10.11.08
“He, who every morning plans…”
“He, who every morning plans the transactions of the day, and follows that plan
carries a thread that will guide him through a labyrinth of the most busy life.”
- Victor Hugo
A while ago, I wrote a post in response to a poem with a very similar message. HERE And today, as I am beginning my own day with only a vague plan and so many things that need to be done, wishing I was a had a little more structure, or direction, I found this quote. Reading this quote reminded me of my own “thread” from before and suddenly, the day’s purpose is much clearer – even though nothing else has changed. (From that earlier post we discussed that every individual’s thread might be something different, but it is what guides us through our lives; it could be religion, love, family, a career, or something else.)
What I am hoping to say here is that I think it is important to remember the bigger and most important things in our lives even when the small and mundane activities seem to take over. If we keep the things that are closest to our hearts at the forefront of what we do each day and why we do those things, then we can’t really go wrong – even when we have responsibilities and obligations to do so many seemingly unrelated things.
Happy Saturday!
~Melissa 
09.23.08
“Man’s love is of man’s life a part…”
“Man’s love is of man’s life a part; It is woman’s whole existence!” Byron
Comment and discuss, please!
~Melissa
09.19.08
More Quotations From My iGoogle
Inspiration and Motivation
“We first make our habits, and
then our habits make us.”
- John Dryden
“They can conquer who
believe they can.”
- Virgil
“To accomplish great things, we must
not only act, but also dream, not
only plan, but also believe.”
- Anatole France
“There’s only one way to succeed in anything
and that is to give everything.”
- Vince Lombardi
Love
“Only love lets us see normal things in an extraordinary way.” Anonymous
“If we deny love that is given to us, if we refuse to give love because we fear the pain of loss, then our lives will be empty, our loss greater.” Tanis HalfElven from the Dragonlance saga
“Life is a journey from one point to another. You know where you will end up, but you don’t know what route will get you there.” Jennifer Robinson
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“The greatest happiness in life is the conviction that we are loved- loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves.” Victor Hugo |
Melissa
09.18.08
iGoogle – I love it!
I recently discovered the iGoogle feature from Google. This Google product allows you to create a personalized page full of widgets that you select from a pretty large variety. There are plenty of widgets that are helpful for writers such as a dictionary, thesaurus, and a widget that gives you a Word A Day from dictionary.com. I have an assortment of things on my page right now including weather information, phases of the moon, puzzles, pictures from National Geographic, and quotations…I love quotations!
I have three different quotation widgets on my page. One is all about literary quotes, one is about love, and the other is inspirational. I thought I would share a few of the recent ones that I have read courtesy of the iGoogle widgets with all of you.
Please leave any comments about the quotes or iGoogle.
Inspirational
“The only limit to our realization of
tomorrow will be our doubts of today.”
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
“Everyone who got to where they are
had to begin where they were.”
- Richard Paul Evans
“Long-range goals keep you from being
frustrated by short-term failures.”
- James Cash Penney
“You are today where your thoughts have
brought you; you will be tomorrow
where your thoughts take you.”
- James Allen
Love
“It is impossible to love and to be wise.” Francis Bacon
“Love is the expression of simplicity in emotion, the unattainable longing that comes so unexpectedly, with great subtlety and bliss.” Luen Dao
Literary
“My entire soul is a cry and all my work is a commentary on that cry.” – Nikos Kazantzakis
~Melissa
09.06.08
“Feeling gratitude…”
“Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.”
– William Arthur Ward
Being grateful for what is good about our lives is an important thing we can each do for ourselves. It helps makes anything that is not-so-good-at-the-moment easier to deal with, and keeps us in a proper perspective so we can focus on all of the things that are amazing-at-the-moment!
I think it was Oprah Winfrey, a few years ago, that advocated a “gratitude journal” because she believed that expressing our appreciation adds to and intensifies the appreciation and gratefulness for all of the little things in our lives that we might otherwise overlook. I (of course!) also advocate keeping a journal or notebook and using it, in part, for this reason. It is a great place to jot down notes to yourself about the wonderful things in your life, including things that people have done for or said to you, and just list all that you have to appreciate about your life. (Hopefully this takes you a while to do…)
Now, while I do believe that journals are a fabulous place for these thoughts of gratitude, expressing the actual gratitude to the people who have done or said something nice to you or have in some way given you something to be grateful for is much more important.
So, take a moment and reflect on the things that you have to be grateful for and wrote about in your journal. Then, look at those things and if there is a person responsible for even one of them, take a moment to write a note of “thanks”, send a small gift or some flowers, or pick up the phone and thank them for it personally. They may not realize that what they said or did had the impact on you that it has. Share the gratitude.
This will be our (not so) Random Act of Kindness and Gratitude #3.
Thank you for reading!
~Melissa
PS…I came across this blog today and thought I would share it with all of you: http://gratitudecollections.blogspot.com/.
