Simply, to be Aware

When I woke up today, 

I started to pray

To be aware of all the peace and beauty

Of all the love, blessings and creativity

That at all time are surrounding me.

 

    And now I am a bit more aware

    Of all these wonderful things out there

    Of all peace and beauty,

    Love, blessings and creativity

    Surrounding me

    And it makes me feel good 

 --------------------------------------------------------------

 I am sure you will enjoy some of my following online treasures as well:

A look at some beautiful skies:

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/mysite-1/skies-seen-by-hans 

Beautiful flowers: 

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/flowersbyhans

Wonderful poems (inspirational and motivational):

 https://aufiezophypoems.blogspot.com/

(my pen name for poetry name is Aufie Zophy) 

-----

Some beautiful inspirational quotes: 

 https://quotesfromhans.blogspot.com/ 

A fantastic short story:

 https://afishwithawish.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-fish-with-wish-whole-story.html

Simply some essays about good things:

 https://abcofvirtues.blogspot.com/

Forest bath

In Japan, in the 1980s, Japanese doctors saw a lot of depression and high stress levels in their patients. They wondered if they get their patients back to nature, whether that would be helpful and they did research on the topic. Taking a "forest bath" was not only beneficial to the mental health of the patient but also physically the patients experienced lots of benefits in terms of blood pressure, heart rate and even blood sugar levels.

Forest bathing is not a hike for physical fitness or exploring the woods, it is merely spending time in nature, in the forest (or the park) and get your senses (at least 4 of them) to experience the calmness and serenity of nature. For sure visually is the easiest. Just taking the time to observe the beauty of a tree, the wonderful crown with the plentiful adorable leaves, the stem and the texture of the bark and the amazing roots. But then we can close our eyes and try to hear the sounds, the sounds from far away but also the sounds of the tree (the wind in the leaves, the birds in the crown,...) and feel the bark of the tree. Let the energy flow. Feel the air on our cheeks, in our hair. Taking a deep breath and feeling the air in our nose in our throat and in our chest. Taking in the smells of the tree, the smell of the woods, ... If we happen to find a chestnut, we can even taste the forest. 

 I love walks in the forest, I love walks on the beach. even before I read about the research of forest baths, I knew that walks in nature have powerful healing properties, especially for  our soul, but also for our body, mind and heart. 

If you have not tried a forest bath, please make some time for a walk in nature without other objective than to take in the beauty of it all. Not for fitness, not for exploration, just to enjoy the great pleasure of spending pure time in nature.

 

Dips and peaks

Our life is often made up of dips and peaks. 

External circumstances vary and they may be not completely under our own control. But they can get so bad that we end up in a deep dip. I think that all of us are susceptible to some degree of dips. I do not use the term depression here, which is uncontrollable sadness, sometimes due to an organic brain problem, while during our deepest dips we may feel quite depressed. 

A very strong characteristic of "dips" is that we do not enjoy the things we used to enjoy during other periods in our life. Amazing sunrises or sunsets may make your soul feel afloat during normal days. When we are in a dip, we notice the beauty but the beauty has trouble getting in, into our heart, into our soul. Have you experienced something like that? Things we love to do in normal days and bring us easily in a state of flow, may lose a lot of their appeal and we may hardly feel like even start doing them. Generally our energy levels may be low.  

It is not easy to get out of a dip. But I think a reasonable start is to write down our feelings and become fully aware that we are in a dip. When we do that we start to remember that we have not always been like this and we may start to explore the reason or reasons why we feel like that. We blame it on a lack of energy or mild ailments that have occurred, but these may be a consequence rather than a cause of our dip. Let us search for the real, real cause(s) and they are often external factors that happened, that are not fully under our control. 

These things may be not reversible or they may be. They may be a necessary thing in our life so we can move on to a next stage a next big thing, another door to be opened. We may not be able to see how we will get out of the problem(s) but out we will get. I think it is important that we do not keep trying to find joy in the things that brought us joy before, because the frustration of not getting the same joy as before may bring us down more. I really feel that the best thing to do, is to make it quiet within.  We need some alone-time, on the beach, in the woods and think silently what is the best approach to our condition at this point. If you have faith, prayer may be truly useful. Not the prayer we say without thinking, but a prayer where we truly ask for guidance from our Creator, or guidance from the universe. 

We may not understand why the bad situation occurred, but a sincere wish, prayer and desire for strength and a deep reflection in nature on what is the best way to build up our strength may be really helpful 

If you are in dip right now, please pray for strength and make some time to reflect in nature.

If you are at a peak, right now, please write down about your aspirations, your motivation, your dreams, because if we do, these writings may be a good guide for us during a dip as well. 

No matter what, I wish you strength and here comes a small poem of hope:

It is dark, no moon, no light
Just darkness, a starless sky
The wind blows, the waves break
A single firefly passes by

Soon the firefly is gone
Leaving me in the darkest of nights
The tiny fly made me anticipate
A sunrise with the finest of lights
 

Aufie Zophy

Fragrance

Making someone else feel good about themselves is like planting a flower along the path of your life.

Making someone else feel small or stupid is like throwing some toxic waste on your life's path.

If we look back at our yesterday's path does it carry the wonderful fragrance of flowers or does it smell more like toxic waste.

It does not matter too much. What really matters, is to ensure that today is filled with the amazing fragrance of making people feel good. 😀

Enjoy the path.

Number 1000

This is my 1000th post in this blog. It started in 2014 and I have written down quite a lot of ideas. Many of these ideas are bright, some may sound a bit eccentric, but I am sure that most can speak to the heart and soul of many people. Please do visit the archive after  you have enjoyed today's soul sprinkle.

While we are in the game of life and society, we are sometimes in the illusion that we need to be equal to others, or if not equal, superior, but definitely not inferior. That game of comparing our situation with that of others, ignores and even deprives us of our own uniqueness. We are simply unique human beings, each with our own gifts, own talents, own limitations and that makes unique. We can simply NOT compare with others. It is time now to get out of the game of equality, superiority, inferiority. We are unique and that is what counts.

Let us celebrate our uniqueness and if we do so, we will move effortlessly towards abundance, love and prosperity. Not to be superior or equal to anyone else but to have this wonderful life of purpose leading to peace of mind and true happiness while making a positive difference to the world we live in. If every day for ten years we make a small positive difference, think how big this thing becomes over a period of ten years. 

Enjoy, ...

Watering plants

There are a few rules for watering plants effectively, like the best time is early in the morning; it is better to give fewer times a lot of water than more frequently small amounts; and a few other tips that are easily available  on the web.

I am not writing this to provide tips for watering plants, but I want to address the simple joy it brings. We cannot water plants without imagining how it will benefit them. And that is such a joy. Even if we do something good for plants, the joy is ours as much as the benefits that go to the plants. 

And that is so if we treat animals right as well. Feeding a stray cat, taking care of a pet. So much happiness hidden in these simple acts. 

But the biggest joy and peace of mind still comes, when we do something nice for our fellow human beings. Random kind acts are so valuable to our peace of mind and happiness that it is difficult to live without them. Whether we are on the receiving or giving end, it always brings joy to both the giver and the receiver of kindness. Let us be fully aware this giant truth for the coming hour, the coming day, the coming week,...

😃

Sharing dreams

All of us tend to have a bigger purpose, aspirations of reaching and achieving some higher goals. If we keep this all to ourselves, we risk to lose our lofty goals along the way. But the risk to lose our lofty goals along the way is still much bigger if we share our bold plans with our family and friends. 

Our purpose, our goals tend to carry some of our passion and attention. Attention and passion will make us see opportunities that will be met along the way. We are in charge and make it happen. 

Once we share our plans with our close relatives or friends, it is not unlikely that we will get their critical opinion and express their disbelief about the mere possibility of our goals. Then our ego has to come in and start defending our goals. It is out of the realm of the passion and drive, and becomes an ego undertaking, proving our family members/friends we can do it.They may create doubts and point out obstacles that may or may not be there. Even if the obstacles are there and they are real, we may be able to deal with them when we encounter them. 

So while ideally, sharing your dreams and lofty aspirations, may lead to extra motivation, more often the simple of act of sharing may push you in a defensive position, taking away the enthusiasm and energy that are so necessary in achieving anything. 

Keep dreaming big, aiming high. But think twice before announcing your dream to the world.

Treasures

Where do we build our treasures?

Do we build them in bank accounts? In gold vaults? In jewelry? In assets? 

Our heart will be exactly there.

 

Do we build them in the realm of kindness, peace and beauty?

Our heart will be exactly there.

A bit of my heart is with my bank account, a bit in my assets

But the treasure hidden in my soul, carries my heart too. 

The treasure of true virtue, of honesty and kind acts

The treasure of wisdom. I want to build them as much 

as I desire that amount in my bank, my list of possessions

Ignoring the importance of physical needs may be not a wise thing to do

But ignoring the treasures of virtue and love within our soul is worse.

I pray to my Creator, 

that I may appreciate and be grateful for the abundance that is around us that I may appreciate and work also on these soul experiences, on these soul moments

I love, I love, I love.

 

Lots of love from my heart to you.

 

Have a wonderful next minute, next hour, next week, next year :)

Changing the world, we do it!

When I was young, I wanted to change the world. 

And sadly, in my early adulthood, I was (almost) convinced that I could not change the world.  

 

But that is the biggest fallacy that we tell our youths.
We try to take away their ideals.
We try to "make them come to their senses"

We want them to see "reality"

 

I put the phrases above between double inverted commas because they are extremely wrong.

The worst thing we have done to this world, is not the wars we have fought, it is not the pollution of the seas; the very worst thing we have done to this world is making large numbers of young dynamic people with lofty great ideals lose these ideals in their early twenties, because we think they will be disappointed if we do not make them live up to our perception of reality.

 

If all youths with fantastic ideals and aspirations to make a huge positive change in this world, would have been encouraged to keep believing and live up to their ideals, the world would have been a very different place at this moment. 

Am I a dreamer? Did I lost touch with reality, making the above statements? The answer is NO.

Every little thing we do in our lives is changing the world, for the worse or the better:

- yesterday i cut into the lane of another car; the driver became visibly upset with me; His wife and children were in his car. The upset driver spread negative emotions to all in the car and a spiral of negativity and problems emerged. I made my day a bit worse and their day a bit worse. I had changed a small part of the world I live in for the worse.

- today, I gave way to two girls standing in the middle of the road, waiting to cross the lane I was driving on to be clear of traffic. I stopped the car and let them cross. The smiles on their faces were wonderful. The small act of giving way, changed my day, their day and it may have caused a spiral of positivity in the small part of the world I live in.

If we are aware that we change the world we live in constantly by all we do and say, we may choose much more positivity than what we do or say routinely, impulsively. 

Let us not discourage our youths, in the name of being "realistic". Instead let us inspire them to go and make lots of positive changes in the world on a daily basis and even if only two in a hundred thousand of these small changes lead to something bigger, just a few positive changes per day will result in a huge change over a life time. 

The ideals, I had in my teens are more alive today than ever. I want to change the world. I want to make small positive changes every day. At the end of my life, I want to be happy with the life I lived and that will depend on how many small positive changes I made :)

Stopping the overthinking

We had done a research project on burn out among caregivers of severely disabled people. One person had a particular bad burn out and asked to get more help. The coordinator of the home care program, our psychologist, one psychology student and myself (a medic who had coordinated the research) were attending the session. 

The person opened up and stated her problem clearly. We probed into what she had done or tried to do about it, and tried to help her think and discover some ways to find relief. When she got stuck in the process, some gentle suggestions were made, but 45 min into the session, it seemed we were making either very slow or no progress. 

I had been mainly listening. I had been thinking what would be best to say, if I was to participate in the counseling, but I had no clue what to say or how to start. 

Then I prayed. I emptied my mind and asked, with the deepest desire to help the caregiver, for help from our Creator. I got mentally disconnected from the session for awhile and then an idea entered my mind which I shared with the group in an empathic way and quite suddenly we seemed to make real progress. 

I feel I had been overthinking for 45 min and after calming my mind through a heartfelt prayer, an idea seemed to cause a breakthrough. I think that for some of us, sincere and heartfelt prayer may at times, be an effective way to tap into positive intuition. :).

Faster

The sun was moving faster
Than the clouds
A spectacle of superb skies
Rapidly changing

A red ball coming out
Of the deep sea
But quickly hiding
Behind a band of gray

The thunderous moisture
Getting orange spots;
Soon yellow rays
Seeping through

Bright areas of water
Glittering close to the horizon
And then the clouds suddenly
moved faster than the sun

Aufie Zophy

 

 

A small poem after an early morning beach walk.

Mornings have really some magic in them

The beauty of the light, of the trees, of the skies,

It feels like supernatural almost

---------------------------------------------------------------

A look at some beautiful skies:

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/mysite-1/skies-seen-by-hans 

Beautiful flowers: 

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/flowersbyhans

Wonderful poems (inspirational and motivational):

 https://aufiezophypoems.blogspot.com/

(my pen name for poetry name is Aufie Zophy) 

-----

Some beautiful inspirational quotes: 

 https://quotesfromhans.blogspot.com/ 

A fantastic short story:

 https://afishwithawish.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-fish-with-wish-whole-story.html

Simply some essays about good things:

 https://abcofvirtues.blogspot.com/

Time for...

 What do we use the bulk of our time for? A simple question that propped up in my mind.

While I have a deep conviction that pure peace and happiness lies more in altruism than in anything else, I have to admit that only fragments of my time are truly spent in selfless service.

Life is time and time is limited. 

While we need to spend time for self development, self renewal at all aspects of life (physical, intellectual, emotional, spiritual,...), i decided to search in mind actively how i can optimize the use of my time.

I want to spend a bit more time in altruism, not the self aggrandizing type of philanthropy, but in simple kindness, in going the extra mile, in simple selfless service...

The blessing in disguise

Quite often we experience setbacks that seem not fair at all. But quite often too, if years later we look back at the setbacks, they seemed to be necessary events for something better to happen. Here I share not a personal example, but an experience about a surgeon who did not complete his contract. 

Our university hospital is located in a rural area of Malaysia. A few years ago we were so lucky to get an Italian Pediatric cardiac surgeon (a surgeon performing heart operations on children) who was very skilled. Within a year, he performed over a hundred complex surgeries on hearts of children and the mortality rate was lower than that of well established centers in the most developed nations. 

The setback, we experienced was that his wife could not get used to the place where we are located and a family crisis forced our superbly skilled surgeon to break off his three-year contract after just more than a year. At that moment we felt pity for our patients, born with heart problems, since that would mean that we had again to send such patients to a far away center where the waiting list was sometimes long. The safety of the patients with the most severe heart problems was again compromised to a certain extent. 

But what happened then? Our lovely Italian surgeon made arrangements with a charity organization to get a whole team of very well trained staff involved in cardiac surgery for children to come over to our place, up to three times per year. So, on these occasions, many of patients received their very much needed surgery, and our very own team of staff involved in these procedures, has had the benefits over the years to learn and keep learning new skills so that now our own team can perform quite a number of procedures by themselves and the learning process is still ongoing after more than 6 years. 

So what happened more than 6 years ago, while definitely a serious setback at the moment, has turned out not too bad in the long run. 

Many times, in the moment of a setback we cannot see what will happen next. If you get despondent or very depressed after a major setback, think about the high likelihood that within a few years time, you will look back and see how the doors closed, resulted in new opportunities, new open doors to make the situation better. :)

Dealing with harsh comments

Too many times people hurt us with harsh remarks.

But the way we handle harsh remarks can change the hurt. It can reduce it to virtually zero. The important premise is to understand why the person giving the harshness to us, is choosing harshness instead of friendly criticism in a constructive way. 

The people who go around scolding others, are generally not too happy themselves. All too often they crave for being on top, for being better than others. And their, perhaps subconscious, perception is that if they put others down, it shows their own superiority. Nothing it further from the truth. Harshness, scolding merely is revealing our weakness. 

Scolding is done by people with a twisted personality. If we are at the receiving end of a good scolding, we can listen to the content and see if we can learn something from it. But we do not have to let the harshness into our heart. I hear you think, that is easier said than done. 

But in fact, it is not too difficult. It easy to feel pity for a person with a twisted back. It is also not too difficult to feel pity for a person with a personality so twisted that they feel the need to shout to appease their own ego into a feeling of superiority. If we understand that we can choose to pity that person for his or her inappropriate behavior, everything changes.

We do not have to accept the harshness, we do not have to let it into our heart. If I give you a pen and you refuse to take the pen, the pen remains with me. If someone calls you stupid and you do not accept the insult, you do not let it in, the insult, the stupidity stays with the giver of the insult. 

So next time, you meet some harshness, do listen to the message inside the harshness. Then pity the person for his twisted personality, his lack of insight in how to create a harmonious relationship, do not let the insult into our heart and not even into our mind, let them keep the words they say and go on with our journey. 

Try to practice this little gem of wisdom. It is a great way to deal with harsh people intending to hurt others. 

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A look at some beautiful skies:

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/mysite-1/skies-seen-by-hans 

Beautiful flowers: 

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/flowersbyhans

Wonderful poems (inspirational and motivational):

 https://aufiezophypoems.blogspot.com/

(my pen name for poetry name is Aufie Zophy) 

-----

Some beautiful inspirational quotes: 

 https://quotesfromhans.blogspot.com/ 

A fantastic short story:

 https://afishwithawish.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-fish-with-wish-whole-story.html

Simply some essays about good things:

 https://abcofvirtues.blogspot.com/

ENJOY

 

Lovely trees

I love trees. Do you love them too?

Just now at 10.15 PM, i thought for awhile about my day. 

I became aware I had not taken even a minute to watch a tree.

 

So I went out, put on some garden lights and watched 

I watched the beautiful majestic crown of a tree

Then its stem and I mused about how deep the roots must go.

 

The silence of the night, the scantiness of the garden lights

gave the whole scene a touch of magic. 

 

It felt like my soul was ready to break its silence

and talk to me about the endless wisdom hidden 

in the universe.

 
I love trees, do you too?

A bit of rain and sun

A little ladybird sitting on the top of a low tree casts a shadow on the rose.
A dew drop tear rolls down the petals, a helpless fall
The soils gets wet, but the tear does not relieve its thirst.
Then there is a bit of rain, a bit of sun and the scene is filled with joy  

Dear Friends,

I hope you enjoyed reading the little 'poem' above.

Sometimes a series of events paints a gloomy picture in our life

And then a small thing sometimes turns the tide. 

A bit of rain, a bit of sun, are sometimes all we needed.

The key lies in being aware of the beauty in a bit of rain and sun...

Bliss

Swallowing every day a bit of bliss, I try
Soft amazing light in the pastel morning sky
The song of a bird, singing passionately
The outline of a gently swaying tree

But if I wake late, all this beauty I may miss.
Then, at work, I still try to find some bliss
In the superb opportunities for caring
In all the love and kindness we are sharing

Still if at work, I was only busy and stressed,
The evening may be super blessed
The love of family, a toddler's kiss
Truly, every day, I try to get a bit of bliss.

For every day, every hour, I wish too
a truckload filled with bliss for you.

Kind math

 If out of the more than 7 billion people in the world

there would be only one million people

who try every day to perform three random kind acts

That would amount to 3 million kind acts per day. 

or more than a billion kind acts in a year. 

How nice our world would have suddenly become

Let us start to become a member of the first 1 million.

If we are persistent the number will snowball 

to many hundreds of millions soon...

 

 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

 

 

A look at some beautiful skies:

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/mysite-1/skies-seen-by-hans 

Beautiful flowers: 

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/flowersbyhans

Wonderful poems (inspirational and motivational):

 https://aufiezophypoems.blogspot.com/

(my pen name for poetry name is Aufie Zophy) 

-----

Some beautiful inspirational quotes: 

 https://quotesfromhans.blogspot.com/ 

A fantastic short story:

 https://afishwithawish.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-fish-with-wish-whole-story.html

Simply some essays about good things:

 https://abcofvirtues.blogspot.com/

ENJOY

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The mountain gone

My soul has no hands and no feet

but it ran over the mountain 

that stood between you and me

It dug a hole in the soil

and planted a fine young tree

 

The roots soaked up all earth

that had made up the mountain

 

Soon the mountain was gone

and a majestic tree 

provided some shadow 

to love forever, you and me

in perfect harmony

---------------------------------------------------------

Small poem from the deepest of my heart.

Our soul can move mountains, if only we let it.

Harmony is possible, if we want it hard enough

 

The big pleasure

 The big pleasure of giving

The big pleasure of serving

The big pleasure of loving

The big pleasure of kindness

WHO wants still to suffer in greed

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A look at some beautiful skies:

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/mysite-1/skies-seen-by-hans 

Beautiful flowers: 

https://hansvro.wixsite.com/flowersbyhans

Wonderful poems (inspirational and motivational):

 https://aufiezophypoems.blogspot.com/

(my pen name for poetry name is Aufie Zophy) 

-----

Some beautiful inspirational quotes: 

 https://quotesfromhans.blogspot.com/ 

A fantastic short story:

 https://afishwithawish.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-fish-with-wish-whole-story.html

Simply some essays about good things:

 https://abcofvirtues.blogspot.com/

ENJOY

Words are flying

 Words that we just say

are flying far away;

but what we write down today,

These thoughts are here to stay

(a free translation of verba volent, scripta manent)

 

A few months ago, I had a wonderful experience.
I wrote it down in a small poem and shared it here on this blog:

https://reflectionsbyhans.blogspot.com/2022/07/ingredients-of-happiness-3.html

 

Today I had a very similar experience and was immediately thinking about the above.

 

What we wrote down, is a kind of eternalized. 

What we do or think or just say, is flying away

Let us all think about our day

and write the most intriguing thoughts down :)

In the middle

      No matter how high we rise in our society, there tend to be always people who are above us, to whom we look up. At work, most of us have subordinates, we have clients and we have superiors. We can say we are somehow in the middle. 

    There is a tendency to focus our efforts on pleasing the people above us. That is not an easy thing to do. People above us, want to "help" us improve by fault finding and criticism. Just like quite often we do with the people below us. 

    I have seen so many house officers and junior medical doctors being close to nervous breakdowns because they get scolded and criticized for the 2 mistakes they made while no one talks about the 98 good things they did. And the weird thing is that those above them, criticizing them, think they are merely helping them to improve. 

    If we shift the focus of our efforts to please the people below us, we enter a wholly different realm. Instead of working to please the "boss" we start to render service to those who need it. There is so much peace and so much job satisfaction to be found in rendering service, seemingly selfless service. In the case of junior docs, if they focus on going the extra mile for their patients, on helping the docs that are still junior to them, on being friendly to nurses and attendants, Job satisfaction will be their part, They will have peace, that will not be easily disturbed by any toxic comments from whoever is their senior. 

    Somehow that is how we were made. Rendering service give peace of mind and happiness of the highest order. Many of us do not know this, or are not consciously aware of this at most of the time. We look for the highest form of happiness in places and achievement where this type of happiness cannot be found. Pleasure was meant as a means to help us survive. Peace of mind and true happiness were meant as a means of becoming a human being with a purpose and contributing to the betterment of this world :)

Let us focus on the people below us. Give them a helping hand and find perfect joy in it.

Imagine!

If the world would be filled with love

The hungry boy in Malawi,

would be bathing in love and not be hungry for very long

The lonely lady in her two bedroom apartment

would be bathing in love and not be lonely for very long

If the world would be filled with love

The quarrels within families

would drown in love and soon be replaced with harmony

The greed within the world

would drown and soon make place for kindness and compassion

If the world would be filled with love

you and me 

would bathe in love

If the world would be filled with love...

Imagine!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A look at some beautiful skies: https://hansvro.wixsite.com/mysite-1/skies-seen-by-hans 

Beautiful flowers: https://hansvro.wixsite.com/flowersbyhans

Wonderful poems (inspirational and motivational): https://aufiezophypoems.blogspot.com/

(my pen name for poetry name is Aufie Zophy)

Some beautiful inspirational quotes:  https://quotesfromhans.blogspot.com/ 

A fantastic short story: https://afishwithawish.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-fish-with-wish-whole-story.html

Simply some essays about good things: https://abcofvirtues.blogspot.com/

ENJOY

Two handles

I share here two parts of the Enchiridion (a work by Epictetus, a Greek philosopher who lived about 2 millennia ago)

 43. Everything has two handles, the one by which it may be carried, the other by which it cannot. If your brother acts unjustly, don't lay hold on the action by the handle of his injustice, for by that it cannot be carried; but by the opposite, that he is your brother, that he was brought up with you; and thus you will lay hold on it, as it is to be carried.

44. These reasonings are unconnected: "I am richer than you, therefore I am better"; "I am more eloquent than you, therefore I am better." The connection is rather this: "I am richer than you, therefore my property is greater than yours;" "I am more eloquent than you, therefore my style is better than yours." But you, after all, are neither property nor style.

I think that the wisdom in the first part (43) is amazing. Please let it sink in for awhile. If we replace brother by spouse, it becomes still more relevant. In the current times we do spend far more time with our spouses than with our siblings. If our spouse does something unjust or not right to us, do not get blinded by the part of the injustice, but keep in mind that our spouse is the one we love and the one who loves us. There are so many imperfections in each of us and if we think deep and hard enough, we will find that we have not always be perfectly just to them either. Let us hold the handle that can be held. So nice, isn't it?

The second part (44) speaks for itself. Another piece of superb wisdom. 

Sometimes, when I read superb pieces of wisdom like this which have been around for so very long, I find it a bit sad that these things are not common knowledge, that these things are not taught in our schools as something everyone should know.

Let us all get so excited about wisdom, that we actively search for a bit of wisdom every week, or even every day and then share it with our friends, with our family. :)

Focus

Emotions can become the subject of what we focus on.

If we choose that we want to be grateful,

we will find so many things to be grateful for.

And if those things, that usually anger us, present themselves,

we may not notice it, since we are in the process 

of seeing so many wonderful things  we want to be grateful for

If, on the other hand, we choose to be critical of others,

we will easily find so many things that are on our nerve 

and anger and frustration will become lead players in the theater of our life.

 

Let us think for a while about what emotion serves us best,

actively search for things that provoke this emotion

and we will no longer notice things that provoke the opposite emotions

 

What do you think about this? 

Best regards from Bachok Malaysia,

Do enjoy some browsing through the archive 

Hans Van Rostenberghe

The desolate escargot

On a deserted beach, a desolate escargot lay helpless in shallow water.

It observed the extravaganza of a dancing crab in a breaking wave

It could see the amazing shades of green on the forest on the shore

It was not moved by the dance, nor by the colors.

 

It was not until a deep thought coming from far away 

entered his little escargot brain, 

that it managed to shake off the sadness.

What was the deep thought?

 

 

 

The story of the cat

       Yesterday I went to a restaurant in Bachok, the small Malaysian town on the East Coast of Malaysia, where I live. There are not many restaurants that are closed or have air-conditioning in our place. Usually the weather is pleasantly warm and a ceiling fan is enough to keep it so. 

        A restaurant is typically an open space with a roof above it to protect everyone from the rains that fall abundantly in our region especially in the late evening and at night. 

        I had ordered nasi goreng, ayam kunyit, which is a classical dish of fried risce with chicken that is prepared with the powder of turmeric, a true delicacy, in my opinion.

         Shortly before the dish arrived, I felt a tap on my leg. It was a colorful cat with lovely eyes. The cat had just used her pat to gently tap my leg, to let me know she was there. Her look, straight into my eyes, told me her expectations of "please share a bit of your food with me"

The cat was so beautiful and the look in my eyes touched so much my heart, that as soon as my meal arrived, I shared a bit of the chicken with the cat. She ate it and soon a second cat, a black one, came and joined. A few times again, the colorful one tapped with one of her pats on my leg and each time I gave a small amount of meat to her and to the black cat who was watching with equally eager eyes from a distance. 

After awhile, it seemed that they got enough, and both of them laid down close to my chair, keeping me company throughout the meal. I was there with seven of my close family members, but I had not a clue why the cat had chosen me. 

Anyhow, I felt good about it and that is why I share the story of the cat here. I know that in a western world, cats do not belong in restaurants, and some Europeans would be irritated if they did. Here they are just a part of our life and if we manage to be gentle to them as we are to our fellow human beings, it brings us peace of mind and yes, a bit of happiness. 

And for the meat on my plate, I had plenty left and I certainly did not go hungry.😅

 PS: if you are not a cat lover or do not like the story above, I am sure it will still be possible for you to find something you really enjoy the archive  of this blog. It is filled with inspiring stories and reflections. Many thanks for reading .

In Every Corner

A few years ago, I wrote a small poem for my sons.  

 

I posted it on the PoemHunter website 

and one yoga teacher let me know 

she used the poem in her yoga classes 

and the people from the classes loved it a lot. 

I post it here in this blog and hope you love it as much as the people in the yoga class :)

Enjoy!

If you are the one shining the light,
You will never be bothered by night.
If loving warmth is given by you to all,
Loneliness may never bother your soul.

If love and kindness are your way of being
And in everyone some good you're seeing,
Then happiness and peace of mind
In every little corner of this world, you'll find. 

 

Aufie Zophy

 

 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Aufie Zophy is my pen name, I use for writing poems

A selection of the favorites among my own poems 

can be found through clicking the following link

https://aufiezophypoems.blogspot.com/ 

Passion for kindness

Passion for kindness 

 

When our future seems just gloomy and dark

It is time to search for that amazing spark

That is always there, that never goes out

No matter how grey the sky, how dark the cloud.

 

No matter how disturbing the news, we read

We can always find what we truly need

Let’s not seek it on facebook, no, not on the net

That spark is not there, let’s never forget

 It sits inside, in our brain, our heart and soul

That spark of passion, that burning call

that little motivating flame to be ever nice and kind

that inspiring thought that never really left our mind

 

Let’s go on a complete fast from news at least for a day

Let us make it silent within and keep all negativity at bay

Find back that spark inside and feed it

A flame, a fire of passion for kindness, we truly need it

-----------------------------------

In difficult times, finding motivation, inspiration may be not easy. 

I am sure if you browse the entries on this blog archive, it may help

I have some created some other sites and blogs too,

that may help to awaken that little spark within

and let it be a flame or even a fire :)

Please take a look

Enjoy

Awaken the awareness of all beauty, love and peace that surrounds us

A look at some beautiful skies: https://hansvro.wixsite.com/mysite-1/skies-seen-by-hans 

Beautiful flowers: https://hansvro.wixsite.com/flowersbyhans

Wonderful poems (inspirational and motivational): https://aufiezophypoems.blogspot.com/

(my pen name for poetry name is Aufie Zophy)

Some beautiful inspirational quotes:  https://quotesfromhans.blogspot.com/ 

A fantastic short story: https://afishwithawish.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-fish-with-wish-whole-story.html

Simply some essays about good things: https://abcofvirtues.blogspot.com/