Can you stand one more quote?

One more, and I will lay off the quotes for a while. This one is just so good!

Finish every day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities no doubt have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; begin it well and serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with old nonsense.

This day is all that is good and fair. It is too dear, with its hopes and invitations, to waste a moment on yesterdays. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Being Easily Impressed

I'm not impressed with people who are not impressed.

The world is amazing! We're surrounded by wonders. We witness miracles every day. We have spectacular light shows at dawn and dusk with blue sky, lightening, rain, snow, and clouds in between. We have trees, shrubs, and plants bursting with fruits, grains, and flowers. We have oceans and lakes and babbling brooks. We have feathered, furry, and finned creatures everywhere. We have love, language, talents, skills, thoughts, ideas, laughter...Why are we not in a constant state of speechless gratitude? I don't know why.

But I noticed a long time ago there are two kinds of people in the world: people who are easily impressed, and people who are not.

As a teenager, I fell into the latter category thinking it was more sophisticated to withhold praise. I had discriminating tastes and I thought that was a virtue. Only the very best from my limited field of experience deserved my admiration. I approached the ordinary and the unexemplary with reservation. Sometimes I withheld compliments out of personal jealousy because acknowledging someone else's superiority in one area seemed to amplify my own feelings of inferiority.

Gradually I grew out of that and experienced the thrill of recognizing someone else's attributes and accomplishments. Looking back, I think this happened as I associated with older women who were more self-assured and consequently less competitive. I discovered how delightful it is to share a sincere observation of a complimentary nature with someone, because people in general are unaware of their uniqueness. We all tend to think there is nothing really extraordinary about us because the world can summarize us in ten words or less: middle-aged housewife, mother of four. Such summaries don't make us sound particularly exceptional, but everyone has something...It's our challenge as fellow human beings to identify what is good in others (and in the world at large) and celebrate it.

Imagine God planting gifts everywhere -- in every person ever born and in every landscape -- and waiting for those gifts to be discovered, acknowledged, and appreciated.

Here are a few quotes that relate to this topic, which I cannot quite define:

Never lose an opportunity to see anything beautiful, for beauty is God’s handwriting…a wayside sacrament. Welcome it in every fair face, in every fair sky, in every fair flower, and thank God for it as a cup of blessing. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

An ungrateful man is like a hog under a tree eating acorns never looking up to see where they came from. - Marion G. Romney

Most of us would rather be ruined by praise than saved by criticism. - Anonymous

Who can say more than this rich praise -- that you, alone, are you? - William Shakespeare

Just praise is only a debt, but flattery is a present. - Samuel Johnson

And lips say 'God be pitiful' who ne'er said 'God be praised.' - Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Gratitude is the memory of the heart. - Anonymous

All great art is praise. - John Ruskin

Joy is the simplest form of gratitude. - Karl Barth

The ultimate success of my life will not be judged by those who admire me for my accomplishments but by the number of those who attribute their wholeness to my loving them, by the number of those who have seen their true beauty and worth in my eyes. – Dave Grant

Trite But True

I almost always strongly dislike BAD poetry, which I would define as poetry that is sacharine sweet, preaches a sermon, and rhymes at the same time.

But once in a while I find that I like a poem that is nonetheless syrupy, preachy and rhyming all at once. I think the difference lies in whether or not I trust the poet's sencerity and believe in the overall sentiment of the 'work,' such as it is.

I came across this poem about 20 years ago, and I have been drawn to it again and again over the years. I am posting it on my blog today in case anyone else could benefit from it as I have. The author is unknown.

"God hath not promised skies always blue,
Flower-strewn pathways all our lives through.
God hath not promised sun without rain,
Joy without sorrow, peace without pain.

But God hath promised strength for the day,
Rest for the labor, peace for the way,
Grace for the trials, help from above,
Unfailing sympathy, undying love."

P.S. I found the picture on the Internet, but it is from the Navajo Loop Trail at Bryce National Park. It's short (just 1.3 miles) but it's the greatest trail I have hiked in my limited experience. I thought it related to the poem because there aren't any flowers in this scene and the blue sky is hard to see so far overhead. When you're at this point along the trail, it's difficult to imagine how you'll ever get out. It's rocky, slick and steep in places, and you don't always get to pick which way you'd like to go. You just have to follow the course water has taken over the centuries and literally 'go with the flow.' But the overall experience is breathtaking! It's a great metaphor for life.

A Modern American Hero: Thomas Sowell

I've been hearing a lot over the past five or six years about Thomas Sowell. He was featured quite prominently in Clarence Thomas's autobiography, My Grandfather's Son. I've heard passages from his books and columns here and there and wondered about him, so I finally did a little reasearch and discovered that he is a modern American hero who has made a lot of thought-provoking statements over the years.

He is a veteran of the Korean War and a magna cum laude Harvard, Columbia, and University of Chicago economist (Bachelor's, Master's, and Ph.D. respectively), but he had an impoverished childhood and dropped out of high school at 17. I've just placed his autobiography, A Personal Odyssey, on hold at the library to learn more about him. I think I failed to mention that he is also Black. He was one of the first politically conservative Blacks, which was even more unpopular during the Civil Rights battle than it is now. In his 20s he was an avowed Marxist, but in 1960 he became a true capitalist after observing the unintended negative consequences of a state-imposed minimum wage on Puerto Rican workers while doing an internship there.

Here are a few of the quotes I've found from Thomas Sowell. Some of them will really make you think:

Hopefully, he (Obama) may also leave the voters wiser, though sadder, after they learn from painful experience that you can't judge politicians by their rhetoric, or ignore their past because of your hopes for the future. Thomas Sowell

Capitalism knows only one color: that color is green; all else is necessarily subservient to it, hence, race, gender and ethnicity cannot be considered within it. Thomas Sowell

Each new generation born is in effect an invasion of civilization by little barbarians, who must be civilized before it is too late. Thomas Sowell

If you are not prepared to use force to defend civilization, then be prepared to accept barbarism. Thomas Sowell

If you have always believed that everyone should play by the same rules and be judged by the same standards, that would have gotten you labeled a radical 60 years ago, a liberal 30 years ago and a racist today. Thomas Sowell

It is amazing that people who think we cannot afford to pay for doctors, hospitals, and medication somehow think that we can afford to pay for doctors, hospitals, medication and a government bureaucracy to administer it. Thomas Sowell

It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong. Thomas Sowell

It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance. Thomas Sowell

Liberalism is totalitarianism with a human face. Thomas Sowell

People who enjoy meetings should not be in charge of anything. Thomas Sowell

People who have time on their hands will inevitably waste the time of people who have work to do. Thomas Sowell

Socialism in general has a record of failure so blatant that only an intellectual could ignore or evade it. Thomas Sowell

Talkers are usually more articulate than doers, since talk is their specialty. Thomas Sowell

The problem isn't that Johnny can't read. The problem isn't even that Johnny can't think. The problem is that Johnny doesn't know what thinking is; he confuses it with feeling. Thomas Sowell

There are only two ways of telling the complete truth - anonymously and posthumously. Thomas Sowell

Too much of what is called "education" is little more than an expensive isolation from reality. Thomas Sowell

What 'multiculturalism' boils down to is that you can praise any culture in the world except Western culture - and you cannot blame any culture in the world except Western culture. Thomas Sowell

What is ominous is the ease with which some people go from saying that they don't like something to saying that the government should forbid it. When you go down that road, don't expect freedom to survive very long. Thomas Sowell

Would you bet your paycheck on a weather forecast for tomorrow? If not, then why should this country bet billions on global warming predictions that have even less foundation? Thomas Sowell

Mom, I'm Bored

We are only about a month into the summer and my 10-year-old is bored. In that time, her brother has returned from his mission. We've driven to and from Seattle and we've cruised to Alaska. She's had sleepovers, she's gone swimming and to piano lessons, and she's visited the zoo (with a friend's family, but hey, she visited the zoo, where she saw the new baby elephant! Come to think of it, they went on a picnic, too.)She's also gone to the movies...I think it's been a very entertaining summer so far.

It drives me crazy when my kids complain that they are bored! I have noticed that my two children who are big readers complain of boredom less than my other two children who are not. Reading occupies their time between big 'events,' I suppose, and takes them to far away places in their imaginations. I need to get Emily hooked on books...

When my kids say they are bored, I respond in different ways. Sometimes I give them work to do. Sometimes I brainstorm with them on things they could be doing. Sometimes I facilitate an activity they would like to do. Almost always I remind them that I never get bored because I have a lot of hobbies and interests to keep me busy.

Some quotes on this subject:

The man who lets himself get bored is even more contemptible than the bore. - Samuel Butler

The secret of being a bore is to tell everything. - Voltaire

We (writers) have the power to bore people long after we are dead. - Sinclair Lewis

An hour's industry will do more to produce cheerfulness, suppress evil humors, and retrieve your affairs than a month's moaning. - Ben Franklin (who is rapidly becoming my favorite historical figure!)