(All photos are mine unless noted. You can bring the
pictures up in full screen by double clicking on any image. Click on a border
to return.)
First this week is a short video about how a few people make a difference by teaching others to give in a most unusual way. Go to:
http://www.globalonenessproject.org/videos/karma_kitchen
I go under the knife for shoulder reconstruction tomorrow, Tuesday, and this and a few additional posts will be readied for the following weeks. It amazes me that we live in a time where medicine treats this kind of work as an outpatient procedure. What is still more wonderful is that the process will be accomplished through just a few very small incisions where saws, hammers, wrenches. power tools and the like will enter and do the necessary work - all seen on monitors by the surgical team! This world is filled with remarkable people who work and succeed in environments like this.
I asked the orthopedist if I could see their storeroom to make sure they had enough parts to keep me going for another half century. A most serious man he said that it doesn't work that way. Good. Another doctor who concentrates and is capable, well up to the job. Although, when I had some electrical issues with my heart a few years ago, a procedure called an ablation was done in a room with 10-15 million dollars of computerized gear, and a staff of 11 of more - the doctor came to the gurney I was lying on and asked, "You know the dangers of this surgery don't you .... Heart attack, stroke or death?" The first multiple choice quiz I had been given in many years. He did have a smile on his face and we both laughed. Great bedside manner which did relax me for what followed easily.
So, This week, special people to consider in our lives. We have all met someone who, beside ourselves, is wonderfully proficient in the work they have been called to. They are worthy of celebration as we remember them, or if they are still about let us tell them of what they, by their being, have influenced us. I do however, find myself having a great deal of attraction to what may be called ordinary people, which is to say that we are all ordinary people called to different tasks to perform so the wheels of the world continue to turn. The elderly man who simply did the best he could in successfully having raised a family, entered into a long term relationship with one other, worked hard and long to simply give what was possible to those God entrusted him with. There are millions of success stories like this, maybe even into the billions.
Grace, Gifts from a Loving Creator abound, seen when we open our eyes and look for the extra-ordinary in the ordinary.
First this week is a short video about how a few people make a difference by teaching others to give in a most unusual way. Go to:
http://www.globalonenessproject.org/videos/karma_kitchen
I go under the knife for shoulder reconstruction tomorrow, Tuesday, and this and a few additional posts will be readied for the following weeks. It amazes me that we live in a time where medicine treats this kind of work as an outpatient procedure. What is still more wonderful is that the process will be accomplished through just a few very small incisions where saws, hammers, wrenches. power tools and the like will enter and do the necessary work - all seen on monitors by the surgical team! This world is filled with remarkable people who work and succeed in environments like this.
I asked the orthopedist if I could see their storeroom to make sure they had enough parts to keep me going for another half century. A most serious man he said that it doesn't work that way. Good. Another doctor who concentrates and is capable, well up to the job. Although, when I had some electrical issues with my heart a few years ago, a procedure called an ablation was done in a room with 10-15 million dollars of computerized gear, and a staff of 11 of more - the doctor came to the gurney I was lying on and asked, "You know the dangers of this surgery don't you .... Heart attack, stroke or death?" The first multiple choice quiz I had been given in many years. He did have a smile on his face and we both laughed. Great bedside manner which did relax me for what followed easily.
So, This week, special people to consider in our lives. We have all met someone who, beside ourselves, is wonderfully proficient in the work they have been called to. They are worthy of celebration as we remember them, or if they are still about let us tell them of what they, by their being, have influenced us. I do however, find myself having a great deal of attraction to what may be called ordinary people, which is to say that we are all ordinary people called to different tasks to perform so the wheels of the world continue to turn. The elderly man who simply did the best he could in successfully having raised a family, entered into a long term relationship with one other, worked hard and long to simply give what was possible to those God entrusted him with. There are millions of success stories like this, maybe even into the billions.
Grace, Gifts from a Loving Creator abound, seen when we open our eyes and look for the extra-ordinary in the ordinary.
Another view of what for me is a most familiar tree.
Opening my eyes to see all that can be seen
is a gift that only promotes gratitude in my center.
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Here in the
Bangor area and beyond we have a valuable resource in Jim LaPierre who has a
Blog in the Bangor Daily News as part of their community outreach. It is called
"Recovery Rocks" and besides being beautifully written, the content
is truly worth reading for everyone, not just those in recovery. Please
take a look Click Here From this page you can see all the
past entries by scrolling down and clicking on "Older Entries."
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A few quotes for pondering:
Let us always meet each other with smile, for the smile is the
beginning of love.
We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See how nature - trees, flowers, grass- grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence... We need silence to be able to touch souls.
We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See how nature - trees, flowers, grass- grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence... We need silence to be able to touch souls.
Love begins at home, and it is not how much we do... but how much
love we put in that action.
Mother Teresa of Calcutta
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Be kind whenever possible. It is always
possible.
Happiness is not something ready made. It
comes from your own actions.
All major religious traditions carry basically
the same message, that is love, compassion and forgiveness the important thing
is they should be part of our daily lives.
This is my simple religion. There is no need
for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart
is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.
The Dalai Lama
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Never look down to test the
ground before taking your next step; only he who keeps his eye fixed on the far
horizon will find the right road.
The pursuit of peace and
progress cannot end in a few years in either victory or defeat. The pursuit of
peace and progress, with its trials and its errors, its successes and its
setbacks, can never be relaxed and never abandoned.
It is playing safe that we create a world of utmost insecurity.
It is playing safe that we create a world of utmost insecurity.
If only I may grow: firmer, simpler, quieter, warmer.
God does not die on the day
when we cease to believe in a personal deity, but we die on the day when our
lives cease to be illumined by the steady radiance, renewed daily, of a wonder,
the source of which is beyond all reason.
Dag Hammerskjold
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Even the birds need to 'ground' sometimes
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Teresa's Prayer by John Michael Talbot - why we use our whole self to give to others without expectations - Click Here
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A little humor -
The boat is named "Bad Decision"
"The Grand Manipulation"
Peace, Bill Lagerstrom
