How's Your Vision?

“A College Admittance Application”

How’s Your Vision?

Most of what it takes to complete a college application on-line is time.  The time I’ve spent doing it has been time well spent; since it’s been with my daughter.  The other day she pulled out her computer and we sat down to answer a few questions together.

The questions we were answering were easy and we breezed along until we hit one question in particular. “What will you have accomplished within the next five years?”

“Why do they always ask such stupid questions?” my daughter asked.

My thoughts went back to interviews I’ve seen with small children.  Most of them don’t hesitate with an answer to a similar question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Their answers flow freely and confidently; a cowboy, a teacher, astronaut, doctor, firefighter, lawyer.

“I don’t have any idea!”

“Yes you do.” I replied.  “You’ve told me over and over again.  Would you like me to tell you what you told me?”

“Yes.”

I spent a few minutes listing the things she had told me in the past.  They were exciting and challenging things.  They were the things she has been spending the last few years working toward.

“I haven’t thought about those things for a long time!”  She said.

We spent the next few minutes writing, thinking about and crafting the vision of her future to complete her application.  It was a good exercise for us to go through.  We talked about the fact that this vision was the basis for her success in college and for her life as well.  It caused me to think about my own life and experience.

We were sitting in our house.  It is the house this girl has lived in virtually her whole life.  We have a photo of her standing in this same house, the winter it was under construction, in her snow suit with bare feet.  She has a huge grin on her face and when I look at the photo today I can still feel her exuberance.

“Had I not created a plan for this house, thought about it, worked to build it, would we be sitting in it right now?  The chances would be too small to even comprehend.  So is the future of my life any different?”

I’ve noticed that as I get older, my eyes don’t quite work as well as they used to.  Now I wish that was the only part of my vision that has been deteriorating!  Good thing I just finished a vision correction session with my daughter!

I’m going to spend some time making application for my future over the next couple of weeks.  It will take some time to create a plan, think it through and work to build it.  I’m sure it will turn out to be as comfortable and customized as the house I live in is. 

The truth is that we all live in our custom lives.  Is your life the way you want it to be, or do you need to begin a new set of plans?

 

The Gentile Voice of Love

“You need to come up here!” (In an angry voice)

- The man with the little white dog

The Gentle Voice of Love

I sat in a small apartment with two men, one woman and a small white dog.  We were getting acquainted with each other and expressing pleasantries when the small dog jumped down to the floor and came over to sniff the trousers that covered my legs.  She could smell my dog so she stayed for a minute lingering in the in the aroma that filled her senses.

As she remained, her owner became anxious so I told him it was just fine, but I watched as his eyes expressed increasing displeasure.  He called to her.  She didn’t respond as he wished.  I watched the fire in his eyes grow!

In one violent eruption the sitting man stomped his foot hard on the floor and angrily yelled, “YOU COME UP HERE NOW!”

I felt my body respond to this outburst as it involuntarily pushed against the back of the couch in shock and dismay.  I watched the gentile little dog put her tail between her two back legs and jump up to her designated spot when threatened. Her little spirit was crushed.

Then, as quickly as the outburst began, I heard new sweet tones from the once contorted face: “I love you!”

“I love you?” I thought to myself.  Is that what love is?  Is love expressed through threats and angry lashing out?  Does one only love another when the other conforms exactly as commanded?

I watched as a large hand stroked the fir of the little one next to his lap.  Her eyes were filled with fear and anticipation, wondering how long this kindness would last.

“What a sad way to live” I thought.  Then I reflected on my own relationships.  How would an independent observer describe my interactions with others?  Would they express my actions as the gentle voice of love?  When others look at me, do they see kindness, consideration, and caring?  I hope so!

The greatest compliment one being can give another is to choose to love, and be with them.  It is the richest tribute to love and freedom I can think of.  When you extend your love to others freely, you’ll find that the sweetness of freedom will furnish fulfillment in ways you never anticipated.  When you allow others to give you their love, in their own way and of their own choice, your relationships will be filled with trust, caring and increased depth. 

The depth of your offered love will be reflected in your life immediately; you will enjoy additional freedom and a joy beyond description. Perhaps it seems too simple, but it’s not.  Allow the gentile voice of love to change your life today.

Doritos and Sweet Tarts

Doorstep Dogs

Doritos and Sweet Tarts

They were all together on a big long front porch.  By they, I mean two little girls and one black, brown, tan and white dog.  I didn’t know where the dog came from, but I knew the girls.  They were my girls; and the dog?

It was clear that the dog was a stray.  She had matted fur and looked a little worse for wear.  We didn’t have a dog and never had.  At that time we only lived with one grumpy cat.  I knew he wouldn’t like to have a dog around and I didn’t need one more animal to take care of.  So I made one simple pronouncement to the girls.

“Don’t feed the dog!”

But, the dog didn’t leave and moved from the front porch to the back deck.  It was only about three days later when a dog’s food bowl magically appeared on the back deck and I knew the battle was over.  The dog had won and I had lost!

It wasn’t until a few years had gone by when the girls finally admitted that the dog, “Freckles,” had been prompted to stay as a result of their gifts of Doritos and Sweet Tarts.  They wanted the dog, felt sorry for her and had offered her the best food they could think of!  That was the first pure bred doorstep dog that came to live with us.

The next one came a few years later.  My wife was out walking Freckles when they happened upon another mostly black dog lying in the ditch just up the road from our house.  She was thin and didn’t look well.  But, she was strong enough to follow them home.  When they arrived, I said, “Don’t feed the dog.  One is enough!”

The next day brought a new collar, leash and bowl.  Once again the pure bread doorstep dog had won.  We were now a family of people with one cat and two dogs.  But, things change with time.

After eighteen years our cat had lived out his life.  The next year Freckles also gave up the ghost.  Their pictures still grace our family photo wall and they are dearly missed.

A few weeks ago our last dog “Cricket” was running happily in the yard and came up lame.  We thought it was a simple sprain or a small wound on her pad.  When it didn’t heal my wife took her to the doctor to see what the problem was.  It turned out to be a torn ACL.  She needed surgery to restore the use of her leg.

The cost estimate was large, but the decision to spend the money was easy.  After all, she is more than just a pure bred doorstep dog.  She’s part of the family and you can’t put a monetary value on that!  And, as I have been thinking about Cricket, Freckles and Simba “Binx,” my mind went back to one thing my Uncle Jerry had taught me long ago.

I went to visit Uncle Jerry and he had a new dog at his farm.  I asked him where he got the dog.  He said, “I went to the animal shelter.”

Said I, “How did you choose the right dog?”

“I just bring the dog who knows me home!”

It’s a lesson I’ve always remembered.  Spend your life with those who want to be with you and you’ll never go wrong.  We love them because they loved us first!

Chrisanne's Open House

An open house at C.G. Sparks

Chrisanne’s Open House

Sometimes I can be in a large crowd and feel utterly alone; strange how that can happen.  But that wasn’t the case during a gathering I attended not long ago.  My friend Chrisanne invited me to her store’s open house and I eagerly put it on my calendar.

When the day arrived I was excited to attend.  Yet, as the day wore on and became more complicated it was beginning to feel as if I would not be able to attend.  My final meeting of the day dragged on and on.  I felt like a kid trying to sleep on Christmas Eve! The specter of the open house was dancing in my head and I could visualize myself talking with my friends and family while walking in the midst of the beautiful offerings in Chrisanne’s store.

The first thing I saw when I arrived was an old Range Rover on the other side of the tree-height roll-up glass door.  It looked as if it was right off the set of an “Indiana Jones” movie.  Its rusted cargo bed was piled high with wooded boxes and furniture.

“That’s one of the best displays I’ve ever seen!” I thought to myself as I walked through the man-door and entered the large space.  A large warehouse-type building filled with people, food, antique furniture, music and the sounds of laughter.  It was good to be there!

Members of my family were also there and it didn’t take long to find them by winding my way around the throng as if I were one of the pythons from the jungles near the cities of India where Chrisanne personally selects her fine offerings.  Once united, we spent the rest of the evening acting like tourists in search of discovery as we talked and viewed the amazing sights.

New sights were all around us and just before we left I pulled my daughter close to me and whispered in her ear, “Look at how different all of these people are.  Isn’t it wonderful to be here to enjoy each other’s company?”

I smiled thinking, “I’m sure everyone is looking at me and saying, ‘look at that guy he doesn’t look anything like the people I usually associate with!’”

But there we all were; all having fun, all with people we loved, all friends & customers of Chrisanne! 

When we’re not remembering we’re Chrisanne’s Customers, we all spend our lives struggling to differentiate ourselves from those around us.  We work hard at being different.  We seek “our own.”  We associate with people sharing our beliefs and talk about how everyone should think and act as we do.  We try to be divided.

“Sad,” I thought as I left.  I would be a better person.  I’d be learning more.  I’d be discovering more.  I’d be more, if I would only spend at least as much of my time working to appreciate the differences of those around me as I do trying to separate myself from them.  So, I made the personal commitment to spend more time with “those people.”

After all, Chrisanne has shown us we’re all part of the human family and even though one third of all the ice cream eaten in the world is vanilla there are other wonderful flavors.  What would life be like without them?

The Limits of Possible

“The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.” – Arthur Clarke

The Limits of Possible

Have you ever had one of those weeks?  There is a kind of week, day or year that all of us have in common.  It s a time when there is too much to do, or there’s a time when everything happening is just too difficult to deal with.  When that happens it is so tempting to simply give up; to quit, while saying, I just can’t do it!  It was in the midst of one of those weeks when I had to good fortune to be reading a work by Arthur C. Clarke.

Mr. Clarke wrote, “The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.”

These words immediately changed my point of view and reminded me that we are who we are, perhaps, more as a result of the challenges we’ve overcome than any other factor in life.  When I look back at my own life I’m able to see a clear path of choices that led me on trails that were a directly attributable to my trials.  Interesting how that works!  In that respect, our lives are a lot like that of a photon in quantum mechanics.

“As a photon makes its way through an arrangement of glass panes and mirrors, its path remains ambiguous.  It essentially takes every possible path available to it.  This ambiguity remains until observation by a conscious observer forces the particle to decide which path it had taken.  Then the uncertainty is resolved – retroactively – and it is as if the selected path had been taken all along.” Ray Kurzweil wrote in “The Age of Spiritual Machines.”

Like these quantum particles, we have choices to make in our lives.  And, sometimes the true nature of our path can only be seen in retrospect.  Knowing this gives each one of us the opportunity to stop, from time to time, and review just what it was that got us here; to this point, right now.  If you will make this a regular practice some encouraging things will begin to unfold before your eyes.

First, you’ll be able to see the growth you’ve made over time.  It’s impossible to do if you all you can see are the challenges in front of you.  So, make a regular appointment with yourself to retrace your steps over a period of time.

Second, notice that even though you have faced many trials, you’ve gotten through each one!  Only then will you have the evidence you need to see that you have the ability to conquer current obstacles as well as those that are coming to you.

Third, realize that your future is not set in stone.  When you make conscious decisions you will begin to force your world to resolve its uncertainty where your future is concerned.  It will indeed be as if the whole universe has acknowledged that this was the path you’ve been on all along.

Your future is just a choice.  So, look at your past, notice where you are in the present, and make sure you make conscious decisions that will allow you to see what your limits of possible are!