Ngong Hills : In Awe of Mother nature

Taking Responsibility

TAKE RESPONSIBILITY.

I the Lord search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.
Jeremiah 17:10

One of man's greatest failings is that he looks almost always for an excuse in the misfortune that befalls him through his own fault, before looking for a remedy - which means he often finds the remedy too late.
Cardinal de Retz.

             I couldn't say 'amen!' so I said 'ouch!'. The fiery preacher had just burst my bubble by saying, " You are the sum total of your decisions therefore you are where you are in life by choice." He went further to add that, apart from those things classified as calamities or catastrophes beyond our control e.g Cancer, the loss of a loved one etc, we are wired to weigh matters and make decisions that produce good success in our lives, edify others and ultimately glorify God. His point? Most of the things we moan, cry, murmur and complain about are products of our own failings. Its time to quit playing the blame game where everyone and everything apart from us have contributed to our misery and accept responsibility for our lives.

How can we do that in this year ?

[1] Accept - It may sound obvious but it is not. Unless you accept that something needs to be done and fast BY YOU,nothing will change and you'll continue in a mediocre existence.

[2] Evaluate - To evaluate is to reflect, analyse and take stock. You have to be brutally honest with yourself about the areas need to take responsibility in.

[3] Plan - Planning enables us to put structure into our thoughts. It highlights what we need to get the job done. It allows us to formulate a beginning, a middle and end of our journey towards change. Your plan must include checks and balances or a sort of accountability system that will ensure you don't chicken out at the first sign of resistance.

[4] Execute - The rubber must meet the road for the journey to begin. Following your plan will be the key to keep you on track and overcome hurdles on the way.

             A journey of a thousand miles begins with one step. Put your best foot forward and be on your way! After all, you are divinely positioned for success.

Mama's Release

It is the morning of my mother's release. Grandmama bustles around the kitchen like a little bird. Grandmama is never still, she's like a bird that has to keep on flying. She is always cooking, or cleaning, or talking on the phone or something. The only time she's still is when she falls asleep in front of the tv before she goes to bed. It's obvious she's nervous because she's moving around more than usual. I pick at my breakfast, uncomfortable in my dress and new shoes and irritable.

     "Stop playing with your oatmeal,young girl, just eat it."

     "Okay, Grandmama." I make little patterns with my spoon. I hate eating especially on this day.

     "Vic, mind you don't get any on your dress."

     "Yes, Grandmama."

     She sips her strong tea while standing at the sink, gazing at me over her cup. I glare at my bowl; I hate being looked at.

     "You look just like your mother did at your age. Skinny, quiet little thing. She was so sweet. Funny, how things can get ruined. Your mother was so innocent, too innocent really. That was probably my fault. And when she took up with that boy I should have known something wasn't right, but I just . . . . well, anyway . . . . "

     I don't say anything, preferring to create hills and valleys in my bowl of uji.

     She sighs. "Young girl, just put it in the sink and go on."

     "Yes, Grandmama."

     I go outside and sit on the front steps, waiting for Grandmama to finish getting ready. Sometimes it's hard for me to think about things in the moment. Like, now, I am thinking of how pretty Grandmama looked in the kitchen a few minutes ago, in her flowered dress, the light from the kitchen window touching her white hair. I am thinking about the years we've spent together, just her and me. It was nice, just the two of us. When I was younger, Grandmama would take me to the park for hours because she said that little girls need lots of sun to grow right. Like I was a plant or something. I am thinking about love, and utopia, and family and the aching hole inside. I wonder if my mother didn't get enough sun. Right now I want to know her, very badly. But I'm scared.

UTOPIA

My mother is a heroine addict who got sent to prison for selling drugs in school compounds. My father was a heroine addict, too, but he's dead now. I was born addicted to the junk, and sometimes, deep down, I feel like I'll always be a heroine addict, always have a gaping hole inside needing to be filled. Sometimes I hurt so bad, feel so empty, and I just want something, anything to fill me up or make me forget. That's how it is, being me. I guess that my mother felt bad for a long time, that's why she started doing drugs. Except knowing this doesn't make me feel any closer to her. Gazing at the watermarks on the ceiling, I wonder what it would feel like to be expectant. Not so alone, probably. Loved. But I also wonder how something like a baby could fit into someone like me.

My grandma won't let me wear make-up, so I wait until I am down the street before I pull out my kit and put it on under a tree. I am basically a good kid, obedient, respectful, but things are changing inside, I feel all confused most of the time now. I want to be a responsible woman, grown. I walk over to Weko's house. Weko's mother isn't home so we have the place to ourselves. Weko's mother is hardly ever home. We get high with some weed Weko got from her brother and sit out on her front bench, sipping the toxic stuff and talking. Two girls sitting on some steps, helpless against the sun pressing down, wilting slightly. Will we live? We're women, wrapped up in little girls. Right now I am happy because Weko likes my outfit; I just got it the day before. I stole it from Mama Kim boutique. One of the reasons that we are best friends is that she notices things about me, little things, not just my lipstick, but different moods and things. Paying attention goes a long way in friendships.

"What do you want to be when you grow up, Mouse?"  

I shrug. "I don't know." Because how can I say that I don't want to be anything, except alive, and loved? I don't like the question, it makes me uncomfortable. Sometimes I wonder if I'll be alive after high school. "Maybe a lawyer." 

Weko nods. "Yeah, that's cool. I think I want to be a dancer."

We don't say anything for a little while.None of us sure if the future actually holds any hope for us.
 
I mutter."That's a good one." We are silent again and I look out into the street, catching pieces of life, but not the whole thing, scraped knees, the sound of a baby crying, car engines, deep laughter. It's hot. "Utopia" is my word. I taste it on the tip of my tongue. It's a good word. It fits.

I LOVE THIS

Taso, the oldest of the three candidates, opened her shaking hands between each crack of a knuckle. She had scored the highest on the employee examination, and I selected her as my assistant.

Dressed in a long, flowered skirt and blue-checked blouse Taso raised a hand to straighten one of her short braids. Only girls who couldn't afford a hair dresser wore the homemade stubs.

I looked at her neat clothes and smiled. "Can you begin work this afternoon?"

"Yes, ma'am." Taso lifted her round black face.

"Before we go home we will stop at the market." I picked up my bag. "What do you eat?"

"For breakfast I eat corn meal mush. For lunch corn meal mush with bean and dried fish soup. If there are leftovers I eat them for supper."

We walked to the market and bought ground corn, dried fish, black-eyed peas, oil, tea bags, bread, rice, onions and spaghetti. Then we hiked two hours through the bush on a trail to my mud house in the village.

Reaching my home, I unlocked the door and turned to Taso. "After work each evening you are free to return to the city if you like."

Taso looked at the two, single bed frames with mattresses and mosquito nets which took up most of the space in the miniature room. An open square resembling a window frame faced us. It had neither glass nor screen.

"I will stay here each evening but go home on the weekends to check on my family."

I pointed. "That is your bed."

Taso set her sack on the mattress and unknotted the lumpy bag. There were two folded blouses, soap, towel, comb and body lotion. She had wrapped her belongings in her long wrap-a-round skirt, so she pressed out the wrinkles in it.

She had worn her best clothes for the interview. Since we were the same size, I gave her three skirts and four blouses, glad for the opportunity to reduce my large wardrobe.

"That room is for storage." I pointed. "There's a clothesline in there if you want to hang your clothes."

We stepped into the third room of the house. "This is a salon, but I store cooking utensils and food in here. I use either this charcoal or the kerosene stove. Can you cook with them?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"How did you cook at home?"

"I chopped firewood which we used for cooking on the fire."

I handed her a flask. "Each morning boil water and fill this thermos."

We were both tired. It was too late to cook, so we ate dry bread and water before sliding into bed under the nets.

At sunrise the next morning Taso hiked three hundred yards to the well. She returned again and again carrying heavy buckets to fill the large clay jar outside the house.

She carried a pail of water into the little stall built of flat stones. After bathing she dressed and poured another bucket of water into the booth for me to wash.

Taso arranged the pieces of charcoal, lit the stove, boiled water and prepared her mush. After breakfast, I opened the Bible and read. Then I handed her a large drawing pad, several pencils, two pens, a ruler and eraser.

For many years without computer support, every lesson was hand printed. A local person from the language group wrote out health lectures in the dialect. I dictated sentence by sentence while Taso wrote each word. She erased many times, but in the end the lectures were perfect.

At noon I suggested, "Let's have peas and rice."

While the beans cooked, Taso looked inside a plastic sack. "I should add the dried fish. Do you have a mortar and pestle?"

I shook my head. I glanced into the neighbor's yard where Taso pounded the fish. She returned to the house with a bowl of powered protein and stirred it into the cooked beans and rice. She dished out two heaping plates.

I swallowed a bite. "This is delicious. You are an excellent cook. I would like to meet your family and see your home."

Taso grunted and nodded. "This weekend."

After siesta the patients arrived for treatment. Taso interpreted. It took hours to translate sentence after sentence, teach lectures, show posters and train women how to cook weaning foods for their babies.
Friday evening after work we hired a taxi to the main junction, and then walked down a long garbage-filled ally. Old, dilapidated buildings lined the end of the road. Taso's mother, two unwed sisters and their children rested on hand-wovenmats on the packed earth floor. No furniture. Half of the thatch roof had collapsed inside the small chamber made of rusted pieces of aluminum siding.

As I left her with her family I took her hand. "You are welcome to spend the weekends in my home."
She puckered her brows as if to say, I came to visit my family. Instead, she said. "I want to eat my mother's slimy food. I've missed her stretchy murere soup."

"I understand you miss your mother's cooking. I sometimes miss foods from my country."
Throughout the week each evening after the sun set, I struck the match for the bush lantern. Squinting my eyes from the kerosene fumes, I pulled out my notebook and pen to write in my journal. After I finished, I lit four candles to read a novel.

Taso always sat in the wooden chair opposite me and stared at the wall.
I was quiet the first week assuming she wanted silence. For she often closed her eyes for several minutes and moved her lips as if in prayer. The rest of the time she looked intently at the black, mud wall for hours each evening.
One evening I stopped writing. "Taso, would you like one of my books to read?"
"No thank you, ma'am."
"You are free to do whatever you like."
"I know." Taso kept staring at the wall.
"Would you like something to do? I have word games."
"I am doing something."
"What are you doing?"
"Resting," She sighed.
"Did I give you too much work to do?"
Taso laughed. "No. Serving you is easier than my business was. And you pay me more each week than I ever earned."
"Where is your business?"
"I abandoned it to work for you." She smiled.
"Why?"
"I woke at three each morning and started the fire. I mixed flour, egg, oil and milk. Then I shaped the mixture into fifty doughnuts, which I deep-fried." Taso moved her weight on the wooden chair. "After bathing and dressing, I put all the beignets in a glass box and set it on my head. Then I walked to the open market. From morning until dark I trekked all over the city hawking my fried cakes."

"Hiking in the hot sun all day is tiring."
"I forced myself to keep going." Taso shook her head. "I had to sell ten doughnuts to pay for the ingredients. I had to sell another ten to buy food for my family."
"Now I understand why you rest each evening."

"I'm resting in God's presence, meditating, recouping my strength, thinking of God's promises and waiting on the Lord."

Taso knew how to enter God's rest. Hebrews 4:9-11 "There remains a rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his."

When I'm tempted to constantly keep busy, I remember this excerpt. Stopping, I close my eyes and count my blessings, take in a breath of relaxation and wait on the Lord.

My One of a Kind

I Met A Friend Some Years Ago, Though Different From The Rest
A Friend I'm Proud To Say Is, One Of My Very Best
Someone That Often Makes Me Laugh, Each Time I Pay A Call
A Friend I Won’t Forget You See, She's Different From Them All 

My Friend Has Lived Upon This Earth, For Quite A Length Of Time
And God Found Me Deserving, Of This Special Friend Of Mine
She Can Easily Warm The Coldest Day, With A Mere Sweet Gentle Smile
Asking Little In Return, Only That You Sit Awhile 

The Gap Between This Friend And I, Seems Many Years To Some
What Could I Have In Common, With God’s Precious Senior One
Well Let Me Tell You Something, That Will Make You Think Again
If You Ever Meet A Friend Like Her, You Will Understand It Then 

Would You Ever Ask A Young One, For Valuable Advice
Have You Noticed How An Antique, Increases Much In Price
And Trees Provide Much Greater Shade, When Roots Are Strong And Deep
A Coin, As It Gets Older, Is Wise To Save And Keep 

I Often Think About Her, And Her Warm And Gentle Hands
I Truly Think, I Got To Meet, One Of God's Most Gentle Lambs
I Could Not Ask For Too Much More, She Is What Life's All About
A True Friend For A Lifetime, Is What I Have, No Doubt.

By Maggie.

Back to the drawing board

And Laban said to Jacob, because you are my brother, should you not therefore serve me for nothing? Tell me, what shall your wages be? And Jacob loved Rachael; and said, I will serve you seven years for Rachael your younger daughter. - Genesis 29:15,18

Memories are like stones, time and distance erode them like acid. - Ugo Betti, Italian dramatist and poet.

...................

         Hollywood must be green with envy at the mastery of the script. Flawless. Creative. Dramatic and of course, romantic. A classic love-at-first-sight story. A fugitive on the run finds love. It overflows his heart crowding out his worries and calming his fears; energizing him with passion to face life. No its not a fable, its the true story of Jacob's life. He meets Rachael, his uncle's daughter and the rest, like they say , is history.

         Problem is, Jacob not only forgets the fury of his brother Esau's wrath, he also totally forgets his divine encounter in which the Lord God of heaven promises to give the land he is lying on to him ad his descendants.

         How do I know he forgot? Right after his encounter with God, in the very next chapter, he is given an opportunity to determine his wages. Isn't it shockingly amazing that, of all the things he could quote and quantify, he decides he wants to work for something God has promised to GIVE him? I am sure by the time God had said 'descendants' he had calculated for the wife factor. In any case, he laboured to earn a wife. Why? She was a built in, integral part of God's promise to him.

      Things don't work out as he plans and he finds himself in the thick of the conspiracy of all time. As a trickster he has found his match in Laban. he worked for Rachael but landed Leah. Its difficult to adequately capture the myriad of emotions he experienced, from anger to bitterness to crushing disappoint to shocked offense.

     Jacob was promised land by God, to be a ruler and owner and God promised to bless his generations. He got distracted by Rachael and her her stunning beauty. This made him a slave instead of a ruler. because he served his uncle fourteen years for her.

      If Jacob had only on his God given vision, he would still have gotten a wife from God and dominion over the land he had been promised.

     There are areas in our lives that we try to do things in our way yet God has commanded us to do other things His way. We derail from God's purpose for our lives and lose the mark the moment we stop following God's instructions and start doing our own things.

      This ends up frustrating us an at that point we stop fulfilling God's perfect purpose for our lives.

     Are there areas in your life that you left God long ago and you cannot trace your purpose? You have to go back to the drawing board and seek God to lead you again.

    Before making a decision, review where you've been with God first. That way you are sure that you are walking with Him and not forgetting any part of the deal. After all, Cesare Pavese (Italian novelist and poet), reminds us "The richness of life lies in the memories we have forgotten."

Make me Whole Again

I tried so hard to walk beside you.But when I looked up, you were hardly in view.It wasn't because you were walking too fast,but I turned around and begin to look back at things I thought would quench my thirst.

I made them my gods, and put them first.Yes, once again I looked away,but thank You Lord, You refused me to stray.Wallering down in the pit of filth,your loving hand began to sift through all my sin cleansing my soul.

Once again Lord, You've made me WHOLE.

Broken once, then broken again,how faithful You are my God and my friend.Searching my heart You only find sin,but you knock like before and ask to come in.As I slowly look up with tears in my eyes,
You assure me gently that I am Your child.

"But God not once, not twice, but everyday my selfish heart wants things now, my own way."
"Patience and time, keep seeking me,you'll grow my child, just trust and you'll see."
"But sin has filled my heart and its deep,but you OH LORD make me strong when I'm weak."

Give me the strength of Job through the trials,
Give me the song of David as He looked to the skies.
Give me the faithfulness that Ruth had within,
Give me perserverance as Paul's, when people condemn.
Give me love as Hosea's for his unfaithful wife,
Give me forgiveness as You had when Peter denied.

So grab my hand, I don't want to let go,I want to walk with you Lord, each day help me grow.Redeeming love you've shown to me and you've released me from sin, into Your arms I rest.
In Your hands I place all my cares,your peace surrounds me as I feel You there.Your promises are faithful, Your covenant true.

You've brought me out of the pit Lord, and I am walking with You!!

This is Jesus Checking in today.

A minister passing through his church in the middle of the day, decided to pause by the altar and see who had come to pray.Just then the back door opened, a man came down the aisle.The minister frowned as he saw the man hadn't shaved in a while.His shirt was kinda shabby and his coat was worn.The man knelt, he bowed his head, then rose and walked away. In the days that followed, each noon time came this guy,each time he knelt just for a moment, a lunch box in his lap.

Well, the minister's suspicions grew, with robbery a main fear,he decided to stop the man and ask him, "What are you doing here?" The old man said, he worked down the road. Lunch was half an hour.Lunchtime was his prayer time, for finding strength and power."I stay only moments, see, because the factory is so far away;As I kneel here talking to the Lord, this is what I say:

"I JUST CAME AGAIN TO TELL YOU, LORD, HOW HAPPY I'VE BEEN, SINCE WE FOUND EACH OTHERS FRIENDSHIP AND YOU TOOK AWAY MY SIN.

DON'T KNOW MUCH OF HOW TO PRAY, BUT I THINK ABOUT YOU EVERYDAY. SO, JESUS, THIS IS JIM CHECKING IN TODAY."

The minister feeling foolish, told Jim, that was fine. He told the man he was welcome to come and pray just anytime. Time to go, Jim smiled, said "Thanks." He hurried to the door. The minister knelt at the altar, he'd never done it before. His cold heart melted, warmed with love, and met with Jesus there. As the tears flowed, in his heart, he repeated old Jim's prayer:

"I JUST CAME AGAIN TO TELL YOU, LORD, HOW HAPPY I'VE BEEN, SINCE WE FOUND EACH OTHER'S FRIENDSHIP AND YOU TOOK AWAY MY SIN.

I DON'T KNOW MUCH OF HOW TO PRAY, BUT I THINK ABOUT YOU EVERYDAY. SO, JESUS, THIS IS ME CHECKING IN TODAY."

Past noon one day, the minister noticed that old Jim hadn't come. As more days passed without Jim, he began to worry some. At the factory, he asked about him, learning he was ill. The hospital staff was worried, but he'd given them joy. The week that Jim was with them,he brought changes in the ward.

His smiles, a joy contagious. Changed people, were his reward.The head nurse couldn't understand why Jim was so glad, when no flowers, calls or cards came, not a visitor he had. The minister stayed by his bed, he voiced the nurse's concern:

No friends came to show they cared. He had nowhere to turn.

Looking surprised, old Jim spoke up and with a smile; "the nurse is wrong, she couldn't know, that in here all the while everyday at noon He's here, a dear friend of mine, you see, He sits right down, takes my hand, leans over and says to me:

"I JUST CAME AGAIN TO TELL YOU, JIM, HOW HAPPY I HAVE BEEN, SINCE WE FOUND THIS FRIENDSHIP, AND I TOOK AWAY YOUR SIN.

ALWAYS LOVE TO HEAR YOU PRAY, I THINK ABOUT YOU EACH DAY,

AND SO JIM, THIS IS JESUS CHECKING IN TODAY."

Scarred and broken

The society will say,

"That type of thing doesn't happen around here.
She must like it if she stays.
Some women like to stir up trouble."

Domestic violence is a subject engulfed with myths.The reality is often quite different.

Why doesn't she just leave?It's the first question people ask.

She stays because she hopes it will get better. Maybe they can get help. Maybe she will make him happy again. Maybe it will stop.

She stays because she is ashamed that they have come to this, that she has allowed him to treat her this way, that she has taken him back so many times before and he has disappointed her again.

She stays because she doesn't have enough money to start all over again. She hasn't held a job before, or she doesn't earn enough to support herself and the kids because he had promised her that he will always provide. She's scared to try to make it alone.

She stays because she is afraid. He has told her that she had better never try to leave him. He says that he will find her no matter where she goes. He says that he'll take away her kids and run. He says he will track her down and kill her. She knows that he means it.

The society blames her for not being able to keep her home intact.It blames her for not being a supportive wife.BUT then for how long is she going to support her husband?Till she's scarred,broken and dead?

Blood groups and personality

I never knew that my blood group plays a big role in my personality.Check this out and group yourself.

• Blood Type A - Tend to be cooperative, sensitive, clever, passionate and smart. Often bottling up anxiety in order to get along with others, they may hold in their emotions until they explode. Many are tense, impatient and unable to sleep well. While they are capable of leadership positions, they may not take them because the stress is not good for their tightly wired systems. In Japan many "A"'s are in research. They have roles in discovering more about and refining science, economics, manufacturing, etc. Their research on microflora and other areas of medicine is some of the best and most meticulous in the world. They are perfectionists to say the least.
  Blood type A's tend to have more sensitive constitutions. Too much stress weakens their immunity more quickly than other blood types. Low stomach acid is common among blood type A's even from birth, so special care should be taken when eating animal proteins.They also eat raw fish which is much easier to digest than cooked.

• Blood Type B - Blood type B individuals tend to be balanced: thoughtful like A's and yet ambitious like O's. They are empathetic, easily understanding others' points of view, yet often hesitating to challenge or confront. Chameleon-like and flexible, they make good friends.

Peter D'Adamo found that While their immunity is strong, they are more prone to slow-growing viral infections like lupus, MS and chronic fatigue.
They may also have problems with hypoglycemia and blood sugar, especially if they eat the wrong foods.

• Blood Type AB - Tend to be very charming and popular. They don't sweat the small stuff and can be seen as spiritual and even at times a bit "flaky". Only about 2 - 5% of the population are blood type AB. There is never a dull moment in a AB's life, so if you find one for a friend, consider yourself lucky! Youll enjoy some exciting times together! Like blood type A's, AB's react to stress poorly. They are stronger and more active than type A's, but need to pay attention to stress levels so that they don't compromise their immunity.
• Sometimes it is difficult to be an AB. AB's don't like to fit in anyone else's "boxes". If they feel too confined, they'll break out of that box and do things their own way. When it comes to food choices and AB must discover when they are more B-like or A-like. For example, dairy foods like milk can be excellent for them or not good at all.

• Blood Type O - Tend to be loners or leaders and are intuitive, focused, self-reliant and daring. They handle stress better than other blood types and have strong immune systems, a well developed physique and a physically active nature. Blood type O's tend to have sluggish blood flow and feel better with vigorous exercise for about an hour each day.

So is it true or false?

The unuttered bible

His name is David. He has wild hair, wears a safaricom T-shirt with holes in it, jeans and red flip-flops. This was literally his wardrobe for his entire four years of college. He is brilliant. Kind of mysterious and very, very bright. He became a Christian recently while attending college.

Across the street from the campus is a well-dressed, very conservative church. One day David decides to go there. He walks in with red flip-flops, jeans, his T-shirt, and wild hair. The service has already started and So David starts down the aisle looking for a seat.

The church is completely packed and he can't find a seat. By now people are really looking a bit uncomfortable, but no one says anything. David gets closer and closer and closer to the pulpit and, when he realizes there are no seats, he just squats down right on the carpet. (Although perfectly acceptable behavior at a college fellowship, trust me, this had never happened in this church before! )

By now the people are really uptight, and the tension in the air is thick. About this time, the minister realizes that from way at the back of the church, an Elder is slowly making his way toward David. Now the Elder is in his sixties, has white hair, and a three-piece suit. A godly man, very elegant, very dignified, very courtly. He walks with a 'mkongojo' and, as he starts walking toward this boy, everyone is saying to themselves that you can't blame him for what he's going to do.

How can you expect a man of his age and of his background to understand some college kid on the floor? It takes a long time for the man to reach the boy. The church is utterly silent except for the clicking of the man's cane.

All eyes are focused on him. You can't even hear anyone breathing. The minister can't even preach the sermon until the Elder does what he has to do. And now they see this elderly man drop his cane on the floor. With great difficulty he lowers himself and sits down next to David and worships with him so he won't be alone.

Everyone chokes up with emotion. When the minister gains control, he says, "What I'm about to preach, you will never remember. What you have just seen, you will never forget. Be careful how you live. You may be the only Bible some people will ever read."

Wife and Husband.

Wife: You always carry my photo in your handbag to the office. Why?

Husband: When there is a problem, no matter how impossible, I look at your picture and the problem disappears.

Wife: You see, how miraculous and powerful am I for you?

Husband: Yes, I see your picture and say to myself, "What other problem can there be greater than this one?"

Lord ,my wife doesn't know what I go through

A man was sick and tired of going to work every day while his wife stayed home. He wanted her to see what he went through so he prayed: "Dear Lord: I go to work every day and put in 8 hours while my wife merely stays at home. I want her to know  what I go through, so please allow her body to switch with mine for a day.

God, in his infinite wisdom, granted the man's wish. The next morning, sure enough, the man awoke as a woman. He arose, cooked breakfast for his wife, awakened the kids, Set out their school clothes, fed them breakfast, packed their lunches, Drove them to school, came home and picked up the dirty clothes,washed them.  And stopped at the bank to make a deposit, went grocery shopping, Then drove home to put away the groceries, Paid the bills. He cleaned the cattle shed. Then it was already 1 P.M. and he hurried to make the beds, and sweep and mop the kitchen floor. Ran to the school to pick up the kids and got into an argument with them on the way home. Set out snacks and got the kids organized to do their homework, then set up the ironing board and watched TV while he did the ironing. At 4:30 he began peeling potatoes and washing vegetables for supper, prepared rice and snapped fresh beans for supper.

After supper, he cleaned the kitchen, ran the dishwasher, folded clean laundry, bathed the kids, and put them to bed. At 9 P.M. He was exhausted and, though his daily chores weren't finished, he went to bed where he was expected to play the role as a wife, which he managed to get through without complaint.

The next morning, he awoke and immediately knelt by the bed and said, Lord, I don't know what I was thinking. I was so wrong to envy my wife's being able to stay home all day. Please, oh please, let us trade back." The Lord, in his infinite wisdom, replied, "My son, I feel you have learned your lesson and I will be happy to change things back to the way they were.

About Einstein

Once the professor of a university challenged his students with this question. "Did God create everything that exists?"

A student answered bravely, "Yes,he did".

The professor then asked, "If God created everything, then he created evil. Since evil exists (as noticed by our own actions), so God is evil.

The student couldn't respond to that statement causing the professor to conclude that he had "proved" that "belief in God" was a fairy tale, and therefore worthless.

Another student raised his hand and asked the professor, "May I pose a question? ",
"Of course" answered the professor. The young student stood up and asked : "Professor does Cold exists?"


The young student answered, "In fact sir, Cold does not exist.According to the laws of Physics, what we consider cold, in fact is the absence of heat. Anything is able to be studied as long as it transmits, energy (heat). Absolute Zero is the total absence of heat, but cold does not exist. What we have done is create a term to describe how we feel if we don't have body heat or we are not hot." "And, does Dark exist?", he continued.

The professor answered "Of course".

This time the student responded, "Again you're wrong, Sir. Darkness does not exist either. Darkness is in fact simply the absence of light. Light can be studied, darkness can not. Darkness cannot be broken down. A simple ray of light tears the darkness and illuminates the surface where the light beam finishes. Dark is a term that we humans have created to describe what happens when there's lack of light."

Finally, the student asked the professor, "Sir, does evil exist?"

The professor replied, "Of course it exists, as I mentioned at the beginning, we see violations, crimes and violence anywhere in the world, and those things are evil."

The student responded, "Sir, Evil does not exist. Just as in the previous cases, Evil is a term which man has created to describe the result of the absence of God's presence in the hearts of man.

After this, the professor bowed down his head, and didn't answer back.

The young man's name was " ALBERT EINSTEIN."

STEVE JOBS

I dropped out of Reed College after the first six months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: “We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?” They said: “Of course.” My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents’ savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn’t see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn’t all romantic. I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends’ rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it’s likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.
Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn’t know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down – that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.” It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn’t even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor’s code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you’d have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I’m fine now.

This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poeti touch. This was in the late 1960′s, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors and Polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.” It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Thank you.

The Apple of Love

"Can I see my baby?" the happy new mother asked. When the bundle was nestled in her arms and she moved the fold of cloth to look upon his tiny face, she gasped. The doctor turned quickly and looked out the tall hospital window.

The baby had been born without ears. Time proved that the baby's hearing was perfect. It was only his appearance that was marred. When he rushed home from school one day and flung himself into his mother's arms, she sighed, knowing that his life was to be a succession of heartbreaks. He blurted out the tragedy. "A boy, a big boy...called me a freak."

He grew up, handsome for his misfortune. A favorite with his fellow students, he might have been class president, but for that. He developed a gift, a talent for literature and music. "But you might mingle with other young people," his mother reproved him, but felt a kindness in her heart.

The boy's father had a session with the family physician..."Could nothing be done?" "I believe I could graft on a pair of outer ears, if they could be procured" the doctor decided. Whereupon the search began for a person who would make such a sacrifice for a young man.

Two years went by. One day, his father said to the son, "You're going to the hospital, son. Mother and I have someone who will donate the ears you need. But it's a secret," said the father. The operation was a brilliant success, and a new person emerged. His talents blossomed into genius, and school and college became a series of triumphs.

Later he married and led the diplomatic service. One day, he asked his father, "Who gave me the ears? Who gave me so much? I could never do enough for him or her." "I do not believe you could, "said the father, "but the agreement was that you are not to know...not yet." The years kept their profound secret, but the day did come. One of the darkest days that ever pass through a son. He stood with his father over his mother's casket. Slowly, tenderly, the father stretched forth a hand and raised the thick, black-brown hair to reveal the mother had no outer ears. "Mother said she was glad she never let her hair be cut," his father whispered gently, "and nobody ever thought mother less beautiful, did they"?