Lilies of the Field

This message is from a commencement speech made by a Pulitzer
Prize-winning author, Anna Quindlen, at Villanova University.

Lilies Of The Field
-- By Anna Quindlen

I'm a novelist. My work is human nature. Real life is all I know. Don't
ever confuse the two, your life and your work.

You will walk out of here this afternoon with only one thing that no one
else has. There will be hundreds of people out there with your same degree;
there will be thousands of people doing what you want to do for a living.
But you will be the only person alive who has sole custody of your life.

Your particular life. Your entire life. Not just your life at a desk, or
your life on a bus, or in a car, or at the computer. Not just the life of
your mind, but the life of your heart. Not just your bank account but your
soul.

People don't talk about the soul very much anymore. It's so much easier to
write a resume than to craft a spirit. But a resume is a cold comfort on a
winter night, or when you're sad, or broke, or lonely, or when you've
gotten back the test results and they're not so good.

Here is my resume: I am a good mother to three children. I have tried never
to let my profession stand in the way of being a good parent. I no longer
consider myself the center of the universe. I show up. I listen. I try to
laugh. I am a good friend to my husband. I have tried to make marriage vows
mean what they say.

I am a good friend to my friends, and they to me. Without them, there would
be nothing to say to you today, because I would be a cardboard cutout. But
I call them on the phone, and I meet them for lunch. I would be rotten, or
at best mediocre at my job, if those other things were not true. You cannot
be really first rate at your work if your work is all you are.

So here's what I wanted to tell you today: Get a life. A real life, not a
manic pursuit of the next promotion, the bigger paycheck, the larger house.

Do you think you'd care so very much about those things if you blew an
aneurysm one afternoon, or found a lump in your breast? Get a life in which
you notice the smell of salt water pushing itself on a breeze over Seaside
Heights, a life in which you stop and watch how a red tailed hawk circles
over the water or the way a baby scowls with concentration when she tries
to pick up a Cheerio with her thumb and first finger. Get a life in which
you are not alone. Find people you love, and who love you. And remember
that love is not leisure, it is work. Pick up the phone. Send an e-mail.
Write a letter.

Get a life in which you are generous. And realize that life is the best
thing ever, and that you have no business taking it for granted. Care so
deeply about its goodness that you want to spread it around. Take money you
would have spent on beers and give it to charity. Work in a soup kitchen.
Be a big brother or sister.

All of you want to do well. But if you do not do good too, then doing well
will never be enough.

It is so easy to waste our lives, our days, our hours, our minutes. It is
so easy to take for granted the color of our kids' eyes, the way the melody
in a symphony rises and falls and disappears and rises again.

It is so easy to exist instead of to live. I learned to live many years
ago. I learned to love the journey, not the destination. I learned that it
is not a dress rehearsal, and that today is the only guarantee you get.

I learned to look at all the good in the world and try to give some of it
back because I believed in it, completely and utterly. And I tried to do
that, in part, by telling others what I had learned. By telling them this:

Consider the lilies of the field. Look at the fuzz on a baby's ear. Read in
the backyard with the sun on your face. Learn to be happy. And think of
life as a terminal illness, because if you do, you will live it with joy
and passion as it ought to be lived.




Hope.

"All things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose."
- Romans 8:25(NKJV).

http://findingsupergirl.blogspot.com

TAKE THE HIGH ROAD

By Dr. John C. Maxwell

A balanced stance is a key ingredient for success in sports. It's hard to hit a curveball, make a hole-in-one, serve an ace or shoot a free throw if your body is not positioned correctly (legs set wide apart, head upright, back fairly straight, center of gravity evenly distributed, knees slightly bent—you get the picture).

According to HumanKinetics.com, some variation of what is known is the "athletic stance" is common to most sports because it is the "most prepared position for the body to receive a force." It is, in fact, the "strongest position."

But as important as the right stance is in an athletic event, it's even more critical in life. When I talk about a person's life stance, I'm referring to his or her overall frame of reference. Stated differently, your life stance is the set of attitudes, assumptions and expectations that you hold about yourself, about other people and about life in general. It's the way that you consistently look at people, events and circumstances; whether you tend to be trusting or suspicious, cheerful or gloomy, optimistic or pessimistic, friendly or reserved.

A person's life stance can be influenced by a number of factors: family background, personality type, educational opportunities (or lack thereof) and unexpected tragedies, to name a few. We weren't given a choice about many of these things, but there is one aspect of our frame of reference over which we have total control, and that is the decision to take the high road on the journey through life.

What does it mean to take the high road? It's very simple. Don't keep score. Forgive others quickly. Learn to serve. Don't get even.

From that short description, I'm sure you can deduce that the high road isn't the busiest highway a person can take through life. It's an amazing road to travel, but it definitely is a road less traveled because it requires people to think and do things that are not natural or common. The good news is that, when people deliberately choose to travel this road, they become instruments of grace to others and recipients of grace for themselves.

Let me give you an example. In the early 1980s, when I was just starting out as a writer, a friend of mine gave a very memorable presentation at a seminar. I liked his talk so much I got the tape and had it transcribed. A few years later, when I was working on a book called Be All You Can Be, I came across the transcription. I couldn't remember where the material had originated, but since some of it fit perfectly with what I was writing, I decided to include it in my book. I didn't leave out the source on purpose, but I did leave it out.

After the book was published, this same friend and I were having dinner when he told me he had been shocked to find that I had used his illustration in my book without giving him credit for it. Needless to say, I was heartsick over what I had done. "It was you!" I told him. "You're the guy who told that story. How can I make this right? How can I apologize?"

As I was hastily trying to come up with a way to fix my mistake, my friend stopped me and said, "John, don't worry about it. I know your heart. You're totally forgiven. We'll never bring the subject up again."

I will never, ever forget those words. They had such redeeming value to me. It was truly life changing to realize that I was the recipient of grace from someone who had chosen to take the high road. And from that point on, I determined that, whenever I was in a similar position—whenever I was right and the person I was facing was clearly wrong—I would win by taking the high road too.

You see, the greatest victory you'll ever have is not over another person. The greatest victory you'll ever have is over your natural inclination to win over that person. When you win but choose to walk away without declaring the win (giving someone a graceful exit or another chance instead), it is absolutely amazing what it will begin to do for you internally.

Again, taking the high road isn't always easy, and it doesn't always come naturally. But, like the balanced stance that lays the foundation for athletic success, it truly is the "strongest position" to take on the journey through life.


This article is used by permission from Dr. John C. Maxwell's free monthly e-newsletter 'Leadership Wired' available at www.MaximumImpact.com."