Education Forever! . . . . . . . . . Jon Seamon & David Lipscomb

     "The art of education is to continue to grow as long as you live. Every moment brings its lesson. Every person is a teacher. Grow in all directions. Develop a desire for goodness, an eagerness for knowledge, a capacity for friendship, an appreciation of beauty, a concern for others. Grow; man is never finished! Man never arrives. Education never stops!"

Opportunities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Ann Landers

"Opportunities are usually disguised by hard work,
so most people don’t recognize them."

After the Winter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Source Unknown

Commit to Excellence . . . . . . . . . . . Coach Tom Landry

"The quality of a person’s life is in direct proportion to one’s commitment to excellence."

Personal Integrity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Bits & Pieces, Vol. 20, # 4

     "Graduates of a well-known business school are given this advice as they leave to take their first jobs:

     ‘No matter what business you enter, the personal quality of integrity is indispensable. Few will reach the top of the management ladder without it…and even those few won’t stay there very long.’"

Best Leaders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Great Performance, Vol. 23

     "The best leaders are clear. They continually light the way, and in the process let each person know that what they do makes a difference."

Foster Wisdom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Faith Today, 5-16-‘85

"Education and contemplation — working things out in one’s own mind, thinking things through without distractions — can foster wisdom. So can listening to the wisdom in adages and stories passed on from generation to generation."

Make a Better World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . United Technologies

"Doctrines, credos, manifestos, laws, declarations, codes of ethics. Ever since people have been able to communicate, they have compiled words to live by. But the world is still troubled. Take these words: honesty, workmanship, ambition, faith, education, charity, responsibility, courage. Chances are four and a half billion people won’t agree to live their lives by them. But think how much better your life would be if just one person does. YOU."

     "It’s over. You can’t have it back. Learn from it. Grow from it. But to feel guilty and immobilized because of things that have happened in the past is not to be a fully functioning person.…

     One of the best ways to clear your emotional slate is to forgive all others for what they have done; forgive everybody! Then forgive yourself for what you have done in the past. Get rid of the negative emotions; get rid of guilt."

On Happiness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Oscar Levant

"Happiness isn’t something you experience —
it is something you remember."

Personal Defeat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Ashley Montagu

     "The deepest personal defeat suffered by human beings is constituted by the difference between what one was capable of becoming, and what one has in fact become."

Pilgrimage of Meditation . . . . . . Laurence Freeman, Man of Marantha

     "Dom John Main introduced those who were seeking a deeper spiritual life to…‘the pilgrimage of meditation.’ He urged them not to waste time trying to assess their progress. The fruit of prayer is an increase in charity, a deepening harmony and self-knowledge…through a path that transcends self-analysis and self-consciousness and teaches us the first lesson of Christian living — how to be.

     Meditation is the foundation of our whole spiritual life. It roots us in experience, not reflection; in God, not self-consciousness; in love, not egoism. Don’t begin the pilgrimage if you don’t want to be changed."

"Enjoy Today . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Patricia P. Cox, GRIT

Inspirational Living . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Jim Rohn

"Mark well what you become
in pursuit of what you desire."

     "Carl Rodgers said he believed that if people do not permit themselves to truly understand what another person wants to express, it is because they find it risky. ‘If I let myself really understand another person, I might be changed by that understanding. And we all fear change.’"

Commencement Address . . . . . . . . . Erma Bombeck,
                                                                                Connections, May 1991

     "I know all of you are sitting out there today frightened, scared and apprehensive about your future. You’re wondering how you’re going to fit into the scheme of things and face the challenges that lie ahead of you. But I’m not here to talk to you parents. I’m here to address your children.

     "Graduation day is tough for adults. They go to the ceremony as parents. They come home as contemporaries. After twenty-two years of child raising they are unemployed. They no longer have to have a stocked refrigerator when they go on vacation. They can buy a new car without worrying whether or not their child is going to need tuition for summer school.…They can come and go as they please and not have to check with their kids. They have the opportunity to put into practice all the things they’ve learned over the past four years…that there is a life after children and bread can be frozen.

     "My heart went out to parents as I saw them sitting there, out of a job and wondering how they would handle their new lifestyle when they no longer had children to tell them what to do."

Make a Name for Yourself . . . . . . . . . . Anonymous

     There were two brothers who grew up on a farm. One went away to college, earned a law degree, and became a partner in a prominent law firm in the state capitol. The other brother stayed home and worked the family farm. One day the lawyer came and visited his brother, the farmer. He asked, "Why don’t you go out and make a name for yourself and hold your head up high in the world like me?"

     The farmer-brother pointed to a field and said, "See that field of wheat over there? Look more closely. It is only the empty heads that are standing up. Those that are well-filled always bow low."

     Said differently, "The branch that bears the most fruit is bent the lowest to the ground."