“Don’t leave anything for later.
Later, the coffee gets cold.
Later, you lose interest.
Later, the day turns into night.
Later, people grow up.
Later, people grow old.
Later, life goes by.
Later, you regret not doing something…
When you had the chance.
Life is a fleeting dance, a delicate balance of moments that unfold before us, never to return in quite the same way again.
Regret is a bitter pill to swallow, a weight that bears down upon the soul with the burden of missed chances and unspoken words.
So, let us not leave anything for later. Let us seize the moments as they come, with hearts open and arms outstretched to embrace the possibilities that lie before us. For in the end, it is not the things we did that we regret, but the things we left undone, the words left unspoken, the dreams left unfulfilled.
A famous Turkish poet requested his famous painter friend to make a painting on ‘happiness’.
So, he made a painting of a family sleeping peacefully on a creaking bed.
One leg of that bed was broken and two bricks were placed there. The roof of that dilapidated house was also leaking. The dog of the house was also sleeping peacefully on the bed. This painting of became immortal.
Look deeply at this immortal painting and think what happiness really is!!
Actually, after seeing this picture, I feel that happiness is not the absence of problems, but in accepting the situation of trouble with ease.
Try to see the good in whatever you have, no matter how bad the situation is. Stop being sad about such things, which are not in your control.
Whenever your heart starts sinking, look at this immortal painting.
Fantastic Lines by Mother Teresa: “If your eyes are positive, you will love the world. But if your tongue is positive, the world will love you.” Half our beauty comes from the way we speak. We must speak in such a way that others will love to listen to us. And listen in such a way that all will love to speak to us. There are so many things to talk about. Why then is it, that we speak only about others. Let’s remember that gossip is the Devil’s radio. Should we become his DJ? We ignore friends sitting with us and enjoy talking to someone over the phone. Cell phones bring us closer to faraway people. But they take us away from the ones sitting next to us, waiting to say something really special. The best conversation is the one we have with ourselves. Cultivating a positive and constructive inner dialogue can greatly influence our overall well-being. It’s in these conversations that we confront our fears, analyze our strengths and weaknesses, and motivate ourselves to strive for improvement. Yet, the most important conversation is the one with the Almighty in the form of prayers.
We are all in “the line” without knowing it.
We never know how many people are before us.
We can not move to the back of the line.
We can not step out of the line.
We can not avoid the line.
So while we wait in line –
Make moments count.
Make priorities.
Make the time. Time is priceless.
Make your gifts known.
Make a nobody feel like a somebody.
Make your voice heard.
Make the small things big.
Make someone smile. Honor your life
Make the change. Change is only permanent.
Make love. Live your life.
Make up. Love your life.
Make peace. Respect your life.
Make sure to tell your people they are loved.
Make sure to have no regrets.
Make sure you are ready.
AGING….
You grow old, they told me, you are no longer you, you become distant, sad and lonely.
I didn’t answer…
I don’t get old, I get wise.
I stopped being what others like me to become, but what I like to be.
I stopped seeking the acceptance of others and accepted myself.
I have left behind the lying mirrors that deceive mercilessly.
– No, I’m not getting old.
I just become more selective with places, people, customs and ideologies.
I have let go of attachments, unnecessary pain, toxic people, sick souls and rotten hearts… bitterness and unhappiness are not for me, I release them for my health.
I’m ditching party nights for learning and embracing insomnia.
I stopped living stories and started writing them, I threw aside the imposed stereotypes.
I no longer carry eyeshadow in my bag, now I have a book that beautifies my mind.
I exchanged wine glasses for coffee cups, forgot to idealize life and started living it.
– No, I’m not getting old.
I carry freshness in my soul, innocence in my heart, and it discovers me daily.
I have in my hands the tenderness of a cocoon that, when opened, will spread its wings to other places unreachable for those who seek only the frivolity of the material.
I have that charming smile on my face when I observe the simplicity of nature.
I carry in my ears the chirping of the birds that delight me and accompany the walk.
– No, I’m not getting old.
I become selective, betting my time on the intangible, rewriting the story I’ve been told, rediscovering worlds, saving those old books I’ve forgotten half open.
I’m becoming more cautious, I’ve stopped the outbursts that teach me nothing, I’m learning to talk about transcendent things, I’m learning to cultivate knowledge, plant ideals and falsify my destiny.
– No, I’m not getting old.
I begin to live who I really am.~
There was a mother zebra that had a blind child. She was very sad all the time, because her child couldn’t see the world for himself. It broke her heart, and made her cry.
One day, the mother zebra accompanied her blind foal to the river to drink water. As they walked through the forest, they came across a mother cheetah and her three cubs sitting under a tree. The mother cheetah suddenly burst into a shout of laughter. She laughed so uproariously that her cubs began to laugh too. They didn’t stop, their laughter sounded horrible and mocking.
At once, it occurred to the mother zebra that the cheetah and her cubs were teasing and making fun of her blind child. She felt hurt and angry, and finally wept in silence as they walked away.
The following day, the same thing happened, and it kept on happening. Each time the zebra and her blind foal passed by, the mother cheetah and her cubs roared with scornful laughter. They always seemed to be whispering mean and hurtful things, and then laughing about it.
Upon returning home one day, the mother zebra became depressed, and felt unable to cope. She then said to her foal,
“The cheetah and her cubs are evil and wicked. They will stop at nothing to humiliate you. I will no longer take you to the river, but I will always bring you water to drink. No one in going to insult you if you’re hiding in the house.”
After that day, the mother zebra would always go to the river all alone. And after drinking, she would head home with some water for her foul. But in spite of that, the cheetahs didn’t stop laughing and laughing whenever she passed by. Their annoying laughter soon got her so angry and impatient that she decided to fight back.
Burning with rage, she stormed at them and yelled,
“You wicked cheetahs! I won’t take this anymore! I have stopped bringing my blind child to the river because of your heartless behaviors! Stop laughing at us, or you’ll have me to deal with!”
Upon hearing that, the mother cheetah gave the mother zebra a confused look. She didn’t seem to understand what she said. After a long pause, she finally spoke,
“Wait a minute… I guess you’re misunderstanding things, mama zebra. The truth is, we have never made mockery of you or your blind child. It’s just your assumption. Let me tell you something; you have only one blind child, but I’ve got three blind children, so there’s no point mocking you. Now, about our laughter… we always laugh so loud because we are happy, and I tell them jokes all the time. So my dear, I’ve got much more problems to even notice yours.”
Many times in life, we become consumed with anger and sadness because we assume things that are not entirely true. Sometimes… we see things and we misunderstand. Taking things personally causes us much pain and suffering. And the main reason why we take things personally is because we make assumptions. We often make the assumption that someone else’s action is about us. However, if we pause a moment and look hard into things, we’d realize that most times, people are too busy with themselves that they rarely pay attention to us, let alone criticize us. Everyone’s got their own vulnerabilities and challenges. So, instead of making assumptions, we should learn to ask questions. Most importantly, we should dream big and never be afraid of chasing our dreams, no matter what our assumptions in life are.”
Today’s Prayer (01 May)
Hail, Guardian of the Redeemer,
Spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
To you God entrusted his only Son;
in you Mary placed her trust;
with you Christ became man.
Blessed Joseph, to us too,
show yourself a father
and guide us in the path of life.
Obtain for us grace, mercy and courage,
and defend us from every evil. Amen.
St. Joseph, Pray for us.
Love is a quality or a virtue, a feeling of strong and continuous affection for the other. We all know that there are different types of love we express or experience or go through the stages of human development as human persons among ourselves and in our relationship with other living creatures. However, love needs no language, because love itself is an expression of the language of God, that’s been given to us since conception. So we have the capacity and potency to express love in various ways. From the human point of view our love can be measured, expects many things in return, possessiveness creeps in, favoritism and partiality exists, true love too is expressed and experienced in sacrifices that we make. But from the viewpoint of God, love is equal for all, because we are his children and his loving creatures. That’s the bottom or top line for God, for God treats us equally and justly.
VATICAN CITY, VATICAN – JANUARY 01: (EDITOR NOTE: STRICTLY EDITORIAL USE ONLY – NO MERCHANDISING) Pope Francis presides over New Year’s Day Mass celebrating the Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God at St. Peter’s Basilica on January 01, 2024 in Vatican City, Vatican. Presiding over the morning Mass in Saint Peter’s Basilica on New Year’s Day, Pope Francis spoke about this day when we celebrate in a special way the Holy Mother of God, “a simple phrase that confesses the Lord’s eternal covenant with us.” January 1st marks the Solemnity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, and also the day the Church marks the World Day of Peace. (Photo by Vatican MVatican Pool/Getty Images)
Pope Francis met with students and teachers of the “Schools for Peace” national network on Friday morning, 19 April. “In this time, still marked by war”, he said to them, “I ask you to be artisans of peace; in a society still imprisoned by the throwaway culture, I ask you to be protagonists of inclusion; in a world traversed by global crises, I ask you to be builders of the future, so that our common home may become a place of fraternity”. The following is a translation of the Holy Father’s words which he shared in Italian in the Paul VI Hall.
Dear boys,
Dear girls,
Dear teachers,
Good morning, everyone!
I am pleased to meet once again the “Schools for Peace” national network. I greet Dr Lotti and I welcome all of you.
I first want to thank you. Thank you for this journey, rich in ideas, initiatives, educational processes and activities, which aim to promote a new world vision. Thank you for being full of enthusiasm in pursuing objectives of beauty and goodness, in the midst of tragic situations, injustices and violence that disfigure human dignity. Thank you, because with passion and generosity you are committed to working in the “building site of the future”, overcoming the temptation of a life restricted merely to today, which risks losing the ability to dream big. However, today more than ever, there is a need to live responsibly, broadening our horizons, looking forward and sowing, day by day, those seeds of peace that tomorrow will be able to germinate and bear fruit. Thank you, boys and girls!
This coming September, the Summit of the Future will take place in New York, convened by the United Nations to face the major global challenges of this moment in history and to sign a “Pact for the Future” and a “Declaration on Future Generations”. It is an important event, and your contribution is also needed so that it does not remain only “on paper”, but becomes concrete and is implemented through processes and actions for change.
You carry in your heart this great dream: “Let us transform the future. For peace, with care”. And on this point, I would like to pause briefly to tell you something I very strongly believe: that you are called — listen carefully — you are called to be protagonists and not spectators of the future. I ask you: to what are you called? To be what? [The young people answer]. I can’t hear you! [The young people answer loudly]. Come on! Go ahead! The convocation of this global Summit, in fact, reminds us that we are all called to build a better future and, above all, that we must build it together! I ask you: Can we build the future by ourselves? [The young people answer “no”]. I can’t hear you… [A loud “no”]. Must we build it? [“Yes!”]. Good! We cannot simply delegate concerns about the “world to come” and the resolution of its problems to designated institutions and to those who have particular social and political responsibilities. It is true that these challenges require specific skills, but it is equally true that they affect us closely, touching everyone’s lives and demanding active participation and personal commitment from each one of us. In a globalized world like this one, where we are all interdependent, it is not possible to proceed as lone individuals who tend only to their own “garden”, who cultivate their own interests: it is instead necessary to connect and form networks. What is needed? To connect and form networks. What is needed? To connect and form networks. All together! [The young people answer]. Good, yes, and this is important: it is necessary to connect, to work in synergy and harmony. This means passing from “I” to “we”: not “I work for my own good”, but “we work for the common good, for the good of all”. We work for the good of all. Together! [The young people repeat]. Good!
In effect, today’s challenges, and especially the risks that, like dark clouds, gather above us, threatening our future, have also become global. They affect all of us, they challenge the entire human community, they require the courage and creativity of a collective dream that inspires constant commitment in order to confront, together, the environmental crises, the economic crises, the political and social crises that our planet is going through.
Dear boys, dear girls, dear teachers, it is a dream that requires that we be awake, and not slumbering! Yes, because it is brought about by working, not sleeping; walking the streets, not lying on the sofa; using information technology well, not wasting time on social media; and then — listen carefully — this type of dream is fulfilled also with prayer, that is, together with God, and not by our own strength alone.
Dear students, dear teachers, you have placed two keywords at the heart of your commitment: peace and care. They are two interconnected realities: indeed, peace is not merely the silence of weapons and the absence of war; it is a climate of benevolence, trust and love that can mature in a society based on relations of care, in which individualism, distraction and indifference give way to the capacity to pay attention to others, to listen to them in their fundamental needs, to heal their wounds, to be instruments of compassion and healing for him or her. This is the care that Jesus has towards humanity, in particular towards the most fragile, and of which the Gospel speaks often. From mutual “caring”, an inclusive society, founded on peace and dialogue, is born.
In this time, still marked by war, I ask you to be artisans of peace; in a society still imprisoned by the throwaway culture, I ask you to be protagonists of inclusion; in a world traversed by global crises, I ask you to be builders of the future, so that our common home may become a place of fraternity.
I would like to speak to you for a couple of minutes about war. Think of the children who are in war, think of the Ukrainian children who have forgotten how to smile. Pray for these children, keep them in your heart… the children who are in war. Think of the children of Gaza, under fire, who are hungry. Think of the children. Now a moment’s silence, and each one of us, let us think of the Ukrainian children and the children of Gaza.
I wish for you always to be impassioned by the dream of peace. I say so with the motto of Don Lorenzo Milani, the prior of Barbiana, who opposed the “I don’t care” typical of uncaring indifference, with the “I care”, that is, “I take it to heart”, “I am interested”. May all this be dear to you. May you always care about the fate of our planet and your fellow human beings; may you care about the future that is opening before us, so that it may truly be as God dreams it for all: a future of peace and beauty for all humanity. And may you care about the children of Ukraine, who forget how to smile; the children of Gaza, who suffer under machine-gun fire. I bless you from my heart. Enjoy school and have a good journey! And, please, remember to pray for me.
