Grif.Net

03/09/13 Weekend Grif.Net – 1 in 10,000 a Day

03/09/13 Weekend Grif.Net – 1 in 10,000 a Day

[Beginning January 1st, 2011 on every single day more than 10,000 Baby
Boomers will reach the age of 65. That is going to keep happening every
single day until December 31st, 2030. Kinda makes March 14, 2013 seem not
so important. I am just 1 in 10,000.]

Last weekend I shared ten “spiritual truths” about aging from Bible
passages. Today we have ten “life lessons” from the father of a blogger I
enjoy. This blogger asked his dad (who was hitting that “special” age) to
share thoughts to pass on to his grandchildren, things he’d learned from
living that he wished he’d known many years ago.

1. Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed.
Happiness is the sacred experience of living every moment with love and
gratitude. There is always, always, always something to be thankful for and
some reason to love. So be sure to appreciate what you’ve got. Be thankful
for the little things in life that mean a lot.

2. Be a student of life every day. Experience it, learn from it, and absorb
all the knowledge you can. Prepare yourself for greatness by keeping your
mind conditioned with fresh knowledge and new challenges. Remember, if you
stay ready, you don’t have to get ready when great opportunities arise.

3. Experience is the best teacher. Don’t try too hard to memorize the
things others are teaching. Learn the best practices and then do your
thing. Life itself will teach you over the course of time, and often at the
right time and place, so that you will remember forever what is truly
important.

4. Your choices, your actions, your life. Live it your way with no regrets.
Never let the odds keep you from doing what you know in your heart you were
meant to do. Continue to work hard at what you love no matter what the
challenges are. Be persistent. Life eventually rewards those who do.

5. No one is ‘too busy’ in this world. It’s all about priorities. What you
focus on grows. Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the
same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Michelangelo,
Mother Teresa, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, Albert Einstein, etc.

6. Be patient and tough. Someday this pain will be useful to you. You will
never realize your true strength until being strong is your only option
left. Until you are broken, you won’t know what you’re truly made of. Pain
doesn’t just show up in your life for no reason. It’s a sign that something
needs to change – it’s a wake-up call that guides you toward a better
future. So keep your heart open to dreams, and make that change. For as
long as there is a dream and positive action, there is hope; and as long as
there is hope, there is joy in living.

7. Oftentimes it is better to be kind than to be right. We do not always
need an intelligent mind that speaks, just a patient heart that listens. Be
kind whenever possible. And realize that it is always possible. It takes a
great deal of strength to be gentle and kind. And when you practice
kindness and bring sunshine to the lives of others, you cannot keep it from
yourself.

8. You can become a magnet for good things by wishing everyone well. Judge
less and love more. If you want inner peace, resist the temptation to
gossip about others, or portray them in a poor light. Instead of judging
someone for what they do or where they are in their life, figure out why
they do what they do and how they got to where they are.

9. Only you are in charge of your attitude. The truth is, unless you let
go, unless you forgive yourself, unless you forgive the situation, unless
you realize that that situation is over, you cannot move forward. You are
responsible for how you feel, no matter what anyone else says or does. You
are always 100% in control of your thoughts right now, so choose to feel
confident and adequate rather than angry and insecure. Choose to look
forward, not backward.

10. Satisfaction is not always the fulfillment of what you want. It is the
realization of how blessed you are for what you have. It’s not that
everything will be easy or exactly as you had expected, but you must choose
to be grateful for all that you have, and happy that you got a chance to
live this life, no matter how it turns out.

~~
Dr Bob Griffin
[email protected] www.grif.net
“Jesus Knows Me, This I Love!”