Ultimate Good Morning Quotes

For most of my life, I would have automatically said that I would opt for conscientious objector status, and in general, I still would. But the spirit of the question is would I ever, and there are instances where I might. If immediate intervention would have circumvented the genocide in Rwanda or stopped the Janjaweed in Darfur, would I choose pacifism? Of course not. Scott Simon, the reporter for National Public Radio and a committed lifelong Quaker, has written that it took looking into mass graves in former Yugoslavia to convince him that force is sometimes the only option to deter our species' murderous impulses. While we're on the subject of the horrors of war, and humanity's most poisonous and least charitable attributes, let me not forget to mention Barbara Bush (that would be former First Lady and presidential mother as opposed to W's liquor-swilling, Girl Gone Wild, human ashtray of a daughter. I'm sorry, that's not fair. I've no idea if she smokes.) When the administration censored images of the flag-draped coffins of the young men and women being killed in Iraq - purportedly to respect "the privacy of the families" and not to minimize and cover up the true nature and consequences of the war - the family matriarch expressed her support for what was ultimately her son's decision by saying on Good Morning America on March 18, 2003, "Why should we hear about body bags and deaths? I mean it's not relevant. So why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that?" Mrs. Bush is not getting any younger. When she eventually ceases to walk among us we will undoubtedly see photographs of her flag-draped coffin. Whatever obituaries that run will admiringly mention those wizened, dynastic loins of hers and praise her staunch refusal to color her hair or glamorize her image. But will they remember this particular statement of hers, this "Let them eat cake" for the twenty-first century? Unlikely, since it received far too little play and definitely insufficient outrage when she said it. So let us promise herewith to never forget her callous disregard for other parents' children while her own son was sending them to make the ultimate sacrifice, while asking of the rest of us little more than to promise to go shopping. Commit the quote to memory and say it whenever her name comes up. Remind others how she lacked even the bare minimum of human integrity, the most basic requirement of decency that says if you support a war, you should be willing, if not to join those nineteen-year-olds yourself, then at least, at the very least, to acknowledge that said war was actually going on. Stupid fucking cow.

Do something that feels good in the mornings! It will help you to setup your day to take in more knowledge and understanding, which ultimately leads to wisdom.

Have you ever wondered What happens to all the poems people write? The poems they never let anyone else read? Perhaps they are Too private and personal Perhaps they are just not good enough. Perhaps the prospect of such a heartfelt expression being seen as clumsy shallow silly pretentious saccharine unoriginal sentimental trite boring overwrought obscure stupid pointless or simply embarrassing is enough to give any aspiring poet good reason to hide their work from public view. forever. Naturally many poems are IMMEDIATELY DESTROYED. Burnt shredded flushed away Occasionally they are folded Into little squares And wedged under the corner of An unstable piece of furniture (So actually quite useful) Others are hidden behind a loose brick or drainpipe or sealed into the back of an old alarm clock or put between the pages of AN OBSCURE BOOK that is unlikely to ever be opened. someone might find them one day, BUT PROBABLY NOT The truth is that unread poetry Will almost always be just that. DOOMED to join a vast invisible river of waste that flows out of suburbia. well Almost always. On rare occasions, Some especially insistent pieces of writing will escape into a backyard or a laneway be blown along a roadside embankment and finally come to rest in a shopping center parking lot as so many things do It is here that something quite Remarkable takes place two or more pieces of poetry drift toward each other through a strange force of attraction unknown to science and ever so slowly cling together to form a tiny, shapeless ball. Left undisturbed, this ball gradually becomes larger and rounder as other free verses confessions secrets stray musings wishes and unsent love letters attach themselves one by one. Such a ball creeps through the streets Like a tumbleweed for months even years If it comes out only at night it has a good Chance of surviving traffic and children and through a slow rolling motion AVOIDS SNAILS (its number one predator) At a certain size, it instinctively shelters from bad weather, unnoticed but otherwise roams the streets searching for scraps of forgotten thought and feeling. Given time and luck the poetry ball becomes large HUGE ENORMOUS: A vast accumulation of papery bits That ultimately takes to the air, levitating by The sheer force of so much unspoken emotion. It floats gently above suburban rooftops when everybody is asleep inspiring lonely dogs to bark in the middle of the night. Sadly a big ball of paper no matter how large and buoyant, is still a fragile thing. Sooner or LATER it will be surprised by a sudden gust of wind Beaten by driving rain and REDUCED in a matter of minutes to a billion soggy shreds. One morning everyone will wake up to find a pulpy mess covering front lawns clogging up gutters and plastering car windscreens. Traffic will be delayed children delighted adults baffled unable to figure out where it all came from Stranger still Will be the Discovery that Every lump of Wet paper Contains various faded words pressed into accidental verse. Barely visible but undeniably present To each reader they will whisper something different something joyful something sad truthful absurd hilarious profound and perfect No one will be able to explain the Strange feeling of weightlessness or the private smile that remains Long after the street sweepers have come and gone.

In the end, a person is only know by the impact he or she has on others. The Gift of Work: He who loves his work never labors. The Gift of Money: Money is nothing more than a tool. It can be a force for good, a force for evil, or simple be idle. The Gift of Friends: It is a wealthy person, indeed, who calculates riches not in gold but in friends. The Gift of Learning: Education is a lifelong journey whose destination expands as you travel. The desire and hunger for education is the key to real learning. The Gift of Problems: Problems can only be avoided by exercising good judgment. Good judgment can only be gained by experiencing life's problems. The Gift of Family: Some people are born into wonderful families. Others have to find or create them. Being a member of a family is a priceless privilege which costs nothing but love. The Gift of Laughter: Laughter is good medicine for the soul. Our world is desperately in need of more such medicine. The Gift of Dreams: Faith is all that dreamers need to see into the future. The Gift of Giving: The only way you can truly get more out of life for yourself is to give part of yourself away. One of the key principles in giving, is that the gift must be yours to give-either something you earned or created or maybe, simply, part of yourself. The Gift of Gratitude: In those times when we yearn to have more in our lives, we should dwell on the things we already have. In doing so, we will often find that our lives are already full to overflowing. The Golden List: Every morning before getting up visualize a golden tablet on which is written ten things in your life you are especially thankful for. The Gift of a Day: Life at its essence boils down to one day at a time. Today is the Day! If we can learn how to live one day to its fullest, our lives will be rich and meaningful. The Gift of Love: Love is a treasure for which we can never pay. The only way we keep it is to give it away. The Ultimate Gift: In the end, life lived to its fullest is its own ultimate gift.

The Loneliness of the Military Historian Confess: it's my profession that alarms you. This is why few people ask me to dinner, though Lord knows I don't go out of my way to be scary. I wear dresses of sensible cut and unalarming shades of beige, I smell of lavender and go to the hairdresser's: no prophetess mane of mine, complete with snakes, will frighten the youngsters. If I roll my eyes and mutter, if I clutch at my heart and scream in horror like a third-rate actress chewing up a mad scene, I do it in private and nobody sees but the bathroom mirror. In general I might agree with you: women should not contemplate war, should not weigh tactics impartially, or evade the word enemy, or view both sides and denounce nothing. Women should march for peace, or hand out white feathers to arouse bravery, spit themselves on bayonets to protect their babies, whose skulls will be split anyway, or,having been raped repeatedly, hang themselves with their own hair. There are the functions that inspire general comfort. That, and the knitting of socks for the troops and a sort of moral cheerleading. Also: mourning the dead. Sons,lovers and so forth. All the killed children. Instead of this, I tell what I hope will pass as truth. A blunt thing, not lovely. The truth is seldom welcome, especially at dinner, though I am good at what I do. My trade is courage and atrocities. I look at them and do not condemn. I write things down the way they happened, as near as can be remembered. I don't ask why, because it is mostly the same. Wars happen because the ones who start them think they can win. In my dreams there is glamour. The Vikings leave their fields each year for a few months of killing and plunder, much as the boys go hunting. In real life they were farmers. The come back loaded with splendour. The Arabs ride against Crusaders with scimitars that could sever silk in the air. A swift cut to the horse's neck and a hunk of armour crashes down like a tower. Fire against metal. A poet might say: romance against banality. When awake, I know better. Despite the propaganda, there are no monsters, or none that could be finally buried. Finish one off, and circumstances and the radio create another. Believe me: whole armies have prayed fervently to God all night and meant it, and been slaughtered anyway. Brutality wins frequently, and large outcomes have turned on the invention of a mechanical device, viz. radar. True, valour sometimes counts for something, as at Thermopylae. Sometimes being right - though ultimate virtue, by agreed tradition, is decided by the winner. Sometimes men throw themselves on grenades and burst like paper bags of guts to save their comrades. I can admire that. But rats and cholera have won many wars. Those, and potatoes, or the absence of them. It's no use pinning all those medals across the chests of the dead. Impressive, but I know too much. Grand exploits merely depress me. In the interests of research I have walked on many battlefields that once were liquid with pulped men's bodies and spangled with exploded shells and splayed bone. All of them have been green again by the time I got there. Each has inspired a few good quotes in its day. Sad marble angels brood like hens over the grassy nests where nothing hatches. (The angels could just as well be described as vulgar or pitiless, depending on camera angle.) The word glory figures a lot on gateways. Of course I pick a flower or two from each, and press it in the hotel Bible for a souvenir. I'm just as human as you. But it's no use asking me for a final statement. As I say, I deal in tactics. Also statistics: for every year of peace there have been four hundred years of war.

champagne, n. You appear at the foot of the bed with a bottle of champagne, and I have no idea why. I search my mind desperately for an occasion I've forgotten - is this some obscure anniversary or, even worse, a not-so-obscure one? Then I think you have something to tell me, some good news to share, but your smile is silent, cryptic. I sit up in bed, ask you what's going on, and you shake your head, as if to say that nothing's going on, as if to pretend that we usually start our Wednesday mornings with champagne. You touch the bottle to my leg - I feel the cool condensation and the glass, the fact that the bottle must have been sleeping all night in the refrigerator without me noticing. You have long-stemmed glasses in you other hand, and you place them on the nightstand, beside the uncommenting clock, the box of kleenex, the tumbler of water. "The thing about champagne," you say, unfailing the cork, unwinding its wire restraint, "is that it is the ultimate associative object. Every time you open a bottle of champagne, it's a celebration, so there's no better way of starting a celebration than opening a bottle of champagne. Every time you sip it, you're sipping from all those other celebrations. The joy accumulates over time." You pop the cork. The bubbles rise. I feel some of the spray on my skin. You pour. "But why?" I ask as you hand me my glass. You raise yours and ask, "Why not? What better way to start the day?" We drink a toast to that.

One more tip. Gay Hendricks came up with what he calls the “Ultimate Success Mantra” as a good place to start. Every morning before you get out of bed, say the following: “I expand in abundance, success, and love every day as I inspire those around me to do the same.

The One who created and controls the world, the One who is the ultimate definition of what is loving, true, and good, and the One who alone has the power to finally defeat sin has chosen, because of his grace, to wrap his arms of faithful love and protection around you, and he will not let you go.

Think about this. The One who created and controls the world, the One who is the ultimate definition of what is loving, true, and good, and the One who alone has the power to finally defeat sin has chosen, because of his grace, to wrap his arms of faithful love and protection around you, and he will not let you go. You can take your life off your shoulders because God has placed it on his.

Excerpt from Forehead Kisses: "I woke to the sizzle and smell of bacon, fresh brewed coffee, and the soft patter of rain on the window. Cooper was nowhere to be seen. My clock radio read 7:35 a.m. I rolled over on my stomach and just laid quietly in bed absorbing the sweet sounds and smells. About 10 minutes later I heard Cooper come into the room. I felt the bed rock as he kneeled on and crawled across it, ultimately straddling my body. He pulled the sheet down exposing my naked back. He placed gentle, wet kisses down my spine, “Good morning Beautiful.

ultimately, most of us would choose a rich and meaningful life over an empty, happy one, if such a thing is even possible. “Misery serves a purpose,” says psychologist David Myers. He’s right. Misery alerts us to dangers. It’s what spurs our imagination. As Iceland proves, misery has its own tasty appeal. A headline on the BBC’s website caught my eye the other day. It read: “Dirt Exposure Boosts Happiness.” Researchers at Bristol University in Britain treated lung-cancer patients with “friendly” bacteria found in soil, otherwise known as dirt. The patients reported feeling happier and had an improved quality of life. The research, while far from conclusive, points to an essential truth: We thrive on messiness. “The good life . . . cannot be mere indulgence. It must contain a measure of grit and truth,” observed geographer Yi-Fu Tuan. Tuan is the great unheralded geographer of our time and a man whose writing has accompanied me throughout my journeys. He called one chapter of his autobiography “Salvation by Geography.” The title is tongue-in-cheek, but only slightly, for geography can be our salvation. We are shaped by our environment and, if you take this Taoist belief one step further, you might say we are our environment. Out there. In here. No difference. Viewed that way, life seems a lot less lonely. The word “utopia” has two meanings. It means both “good place” and “nowhere.” That’s the way it should be. The happiest places, I think, are the ones that reside just this side of paradise. The perfect person would be insufferable to live with; likewise, we wouldn’t want to live in the perfect place, either. “A lifetime of happiness! No man could bear it: It would be hell on Earth,” wrote George Bernard Shaw, in his play Man and Superman. Ruut Veenhoven, keeper of the database, got it right when he said: “Happiness requires livable conditions, but not paradise.” We humans are imminently adaptable. We survived an Ice Age. We can survive anything. We find happiness in a variety of places and, as the residents of frumpy Slough demonstrated, places can change. Any atlas of bliss must be etched in pencil. My passport is tucked into my desk drawer again. I am relearning the pleasures of home. The simple joys of waking up in the same bed each morning. The pleasant realization that familiarity breeds contentment and not only contempt. Every now and then, though, my travels resurface and in unexpected ways. My iPod crashed the other day. I lost my entire music collection, nearly two thousand songs. In the past, I would have gone through the roof with rage. This time, though, my anger dissipated like a summer thunderstorm and, to my surprise, I found the Thai words mai pen lai on my lips. Never mind. Let it go. I am more aware of the corrosive nature of envy and try my best to squelch it before it grows. I don’t take my failures quite so hard anymore. I see beauty in a dark winter sky. I can recognize a genuine smile from twenty yards. I have a newfound appreciation for fresh fruits and vegetables. Of all the places I visited, of all the people I met, one keeps coming back to me again and again: Karma Ura,

The same kind of situation complicates many public debates, like that over global warming. Many scientists predict that altered atmospheric conditions will raise the average global temperature by several degrees. But such changes can also cause extreme weather, which may mean worse snowstorms in the southern United States. Global warming may alter ocean currents like the Gulf Stream and ultimately turn northern Europe into a much colder Siberian-type icebox. Anomalies like this fuel the global warming naysayers: scientists say the world is getting hotter, but you’ve just suffered through the biggest snowstorm in your region’s history. How should you respond? A judicious response is that nature is amazing—rich, varied, complex, and intricately interconnected, with a messy, long history. Anomalies, whether in planetary orbits or North American weather, are not just inconvenient details to brush aside: they are the very essence of understanding what really happened—how things really work. We develop grand and general models of how nature works, and then we use the odd details to refine the original imperfect model (or if the exceptions overwhelm the rule, we regroup around a new model). That’s why good scientists revel in anomalies. If we understood everything, if we could predict everything, there’d be no point in getting up in the morning and heading to the lab.

God is with you in your moments of darkness because he will never leave you. But your darkness isn’t dark to him. Your mysteries aren’t mysterious to him. Your surprises don’t surprise him. He understands all the things that confuse you the most. Not only are your mysteries not mysterious to him, but he is in complete charge of all that is mysterious to you and me. Remember today that there is One who looks at what you see as dark and sees light. And as you remember that, remember, too, that he is the ultimate definition of everything that is wise, good, true, loving, and faithful. He holds both you and your mysteries in his gracious hands, and because he does, you can find rest even when the darkness of mystery has entered your door.

Kami was too tired to even despair. And from the look of Jared, he was more tired still: bleeding all over the floor could not be good for him. “You need to go to bed,” Kami decided, and hauled him away and out of Lillian’s room. “Come on. Everything will still be ruined in the morning.” It was a brief walk down the narrow hall to Jared’s little room. They did not speak until they were at his door. “Can you believe that we screwed up everything about twice as much in the space of a couple hours?” Kami asked. “I can,” said Jared. “But only because I truly believe in us, the utter depths of our incompetence, and that it must inevitably lead us to our ultimate epic failure.” “Aw, sugar flower,” Kami told him. “You always know just what to say.” “And just how to poison my brother,” said Jared.

We must realize that the real impact and consequence of each of our choices and actions—and even our thoughts—is monumental, because every single thought, choice, and action is determining who we are becoming, which will ultimately determine the quality of our lives. As T. Harv Eker said in his best-selling book Secrets of the Millionaire Mind, “How you do anything is how you do everything.” Every time you choose to do the easy thing, instead of the right thing, you are shaping your identity, becoming the type of person who does what’s easy, rather than what’s right. On the other hand, when you do choose to do the right thing and follow through with your commitments—especially when you don’t feel like it—you are developing the extraordinary discipline (which most people never develop) necessary for creating extraordinary results in your life. As my good friend, Peter Voogd, often teaches his clients: “Discipline creates lifestyle.

When I woke up in the morning I was in bad shape. My neck was stiff and I couldn’t turn it. We weren’t pros, so there was no such thing as a physical therapist or masseuse to fix it. The best I could do was just rub in some Bengay and hope for the best. When we got to the Czech Republic a couple of days later, my neck still had zero mobility. In order to look to the side, I had to move my entire body. As if that weren’t enough to worry about, we were competing against Rachael, who was now teamed up with the Russian guy who had beaten me as a junior. His name was Evgeni Smagin, and he wore his dark hair greased back. The guy just looked slick from head to toe. I turned to Aneta. “This is so not good,” I told her. “They are like the ultimate, ultimate couple. They’re going to beat us.” Aneta looked very upset, so I guess something inside me said, “Derek, man up!” My neck was messed up and I was about to get my ass kicked by my archnemesis and my ex. It couldn’t get much worse than that.

Ah, my friends, that innocent afternoon with Larry provoked me into thought in a way my own dicelife until then never had. Larry took to following the dice with such ease and joy compared to the soul-searching gloom that I often went through before following a decision, that I had to wonder what happened to every human in the two decades between seven and twenty-seven to turn a kitten into a cow. Why did children seem to be so often spontaneous, joy-filled and concentrated while adults seemed controlled, anxiety-filled and diffused? It was the Goddam sense of having a self: that sense of self which psychologists have been proclaiming we all must have. What if - at the time it seemed like an original thought - what if the development of a sense of self is normal and natural, but is neither inevitable nor desirable? What if it represents a psychological appendix: a useless, anachronistic pain in the side? - or, like the mastodon's huge tusks: a heavy, useless and ultimately self-destructive burden? What if the sense of being some-one represents an evolutionary error as disastrous to the further development of a more complex creature as was the shell for snails or turtles? He he he. What if? indeed: men must attempt to eliminate the error and develop in themselves and their children liberation from the sense of self. Man must become comfortable in flowing from one role to another, one set of values to another, one life to another. Men must be free from boundaries, patterns and consistencies in order to be free to think, feel and create in new ways. Men have admired Prometheus and Mars too long; our God must become Proteus. I became tremendously excited with my thoughts: 'Men must become comfortable in flowing from one role to another' - why aren't they? At the age of three or four, children were willing to be either good guys or bad guys, the Americans or the Commies, the students or the fuzz. As the culture molds them, however, each child comes to insist on playing only one set of roles: he must always be a good guy, or, for equally compulsive reasons, a bad guy or rebel. The capacity to play and feel both sets of roles is lost. He has begun to know who he is supposed to be. The sense of permanent self: ah, how psychologists and parents lust to lock their kids into some definable cage. Consistency, patterns, something we can label - that's what we want in our boy. 'Oh, our Johnny always does a beautiful bower movement every morning after breakfast.' 'Billy just loves to read all the time...' 'Isn't Joan sweet? She always likes to let the other person win.' 'Sylvia's so pretty and so grown up; she just loves all the time to dress up.' It seemed to me that a thousand oversimplifications a year betrayed the truths in the child's heart: he knew at one point that he didn't always feel like shitting after breakfast but it gave his Ma a thrill. Billy ached to be out splashing in mud puddles with the other boys, but... Joan wanted to chew the penis off her brother every time he won, but ... And Sylvia daydreamed of a land in which she wouldn’t have to worry about how she looked . . . Patterns are prostitution to the patter of parents. Adults rule and they reward patterns. Patterns it is. And eventual misery. What if we were to bring up our children differently? Reward them for varying their habits, tastes, roles? Reward them for being inconsistent? What then? We could discipline them to be reliably various, to be conscientiously inconsistent, determinedly habit-free - even of 'good' habits.

There are so many things to remember, and I guess what ultimately stresses me out is the idea that other moms—at school or out there in the wild world—are somehow way better at keeping track of this than I am. I am one of the most organized people I have ever met, and even with all of my planning, I still am constantly forgetting things—or remembering them at midnight the night before they’re due. And no matter what I do or create or volunteer for, some mythical “other mom” at school has done it better. “Yes, Mommy, you can buy the T-shirt we need for make-your-own-T-shirt day, but Liam’s mom grew organic cotton plants. Then she hand-separated the seed from the fiber before spinning it into thread and fabric for the shirt she sewed him herself.” I can’t even begin to keep up, and the stress of trying to do so can make me crazy. So this year I made a big decision. I’m over it. I am utterly over the idea of crushing back-to-school time—or any other part of school for that matter! I do some parts of it well. Our morning routine might be choreographed chaos, but we are never late to school. My kids (with the exception of the four-year-old) are well groomed and well mannered, and they get good grades. Beyond that, they are good people—the kind of kids who befriend the outcasts and the loners. Sure, they attack each other at home and are dramatic enough about their lack of access to technology to earn themselves Oscars, but whatever. We are doing pretty good—and pretty good is way better than trying to fake perfection any day of the week.

In another building, I was shown his [Mr Brunel's] manufactory of shoes, which, like the other, is full of ingenuity, and, in regard to subdivision of labour, brings this fabric on a level with the oft-admired manufactory of pins. Every step in it is effected by the most elegant and precise machinery; while as each operation is performed by one hand, so each shoe passes through twenty-five hands, who complete from the hide, as supplied by the currier, a hundred pair of strong and well-finished shoes per day. All the details are performed by ingenious applications of the mechanic powers, and all the parts are characterized by precision, uniformity, and accuracy. As each man performs but one step in the process, which implies no knowledge of what is done by those who go before or follow him, so the persons employed are not shoemakers, but wounded soldiers, who are able to learn their respective duties in a few hours. The contract at which these shoes are delivered to government is 6s. 6d. per pair, being at least 2s. less than what was paid previously for an unequal and cobbled article. While, however, we admire these triumphs of mechanics, and congratulate society on the prospect of enjoying more luxuries at less cost of human labour, it ought not to be forgotten, that the general good in such cases is productive of great partial evils, against which a paternal government ought to provide. No race of workmen being proverbially more industrious than shoemakers, it is altogether unreasonable, that so large a portion of valuable members of society should be injured by improvements which have the ultimate effect of benefiting the whole.

Sample Daily Plan: Begin your morning with hydration – think green tea and water. Also, make a breakfast that has lean proteins and don’t forget to do your yoga. If mornings are easy for you, get in your exercise. Try for 30-60 minutes of cardio and 15 minutes of strength training. Have 5-6 mini-meals, making sure you don’t exceed your calculated calorie count. Get your daily intake of water. (1 ounce for every 2 pounds you weigh) Stay away from sugar and salt. Spend your evening time engaged in some relaxing stretches. Soothe your body even more by drinking a warm cup of tea or reading a good book. Get 7-10 hours of sleep. Make all seven days like this. Remember, you need to eat well, exercise often and sleep good at night.

March 4 MORNING “My grace is sufficient for thee.” — 2 Corinthians 12:9 IF none of God’s saints were poor and tried, we should not know half so well the consolations of divine grace. When we find the wanderer who has not where to lay his head, who yet can say, “Still will I trust in the Lord;” when we see the pauper starving on bread and water, who still glories in Jesus; when we see the bereaved widow overwhelmed in affliction, and yet having faith in Christ, oh! what honour it reflects on the gospel. God’s grace is illustrated and magnified in the poverty and trials of believers. Saints bear up under every discouragement, believing that all things work together for their good, and that out of apparent evils a real blessing shall ultimately spring — that their God will either work a deliverance for them speedily, or most assuredly support them in the trouble, as long as He is pleased to keep them in it. This patience of the saints proves the power of divine grace. There is a lighthouse out at sea: it is a calm night — I cannot tell whether the edifice is firm; the tempest must rage about it, and then I shall know whether it will stand. So with the Spirit’s work: if it were not on many occasions surrounded with tempestuous waters, we should not know that it was true and strong; if the winds did not blow upon it, we should not know how firm and secure it was. The master-works of God are those men who stand in the midst of difficulties, stedfast, unmoveable, — “Calm mid the bewildering cry, Confident of victory.” He who would glorify his God must set his account upon meeting with many trials. No man can be illustrious before the Lord unless his conflicts be many. If then, yours be a much-tried path, rejoice in it, because you will the better show forth the all-sufficient grace of God. As for His failing you, never dream of it — hate the thought. The God who has been sufficient until now, should be trusted to the end.

Every day, in this earthly life, there are ups and downs, deep emotional valleys and steep mountains to overcome. We have not yet learned to travel the straight and narrow road of Understanding. We still coast and veer off the path we travel. A sudden change of attitude or a jump back into a dark habitual mood always deters us from moving toward the light. How much easier does it seem to reach back to the old and outgrown thought habits of the past? But it is this light, or moment of ‘seeing with the mental eye’, that inspires us to keep moving and to get back on the road to eternal bliss - again and again. This glimpse of the Truth that all is good and all is mental, and that we are part of this Universal goodness with its wonderful effects, is what keeps us going. We instinctively know the Truth when we keep our minds open to all possibilities. Inspiration comes in many forms. A wonderful reminder of a past experience, a certain smell reminding you of a pleasant encounter, the sound of a song that triggers loving feelings, looking at nature and its wondrous bounty, or the birth of a baby are just a few examples of new hope and a fresh want for living. A new desire for a better tomorrow is born every second and readily available to you. Indeed, desire is the starting point of all achievement, but most of all it is the starting point of imagination and the active spark or beginning of all creation. Your desire is a spark in your consciousness pressing for expression. Life is unfolding itself. Life always presses for manifestation and progress. It is an ever-changing ongoing process. Like water, life flows. With this in mind I make sure that my motivation is pure, and comes from within the chambers of my loving heart. The Universe with its vast ocean of pure possibilities is ready and willing to provide, and I draw from this unlimited Universal gift. Knowing that God is close and ever-present is all the daily inspiration I need to keep moving forward. Seeing the sunrise in the early morning hours reminds me that I have another chance to change my course; and I will travel happily toward my ultimate goal, which is perfect Understanding of the Allness of Good.

Sean had never stared into as many blank-eyed faces before. Throughout the high school civics talk, he felt as if he were speaking to the kids in a foreign language, one they had no intention of learning. Scrambling for a way to reach his audience, he ad-libbed, tossing out anecdotes about his own years at Coral Beach High. He confessed that as a teenager his decision to run for student government had been little more than a wily excuse to approach the best-looking girls. But what ultimately hooked his interest in student government was the startling discovery that the kids at school, all so different—jocks, nerds, preppies, and brains—could unite behind a common cause. During his senior year, when he’d been president of the student council, Coral Beach High raised seven thousand dollars to aid Florida’s hurricane victims. Wouldn’t that be something to feel good about? Sean asked his teenage audience. The response he received was as rousing as a herd of cows chewing their cud. Except this group was blowing big pink bubbles with their gum. The question and answer period, too, turned out to be a joke. The teens’ main preoccupation: his salary and whether he got driven around town in a chauffeured limo. When they learned he was willing to work for peanuts and that he drove an eight-year-old convertible, he might as well have stamped a big fat L on his forehead. He was weak-kneed with relief when at last the principal mounted the auditorium steps and thanked Sean for his electrifying speech. While Sean was politically seasoned enough to put the morning’s snafus behind him, and not worry overmuch that the apathetic bunch he’d just talked to represented America’s future voters, it was the high school principal’s long-winded enthusiasm, telling Sean how much of an inspiration he was for these kids, that truly set Sean’s teeth on edge. And made him even later for the final meeting of the day, the coral reef advisory panel.

THE BIGGER PICTURE   During World War II, thousands in factories across the United States constructed parachutes. From the worker’s point of view, the job was tedious. It required stitching endless lengths of colorless fabric, crouched over a sewing machine eight to ten hours a day. A day’s work produced a formless, massive heap of cloth with no visible resemblance to a parachute. In order to motivate workers and keep them concerned with quality, the management in one factory held a meeting. Management informed workers each day of the approximate number of parachutes that had been strapped to the back of pilots, copilots, and other “flying” personnel the previous day. They learned just how many men had jumped to safety from disabled planes as a result of their high-quality work. The managers encouraged their workers to see the big picture on their job. As a second means of motivation, the workers were asked to form a mental picture of a husband, brother, or son who might be the one saved by the parachute they sewed. That factory held one of the highest levels of quality on record!3 Don’t let the tedium of each day’s chores and responsibilities wear you down so you only see the “stitching” in front of you. Keep your eyes on the big picture. Focus on why you do what you do and who will benefit from your work, including those you don’t know and may never meet. You may not have all the answers to the question, “Why am I here?” but you can rest assured, the Lord does! Ultimately, the Bible tells us we will be in heaven for eternity—and that is the biggest picture of all! God is preparing us for heaven, just as He is preparing heaven for us. He is creating us to be the people He wants to live with forever. Whatever mundane tasks or trivial pursuits you undertake today, see them in the light of eternity. They will take on a whole new meaning!   “I GO TO PREPARE A PLACE FOR YOU. AND IF I GO AND PREPARE A PLACE FOR YOU, I WILL COME AGAIN AND RECEIVE YOU TO MYSELF; THAT WHERE I AM, THERE YOU MAY BE ALSO.” JOHN 14:2-3 NKJV

Here’s what we all need to keep in mind at all times: the One who rules over this world is the ultimate definition of everything that is good, wise, right, loving, faithful, and true. Hope in life is never about doing whatever you need to do to get your way. Hope in life is not found in expending all your resources, time, energy, and gifts to realize your personal dreams. Hope in life is not found in working yourself into as much control as possible over the people and situations in your life. In a word, hope is not found in your will being done.

Am I rooted in sincere fidelity and love to Jesus? If my heart remains unsoftened and unfertilized by grace, the good seed may germinate for a season, but it must ultimately wither, for it cannot flourish on a rocky, unbroken, unsanctified heart. Let me dread a godliness as rapid in growth and as lacking in endurance as Jonah’s vine; let me count the cost of being a follower of Jesus. Above all let me feel the energy of His Holy Spirit, and then I shall possess an abiding and enduring seed in my soul. If my mind remains as stubborn as it was by nature, the sun of trial will scorch, and my hard heart will help cast the heat the more terribly upon the ill-covered seed, and my religion will soon die, and my despair will be terrible. Therefore, O heavenly Sower, plow me first, and then cast the truth into me, and let me yield a bounteous harvest

Morning,” he said, headed for the coffeepot. When he got back to the table and sat, he was met by her glare. “What?” he asked, perplexed. “I cannot believe you did that,” she said. “Did what?” he asked. “My best friend. You know she’s been through a hard time.” He looked around a little frantically. “Vanni, what? Where’s Nikki?” “Gone,” she said flatly. “Gone?” he asked, rising out of his chair. “Gone?” “Yes,” she affirmed. “What were you thinking?” He gave a huff of unhappy laughter. “I was thinking I’d just found the woman of my dreams,” he said. “She left?” “In tears,” Vanni said, her mouth set in a grim line. “Tears? Vanni, I did not make her cry!” “Didn’t you have sex with her all night long in that little fifth wheel?” she asked, anger in her tone. Hoo-boy. You don’t talk about that, especially when it’s meaningful. “Vanni, I swear to you, I didn’t do anything to hurt her.” “Didn’t you find her on the deck, crying, and kiss her and seduce her and take her to that little trailer?” “Well… Yeah… I did that part….” And he was thinking, was there a felony in there somewhere? Because all through the night the only thing he had tried to do was show her how much she could be loved. And it was wonderful; she was wonderful. Spontaneous and aroused and ultimately quite satisfied. And happy. He’d heard her sigh, he’d heard her laugh. There was absolutely no crying. “Didn’t it occur to you that after her heart had been broken, that was probably not a great idea?” He got a little angry himself. He leaned his hands on the table, got a little bit in her face and said, “No. I thought it was a terrific idea, and so did she. I wanted to be good to her and I was. I treated her with absolute respect, and she consented one hundred percent. Now, give me her number. I need to talk to her as soon as possible.” “She said absolutely no.” “What? No, I have to get in touch with her. Vanni, this isn’t funny.” “No, it’s not. I just don’t know what went through your mind.” “Wait a minute here, I didn’t talk her into anything! I was a perfect gentleman, I swear to God!” “Don’t you know anything about women?” she asked him. “Apparently not!” he answered hotly. “She’s just spent five years with a guy who wouldn’t come through. What do you suppose she thinks you’re going to do after one night?” “She could give me a frickin’ chance!” Vanni’s mouth was set in a firm line. “She said absolutely no.” “Oh, for God’s sake. Vanni, this is cruel and unusual. Listen, I have feelings for her. Really.” “After one night?” she asked, a definite superior tone to her voice. “Before the night,” he said. “Will you ask her to call me? Please?” “You knew her for what? Ten minutes?” “Shit,” he said. “Okay, it was fast. Okay? I admit it. But by the time we’d spent a night together it seemed…” It seemed as if he’d been with her for years! Jesus, his voice was quivering. He was losing his mind. He should be saying, fine—if that’s the way she wants it, fine. But in his head, his heart, his gut, he was feeling desperate. Driven. He was not letting this woman get away. His

You can make a better axe and pickaxe using the same crafting recipe, but with cobblestone instead of planks. When the morning comes, it would be a good idea to find some sheep. You can kill them to get some wool and make a bed. This will help you pass the night peacefully. Place three wool in a line above three planks in a crafting bench to make it. Well done, you’ve survived your first night! You’ll probably need some breakfast. So let’s move on to satisfying that hunger.

Love means vulnerability; people who love you can also hurt you. Making oneself vulnerable is the ultimate in bravery.

OM CHANTING Various studies have shown that OM chanting deactivates the limbic part of the brain responsible for our basic emotions (fear, pleasure, anger) and our impulses (hunger, sex, dominance and care of offspring). Since the effectiveness of OM chanting is associated with the experience of vibrations around the ears, scientists have suggested that these sensations are transmitted through the auricular branch of the vagus nerve. As the vagus nerve branches off into the inner ear and larynx, controlling the opening and closing of the vocal cords and tone of the sound, it appears that this is stimulated during the vocalization of the O and M sounds. In addition, by performing chanting in exhalation, the vagus nerve is activated in its role as manager of the parasympathetic system. In addition, chanting, by facilitating the lengthening of the exhalation, further amplifies the effect on the parasympathetic system. This is why this practice helps to calm and relax the body and mind. -Find a quiet place to sit comfortably. -A good position is to sit with your legs crossed and your back straight. -Wear comfortable cotton clothes that do not tighten any part of your body. All body channels should be free and comfortable. Place the palm of your right hand (facing upwards) on the palm of your left hand at navel level. Close your eyes for a few minutes and relax your mind and body. Slowly feel the vibrations that occur in every part of your body. When the vibrations become more intense, start breathing deeply. Hold your breath for a second and then slowly exhale. Initially count to 7 as you exhale. This ought to be duplicated thrice. As you exhale the third time, sing "oooooooooo..." Feel the vibrations in your abdomen (and under your chest). After exhaling, relax for 2 seconds. Breathe in again (slow, deep breaths). As you exhale sing "ooooo..." and feel the vibrations in your chest and neck. After exhaling, relax for 2 seconds. Inhale again (long, deep breath). As you exhale, sing "mmmmmmmm...". Feel the vibrations in your head and neck. After exhaling, relax for 2 seconds. Inhale again and as you exhale say "oooommmm..." or "aaauuummm...". About 80% of the sound should be "aaauuu..." and 20% should be "mmmm...". Repeat the previous steps 3 times (you can do it up to 9 times). After the Om meditation, relax and concentrate on your regular breathing for about 5 minutes. TIPS -Wearing white clothes and being in a white environment will improve your experience. But the rule of white is not fundamental. -A good place could be a quiet room or a garden with shade. Your eyes, ears or other sensory organs should not be disturbed. -Do not consume alcohol for at least 8-10 hours before meditation. -It would be better not to eat or drink anything for at least 2 hours before meditation. The body's channels should not be blocked in order to achieve maximum results. This applies especially to the digestive system. -The best times for this meditation are early in the morning or late at night. -For beginners, singing "aum" can cause dizziness. It is recommended to proceed slowly and try to learn one step at a time. In this way you will prepare body and mind for the next step. -It is very important to open your eyes slowly when your breathing has stabilized. -If you cannot sit on the floor, you can try sitting on a bed or a chair. The most important thing is to keep your back straight. -Doing this kind of meditation in a group brings more peace and harmony to all members than doing it alone.

October 3 After the earthquake came a fire. . . . And after the fire came a gentle whisper. (1 Kings 19:12) A woman who had made rapid progress in her understanding of the Lord was once asked the secret of her seemingly easy growth. Her brief response was, “Mind the checks.” The reason many of us do not know and understand God better is that we do not heed His gentle “checks”—His delicate restraints and constraints. His voice is “a gentle whisper.” A whisper can hardly be heard, so it must be felt as a faint and steady pressure upon the heart and mind, like the touch of a morning breeze calmly moving across the soul. And when it is heeded, it quietly grows clearer in the inner ear of the heart. God’s voice is directed to the ear of love, and true love is intent upon hearing even the faintest whisper. Yet there comes a time when His love ceases to speak, when we do not respond to or believe His message. “God is love” (1 John 4:8), and if you want to know Him and His voice, you must continually listen to His gentle touches. So when you are about to say something in conversation with others, and you sense a gentle restraint from His quiet whisper, heed the restraint and refrain from speaking. And when you are about to pursue some course of action that seems perfectly clear and right, yet you sense in your spirit another path being suggested with the force of quiet conviction, heed that conviction. Follow the alternate course, even if the change of plans appears to be absolute folly from the perspective of human wisdom. Also learn to wait on God until He unfolds His will before you. Allow Him to develop all the plans of your heart and mind, and then let Him accomplish them. Do not possess any wisdom of your own, for often His performance will appear to contradict the plan He gave you. God will seem to work against Himself, so simply listen, obey, and trust Him, even when it appears to be the greatest absurdity to do so. Ultimately, “we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him” (Rom. 8:28), but many times, in the initial stages of the performance of His plans: In His own world He is content To play a losing game. Therefore if you desire to know God’s voice, never consider the final outcome or the possible results. Obey Him even when He asks you to move while you still see only darkness, for He Himself will be a glorious light within you. Then there will quickly spring up within your heart a knowledge of God and a fellowship with Him, which will be overpowering enough in themselves to hold you and Him together, even in the most severe tests and under the strongest pressures of life. from Way of Faith

Think about this. The One who created and controls the world, the One who is the ultimate definition of what is loving, true, and good, and the One who alone has the power to finally defeat sin has chosen, because of his grace, to wrap his arms of faithful love and protection around you, and he will not let you go.

SATURDAY, APRIL 4 Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Galatians 6:9 (NIV) WRITING IS MY CALLING. EVEN without compensation, I would write. My latest book explores the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. I wrote the first draft in 2005. Countless editors rejected it. Over ten years, I rewrote the manuscript no fewer than eight times. Each new revision was denied for publication. As an orator and Bible scholar, Dr. King said, “Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.” I was tempted to quit on many days as my manuscript received mountain-high rejection notices. Isaiah’s words comforted me, “But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint” (Isaiah 40:31, KJV). Ultimately I did not quit or cave to self-defeat, and my book was finally published in 2018. The decade that I spent revising the text proved to be a priceless exercise in learning patience and sharpening my writing skills. My dream was deferred, but it was not denied. And here is a spiritual nugget that was gleaned from my ten-year writing journey: The soul will grow weary when it toils toward an unseen promise. Yet, as I labor to attain the vision that I hold for myself, the Spirit of the Lord strengthens my heart and emotions as I press ahead. What are you laboring to achieve? If you refuse to quit, Jesus will touch you with His unwavering perseverance. Despite what happens in the process, never give up on yourself. Press onward. Jesus will bring you to a successful finish. —ALICE THOMPSON

Making oneself vulnerable is the ultimate in bravery.

But she cherished life as well. Getting up in the morning and making French toast for breakfast. Working in the antique shop. Reading a good book. Going out to an exciting movie. So many small delights. Perhaps it was true that the little joys of daily life were insignificant when compared to the intense pleasures of love, but if she was to be denied the ultimate, she would settle willingly for second best.

The Binding of Isaac and the Binding of You and Me With Rosh Hashanah coming in a few weeks, it is a good time to think about some of its important lessons. The High Holy Days are a time to evaluate our relationship with important people in our lives. We ask their forgiveness, they ask ours, and if there is regret for past faults and insensitive acts (Tradition calls them “sins”), we lend forgiveness to others, and they to us. Rosh Hashanah is also a time to think about our relation with our Tradition, with Judaism. It is the Jewish New Year, and a time to reexamine where we stand with regard to the faith/culture/civilization we call Judaism. Those hearing these words have already taken significant steps toward solidifying their Jewish connections by joining a synagogue, coming to religious worship, and doing many other Jewish things in our lives. Take a few moments—even a few hours—to think about and discuss your Jewish values and priorities with your loved ones and intellectual sparring partners. How can you deepen and strengthen your Jewish ties and commitments in the coming year? Perhaps that is why we are bidden to hear the sound of the Shofar each morning for thirty days during the month of Elul, before Rosh Hashanah, as well as on the New Year itself. The Talmud, in tractate “Rosh Hashanah” (16a), tells us: “Rabbi Abahu said: Why do we use the horn of a ram on Rosh Hashanah? Because the Blessed Holy One is saying to us: If you blow a horn from a ram before Me on Rosh Hashanah, I will be reminded of the act of ultimate faith performed by Avraham when he was ready to carry out my demand, even though a ram was eventually sacrificed in place of Yitzhak. The merit of Avraham will reflect merit on you, his descendants. In fact, when you blow the Shofar, and I remember the Binding (Hebrew: Akedah) of Yitzhak I will attribute to you the merit of having bound (Hebrew: akad-tem) yourselves to me. As we begin to blow the Shofar each morning, from the first day of the Hebrew month of Elul, let’s begin to think about how we bind ourselves to God. About our Jewish boundaries, the ties that bind us to our Jewish past. Let’s think of how our ritual lives can be enriched and enhanced with more song, custom, prayer and ceremony. Let’s think of how we can give ourselves to more Jewish causes (Israel, Jewish education, the synagogue), and how being Jewish can help bind and tie us to the needs of humanity (the environment, the needs of our community, the eradication of poverty and injustice). Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins

Here’s what we all need to keep in mind at all times: the One who rules over this world is the ultimate definition of everything that is good, wise, right, loving, faithful, and true. Hope in life is never about doing whatever you need to do to get your way. Hope in life is not found in expending all your resources, time, energy, and gifts to realize your personal dreams. Hope in life is not found in working yourself into as much control as possible over the people and situations in your life. In a word, hope is not found in your will being done. Hope is found in only one place—in the wise and faithful rule of your Father in heaven. With his “before origin to beyond destiny” perspective, he really does know what is best for you and for everything he created. Prayer is never about asking God to submit his awesome power to your will and plan; prayer is an act of personal submission to the always-right will of God.

embedded her theology in song and liturgy, so the simple act of going to church is a big part of how faith and commitment are passed from generation to generation. This brief hymn to the Holy Spirit from the morning service of Matins reminds us that our blessings ultimately come from outside ourselves—a good lesson for any generation to learn. The “divine treasures” we enjoy are not ours by nature but by the grace of the Holy Spirit. The most valuable of those treasures were considered in chapter 3—the truths that the Holy Spirit reveals about the Holy Trinity, about ourselves, and about the Church.

I felt the weight of that responsibility even more now that I had seen firsthand what life here had been like. I took the donuts and juice to a little table we had set up in the Blue Room. I opened the box and set out some paper cups. Matthews was the first to arrive at the table. “Thank you, Carrie Jo.” “My pleasure. Have you heard anything from C. M. Lowell on those mantelpieces? I know it’s only been a few weeks, but TD is going to need to install them before they cut the molding for the rest of the room.” “Right. I’ll put a call in to them this morning. I’d forgotten about that. I’ve got some leads on paintings for the two main parlors. One is pretty incredible; I emailed you photos of both of them. Don’t forget, we’ve got boxes of paintings in the attic. And good news—we have air up there now, too. If you can’t find what you want, there is plenty of room in the budget, but many of the local families are willing to allow us to use their pieces. With all credits, of course.” I couldn’t figure Hollis Matthews out: one minute he was cold and distant, and the next he was kind and friendly. One thing I knew for sure—he was always a man with a plan. “Great. I’ll check out those pictures and let you know. I’ve got some plans ready for the ladies’ parlor, including a significant display of Augusta Evans books. I’ll have those to you by the end of next week.” With a nod of his salt-and-pepper head, he walked away, probably off to call about those mantelpieces. I invited the interns to have a donut and took a few minutes to get to know them. There were two Rachels, Rachel Kowalski and Rachel McGhee, and James Pittman. All of them were excellent archaeological students who had earned their spots on our team. I’d Skyped with them individually before I came to Mobile, but this was the first time we’d met in person. “Well, guys, are you ready for the grand tour? It’s the same one visitors will take once the museum is open.” We started in the ladies’ parlor, continued on to the men’s parlor and the Blue Room, and then went up the opposite side of the hall to the servants’ waiting area, the music room and the ballroom. There were of course a myriad of

Let us say, for example, that there is a flaw in my personality, and my friends start criticizing me for its manifestations. My first reaction is one of denial: She just got out of the wrong side of the bed this morning, I think, or He’s really just angry at his wife. Through such things I tell myself that their criticisms really don’t have anything to do with me. But if my friends keep it up, then I get angry at them. What gives them the right to stick their noses into my business? They don’t know what it’s like to be in my shoes. Why don’t they keep their noses in their own darn business?, I think, or perhaps even tell them. If they love me enough to keep after me, however, then I bargain: Actually I haven’t given them many pats on the back lately or told them what a good job they’re doing. And I go around smiling at my friends and being of good cheer, hoping that will shut them up. But if it doesn’t work—if they still insist on criticizing me—I finally begin to contemplate the possibility: Maybe there really is something wrong with me. And that’s depressing. But if I can hang in there with that depressing notion, contemplate it, stay with it, analyze it, I can not only discern the nature of the flaw in my personality but begin the work of isolating and naming it and ultimately eradicating it, killing it, emptying myself of it. And should I succeed at this work of assisting a part of me to die, I will emerge from the other end of my depression a new and better and, in some sense, resurrected person.

That’s how much she wanted to protect herself from her feelings of love. Love means vulnerability; people who love you can also hurt you. Making oneself vulnerable is the ultimate in bravery. It’s scary,