Don’t ever stop believing in your own personal transformation. It is still happening even on the days you may not realize it or feel like it.
His famous, soul-stirring "I have a dream" speech will still give you chills and break your heart today. Decades later, long after his life on earth tragically ended, the legacy of his burden lives on, improving lives for generations to come. All because one man allowed his burden to birth a dream.
When others seem to take advantage of you, do not retaliate by trying to take advantage of them. Use your power in improving yourself, so that you can do better and better work. That is how you are going to win in the race. Later on, those who tried to take advantage of you will be left in the rear. Remember, those who are dealing unjustly with you or with anybody are misusing their mind. They are therefore losing their power, and will, in the course of time, begin to lose ground; but if you, in the mean time, are turning the full power of your mind to good account, you will not only gain more power, but you will soon begin to gain ground. You will gain and continue to gain in the long run, while others who have been misusing their minds will lose mostly everything in the long run. That is how you are going to win, and win splendidly regardless of ill treatment or opposition.
We have indeed, felt the effects of the epic journey that has been our life. We have covered a lot of ground, parenting, marriage, career, family and otherwise, and at times, surely, have felt the worse for the wear, especially when different circumstances have chewed us up and spit us out! When it felt as if the kiln was stoked to maximum heat levels, and that we would shatter into a billion pieces that would never all be found! There are some differences now, having a little more seasoning to us. First of all, now we understand there is no such thing as being finished. There is always more firing, refining and glazing we can experience, and it is only a matter of when and how, not if we will do so. Secondly, we look forward to it, knowing now it would take more heat than possible to break us beyond repair.
Why is it we must suffer the loss of something so dear before we realize what a treasure we had?Why must the sun be darkened before we feel how genuinely impossible it is to live without its warmth?Why within the misery of absence does love grow by such bounds?Why must life be this way?It is a strange existence where such suffering makes us far better people.
I am just a guy, doing my best to be the best person I can be.And, every once in a while, I fuck up the moment I’m in.Please. Get over it. Get over yourselves. Get over this weird need to be morally superior to me and to the other people in this world.And let me be imperfect. I assure you, my imperfections drive me to improve.Let me love myself. I assure you, loving myself despite my faults will only make me a better person.Let me be my own judge. I assure you, I’ll be more fair and just than you ever will.Let me be the owner of my own intentions. I assure you, there isn’t another soul on earth who knows what my real intentions are but me.Love and acceptance despite ongoing and glaring imperfection is all I’ve ever tried to attain with this blog. For me. For you. For everyone. And I’ll never stop.
To be able to listen -- really, wholly passively, self-effacingly listen -- without presupposing, classifying, improving, controverting, evaluating, approving or disapproving, without dueling with what is being said, without rehearsing the rebuttal in advance, without free-associating to portions of what is being said so that succeeding portions are not heard at all -- such listening is rare.