my journey contines

some of you will remember this song/poem… it was on the radio in 1999, popular at graduations and such. just wanted to share the lyrics with you. i was listening to it today… hehe

Sunscreen Song
Baz Luhrman

Ladies and gentlemen, if I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it.
The long term benefits of sunscreen have been proven by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience.
I will dispense this advice now:

Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth. Oh, nevermind. You will not understand the power and the beauty of your youth until they’ve faded. But trust me, in 20 years you’ll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous your really looked.

You are not as fat as you imagine.

Don’t worry about the future or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blindsides you at 4pm on some idle Tuesday.

Do one thing every day that scares you.

Sing.

Don’t be wreckless with other people’s hearts. Don’t put up with other people who are wreckless with yours.

Floss.

Don’t waste your time on jealousy. Sometimes you’re ahead, sometimes you’re behind. The race is long and in the end it’s only with yourself.

Remember compliments you receive. Forget the insults. If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.

Keep your old love letters. Throw away your old bank statements.

Stretch.

Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you want to do with your life. The most interesting people I know didn’t know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives. Some of the most interesting 40 year olds I know, still don’t.

Get plenty of calcium. Be kind to your knees - you’ll miss them when they’re gone!

Maybe you’ll marry. Maybe you won’t. Maybe you’ll have children. Maybe you won’t. Maybe you’ll divorce. Maybe you’ll dance the funky chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary. Whatever you do don’t congratulate yourself too much. Your choices are half chance. So are everybody elses.

Enjoy you’re body. Use it every way you can. Don’t be afraid of it or of what other people think of it. It’s the greatest instrument you’ll ever own.

Dance. Even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room.

Read the directions, even if you don’t follow them.

Do not read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly.

Get to know your parents. You never know when they’ll be gone for good. Be nice to your siblings. They’re the best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future.

Understand that friends come and go, and for the precious few you should hold on. Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle, for as the older you get the more you need the people you knew when you were young.

Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard. Live in Northen California once, but leave before it makes you soft.

Travel.

Accept certain inallieable truths: prices will rise, politicians will filander, you too will get old and when you do: you’ll fantasize that when you were young prices were reasonable, politicians were noble, and children respected their elders. Respect your elders.

Don’t expect anyone else to support you. Maybe you have a trust fun. Maybe you’ll have a wealthy spouse. But you never know when either one might run out.

Don’t mess too much with your hair, or by the time you’re 40 it will look 85.

Be careful whose advice you buy, but be patience with those who supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia. Dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts, and recycling it for more than it’s worth.

But trust me on the sunscreen.

A Prayer for Love

Everyone longs to give himself to someone,

To have a deep soul relationship with another,

To be loved thoroughly and exclusively,

But God to a Christian, says,

“No, not until you are satisfied, fulfilled,

and content with being loved by Me alone.

Until giving yourself totally unto Me,

To have a intensely personal and unique

relationship with Me alone,

Discovering that only in Me is your

satisfaction to be found, will you be

capable of the perfect human relationship

that I have planned for you,

you will never be united with Me;

Stop planning,

Stop wishing and allow me to give you the

most thrilling plan existing – one that you

cannot imagine.

I want you to have the best.

Please allow me to give it to you.

You just keep watching me,

Expecting the greatest things.

Keep experiencing the satisfaction that I am.

Keep listening and learning the things I tell you.

You just wait, that’s all.

Don’t be anxious.

Don’t look at the things you want.

You just keep looking off and up to me or

You’ll miss what I want to show you.

And when you are ready,

I’ll surprise you with a love far more

wonderful than you could dream of.

You see, until you are ready

(I am working at this moment to have both

of you ready at the same time),

Until you are both satisfied exclusively with

Me and the life I have prepared for you,

You will not be able to experience the love

that exemplifies your relationship with Me,

and this perfect love.

And dear one,

I want you to have the most wonderful love

I want you to see in the flesh a picture

of your relationship with Me.

And to enjoy materially and concretely the

everlasting union of beauty, perfection, and

love that I offer you with Myself.”

Attitude
Charles Swindoll

“The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life.

Attitude, to me, is more important than facts.
It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than successes, than what other people think or say or do.

It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill.

It will make or break a company… a church… a home.

The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day.

We cannot change our past… we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable.

The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude…

I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it.”

Keep Me in Touch with My Dreams
Ted Loder (from Guerillas of Grace)

“O Lord, in the turbulence and the loveliness of my living from day to day and night to night,
keep me in touch with my roots, so I will remember where I cam from and with whom;
keep me in touch with my feelings so I will be more aware of who I really am and what it costs;
keep me in touch with my mind so I will know who I am not and what that means;
and keep me in touch with my dreams, so I will grow toward where I want to go and for whom.

O Lord, deliver me from the arrogance of assuming I know enough to judge others;
deliver me from the timidity of presuming I don’t know enough to help others;
deliver me from the illusion of claiming I have changed enough when I have only risked little,
that, so liberated, I will make some of the days to come different.

O Lord, I ask not to be delivered from the tensions that wind me tight, but I do ask for
a sense of direction in which to move once wound,
a sense of humour about my disappointments,
a sense of repect for the elgant puzzlement of being human,
and a sense of gladness for your kingdom which comes in spite of my fretful pulling and tugging.

O Lord, nurture in me the song of a lover, the vision of a poet, the questions of a child, the boldness of a prophet, the courage of a disciple.

O Lord, it is said you created people because you love stories.
Be with me as I live out my story.”

A stately tree stood by the stream
Where sparkling waters flowed,
Her trunk was gnarled and badly scarred,
Her branches deeply bowed.

For many years she’d stayed the storms,
Withstood the windy blasts,
Her roots, sunk deep beneath the soil,
Tenaciously held fast.

At times she swayed so furiously
She thought her boughs would break;
The winds did heave her to and fro,
The ground did firmly shake.

Yet further down her roots did grow,
Her anchor firmly set,
She raised her branches to the sky
Her praises to beget.

For each new storm that came her way
Forced her to take strong hold,
And all the trials and stormy blasts
Caused her to grow fourfold.

When winds of tribulation blow,
Our faith takes root and grows;
And when shaken by life’s trials,
God’s strength He then bestows.

So when the trials of life befall,
Remember this old tree;
And thank God for each storm that comes
Which serves to strengthen thee

Linda J. Stevenson
Roanoke, Virginia

Seeing as it’s Valentine’s Day, I thought I’d put up something related to “love”.

A camp counsellor gave me this one summer. I was about 14 and she told me it wouldn’t mean much to me then, but that I should keep it because one day I would really appreciate it. I do.