Thoughts for the day

From an article I read today, "one’s REAL father can never be replaced with a step father. Regardless of how wonderful their mother is, children always long for their father."  Amen! More here on equal parenting.

On marriage, Linda and Richard Eyre said, "Marriage is about synergy and synchronicity and symbiosis. It is about making each other better and making each other happier. It is more about always making up than about never disagreeing, and it is more about learning together and from each other than about who can win."  I agree - there is no room in the bed for competition.

When you feel persecuted or offended, say to yourself, "it's not all about me!"  People really are not all focusing on you!  They have their own lives, thoughts, feelings and opinions.  If they say it or write about it, it's probably about them and to think it to be otherwise is often paranoid delusion!  Also, people aren't all talking about you - they are busy with their lives and as I heard Helen Keller quoted, "we wouldn't worry so much about what people think of us if we knew how seldom they do it."  If the shoe fits...


For women's history month:  A few thoughts by Eleanor Roosevelt (very timely for me):

• "You can never really live anyone else's life, not even your child's. The influence you exert is through your own life, and what you've become yourself."

• "Happiness is not a goal; it's a by-product"

• "You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along."

• You must do the things you think you cannot do." 
• "You have to accept whatever comes and the only important thing is that you meet it with courage and with the best that you have to give."

"Rather than simply passing through trials, we must allow trials to pass through us in ways that sanctify us." Elder Neil A. Maxwell

 When Your Hut Is On Fire!
 
The only survivor of a shipwreck was washed up on a small, uninhabited  island. He prayed feverishly for God to rescue him. Every day he  scanned the horizon for help but none seemed forthcoming.

 Even though he was exhausted, he eventually managed to build a little  hut out of driftwood to protect him from the elements and to store his  few possessions.
 
One day he arrived home from scavenging for food to find his little hut  in flames, with smoke rolling up to the sky. He felt the worst had  happened and everything was lost. He was stunned with disbelief, grief, and anger. He cried out, "God! How could you do this to me?"

 Early the next day he awakened to the sound of a ship approaching the  island! It had come to rescue him! "How did you know I was here?"  asked the weary man of his rescuers. "We saw your smoke signal," was  the reply.

The moral of this story: It is easy to get discouraged when things are  going bad but we should never lose heart because God is at work in our  lives, even in the midst of our pain and suffering. Remember the next  time your little hut seems to be burning to the ground that it just may  be the smoke signal that summons the Grace of God.