AND SO IT IS

And So It Is

When I’m alone

My thoughts they roam

With no apparent plan.

Sometimes I try

But away they fly

Stay focused? I rarely can.

But are we supposed

To always show

An end result for a thought?

Or maybe we

Are supposed to be

Exactly how we are.

An original poem by Nancy Elizabeth Luz (c) 2011

Yesterday the discussion was about staying focused. That the ability to focus is what constitutes success. I still believe that is true, but focusing on being focused all the time, not only is exhausting it's impossible. 

So enjoy those times that a wandering mind demands. Creativity bubbles up when the mind is at rest. The key? Balance. When creativity strikes, that's the time to act. 

Realizing your dream may take a concentrated effort; but if your dream contains the spirit of you, it will be like no effort at all - more like flowing with the stream, riding the wind, sailing the current.

"Through work you charge all things you fashion with the breath of your own spirit."  

Kahlil Gibran (1883-1931)

Make every effort the spirit of you. 

DISCIPLINE

Discipline: to train oneself to do something in a controlled and habitual way.  It is something we all strive for, know we should be better at, or fail miserably when attempting to be so. 

A good source of self-inflicted guilt, discipline can hang over our heads like a black cloud.

Maybe that's because the other meaning behind the word contains punishment. Discipline also means: to train someone to obey rules or codes of behavior, utilizing punishment to correct disobedience. 

No wonder we so easily resist discipline. We wouldn't punish ourselves! We can get away with not doing, right?

But we do punish ourselves, through guilt. When I began these writings I was determined to write six days a week, taking only Saturdays off. And I did well for a while. Then the lens became less focused. Entries felt repetitious. Readership leveled. Does a lack of vision promote complacency? Does complacency make me feel guilty when I don't write? 

You see, discipline involves focus. An ideal must be set. Regarding Smiles, Frowns, and Kisses, I was hoping the vision would become clearer the more I wrote. And in some regard it did, but not to the degree required. 

And so, as the actor Alan Rickman (1946- ) says:

"There's a voice inside you that tells you what you should do."

And so I focus again. Re-focusing must be key. 

The future for Smiles, Frowns, and Kisses is feelings. It's what life is about is it not? We smile. We frown. We love. Feelings are what drives behavior, makes us who we are - and can cause more confusion than we may want to acknowledge. So let's tackle that. 

My original goal in starting this blog was to help people recognize their importance - to their friends and families, to themselves, and in the world - a world in which not all is equal.

So, I urge you as I urge myself:

"The first and best victory is to conquer self." 

Plato (427 BC-327 BC)

See you tomorrow.

CONGRATULATIONS GRADUATES!

"Whatever you do or dream you can do – begin it. Boldness has genius and power and magic in it." 

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)

VIBRATION SCIENCE

"The source of every sound is a vibrating body."

From the song 'Vibration Science' by Kaleidoscope Jukebox

Source: collective-evolution.com

"It is through the law of vibration that the mind exercises control (or thoughts)... We know that every mental action is a vibration... and we know that all form is simply a mode of motion, a rate of vibration. Everything in the Universe is what it is by virtue of its rate of vibration.

The first form which thought will find is language, or words; this determines the importance of words; they are the first manifestation of thought - the vessels in which thought is carried. They take hold of the ether and by setting it in motion reproduce the thought to others in the form of sound.

We cannot escape from the pictures we incessantly photograph on the mind (and share with others), and this photography of erroneous conceptions is exactly what is being done by the use of words when we use any form of language which is not identified with our (or other's) welfare.

Change the rate of vibration and you change the nature, quality, and form of the world you experience."

Charles Haanel (1866-1949)

Let's make it a good one!

ESSAY ON MAN

"Man never knows precisely what is right

So torn between a purpose and a doubt.

He first makes windows to let in the light

And then hangs curtains up to shut it out."

Author Unknown

NATURE'S CHILD

“I sadly want a reform in the construction of children. Nature's only idea seems to be to make them machines for the production of incessant noise.” 

Wilkie Collins (1824-1889)

ON CHILDREN

Kahlil Gibran (1883-1931) On Children, from the book The Prophet (1923)

Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.

They come through you but not from you, and though they are with you, they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts. For they have their own thoughts.

You may house their bodies but not their souls; for their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.

You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. For Life goes not backwards nor tarries with yesterday.

...You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.