The Philosophers Zone

BRRRR. Even as a born and bred Canadian I still hate the winter! It takes an extra ten minutes to get out the door in this season. The only thing I like about it is the fact that because I have tons of pockets on the coat I can skip carrying my purse.
I have been busy and I apologize to my faithful readers that I have missed 8 days. I am moving in a month and have had lots to do since it is a relocation to another city. Plus throw a baby shower in there for my sisterinlaw and there goes two days alone in preparations. It was worth it though. We had a contest where we had to guess the baby food without the labels and I tell you, they didn't have flavours like that for my kids 13 years ago! Yuck! I understand why babies make those faces and spit it out now! Some food is not meant to be mixed and ground up together.
Keeping on the theme of children I would like to introduce the following article to you. I thought it was an amusing yet truthful read.

What 9/11 and a 3-Year-Old Taught Me About Gratitude
Copyright 2005 Tony Mase

One of the most important concepts Wallace D. Wattles wrote
about in his books was gratitude. As a matter of fact, in
the book for which he's best known, "The Science of Getting
Rich", Wallace D. Wattles devoted an entire chapter to
gratitude and used the word gratitude some thirty-two times
throughout the book.

Although I'd been studying "The Science of Getting Rich" by
Wallace D. Wattles for over three years, and made
incredible changes in my life by applying its principles, I
still didn't completely get this gratitude "thing".

I understood the importance of gratitude intellectually
and, at least to some extent, was applying it in my life,
but, and I don't know if this was just a "guy thing" or
what, I didn't feel like I really understood it emotionally
at a deep down, visceral level.

Then it happened...

September 11, 2001...

A day few of us will ever forget.

The one thing I'll always remember most about that fateful
day was my son, who was three years old at the time,
looking at me with his big brown eyes asking me the dreaded
but inevitable...

"Why Daddy?"

For lack of anything better, I gave him the best good guy,
bad guy analogy I could come with at the time and then, for
whatever reason, I ended it with, "as bad as this appears
to be, we have a lot to be thankful for."

Hoping that was that, I quickly began thinking of something
else we could do or talk about to get his mind off the
horror he'd just witnessed on television.

Suddenly, I heard him ask...

"Like what Daddy?"

"Like what, what?" I replied.

"Like what we have to be thankful for?" he asked.

"Great," I thought to myself, "I thought we were done with
this."

"Well," I said, "we can be thankful that you, me and mommy
are okay. A lot of little boys and girls lost their mommies
or daddies today. Some of them lost both."

He thought for a moment and then asked, "What else Daddy?"

"Well," I replied, "we can be thankful that so many people
were able to get out of those buildings alive before they
collapsed."

"What else Daddy?" he asked.

"Well..." I hesitated, desperately trying to think of
something else.

"Come on Daddy," he said, "what else we have to be thankful
for?"

"Well," I said, "we can be thankful for all the brave fire
fighters, paramedics and police officers who are helping
those who need it."

"And the fire fighters have fire trucks with lights and
sirens, huh Daddy?" he asked with a smile on his face.

"Yes son, they do," I replied, returning his smile.

"What else Daddy?" he asked.

"Well son," I said, "we can be thankful that we have a
strong military to protect us."

"And they have tanks, huh Daddy?" he asked, this time with
a really big smile (for whatever reason, he *really* likes
tanks :-)).

"Yes son, they do," I replied, "and they have lots of them."

"What else we have to be thankful for Daddy?" he asked...

As his "grilling" continued (which at the time seemed like
it went on forever :-)), and the list of things we had to
be thankful for grew larger and larger and larger, I could
*feel*, rather dramatically, our thoughts shift from those
of doubt, uncertainty, fear and worry, to those of
certainty and faith.

Finally...

I got it! :-)

You see, all too often, when something's not "right" in our
lives, or something's not the way we'd prefer it to be,
even though it may be only a *tiny* portion of our overall
experience, we tend to focus all our mental energy on it
causing us to lose our perspective and, in the process, we
virtually insure we'll get more of the same... more of what
we *don't* want.

On the other hand...

Gratitude forces us to focus on what's right in our lives,
on the things that are the way we'd prefer them to be,
which, chances are, are the overwhelming majority of our
experience at any given time, causing us to put things in
their proper perspective and thereby virtually insuring
we'll get more of the same... more of what we *do* want!

Since that unforgettable day, I've repeated this simple
exercise dozens of times...

Whenever I feel thoughts of doubt, uncertainty, fear or
worry starting to creep in, I simply ask myself what I have
to be thankful for right *now* and then I keep asking...

What else...

What else...

What else...

It's never failed yet to almost instantly help me regain a
"constructive" perspective and replace those "destructive"
thoughts of doubt, uncertainty, fear and worry with
"constructive" thoughts of certainty and faith.

Thanks son. :-)

----------------------------------------------------
Tony Mase is a serious student of the works of Wallace D.
Wattles and the publisher of "The Science of Abundant Life"
ebook by Wallace D. Wattles...
http://www.thescienceofabundantlife.com