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Volume 29, # 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . November 2013 |
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![inspiration, motivation, Apple Seeds, [Apple]](AppleSeeds-1c.jpg)
![inspiration, motivation, Apple Seeds, [Apple]](AppleSeeds-2c.jpg)
Plant these "seeds" well and water often. Enjoy!
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Continuing Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . William Arthur Ward
"Education requires that we answer many questions; continuing education requires that we question many of our answers."
Faith: Light – Shadows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Blaise Pascal
"In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don’t."
Competence at Living . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Dr. Chris Mruk
"Self-esteem must be understood as a continuous developmental issue.
The second major finding is that self-esteem is earned – at least at the adult level. At the adult level we have a clear relationship between competence at living and the worthiness of it and a particular combination of struggle and choice. It appears that the measure of self-esteem we live as adults is at least partly dependent on the quality of self-awareness we possess and the degree to which we are willing to contend with our situations and choices. The more difficult the conflict the more intense the battle. The greater the willingness to struggle the more likely one is to achieve a worthy outcome."
Our Rewards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Earl Nightingale
"We will receive not what we idly wish for but what we justly earn. Our rewards will always be in exact proportion to our service."
The Best Leader . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Theodore Roosevelt
"The best leader is the one who has sense enough to pick good people to do what he or she wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it."
Mercy & Compassion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Fr. Brian Cavanaugh, TOR
"Over the years, one of the top issues I hear from people is of ‘being judgmental.’ An illustration dawned on me, that when we clean our glasses, or contact lenses, we will name one ‘Mercy,’ and the other ‘Compassion.’ Therefore, when we clean these lenses we clean off the smears of judgment and the haze of criticism, and when we put them on we now see clearly through mercy and compassion. Keeping this in mind has a good chance of changing one’s paradigm of looking out on the world."
A Better Way to Live . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Og Mandino, p. 106
"Rule Fourteen…Be patient. Never allow your day to become so cluttered that you neglect your most important goal – to do the best you can, enjoy this day, and rest satisfied with what you have accomplished."
True Happiness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Seneca
"True happiness is to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future, not to amuse ourselves with either hopes or fears but to rest satisfied with what we have, which is sufficient, for he that is so wants nothing. The great blessings of mankind are within our reach. A wise man is content with his lot, whatever it be, without wishing for what he has not."
Thanksgiving . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . President Abraham Lincoln
"We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of heaven. We have been preserved, the many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own.
Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to God that made us! It behooves us, then to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness."
April 30, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln’s Proclamation
for a National Day of Fasting, Humiliation and Prayer
Stretch Yourself . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Jim Rohn
"The big challenge is to become all that you have the possibility of becoming. You cannot believe what it does to the human spirit to maximize your human potential and stretch yourself to the limit."
It’s What Makes Us… . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Francis Bacon
"It is not what men eat but what they digest that makes them strong; not what we gain, but what we save that makes us rich; not what we read, but what we remember that makes us learn; and not what we preach, but what we practice that makes us Christians."
The Refining Fire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Roy L. Smith
"Discipline is the refining fire by which talent becomes ability."
Nation’s Greatest Asset . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . George B. Cortelyou
"The greatest asset of any nation is the spirit of its people, and the greatest danger that can menace any nation is the breakdown of that spirit – the will to win and the courage to work."
Maxims . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Max Lucado
"Faith is the grit in the soul that puts the dare into dreams."
One’s Better Self . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Eleanor Porter
"Instead of always harping on a man’s faults, tell him of his virtues. Try to pull him out of his rut of bad habits. Hold up to him his better self, his real self that can dare and do and win out."
Law of Fallow Field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Fr. Brian Cavanaugh, TOR
Over the years, living in farm country of western Pennsylvania, I became aware of what I call the "Law of the Fallow Field." In farming there is a principle of crop rotation, i.e., a field is sectioned off by threes. In the first section corn is grown, in the second section, potatoes or soybeans are planted, and the third section is left fallow, nothing is planted to give the soil a season of rest. In the following years, each section is rotated through the cycle.
The first two sections are easy to understand, they grow corn or potatoes or soybeans, but it is the third section that is interesting. If you drive past a field with this type of planting, check out the section left fallow, intentionally nothing was planted in it. Yet, you will notice this section is filled with an abundance of weeds growing. But, the farmer didn’t plant any weeds!
Weeds, just like sin, vices, negative attitudes, seem ubiquitous, they’re everywhere. You don’t need to plant them, they just appear and grow. However, to grow something positive like corn, potatoes, soybeans, virtue, or teamwork, that has to be intentional, and you have to repeat it each and every growing season. Just because you grew something last year does not mean you can skip this year, otherwise those weeds/sins/vices will sprout up in your fallow field.
"I’m Going to Die" . . . . . . . . . . . . A. Lynn Scoresby, Ph.D., PRIORITIES, Vol. 1, # 3
A woman went to a psychiatrist for her initial visit. Her first words to the doctor were, "I’m going to die."
The doctor worked with many terminally ill people and knew the task was to get them to accept death. He replied to her, "So?"
She laughed and said, "Look, dying’s serious."
The doctor acknowledged that and said, "That’s why you ought to be worried about how you’re living."
The woman taught her doctor a great lesson. Her experience reminded him that every person he knew in her situation becomes obsessed with the same thing: Have I loved enough? She had three months left to live, and all she wanted to talk about was how she could make sure her children, her husband and her parents would know she loved them.
As he observed her, he thought, "I’m not going to wait until I’m dying to make sure that the most important people in my life know that I love them."
Turn the clocks back Saturday night, Nov. 2
before going to bed.
Apple images are from ClickArt Incredible Image Pak 65,000 Broderbund, Inc.
Graphics used with permission from ChurchArt Online. They are not to be copied or downloaded.