Today

Today I will delete from my Diary two days: yesterday and tomorrow.

Yesterday was to learn and tomorrow will be the consequence of what I can do today.

Today I will face life with the conviction that this day will not ever return.

Today is the last opportunity I have to live intensely, as no one can assure me that I will see tomorrow's sunrise.

Today I will be brave enough not to let any opportunity pass me by, my only alternative is to succeed.

Today I will invest my most valuable resource: my time, in the most transcendental work: my life; I will spend each minute passionately to make of today a different and unique day in my life.

Today I will defy every obstacle that appears on my way trusting I will succeed.

Today I will resist pessimism and will conquer the world with a smile, with the positive attitude of expecting always the best.

Today I will make of every ordinary task a sublime expression.

Today I will have my feet on the ground understanding reality and the stars' gaze to invent my future.

Today I will take the time to be happy and will leave my footprints and my presence in the hearts of others.

Today, I invite you to begin a new season where we can dream that everything we undertake is possible and we fulfil it, with joy and dignity.

~ Author Unknown ~

Struggle

A man found a cocoon of a butterfly. One day a small opening appeared; he sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could and it could go no farther.

Then the man decided to help the butterfly, so he took a pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the cocoon. The butterfly then emerged easily. But it had a swollen body and small, shriveled wings.

The man continued to watch the butterfly because he expected that, at any moment, the wings would enlarge and expand to be able to support the body, which would contract in time.

Neither happened! In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around with a swollen body and shriveled wings. It never was able to fly.

What the man in his kindness and haste did not understand was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly to get through the tiny opening were nature's way of forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly into its wings so that it would be ready for flight once it achieved its freedom from the cocoon.

Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our life. If nature allowed us to go through our life without any obstacles, it would cripple us. We would not be as strong as what we could have been...and we could never fly...
--author unknown
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TODAY'S INSPIRATIONAL QUOTE:

"Great minds must be ready not only to take opportunities, but to make them."

~ Charles Caleb Colton

YOU CAN BE WHATEVER
YOU WANT TO BE

There is inside you
all of the potential to be whatever
you want to be,
all of the energy to do whatever
you want to do.

Imagine yourself as you would like to be,
doing what you want to do,
And each day, take one step
towards your dream.

And though at times it may seem too
difficult to continue,
hold on to your dream.

One morning you will awake to find
that you are the person
you dreamed of.
Doing what you wanted to do
simply because you had the courage
to believe in your potential
and to hold on to your dream.
~ Donna Levine ~

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TODAY'S INSPIRATIONAL QUOTE:

"The happiest of people don't necessarily have the best of everything; they just make the most of everything that comes along their way."

~ Author Unknown

If God Should Go On Strike

How good it is that God Jehovah has never gone on strike
Because He was not treated fair in things He didn't like.
If only once He'd given up and said, "That's it, I'm through,
I've had enough of thee on earth, so this is what I'll do.

I'll give my orders to the sun, cut off the heat supply,
And to the moon give no more light and run the oceans dry.
Then just to make things really tough and put the pressure on,
Turn off the vital oxygen till every breath is gone."

You know that He would be justified, if fairness were the game.
For no one has been more abused or met with more disdain
Than Jehovah God, and yet He carries on, supplying you and me
With all the favours of His undeserved kindness, and everything for free.

Men say they want a better deal, and so on strike they go,
But what a deal we've given God to whom all things we owe.
We don't care who we hurt to gain the things we like,
But what a mess we'd all be in if God should go on strike.
~ Author Unknown ~
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TODAYâS INSPIRATIONAL QUOTE:

"A weed is a plant whose virtues have not been discovered."

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

1000 MARBLES

The older I get, the more I enjoy Saturday mornings.
Perhaps it's the quiet solitude that comes with being the first to rise, or maybe it's the unbounded joy of not having to be at work.
Either way, the first few hours of a Saturday morning are most enjoyable.

A few weeks ago, I was shuffling toward the basement shack with a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and the morning paper in the other. What began as a typical Saturday morning, turned into one of those lessons that life seems to hand you from time to time.

Let me tell you about it.
I turned the dial up into the phone portion of the band on my ham radio in order to listen to a Saturday morning swap net.
Along the way, I came across an older sounding chap, with a tremendous signal and a golden voice. You know the kind; he sounded like he should be in the broadcasting business.
He was telling whomever he was talking with something about "a thousand marbles." I was intrigued and stopped to listen to what he had to say.

"Well, Tom, it sure sounds like you're busy with your job. I'm sure they pay you well but it's a shame you have to be away from home and your family so much. Hard to believe a young fellow should have to work sixty or seventy hours a week to make ends meet.
Too bad you missed your daughter's dance recital. He continued, "Let me tell you something Tom, something that has helped me keep a good perspective on my own priorities."

And that's when he began to explain his theory of a "thousand marbles." "You see, I sat down one day and did a little arithmetic. The average person lives about seventy-five years. I know, some live more and some live less, but on average, folks live about seventy-five years.
Now then, I multiplied 75 times 52 and I came up with 3900, which is the number of Saturdays that the average person has in their entire lifetime.

"No, stick with me, Tom, I'm getting to the important part. It took me until I was fifty-five years old to think about all this in any detail"; he went on, "and by that time I had lived through over twenty-eight hundred Saturdays. I got to thinking that if I lived to be seventy-five, I only had about a thousand of them left to enjoy.

"So I went to a toy store and bought every single marble they had. I ended up having to visit three toy stores to round up 1000 marbles. I took them home and put them inside of a large, clear plastic container right here in the sack next to my gear.

Every Saturday since then, I have taken one marble out and thrown it away." "I found that by watching the marbles diminish, I focus more on the really important things in life.

There is nothing like watching your time here on this earth run out to help get your priorities straight." "Now let me tell you one last thing before I sign-off with you and take my lovely wife out for breakfast. This morning, I took the very last marble out of the container. I figure that if I make it until next Saturday then I have been given a little extra time. And the one thing we can all use is a little more time."

"It was nice to meet you Tom, I hope you spend more time with your family, and I hope to meet you again here on the band. 75 year Old Man, this is K9NZQ, clear and going QRT, good morning!"

You could have heard a pin drop on the band when this fellow signed off. I guess he gave us all a lot to think about. I had planned to work on the antenna that morning, and then I was going to meet up with a few hams to work on the next club newsletter.
Instead, I went upstairs and woke my wife up with a kiss. "C'mon honey, I'm taking you and the kids to breakfast." "What brought this on?" she asked with a smile.
"Oh, nothing special, it's just been a long time since we spent a Saturday together with the kids.
Hey, can we stop at a toy store while we're out? I need to buy some marbles..."
~ Jeffrey Davis ~

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TODAY'S INSPIRATIONAL QUOTE:

"You are in charge of your feelings, beliefs, and actions. And you teach others how to behave toward you. While you cannot change other people, you can influence them through your own behaviors and actions. By being a living role model of what you want to receive from others, you create more of what you want in your life."

~ Eric Allenbaugh

ITâS ALL THESE SOUNDS I HEAR (my reason to write)

My head overflows with sounds· sounds not the same· sounds I must report.
Itâs the sound of the cock crowing, a stream flowing, the swallow twittering
Itâs the sound of a bleating kid, a clucking fowl, a dog howling at the moon
Itâs the unsilent, unsettling Calabash Bay seaside
Itâs the wild wind stiff and strong
Itâs rumbling booms of thunder bringing the loud-pouring October floods
Itâs the swishing of machetes from the gang of men slashing sugarcane
Itâs all these sounds I hear.

Itâs the breezy call of early-morning workers, calling workmates, the women whooping with wild laughter
Itâs the air alive with shouts of higglers, their musical cry rising and falling, hawking their wares, ãBuy yuh white yam! Buy yuh yellow yam! Sweetheart, come here anâ buy sometâing from me nuh!
Itâs the savage sound of two maddening womenâs strife, each claiming the same sweet man.
Gathered in circles on the greening grass, itâs the voices telling history÷Duppy & Anancie stories
Itâs a word÷perhaps well-meaning÷that pierces, crushes, and stings.
Itâs the power of Godâs word÷the two-edged sword÷to reach the heart of a penitent one
Itâs all these sounds I hear

To the struggling pangs of conscious truth itâs the melancholy strains of Bob Marleyâs reggae music: ãMe belly full but me hungry.ä
To the quiet breath of death claiming another foe, itâs the shrill cry breaking the silence of the country-side night
At a funeral to the natural flow of sorrow, loss, and pain, itâs the strains swelling the notes of praise and hope: ãWhen peace like a river·ä
Up, gushing from the current of the heart, itâs the joyful shout of praise: ãLet us sing Jehovahâs praise with courage.ä
Itâs a passing sigh of threats of pain and uncertainty
Itâs the rusty sound of the politician shouting promises, and the applause of the listening crowd
Itâs all these sounds I hear

Itâs the patter of little feet on the tough dry ground
To the midwifeâs coaching, itâs the pregnant womanâs labored breath
Itâs the crackling of brambles under the iron pot with the gravy bubbling merrily away
Itâs a motherâs voice, round and clear and sharp, calling her children to duty.
Itâs that same motherâs pleading prayer, crying out for her wayward boy
Itâs the sound of my motherâs encouraging words, ãGo to school me chile. Labor foâ learninâ before you grow olâ, foâ learninâ is better than silver anâ gold. Silver anâ gold will vanish away, but a good education will never decayä
Itâs all these sounds I hear÷sounds mingling in a restless pulse÷that breathe words into life that I pen.
--Glasceta Honeyghan, 2002

A SYMPHONY

If I were to write a symphony, what would it say? It would shed the tear I canât shed when I need to cry. It would be exuberant and loud at times. I would hope to hear children frolicking in its passing passages. There would be moments of tenderness that would grow into climactic romance. All its qualities would be recapitulated and woven around the main theme. That theme would be a peaceful answer to all the questions I had in my head. Its finale would invoke the sigh of relief one experiences when those pressing questions are truthfully answered. I would want to see the listeners walk away satisfied as with a gourmet meal just consumed amongst delightful conditions. I would want the answer to say ãThere can be peace in this worldä.
~ Bill Alexander ~