I'm asking because a while ago on Oprah Winfrey ( I don't usually watch her... just sometimes) she said something that made me wish I had heard it when I was young. She was actually quoting someone else and I don't know who it was but it went something like this:

"When someone shows you who they ARE..believe them the FIRST time."

I loved it. I do believe people are capable of change.. but in general... that to me is a brilliant, profound statement and had I heard it and acted on it in my life.. I think I could have saved myself and others a lot of trouble. So, I tell my boys all the time that very thing.

So... what thought, quote or whatever changed your way of thinking? It can be something stupid or silly even. If it made you stop and think... then it's worth talking about.

A long time ago a mentor asked me what I wanted from my life. I was young and stupid and I answered 'tons of money!' After some discussion with him I understood that what is really important is 'to be truly happy.' And from that moment this has been my goal. He took the time to explain what truly has meaning and I was fortunate to have realized it.

Stringer

No one one moment changes my life, it's always in evolution. Having said that my backpacking tour of Europe when I was 24 surely shaped the way I view things - we are basically all the same!

Changed my life? Don't know.

After a really painful breakup one I latched onto was


"Forgiveness is giving up the possibility of a better past"


Which helped a little with all the "done me wrong" feelings... I can't go back and neither can she... there's no creating a prettier, cleanier, more kind past. Accepting that helps.

Ok.. I shouldn't have said changed your LIFE but rather your way of THINKING.

NK.. I agree we are basically all the same. My Problem is I didn't really learn much about myself in my 20's or at least what I learned I didn't apply to my life.

Stringer.. plenty of rich people kill themselves so money didn't really make them happy either ( but I still WANT some... lol said with a whine)

AND... KP... I read yours and I had another "aha" thing happen. At first I thought your quote was depressing, and I didn't like it at all. But it is TRUE... like it or not. I always want a re-do... coming to terms with it is much healthier. :)

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Originally Posted by classyT

AND...KP...i read yours and I had another "aha" thing happen. At first i thought your quote was depressing, and I didn't like it at all. But it is TRUE...like it or not. I always want a re-do.....coming to terms with it is much healthier. :)

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It certainly has moody tones, 'cause we don't struggle with the good stuff so much... its all the crap and noise...

But it's a pretty powerful thing to honestly accept that which you cannot change, it can play into everyday living, maybe its just a twist on the Serenity Prayer?

Hello T:

A Napoleon Hill poem changed me. It's called Life.

I bargained with life for a penny,
And Life would pay no more,

However, I begged at evening,
When I counted my scanty store,

For Life is a just employer,
It pays you whatever you ask,

But, once you have set the wages,
Why you must bear the task,

I worked for a menials hire,
Only to learn, dismayed,

That any wage I had asked of Life,
Life would have willingly paid.

excon

PS> Yeah, it's corny.

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Originally Posted by classyT

NK..i agree we are basically all the same. My Problem is i didn't really learn much about myself in my 20's or at least what i learned I didn't apply to my life.

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I agree. I think it has something to do with breaking out of those teen years and becoming self-aware.

Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city.
~ George Burns

This didn't so much change my life, or way of thinking, so much as make me realize I'm not the only one who likes their family better from a distance.

I live almost 200 miles away from my entire family. While I sometimes miss my niece and nephew, and wish I could meet my newest niece, I don't really miss the rest of my family. That may sound bad, especially when you consider that I have a niece I've met, but don't miss at all.

My mother and I email. We rarely talk about anything important. Most of the time she's telling me about some idiot customer at work and that she bought a new mattress because the old one had a spring poking through it. I tell about my cat and that I finally bought a kitchen trashcan after living in my apartment for 2 weeks.

Do I know what's really going on in her life? Not at all. Do I even bother trying to tell her about the important things in my life? Not beyond letting her know they happened (sometimes) without going into detail. It's the way we've always been, even when I was little.

We have a silent agreement. I deal with my things on my own. She doesn't give me inappropriate details, like a blow-by-blow of her last pap smear (that did happen once, in front of ALL of my friends).

I don't miss my mom, or my siblings. My relationship with my mother finally has the physical distance that makes the emotional distance make sense. I talk to my sister more, now, than I did when I lived at home. And I no longer have to deal with my brother's threats of murder and physical violence or him stealing from me.

I got a bit off topic...

Basically, that quote just makes me feel better about loving my family more from a distance.

Ex,

You? Corny? No way! From everything I have read you are the epitome of... of... ummmm, well the epitome of something. I wouldn't call you corny... well maybe just a little. ;)

Hhealth,

Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city.
~ George Burns

I loved the quote... but for ME I would change it to close -knit "IN LAWS" in another city. :)

Now THAT would be a quote to live by... ha ha.

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Originally Posted by NeedKarma

I agree. I think it has something to do with breaking out of those teen years and becoming self-aware.

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NK,

You actually said something to me that I have taken to heart and maybe it has changed me a little... you once or twice called me "passive aggressive" which bugged me. I don't like that quality as I have an "in-law" very much like that. It isn't pretty, so I'm working on it... and have been since you said it. I denied it at first though.. but don't get your hopes up... I still think you are a dufus head... ha ha. I'm totally teasing you so do NOT call that passive aggressive... it was a joke. :) I'm being really serious about the passive aggressive thing.

Cool. We all have slightly different personas online that in real life face-to-face situations. It's much easier to say stuff anomously, also sometimes some meaning gets lost when it's not paired with tone inflection and the non-verbal that goes with the face-to-face communication. That's one of the reasons I don't really understand people that have most of their friends online, I find a lot is lost that way... plus I'm a crappy typist :)

There are many, and some were not obvious at the time, but one particular has come to mind. 25 years ago in my senior year in college waiting to graduate I took a fluff one credit, squash / handball, course. I had not really played either at that point. I quickly picked up both at first, and then I hit a wall where I was not getting better. So I got frustrated and angry. The coach/ instructor, whose name I don't remember, took me aside and told me that when a person faces this in life [ as we all do ] this is the time to see if you either quit or develop the character to persevere and learn something about yourself. I forgot 99.9% of organic chemistry but this little tidbit from a throw away college course has helped me through a lot in life.


Hey KP, like your lessons also


G&P

2 sayings that I live by and keep close to heart.

1) When crossing the road in life be sure to look both ways.

2) You never lose when you try but if you never try you always are going to lose.

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Originally Posted by classyT

Ex,

You? corny? no way! From everything I have read you are the epitome of .....of...ummmm, well the epitome of something. I wouldn't call you corny...well maybe just a little. ;)

hhealth,

Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city.
~ George Burns

I loved the quote...but for ME i would change it to close -knit "IN LAWS" in another city. :)

now THAT would be a quote to live by....ha ha.

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I take it your in-laws are very much in the same city. Makes me glad I'll never have any ^_^

"Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin; and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore do not worry, saying 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble" (Matthew 6:25-34).

This was read to me by a woman who sort of "mentored" me about working for social justice issues (poverty, hunger, etc) as she was retiring from 25 unplanned years of working for helping the poor. She said she read or recited it every morning.

"Do not depend on the hope of results. You may have to face the fact that your work will be apparently worthless and even achieve no result at all, if not perhaps results opposite to what you expect. As you get used to this idea, you start more and more to concentrate not on the results, but on the value, the rightness, the truth of the work itself. You gradually struggle less and less for an idea and more and more for specific people. In the end, it is the reality of personal relationship that saves everything."
- Thomas Merton

It is one of my all time favorites. It flies in the face of most of what our society is driven by. And I believe it is critical to those who work in areas where change is needed, but often comes so slowly.

"The past does not define you, the present does".

It took a while to realize that it's true.

Also this one, because it's funny. :)

"The average woman would rather have beauty than brains, because the average man can see better than he can think."

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Originally Posted by Altenweg

"The average woman would rather have beauty than brains, because the average man can see better than he can think."

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Ouch. That hurt.

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Originally Posted by kp2171

ouch. that hurt.

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I thought you liked it rough. ;)