Re: thoughts

[Myra Perala <mperala@teleport.com>]

Dear Laurel,

Thank you for your inspirational thoughts.  I was deeply touched by your
words of blessing and appreciation.  Truly after having been through an
experience such as yours, taking life for granted is an impossibility.  

We are blessed and very fortunate. May our lives all be full of
appreciation and gratitude and sensitivity.
Thoughtfullness requires periods of silence, introspection and awareness of
the moment.



Thought for the day from Sarah Ban Breathnach's SIMPLE ABUNDANCE COMPANION:

"Mindfulness means that instead of thinking about what you've just done, 
should have done, or are about to do, you focus only on what you're doing 
right now, whether it is reading a book, driving to work, paying bills, 
cooking dinner, picking up the dry cleaning, or bathing your child.  
Mindfulness means not being so impatient that you try to open a stubborn 
orange juice container with a steak knife.  Because unless you pay attention 
to that fleeting moment, you'll lose a pint of blood on the kitchen floor and 
five hours in the emergency room."

"Life is made up of millions of moments.  You must experience each one before 
you can appreciate them.  Whether you're shampooing your hair, having an 
argument, writing amemo, making love, talking on the telephone, or eating an 
apple, savor the sensatios involved.  All of these mements, whether joyous, 
routine, or painful, deserve your full attention.  In a life well lived, they 
are the heartbeats."





At 07:58 AM 7/17/00 -0700, you wrote:
>Dear cousins,
>    I was thinking as I awoke this beautiful morning, how fortunate I am.  I
>thank you all again for all your thoughts and prayers.  I have never felt
>really dejected (well maybe a couple of times in the middle of the night
>that I can hardly remember now) but just have been uplifted by all of your
>concern for my health.
>   Also I think it helped to have a historian's perspective on all of this.
>During this time I read about the ill-fated voyage of the Scots to Darien
>and in "A Dance Called America", the misery of those destitute folks fleeing
>the Clearances was laid out before me.  One can only marvel that any of them
>made it at all and then the impact on their health was never over-come, I'm
>sure.  How thankful I am to be alive now when such advances in the medical
>field are available.  I think it would be good for all to read John
>Prebble's "The Darien Disaster" or something like it.  Remembering the
>misery of the Pilgrims, the African Slaves, the Jews, the poor people caught
>along the way in the jaws of the Crusaders, the many pockets of misery today
>in Africa and SE Asia, the North Koreans, Stalin's massacre of millions of
>Ukranians and others in Siberian camps, etc.  What have we to complain about
>if we miss an airplane connection, are slowed down by another driver, have a
>bad hair day, or someone on this discussion group riles you?
> Thank you again, and be gentle with one another, and do have a good time
>for me in Scotland.
>
>    By the way is there anyone that might have a few extra hours around
>Sterling Castle?  There was something I had wanted to look into while there.
>Laurel
>
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>

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