Finding Our Way Back To Each Other

Posted on March 18, 2012 by russtowne

I just heard a powerful and inspiring TED talk by Dr. Brene’ Brown about Vulnerability and Shame. I highly recommend that you invest the time to listen to it. Some of my favorite parts:

Vulnerability is NOT weakness. Vulnerability is the most accurate measurement of courage. It is the brithplace of innovation, creativity, and change.

Guilt is, “I did something bad.”
Shame is, “I am bad.”

Empathy is the antidote to shame.

It takes 3 things to grow shame:
Secrecy
Silence
Judgement

The 2 most powerful words when we are in struggle: “Me too.”

If we’re going to find our way back to each other, vulnerability is going to be that path.

Dare greatly!

http://tinyurl.com/6meku6g

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Finding the Light Within Yourself in Moments of Darkness

Posted on March 17, 2012 by russtowne

We all go through tough times. Sometimes even excruciating ones. If you are going through such a painful situation right now, this post is dedicated to you. I don’t know who wrote the paragraph below, but I believe it captures an important truth. May you find the light within yourself in your dark moments.

“It’s the times in our lives when we go through hardship, loss, disappointment and failure that help us define who we really are. It’s in those moments that we are forced to reach deep within ourselves and pull out strength we never really thought we had. We are stronger than we know and can weather storms far worse than we believe. It’s in these moments of darkness that we see the light within ourselves and know that we can survive these difficult times. Believe in yourself and know that you have the strength to not only survive but thrive.
~Believe”

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I Believe…

Posted on March 17, 2012 by russtowne

I relative sent an email to me with the title “I Believe”. I liked it and thought you might too. It has been edited for brevity.

I Believe…

That just because two people argue,
It doesn’t mean they don’t love each other.
And just because they don’t argue,
It doesn’t mean they do love each other.

I Believe…
That we don’t have to change friends if
We understand that friends change.

I Believe….
That no matter how good a friend is,
they’re going to hurt you,
every once in a while
and you must forgive them for that.

I Believe…..
That true friendship continues to grow,
even over the longest distance.
Same goes for true love.

I Believe….
That it’s taking me a long time
To become the person I want to be.

I Believe…
That you should always leave loved ones with Loving words. It may be the last time you see them.

I Believe….
That you can keep going long after you think you can’t.

I Believe….
That we are responsible for what
We do, no matter how we feel.

I Believe…
That either you control your attitude or it controls you.

I Believe….
That heroes are the people
who do what has to be done
when it needs to be done,
regardless of the consequences.

I Believe….
That my best friend and I can do anything or nothing
and have the best time..

I Believe…
That sometimes when I’m angry
I have the right to be angry, but that
doesn’t give me the right to be cruel.

I Believe…
That maturity has more to do with what types of experiences you’ve had
And what you’ve learned from them and less to do with how many birthdays you’ve celebrated.

I Believe…..
That it isn’t always enough,
to be forgiven by others.
Sometimes, you have to learn
to forgive yourself.

I Believe….
That our background and circumstances
may have influenced who we are, but,
we are responsible for who we become.

I Believe….
Two people can look at the exact same
Thing and see something totally different.

I Believe…
That even when you think
you have no more to give,
When a friend cries out to you,
you will find the strength to help.

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Friendship

Posted on March 16, 2012 by russtowne

“It is not so much our friends’ help that helps us as the confident knowledge that they will help us.” -Epicurus, philosopher (c. 341-270 BCE)

Based on how long ago Epicurus lives, it seems safe to say that some things never change. Just knowing that one has good friends can be a great comfort.

If you are have good friends in your life, I compliment you on the ways that you’ve likely been a good friend.

For those who don’t have good friends in your life, or who wonder about how good your friends are, you might want to consider focusing on becoming a better friend. I have not always been a good friend and there have been times that people who I thought were my friends turned out not to be. Some were merely buddies (ggod-weather friends who are nowehere to be found when times get tough), and some were even false friends, but I’ve worked on becoming a better friend.

I’ve learned that as one becomes a better friend, good friends begin appearing in ever-greater numbers. The reason is simple. Everyone wants to have a good friend. I believe that we all have inside ourselves attributes that can help us to become good friends. May we all eventually find that we have great ones, and may they always be there to help pick us up when we are down, to celebrate our wins and mourn our losses, and to simply share themselves and by doing so make our lives richer.

I’ve also been blessed to have had some good friends even before I’ve earned them by being a good friend myself. In some cases, I had no clue as to just how good of a friend they were until they were there for me when I most needed a friend. To all such people in the world who have done that for me or others: Thank you for making my world a better place!

By the way, I read the above quote from Epicurus in a daily email I recieve from Wordsmith.org called A.Word.A.Day by Anu Garg. The site defines and discusses a different word or phrase every day and includes a quote. I enjoy the quotes at least as much as the learning more about words. Anu Garg appears to be a person who has passion for words and is using it to help the world become better acquainted with the Enlish language. Thank you, Anu!

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Spontaneous Rescue Efforts By Many People Saves Stranded Dolphins

Posted on March 15, 2012 by russtowne

I’ve heard of stories where dolphins have saved drowning humans, and today I saw a heart-warming video where a bunch of apparant strangers spontaneously worked together to save a group of dolphins that were in danger of dying. If different species can save each other there is even greater hope for our planet.

http://www.wimp.com/dolphinssaved/

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Making A Difference

Posted on March 13, 2012 by russtowne

I will sometimes re-post something for readers who found this site in recent months. Below is one such re-post.

Russ

Remember the hit song from awhile back that included these words?:

Don’t Laugh At Me
Don’t call me names
Don’t get your pleasure from my pain
In God’s eyes we’re all the same
Some day we’ll all have perfect wings
Don’t laugh at me

Don’t Laugh At Me is one of my favorite songs. It has been my great pleasure to have met the man who wrote that song. His name is Steve Seskin. While I don’t know him well from our relatively brief interactions, I feel I know a lot about his heart and spirit from the words in this song. I like, admire, and respect him, and not just because as a fellow songwriter I admire and am touched by his work, or the fact that he has seven #1 hit songs to his credit. Those are relatively minor things to me compared to something else he has done that has potentially had a far greater positive impact on the world.

Steve took this beautiful and very successful song about kindness and the pain caused by bullying and indifference and did something truly extraordinary. He began going to schools to teach about kindness and to help students, faculty, and parents to work together to eliminate bullying in their schools.

The messages of kindness and working together to eliminate bullying have clearly struck a chord, not just in the USA but around the world. The song has been translated into several languages. Hearing it being sung in Hebrew, Arabic, Serbian, English, and Japanese I can’t help but feel that there is hope for humanity and that working together we can make the world an even better place.

If you’d like to hear the song sung in different languages by people from around the world, check out
http://steveseskin.com/news/. At that site you’ll also be able to learn more about the program to replace bullying and indifference with kindness. You’ll also be able to hear more of Steve’s other songs.

Thank you, Steve Seskin, for all you do to make a positive difference in the world!

Posted in Bullying, Courage, Healing, LIfe Lessons, Making the World a Better Place, Random Thoughts, Vids & Stories That Touched Me | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

To The Stars, And Beyond

Posted on March 12, 2012 by russtowne

A friend on Facebook posted this quote. It resonated with me and I thought it would with many of you, too.

“And finally, I believe in my whole race. Yellow, white, black, red, brown –in the honesty, courage, intelligence, durability….and goodness…..of the overwhelming majority of my brothers and sisters everywhere on this planet. I am proud to be a human being. I believe that we have come this far by the skin of our teeth, that we always make it just by the skin of our teeth –but that we will always make it….survive….endure. I believe that this hairless embryo with the aching, oversize brain case and the opposable thumb, this animal barely up from the apes, will endure –will endure longer than his home planet, will spread out to the other planets, to the stars, and beyond, carrying with him his honesty, his insatiable curiosity, his unlimited courage –and his noble essential decency.”
“This I believe with all my heart.” — R. A. Heinlein

I’d add “hers” to all of the “his’s” in his last sentence. There is not enough “skin of our teeth” for humanity to continue to survive and evolve without all the great contributions the “hers” of our race provide.

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Woman Rescues Driver Who Flipped Her Off

Posted on March 11, 2012 by russtowne

It has happened to most of us. A driver flips us off or gives some other rude gesture, then speeds off down the road. That happened to a woman in Crystal Springs, Florida, but what happened next is the reason for this post.

Shortly after receiving the rude gesture, the woman Kristyn Dominy, risked her life to save the driver who had flipper her off and her daughter from what could have become a tragic fiery death.

Life is all about choices. When we’re flipped off we can choose to continue adding to the chain of unkindness, or we can break that chain with kindness, empathy, and forgiveness. I applaud Kristin Dominy for the choices she made that day.

I hope that the other driver and her daughter fully recover from their injuries. And I hope the other driver is inspired to make a different choice when tempted to flip off drivers in the future. Perhaps the choices Kristin Dominy made that day will be the catalyst for that change in the driver, and maybe even for other drivers too.

http://tampa.cbslocal.com/2012/03/09/woman-rescues-driver-who-flipped-her-off/

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I Just Returned from a Memorial Service of a Man I’ve Never Met

Posted on March 11, 2012 by russtowne

I just returned from a memorial service of a man I’ve never met. He was a distant relative of my elderly father-in-law who would not have been able to go if I hadn’t taken him.

The deceased was born in 1918. When he was in school his class took a bus on a field trip to a public pool to go swimming. When they arrived, he and another boy were told they couldn’t go swimming and had to stay on the bus the whole time while all of the rest of the students got to go swimming. They had committed a terrible crime. They’d neglected to be born white.

He was dirt poor. So poor he had to drop out of school to help support his family. He didn’t get to go to high school until he was 21–a freshman in a class full of 14 year olds.

He joined the Army six months before Pearl Harbor was attacked. When the war began he joined a secret unit called MIS, an intelligence group that was never mentioned in the news throughout the whole war and for a quarter of a century later. Ultimately it was credited with helping to save a million American lives and end the war two years sooner.

He served as an interpreter and interrogator to many Japanese POW’s during the war, and then war criminals after Japan surrendered. He interrogated and interpreted for Tojo, Japan’s Prime Minister and top war leader, and for the Japanese General who was in charge of the atrocities that occurred during the Bataan Death March.

For his wartime efforts, weeks before his death at the age of 94 he (and other remaining survivors of MIS) received the Congressional Gold Medal, America’s highest award for civilians and joining the ranks of fellow recipients George Washington, Nelson Mandela, and Martin Luther King.

I just returned from a memorial service of a man I’ve never met, but wish I had.

Walter Tanaka, thank you for your service and the legacy you left behind.

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