Pure Thoughts

All entries in the ‘Stories’ Category

1. Never give up on anybody, miracles happen everyday.

2. Be brave even if you’re not, pretend to be. No one can tell the difference.

3. Think big thoughts, relish small pleasures.

4. Learn to listen. Opportunity sometimes knocks very softly.

5. Never deprive someone of hope, it might be all they have.

6. Strive for excellence, not perfection.

7. Don’t waste time grieving over past mistakes. Learn from them and move on.

8. When someone hugs you let them be the first to let go.

9. Never cut what can be untied.

10. Don’t expect life to be fair.

11. Remember: Success comes to the one that acts first.

12. Never waste an opportunity to tell someone you love them.

13. Remember that nobody makes it alone. Have a grateful heart and be quick to acknowledge those who help you.

14. Never underestimate the power of a kind word or deed.

15. Laugh a lot. A good sense of humor cures almost all of life’s ills.

16. Don’t miss the magic of the moment by focusing on what’s to come.

17. Watch for big problems. They disguise big opportunities.

Technorati Tags: Life

Imagine there is a bank account that credits your account each morning with $86,400. It carries over no balance from day to day.

Every evening the bank deletes whatever part of the balance you failed to use during the day. What would you do? Draw out every cent, of course?

Each of us has such a bank. It’s name is TIME.

Every morning, it credits you with 86,400 seconds.

Every night it writes off as lost, whatever of this you have failed to invest to a good purpose.

It carries over no balance. It allows no over draft. Each day it opens a new account for you. Each night it burns the remains of the day.

If you fail to use the day’s deposits, the loss is yours. There is no drawing against “tomorrow.”

You must live in the present on today’s deposits. Invest it so as to get from it the utmost in health, happiness and success!
The clock is running!! Make the most of today.

To realise the value of ONE YEAR, ask a student who failed a grade.

To realise the value of ONE MONTH, ask a mother who has given birth to a premature baby.

To realise the value of ONE WEEK, ask the editor of a weekly newspaper.

To realise the value of ONE HOUR, ask the lovers who are waiting to meet.

To realise the value of ONE MINUTE, ask a person who just missed a train.

To realise the value of ONE SECOND, ask someone who just avoided an accident.

To realise the value of ONE MILLISECOND, ask the person who won a silver medal at the Olympics.

Treasure every moment that you have! And treasure it more because you shared it with someone special, special enough to spend your time with. And remember time waits for no one.

Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That’s why its called the present.

Technorati Tags: Life

As many of you are aware by my past writings I have a love of books. In reading books I have found mentors, stories of people who have faced challenges and overcame them; people whom I admire.

I have also found wisdom, and words that make me stop and think, words that have given me an “aha” moment! And, some books have given me hope. These writings that have encouraged me to continue with my goals, or have inspired me to take action.

I was recently reading a book of poetry that was written in the 1930’s. I bought this book at an auction. To me, older books are treasures; they contain wisdom that still applies today.

While I was reading this book, I noticed there we clippings of poems inserted throughout the book. Someone, many years ago, took the time to clip out these poems. I carefully opened these clippings and found, much to my delight, a poem that reminded me to be thankful for all that I have been blessed with. The poem was called “When I Whine”. It showed Author Unknown. So I got on the Internet and found the poem; it was written by Red Foley. Upon further research, I found Mr. Foley was a singer during the post-war era who sold some 25 million records between 1944 and 1965. He was born in 1910 and his real name was Clyde Julian Foley. He died on September 19, 1968, but his words of wisdom still live on. Below is Mr. Foleys poem, When I Whine.

When I Whine

By Red Foley

Today upon a bus, I saw
A lovely maid with golden hair; I envied her – she seemed so gay -
And oh, I wished I were so fair.
When suddenly she rose to leave,
I saw her hobble down the aisle,
She had one foot and wore a crutch,
But as she passed, a smile.
Oh, God, forgive me when I whine;
I have two feet – the world is mine.

And when I stopped to buy some sweets,
The lad who served me had such charm;
He seemed to radiate good cheer,
His manner was so kind and warm.
I said, “It’s nice to deal with you,
Such courtesy I seldom find.”
He turned and said, “Oh, thank you, sir!”
And I saw that he was blind.
Oh, God, forgive me when I whine;
I have two eyes – the world is mine.

Then, when walking down the street,
I saw a child with eyes of blue.
He stood and watched the others play;
It seemed he knew not what to do,
I stopped a moment, then I said:
“Why don’t you join the others, dear?”
He looked ahead without a word,
And then I knew; He could not hear.
Oh, God, forgive me when I whine;
I have two ears – the world is mine.

With feet to take me where I’d go,
With eyes to see the sunset’s glow,
With ears to hear what I should know:
I’m blessed indeed, The world is mine;
Oh, God, forgive me when I whine.

So the next time you are having an “its all about me day”, or on a day when you are feeling sorry for yourself, or on a day that you catch yourself complaining about the things that truly are not issues, remember Mr. Foley’s poem, “When I Whine”.

Technorati Tags: Life

by Jackie Sagner

A little boy selling magazines for school walked up to a house that people rarely visited. The house was very old and run down and the owner hardly ever came out. When he did come out he would not say hello to neighbors or passers by but simply just glare at them.

The boy knocked on the door and waited, sweating from fear of the old man. The boy’s parents told him to stay away from the house, a lot of the other neighborhood children were told the same from their parents.

As he was ready to walk away, the door slowly opened. ” What do you want?” the old man said. The little boy was very afraid but he had a quota to meet for school with selling the magazines.

“Uh, sir, I uh am selling these magazines and uh I was wondering if you would like to buy one.” The old man just stared at the boy. The boy could see inside the old man’s house and saw that he had dog figurines on the fireplace mantle. “Do you collect dogs?” the little boy asked. “Yes, I have many collectibles in my house, they are my family here, they are all I have.” The boy then felt sorry for the man, as it seemed that he was a very lonely soul. “Well, I do have a magazine here for collectors, it is perfect for you, I also have one about dogs since you like dogs so much.” The old man was ready to close the door on the boy and said, “No boy, I don’t need any magazines of any kind, now goodbye.”

The little boy was sad that he was not going to make his quota with the sale. He was also sad for the old man being so alone in the big house that he owned. The boy went home and then had an idea. He had a little dog figure that he got some years ago from an aunt. The figurine did not mean nearly as much to him since he had a real live dog and a large family. The boy headed back down to the old man’s house with the figurine. He knocked on the door again and this time the old man came right to the door. “Boy, I thought I told you no magazines.”

“No, sir I know that, I wanted to bring you a gift.” The boy handed him the figurine and the old man’s face lit up. “It is a Golden Retriever, I have one at home, this one is for you.” The old man was simply stunned; no one had ever given him such a gift and shown him so much kindness. “Boy, you have a big heart, why are you doing this?” The boy smiled at the man and said, “Because you like dogs.”

From that day on the old man started coming out of the house and acknowledging people. He and the boy became friends; the boy even brought his dog to see the man weekly.

Technorati Tags: Inspirational

by: Author Unknown, Source Unknown

Bobby was getting cold sitting out in his back yard in the snow. Bobby didn’t wear boots; he didn’t like them and anyway he didn’t own any. The thin sneakers he wore had a few holes in them and they did a poor job of keeping out the cold.

Bobby had been in his backyard for about an hour already. And, try as he might, he could not come up with an idea for his mother’s Christmas gift. He shook his head as he thought, “This is useless, even if I do come up with an idea, I don’t have any money to spend.”

Ever since his father had passed away three years ago, the family of five had struggled. It wasn’t because his mother didn’t care, or try, there just never seemed to be enough. She worked nights at the hospital, but the small wage that she was earning could only be stretched so far.

What the family lacked in money and material things, they more than made up for in love and family unity. Bobby had two older and one younger sister, who ran the household in their mother’s absence.

All three of his sisters had already made beautiful gifts for their mother. Somehow it just wasn’t fair. Here it was Christmas Eve already, and he had nothing.

Wiping a tear from his eye, Bobby kicked the snow and started to walk down to the street where the shops and stores were. It wasn’t easy being six without a father, especially when he needed a man to talk to.

Bobby walked from shop to shop, looking into each decorated window. Everything seemed so beautiful and so out of reach. It was starting to get dark and Bobby reluctantly turned to walk home when suddenly his eyes caught the glimmer of the setting sun’s rays reflecting off of something along the curb. He reached down and discovered a shiny dime.

Never before has anyone felt so wealthy as Bobby felt at that moment. As he held his new found treasure, a warmth spread throughout his entire body and he walked into the first store he saw. His excitement quickly turned cold when salesperson after salesperson told him that he could not buy anything with only a dime.

He saw a flower shop and went inside to wait in line. When the shop owner asked if he could help him, Bobby presented the dime and asked if he could buy one flower for his mother’s Christmas gift. The shop owner looked at Bobby and his ten cent offering. Then he put his hand on Bobby’s shoulder and said to him, “You just wait here and I’ll see what I can do for you.”

As Bobby waited, he looked at the beautiful flowers and even though he was a boy, he could see why mothers and girls liked flowers.

The sound of the door closing as the last customer left, jolted Bobby back to reality. All alone in the shop, Bobby began to feel alone and afraid.

Suddenly the shop owner came out and moved to the counter. There, before Bobby’s eyes, lay twelve long stem, red roses, with leaves of green and tiny white flowers all tied together with a big silver bow. Bobby’s heart sank as the owner picked them up and placed them gently into a long white box.

“That will be ten cents young man.” the shop owner said reaching out his hand for the dime. Slowly, Bobby moved his hand to give the man his dime. Could this be true? No one else would give him a thing for his dime! Sensing the boy’s reluctance, the shop owner added, “I just happened to have some roses on sale for ten cents a dozen. Would you like them?”

This time Bobby did not hesitate, and when the man placed the long box into his hands, he knew it was true. Walking out the door that the owner was holding for Bobby, he heard the shop keeper say, “Merry Christmas, son.”

As he returned inside, the shop keepers wife walked out. “Who were you talking to back there and where are the roses you were fixing?”

Staring out the window, and blinking the tears from his own eyes, he replied, “A strange thing happened to me this morning. While I was setting up things to open the shop, I thought I heard a voice telling me to set aside a dozen of my best roses for a special gift. I wasn’t sure at the time whether I had lost my mind or what, but I set them aside anyway. Then just a few minutes ago, a little boy came into the shop and wanted to buy a flower for his mother with one small dime.

“When I looked at him, I saw myself, many years ago. I too, was a poor boy with nothing to buy my mother a Christmas gift. A bearded man, whom I never knew, stopped me on the street and told me that he wanted to give me ten dollars.

“When I saw that little boy tonight, I knew who that voice was, and I put together a dozen of my very best roses.”

The shop owner and his wife hugged each other tightly, and as they stepped out into the bitter cold air, they somehow didn’t feel cold at all.

Technorati Tags: Love

by Michael Hargrove
©1998 by Michael D. Hargrove, mhargrove@bluinc.com. All rights reserved.
Used with permission of the author.

While waiting to pick up a friend at the airport in Portland, Oregon, I had one of those life changing experiences that you hear other people talk about. You know, the kind that sneaks up on you unexpectedly? Well, this one occurred a mere two feet away from me! Straining to locate my friend among the passengers deplaning through the jetway, I noticed a man coming toward me carrying two light bags. He stopped right next to me to greet his family.

First, he motioned to his youngest son (maybe six years old) as he laid down his bags. They gave each other a long, and movingly loving hug. As they separated enough to look in each other’s face, I heard the father say, “It’s so good to see you, son. I missed you so much!” His son smiled somewhat shyly, diverted his eyes, and replied softly, “Me too, Dad!”

Then the man stood up, gazed in the eyes of his oldest son (maybe 9) and while cupping his son’s face in his hands he said, “You’re already quite the young man. I love you very much Zach!” They too hugged a most loving, tender hug. His son said nothing. No reply was necessary.

While this was happening, a baby girl (perhaps one or one and a half) was squirming excitedly in her mother’s arms, never once taking her little eyes off the wonderful sight of her returning father. The man said, “Hi babygirl!” as he gently took the child from her mother. He quickly kissed her face all over and then held her close to his chest while rocking her from side to side. The little girl instantly relaxed and simply laid her head on his shoulder and remained motionless in total pure contentment.

After several moments, he handed his daughter to his oldest son and declared, “I’ve saved the best for last!” and proceeded to give his wife the longest, most passionate kiss I ever remember seeing. He gazed into her eyes for several seconds and then quietly said, “I love you so much!”. They stared into each other’s eyes, beaming big smiles at one another, while holding both hands. For an instant, they reminded me of newlyweds but I knew by the age of their kids that they couldn’t be. I puzzled about it for a moment, then realized how totally engrossed I was in the wonderful display of unconditional love not more than an arm’s length away from me. I suddenly felt uncomfortable, as if I were invading something sacred, but was amazed to hear my own voice nervously ask, “Wow! How long have you two been married?”

“Been together fourteen years total, married twelve of those.” he replied without breaking his gaze from his lovely wife’s face.

“Well then, how long have you been away?” I asked. The man finally looked at me, still beaming his joyous smile and told me, “Two whole days!”

Two days?! I was stunned! I was certain by the intensity of the greeting I just witnessed that he’d been gone for at least several weeks, if not months, and I know my expression betrayed me. So, I said almost offhandedly, hoping to end my intrusion with some semblance of grace (and to get back to searching for my friend), “I hope my marriage is still that passionate after twelve years!”

The man suddenly stopped smiling. He looked me straight in the eye, and with an intensity that burned right into my soul, he told me something that left me a different person. He told me, “Don’t hope friend…decide.” Then he flashed me his wonderful smile again, shook my hand and said, “God bless!”. With that, he and his family turned and energetically strode away together.

I was still watching that special man and his exceptional family walk just out of sight when my friend came up to me and asked, “What’cha looking at?” Without hesitating, and with a curious sense of certainty, I replied, “My future!”

Technorati Tags: Life, motivational

By Catherine Pulsifer

Your outlook on life, basically your attitude can determine your happiness and success in life. Attitude is a mindset, how you view your world. Do you see the positive or do you focus on the negative? Our perception of the events in our life, and how we regard these events can be attributed to our attitude.

How can you change your attitude?

- when dealing with a situation try and find the good in it. Focus on the good; do not dwell on the negative. Depending on the situation, you sometimes have to look hard to find the good but it is there. By doing this you start changing attitudes to a positive attitude rather than a negative attitude.

- Remember the saying, “you can’t change other people, you can only change yourself.” So if someone tells you that you have a poor attitude, don’t try and convenience them otherwise as you won’t change their mind. When someone tells us this we have a tendency to take a defensive attitude, instead focus on how you can change.
Can you change attitudes of other people?

- Again, I would refer to the saying, “you can’t change other people, you can only change yourself”. You will end up becoming very frustrated if you try and change other people. Remember, you can only change yourself and how you deal with that individual.
The story below is a story of attitude. The individual in this story could have easily developed a “poor me” attitude, but instead he chose to focus on what he can do, his attitude reflects what a positive outlook on life can be like.

“Now I look beyond what I can’t do and focus on what I CAN.”
Robert M. Hensel
Too often in life, we focus on the things we cannot do.

Sometimes we cannot do things because of financial limitations, health limitations, family limitations, educational limitations, and so on.

Sometimes, we end up limiting ourselves from achieving success in reaching our goals. We end up having a negative attitude which limits our ability to achieve success and happiness in our life.

Technorati Tags: Life, outlook

by: Brian Cavanaugh, T.O.R., The Sower’s Seeds

The disciple asks his master, ” What can I do to attain God?”

The master answers by asking, “What can you do to make the sun rise?”

The disciple says indignantly, “Then why are you giving us all these methods of prayer?”

And the master replies, “To make sure you’re awake when the sun rises.”

Technorati Tags: God, Prayer

By Yuri Alkin

They say that once upon a time, there lived a man who wanted to achieve everything he was capable of achieving. He was obsessed with this desire. He ate, slept, and walked with one and only dream: to die, having accomplished every single thing he was able to accomplish. There were so many things he could do. He felt like the whole world could be his, if he only set his mind to it. At times, he was even horrified by the powers hiding in his mind and heart. He was certain-in fact-he knew that his potential had no limits. He knew that he could accumulate power that would dwarf the power of ancient kings; he knew that he could write books that would shake the minds of generations to come; he knew that he could invent things that would forever change the lives of millions of people. He lived, constantly feeling the power within-and that power knew no bounds.

There was only one obstacle: having such a potential, but only one life, he had to make a choice. He had to decide where to apply all of his enormous abilities. Making that decision was extremely hard, for any choice meant cutting off some future achievements. And so in the meantime, he went to school, graduated, found a respectable well-paid job, married, and bred children. And he spent every minute of his spare time trying to decide where he should apply all his might. Even though he was not interested in applying it to his work, his power was impossible to hide. He was successful in everything he touched, and he earned great respect of the people who worked with him. And all the while, he thought to himself: Imagine what I would achieve once I concentrate entirely on the area of my choice.

Time went by, and he grew older. Some roads he used to dream about became closed to him. But there was still so much he could accomplish. And he kept thinking hard while working, raising children, dealing with everyday problems, and knowing that his potential had no limits. And most people who knew him were of the same opinion, for it was impossible not to realize this, being around him for a while.

One day, a sudden chest pain made him come home early. He dragged his feet to the bathroom. There, feeling weak and empty, he looked in the mirror. A worn-out, gray-haired man stared back at him. But his eyes, though red and tired, were still full of unrealized potential. He peered into these eyes and, all of a sudden, realized one simple truth. The next moment, the pain pierced his heart again, and it stopped beating forever.

Everybody cried, even those who knew him only slightly. The pain of this loss was staggering. Not only had he been a good man but they also knew what great potential had died with him. True, he had spent his life trying to make the choice, but imagine what would’ve happened had he made it. After all, he was so close to making it, and he hadn’t been that old. He could not have had this feeling of unlimited potential for nothing. His potential was truly unlimited. The choice was about to be made, and very soon he could have achieved anything. His life could have become a shining monument, which would have forever inspired future generations. What a loss! What a tragedy! They cried and cried and cried. And they didn’t know what he had realized the moment before he died.

The truth that came upon him was rather simple. People only flatter themselves by thinking that they could have achieved this or that if not for such-and-such circumstances. Yet this is nothing but delusion. At any given moment, as long as you’ve been healthy and haven’t been thrown into the midst of war, crime or forces of nature, you always achieve everything you can. You simply lack something that is necessary for achieving that goal you’ve never reached-a talent, a skill, willpower, a set of priorities, or something else. Like it or not, realize it or not, believe it or not, but you simply lack it. You just think you’ve got what it takes, and only these insurmountable difficulties have prevented you from reaching the ultimate heights. But in reality, what you don’t achieve is something you’re not capable of achieving.

Technorati Tags: Inspirational, Life, people

By Unknown Monk, 1100 A.D.

When I was a young man, I wanted to change the world.

I found it was difficult to change the world, so I tried to change my nation.

When I found I couldn’t change the nation, I began to focus on my town. I couldn’t change the town and as an older man, I tried to change my family.

Now, as an old man, I realize the only thing I can change is myself, and suddenly I realize that if long ago I had changed myself, I could have made an impact on my family. My family and I could have made an impact on our town. Their impact could have changed the nation and I could indeed have changed the world.”

Food For Thought:

“After you’ve done a thing the same way for two years, look it over carefully. After five years, look at it with suspicion. And after ten years, throw it away and start all over. ” Alfred Edward Perlman
“All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another.” Anatole France

“Growth is the only evidence of life.” John Henry Newman

“If nothing ever changed, there’d be no butterflies.” Author Unknown

“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.” Victor Frankl

Technorati Tags: Change, people