“Slip,Slidin’ Away”*
We often speak of wanting our lives to change or for changes to be made. We often struggle to get there, then give up, and then we have the same conversation with ourselves. That is simply because in order for our lives to change, we actually have to be willing to make changes and then make those changes.
There isn’t a magic potion and we can’t expect instant success. Learning and developing a new habit takes time and regular practice through use. The longer we have been living a certain way, the longer any change takes.
Like an athlete who hires a new coach. The new coach wants the athlete to change a fundamental part of their game, in order to improve their game. First, the athlete unlearns the old/bad habit while learning the new/good habit. He does this through practice and repetition , practice and repetition , and more practice and repetition……
An athlete also learns that the power is in the follow through. If you visualize or perform a tennis stroke, golf swing, batting, shooting a basket, throwing a ball, throwing a punch, a pedal stroke, you know that the power in those athletic actions comes from the follow through. So to it is with your dreams and goals. Your power lies in your follow through.
Without the continual practice, repetition, and follow through, whatever progress you’ve made will be “slip, sliding, away”*
“People who believe they have the power to exercise some measure of control over their lives are healthier, more effective and more successful than those who lack faith in their ability to effect changes in their lives.” – Albert Bandura, Phd.
“They say that time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself.” – Andy Warhol
So if you really want change it’s…… “Slowly I turn…step by step…inch by inch…**
Remember, however “slowly”, each step forward is progress. Each step forward is a step closer. The instant gratification you would like to have is found in the steady and incremental progress. Congratulate yourself with each step forward.
Be Good Do Good Think Good
This is also an updated version of one of the Spinning Rabbi’s greatest hits
* Paul Simon
** Famous comedy routine most associated with Abbott and Costello, The Three Stooges
Just One Day?
A Valentine’s Day Thought
Do we need a special day, or just one day to celebrate how valuable love is?
Those that have it, know how valuable it is. Keeping it alive means celebrating it everyday. Wouldn’t that make everyday a Happy one?
Those that don’t have it yet, still know how wonderful and valuable it is, which is why searching matters so much.
At one time or another, everyone was a searcher, so once found cherish it.
Here are lots of beautiful quotes on love for those that have it and the searchers
“Love is a game that two can play and both win.” – Eva Gabor
“To love for the sake of being loved is human, but to love for the sake of loving is angelic.” – Alphonse de Lamartine
“Love has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get – only with what you are expecting to give – which is everything.” – Katherine Hepburn
“We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.” – Sam Keen
“The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and to let it come in.” – Morrie Schwartz
“Love has no age, no limit; and no death.” – John Galsworthy
“I can live without money, but I cannot live without love.” – Judy Garland
“The degree of loving is measured by the degree of giving.” – Edwin Lewis Cole
“If you press me to say why I loved him, I can say no more than because he was he, and I was I.” – Michel de Montaigne
“Any love that is dependent on something — when the thing ceases, the love also ceases. But a love that is not dependent on any thing never ceases…” – Ethics of the Fathers, 5:16
“Love turns one person into two and two into one.” – Rabbi Don Yitchak Abarbanel
“I’ve learned…. That no one is perfect until you fall in love with them.” – Andy Rooney
“To love and be loved is to feel the sun from both sides.” – David Viscott
“You know you’re in love when you can’t fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams”. — Theodor Seuss Geisel
“Love is not affectionate feeling, but a steady wish for the loved person’s ultimate good as far as it can be obtained.” – C.S. Lewis
“We waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love.” – Tom Robbins
“Love is the magician that pulls man out of his own hat.” – Ben Hecht
“We may give without loving, but we cannot love without giving.” – Bernard Meltzer
“Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.” – Aristotle
“Love doesn’t make the world go ’round. Love is what makes the ride worthwhile.” – Franklin P. Jones
“Most people have a harder time letting themselves love than finding someone to love them.” – Bill Russell
“Who, being loved, is poor?” – Oscar Wilde
“Love is the condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own.” – Robert Heinlein
“Immature love says: ‘I love you because I need you.’ Mature love says: ‘I need you because I love you.” – Erich Fromm
“Love is the master key that opens the gates of happiness.’ – Oliver Wendell Holmes
“Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.” – Lao Tzu
“The first duty of love is to listen.” – Paul Tillich
“The minute I heard my first love story I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was. Lovers don’t finally meet somewhere. They’re in each other all along.” – Jalal ad-Din Rumi
“I am to my beloved, and my beloved is to me” – Song of Songs 6:3
“To be loved means to feel worthy of being loved.” – Rabbi Laibl Wolf
“There is only one happiness in this life, to love and be loved.” – George Sand
“True love stories never have endings” – Richard Bach
“Love does not consist in gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction.” – Antoine de Saint-Exupery
“To love another person is to see the face of G-d.” – Victor Hugo
“Age does not protect you from love. But love, to some extent, protects you from age.” – Anais Nin
“Love is a ladder; it allows us to climb out of ourselves”. – Noah benShea
“Do not seek the because – in love there is no because, no reason, no explanation, no solutions.” – Anais Nin
“Fall in love and you can fall out of love. Create love and it will last forever.” – Tzvi Freeman
“People think you give to those that you love, true love is when you love those to whom you give” – Rabbi Dessler
“If you would be loved, love, and be loveable.” – Benjamin Franklin
“The joyous miracle of true love is in becoming we, neither of us has to give up me.” – Rabbi David Aron
“To love and win is the best thing. To love and lose, the next best.” – William Makepeace Thackeray
“Life without love is like a tree without blossoms or fruit.” – Khalil Gibran
“What love we’ve given, we’ll have forever. What love we fail to give, will be lost for all eternity.” – Leo Buscaglia
“Love is a ladder; it allows us to climb out of ourselves”. – Noah benShea
“The salvation of man is through love and in love.” – Dr.Viktor Frankl
For all the other Spinning Rabbi posts on romantic love click here
Be Good Do Good Think Good
“I Can’t?” – Who Says So?
Here is an old post from the Spinning Rabbi’s Greatest Hits.*
Posting it again now will help with your 2020 vision, or is it your vision for 2020. It will help you stay Enthusiastic.
So here it is
You will be so inspired when you watch the video below, but first let’s give it a little context.
If there is something you really wish to do or accomplish, how often do you say to yourself “I can’t”? If you say that to yourself, then you will come to believe it. Once you believe it, it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. That is a self-imposed limitation. Besides, how do you know you can’t, if you don’t try?
Do you say it because others tell you that “you can’t”? Why are you letting them decide for you? If you listen to them, it’s the same as a self-imposed limitation. Besides, how do they know?
This video titled “Yes I Can”, will show you what never saying “I Can’t” and always saying “Yes I Can” can do and will do for you.
Watching this, you will say to yourself, “Amazing”. The point being made by the people in this video is just the opposite. They don’t believe what they do is amazing!!! They believe they can and no one can tell them otherwise!
You Cannot Lower Your Mountain, You Can Elevate Yourself!
*updated slightly from the original of AUGUST 17, 2016
Always Enthusiastic
As we begin another New Year, we make promises/resolutions to ourselves with an eye towards reaching our dreams and goals.
We begin the New Year with lots of enthusiasm towards reaching those dreams and goals. Inevitably, for most, that enthusiasm wanes over time.
So how do we keep that enthusiasm burning?
There are lots of new beginnings. There is a new year, a new month, a new week, a new day, hour, minute…… Each new is another opportunity to reignite the enthusiasm you had at the beginning of the last new. If we celebrate each new as another opportunity, we can renew that enthusiasm and keep it burning. So cherish the new of every new and especially every moment.
With every new remind yourself of your dreams and goals. Think of a word or thought that you can use as prompt reminder. With those reminders you will keep the enthusiasm in the present. Renew with each and every New.
“The beginning is embedded in the end, and the end is embedded in the beginning”. – Sefer Yetzirah 1:7
Most Important – be grateful for each New that you are given!
You were given life for this moment, so that you can give this moment life.
For a new beginning to truly be a new beginning means not being anchored to the past. It is an opportunity to leave it behind.
Don’t just take a step forward, jump forward. Why jump, because when you take a step, one foot is still left in the past. When you jump, both feet leave the ground and then both land in the new spot. That means you are leaving the past behind and landing in your new beginning.
So leave the past behind, except for remembering the lessons you learned and create the present……Enthusiastically!!
Now with all that enthusiasm, remember that it is the Doing!! “Wishing and hoping… and planning and dreaming”*, – “Won’t get you where you want to go”**. It’s the doing that will get you the results.
“When all is said and done, a lot more is said than done”. — Lou Holtz
A reminder lesson from the Tightrope Walker who said when asked how he gets across
“It’s simple. Before I begin, I find an object on the other end and focus on it. I don’t dare take my eyes off the object while I’m walking. I don’t look to the right, I don’t look to the left, I don’t look down. As long as I focus on my goal, I make it across”.
With every step and progress you make towards the goal congratulate yourself
Be Good Do Good Think Good
* from “Wishing and Hoping”,Dionne Warwick
** from “Words of Love”, the Mamas and Papas
Healthy and Happy New Year 2020!!
Healthy and Happy New Year!!
As we begin another new year, another new, another beginning, a new decade, we look forward to all that we wish for. The good that we wish for ourselves, is the good that we wish for others and vice-versa.
For this New Year, let’s do more than just wish. Let’s make this a “Happy New Year”. Let’s make this the year where our deeds make our wishes reality. A year where we tap into “all of our possibilities” and potential to become the human we were destined and created to be. A year where we each do our part to make our world a better one.
We can get there by constantly striving to make all of our actions directed to a purpose higher than just ourselves.
All that we need and the world we all wish for is in our hands.
Many years ago there was this great old wise man, a seer, who was coming to a town to speak. His reputation preceded him, so many people waited with great anticipation for his arrival and then went to hear him speak. Among them, was this one young and skeptical man, who went simply to challenge the wise man. After the wise man spoke, there was a Q&A. When it was the young mans turn, he put out his cupped hands and asked the wise man what was in his hands. The wise man replied, “two little birds”, which was correct. The young man was impressed, but he was still skeptical, so he asked whether they were dead or alive. The wise man knew that if he replied, “they’re dead”, the young man would open his hands and the birds would fly away. If he replied “they’re alive”, the young man would crush the birds in his hands. The wise man’s reply was simply
“the answer is all in your hands.”
“Each person must see himself as though the entire world were held in balance and any deed he may do could tip the scales.” – Maimonides
May 2020 be your best year ever…so far!!
Healthy and Happy 2020
Be Good Do Good Think Good
You Don’t Have To Be Jewish To Enjoy Latkes
You don’t have to be Jewish to enjoy Latkes and you don’t have to be Jewish to enjoy some of Chanukah’s lessons and miracles.
Here are some of the lessons that apply to all
Jews all over the world are now celebrating Chanukah, the celebration of many miracles. From the victory of a small band of men fighting for their religious freedom against a very large and well equipped army, to one days worth of olive oil used to light the Menorah which then lasted for eight days.
The miracle of the oil burning for eight days represents the victory of light over darkness, both literally and figuratively.
At nighttime, Jews place their lit Menorah in doorways or windows to bring light to the dark street and to all who see it.
“A little light will dispel much darkness.” — Tzeda LaDerech
On the Menorah is a head candle called the Shamash, which is used to light all the other candles. The Shamash lights other candles without losing any of its own light. Each of us can be like the Shamash and bring light to all whose lives we come into contact with. When we are like the Shamash, not only do we keep our light, we actually shine brighter. We all have that power through acts of goodness, kindness, and charity.
“From one burning candle many candles are lit, yet its own light is not diminished.” – The Sages
Here is another powerful and universal message from Chanukah, the miracle of light.*
Of all the special qualities of a pretty and delicious olive, its essence is found in its oil when lit, producing its light. In order to get to the olives essence, it must first be crushed to produce the oil.
So too in our lives, we sometimes are or feel crushed – by pain and suffering, loss, struggle, and disappointment – and just like the olive, it is then that our essence can be revealed. It is in those moments that you may find your essence and with it bring your light to the world.
Happy Chanukah and Merry Christmas
and to all a good light
*Based on a teaching of the Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson
Can Make You Stronger
“That which doesn’t kill us, makes us stronger.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
You’re probably familiar with that quote. I think it would be more accurate to say “can make us stronger”.
It ultimately comes down to choice. How you choose to respond to all that comes, or is sent your way, can make you stronger. You have no choice as to what comes or is sent your way. You do have the choice as to how you respond.
Like a boxer in a fight who gets knocked down. He can give up and stay down, or he can get up, quickly learn what just happened, and fight stronger and better.
One choice can make you stronger and one might kill you. Not literally kill you, but kill your chance for a life filled with meaning, purpose, success, and joy. The life you say you want, right?
“Our lives are fashioned by our choices. First we make our choices. Then our choices make us.” – Anne Frank
“It’s choice, not chance that matters” – Jean Nidetch
“Life is a sum of all your choices.” – Albert Camus
It begins with internalizing the attitude of believing that you do have the power of choice. You are the boss of you!
All of life’s choices have a price. We can’t choose the price. We can only choose whether we are willing to pay it.
“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given circumstances, to choose one’s own way”. – Dr. Viktor Frankl from his book “Man’s Search for Meaning” He was a Holocaust survivor*
Attitude and Choice
“In life some people have it easy and make it hard and some people have it hard and make it easy” Sam Fox, my Father (obm), a Holocaust suvivor
Dr. Edith Eva Eger, who was also a Holocaust survivor, never forgets what her mother told her the day her and her family were taken by the Nazis:
“We don’t know where we’re going, we don’t know what’s going to happen, but no one can take away from you what you put in your own mind.”
Dr. Eger used to ask herself, “Why me? Why did I survive?” But over the years she has learned to ask a different question: “Why not me? What is mine to do with the life I’ve been given?”
Here is your homework
*I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, if you haven’t read Dr. Viktor Frankl’s book, make the choice to read it!!
Then read “The Choice” by Dr. Edith Eva Eger
Be Good Do Good Think Good
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