May You Always Feel Loved

May you find serenity and tranquility
in a world you may not always understand.

May the pain you have known
and the conflict you have experienced
give you the strength to walk through life
facing each new situation with courage and optimism.

Always know that there are those
whose love and understanding will always be there,
even when you feel most alone.

May a kind word,
a reassuring touch,
and a warm smile
be yours every day of your life,
and may you give these gifts
as well as receive them.

May the teachings of those you admire
become part of you,
so that you may call upon them.

Remember, those whose lives you have touched
and who have touched yours
are always a part of you,
even if the encounters were less than you would have wished.

It is the content of the encounter
that is more important than its form.

May you not become too concerned with material matters,
but instead place immeasurable value
on the goodness in your heart.
Find time in each day to see beauty and love
in the world around you.

Realize that what you feel you lack in one regard
you may be more than compensated for in another.
What you feel you lack in the present
may become one of your strengths in the future.
May you see your future as one filled with promise and possibility.

Learn to view everything as a worthwhile experience.
May you find enough inner strength
to determine your own worth by yourself,
and not be dependent
on another’s judgment of your accomplishments.

May you always feel loved.

~ Sandra Sturtz Hauss ~

The Power of Kindness

It was a Saturday, the last weekend before Christmas. A beautiful light snow with giant flakes was falling. I had promised my wife that I’d be home to do some last minute shopping together, and I was running late.

As I approached the stop sign near our home in the country, I didn’t realize that there was a layer of ice under the snow. You can probably guess the rest of the story. The car slid through the intersection into a small ditch on the other side of the road.

I wasn’t hurt, but I was angry with myself. A day that was supposed to be “Christmas fun” would be spent waiting for a tow truck to pull me out of the ditch.

Since I was not far from my home, I started walking down our country road to share the “no shopping today” news with my wife. I noticed two men who were building my neighbor’s barn and I thought that maybe…just maybe, I could pay them to take a break and try to push me out.

As I approached, I introduced myself and pointed to the car in the distance. Without hesitating, they looked at each other and said, “We can solve that problem!” One of them said, “I’ll get the chain and George, you can drive the backhoe down the road and we’ll have it out in no time!” In the next 30 minutes while I watched helplessly from the sidelines, they had my car out of the ditch and on the road again. To say that I was grateful was an understatement. My Saturday had been saved thanks to two men I’d never met before.

I thanked them, reached into my wallet and handed them a $100. I said, “Please take this. It would have cost me more to call a tow truck and I would have spent my afternoon waiting for it to show.” They both looked at me, and at the same time said, “No way! We wouldn’t consider taking a cent.” Then the one man said, “This was our good deed for the day and we know that you’ll help someone else because we helped you. That’s all we ask.”

I drove away with a wonderful feeling inside, knowing there are people like this in the world. It made my day! But here’s the amazing thing about kindness…from the look on their faces, it made theirs too! Emerson was so right when he said, “One of the most beautiful compensations in life is that no man can help another without helping himself.”

That day provided the inspiration to write the book I simply call, The Power of Kindness.

In doing the research to write the book, I discovered something I had always suspected, but never knew for sure. Here’s what I found…

The great English writer, Aldous Huxley, was a pioneer in the study of philosophies and techniques to develop human potential. In a lecture toward the end of his life, he said this:

“People often ask me…what is the most effective technique for transforming their lives?”

He then said, “It’s a little embarrassing that after years and years of research, my best answer is – just be a little kinder.”

This is the paradox of the power of kindness. It doesn’t feel powerful at all. In fact, it almost feels too simple to be important. But as Huxley said, it is the #1 thing that can transform your life.

I’ve been so blessed to share what I believe through many of the Simple Truths’ books. However, there is nothing, in my opinion, that can top the awesome “power of kindness.”

Why? Because, everyday, through unexpected acts of kindness, you can make a meaningful difference with your life!

Today, I wanted to share one of the many stories from the book. It’s called Paid in Full:

An excerpt from
The Power of Kindness
by Mac Anderson

 

One day, a poor boy who was selling goods from door-to-door to pay his way through school, found he had only one thin dime left, and he was hungry. He decided he would ask for a meal at the next house. However, he lost his nerve when a lovely young woman opened the door.

Instead of a meal, he asked for a drink of water. She thought he looked hungry and so she brought him a large glass of milk. He drank it slowly, and then asked, “How much do I owe you?”

“You don’t owe me anything,” she replied. “Mother has taught us never to accept pay for a kindness.” He said, “Then I thank you from my heart.” As Howard Kelly left that house, he not only felt stronger physically, but his faith in God and man was strengthened also. He had been ready to give up and quit.

Years later, that young woman became critically ill. The local doctors were baffled. They finally sent her to the big city, where they called in specialists to study her rare disease.

Dr. Howard Kelly was called in for the consultation. When he heard the name of the town she came from, he went down the hall of the hospital to her room. Dressed in his doctor’s gown, he went in to see her. He recognized her at once. He went back to the consultation room determined to do his best to save her life. From that day, he gave special attention to the case.

After a long struggle, the battle was won. Dr. Kelly requested from the business office to pass the final billing to him for approval. He looked at it, then wrote something on the edge, and the bill was sent to her room. She feared to open it, for she was sure it would take the rest of her life to pay for it all. Finally, she looked, and something caught her attention on the side of the bill. She read these words:

“Paid in full with one glass of milk…”

Dr. Howard Kelly

(Dr. Howard Kelly was a distinguished physician who, in 1895, founded the Johns Hopkins Division of Gynecologic Oncology at Johns Hopkins University. According to Dr. Kelly’s biographer, Audrey Davis, the doctor was on a walking trip through Northern Pennsylvania one spring day when he stopped by a farm house for a drink of water.)

 

Today, I’m pleased to offer The Power of Kindness with DVD for only $10. Our regular price is $15.95, a 37% savings.

To look inside this inspirational book or to watch the 3-minute movie, just click here.

 

All the Best,

Mac Anderson Founder, Simple Truths

 

Living with Joy

“Part of growth is learning to create inner peace without being dependent upon things turning out a certain way or needing people to respond to you in a specific way. You want to create it as something you are and be able to give and share it with others. YOU become the center, radiating your soul’s light outward, rather than reacting, waiting for others or for situations and events in your life to be arranged in such a way that you have peace.” Orin

 

In the tradition of Jane Roberts, Esther Hicks, and Edgar Cayce, gifted channel Sanaya Roman presents Living with Joy, given to her by Orin, a timeless being of love and light. This wise and gentle spirit teacher offers a systematic course in spiritual growth.

The spiritual truths and transformative meditations and exercises in these pages have opened millions of people to their greater potential. Sanaya and Orin invite you to choose joy, release struggle, and open to the power of your innermost being.

With the guidance of this bestselling classic, you can learn to grow through joy rather than through struggle and pain. See immediate results in your life when you learn to:

• Love and appreciate yourself
• Open to receive
• Experience more self-confidence and self-esteem
• Live in higher purpose
• Take a quantum leap in any area
• Change negatives into positives
• Gain clarity in your relationships
• Increase your sense of aliveness and well-being

Orin (through Sanaya Roman) explains how to shift energy instantly, to create effective healing and life-changes, simply by using your conscious mind’s imagery, symbols and intentions.

But even more amazingly, Orin also broadcasts non-verbal, super-conscious information that aligns you with real joy, power, peace and inspiration.

I especially liked Orin’s admonition to take what he says and use what resonates for you, personally, and leave the rest behind. A good principle, I feel, when reading anything pertaining to our individual growth paths. Having said that, I found that almost all of it resonated with me, deeply and profoundly. You may, too.

Many people from all walks of life are going to benefit from this book because of the information that it contains regardless of how happy you are in your life (whether you are still learning to be happy or you are already super happy).

Some of the helpful chapters contained in this uplifting book are about living in higher purpose and recognizing life purpose. You may want to keep a pen, paper, and/or highlighter handy for information that is going to resonate with you depending what path you are currently on in your life

Read it for the light it can bring. Live it for the positive changes it can invoke. Love it for the joy we can all share and partake of. Highly recommended.

Living with Joy: Keys to Personal Power and Spiritual Transformation (Earth Life Series)

Be grateful for your teachers

“I have learned silence from the talkative, tolerance from the intolerant and kindness from the unkind. I should not be ungrateful to those teachers.” Kahlil Gibran

Little broken things

“Your head’s like mine, like ALL our heads – big enough to contain every god and devil there ever was. Big enough to hold the weight of oceans and the turning of stars. Whole UNIVERSES fit in there! But what do we choose to keep in this miraculous cabinet? Little broken things. Sad trinkets that we play with over and over. The world turns our key and we play the same little tune again and again, and we think that tune is all we are…”

Tom O’Bedlam, The Invisibles by Grant Morrison

Today is your big moment

“Today is your big moment. Moments, really. The life you’ve been waiting for is happening all around you. The scene unfolding right outside your window is worth more than the most beautiful painting, and the crackers and peanut butter that you’re having for lunch on the coffee table are as profound, in their own way, as the Last Supper. This is it. This is life in all its glory, swirling and unfolding around us, disguised as pedantic, pedestrian non-events. But pull off the mask and you will find your life, waiting to be made, chosen, woven, crafted.”

—     Cold Tangerines by Shauna Niequist

The Teacher’s Expectation

The inspiring movie Stand and Deliver portrays the true story of Jaime Escalente, a math teacher who went into the Los Angeles barrios and decided to teach calculus to some of the school’s lowest-functioning students. When the math department chairwoman caustically told Jaime he was dreaming, he told her, “The students will live up to the teacher’s expectations!”

In spite of objection, derision, and resistance, Jaime went on to teach calculus. Ultimately everyone in his class passed the state calculus test, and calculus became on ongoing course in a school that would not previously touch it.

If you are a teacher, parent, therapist, counselor, coach, doctor, or healer, remember that your students lives up –or down — to your expectations. Every student can be as great as your vision of him or her, so hold the highest vision you can see.  This principle applies not only to teachers in official capacities. If you are a waitress, shuttle bus driver, or artist, your clients, colleagues, or customers will rise to your expectations ? or fall to them. So take care to examine your expectations, and keep stretching beyond your old sense of limits, for their sake and yours.

All of life is self-fulfilling prophecy. Everyone lives the reality they create by virtue of their beliefs. You hire actors to play the roles you assign in the script you have written. If you don’t like the script you have written, write a new one. Begin by piercing beyond the limits you have ascribed to others, and letting them be bigger than you thought they were or could be. Then you will work miracles because you raised the ceiling of your mind.

How might you create better students, clients, friends, or family members by holding a higher vision of who they are and what they can do?

I create and attract positive, successful, loving people around me by seeing the best in them and for them, as well as for myself.

The integral being

to the ordinary being, others often require tolerance.
to the highly evolved being, there is no such thing as tolerance,
because there is no such thing as other.
she has given up all ideas of individuality
and extended her goodwill without prejudice in every direction.
never hating, never resisting, never contesting,
she is simply always learning and being.

loving, hating, having expectations:
all these are attachments.
attachment prevents the growth of one’s true being.
therefore the integral being is attached to nothing
and can relate to everyone with an unstructured attitude.
because of this, her very existence benefits all things.

you see, that which has form
is equal to that which is without form,
and that which is alive
is equal to that which rests.
this is the subtle truth, not a religious intervention,
but only those who are highly evolved will understand this.

Lao Tzu

Delicious Ambiguity

“Some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next. Delicious ambiguity” ~ Gilda Radner

kaleidoscope of new possibilities

“At the height of laughter, the universe is flung into a kaleidoscope of new possibilities.” ~ Jean Houston

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