ALIVE AND WELL THANK YOU!

I am sure that each one of us has noted that when we do good to others it pays off better than any stock market investment! That doesn’t mean that at that particular time we are going through peaches and cream in our own either. It seems so natural sometimes that when distress and hard times arise, we resort to not only feeling badly about ourselves, but many times we spread this bad carma to others if we are not careful. It helps to treat difficult issues the same way we chew our food! Take small bites and chew on them well so we don’t get CHOKED! Everything that lives and breathes struggles to survive, down to the smallest life form, the cell! It has to function and live just like our bodies do, and even in plant life, including the smallest known llving organism, the amoeba (I don’t think that has changed has it?) But while we struggle to survive we still have the option of choosing whether we are going to be, “Under the Circumstances” as many of us say or on TOP OF CIRCUMSTANCES if we choose so. It’s true that some of lifes knockout punches can send us for a Doozey, but we can get up off the floor, brush ourselves off, check to see if our body parts are still attached and then deal with the aftermath like human beings. But often the real test comes when we interact with other people. One day not long ago I watched a black lady in the courtroom. Her son had been brutally murdered by the Defendant who was just found guilty standing there for the Judge to pronounce sentence on him. The defendant, tearfully, told the mother of how dreadfully sorry he was for what he had done to her beloved son and that whatever punishment was to be doled out to him he deserved it and more. After he had spoken and sat down, I watched that mother to see her reaction; you could have heard a pin drop in that courtroom. She struggled to speak, and asked the Court if she could say something. The Judge granted her permission to speak. She stood to her feet, wiping her eyes and gained composure for a moment. She looked straight at the man who had, admittedly, murdered her son. The words she said I will never forget nor the way she said them. Gathering all the courage she could muster as a grieving mother she told that man who killed her son that “I forgive you and I pray that somehow you will forgive yourself”. Even as I just typed those words that she said I had to just sit back for a minute or two and I could hardly continue, myself. Now clearly, most of us had not had to climb that mountain and I hope we never ever will. Most anything that we encounter is dwarfed by that in itself. But listen my friends, if that lady could stand there and forgive that man then we can certainly forgive others for less crimes, I’m sure. We can somehow stand tall and keep our chins up and like my Brit Friends say, “keep a stiff upper lip” Here here! So as we deal with the “wrongs” that life has so devastatingly dealt us sometimes we can be like the young pine trees that bend with the Hurricane winds here in Eastern North Carolina. They bend all the way down to the earth and touch the ground sometimes, and then spring back when the winds have subsided. When we get stiff and hardened in our ways (our bodies are telling somewhat about that!) so when the proverbial “poop” hits the fan we will stiffen up and crack and break in two! As we get older, yes, it’s tougher. But we can keep an attitude of resilience and sort things out and put them in their proper perspective and go on. That is one reason among many that FRIENDS are so valuable, they add some honey to the bitterness we get sometimes. We help to keep each other vertical! I want to add this; when that remarkable and dear lady forgave that man who murdered her son, she was doing herself more good perhaps than she was doing him. When we do something in good character, our bodies and our mind and our Spirit immeditaly respond positively because we are simply made that way! Some may call it “good carma” or “Lucky Sevens” or whatever, but the fact is that good produces better, and better produces best. Tat act of forgiveness starts the healing process at warp speed ahead. Unforgiveness does the same in reverse. Our body fills with unhealthy toxins, proven medically! Our joints ache and our digestive system suddenly needs more and more antacids and milk of magnesia (if you can stand that stuff!) So spare yourself of that unmitigated garbage and just forgive, if and when you can. It’s a choice, but one that you can, literally, “LIVE” with. Ssometimes I have to stop complaining and count my blessings! Now, true, this all sounds so “ALTRUISTIC” and heavenly….LOL….but somewhere in the middle we can find refuge 🙂 And we can enjoy our “GOLDEN YEARS”…..our GOLDEN GIRDLES…no…that’s GOLDEN GIRLS!
Ah whatever! Paul