Life Coach: Spirit, Body and Mind » wisdom

Shared Wisdom: Collected Works

Margo — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 21:19:00 +0000

Although my creative Muse was on vacation or dormant for the last couple of months, scraps of paper with scribbled words still accumulated on my desk, in my handbag, and in the car. All carried words of wisdom that somehow continue to make their way to me. I’ve decided that one of my missions in life seems to be to share as much collective and collectable wisdom as I can. So here’s the latest and the greatest!

“We make a living by what we get, but we make a life, by what we give.” Sir Winston Churchill

“You and I share the serenity of understanding – a warm glow in the silences between us. When we have talked and
talked and come to the end of words, the speech of our hearts continues on………… Anonymous

“If I have achieved anything in my life it is because I have not been embarrassed to talk about God.” Jim Forest

“If you wish to travel far, travel light. Take off all your envies, jealousies, unforgiveness, selfishness and fear.” Cesare Pavese

“Your spiritual growth does not happen when you are peaceful and content. It happens when you get angry, sad,
greedy, jealous, critical, impatient. It happens when you lose your “spiritual mask” and realize that you are not
superman or –woman, but just an ordinary human being learning how to love.” Paul Ferrini

“No matter what age you are, or what your circumstances might be, you are special, and you still have
something unique to offer. Your life, because of who you are, has meaning.” Barbara De Angelis

“The lure of the distant and difficult is deceptive. The great opportunity is where you are.” John Burroughs

“You are never given a wish without also being given the power to make it true. You may have to work
for it, however.” Richard Bach

“Woman must come of age by herself ………. She must find her true center alone.” Ann Morrow Lindbergh

“Live your life each day as you would climb a mountain. An occasional glance towards the summit keeps
the goal in mind, but many beautiful scenes are to be observed from each new vantage point.” Harold B. Melchart

“Happiness exists more in small conveniences or pleasures that occur every day than in great pieces
of good fortune that happen but seldom in the course of life.” Benjamin Franklin

Here’s to the next time. May I wish you all a peaceful, healthy, abundant and joy-filled 2012!

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Shared Wisdom: It’s All About God

Margo — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 13:42:00 +0000

Because many of the circles or groups of friends that I frequent are full of people who live on a similar spiritual wavelength to myself, I seem to gather many quotations about God or things Christian. I also receive many spiritually based books as gifts which are full of God-quotations. I realize that not everybody is Christian. However I also realize that many people live very spirit-filled lives and can relate to many of these quotations, even the ones that specifically use the term God. So I invite everyone to just be open and adapt the following words in ways that can be meaningful to you.

“Be patient. Our prayers are always answered, but not always on the exact day we’d like them to be. (Marjorie Turner)

“A visitor saw a nurse attending to the sores of a leprosy patient. ‘I would not do that for a million dollars,’ she said. The nurse answered, ‘Neither would I, but I do it for nothing for Jesus.’” (Corrie ten Boom)

“Be sure to remember that nothing in your daily life is so insignificant and so inconsequential that God will not help you by answering your prayer.” (Ole Hallesby)

“If there are a thousand steps between us and God, He will take all but one. He will leave the final one for us. The choice is ours.” (Max Lucado)

“The great thing to remember is that, though our feelings come and go, His love for us does not.” (C.S.Lewis)

“God doesn’t call the qualified, He qualifies the called.” (Anonymous)

“If God would have wanted us to live in a permissive society He would have given us Ten Suggestions and not Ten Commandments.” (Zig Ziglar)

“If God had wanted to be a big secret, He would not have created babbling brooks or whispering pines.” (Robert Brault)

“I could not say I believe. I know! I have had the experience of being gripped by something that is stronger than myself, something that people call God.” (Carl Jung)

“No God, no peace. Know God, know peace.” (Anonymous)

“What God intended for you goes far beyond anything you can imagine.” (Oprah Winfrey)

“After God created the world, He made man and woman. Then, to keep the whole thing from collapsing, He invented humor.” (Guillermo Mordillo)

“There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, "’Thy will be done,’ and those to whom God says, ‘All right then, have it your way.’ (C.S. Lewis)

“People see God everyday, they just don’t recognize Him.” (Pearl Bailey)

May God bless you all.

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Shared Wisdom: The Last of the Batch

Margo — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 21:00:00 +0000

So these are the last group of wise words that came to me as we were doing our retirement ride. I know there will be many more words of wisdom to share with you, there are so many wise people past and present! But these particular words just seemed to jump out of the woodwork wherever I found myself in those twenty days traveling this continent.

“Life is a mirror – if you frown at it, it frowns back; if you smile at it, it returns the greeting.” (Chinese proverb)

“Happiness is not something you postpone for the future; it is something you design for the present.” (Jim Rohn)

“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.” (Marcel Proust)

Failure is, in a sense, the highway to success, in as much as every discovery of what is false leads us to seek earnestly after what is true, and every fresh experience points out some form of error which we shall afterwards carefully avoid.” (John Keats)

“Take time every day to do something ridiculous.” (Philipa Walker)

“Insist on yourself. Never imitate.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

“Every moment and every event of every man’s life on earth plants something in his soul.” (Thomas Merton)

“You’re the strongest person I ever met, she said, I said, you too and we decided we’d know each other a long time.” (Brian Andreas)

“Although the world is full of suffering, it is also full of the overcoming of it.” (Helen Keller)

“Most people don’t know there are angels whose only job is to make sure you don’t get too comfortable and fall asleep and miss your life.” (Anonymous)

“Your outer world reflects your inner world; peaceful thoughts produce peace.” (Joan Gattuso)

“Every artist was first an amateur.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

I have already accumulated more quotations to share with you, so it won’t be long before another “Shared Wisdom” posting reaches you. I think my secondary mission in life may be to spread these words to as many people as possible.

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Shared Wisdom: Words from Wise Ones

Margo — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 14:30:00 +0000

Here is an eclectic mix of wise sayings that have come from here, there, and everywhere!

“Nothing is impossible, the word itself says, ‘I’m possible!’”. (Audrey Hepburn)

“We all move toward the ego, and we even solidify it as we get older if something doesn’t expose it for the lie that it is: not because it is bad, but because it thinks it is the whole enchilada! (Richard Rohr)

“Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.” (Maria Robinson)

“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it! Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” (Howard Thurman)

“To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children …….. to leave the world a better place ………. to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

“The greatest challenge of the day is: how to bring about a revolution of the heart, a revolution which has to start with each and everyone of us.” (Dorothy Day)

“God will find us, bless us, even when we feel most alone, unsure ……….God will find a way to let us know that He is with us in this place, wherever we are.” (Kathleen Norris)

“A man begins cutting his wisdom teeth the first time he bites off more than he can chew.” (Herb Caen)

“If it is peace you want, seek to change yourself, not other people. It is easier to protect your feet with slippers than to carpet the whole of the earth.” (Anthony de Mello)

“Do you know why the mighty God of the universe chooses to answer prayer? It is because His children ask. God delights in our asking. He is pleased at our asking. His heart is warmed by our asking.” (Richard J. Foster)

“In the end, I think that I will like that we were sitting on the couch, talking and wondering where the time went.” (Anonymous)

“She said she used to cry everyday, not because she was sad, but because the world was so beautiful, and life was so short.” (Brian Andreas)

Enough, enough or I shall drown in the beauty of words! Don’t you just love the way they run off the end of the pen in someone’s hand, or appear on the computer screen at the insistence of someone’s fingers flying across a keyboard? It never ceases to amaze me that the wit or humor or intelligence contained in a person’s brain just flows out onto paper in some fashion or another. And then, I get to read it, soak it in, and share it on to others.

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Shared Wisdom: A Rush of Words–Part 2

Margo — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 13:42:55 +0000

As promised in my posting on September 10th, here are some more “words of wisdom” from others. They are almost all simple one-liners – but they are not in the least bit simplistic!

“Your present circumstances don’t determine where you can go; they merely determine where you start.” (Anonymous)

“Even the rich are hungry for love, for being cared for, for being wanted, for having someone to call their own.” (Mother Teresa)

“I have long since come to believe that people never mean half of what they say, and that it is best to disregard their talk and judge only their actions.”
(Dorothy Day)

“If there is any secret to this life I live, this is it: the sound of what cannot be seen sings within everything that can, and there is nothing more to it than that.”
(Brian Andreas)

“I always treat people as if they have already reached the goal I have for them.” (Thomas Merton)

“If I am not for myself, who will be? And if I am for myself alone, then what am I? And if not now, when?” (Rabbi Hillel)

“Whether you think you can or think you can’t – you are right.” (Henry Ford)

“One day your life will flash before your eyes. Make sure it’s worth watching.” (Anonymous)

“Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced.” (Soren Kierkegaard)

“God always gives His best to those who leave the choice with Him.” (Jim Elliot)

So take these words of wisdom into your day today and spend some time pondering their meaning in your heart. Carry them deep into your soul and see how and if they apply to the “reality you are experiencing”!!

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Shared Wisdom: A Rush of Words

Margo — Sun, 11 Sep 2011 02:16:21 +0000

I just love it when I come upon a wealth of wise sayings and quotations. In the last seven days I have received a rush of wise words. They have come from many disparate places: a car bumper sticker, a friend’s home, a special workshop given by a dynamic speaker – Fr. Larry Richards from Pennsylvania, and, because of a piece of research work that I did, from the internet. I have collected so many of them that I will spread them over a few postings. Here is the first batch.

“God does not love us if we change; God loves us so that we can change.” (Fr. Richard Rohr)

“It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

“No man is rich enough that he can buy back his past.” (Oscar Wilde)

“When the spiritual, mental, and emotional bodies are healthy, the physical body manifests health and becomes more vibrant, too. Our smiles, our eyes, our posture, and even our skin, which is the largest organ in the body and most sensitive to energy, send off a positive, attractive energy. This is part of the realignment process and will naturally affect your relationships, too.” (Sierra Bender)

“Your love for God is only as great as the love you have for the person you love the least.” (Dorothy Day)

“Clouds come into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add color to my sunset sky.” (Rabindranath Tagore)

“They came to sit and dangle their feet off the edge of the world and after a while they forgot everything but the good and true things they would do some day.”
(Brian Andreas)

“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” (Maya Angelou)

“The fact that I can plant a seed and it becomes a flower, share a bit of knowledge and it becomes another’s, smile at someone and receive a smile in return, are to me continual spiritual exercises.” (Leo Buscaglia)

“It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, it is because we do not dare that they are difficult.” (Seneca)

And the last one for today is, in my opinion, superb:

“Show up. Tell the truth. Be very alert. Expect nothing.” (A car bumper sticker)

And just think, there are more to follow.

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Shared Wisdom: Words On The Road

Margo — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 15:00:00 +0000

We have arrived in Kentucky and are spending time with family in Louisville. So far we have travelled through 14 States, a couple of them twice over. Even as I travel, I am aware of words that float up from memory, or that I encounter as I journey from place to place, or that I find scribbled on pieces of paper tucked into my meditation books or my gratitude journal. So here are some words of wisdom from the road.

“Life is curly, don’t even try to straighten it out.” (Rebecca – age 11 years)

“What God gives us in answer to our prayers will always be the thing we most urgently need, and it will always be sufficient.” (Elisabeth Elliot)

“What matters supremely is not the fact that I know God, but the larger fact ……… that He knows me …….. I am never out of His mind. All my knowledge of Him depends on His sustained initiative in knowing me.” (J.I. Packer)

“Light does not resist or avoid darkness. It merely includes it, welcomes it, loves it. Light is not afraid of the shadow for it knows the appearance of the shadow is the first sign of illumination.” (Paul Ferini)

“We are not alone on our journey. The God of love who gave us life sent us {His} only Son to be with us at all times and in all places, so that we never have to feel lost in our struggles but always can trust that God walks with us.” (Henri J.M. Nouwen)

“I’m a girlfriend-kind-of-girl. I love having women in my life. In fact, I think women who claim they don’t need a girlfriend just haven’t found a good one yet. I don’t have that problem. I am surrounded by an abundance of the most remarkable women God ever created to be my sister, mother, daughters, and friends. It’s a blessing I don’t take lightly. Quite simply, having such dear women in my life makes my heart tingle.” (Suzy Toronto)

“When you take the first step to embrace God in your circumstances, He will go the distance to embrace you.” (Stormie O’Martian)

“When the reed is empty, blowing through it makes a beautiful sound, a sound that returns effortlessly to silence. When mind is still, thoughts arise spontaneously, offer themselves, and die in the wind. There is no complexity here. The goal is not to make thinking go away, but to slow it down so that it comes to rest in its natural container. Once you rest in that place, you no longer desire to be anywhere else.” (Paul Ferini)

“Faith is meant to be lived moment by moment. It isn’t some broad, general outline – it’s a long walk with a real Person.” (Joni Eareckson Tada)

Blessings to you all.

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Shared Wisdom: There’s Always More

Margo — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 13:40:16 +0000

You all know that I love words. I am so grateful to the many people who have gone before me and shared their words of wisdom. I am so grateful that there continues to be a steady stream of wise and intelligent beings who share their thoughts on life and their personal life experiences. Here are a few that I choose to share with you today.

- “Feeling healthy and feeling good about yourself is not a luxury – it’s an absolute necessity.” (Anonymous)

- “I do not pray that you may be delivered from your pains, but I pray earnestly to God that He would give you strength and patience to bear them as long as
pleases.” (from “Safely Through The Storm)

- “May your footsteps set you upon a lifetime journey of love. May you wake each day with His blessings and sleep each night in His keeping. And may you
always walk in His tender care.” (Anonymous)

- “In those times I cant seem to find God, I rest in the assurance He knows how to find me.” (Neva Coyle)

- “God walks with us …….. He scoops us up in His arms or simply sits with us in silent strength until we cannot avoid the awesome recognition that
yes, even now, He is there.” (Gloria Gaither)

- “To be simply surrounded by God’s love and presence is pure JOY!” (Chuck Colson)

- “Joy is not the absence of trouble, but the presence of Christ.” (William Van Der Holden)

- “Fear of trials often depletes more energy than facing them.” (Beth Moore)

- “If God accepts me as I am, then I’d better do the same.” (Hugh Montefiore)

- “Resolve to keep happy and your joy, and you, shall form an invincible host against any difficulty.” (Helen Keller)

And as I was writing these quotations, I realized that many of them refer to “God” and to “joy”, and I found myself thinking that those two topics are intrinsically connected for me. Greetings from the road – New Lisbon,Wisconsin to be precise!

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Shared Wisdom: More Words On The Path

Margo — Sat, 25 Jun 2011 02:27:57 +0000

Often times the words of wisdom that I share have come from many places in time along my path. These few that I share today have come to me in more recent times. They have nurtured me on my spiritual path.

“I turn to God not so much for forgiveness but for the power to accept humbly the reality about my imperfect self. I turn to Him for the grace to give myself the forgiveness which He gives freely.” from Happy Catholic

“Clear boundaries are important on the spiritual path because they tell you exactly where your responsibility begins and where it ends.”
Paul Ferrini

“Be patient with everyone, but above all with yourself. Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections but instantly set about remedying them – every day begin the task anew.” St. Francis de Sales

“Moments of grace are transient – will we meet this moment and be ready to serve.” and “We are being called into the holiness of wholeness.”
J. Phillip Newall

“Be one to know God. The extent to which I am divided from you, I am divided from God.” Meister Eckhart

“May you always be overwhelmed by the grace of God rather than by the cares of life.” Anonymous

“I speak to you continually. My nature is to communicate, though not always in words. I fling glorious sunsets across the sky, day after day. I speak in the faces and voices of loved ones. I caress you with a gentle breeze that refreshes and delight you. I speak softly in the depths of your spirit, where I have taken up residence.” from “Jesus Calling” by Sarah Young

“God comes to you disguised as your life.” from Center for Action and Contemplation

“We are not simply made by God, we are made of God – as is everything.” Julian of Norwich

“Once you find the light, no matter how insignificant it seems, your life will never be the same again.
A light-bearer never questions the light s/he carries. And so s/he can offer it to others patiently and without fear.”
Paul Ferrini

I love finding these words and phrases that resonate so deeply within me, and I love being able to share them out with you. Blessings!!

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Shared Wisdom: Latest Quotations

Margo — Sun, 22 May 2011 03:32:56 +0000

So while I collect my thoughts and get ready write on some specific topics that have come up for me over the past couple of months, let me share some words of wisdom from others. I think if I had lots of money I would have a house with a huge library that would house not only lots of books, but collections of all the words that I have read over the years that have impacted me deeply or influenced me in some way. Here are a few more of those precious words.

“Everything that I think, feel,say, and do belongs to me, and everything that you think, feel, say, and do belongs to you.” (Paul Ferrini)

“I cannot think myself into a new way of living; I have to live myself into a new way of thinking.” (AnShin Thomas)

“Know that making a commitment to your happiness, to your health, to your fitness, to your family, to your abundance, to your career, to your mission in life, to your love, to your friends, to your community, to your creativity, to your spiritual life, is all the same thing. It is all a commitment to growth, to wholeness, to being your best, to living life fully and gratefully starting from where you are right now!” (Jinjee)

“Making amends without forgiveness leads to dishonesty and lies.” (Anon)

“Everyone who’s human deserves to be treated with some dignity – whether they’ve done good things or bad things, they have to be given hope.”
(Elton John)

“When you stop resenting what anther person can’t give you, you begin to appreciate what they have to offer.” (Anon)

“There are some people who live in a dream world, and there are some who face reality; and then there are those who turn one into the other.”
(Douglas Everett)

“Forgiveness is the fragrance the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.” (Mark Twain)

“The fact that Christianity is a religion of love makes every evangelizer the teller of a love story, the singer of a love song. By example as well as by words evangelizers must be teachers of love.” (from John Paul II and the New Evangelization)

“The power of a man’s virtue should not be measured by his special efforts, but by his ordinary doing.” (Blaise Pascal)

“When people envy me I think, Oh God, don’t envy me, I have my own pains.” (Barbra Streisand)

“He paints the lily of the field, perfumes each lily bell; if He so loves the little flowers, I know He loves me well.” (Maria Strauss)

“Go out into the world today and love the people you meet. Let your presence light new light in the hearts f people.” (Mother Teresa)

“He that cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he must pass himself; for every man has need to be forgiven.” (Thomas Fuller)

Happy reading!

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Shared Wisdom: More About Grace

Margo — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 15:56:51 +0000

It never ceases to amaze me how Creator speaks to me, affirming and reaffirming me as I make my way through the joys and sorrows of this earthly life. And right now I am filled with both joy and sorrow. Yesterday I spent the day at the Grand Canyon in Arizona and my heart was so filled with joy, awe and gratitude that I completely choked up several times, unable to even speak in the face of such vast beauty and majesty. At the same time, back home in Jacksonville, FL, my dear friend and sister-in-Christ, Susan, is very, very sick and probably in transition from this life to the next even as I write.

But even as I experience these two very raw emotions side by side, I am aware of the grace of God present in both situations. Two days ago I wrote about “grace”, and it does not surprise me that when I opened my Daily Word yesterday morning the topic was “grace”. And as I received the latest update on Susan this morning, I felt called to go back and read that reflection which I share with you in its entirety here.

“Daily Word, Tuesday April 12, 2011 Grace

There is no place that is beyond God’s love.

As part of God’s creation, I am blessed with the gift of grace. Grace is bestowed upon me unconditionally, without my needing to earn it or prove I deserve it. Like the father rushing to meet his returning prodigal son, God meets me when I seek the kingdom. Moreover, grace is active in me even when I am not consciously seeking, for there is no place in my mind or heart that is beyond God’s love.

Grace is visible in my life when the consequences of a mistake are gentler than they might have been. Grace is tangible when I feel blessed beyond all imagining. Love wells up within my heart until I feel the full impact of God’s presence.

Thank you, God, for your gift of grace. I know I am always in your loving care.

Grace be with all of you. (Hebrews 13;25)

Peace be with you.

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Shared Wisdom: Words For The New Year

Margo — Sun, 02 Jan 2011 17:34:00 +0000

Christmas and the New Year is always a time when I find myself digging through “old stuff”. This is partly because, as I acquire various gifts for people throughout the year, I put them in “special places” which I then forget about. Therefore I have to search high and low for them, which leads me to look in places that I don’t check into normally. And so top shelves and boxes and bottom drawers yield a treasure trove of gifts, new gems, words that I have squirrelled away that now come to light to be shared with others. Enjoy!

“When working with others, leave the results to God.” (Anonymous)

“What makes us special is the signature of God on our lives.” (Max Lucado)

“To expect life to be tailored to our specifications is to invite frustration.” (Anonymous)

“Everyone has a talent. What is rare is the courage to follow the talent to the dark place where it leads.” (Erica Jong)

“Fatherly and motherly hearts often beat wise and warm in the breasts of bachelor uncles and maiden aunts; and it is my private opinion that these worthy
creatures are a beautiful provision of nature for the cherishing of other people’s children.” (Louisa Mae Alcott)

“Contentment is the philosopher’s stone, which turns all it touches into gold; the poor man is rich with it, the rich man poor without it.” (Proverb)

“Life is like a blanket too short. You pull it up and your toes rebel, you yank it down and shivers meander about your shoulders; but cheerful folks manage
to draw their knees up and pass a very comfortable night.” (Marion Howard)

“The longer I live the more I am convinced that the one thing worth living for and dying for is the privilege of making someone more happy and more
useful. No man who ever does anything to lift his fellows ever makes a sacrifice.” (Booker T. Washington)

“Grant to me that I may be made beautiful in my soul within, and that all external possessions be in harmony with my inner man. May I consider the wise man
rich, and may I have such wealth as only the self-restrained man can bear or endure.” (Prayer of Socrates)

“I’ve learned to hold everything loosely because it hurts when God pries my fingers from it.” (Corrie ten Boom)

“The burden of suffering seems to be a tombstone hung around our necks. Yet in reality it is simply the weight necessary to hold the diver down while
he is searching for pearls.” (Julius Richter)

And this last one is truly one to ponder on:

“Never underestimate yourself or what God can do in your life because remember, professionals built the Titanic, but amateurs built the ark!”
(Anonymous)

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Spiritual Growth: The Two Sides Of Life

Margo — Wed, 01 Dec 2010 13:00:00 +0000

It is Sunday morning and I am sitting in my lanai. I relished a short lie-in this morning after our trip home yesterday afternoon, unpacking and sorting out clothes and getting them washed and put away. It is good to be home in familiar surroundings. We had a great week in Orlando and it was good to be away from the usual routines. But it’s always lovely to come home.

It is a gorgeous day. Another one of those sparkling “Princess Di” days. The sun is shining brilliantly from a clear blue sky and there is a slight breeze sighing through the pine trees out back. Everything is gently moving and I can see all the individual needles on the pine trees fluttering in the breeze and shimmering in the sunlight.

I sit back in my chair and breathe in the soft, warm air. Yes, it’s warm here in sunny Florida at the end of November, although I hear that temperatures are going to dip down later on this week. In the meantime, I am enjoying this “Indian summer” and feel very happy and content. In fact my heart is full joy right now as I look at the beauty that God has placed right here in my back yard.

I notice that the small brown birds, I believe they are sparrows, are back again as they pass through on their way to who-knows-where and they are clustering on the feeders. There’s a flash of red as a colorful cardinal claims his place and the sparrows flutter away until he is done. I can hear the squirrels barking in the trees as they playfully, or maybe not, fuss at each other. Mokka, our cat, sits in the sun, her tail slowly swishing as she thinks her cat-thoughts about the birds.

But even as I am aware of the joy that I feel I am also aware that there is sadness punching and poking at my heart. It feels as though one ventricle is full of joy and the other is full of sadness. My life is blessed in so many ways and I am truly grateful for that. Yet I have a longing for a healed relationship with my sister who I miss so very much, and another longing for a happy, satisfying relationship with my daughter who I also miss very much.

And I am reminded of one of my favorite authors, Kahlil Gibran, who, when asked in his book The Prophet to speak about Joy and Sorrow, responds with these wise and wonderful words of wisdom:

“Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.
And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.”…………..

“Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter’s oven?”……………

“When you are sorrowful, look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.”………..

”Together they come [Joy and Sorrow], and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.”

And so hangs the balance of all life. One moment we are in joy, and the next we are in sorrow. And sometimes we carry them together. And I can only learn to surrender to what is, to accept the gift of my emotions no matter what they are. As a character in the movie Shirley Valentine said, “If I can feel it means I am alive.”

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Shared Wisdom: Words From Others

Margo — Wed, 01 Dec 2010 00:11:00 +0000

Once again it is my pleasure to share words of wisdom from others that I seem to find at every corner and in every moment of my journey, many of them at just the exact moment that I need them.

- “Truth is such a rare thing; it is delightful to tell it".” (Emily Dickinson)

- “One thing I know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who will have sought and found how to serve.” (Albert Schweitzer)

- “I pray thee, O God, that I may be beautiful within.” (Socrates)

- “Do whatever comes your way to do as well as you can. Put a good deal of thought into happiness that you are able to give.” (Eleanor Roosevelt)

- “Those who bring sunshine to the lives of others cannot keep it from themselves.” (James M. Barrie)

- “From every human being there rises a light that reaches straight to heaven and when two souls that are destined to be together find each other,
their streams of light flow together, and a single brighter light goes forth from their united being.” (Unknown – used by Michael Podesta, Calligrapher)

- “No man is an island entire of itself; Every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.” (John Donne)

- “You can lay the foundation of a friendship in a matter of moments, but it is a work of time to build a monument.” (Madelyn Watt)

- “Every human being, of whatever origin, of whatever station, deserves respect. We must each respect others, even as we respect ourselves.”
(U. Thant)

- “Were there no God, we would be in this glorious world with grateful hearts and no one to thank.” (Christina Rossetti)

- “Don’t be afraid to take big steps. You can’t cross a chasm in two small jumps.” (David Lloyd George)

- “Some goals are so worthy, it’s glorious even to fail.” (Unknown)

- “Why was man created on the last day? So that he can be told, when pride possesses him: God created the gnat before thee.” (The Talmud)

- “No one is so rich that he does not need another’s help: no one is so poor as not to be useful in some way to his fellow man.” (Pope Leo XIII)

I hope you enjoy these quotations and that they prove to be as helpful to you as they have to me.

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Musings: Tears ……

Margo — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 23:51:00 +0000

I carry my reflection books in a small plastic tub. It keeps them all tidily in one place, and makes for easy transportation when I go away. As I reached down to pick one out this morning, my fingers encountered a loose piece of paper. There, at the bottom of the tub, lay a small 3” x 5” piece of printing. I pulled it out and recognized it immediately as something that a dear friend had given me about a year ago. It was the copy of page 242 from a daily book of goddess reflections that she reads.

At the time, I was going through an immensely sad moment in my life. In hindsight, I realize I was probably verging on the edge of depression. I am very fortunate that I have many tools that I use on a daily basis that help me to never sink into the desperate depths of that particular disease. And then too, I have wonderful friends who walk a similar path to mine who care about me and give me exactly what I need when I need it.

And thus I received page 242 at just the right moment. The goddess who was addressed on that page was O-Ryu. She is referred to as Grandmother O-Ryu and is the Japanese goddess of the Willow tree. This is what was written about her.

She waits for you in her sacred tree temple beside the quiet night river. A golden Moon whispers above her long and hanging
branches, casting a twinkling outline around her wavy edges. “Come to me”, O-Ryu calls out as she reaches her long and
leafy branches toward you for a loving hug. An owl flaps a low, deep hoot from somewhere inside her soft green tendrils,
and you notice a spider’s web gleaming silver on the tips of her twiggy fingers.

”I am the Witch’s Tree, sacred to the Wise Ones”, she reminds you. “My branches are for making magic wands. My bark
supplies aspirin, the remedy for pain. Come. Sit beneath my weeping branches. Let me hold you close. It’s okay to feel
sad. Let yourself mourn and cry and weep. The relief you are seeking is in letting yourself feel. Do not hold back.

Perhaps you have postponed your mourning too long,” O-Ryu urges. “Mourn means ‘to remember’. Who wants to be
remembered today? Can you whisper their name out loud? Call their spirit to come and sit beside you here by the River.
Let us cry together and gather the wisdom they want to share with you. The spirit of someone deceased wants to talk
with you. Something you need to know will be revealed in a powerful feeling.”

At the top of this page was a statement: “Tears, too, are sacred and can wash away your grief. Honor your memories.” At the bottom of the page was another statement: “Mourning my losses and grieving are necessary processes on my spiritual path.”

When I was in High School there was a small section of the playground that was a grassed area where we could sit in those rare warm English summer days! In the corner of this place was a large weeping willow tree that I loved to sit under and feel protected and safe, cocooned if you will. As I read page 242 I was reminded of those days and, because I firmly believe that nothing happens “by chance”, I chose to work with the imagery of O-Ryu for the next few days, weeks, however long it should prove necessary.

In those days, I discovered that I was mourning the loss of my daughter. No, she had not died in the physical sense, but I had “lost” her all the same. The details of this loss are not important to this writing. What is important is that I discovered what had been destroying me inside during that moment in my life, and I was able to release it with O-Ryu’s help. I also discovered that I needed to mourn the loss of my mother at a deeper level, I came to understand some of her pain that I had helped to create.

Tears are cleansing. They are an important part of our journey to wholeness. They wash away the grief and allow for new seeds of happiness to bloom in once broken hearts. Welcome your tears as the refreshing waters for new growth. As the tears evaporate and dry on your cheeks, so an inner peace will enter your soul and bless you on your way.

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Shared Wisdom: Words of Love and Friendship

Margo — Tue, 16 Nov 2010 17:02:00 +0000

I love finding quotations that speak of love and friendship. Whenever I read them they remind of the great blessings I have in my many friends and the gift that I receive when someone loves me. I believe that these are human manifestations of what God feels toward us. So here are a few quotations that caught my attention and my heart’.

“Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend.” (Martin Luther King)

“Too many of us stay walled because we are afraid of being hurt. We are afraid to care too much, for fear that the other person does not care at all.” (Eleanor Roosevelt)

“The supreme happiness of life is the conviction of being loved for yourself, or more correctly, of being loved in spite of yourself.” (Victor Hugo)

“For whoever knows how to return a kindness he has received, must be a friend above all price.” (Sophocles)

“Like everyone else I feel the need of relations and friendship, of affection, and I am not made of stone or iron, so I cannot miss these things without feeling, as does any other intelligent man, a void and deep need. I tell you this to let you know how much good your visit has done me.” (Vincent Van Gogh)

“Today a new sun rises for me; everything lives, everything is animated, everything seems to speak to me of my passion, everything invites me to cherish it.” (Anne De Lenclos)

“Wishing to be friends is quick work, but friendship is a slow-ripening fruit.” (Aristotle)

And this last one I treasure most of all.

“Human love and the delights of friendship, out of which are built the memories that endure, are also to be treasured up as hints of what shall be hereafter.” (Bede Jarrett)

So as we approach Thanksgiving Day, I will offer a gratitude for all the people who love me and for the friendships that bring me so much joy.

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Shared Wisdom: Some More Pearls

Margo — Sat, 23 Oct 2010 00:42:00 +0000

This, of necessity, will be a short posting as I am preparing to go out of town for the weekend. But I couldn’t leave without sharing these pearls of wisdom.

“Now and then it is good to pause in our pursuit of happiness and just be happy.” Guillaume Apollinaire (WOW!!!)

“Truth does not oppose falsehood. It waits patiently, quietly, yet with open arms.” Paul Ferrini

“We attract hearts by the qualities we display; we retain them by the qualities we possess.” Jean Baptiste Antoine Suard

“Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it.” Eckhart Tolle

“One must never be in haste to end a day; there are too few of them in a lifetime.” Dale Coman

“I no doubt deserved my enemies, but I don’t believe I deserved my friends.” Walt Whitman

“A good rule for going through life is to keep the heart a little softer than the Head.” Anonymous

“Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not.” Robert F. Kennedy

“Some people complain about the boat. Others try to escape it. Neither choice is helpful. Until you accept the boat for what it is, it cannot take you to the other side.” Paul Ferrini

Enjoy my friends and have a great weekend.

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Going Raw: Part One

Margo — Mon, 11 Oct 2010 02:38:34 +0000

(My Life-Long Love Affair With Food)

I don’t normally put sub-titles to my postings, but I felt this one deserved one. There is no way I can share my “adventure” at going raw without giving some background as to my relationship with food. And it is a love affair.

I have had an intimate relationship with food ever since I can remember. Some of my earliest memories of food are:

- sitting under the dining room table in the middle of the night eating rice paper (don’t even ask!!)

- sitting for what seemed like hours on the garden gate or at the front room window waiting for Aunty Polly to arrive with ice cream and candy

- going to Aunty Peggy’s to have wonderful four course dinners that included incredible appetizers, cheese and crackers, dessert with coffee (like in a “grown
up’s” restaurant)

- going down to the kid’s secret den to eat as many candies as I had been able to take from the pantry without it looking as though someone had taken them
(I’m sure my mother realized!)

- finger-swiping the frosting off a freshly baked “chocolate horror” cake (bliss!)

- sneaking teaspoonful’s of Fry’s chocolate spread (pure paradise!!)

- biting into the crusty heel of a fresh loaf of country bread slathered in real butter

- English cheddar cheese and crunchy pickled onions

So as you can see I was pretty much addicted to food from an early age. I could describe in detail, and still can, the sensations of different foods hitting the different taste buds in the various areas of my mouth just the way someone can describe the details in a picture. I think God proved that He really, really loved us when he gave us taste buds.

I discovered “ethnic” restaurants in my mid to upper teens and a whole new world of tastes and flavors opened up to me. English food is usually so bland and much of it, particularly vegetables, is simply boiled into oblivion and mush. Indian curry and crisp Chinese vegetables were like heaven, and the awesome blend of herbs in authentic, freshly cooked, Italian cuisine can still send me into a swoon today. I think you get the picture.

Moving to Sardinia, Italy in 1979 was a dream come true for this foodaholic. The Sardinian cuisine is unique and is as beautiful as the island itself. Home-made pasta was the norm in a Sardinian home in those days and if you have never eaten fresh home-made pasta you need to before you die. Roast lamb, kid, and pig are nothing like anything over here. I have eaten some of the best bar-b-q pork since coming to the States but nothing touches a succulent roast-in-the-ground pig in Sardinia.

From Sardinia I returned to London in 1978. It was mainly a “big mistake” but forms part of my life journey so it was important. During the five years I remained in the UK back then the only time that I ate well was when I cooked Italian pasta or I ate ethnic. I missed Italy badly, not just the food but the whole culture. So it was with a happy heart that I returned in 1983 to live in Naples, Italy.

Naples, rather like Sicily, gets a bad rap in some tourist books, but I fell in love with Naples very quickly. There’s an Italian saying that goes, “see Naples and die”. There’s a Neapolitan saying that goes, “Napoli ti prende per la gola” – Naples grabs you by the throat. The people are warm-hearted and friendly and the food, well I’m not sure anything I could say about Neapolitan food would do it justice. There are amazing pasta dishes with incredible sauces and fresh seafood cooked in the simplest but most divinely-tasting ways. “Dolce” (cakes) are out of this world and the pizza, oh the pizza!!!!! You have not eaten real pizza until you eat pizza prepared and baked in Naples. Not even the pizza in other parts of Italy is as sublime as Neapolitan pizza.

And then there’s REAL mozzarella cheese freshly dripping in its own liquid. This is an absolute delicacy that is only made in Naples, Italy. There is only one place over here that I know of where you can find real, fresh Mozzarella cheese and that is at the Fratelli La Buffala restaurant in the beaches area of Miami. They have it flown in fresh from Naples two or three times per week.

So, with all this love of marvelously prepared and served food, how do I get to going raw? With great difficulty let me tell you! I guess with age comes some sort of wisdom, and my brain began to tell my body that two hundred pounds on a five foot four inch frame was not so healthy. And, as usually happens with the fat accumulation, my blood pressure had risen and my cholesterol was fast following it.

Thankfully, when the student is ready, the teacher appears. Back in 2005, about eighteen months after getting to Jacksonville, Florida, my church hosted a series of classes on the vegetarian diet. I was interested not only because I thought it would help me lose weight, combat the BP and cholesterol issue, and improve my overall wellness, but also because the classes were offered by the Cancer Society as a way to help people prevent cancer or live cancer free once they were in remission. Because there is a history of cancer in my family I decided it was time to take the bull by the horns.

I’ll leave the “vegetarian experiment” for my next posting in this series.

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Shared Wisdom: Short & Sweet

Margo — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 03:28:44 +0000

I love coming across words that are lush, that have deep meaning, that carry a wealth of wisdom. I also love economy of words. You know, that short phrase that says so much with so little. The following quotations are a combination of those short and meaningful sentences and some that are slightly longer. All are worth reading and remembering.

“It’s never too late to become what you might have been.” (George Eliot)

“It’s hard to fight an enemy who has outposts in your head.” (Sally Kempton)

“When there is no enemy within, the enemies outside cannot hurt you.” (African proverb)

“If I don’t have red, I use blue.” (Pablo Picasso)

“God is a verb.” (Buckminster Fuller)

“Nothing makes us so lonely as our secrets.” (Paul Tournier)

“I celebrate myself, I sing myself.” (Walt Whitman)

“You can only perceive real beauty in a person as they get older.” (Anouk Aimee)

“Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower.” (Albert Camus)

“The easiest kind of relationship is with ten thousand people, the hardest is with one.” (Joan Baez)

Not quite so short but still so sweet!

“Perfection is never about the past or the future. It is always and only about now. You are perfect no matter how many mistakes you think you have made. There is nothing you have thought, felt, or done that prevents you from realizing your perfection right here and right now.” (Paul Ferrini)

“What a joy for two people – each to be a shady covering for the other. A place to rest when the sun is too hot or the wind too biting. ………Real friendship grows when we are prepared to be there equally in the bad moments and the good, when we weep with those who weep – and rejoice with those who rejoice.” (Sheila Walsh)

“The sharing of joy, whether physical, emotional, psychic, or intellectual, forms a bridge between the sharers which can be the basis for understanding much of what is not shared between them, and lessens the threat of their difference.” (Audre Lord)

“While we may not be able to control all that happens to us, we can control what happens inside of us.” (Benjamin Franklin)

“It’s great to love, but another person’s love cannot fill the hole in your heart. Filling up your heart is your responsibility. You need to love and affirm yourself day by day, moment by moment. Without your love for yourself, no amount of love from your partner is enough.” (Paul Ferrini)

And let me finish up with a beautiful short prayer that really uplifted me in a dark moment and reminded me that my God is always there for me, even when I don’t see Him or I turn my back on Him. My husband Rich forwarded it to me from a web site called AmericanCatholic.org which provides “Minute Meditations” each day. This one came on 5 August 2010.

“Dear Lord God, echo in our hearts at the right moment when life is most unpredictable, that you are never unfaithful and will never leave is.”

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Shared Wisdom: A Found Treasure

Margo — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 20:41:00 +0000

I love finding treasure. It might be that I put on a jacket that I haven’t worn in a long time and there in the pocket I find a five dollar bill. Or perhaps I decide to clean out a closet or a drawer and there, caught up in all the stuff, I find a piece of jewelry that I thought I had lost.

I sit at my computer desk two or three times a day almost every day. I have had this desk for a few years now. It’s a typical computer desk with the working area and then a series of cubby holes and shelves set at eye level. Sitting there yesterday I noticed a little wad of papers tucked into one of the shelves. I pulled them out and, voila – treasure!! Here is what I found.

“Aerodynamically the bumblebee shouldn’t be able to fly, but the bumblebee doesn’t know that so it goes on flying anyway.” (Mary Kay Ash, founder of Mary Kay Cosmetics)

“If I had my life to start over, I would start barefoot earlier in the spring and stay that way later in the fall.” (Nadine Stair, poet)

“After all these years, I am still involved in the process of self-discovery. It’s better to explore life and make mistakes than to play it safe. Mistakes are part of the dues one pays for a full life.” (Sophia Loren, Italian actor)

“Getting married is easy. Staying married is more difficult. Staying happily married for a lifetime should rank among the fine arts.” (Roberta Flack, singer and song writer)

“You can take no credit for beauty at sixteen. But if you are beautiful at sixty, it will be your soul’s own doing.” (Marie Stopes, writer and scientist)

“If you find it in your heart to care for somebody else, you will have succeeded.” (Maya Angelou, author and inspirational speaker)

Notice that all those little gems come from women – great women!! But, I have to be honest, some of those pieces of paper carried men’s names too! Here are a few more treasures.

“To know what is right and not do it is the worst cowardice.” (Confucious, ancient eastern philosopher)

“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that there was within me an invincible summer.” (Albert Camus, philosopher)

“Start by doing the necessary, then what’s possible, and suddenly you are doing the impossible.” (St. Francis)

“The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.” (Albert Einstein, physicist, philosopher, author)

And here is one final piece of wisdom that unfortunately carried no author’s name.

“Life may not be the party we hoped for, but while we are here we might as well dance. Every morning when I open my eyes, I tell myself that it is special. Every day, every minute, every breath truly is a gift from God.” (Anonymous)

Amen!!

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