Advice to my Children's Children

TO MY CHILDREN’S CHILDREN
These are insights I wish to pass on to my children’s children. I wish I could have taught my children all of them but some I learned too late. Some of them I whispered into the ears of my children, while others took 60 years to gain enough wisdom to articulate them. Even though I still cannot keep these rules consistently, I know they made my life much better. I give them you, my friends, so that those of you who are still young and lack parents or teachers may use them as you will. Shallow and lacking as they may be, they are a start.

RULES FOR A BETTER LIFE

Be grateful – gratitude is the pipeline to God. Gratitude draws in to itself joy and happiness. Gratitude forces us to let go of past hurts and be thankful for the present. Gratitude brings wonder and surprise. Through gratitude we can see grace.

Be kind – you never know whom you are talking to and you never know when the person sweeping the floor or waiting on your table today will be your boss tomorrow. Treat everyone with equal respect.

Be humble - always know that no matter how good you are at something your abilities will fade and a better person will always come along.

Be peaceful - Move peacefully through life. Do not distract others from their goals or interfere with their peace. Shun those who cause drama and disruption. They will cost you peace, focus and stability.

Be Strong - Even though we walk in peace, there is a time for violence. Stand up for yourself. Do not let anyone run over you. Evil will win if good men do not stand up for what is right. Protect the weak and vulnerable. They have no one else.

Be Smart - Always assume you could be wrong. Start from the place of seeking further information. Keep an open mind. Be open to possibilities you have not yet seen. But do not be easily led by others. Just because others believe something to be right or true does not make it true or right for you. You must define your own path.

Be Improving - Know your strengths and weaknesses – work harder on your weaknesses to make them less weak. In the meantime, hide your weaknesses and show forth your strengths.

Be Inspired - There is part of us that is “inspired” by God. Inspired means He breathed into us. We are part of Him and he is part of us. That means we have the ability to create. We create art, buildings, books, and even other people when we have children. But there is more. We have the ability to create opportunities by our intention. By seeing in our minds and imagination what we want and focusing on our desires we will open up possibilities to reach those goals. So make sure your wishes are not selfish or destructive. See yourself as successful. See yourself prosperous – and then work your butt off to reach your goals. Nothing is free and if you take things without effort it cheapens your worth as a person. Labor, work, and ideas have worth. Know your worth.

Be Loving - Know love. Do not hide for fear of being hurt. The joy will always outweigh the pain. To love you must allow yourself to get close enough to be hurt. There is no other way. Like childbirth, the memory of the pain will fade it you let it, but the memory of the joy remains.

The clarion call of the human heart is to love and be loved. Yet, love must be balanced and uplifting and not toxic or hurtful. Let love be supportive, giving strength and freedom to those we care about and accepting no less for yourself.

There are types of love and it take time to tell them apart. There is love that springs from the soul love that flows from the heart, love that comes from the body. Only age and wisdom will allow you to know the difference. If you should get them confused consider yourself human and learn from the experience.

A relationship with God is the most fulfilling and loving experience a person could have, but a relationship with religion is the most hateful, judgmental and damaging of all. It is more difficult the experience the love and acceptance of God when constrained by the rules and judgment of man. Sadly, it is easier to fall into the rules and judgment of men than it is to reach out to the heart of God. God has one rule. Love and do what you will in the light of perfect love. If you love God and love your fellow man you will fulfill all that God desires. Man has a million rules that no one will ever be able to fulfill. When you fail you will be judged. The trick is to know who condemns you. It will always be someone coated with pride, ego, arrogance, and they will always be blind to their own vileness and shortcomings.

Be Wise - No one is perfect but we hope to sin less and less and have greater periods between sins. Be merciful but do not forget what a person’s weakness is. Do not be a fool. Keep enough distance from weak people so that their follies and failures do not affect or reflect on you. There are some people who cannot change. They are the ones lacking a moral compass. They do not feel what is right or wrong. They only want their way. These will be able to lie and convince you because they feel no guilt. These are people who are evil. Evil is difficult to spot. It is cloaked in smiles and flattery, but it always originates from pernicious selfishness. It is without conscious and cares only about itself. It has no thought of the feelings of others. It pretends to care but does not even think of others except as to how they can serve the evil person. Stay away from selfish and self-serving people. Even Satan himself falls into this category, and many people are just like him. It has taken me 60 years to gather to myself fewer than a dozen people I trust completely. Even at this, I feel I have been blessed with the best friends. If you want to know the true heart of a person watch how they treat others who they perceive to be below them or those serving them. If you want to know the true person watch them when things get tough. Between the lightning and thunder the true man is revealed.

Be Fearless - A successful life is made up of taking REASONABLE risks. Never bet the farm. Never try something that will ruin you or your family if it does not work. Take risks to get ahead and try new things if those risks are limited and you can recover if they fail. If you take reasonable risks you are assured of failing at times. Do not let your pride make you hold on to bad directions or choices too long. Do not become attached to them. Let go of them and move on. It does not matter how many times you fail, but how many times you try again. Be resilient.

Be Consistent – Go out of your way to keep your word. The more you do the more powerful your word becomes. There will be those who wish you to bend your word to benefit them. Let your word be as true for one as the other.

Make your plan and stay on the path -

There is a plan for living a good and rich life. You need a good education – a good plan – and a good job, and never take your eyes off the goal. Don’t do things that take you off the path.

Always think three steps ahead. Ask yourself how others will react to your words or actions. Ask yourself what the outcome will be. Then ask yourself what the outcome of the outcome will be. If you can do these things you will have a great life because so few people think more than one move ahead.

You must finish your education, land a good job, and only then should you get married. After these things you may decide when to have children. Doing things in any different order will greatly reduce your likelihood of a successful life.

Never be a one trick pony – be able to do many things because the world changes and what you make a living doing today may not be needed tomorrow.

Most problems in life are of our own making - lack of concentration – lack of thinking about the outcome of your actions. Most of the time it is because what clouded our judgment was “SPAM”. Sex, Power, Arrogance, and Money. These are the downfall of good people. One day they may be your downfall too, so be forgiving. We all suffer from the same diseases.

Understand that we are all connected in ways we cannot fathom. You attitudes will affect others around you. And the ones affected by you will in turn affect others. And the energies will spread like a mist of love or hate from one person to another.

There are areas of personally space and freedom. Theses are “Yours – Mine - and ours.”

Never tell someone how to feel or what to think. Those things are sacred and belong to them alone. Never let anyone tell you how to feel or what to think. Those are yours and just as others have a right to stand up for what they think or feel or believe, so do you have that right. The most we should do is present our case clearly and leave it to the person to change or not. We cannot change another person. Only in the areas of life where you and others have mutual concerns do you have the right and are allowed to argue strongly. Yet, in the midst of the argument ask yourself how much it really means to you and never let winning become more important than what you are discussing.

Changing takes tremendous and constant energy. It is difficult for people to change. If you are a teacher, sensei, or counselor you must apply gentle and constant energy and encouragement over a long period of time to help the person change, even if that person is you. The person must want to change. Even then, it is like bending cold steel, and many times when the strength of will is released the personality has a tendency to spring back.

At every stage of life we think we have arrived, matured, become what we were meant to be. We are wrong every time. We never arrive because we are always learning and changing. Never assume you are fully formed. If you are alive you are not. Also – If you want to know if your journey here is done, if you are alive it is not. BUT – your mission may be accomplished before your journey is over.

Be strong and walk your own path. If you do this and respect others they will call you a leader.

There are great and constant laws in this universe. These laws are how God has created the universe to work. These are my interpretation of the laws I have seen work for me.

1 "As you sow, so shall you reap". Whatever we put out into the Universe comes back to us in some similar form. - If what we want is Happiness, Peace, Love, and Friendship... then you must be Happy, Peaceful, Loving and a True Friend. How you treat others will be reflected in how you are treated. Of course this also has to do with your choice of people, as well as how you treat them.

2 Life doesn't just HAPPEN, it requires our participation. – Very few things happen by chance. We draw things to us. The things that happen and the people in our life reflect what we are inside. If you have several failed relationships they will likely have something in common. A flaws in you and thus your decisions.

3 Because nothing happens by chance we must take responsibility for what happens to us and because of us. Our choices and our attitudes cause our life to happen. If we do not accept responsibility we cannot change the things that need changing. Remember that the masses go in circles but the wise man rises in spirals. History will repeat itself . Over and over the same things will occur in various ways. Most people react the same and make the same mistakes. But the wise person learns each time and each time they act with more knowledge and wisdom.

4 When we change we will see the people, things and circumstances around us change also. Our world mirrors us. Likewise, if you wish to change it is easier to do so after we change our friends and our daily routines/habits.

5 Everyone and everything is connected. Your bad mood, thoughtless deeds, or harsh words will change those around you for the worse and make them feel like you feel. Keep your bad moods to yourself or it will spread and come back to get you. Likewise, your love and respect will spread also and will lift you up as you life up others.

6 Keep your mind focused on better things, spiritual things, things that will cause growth. Most mistakes are made for two reasons. – Lack of focus. Lack of consideration of the outcome of your actions or words.

7 Be here now. Learn from the past but live in the present. Each moment becomes its own world. You cannot fully live if you regret the past or dread the future. Plan. Prepare, think ahead, but live with your focus on what you are doing now. You will get out of a deed or thought what you put into it so put all of yourself in each thought and action. It is your intent that will open the doors of possibility and opportunity. Intend – Want – Work – and Be ambitious creators.