Chicken Soup for the Soul

Love: The Creative Force
A college professor had his sociology class go into the Baltimore slums to get case histories of 200 young boys. They were asked to write an evaluation of each boy's future. In every case the students wrote, "He hasn't got a chance."

Twenty-five years later, another sociology professor came across the earlier study. He has his students follow up on the project to see what had happened to these boys. With the exception of 20 boys who had moved away or not contacted, the students learned that 176 of the remaining 180 had achieved more than ordinary success as lawyers, doctors and businessmen.

The professor was astounded so he decided to pursue the matter further. Fortunately, all the men were in the area, and he was able to speak to each one. "How do you account for your success?" In each case the reply came with a feeling: "There was a teacher."

The teacher was still alive, so he sought her out and asked the old but still alert lady what magic formula she had used to pull these boys out of the slums and into successful achievement.

The teacher's eyes sparkled and her lips broke into a gentle smile. "It's really very simple," she said. I believed those boys."

-Eric Butterworth / Chicken Soup for the Soul

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On Courage
A little girl was suffering from a rare and serious disease. Her only chance of recovery appeared to be a blood transfusion from her five year-old brother, who had miraculously survived the same disease because he had developed the antibodies needed to combat the illness.

The doctor explained the situation to her little brother and asked him whether he was ready to transfer blood. He hesitated for only a moment, then took a deep breath and said, "Yes, I'll do it if it will make my sister healthy."

As the transfusion progressed, he lay in a bed next to his sister. He smiled as seeing the color returning to her cheeks. Then his face grew pale and his smile faded. He looked up at the doctor and asked with a trembling voice, "Will I start to die right away? Please save my deer sister."

Being young, the boy had misunderstood the doctor; he thought he was going to have to give her all his blood.

-Dan Millman/Chicken Soup for the Soul
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A Brother Like That!
I was received a beautiful bicycle as a birthday present. One day, when I took a ride on my bicycle in the park, a boy was walking around the bicycle, admiring it.
"Is this your bicycle?", he asked.
"My brother gave it to me on my birthday", I replied with pride and satisfaction.
"Oh, I wish....", he hesitated.
Of course I knew what he was going to wish for. He was going to wish he had a brother like that. But what the boy said was unexpected to me:
"I wish," the boy went on slowly, "that I could be a brother like that". I saw his face full of determination. Then, he went to the bench behind me, where his little crippled brother was sitting and said:
"Someday, I'm gonna give you a wheelchair on your birthday."
-Dan Clark

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See

allwomenstalk


Chicken Soup for The Soul
 

It was a hot, sunny day and a man was lounging at the hotel pool. Clad in a bright orange swimsuit and sleek wrap-around sunglasses, the man casually sipped a frozen drink.   


Soon a woman lay down on the chaise to the right of him and commented, “What a drag.  There are clouds in the sky and one of them is going to cover the sun. It’s even getting windy.”

The man in the sunglasses replied, “No it’s a wonderful day. Can’t you see the birds chirping in the tree?  Can’t you see that the clouds and breeze will cool down the blistering heat?”

In moment, it started to sprinkle. The woman complained, “What did I tell you. This rain ruins everything. “The man in sunglasses said, “No it doesn’t.  Can’t you see that the magnificent, fragrant flowers blossoming all around us and freshly cutgrass need the rain?”

Soon a couple pulled up chairs and sat town to the left of him. “You idiot. I can’t believe you locked the key in the room, “the man yelled at his wife. “Yeah, but you big imbecile, you forgot to bring the suntan lotion,” she replied.

The man in the sunglasses interrupted, “Can you see there is another key at the front desk and probably lots of lotion in the gift shop? Can’t you see that fighting over shallow thing is waste of precious life?”

A mother sitting two seats away asked her son if he would please pick up a heavy box and take it to the car. He complained “Oh, Mom, my back hurts, I’m tired, and ouch! I just got something in my eye!”

The man in the sunglasses turned to the lad. “Can’t you see there are people in this world who give anything just to be able to bend over and lift something?”

Just then, a woman came from the room behind the wall with a wheelchair. She helped hoist the paralyzed, blind man would into the seat, rearranged his sunglasses, carefully wheeled him out the gate and extended his telescopic white cane so that he could tap his way back to his hotel room.

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The Art of Being Alive

allwomenstalk

Chicken Soup for The Soul

Pain can be a signal to grow, not necessarily to suffer.

Once we learn the lesson that the pain teaches us, the pain goes away.

I played foodball for 13 years. My dreams of being an NFL star were on the horizon when I was hit in a practice tackling drill. My eye drooped, I experienced speech loss, my right side was numb and my right arm dangled at my side. My arm stayed numb and hung helplessly at my side for well over a year. It was a physical injury but it affected my whole life. 

Being right-handed, I couldn’t write, and the constant pain made concentration on work impossible.

I didn’t have have control over my muscle spasms, and every now and then my nerves would unexpectedly twinge and contract my shoulder, which whipped my arm out! One night, I knocked a bowl of dressing off the dinner table, and my younger brother showed up to the next meal wearing a batting helmet and goggles! 

I went to 16 of the best doctors in North America and they all concluded I would never recover. My dreams were shattered, my heart was broken and my life slowly fell apart.

Although I kept playing ball, I had to play with my arm strapped to my side. Eventually I had to give it up and I hit rock bottom. Totally confused and depressed, I decided to take my life. Obviously I didn’t and today I enjoy a 95 percent recover. So what three things did I learn from this experience and how does it relate to you?

1/  I kept playing football – even though there was a chance for total paralysis -  because I was unable to let go of the past.

We’ve all been raised to believe that what we’ve been in the past makes us who we are. No matter what our past has been, we have a spotless future. Only when I let go of the past did I become emotionally available to embrace change, dream a new dream and get on with her life. (the life) I learned that we cannot and should not a cling to the past. 

Lesson: When your horse died, dismount!

2/ Why would I want to quite or kill myself? 

I was somebody because I was an athlete. When I was injured, suddenly I was a nobody.  Why?  When  we  identify ourselves in terms of what we do, instead of who we are, we become a human doing instead of what we do, instead of who we are, we become a human doing instead of a human being.  If lasting happiness is what we seek, we must realize we are not our bodies, our sport cars, our houses or our country club memberships. 

Lesson: We must be more than those superficial things!

3/ Why didn’t  I quit?  I  stopped focusing on having fame and started forcusing on being whole. I started focusing on obvious purposes instead of just setting goals.

I listened to a Zig Zaglar tape on motivation which insprired me to start dreaming again. He taught “If you don’t have a dreaming, how are you going to make adream come true?” That fired me up to do whatever it took to get better physically.

This  significant  awakening  tought  me a philosophy that affects my life each and every day. 

Lesson: It is summarized by I. Stone, who says:

The most visible creators are those artists whose medium is life it self.   The ones who express the inexpressible without brush, hammer, clay, or guitar.  Their medium is being. Whatever their presence touches has increased life. They see and don’t have to draw. They are the artists of being alive.

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Puppy Love

 
 allwomenstalk


Chicken Soup for The Soul
 

The young boy who had been wearing a steel brace on his left leg for the last four months walked through the front door of his home with a newly purchased puppy in his arms.  


 The dog didn’t have a hip socket and, when placed on the floor, it walked with a serious limp.  


The boy’s selection of a physically challenged puppy intrigued his parents, for he had been down-and-out.  But with his new companion at his side, they sensed a newly revitalized spirit of hope and enthusiasm emerging from his soul.

The next day the young boy and his mom went to see a veterinarian to find out how he could best help his little dog.   


The doctor explained that if he stretched and massaged his puppy’s leg every morning and then walked with him at least one mile per day, the muscles around his missing hip would eventually strengthen to the point of no pain and less of a limp.

Although the dog whimpered and barked out his discomfort, and the boy winced and hassled with his own leg brace, for the next two months they religiously kept to their rehabilitation regimen.   


By the third month they were walking three miles every morning before school began and they were both walking without pain.

One Saturday morning when returning from their workout, a cat leaped out of the bushes and startled the dog.  Breaking loose of the leash, the dog darted into oncoming traffic.   


With a speeding truck only seconds away, the boy ran into the street, dove for his dog, and rolled into the gutter. He was too late. 


The dog was hit and bleeding profusely from the mouth. As the boy lay there crying and hugging his dying dog, he noticed that his own leg brace had broken off.

With no time to worry about himself, he sprang to his feet, picked up his dog, cuddled it close to  him and started for home.   


The dog quietly barked, giving him hope and turning the boy’s jog into an all-out, adrenaline sprint.

His mother rushed him and his suffering pup to the pet hospital. As they anxiously waited to see if his dog would survive the surgery, he asked his mother why he could now walk and run.

“You had osteomyelitis, which is a disease of the bone,” she said. “It weakened and crippled your leg, which caused you to limp in severe pain.  Your brace was for support.  It wasn’t necessarily a permanent condition if you were willing to fight through the pain and hours of therapy.  You responded well to the medication, but you always resisted our encouragement for physical therapy, and your father and I didn’t know what to do.   


The doctors told us you were about to lose your leg. 


Then you brought home your puppy and seemed to understand his needs.  Ironically, as you were helping him, you were actually helping yourself to strength then and grow.”

 

Just then the operating room door slowly opened. Out walked the veterinarian with a smile on his face. “Your dog is going to make it,” he said.

And, the boy learned that when you lose yourself, you find yourself.  It is more blessed to give, then receive.

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I Will Do More

allwomemstalk

Chicken Soup for The Soul

Passionate determination is the feeling you need to get ahead in life.  To make it work for you, try learning this:

I am only one, but I am one.

I cannot do everything, but I can do something.

And what I can do, I ought to do.

And what I ought to do, by the grace of God, I will do.

I will do more than belong – I will participate.

I will do more than care – I will help.

I will do more than I believe – I will practice.

I will do more than be fairr – I will be kind.

I will do more than dream – I will work.

I will do more than teach – I will inspire.

I will do more the earn – I will enrich.

I will do more than give – I will serve.

I will do more than live – I will grow.

I will do more than talk – I will act.

I will do more than be good – I will be good for something.

……………………..

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A Very Bad Day

allwomenstalk


Chicken Soup for The Soul

Michelle had a terrible day at school. When she got home she found her little brother and his friend playing with her lipstick.  “Stay out of my stuff, you little pest,” she shrieked.

Her brother’s face turned beet red.  He apologized but Michelle didn’t let up.  She ignored him during dinner and even the next morning as she got ready for school.  



He begged her not to mad at him and to forgive him.  But she decided to hold her grudge and make him pay, thinking she would accept his apology later that afternoon.

Sadly, when she came home from school, it was too late.  



She found her brother’s badly twisted bike on the lawn.  Her mother and father were sitting in the front room crying. There on the ground, with a sheet over his head, was her little brother. Johnny was dead.

Michelle begged him to be alive.  She thought of all the reasons she loved him.  She wished she could take him in her arms and say, “I love you, I forgive you.

………………………………

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Pause And Patiently Ponder

allwomenstalk


Chicken Soup for The Soul

A man came out of his home to admire his new truck. To his puzzlement, his three-year-old son was happily hammering dents into the shiny paint. The man ran to his son, knocked him away and hammered the little boy’s hand into a pulp as punishment.

When the father calmed down, he rushed his son to the hospital. Although the doctor tried desperately to save the crushed bones, he finally had to amputate the fingers from both of the boy’s hands.

When the child woke up from surgery and saw his bandaged stubs, he innocently said, “Daddy, I’m sorry about your truck.” Then he asked, “But when are my fingers going to grow back?”

The father went home and committed suicide.

Think about this story the next time you see someone spill milk at the dinner or hear a baby crying. Think first before you lose your patience with someone you love. 


Trucks can be repaired. Broken bones and hurt feelings often can’t.

Too often we fail to recognize the difference between the person and the performance. 


People make mistakes. We are allowed to make mistakes. But the actions we take while in a rage will haunt us forever.

Pause and ponder. Think before you act. Be patient. Understand and love.

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