The cracked pot

A water bearer in India had two large pots, each hung on each end of a pole which he carried across his neck.

One of the pots had a crack in it, and while the other pot was perfect and always delivered a full portion of water at the end of the long walk from the stream to the master's house, the cracked pot arrived only half full.

For a full 2 years this went on daily, with the bearer delivering only one and a half pots full of water in his master's house.

Of course, the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments, perfect to the end for which it was made.

But the poor cracked pot was ashamed of its own imperfection, and miserable that it was able to accomplish only half of what it had been made to do.

After to years of what it perceived to be a bitter failure, it spoke to the water bearer one day by the stream.

"I am ashamed of my self, and I want to apologize to you."

"Why?" asked the bearer. "what are you ashamed of?"

"I have been able, for these past two years, to deliver only half my load because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back to your master's house. Because of my flaws, you have to do all of this work, and you don't get full value from your efforts," the pot said.

What makes the difference

A young black boy saw a balloon seller on a street corner. His eyes sparkled as he gazed at all the different colored balloon - red, blue, white, black, yellow....

The old man selling the balloon saw the boy hesitate, then gather his courage and approach.

"Tell me mister," said the boy, "Do the black balloons fly as high as the others?"

The old man felt a tear forming in his eye. He pick the boy up, sat him on his knee and said, "Look."

He let go of all the balloons. They drifted up in a cluster, higher and higher into the blue sky, until they were so high they disappeared.

"Did you see that?" the balloon seller asked.

"Yes," said the boy.

"Did the black balloons fly as high as the others?"

"Yes, mister, they did."

"You see my boy, the balloons are like people. The important thing isn't their color, or what they look like on the outside. No, the important thing is WHAT'S INSIDE.

And what's inside you makes all the difference in life."

"when some one's character seems impossible to fathom, observe his friends."
Japanese proverb

The value of time

To understand the value of year, talk to student who has failed an important exam.

To understand the value of a month, talk to a mother who has given birth to a baby a month prematurely.

To understand the value of a week, talk to publisher of a weekly newspaper.

To understand the value of an hour, talk to a couple in love who are separated and want only to be together again.

To understand the value of a minute, talk to someone who has just missed a train or plane.

To understand the value of a second, talk to someone who has lost a loved one in an accident.

To understand the value of a millisecond, talk to someone who won a silver medal at the Olympic Games.

Time waits for no one. Gather all the time you have left every moment, and it will be of great use to you. Share it with people you value and love and it will become even more precious.

Socrates, Triple filter test

In ancient Greece, Socrates was reputed to hold knowledge in high esteem. One day an acquaintance met the great philosopher and said, "Do you know what I just heard about your friend?"

"Hold on a minute," Socrates replied. "Before telling me anything, I'd like you to pass a little test. It's called the Triple Filter Test."

"Triple filter?"

"That's right," Socrates continued. "Before you talk to me about my friend, it might be a good idea to take a moment and filter what you're going to say. That's why I call it the triple filter test.

The first filter is Truth. Have you made absolutely sure that what you are about to tell me is true?"

"No," the man said, "Actually I just heard about it and..."

"All right," said Socrates. "So you don't really know if it's true or not. Now let's try the second filter, the filter of goodness. Is what you are about to tell me about my friend something good?"

"No, on the contrary..."

"So," Socrates continued, "You want to tell me something bad about him, but you're not certain it's true. You may still pass the test though, because there's one filter left: the filter of usefulness. Is what you want to tell me about my friend going to be useful to me?"

"No, not really."

"Well," concluded Socrates, "If what you want to tell me is neither true nor good nor even useful, why tell it to me at all?"

Are you a prairie chicken ?

An old Amerindian legend tells of a brave who found an eagle's egg one day and put it in a prairie chicken's nest. The eaglet hatched at the same time as a nestful of prairie chickens saw the light of day, and grew up alongside them.

All his life the young eagle did exactly what prairie chickens do. He pecked for insects and grubs in the earth. He clucked and cackled exactly like a prairie chicken. And when he flew it was always in a cloud of feathers and only for a few yards at most.

After all, that's how prairie chickens fly.

The years passed and the eagle grew old. One day he saw a magnificent bird gliding high in the cloudless sky. Gracefully the huge bird rode the air currents, hardly moving his great golden
wings.

"What a beautiful bird!" exclaimed our eagle to his prairie chicken friends. "What is it?"

"That's an eagle, the king of birds," clucked his neighbor.

"But you better forget about it. You'll never be an eagle."

And so the eagle forgot all about the magnificent bird and died, thinking he was a prairie chicken.

Hi, have you ever thought you were less than you could be, like the eagle who thought he was a prairie chicken?

If so, think again...

"The secret of success is constancy to purpose."
Benjamin Disraeli

"Our aspirations are our possibilities".
Robert Browning

The secret of success

During a meeting of top salespeople from around the country, the 'big cheese' himself, a man who'd consistently had the highest sales figures for the last 20 years, and who earned more money the owner of his company, got up to speak.

"I am now going to reveal the secret of my success," he said.
"I wrote it down on a piece of paper and I put it in this envelope.
But success must be earned. So I'm going to sell the envelope to the highest bidder. You have my word that it contains what I said

- the Secret of my Success, not only as a salesman, but also in life."

The bidding started slowly... $5, then $10, then $50, $100, $130, $150, $200. Finally one of his colleagues bought the envelope for $1000. The happy buyer took the envelope and kept it to himself until he got home that night. Only then did he open it to learn THE SECRET OF SUCCESS.

What do you think was written on the piece of paper?

Think about it. Make a mental note of whatever comes to mind before reading the answer. Because I am going to tell you what it was later in this blog post. And in my opinion what was written on that piece of paper is worth much more than $1000.

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The winner of the auction tore open the envelope, unfolded the piece of paper and read the following hand-written words:

== THE SUCCESS' SECRET IS... TO ASK. ==

"Action does not always lead to happiness, but there is no
happiness without action."
Benjamin Disraeli

"Better do things yourself than hope they will be done."
Scottish Proverb

What money can buy

We convince ourselves that life will be better after we get married, have a baby, and then another. Then we are frustrated that the kids aren't old enough and we believe that we'll be more content when they are.

After that, we're frustrated that we have teenagers to deal with. We will certainly be happy when they are out of that stage. We tell ourselves that our life will be complete when our spouse gets his or her act together, when we get a nicer car, when we're able to go on a nice vacation, or when we retire.

The truth is there's no better time to be happy than...

RIGHT NOW !!!

If not now, when? Your life will always be filled with challenges. It's best to admit this to your self and decide to be happy anyway. Happiness is the way.

So, treasure every moment that you have, and treasure it more because you shared it with someone special, (special enough to spend your time with), and remember that time wait for no one.

So, stop waiting...
* until your car or home is paid off.
* until you get a new car or home.
* until your kids leave the house.
* until you go back to school.
* until you finish school.
* until you lose 10 lbs.
* until you gain 10 lbs.
* until you get married.
* until you get a divorce.
* until you have kids.
* until you retire.
* until summer
* until spring
* until winter
* until fall.

Listen to your heart, Follow your heart

Every year Father Cornillo opened the vestry of his little country church and received visits from the young people of neighbouring villages.

Joan of Arc

They came from far to receive advice and to learn about what to meditate on.
One day, a young girl from a good family knelt at the feet of the priest. "Father," she said, "I want to become a saint. What should I do?"

"Follow your heart, and never deviate from what it tells you, " Father Cornillo replied.
The girl was pleased with he advice. 'How easy it is to become a saint,' she thought. 'All I have to do is listen to what my heart says.'

But before she could get up and leave the church, the priest added, "To follow you heart you will have to be very strong, and your life will be full of sacrifice."

Father Cornillo was perfectly right: listening to your heart requires tremendous willpower.

It is not a question of living according to what you feel like doing day by day. On the contrary, you have to seek out the wisdom of your heart, and never give up. You cannot be satisfied with little victories, and you must not fall prey to self satisfaction.

Listening to your heart means being hard on yourself, and never trying to circumvent its moral requirements.

"The intelligent man who is proud of his own intelligence is like a condemned man who is proud of his large prison cell."
Simone Weil

The Kirlian Effect

A Russian researcher, S.D. Kirlian, aided by his wife Valentina, finally managed to convince the extremely conservative scientific community of the existence of what he call an 'energy body' composed of bioplasm.

Scientists around the world were amazed by Kirlian's discovery, and especially by its proposed practical application - the early detection of both physical and mentl diseases through an analysis of the colors of a patient's aura, which Kirlian referred to as 'bioluminescence'.
Hospitals soon began equipping themselves with devices designed to measure the Kirlian effect. Here's how one observer described an image produced by a Kirlian device:

"... fireworks exploding against a dark blue background, sheaths of multicolored sparks in the midst of flames and dazzling flashes. Some light patterns had the regular glow of candles, while others were explosions of blinding light, which gradually faded. Some flew by like flaming meteors. In some areas we could see dark filaments of vapor floating in space. Random flashes outlined a sparkling, labyrinth-like structure resembling a spacecraft in search of new galaxies."

This was no dream imagery, or the product of some poet's unbridled imagination, but the report of a Russian academic after witnessing the bioplasmic aura produced by a human hand, as seen through a Kirlian photographic device.

The year is 1939. A technician in the city of Krasnodar is called in to repair a high frequency machine used for electrotherapy. He notices a brilliant glare between the patient's skin and an electrode linked to the machine. He tries to photograph the phenomenon, which turns out to be a variation of something called the corona effect, an occurrence that is well known in the field of electronics.

AURA

Aura

"And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." (Genesis 2, Verse 7)

Man has been wondering about the mystery of the life since the down of time. Once all the chemical components are in place, how do you 'breathe the breath of life' into your creation? How do you transform matter into a living soul?

In Latin the word aura referred to breath. To mystics, aura represents a kind of halo of light, enveloping the body, visible only to those who have been taught how to see it. Others explain that aura is an emanation of the energy field that gives us life, and call it the subtle or astral body.

During solar eclipses we can see rays of energy, like huge sheaths of flame, emanating from the surface of the sun, while its center is marked by the moon. In the same way, our subtle, etheric body is masked by our physical body - all we can see of it are the rays of its aura.

There is an amazing resemblance in the various descriptions of the human aura. Yogis, theosophists, clairvoyants and mystics all describe more or less the same phenomenon. On the other hand, their observations are by no means scientific, so we cannot conclude that the human aura does, indeed, exist, simply because so many people claim it does.