity, and finding the best in ourselves and each other.

Deep inside all of us, we know there is someone we are meant to be.

There are dreams of love, life and adventure in all of us.

When we face the worst that can happen in any situation, we grow.

We don’t realize that each of us has the power of the universe within us.

Our personal power is our inherent gift and our real strength.

A grateful person is a powerful person, for gratitude generates power. All abundance is based on being grateful for what we have.

We often teach just what we need to learn. (David Kessler)

Endings are just beginnings backwards.

 

Stop Pretending

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Here’s a snippet from a book, Passionate Presence, by Catherine Ingram:

Some years ago a young friend of mine, six years old at the time, walked up to me and said the following:”Pretend you are surrounded by a thousand hungry tigers. What would you do?”

I gave it some thought, imagining the scary scenario and feeling more and more tense. Would I pray? Probably not. Would I run? One doesn’t outrun tigers. Anxiety began to take hold as I saw in my mind’s eye the tigers closing in. I said to my young friend, “Wow, I don’t know what I would do. What would you do?”

And he replied, “I’d stop pretending.”

That got me to thinking. Could we stop pretending even if we wanted to? Could we stop pretending that the other person is to blame for a torn relationship; or that we could do a better job of leading the world instead of the people who are actually supposed to be doing that? Could we stop pretending that our life is a bed of roses when in fact it is a bush of thorns?

And what if we stopped pretending that God doesn’t exist; that the world invented itself and everything in it, including us?

I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to be surrounded by those hungry tigers…guilt, jealousy, unbelief, narcissism, egoism, cynicism.

Maybe it’s time to face those hungry tigers and stop pretending.

 

 

 

Only Listen

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I read Revelation 1:17 this morning and it reminded me of a dream I had in 1991. Here it is in an excerpt from my book, My Precious Life.

The next time God spoke to me in a dream was 1991. I dreamed my family was gathered in an old farm house which had seen better days. As we exited the house, the overhang of the verandah collapsed, knocking all of us to the floor. I stood up and watched as everyone got to their feet except my eldest daughter and youngest son. As I gazed down at them lying there, still as statues, the thought came to me: My first and my last…why my first and my last? Once again I woke up with a tingly feeling, with the words, first and last, repeating in my mind. I felt no fear or foreboding, but that dream stayed with me for weeks until I came across Revelation 1:17 where Jesus says, “Do not be afraid, I am the first and the last”, confirming that he is truly in my life, and is always by my side, waking or sleeping. To this day though, Debbie and Kelly, my eldest daughter and youngest son, refuse to be on any covered verandah together.

I might add here that in verse 19, Jesus goes on to say, “Write, therefore, what you have seen…” which was one of the scriptures that prompted me to write the book.

I’m not sure why Revelation 1:17 came to me this morning, but I always love to be reminded of the many ways God speaks to us if we only listen.

A New Page in the Book of Life

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Each day is a new page in the book of life. Many words may appear on the page but only a few will be meaningful. There are so many instances in which we have to pick and choose our words in order to keep peace in a relationship, make the most of a bad situation, and use words of encouragement when needed. It is up to us how we are going to fill each new page so that any particular day in the book of our life will make a good read for us and those with whom we share our lives.

It is also good to not only write our daily page but to read the pages of others who have gone before us, such as Dr. Frederick “Fritz” Perls (1893-1970) who wrote this as perhaps one way of dealing with relationships strained to the limit:

I do my thing and you do your thing.
I am not in this world to live up to your expectations,
And you are not in this world to live up to mine.
You are you, and I am I,
and if by chance we find each other, it’s beautiful.
If not, it can’t be helped.

And then there was this by American Theologian, Reinhold Niebuhr (1892-1971):

God grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change;
Courage to change the things I can;
And wisdom to know the difference.

This one recently caught my eye in Harry Belafonte’s memoir, My Song:

“Not everyone can be who you want him or her to be.”

Whether we are writing our own page, or reading that of another, each new page in the book of life is a challenging experience. It should not only be written well, but lived well, and make good reading for all whose lives touch ours.

 

NOW IS YOUR TIME

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It isn’t always apparent where material for a blog will come from. Today’s came from a post on Facebook last Friday that stood out because it was highlighted in yellow. It was an excerpt from a book with no title given; just a single highlighted paragraph, and here it is:

The people we surround ourselves with either raise or lower our standards. They either help us to become the-best-version-of-ourselves or encourage us to become lesser versions of ourselves. We become like our friends. No man becomes great on his own. No woman becomes great on her own. The people around them help to make them great. We all need people in our lives who raise our standards, remind us of our essential purpose, and challenge us to become the-best-version-of-ourselves.

Upon doing a little research I discovered that this quote is from one of many books written by a forty-four-year-old  Australian author, Matthew Kelly. However the title of the book was not revealed. Matthew Kelly has written many other quotable quotes and I will mention one or two later.

But let’s take a look at this particular one. I agree with the first sentence except for letting someone lower my standards.  The second sentence leaves me wondering how we would let someone encourage us to be lesser versions of ourselves. Continuing on, if we become like our friends, hopefully it would be the friends that we admire, the ones who live kind, courteous, sincere, helpful lives. No, we don’t become great on our own. We become great by emulating the best qualities of great people and by ridding ourselves of our own idiosyncrasies that keep us from being the best we can be; somewhat like separating the wheat from the chaff.

We do need people who raise our standards but that can only be achieved by being open to what is being offered in that regard. We do need to be reminded of our essential purpose which is to live the golden rule; do to others as you would have them do to you…not as they do to you , but as you would have them do to you. That is such a profound statement and can only be lived by reflecting on its true meaning. Finally, it is up to us to accept the challenge to become the-best-version-of-ourselves. We all know what that version is and must strive for it continually.

And now more Matthew Kelly quotes:

Life is about love. It’s about whom you love and whom you hurt. Life’s about how you love yourself and how you hurt yourself. Life’s about how you love and hurt the people close to you. Life is about how you love and hurt the people who just cross your path for a moment. Life is about love.

“In fact, the more each person can remove his or her ego from the discussion and focus on the subject matter, the more fruitful the conversation will be for all involved.”

“Withholding love is a bit like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.”

 

 

In the Moment

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“Living consciously involves being genuine; it involves listening and responding to others honestly and openly; it involves being in the moment.”  So says Sidney Poitier in his book, The Measure of a Man.

What does it mean to be genuine; to listen and respond to others honestly and openly; to be in the moment?

It is enough to just ponder these words and glean something from them. It is more than enough to act upon them. There are people waiting to be heard, to have their concerns responded to honestly and openly, to know that someone is in their moment.

Living consciously is being aware; not just going through the motions of day-to-day life. Living consciously is also a responsibility, not only to ourselves but to those who inhabit our world, both our own little world and the world at large. By living consciously we can make a difference in someone else’s life. Maybe we should take a page from Sidney Poitier’s book and take a moment to be in the moment.

 

 

Recycling Anger

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It has been my practice over the years to take notes from interesting books and tuck them away for future reference after gleaning the wisdom of the moment. The other day it was something from “Your Call is Waiting”. Today it is a passage from The Measure of a Man by Sidney Poitier. And it is simply this: “…I have a great respect for the kinds of people who are able to recycle their anger and put it to different uses.”

How timely given what’s going on in the world today. So as the saying goes, ‘take a page from that book’ (page 124). Imagine if we all recycled our anger into peace and reconciliation…we could then sing along with Louis Armstrong, “what a wonderful world”.

Thank you, Sidney, for another life lesson.

The Measure of a Man: A Spiritual Autobiography (Oprah's Book Club)

When Love Hurts

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“When Love Hurts” is the title of a book relating to abuse in a relationship. authored by Jill Corey and Karen McAndless-Davis. The third edition is published by Penguin Randomhouse and is available on Amazon.com. The authors were recently interviewed on CTV and are currently traveling to promote their book.

Karen is the daughter of two of our congregation’s long time and much respected members who had no idea what their daughter was going through during the early years of her marriage.  Her story is related on Amazon and is a source of inspiration to those of us who have suffered abuse either directly or witnessed it.

Love hurts in other ways as well. It is called when “I do turns to I don’t”. This happens when one or the other partner in a relationship withdraws their love and affection little by little over the lifetime of the union. What is left is a shell. The shell maintains the normal activities of day to day living…all the things that keep a household going…the “his and her” agendas, the family get-together’s, the social functions to be attended.

But something is missing…and that something is the little things; the hand-holding, the hugging, the gentle touch, the communication, the togetherness that was there in the beginning and has somehow faded into the dailiness of living life.

Thanks to Karen and Jill for putting the spotlight on abusive relationships with their book Amazon.com: When Love Hurts: A Woman’s Guide to Understanding

http://www.whenlovehurts.ca/authors/karen-and-bruce-story/          And thanks to the rest of us for recognizing the love that hurts in our own lives and rewriting our relationships to include the healing human touch.

Angel on the Infield.

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Everyone loves baseball, right? I hope so because that’s my theme for Day Eighteen of this assignment…A Series of Anecdotes.

The first one is taken from a chapter in my book, My Precious Life, where an eight-year-old boy is being berated by an irate parent who doesn’t like the way he is playing his position at second base. Her constant yelling and criticizing causes the player to hang his head in dejection. When a neighbor of mine gets to the game a little late and asks me where my son is playing, I answer loud enough for the woman to hear, “Second base. My son is playing second base.” With that the woman’s comments were silenced. The kid on second gained some confidence and the heckler hopefully gained some common sense.

The second story is about my stint at coaching a girls’ softball team. We were a pretty small team, in stature, but not in heart, and had a pretty good standing in the community league. What we lacked in size, we made up for in really fast base running. When the championship games came along the first team we were to play  looked like they had been raised on the Jolly Green Giant’s diet. They were big girls…I mean big girls. Our girls were mortified until I told them an old saying I had heard when I was their age. “The bigger they are, the harder they fall.” It was about tree cutting and how the biggest tree cut fell the hardest. For some reason it had stayed in my psyche and the girls loved it. They ran those bases so fast that the bigger team couldn’t keep up with where they were. We won not only that game but the championship as well and the girls learned to not judge by appearances. Bigger is not necessarily better.

The third anecdote is about a young ball player I know. He loves baseball to the nth degree but has a difficult time being the player he dreams of being; mainly due to his less than perfect batting skills…much less than perfect. Seeing the torment his son went through every time he muffed a turn at bat, Dad contemplated extra batting coaching. But he didn’t go that route. Being somewhat of a ball player himself, he took the teenager to a diamond in the park to practice. The balls were going nowhere and both father and son were frustrated. A stranger wandered onto the infield and offered some helpful hints to improve the boy’s stance and swing. Before long the balls were sailing over Dad’s head and his son was wearing a grin only an SOS scouring pad could remove. Would you believe the stranger was a retired professional ball player who just “happened by”? I truly believe he was an angel on the infield!

And then there was Blue Jay’s Jose Bautista’s famous…or infamous bat flip after his three-run home run hit against Texas on October 14, 2015.