When has the night ended and the day begun? Awakening from the Hour of Dog and Wolf

There is a story told of a rabbi in ancient times who gathered his students together very early one morning, while it was still dark. He put this question to them: "How can you tell when night has ended and the day has begun?"

One student made a suggestion: "Could it be when you can see an animal and you can tell whether it is a sheep or a goat?"

"No, that's not it," answered the rabbi.

Another student said: "Could it be when you look at a tree in the distance and you can tell whether it is a fig tree or a peach tree?"

Again the rabbi answered: "No."

After a few more guesses the students said: "Well, how do you tell when night has ended?"

The rabbi answered: "It is when you look on the face of any man or woman and you see them as your brother or sister. If you cannot do this, then, no matter what time it is, it is still night."

The nights are becoming longer, as I am sure you have noticed. This often brings with it a sense within us to seek hibernation, to go into ourselves. We need to be careful here, as tempting as it is. If we hibernate we are not awake, we are falling asleep.

It can become difficult to awake from our slumber on these cold, darkening mornings that the Autumn brings. The temptation is to stay in and not awaken to life, to turn inwards and not to live in the world.

This last Tuesday I experienced a lovely example of this. I regularly attend an early morning meditation. Now when my alarm went off early on Tuesday morning a part of me didn’t want to get up and step into the cold darkness of the morning. But I did. I prayed my morning prayers; I sought inspiration from the great mystery and listened to the birds outside my window. I got ready for the day. I brushed Molly’s hair and took her to the toilet. We then went to join in meditation. Molly shot in and greeted the folk and also greeted each individual as they arrived. We humans greeted one another with humour and coffee and then we enjoyed silence together in complete darkness as Molly settled down in her bed. As the silence ended the light was just starting to appear. We then began to share about our own personal joys and troubles, our own spiritual journeys. As everyone spoke I looked at their faces and connected with them and saw in them as my own brother and sister, I saw myself reflected back at me. I saw a reflection of the Divine in their eyes and heard it in their words.

It is so tempting at times to separate people into those that are for me and those that are against me; that there are those that are my friends and those who are my foes. That we need to keep an eagle eye out for the ‘foes’, because if we do not they may well cause us harm; that these people are dangerous, even “toxic” and you must keep them out of your life. This is not helpful or healthy. We are all formed from the one flesh and we all have the same spirit flowing through us. Divisiveness does not help anyone.

There is a French saying...Please excuse my accent... “L’heure entre chien et loup” which translates as “The hour between dog and wolf”. The saying is basically describing the time just as the sun is setting, the twilight hours when you cannot really differentiate between dog and wolf, between who is a friend and who is a foe.

Has anyone heard this phrase before “The hour between dog and wolf?”

It first came into my consciousness a few years ago because it was the title of a New Model Army album, as well as a documentary film that was made about their strange and enduring career.

“Between dog and wolf, between water and wine, between wine and blood.” This brings to mind some lyrics from a really old songs of theirs “Better than them” and the words of the chorus...

Divided we were born,divided we live

divided we fall,yeah,divided we die

still we tell ourselves over and over again

we're better than them... (we're better than them)

we're better than them..

We’re not like them, we’re better than them...

“Them” are whoever we think are somehow separate from us...

The song is essentially a rant against this sense of superiority and separation that all groups of people and individuals feel from time to time, that sadly some feel permanently; this sense that somehow we are better than, or less than other people. It seems to go on in all sections of society and throughout human history. It is there in religion, but also secular society. Some religious groups talk about the saved and the unsaved, others talk of being God’s chosen people. When they speak this way they are talking of a God I do not recognise. The God I know accepts and loves all universally. Experience has revealed to me that we are all chosen by God, it’s just that so many of us turn away and cannot believe that there is a spirit that is there in all life.

Then of course there are the anti-religionists who reject any kind of faith at all; who see it all as purely infantile projections. They mock, they poke fun, they separate people into the stupid and the wise. They say we are not like them, we’re better than them.

I am no better by the way; I do it too. There are days when I feel superior to other people and there are days when I feel less than them. That said thank God most days I recognise the truth that there is one human family. We are made of the same flesh and we have the same spirit within each of us.

Something I felt powerful as the dark turned into light on Tuesday morning. In that hour of dog and wolf as the night turned into day.

If we see others as separate from ourselves, we see us and we see them. As Walter Kaufmann, who translated Martin Buber into English put it, when we use words like “Us-Them”, “'the world is divided in two: the children of light and the children of darkness, the sheep and the goats, the elect and the damned.' It is this that leads to a lack of empathy for all people and thus their suffering can be ignored. In such a state any form of barbarity and abuse can become acceptable, something we have seen throughout human history. It still goes on today, we continue to dehumanise, breeding hatred and violence.

As the Nobel Peace Prize Winner, author of such greats as “Night” and Holocaust Survivor Elie Wiesel put it " 'Hatred, is a cancer that is passed from one person to another, one people to another.'

There is one human family, we are each other’s keepers. In “Conversations with Elie Wiesel” Wiesel sees the Biblical question Cain poses to God after killing Abel “Am I my brother’s keeper?” becomes a lens to see brother and sisterhood in broadest humanist sense. As he reflects:

We are all our brothers’ keepers… Either we see in each other brothers, or we live in a world of strangers… There are no strangers in a world that becomes smaller and smaller. Today I know right away when something happens, whatever happens, anywhere in the world. So there is no excuse for us not to be involved in these problems. A century ago, by the time the news of a war reached another place, the war was over. Now people die and the pictures of their dying are offered to you and to me while we are having dinner. Since I know, how can I not transform that knowledge into responsibility? So the key word is “responsibility.” That means I must keep my brother.

When the epistle Paul talked of the oneness, the unity in Christianity, he wrote that in Christ “there is no longer Jew or Greek.” He did not say that there are no longer Jews or Greeks more that people are no longer separated by these distinctions; that they are all one in love, in body and in spirit; that if all people are viewed in the light they are brothers and sisters to one another.

As Tenzin Gyatso XIVth Dalai Lama has said “Mentally, physically and emotionally we are the same. We each have the potential to good and bad and to be overcome by disturbing emotions such as anger, fear, hatred, suspicion and greed. These emotions can be the cause of many problems. On the other hand if you cultivate loving kindness, compassion and concern for others, there will be no room for anger, hatred and jealousy.

These words very much chime with that favourite story of mine, which seem appropriate today, “The Two Wolves”

Do you recall it?

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life.

“A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.

“It’s a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil - he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, ego and it makes me cynical about life.” He continued, “The other is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, faith and it fills me with enthusiasm for life. The same fight is going on inside you – and inside every other person, too.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win?”

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

Where does this sense of superiority come from, this sense that we are somehow better than other people? Where does this fear come from? Well I believe it comes from habit. We are taught to fear the stranger who is not exactly like us, we are taught to separate one another, to see the difference. Habits, especially fear based ones, are hard to break.

So how do we get to the place where we can tell when the night has ended, where when we look into someone else’s eyes we see our brother and our sister. How do we get out of the habit of separating people into one camp or another? Well I believe it begins by us waking up to reverence in one another and to practise loving kindness each and every day. This is not easy. I know this from personal experience. Every day I find myself putting up the barriers of separation; every day I find myself doing all I can to ensure that they come tumbling back down again. It is perhaps a whole life times work and perhaps beyond, this moving from night to day. That said I believe it is possible and we can begin aspiring to it right here right now. We just need to wake up.

Why don’t you try it now? Why don’t you offer a blessing to one another?

Give it a go. Go to one another, look one another in the eye and recognise yourself within each other. Then why don’t you bow in reverence, shake one another’s hand, or if you feel really brave you could even hug your neighbour. As you do why not say to each other...”I honour your sacred humanity, we are made of the same flesh and have the same spirit running through us.”

Now of course this is easy to do amongst friends, people you know. This is perhaps less easy out there in the world outside our window. A hug might be a bit much for a stranger. That said we can practise recognising the sacred in each of us. We can bring an end to the night and a beginning to a new day. We can wake up.

I am going to end today with this story from the life of the Buddha

It is said that soon after his enlightenment that the Buddha passed a man on the road who was struck by the Buddha's extraordinary radiance and peaceful presence. The man stopped and asked, "My friend, what are you? Are you a celestial being or a god?"

"No," said the Buddha.

"Well, then, are you some kind of magician or wizard?"

Again the Buddha answered, "No."

"Are you a man?" "No."

"Well, my friend, then what are you?"

The Buddha replied, “I am awake”.

The night has ended and the day has begun.

We need to be awake.

Please find below a video devotion based on the material in this "blogspot"

The Opposite of Schadenfreude: Rejoicing in the Good Fortune of Others

I generally take a positive view of social media, as I do with most aspects of human interaction. When things are used in a positive way they enhance our lives. That said there are downsides. They can be misused. The one I have perhaps struggled with the most is what was once called Twitter and now X. I have never really got it. In fact, beyond posting my blog and videos I rarely interact. There is one person I love on Twitter though, this is Susie Dent from Dictionary Corner on Countdown. She is informative, funny and warm hearted. I have learnt so much from her in recent years as she has shared lost words, often as a way of social commentary. It was Susie who brought “respair” back into public consciousness, that word that means a new or fresh hope. She has also shared lost positive words, that are the opposite of negative versions that have remained in usage. Words like “gruntled”, meaning happy or contended, in good humour, it is the opposite of disgruntled; or “gormful, meaning sensible, not foolish or senseless, the opposite of gormless; or “ruthful”, meaning feeling or expressing pain or sorrow for wrong doing or causing offense, the opposite of ruthless; or feckful, meaning efficient or effective, the opposite of feckless. It is interesting that only the negative versions of these words have survived in common usage.

Another example, of the loss of positives, is the word “resentment”. I resent the word itself. Actually, what I resent is how I and others use the word. The word literally means to re-feel, to re-sense something. That said when we re-feel something wonderful or positive we do not say we resent it. There is no word in common usage that describes a positive way of re-sensing something.

Now one word that is in common usage, but we do not have an equivalent English word for is Schadenfreude, at least not in common usage. We used to have “epicaricacy”, but it has disappeared. Schadenfreude is the experience of pleasure , joy or self-satisfaction that comes from learning of or witnessing the troubles, failures, pain, or humiliation of another. A good example would be when a rival football team loses, or the political party you are opposed to suffers a humiliating loss. Or closer to home, someone trips over, provided they don’t get too hurt. When social media is at its worse it seems to be powered by such feelings; Schadenfreude seems to fuel Twitter or X.

Schadenfreude is derived from “Schaden” meaning damage or harm and “Freude” meaning Joy. We think of it as joy in someone’s misfortune. Now what is frustrating is that there isn’t a equivalent word for the opposite of Schadenfreude, say the joy in someone’s good fortune.

We have all lived through difficult times in recent years. As a result there are folk about who are trying to find ways to spread a little joy, to share good news as an antidote to the negativity abound. As a result people have begun using a new word -a neologism - “freudenfreude”. This is seen as the opposite of Schadenfreude.

“Freudenfreude” is described as positive empathy. It is the ability to feel someone else’s positive emotions as if they were your own. A small study published in the journal “Psychological Science” in August 2021 showed that this type of empathy helps people become kinder, more resilient and satisfied with their lives, it creates a sense of gratitude. It also brings people together, so it is thus an antidote to self-centredness. Social media at its worse can increase this insular self-cented way of seeing life.

Anyone can tap into the power of freudenfreude. All you have to do is look for the good things happening to people around you, look for the small examples of good news, not the big bad news on “X” or printed and tv news. Look around you, celebrate other people’s small successes. When you talk with the people in your life ask them about their joys and share in them. Do not be afraid to share your good news too, do not hide your light, let it shine. Be a bearer of the good news. It helps build community you know, something so needed in ever more isolating and isolated lives. This is not to say that we avoid one another’s troubles, freudenfreude is about developing empathy and you can’t have positive without negative. That said when we say we feel what you feel then we must feel positive as well as painful emotions. To feel with another is to do so wholly. This is true empathy.

Now when I think of someone who exemplified “Freudenfreude” Angela Fowler, a member of one of the congregations I serve, comes straight to mind. Sadly, Angela died on News Years Eve. What an example though of someone who encouraged and enjoyed the achievements of others. She did so much herself, despite her very real struggles in life. She certainly lived a life of gratitude and always made the most of every little thing that life gave to her. Not that Angela would have used the word “Freudenfreude”. She was an expert in language, speaking perfect French and was also fluent in German. So, I don’t want to insult her by not using correct language. Not that she would mind too much as she always encouraged me in my ministry and forgave all my terrible pronunciations.

Thankfully there is another word that means pretty much what “Freudenfreude” does. This is the ancient Sanskrit word “Mudita”. Mudita means vicarious joy or sympathetic joy. It is used in Buddhism to highlight the importance of feeling joy for others good fortune even if, or especially because, you do not directly benefit from it. Again, it suggests something community centred rather than merely self-centred.

There is a similar word in Hebrew too, this is “Firgun”, which describes the ungrudging pleasure one takes in someone else’s good fortune. A kind of generosity of spirit, an unselfish, empathetic joy that something good has happened or might happen to another person. I think both “Firgin” and “Mudita” apply to Angela and I am sure as someone who loved interfaith interaction it speaks powerfully to her personal soul.

I experienced a great deal of “Freudenfreude”, “Mudita” and “Firgin” last weekend. On Friday I was at a good friend, Ian Etto’s, album launch at Manchester Art Gallery. It was wonderful to be with Ian and Jules and countless other people from their lives as they performed and we all joined together in celebration. Both Ian and Jules have had their struggles in life and it was wonderful to see them shine their lights so bright and to be together with others sharing in their joy. On Saturday morning I opened proceedings at Altrincham “Court Leet”. During the proceedings Barbara Thackray, a congregational member, was made a “Freeman” of Altrincham. In recognition for the years of dedicated service raising money for St Anne’s Hospice, following the death of her sister. Barbara took up running about 10 years ago, in her mid 70’s. She runs 10k twice a week and runs in events around the area raising money. She has become bit of a celebrity, appearing all over local news and even being the star of an Adidas advert with Mo Salah, her smiling face being the last image as she runs along. It was such a joy sharing in Barbara’s recognition. So wonderful sharing with these people who are a rich part of my life and the lives of others too, who have known recent joys. Yes it is important to be with others in their struggles, but also their joys. This to me is what loving community is all about. I just wish we had a word in common usage to describe such a feeling and to shine that light bright for all to see. So, I am going to join in with those who are using the word “Freudenfreude”, lets make it word of the year for next year.

You may recall I was deeply effective in a positive way by Rutger Bregman’s “Humankind” a few years ago. It came out just as we went into lockdown during Covid. It was a brilliant book and was an antidote to a great deal of negativity about human nature being peddled at the time. He offered a different perspective and suggested, as many have before, that if we only portray a low opinion and expectation of humanity, then this is what we will see and experience. The problem is that we under estimate our capacity and only really promote bad news and bad behaviour. Now one of the solutions that he suggested is that we should come out of the closet for the good that we do and others do. That we need to learn to celebrate doing good and promote it. I see echoes of Freudenfreude in his proposals.

Now this probably sounds a little shocking as it seems to go against the grain of what we are taught to do, to not boast about the good we do. We need though to let our light shine, so that people see another example other than what we hear and read about on the news.

As Bregman highlights

“Unfortunately, this reticence works like a nocebo. When you disguise yourself as an egoist, you reinforce other people’s cynical assumptions about human nature. Worse by cloaking your good deeds, you place them in quarantine, where they can’t serve as an example for others. And that’s a shame, because Homo puppy’s secret superpower is that we’re so great at copying one another.”

I suspect the same applies with “freudenfreude”. Let us come out the closet about the good we do. Let us learn to celebrate the good fortune of others. Let us hold up these lights and share in each others good news. You never know we might just begin to change our world and become a beautiful antidote to the prevailing cynicism that others promote around the world.

Let us not hide the good in ourselves and each other. Let us not deny the dark, what is wrong in the world. It is there of course it, but it is not all that is there. There is goodness, there is light, there is joy and good things do happen for us and each other.

I’m going to end this morning with a classic story, one I have told before, but one that speaks powerfully to me at our human nature and the nature of life. That each of us has the capacity for good and bad within us, for both Schadenfreude and Freudenfreude, what matters is what aspect of ours and others humanity we shine a light on. It is titled “Two Wolves.”

One winter’s evening whilst gathered round a blazing camp fire, an old Sioux Indian chief told his grandson about the inner struggle that goes on inside people.

“You see” said the old man, “this inner struggle is like two wolves fighting each other. One is evil, full of anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, deceit, false pride, superiority, and ego”.

“The other one,” he continued, poking the fire with a stick so that the fire crackled, sending the flames clawing at the night sky, “is good, full of joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith”.

For a few minutes his grandson pondered his grandfather’s words and then asked, “So which wolf wins, grandfather?”

“Well”, said the wise old chief, his lined face breaking into a wry smile, “The one you feed!”

Please find below a video devotion based on the material in this "blogspot"

 

Imagination: More Important than Knowledge

Last weekend my brother and his family finally managed to come "up north" for the weekend. It was the first time we had been able to see them for more than a year. Sadly due to ill health and other problems they had been unable to come for a couple of days at Christmas. So it was a little bizarre going through the whole process of giving and receiving Christmas present from nine months before.

It was a lovely day, in so many ways. What I enjoyed the most though was watching the cousins playing together. I especially delighted in watching the young and active imaginations of the youngest two Johhny and Sammy playing with what looked like mechanical insects, seeing their imaginations come alive and create little adventures and worlds together. I also loved watching and listening to the older two Joey and Scarlet as they went off into the other room with a guitar and began to write music together. They wrote a song which they would perform to each of us separately. It was beautiful witnessing their creative minds work together and them sharing their imaginations with us all. It is truly amazing what can be created when people come together in love. These two sets of children had not spent time together in over a year and yet the rapport they shared and the creativity that came from it, was a beautiful thing to behold. Just a wonderful example of the beautiful and creative thing that is the human imagination, especially in a child.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to see life through the eyes of a child once again; wouldn’t it be wonderful to see the wonder and mystery of life once again; to see the things around us as fertile ground for adventure, rather than just mere objects to be used and discarded.

Lynda Sexson captures this feeling near perfectly, in “Ordinarily Sacred” she wrote:

“My son once found the hip-bone of a large cow. He wore it as a stately garment or as armor; he played the bone like a guitar or played himself in the bone like a dinosaur. He circulated his interest upon the bone back into his discovery of it in the woods, to the being who had walked if before abandoning it, to the shape and feel of it, to hanging it on the wall and looking at it and the shadows it cast. And the bone was transformed – quite beyond the original fragment of decay in the woods – into images of everything from death to art.”

It got me thinking of my own childhood and little adventures that I would create in my own mind. Memories that had at one time become lost in some many other things. I thought of times just going off alone and creating whole worlds in my imagination. I remembered Sunday mornings at my grandparent’s farm and waking very early in my pyjamas and getting my granddads broken no longer usable rifle and pretending I was John Wayne defending the Alamo and other such adventures and many other dreams and memories too. I remembered too the fascination with old animal skulls, especially the jaws and teeth. It brought back lots of lovely memories of innocent and happy days, memories which for years had become lost. I thought about all these things as I drove back to Altrincham to prepare myself to lead worship the next day. It created a beautiful space in the soul of me.

It brought to mind the following meditation...

“Magical Thinking” by Colin Bossen

"The sign in the windowpane of Kristin Baybar's toyshop in London reads "We do not exist but if you think we do, and would like to visit... please knock." Knock I have. In truth, I have more than knocked I have entered the sanctum of the toyshop itself. It is a strange and magical place, filled with curios, doll house furniture and hand carved toys. Every surface is covered, the cupboard display cases stacked high, with miniature flowers, snapping tin alligators, painted puzzles that move, penny whistles and cheap magic tricks. Several signs proclaiming "Do Not Touch" suggest that this might not be a shop for small children.

Yet some of my fondest childhood memories are of Kristin Baybar's. For three summers, while my father taught a study abroad course, my family rented a flat around the corner. Every chance I got I would wander over to the toy shop. The shop owner--Kristin Baybar herself--seemed to delight in entertaining small children. There were magic tricks, toys that made noises and puzzles. Within the walls of the shop the world seemed just a little more wonderful than outside.

The shop and its owner did much to teach me about the power of the imagination. Creative play, the ability to dream and discover new things helps make us human. Without them there would be no culture, no religion, no art and no science. They help us to define and redefine the world for, as William Shakespeare wrote, "We are such stuff / As dreams are made."

My friend Richard once defined magic as the act of imagining something and then creating it. “I think, I’m hungry. I want a sandwich,” he would say, “I imagine it and then I create it. That’s magic!” Open yourself to the marvellous that surrounds you, seek it out if only for a moment, and you never know what sort of magic you might create. So much of the world first began as a dream. So much of the world has yet to be dreamed."

...Colin Bosset captures beautiful the power and magic of the imagination, in this beautifully moving meditation...

One of my all time favourite quotes is by Albert Einstein who said “Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand.” Without imagination there is no way that he could have developed his theory of relativity; without it there is no way he could have stepped beyond the perceived wisdom of the time. Without imagination there is no way that Beethoven could have created the Ninth Symphony, ground breaking in so many ways and composed while he himself had become deaf. Beethoven never heard his own masterpiece. Without imagination there is no way that Shakespeare could have created his masterpiece Hamlet. Without imagination JRR Tolkein would not have created the works “The Lord of the Rings” and without imagination Peter Jackson would not have been able to create the cinematic masterpieces that were the motion pictures. Without imagination so much of what brings pleasure to our lives, that makes life life, would never have come to pass. It is imagination, as an expression of our creativity, that enables us to boldly explore our world and envision worlds and reality beyond prosaic fact. I agree with Einsten “Imagination is more important than knowledge”

It is imagination that allows us to see beyond the confines of the understanding of the day. In the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew’s Gospel chapter 5 Jesus begins his ministry with his vision of how a good person a holy person should be. He begins by telling the people that they are the light of the world, that it is through them that the Kingdom will come about and then in the final verses he once again turns the wisdom of the day right around by rejecting the eye for an eye concept of justice and tells those who will listen that they must love their enemies. This new thinking, this new way of being grows from that very same place of imagination, from which all creativity flows.

Yes all creativity flows from the imagination, but so do many of our troubles too. Our imaginations can project all kinds of fears onto our psyches. Throughout history this has been exploited. Aspects of the media both feed and feed on this. Politics and religion has often operated here too. They have preyed on our fears and this sense that there is something fundamentally wrong with us. Advertising does similar things, especially the beauty industry. They sell us an imagined ideal of what we can be and thus we dream of reaching perfection. When the truth is that the only perfection we are capable of attaining is perfect love, which means acceptance of all no matter who they are or where they have been.

Fear can really tap into that place deep within us, the same place that all creativity grows from. Imagination is a double edged sword. The same thing that creates all that is beautiful, wonderful, moving and deeply spiritual in life is also the same thing that creates all that is destructive, hateful and dehumanising too. It all stems from that place deep in the marrow of our being. From what I call our soul. Fear and love are two sides of the same coin and the one that wins out is the one that we feed, as the old Cherokee chief taught his grandson.

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life.

“A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.

“It’s a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil - he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, ego and it makes me cynical about life.” He continued, “The other is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, faith and it fills me with enthusiasm for life. The same fight is going on inside you – and inside every other person, too.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win?”

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

The key, it would seem, is how we feed our souls. In the same way the food that we eat effects our bodies, so too the stimulus we feed our hearts and minds effects our souls.

Now we feed our souls in many ways, art is one but it is just as easily fed by the ordinary. I noticed this last weekend as I enjoyed my nieces and nephews imaginations come alive. My soul was beautifully enriched by the whole experience. As I drove back alone that night I wept at the beauty of it all and the space that it had created within my soul to awaken my own imagination and give birth to my own creativity, my own gift to share with the world.

It brought to mind the following extract by Graziano Marcheschi’s in “Wheat and Winds and the Wolf of Gubbio

"You hear an old song and the face of a lost loved one suddenly appears, and in the space of the song the loved one grabs your loneliness by the collar and sends it out the door.

"You stand before a painting and the peaceful landscape calls you in — or a scene of violent pain holds you in thrall — and for a minute that's longer than eternity you enter the serenity, or you rage and grieve along with the picture's tortured souls.

"You read a piece of poetry and for the span of a minute — or an hour — you find a space to sit and listen to the sound of naked joy, or to stare into the face of unfathomable grief.

"More than anything else, that's what good art does: not answer questions or set agendas, but create space — space to laugh, to mourn, and to wonder who and how and why we are."

Marcheschi captures the transformative nature of imagination. He honours it and sees it as a vehicle of love and service. Service to humanity and service God. He is so right.

Everything that we do begins in the imagination, which is so much more than our individual thoughts. We are fed from everything and that little bit more than everything too. It is imagination that leads to action. You see what we imagine we live. And how we live really matters because everything that we do and everything that we do not do matters. Why you may well ask? Well because everything that we do impacts on those around us, in who we live and breathe and share our being. We are constantly feeding one another and life itself just as everyone we come into contact with, and the whole of life is feeding us, even if we aren’t consciously aware of it. There is still so much that we don’t know and may never know. This is why the imagination is, in the words of Einstein, “more important than knowledge.” Imagination enables us to become all that we are meant to be, it creates our destiny it allows us to explore new routes and even carve ones that were not there before, weren’t even dreamed of. This is the real beauty of imagination. For with it there is always something new to be seen, felt, experienced, to fall in love with. It is imagination that brings our world alive.

Just be careful how you feed it and how you feed life with it…

Between Dog And Wolf: When Has The Night Ended?

Have you ever heard the saying “There are two types of people in this world” What do you think of it? Is there truth in it?

Yes? No?

Well I have discovered that there are two types of people in this world, those who think that there are two types of people in this world and those that know that there are not!!!

Of course it is ludicrous to suggest that there are two types of people in this world. We are all formed from the one flesh and we all have the same spirit flowing through us. Divisiveness does not help anyone.

There is a story told of a rabbi in ancient times who gathered his students together very early one morning, while it was still dark. He put this question to them: "How can you tell when night has ended and the day has begun?"

One student made a suggestion: "Could it be when you can see an animal and you can tell whether it is a sheep or a goat?"

"No, that's not it," answered the rabbi.

Another student said: "Could it be when you look at a tree in the distance and you can tell whether it is a fig tree or a peach tree?"

Again the rabbi answered: "No."

After a few more guesses the students said: "Well, how do you tell when night has ended?"

The rabbi answered: "It is when you look on the face of any man or woman and you see them as your brother or sister. If you cannot do this, then, no matter what time it is, it is still night."

What do you see when you look into the face of any man or woman? Do you see them as your brother and or sister?

The nights are becoming longer, as I am sure you have noticed. This often brings with it a sense within us to seek hibernation, to go into ourselves. We need to be careful here, as tempting as it is. When we are hibernating we are not fully awake, we are falling asleep.

It can become difficult to awake from our slumber on these cold, darkening mornings that the Autumn brings. The temptation is to stay in and not awaken to life, to turn inwards and not to live in the world.

This last Tuesday I experienced a lovely example of waking up into the cold Autumn day. Every Tuesday I attend an early morning meditation in the schoolroom at the chapel. Now when my alarm went off at a little before 6am part of me didn’t want to get up and step into the cold darkness of the morning. But I did. I prayed my morning prayers; I sought inspiration from the great mystery and listened to the birds outside my window. I showered and got ready for the day. I then slipped next door for the meditation. We greeted one another with humour and coffee and then we enjoyed silence together in complete darkness. As the silence ended the light was just starting to appear through the windows. We then began to share about our own personal joys and troubles with our spiritual journeys. As everyone spoke I looked at their faces and connected with them and saw in them my own brother and sister, I saw myself reflected back at me. I saw a reflection of the Divine in their eyes and heard it in their words. There was no sense that there were two types of people in the room that morning.

It is so tempting at times to live with this idea that there are two types of people in this world those that are for me and those that are against me; that there are those that are my friends and those who are my foes. It is so easy to be seduced by the need to keep an eagle eye out for ‘foes’, because if we do not they may well cause us harm; that these people are dangerous, even “toxic” and you must keep them out of your life.

There is a French saying “L’heure entre chien et loup” which translates as “The hour between dog and wolf”. The saying is basically describing the time just as the sun is setting, the twilight hours when you cannot really differentiate between dog and wolf, between who is a friend and who is a foe.

The phrase “The hour between dog and wolf?” has only recently come into my consciousness. This is because it is the title of New Model Army’s latest album, as well as the film that has just been made about their strange and enduring career. By the way the album is an absolute sonic masterpiece, their best work for over 20 years...

“Between dog and wolf, between water and wine, between wine and blood.”

By the way I discovered the other day that this week is "Wolf Awareness Week"...A nice bit of synchronicity as I formulated ideas around the time between dog and wolf.

The idea that there are two types of people in this world brings to mind some lyrics from a really old song by New Model Army’s “Better than them” and the words of the chorus...

Divided we were born,divided we live
divided we fall,yeah,divided we die
still we tell ourselves over and over again
we're better than them... (we're better than them)
we're better than them..
We’re not like them, we’re better than them...

"Better Than Them" 

The song is essentially a rant against this sense of superiority and separation that all groups of people and individuals feel from time to time, that sadly some of us feel permanently; this sense that somehow we are better than, or less than other people. It seems to go on in all sections of society and throughout human history. It is there is religion, but also secular society. Some religious groups talk about the saved and the unsaved, others talk of being God’s chosen people. When they speak this way they are talking of a God I do not recognise. The God I know accepts and loves all universally. Experience has revealed to me that we are all chosen by God, it’s just that so many of us turn away and cannot believe that there is a spirit that is there in all life.

Then of course there are the anti-religionists who ridicule people of faith; who see it all as purely infantile projections. They mock, they poke fun, they separate people into the stupid and the wise. They say we are not like them, we’re better than them.

I am no better by the way; I do it too. There are days when I feel superior to other people and there are days when I feel less than them. That said thank God most days I recognise the truth that there is one human family. We are made of the same flesh and we have the same spirit within each of us.

When the epistle Paul talked of the oneness, the unity in Christianity, he wrote that in Christ “there is no longer Jew or Greek.” He did not say that there are no longer Jews or Greeks more that people are no longer separated by these distinctions; that they are all one in love, in body and in spirit; that if all people are viewed in the light they are brothers and sisters to one another.

As Tenzin Gyatso XIVth Dalai Lama has said “Mentally, physically and emotionally we are the same. We each have the potential to be good and bad and to be overcome by disturbing emotions such as anger, fear, hatred, suspicion and greed. These emotions can be the cause of many problems. On the other hand if you cultivate loving kindness, compassion and concern for others, there will be no room for anger, hatred and jealousy.

These words very much chime with a favourite story of mine, “The Two Wolves"

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life.

“A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.

“It’s a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil - he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, ego and it makes me cynical about life.” He continued, “The other is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, faith and it fills me with enthusiasm for life. The same fight is going on inside you – and inside every other person, too.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win?”

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

Where does this sense of superiority come from, this sense that we are somehow better than other people? Where does this fear of some people come from? Well I believe it comes from habit. We are taught to fear the stranger who is not exactly like us, we are taught to separate one another, to see the difference. Habits, especially fear based ones, are hard to break.

This brings to mind a tale I recently came across...

"There is a story from the middle ages about a poor farmer whose plow one day hit an iron box that was buried in his field. When he opened up this box, he found inside a scroll which gave directions to a fantastic treasure. It said that on a certain part of the beach on the shore of the Black Sea there was a magic pebble. If you rubbed this pebble against any kind of metal it would turn that metal into gold. Now this pebble looked like every other pebble, but you could identify it by touch. If you picked up the other pebbles, they would be cold. But the magic pebble would be warm.

Now this story seemed unreliable, but the farmer believed in it. He sold all that he had and moved to the shore of the Black Sea. He began his search for this great treasure. There were of course millions of pebbles on the beach, and it was like looking for a needle in a haystack. But he began resolutely. He would pick up a pebble. If it was cold (and therefore not the magic one), he would hurl the pebble into the sea. Then he would then pick up the next pebble. He followed this pattern hour after hour, day after day, and year after year. Pick up the pebble. It is cold. Throw it into the sea. Pick up the next pebble. He never gave up. He kept trying until one day, a rather ordinary day, he picked up a pebble and it was warm. Then, in shear force of habit, he threw it into the sea."

The man was so used to throwing the stone in the sea that when he finally picked up the hot stone he just threw it into the sea without thinking. Habitual thinking and behaving are not easy things to break free from.

So how do we get to the place where we can tell when the night has ended, where when we look into someone else’s eyes we see our brother and our sister. How do we get out of the habit of separating people into one camp or another? Well I believe it begins by us waking up to reverence in one another and to practise loving kindness each and every day. This is not easy. I know this from personal experience. Every day I find myself putting up the barriers of separation; every day I find myself doing all I can to ensure that they come tumbling back down again. It is perhaps a whole life times work and perhaps beyond, this moving from night to day. That said I believe it is possible and we can begin aspiring to it right here right now. We just need to wake up.

It can begin with your next encounter. When you look into the eyes of the next person you meet, what do you see?

I am going to end this little chip of a blogspot with a story from the life of the Buddha.

It is said that soon after his enlightenment that the Buddha passed a man on the road who was struck by the Buddha's extraordinary radiance and peaceful presence. The man stopped and asked, "My friend, what are you? Are you a celestial being or a god?"

"No," said the Buddha.

"Well, then, are you some kind of magician or wizard?"

Again the Buddha answered, "No."

"Are you a man?" "No."

"Well, my friend, then what are you?"

The Buddha replied, "I am awake."


The night has ended and the day has begun.

We need to be awake.

"Between Dog and Wolf"

Never Curb Your Enthusiasm

In “One Minute Wisdom” Anthony de Mello wrote

“To the woman who complained that riches hadn’t made her happy the Master said, ‘You speak as if luxury and comfort were ingredients of happiness; whereas all you need to be really happy, my dear, is something to be enthusiastic about’”

All you need is something to be enthusiastic about!

I received two very different phone calls on Monday evening from two people I hold very dear to my heart. The first was from someone really suffering with life, someone who had lost all the zest all the spirit from themselves. It was a real cry for help. They just could not face the world that day, they’d had enough. I listened; I really listened, as hard as it was to hear someone you love in such a desolate state. I empathised too as I had been in that very same place myself about 11 years ago. By the end of the conversation things seemed a little better, my loved one put down the phone in hope.

A little later I received a phone call from another friend, who was just full of it. He was full of the spirit of life, of love, of God. He was saying I know you are busy but in half an hour a new series of “Sorry I haven’t got a clue” is starting and Jack Dee (A very British Larry David) is the new compare, it will be really funny etc...It was just wonderful to hear this. Not because of what he was telling me, but just to hear the enthusiasm in his voice. Only eighteen months previously this friend had given up, he had had enough. He was suicidal and seriously so. That’s what brought such joy to my heart, to hear someone who had gone from the depths of his own private hell to such enthusiasm about a programme on radio 4.

Those two conversations once again showed to me how life, just like the sherbet lemons I love, can be so bitter sweet. It also once again showed that there is always hope, no matter how despairing things can seem.

I was naturally enthusiastic as a child, I think most children are. I use to more or less wet myself when going on new adventures or just fairground rides. The first time I flew I was shaking so much I could hardly get on the plane. I wasn’t shaking with fear, it was pure excitement and it was flowing out of me. I also remember how excited my brother use to get too. Every year as children we would go on holiday to Scarborough and one year, actually it was 1981 and just after Ian Botham’s defeat of the Australian’s at Headingley. We were staying at the same hotel as the Yorkshire cricket team; nothing could have been more exciting for two boys from Yorkshire. We had great fun with them. I was taught how to swim by Chris Old’s glamorous wife and how to drink whiskey and lemonade by Chris Old and David Bairstow. My brother though was more interested in getting his bat signed. He’d got the whole team to sign it, except for one, our greatest hero, Geoffrey Boycott.  One morning he saw him sat reading his newspaper and he plucked up the courage to ask him for his signature “Mr Boycott, Mr Boycott will you please sign my cricket bat.” There was no answer. So he asked him again “Mr Boycott, Mr Boycott will you please sign my cricket bat,” still no answer. Finally he asked him a third time “Mr Boycott, Mr Boycott, will you please sign my cricket bat.” This time he looked up ever so slightly and peered over his paper and said “I heard you the first time” and held out his hand and signed the bat and then returned to his paper. He said nothing more. This destroyed my brother; it completely curbed his enthusiasm for quite some time.

It is so easy to destroy the enthusiasm in others, especially if they are a little on the fragile side. That said we can also help to build enthusiasm in others too. Enthusiasm and cynicism are just as infectious as each other. I think this autumn we have been going through a cynical cycle. Some are probably relieved to witness this. For some folk the enthusiasm and high spiritedness of the summer was probably a bit a too much. Maybe we need a bit of both; perhaps they balance one another out. “Maybe, maybe not”! Personally I do not agree in curbing anyone’s enthusiasm, we need more of it! There can never be too much enthusiasm!

Oh by the way enthusiasm is one of those words that have changed in meaning over time. The etymology of words is something I am getting increasingly enthusiastic about. It is amazing to me how many words have been reduced in meaning and impact as time as gone on. Enthusiasm is one of those words.

Enthusiasm comes from two Greek words “Theos” (meaning “God”) and “En” (which means “in”). The words put together create “En-theos-ism, which literally means “to be filled with God” or “to have God within”.

When we think of enthusiasm today we think of being thrilled or uncontrollably excited about something. Like the first time I flew in an aeroplane as a child and I was shaking with enthusiasm or when my brother discovered that we were staying in the same hotel as the Yorkshire cricket team. Enthusiasm in its truest sense is actually much more than this, it is one of those words that we have tried to tame and it has therefore been reduced in meaning. Enthusiasm has a deeper and much more sustained and longer lasting quality, than the current understanding we have of it. It has a truly deeply spiritual quality. It means to be filled with the great spirit of all life; it’s about being in touch with that highest quality of life already within us and all life; it means that we are able to live and express this quality in all that we do. This becomes infectious as we pass it on to others and it becomes manifest in our daily human actions. My friend, who called the other day, was bursting with it and yet just eighteen months earlier he had lost the will to live, life had become empty and meaningless, he had lost the taste for it.

Enthusiasm gives us is the ability to be fully engaged with all of life, whether that’s a radio program, the sunrise, a conversation with an old or new friend, a walk alone in the park or the hug of a loved one, or just simply settling down with a good book. Enthusiasm is a deeply spiritual quality that allows us to fully live in the richness that is life, in our time and place.

To be truly happy in life all we need is something to be enthusiastic about. This can allow and enable us to do great things and it can inspire others to do the same.

Margaret M Stevens tells a story of three bricklayers who were asked by a passing stranger what they were building? The first answered rather gruffly “I’m just laying bricks”, he didn’t even look up to acknowledge the person asking the question. The second did look up for a brief moment and simply said “I’m putting up a wall” and then carried on. The third put down his trowel and rose to his feet and with great enthusiasm and obvious pride said “I’m building a cathedral”.

“I’m building a cathedral”

A person overflowing with enthusiasm gives all that they have. They tend to hold nothing back. They can do great things and they can inspire others to do likewise. They give all that is in them to life and life tends to reward them in turn. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said “Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm. The way of life is beautiful; it is by abandonment.” Enthusiasm is about believing in life itself; it’s about being filled with life; with the spirit of life; it’s about knowing that God is in us. It is more than that though; it’s about expressing that in our lives and allowing it to spread throughout our world. The conversation I had with my friend on Monday certainly did that for me.

Enthusiasm can be infectious it can start to spread. In previous blogs I have written of my belief in the chaos theory of compassion. Well I believe that the same theory applies to enthusiasm. This can be infectious too. Last summer we were all lifted by the sporting spectacles throughout Britain, as my brother and I were by Botham and Willis’ heroics at that beloved cricketing cathedral of Headingly in 1981. This autumn we seem to have begun to slip back into cynicism once again as we have seen the negative side of humanity gain prominence. Both have power over us, both can live in and through us, but which one is it better to live by? Which one serves life? Well I for one want to live with enthusiasm and to share that with the world. If you like this is my religion.

In my view the purpose of the religious life is to discover ways to find and develop that natural enthusiasm at the core of our being and to share it with our world. You never know but that one phone call by my friend on Monday may lead to a tidal wave of enthusiasm all over this world. It certainly picked me up after a rather painful phone call had ended only minutes earlier.

I’d like to end this little chip of a blog by repeating a story I have shared before. I believe that it is definitely worth repeating. This is the story of “Two Wolves”

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life. 

“A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.

“It’s a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil -  he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, ego and it makes me cynical about life.” He continued, “The other is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, faith and it fills me with enthusiasm for life. The same fight is going on inside you – and inside every other person, too.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win?”

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

So I say never curb your enthusiasm, feed it and let that flavour flood out of you.

Life needs it.

Below is one of my favourite YouTube clips

Telling the Tale

There are many elements to ministry, most of which I love. One of the greatest joys is creating worship. The Unitarian and Free Christian tradition in which I have found a home not only allows but encourages a broad scope. I truly am given the freedom of the pulpit and can explore any theme or subject I wish...I'm actually given far more freedom than I often take.

Something I have always loved is the sharing of stories from the worlds many traditions. I don't suppose I will ever exhaust all them in the years to come. In the two years that I served the good folk of Altrincham and Urmston we have had a lot of fun and some seriousness with the tales we have shared...below is a collection of some of them...


I will offer no explanation for each individual tale as I would like them to stand for themselves and for who ever reads them to make their own sense of them...hope they open you up as they have opened me up,,,

Standing on One Foot

A man came to talk with Rabbi Shamai, one of the most famous of all the rabbis, nearly as famous as Rabbi Hillel.

"I would like to convert to Judaism and become a Jew," said the man. "But I don't have much time. I know I have to learn the entire book you call the Torah, but you must teach it to me while I stand on one foot."

The Torah is the most important Jewish book there is, and this crazy man wanted to learn it while standing on one foot? Why, people spent years learning the Torah; it was not something you can learn in five minutes! Rabbi Shamai grew angry with this man, and he pushed the man away using a builder's yardstick he happened to be holding in his hand.

The man hurried away, and found Rabbi Hillel. "I would like to convert to Judaism and become a Jew," said the man. "But I don't have much time. I know I have to learn the entire book you call the Torah, but you must teach it to me while I stand on one foot."

"Certainly," said Rabbi Hillel. "Stand on one foot."

The man balanced on one foot.

"Repeat after me," said Rabbi Hillel. "What is hateful to you, don't do that to someone else."

The man repeated after Rabbi Hillel, "What is hateful to me, I won't do that to someone else."

"That is the whole law," said Rabbi Hillel. "All the rest of the Torah, all the rest of the oral teaching, is there to help explain this simple law. Now, go and learn it so it is a part of you."

Life Is Echo

A man and his son were walking in the forest.
Suddenly the boy trips and feeling a sharp pain he screams, “Ahhhhh.”
Surprised, he hears a voice coming from the mountain, “Ahhhhh!”
Filled with curiosity, he screams:
“Who are you?”,
but the only answer he receives is:
“Who are you?”

This makes him angry, so he screams:
“You are a coward!”,
and the voice answers:
“You are a coward!”

He looks at his father, asking,
“Dad, what is going on?”
“Son,” the man replies, “pay attention!”
Then he screams, “I admire you!”
The voice answers: “I admire you!”

The father shouts, “You are wonderful!”,
and the voice answers:
“You are wonderful!”

The boy is surprised, but still can’t understand what is going on.
Then the father explains,
“People call this ‘ECHO’,
but truly it is ‘LIFE!’ Life always gives you back what you give out!
Life is a mirror of your actions.
If you want more love, give more love!
If you want more kindness, give more kindness!
If you want understanding and respect, give understanding and respect!
If you want people to be patient and respectful to you, give patience and respect!
This rule of nature applies to every aspect of our lives.”

Life always gives you back what you give out.
Your life is not a coincidence, but a mirror of your own doings.

Six Blind Men and the Elephant

 “The Perfect Woman”

Nasrudin met an old friend whom he had not seen for twenty years. They sat down together in the cafe and talked over old times. “did you ever get married Nasruddin?” asked the friend.

“No I’m afraid I didn’t.”

“Why not? I’ve been married many years and I’ve never regretted it.”

“Well”, said Nasruddin, “I was always looking for the perfect woman. I wanted my wife to be beautiful, intelligent, and sensible.”

“And you never found her?”

“I thought I had, when I was twenty. Her name was Ablah.

She was beautiful, just the kind of woman I like, but I’m afraid she wasn’t very intelligent, and her language was atrocious! I was embarrassed to be with her! She certainly wasn’t the perfect woman.”

“Was she your only girlfriend?”

“No. When I was twenty-five I met a woman called Bahira. She was good looking and intelligent, but she wasn’t very sensible. She spent all my money on frivolous things, and she couldn’t even boil an egg! She wasn’t the perfect woman either.”

“Where there any more?”

“Only one. At thirty I met Haddiyah and she was truly a gift from God! She was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen, and the most intelligent. What’s more she was prudent and sensible, a good cook, and a brilliant conversationalist.”

“She sounds like the perfect woman you were looking for.”

“Then why didn’t you marry her?”

“Unfortunately, she was looking for the perfect man!”

Two Wolves

“What Price a Kingdom”

Haroun Al-Rashid was a very powerful king. In fact he was the most powerful king in the whole world, and his influence stretched over many hundreds of miles. One day he was talking about his power and his wealth to a wise man called Aman.

“I have so much power that I can make any man do what I command; I have so much wealth that I can buy anything I like. I live in the most beautiful of palaces; I eat my food from golden plates, and I wear clothes spun from the finest silk. There is no man in the whole world who can compare with me,” he boasted.

Aman listened carefully, and then he asked the king a question. “If you were dying of thirst in the middle of a desert, what would you give for a cup of water?”

Without hesitation the king answered, “I’d give half of my kingdom!”

“And if you drank the water so fast that your stomach was in danger of bursting, what would you give for the pills which would cure your condition and keep you alive?”

“I would give the other half of my kingdom!” declared the king.

“Why then, O great king, do you boast about you fantastic wealth and your great power if you would trade then both for a cup of water and a few pills?” asked Aman.

Are you an eagle living the life of a chicken?

The Miller, His Son, and Their Donkey

"I shall have to sell that donkey of ours," said a miller to his son. "I can not afford to keep him through the winter. I will take him to town this very morning to see if I can find a buyer. You may go with me." In a little while the miller, his son, and the donkey were on their way to town.

They had not gone far when they met some girls going to a party. They were talking and laughing as they went along. One of them said, "Look at that man and boy driving a donkey. One of them surely might ride it."

The miller heard what they said, and quickly made his son mount the donkey, while he walked along at its side.

After a while they came to a group of old men who were talking very earnestly. "There," said one, "I was just saying that boys and girls have no respect for the aged. You see it is true in this case. See that boy riding while his old father has to walk."

"Get down, my son," said his father, "and I will ride." So they went on.

They next met some women coming from town. "Why!" they cried, "your poor little boy is nearly tired out. How can you ride and make him walk?" So the miller made his son ride on the donkey behind him.

They were now in town. A man coming down the street called to the miller, "Why do you make your donkey carry such a load? You can carry him better than he can carry you."

At this the miller and his son got off the donkey. They tied the donkey's legs together, turned him over on his back; and began to carry him.

A crowd soon gathered to see the strange sight. As they were crossing a bridge the donkey became frightened at the hooting of the crowd. He broke loose, fell into the river, and was drowned.

The miller was angry and ashamed. He said, "There! I have tried to please everybody and have only made a fool of myself. After this I shall do as I think best and let people say what they will."

The difference between Heaven and Hell

What are the Neighbours like?

One Sunday afternoon an old man was leaning on his garden gate, smoking his pipe, and meditating on life, when a stranger approached him. “Excuse me, sir,” said the stranger. “I’m thinking of moving to this town, and I was wondering what people are like around here?”

The old man took the pipe from his mouth and said, “What are the people like where you live now?”

“Oh I don’t like them. They are noisy, selfish, mean, and unfriendly. I’ve lived there five years and I’ve not found a single person that I like. I’ll be glad to get away from them.”

“Well said the old man, “I expect you’ll find the people around here are like that too – selfish, mean, and unfriendly. I don’t think you’ll like it here.”

The stranger walked on. A little while later, another stranger approached the old man. “Excuse me sir,” he said, I’m thinking of moving to this town, and I was wondering what the people are like round here?”

“What are the people like where you live now?”

“Oh they are fine people. I’ve grown to love them all. They are friendly, sociable, helpful. I’ll be sorry to leave, but I’ve just been promoted and so I’ve got to move house.”

“Well,” said the old man, “I expect you’ll find that the people around here are like that too – friendly, sociable, and helpful. I think you’ll enjoy living here.”

“The Seven Wonders of the World”

“Let’s make a list of the Wonders of the World,” suggested a teacher to her students one day. “We can include both man-made structures and natural phenomena,” she added.

After much discussion and some disagreement, the class came up with the following list, which the teacher wrote on the blackboard:

The Pyramids of Egypt

The Grand Canyon in Arizona

St Peter’s Basilica in Rome

The Niagara Falls

The Taj Mahal in India

The Empire State Building in New York

The Northern Lights

The teacher continued “One day you may be lucky enough to see each of these seven wonders.”

Wouldn’t you like to see all these magnificent things?” she asked the one girl who had so far taken no part in the discussion.

“Yes I would,” replied the girl. “But I have a list of my own, and it’s very different from the one on the blackboard.”

“Would you like to share it with us?” asked the teacher.

“This is my list of the wonders of the world,” she began. Then she went on:

“To see...

to hear...

to touch...

to taste...

to smell...

to laugh...and...

to love.”

The class went quiet, as the teacher and the students realised that they didn’t have to go very far to find wonder in the world.”

Learning to Write in the Sand

A story is told of two friends who were walking through the desert. During some point of the journey, they had an argument, and one friend slapped the other one in the face.

The one who got slapped was hurt, but without saying anything, he wrote in the sand: “Today my best friend slapped me in the face.”

They kept on walking, until they found an oasis, where they decided to take a bath. The one who had been slapped got stuck in the mire and started drowning, but his friend saved him.

After he recovered from the near drowning, he carved on a stone: “Today my best friend saved my life.”

The friend, who had slapped and saved his best friend, asked him, “After I hurt you, you wrote in the sand, and now, you carve on a stone, why?”

The other friend replied: “When someone hurts us, we should write it down in sand, where the winds of forgiveness can erase it away, but when someone does something good for us, we must engrave it in stone, where no wind can ever erase it.”

Learn to write your hurts in the sand and to carve your blessings in stone!

The overflowing tea cup