The Power of Prayer

To introduce some humour, the following example of the power of prayer was sent to me by my father-in-law:

In a small town in the state of Nevada (where brothels are legal), an entrepreneur buys a piece of land right opposite the local church. He announces that he is building a brothel on this site.

The church and its congregation object strongly. They start a campaign to block the opening of the brothel and hold daily prayer meetings against it. Work progresses and the brothel duly opens.

However, the same day a freak thunderstorm hits the town. The brothel is hit by an enormous bolt of lightning and burns to the ground. The insurance company refuses to pay out as they say the lightning strike is an Act of God.

The church folks are extremely pleased until the brothel owner sues the church authorities. He claims that the church, through its action and prayer, is ultimately responsible for the destruction of his property, directly or indirectly.

The case goes to trial.

In court, the church vehemently denies all responsibility for the destruction of the brothel. The judge comments: “I don’t know how I’m going to decide this case. From the paperwork it appears we have a whore-house keeper who believes in the power of prayer – and an entire Episcopalian congregation who doesn’t!”

Patch Adams failed to make it through the medical board exams he needed to pass to become a doctor and it got to him. After months of suffering from depression and attempting suicide he sought help by voluntarily admitting himself to a psychiatric ward.

In hospital, he met people with a wide range of problems: catatonics, the mentally retarded, schizophrenics and so on. Eventually, Patch found ways of treating his own ailment and recognises that he has to sort his life out. Why? Because he realised that he still wanted to become a doctor, in spite of (because of?) all he had been through! He carries with him a positive attitude that fuelled his personal growth and success.

As he grew, he used his unusual methods to help the people around him to deal with their issues. Did he succeed in becoming a doctor? I wont spoil it for you if you haven’t seen the film.

So, what self-growth lessons can we learn from Patch Adams?

• How can others accept you if YOU can’t accept YOU? Stop acting, thinking and feeling like a failure, because you’re not.

• When you see hunks and models on TV, focus on self development, not self pity. Stop comparing yourself unfavourably. Self acceptance is not about having nice slender legs, or great abs. I know some real bitches and morons with ‘perfect’ bodies! Concentrate on inner beauty.

• If someone feels down, reach out to them and give them a hand back up. Don’t pity them or pile on the sympathy, give them practical help.

• The world is a classroom with the emphasis on lessons, not mistakes. Of course you will make mistakes along the way, but that’s part of the learning and are not to be dwelled on. Don’t beat yourself up over each mistake – if a toddler did that, she’d never learn to walk!

• One day at a time. Plants, trees, animals all grow one day at the time. Self growth is no different; it is a one day at a time process.  I use the word process for a reason; it’s not a journey, because journeys have destinations. Self growth is a continuous process.

• Consistent, one day at a time, small steps in personal growth  lead to inner stability, self confidence, increased self-esteem and… SUCCESS!

• Little things may have big meanings for other people. You may never know just how much the pat on the back, the friendly smile, saying “hello”, meant to the other person.

• Just because you are willing to go through the process of self development, it doesn’t mean that everyone else is. Be tolerant of other people’s attitudes to change, no matter how crazy you may think they are.

• My definition of success may not be the same as yours and there’s no point one of us forcing our view on the other.

• Finally, remember that there’s no such thing as over night success. Chris Brogan, one of the world’s leading bloggers on social media issues, took 6 years to be an “overnight success”!

But if you feel you are floundering, unsure what to do, there’s a lovely Chinese quote to fall back on – “When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.”  It sounds like one of those trite, fortune cookie sayings, but I’ve found it to be true in my life.

We are all here to learn our lessons and it doesn’t require formal “teachers or “gurus”.  Our spouses, partners, children, parents, friends, colleagues, officemates, neighbors, even strangers, may be our teachers.  All you have to do is be open to receive the lesson.

Box of Crayons have several similar videos, including “Find your great work, the movie” and “The 5.75 Questions You’ve Been Avoiding”

Moral of the story
Bull Shit might get you to the top, but it won’t keep you there.

Moral of the story
To be sitting and doing nothing, you must be sitting very, very high up.

Moral of the story
Always let your boss have the first say.

Moral of the story
If you share critical information pertaining to credit and risk with your shareholders in time, you may be in a position to prevent avoidable exposure.

Last year I upgraded from Boyfriend 5.0 to Husband 1.0 and noticed a distinct slow down in overall system performance, particularly in the flower and jewelry applications, which operated flawlessly under Boyfriend 5.0.

In addition, Husband 1.0 uninstalled many other valuable programs, such as
· Romance 9.5 and
· Personal Attention 6.5, and then installed undesirable programs such as
· World Cup 5.0,
· Super 14, 3.2 and
· Golf Clubs 4.1.

Conversation 8.0 no longer runs, and Housecleaning 2.6 simply crashes the system..

· Please note that I have tried running Nagging 5.3 to fix these problems, but to no avail.

What can I do?

Signed,

Desperate.

DEAR DESPERATE,

First, keep in mind,
· Boyfriend 5.0 is an Entertainment Package, while
· Husband 1.0 is an operating system.

Please enter into your browser: ithoughtyoulovedme.html and try to download Tears 6.2 and do not forget to install the Guilt 3.0 update.
· If that application works as designed, Husband1.0 should then automatically run the applications Jewelry 2.0 and Flowers 3.5.

However, remember, overuse of the above application can cause Husband 1.0 to default to Grumpy Silence 2.5, Happy Hour 7.0 or Beer 6.1.
· Please note that Beer 6. 1 is a very bad program that will download the Farting and Snoring Loudly Beta.

Whatever you do, DO NOT under any circumstances install Mother-In-Law 1.0 (it runs a virus in the background that will eventually seize control of all your system resources..)

In addition, please do not attempt to reinstall the Boyfriend 5.0 program.These are unsupported applications and will crash Husband 1.0.

In summary, Husband 1.0 is a great program, but it does have limited memory and cannot learn new applications quickly.. You might consider buying additional software to improve memory and performance. We recommend
· Cooking 3.0 and
· Hot Lingerie 7.7.

Regards

The Support Team