Inspirational Living: Life Lessons for Success & Happiness

Listen to episode 289 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Overcoming Troubles & Difficulties. Adapted from the book The Power of Thought by Henry Thomas Hamblin. Motivational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. Don’t forget to follow us on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook, or to leave us a review at the iTunes store. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from The Power of Thought by Henry Thomas Hamblin, published in 1924. WHY is thinking right thoughts so important? It’s important because it influences our actions. It’s important because it builds up character and a steadfast mind. It’s important because upon it our well-being and the success of our whole life depend. It’s important because it is by right thought that we can overcome harmful suggestion. First of all, we have to realize that thought is the cause of our actions and decisions. It is largely because of this that our circumstances depend upon our thoughts. If, for instance, we do not overcome life's difficulties in our thoughts, then we can never overcome them in actual experience. By this I mean that our difficulties must be boldly met and conquered in thought, if ever we are to hope to overcome them in reality. In a way, it is good advice to tell people not to dwell upon their woes but to think of pleasant things instead — however, it is liable to lead to a habit of thought almost as destructive as brooding over trouble. This negative application of what is meant to be good advice is responsible for the failure of those who say, “I have tried right- thinking, but it makes no difference.” The reason “it makes no difference” is that it is not right-thinking at all, but actually a form of wrong-thinking. Such people say, “I never indulge in wrong thoughts about my troubles. I refuse to think about them.” Just so, and it is there where the whole trouble lies. Instead of life's troubles being met boldly and conquered in thought, they run away from them. As soon as the mind comes up against an unpleasant thought — the thought of an irksome duty that must be done or of a crisis that must be faced, or of a difficulty that has to be overcome — the mind dodges it and moves on to something more pleasant.

Listen to episode 288 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Fate vs. Free Will | Defying Astrology & Circumstance. Adapted from the book Within You is the Power by Henry Thomas Hamblin, published in 1920. Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. Get notified of new episodes each week by subscribing to us at the iTunes store, Google Play, or your favorite podcast player. And if you have a spare moment, please do leave us a review. I always enjoy hearing from listeners who have been helped by our podcast. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Within You is the Power by Henry Thomas Hamblin, published in 1920. Great has been the controversy in the past, over the vexing subject of fate versus free-will. On the one hand, fatalists claim that we are so closely bound to the wheel of fate it is impossible for us to live our lives in any different way than that which is mapped out for us. They can bring a quantity of first-class evidence in support of their claim and believe in their theory with all their heart. On the other hand, the advocates of free-will believe just as whole-heartedly that we are not bound at all, being as free as air. They, too, can bring plenty of evidence in support of their theory, which confirms to them in their belief. Each school of thought thinks that the other is wrong, yet they cannot both be wrong! Let us therefore examine the subject for ourselves, for it is an important one, being intimately connected with the manner in which we live our lives. First of all, let it be said that they are both wrong, in part, and both right, in part. Humanity is bound to the wheel, yet, at the same time, we have free-will. Let us, therefore, explain this seeming paradox. It is an ancient truth of mystical teaching that the human being, when it is unevolved and before it is "unfolded," is bound to the wheel of fate very closely. The unevolved human being follows its base desires, thus creating for itself a future from which it cannot escape. When however, we become more evolved and emancipated, we begins to resist following our base desires and strive, instead, to follow higher things. This creates for us a better future and thus we become free in comparison with our former slave state. We are a slave to fate as long as we are a slave to our base desires. We are, however, free to overcome lower things and thus rise to higher. When we do this, we cease to create a painful future for ourselves and thus become free.

Listen to episode 287 of the Inspirational Living podcast: The Art of Life. Adapted from the book The Art of Being Alive by Ella Wheeler Wilcox. Motivational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. Today I would like to reach back a couple years to one of our earliest podcasts, and one of my personal favorites. It’s a reading from Ella Wheeler Wilcox, and an essay that is included in our book Evergreen: 50 Inspirational Life Lessons. You can purchase Evergreen now in e-book and get our 2nd book Everest: 50 Motivational Life Lessons for free. To buy your copy, please visit InspirationalLifeLessons.com. Thank you. LIFE means action, from the cradle to the grave. There are limitless possibilities in this life to bring into realization whatever hopes or aspirations we desire. If we only but begin… There is no such thing as inaction during this life. We are continually going forward or backward. You are either stronger or weaker this year than you were last year. You are braver or more cowardly. You are more hopeful or more pessimistic. You are more capable mentally or less so. You have better or poorer command of your forces. You have more efficiency or not as much. You are nearer your goal or farther from it. You are a better human being or not as good. Next year at this time, you will be farther onward or farther backward. Every thought, every word, and every act of each day is chiseling out the statue you are making of yourself. If you desire to be an expression of the universe’s finest handiwork, you must work with care. Delicate tools are these thoughts of ours, and they must be used with caution. Every morning say to yourself: "Today I will think of whatever is beautiful, strong, noble, wholesome, and worthy. I will entertain hope, courage, reverence, gratitude, and love as the guests of my heart. I will make thoughts of health at ease in the guest-chamber of my mind, so disease may not enter. I will achieve something worthwhile in my chosen field of endeavor. I will work faithfully, but I will find time to sit alone with thoughts of the universe for a little while, and no worldly ambition or anxiety shall intrude upon that time."

Listen to episode 286 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Building Foundations for a Life Worthwhile. Edited and adapted from The Keys to Success by B.C. Forbes. Motivational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast, brought to you by the kind financial support of listeners like you. To become our patron for as little as a dollar a month, please visit LivingHour.org/patron. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from The Keys to Success by B.C. Forbes, published in 1918. Personality is the sum of what you are. Personality means character— plus. Many persons have a good character, but a personality signifies something other than honesty, truthfulness, industry, and the like. It embodies all these and something more. Personality implies pleasing, winning ways, graciousness, heartiness, enthusiasm, magnetism. To have a gracious personality we must cultivate graciousness. To have a personality that radiates the right qualities, we must possess the right qualities. We cannot wear the right kind of personality and be the wrong kind of person. We may indeed have brilliant talents and un-selfish natures, and yet fail to cultivate or exhibit the kind of personality that inspires love and admiration. Personality may be defined as the right kind of character in the right kind of wrapper. The workshop, the office, the university, and the world have no dearth of men and women of education: people of technical skill, professionals of full-measure ability. But there is a dearth of people possessing these qualifications plus personality. And what the workshop, the office, the classroom and the world needs is just such women and men. It is worthwhile striving to become one of them. A friend of mine once sent me a series of 11 words as his “Key to Success.” You will notice that the initial letters of each word spell Personality. They are: Persistence, Enthusiasm, Respectful, Systematic, Original, Natural, Alert, Loyal, Imaginative, Truthful, and Youthful. If you want to build up a strong, enduring worthwhile life, you must lay the right kind of foundations such as these.

Listen to episode 285 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Success Through Self-Reliance | How to Succeed. Edited and adapted from The Keys to Success by B.C. Forbes. Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. We’ve had such a positive response to our MAJESTY meditation and e-books promotion that I’ve decided to extend the special until the end of the month. To get our Majesty meditation, plus the e-book Evergreen: 50 Inspirational Life Lessons, plus the e-book Everest: 50 Motivational Life Lessons, all for the one low price of $9.99, please visit LivingHour.org/majesty. Thank you. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from The Keys to Success by B. C. Forbes, published in 1918. Without self-reliance no one can succeed in the largest way. Self-reliance breeds courage, faith, determination, never-say-dieness. Self-reliance inspires a person to do the best that is in them. Without self-reliance, the difficulties that are common to forging ahead cannot be fought and overmatched. Self-reliance is a well-spring of hope and inspiration and courage. It strengthens the will, the brain, the arm. It is as a strong pole by which you can vault over obstacles. Lose self-reliance, and you become weak, wobbly, vacillating. You balk at even the shadow of difficulty. Admit the danger of defeat, and you are already half defeated. Archimedes is credited with the declaration: "Give me a lever of sufficient length and a fulcrum to rest it upon, and I would move the world." Our modern Archimedes sets about making the needed lever and fulcrum. They do not wait to have something handed to them: they go after it, and either finds it or makes it. If you have no faith, no reliance in yourself, how can you expect others to place faith or reliance in you? Aim high and you may hit high. Aim low and you are little likely to hit high. Don't be a Uriah Heep. Strive rather to cultivate something of the Napoleonic mind — Napoleon not only had self-faith, but he inspired among others such confidence that his presence at a battle was accounted to be worth a hundred thousand men.

Listen to episode 284 of the Inspirational Living podcast: The Secret of Harmonious Living | Life Hacks. Edited and adapted from Success Through Thought Habit by Benjamin Johnson. Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Occasionally people feel that study of the best gurus will give them what they need, and they seek wildly for the self-development books they think may help them. One such person, who had read many pages of good advice but had failed to improve, went to one of the greatest teachers in the self-help field and said, "I have spent days and weeks fighting against of all sorts of bad habits and I have resisted temptation as hard as I can, but I still find it harder all the time to be better. The teacher smiled and said, "The reason for your trouble is very clear; you really have been thinking so much of what you wanted to avoid that you have been concentrating on your bad habits rather than your good ones. Now, for a time, just stop weeding your mental garden and affirm Harmony as hard as you can." "But," objected the young person, "what can I study that will help me?" And the teacher replied, "Study Harmony. Eat it, think it, drink it, sing it, breathe it, whistle it---fill your mind with it the last thing at night and the first thing in the morning. And, last but not least, demonstrate it in every action." Friends who watched this young person’s progress spoke of it as remarkable, and that the person’s ability became phenomenal, with a smile that was the most winning they had ever known. When this individual became one of the most successful business people in the town, many called the person lucky--for they did not know of the many hours and days and weeks that this person had spent cultivating the Harmony Habit from which they were now but reaping the reward.

Listen to episode 283 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Integrity & Self-Respect | Building Your Personal Brand. Edited and adapted from The Keys to Success by B.C. Forbes. Motivational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast, brought to you by the kind financial support of listeners like you. Learn how you can support our podcast for as little as a dollar a month by visiting LivingHour.org/patron. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Keys to Success by B.C. Forbes, published in 1918. A person may lose their earthly all, yet if they retain their self-respect, they can still be rich in the things that count, the things that endure, the things worthwhile. The individual who loses their self-respect (though they may have millions) is poor indeed, a bankrupt, a failure. Self-respect is one of the basic ingredients that go to make success. If we lose respect for ourselves, we will sooner or later lose the respect of others. Self-respect is not pride. It is not haughtiness. It is that hard-to-define "something" which prevents us from stooping to meanness, pettiness, harshness, bossiness; which resents every form of unfairness; which rebels against injustice; which compels us to have scrupulous regard for the rights and feelings of others. The self-respecting person cannot flout the self-respect of others, cannot do unto others what they would resent having done to themselves — for they who wound the self-respect of another thereby mar and scar their own self-respect. But self-respect is not a quality apart. It is not a flower that can be cultivated in a garden overgrown with weeds. It is a virtue that can flourish only in the company of other virtues. The person who cheats, the one whose business is not run honestly, the person whose daily object is to get the better of others, cannot retain the true brand of self-respect. Such people may strive to convince others — they may even try to delude themselves — that they are entitled to self-respect, and they may, and probably will, demand that others, particularly their subordinates, show them scrupulous "respect" (for those who pose are the greatest sticklers for insisting upon being shown deference). But at heart they will know, or at least suspect, that they are bluffing, that their character does not ring true, that they are not worthy of being shown the respect which they demand of those they lead.

Listen to episode 282 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Make Your Life Count | Motivational Speeches. Edited and adapted from “Ambition and Success” by Orison Swett Marden. Motivational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. If you are a regular listener of this podcast, you’ve probably heard me mention our MAJESTY meditation program. If you’ve thought about purchasing the meditation, but have yet to do so — now is the time to finally give the program a try. To celebrate my birthday tomorrow, I am now offering the MAJESTY meditation + our e-book Evergreen (50 Inspirational Life Lessons) + our e-book Everest (50 Motivational Life Lessons) all for the one low price of $9.99. In other words, you’re getting $20 worth of free e-books with your purchase of the MAJESTY meditation. To take advantage of this limited-time special offer and begin building a fresh, new positive mindset, visit LivingHour.org/Majesty. Thank you. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Ambition and Success, by Orison Swett Marden, published in 1919. Everywhere we see men and women doing the lower, the commoner things, seemingly satisfied to do them all their lives, when they have the ability to do the higher. Many people do not start out with ambition enough to spur them to do big things. They make a large career practically impossible at the very outset, because they expect so little of themselves. They have a narrow, stingy view of life and of themselves which limits their ambition to a little, rutty, repetitive groove. If I could give you but one word of advice, it would be that which Michelangelo wrote under a diminutive figure on a canvas in Raphael’s studio, when he called on the artist and found him out: “Amplius” (which is the Latin word for “larger”). Raphael needed no more advice. This one word meant volumes to him. I advise every one of you to frame this motto, hang it up in your room, in your store, in your office, in the factory where you work, where it will stare at you in the face. Constant contemplation of it will make your life broader and deeper. A fine ambition will steady your life. It will hold you to your task; keep you from yielding to the hundred temptations that might ruin you. What chaos there would be but for a person’s ambition to get up and get on in the world and to improve their condition. Nothing so strengthens the mind and enlarges the horizon of achievement as a constant effort to measure up to a worthy ambition. It stretches the thought, as it were, to a larger measure, and directs the life to finer things.

Listen to episode 281 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Health & Success Through Will Power. Edited and adapted from “How to Develop Your Will Power” by Clare Tree Major. Motivational Podcasts: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. Last week I announced the release of our Ocean Sounds Sleep Meditation with Positive Affirmations. We now have added a variation of that meditation, with gentle rain replacing the ocean sounds — giving you two different meditation sounds to choose from. Pick up your copy for the special sale price of $4.99, by visiting LivingHour.org/ocean. Thank you. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from How to Develop Your Will Power by Clare Tree Major, published in 1920. THE human Will may be termed your power to direct your own actions. You are the master of your own destiny when you yourself, the Self, holds the reins. However, you have three forces to conquer — three forces which must serve you or destroy you. You must control your physical, emotional, and mental attributes. These are your tools, the forces with which you must work to draw from the world the experience you need to make your life complete. Now, what these experiences may be, each person will decide for themselves, but there is but one driving force, the controlling Will. As a child, the tremendous soul which the world knew as Theodore Roosevelt found itself in a frail, delicate body absolutely incapable of demonstrating the characteristics of its owner. But this same soul refused to inhabit a frail, delicate body as a man, and by sheer persistent will power, built up for itself a physical personality so superior to that of the average man that to mention Roosevelt’s name brings to mind immediately a physical magnetism and power so dominating as to seem a fitting representation of the great man that he proved himself to be. Roosevelt radiated energy, the energy of dominant WILL. You should think of Will as a force in itself — as really nothing but a force. It is pure energy. It does not choose your way of life (your reason, or intellect, does that). It does not desire things (your inclinations, or preferences, present to your mind for choice the things which cause desire). Your Will is purely the energy which you use to make these selected desires become your own property. It is the power which the Self (you) sets in motion to obtain that which your intellect and desire approve as the thing you should have.

Listen to episode 280 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Positive Affirmations | Ocean Sounds Sleep Meditation. Edited and adapted from Peace, Power & Plenty by Orison Swett Marden. Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. For the past several months, a number of listeners have reached out, asking if we could put together a sleep meditation with positive affirmations. I’m happy to announce that this new meditation is now available. The recording includes soothing ocean waves that I recorded off the Gulf of Siam, and a soft binaural beat track to enhance the mind’s receptivity of the affirmations — all of which will help usher you into a deep, restful sleep, while encouraging creative dreaming to solve problems, inspire new ideas, and build a positive mindset. We are offering the new meditation for the special sale price of only $4.99. But that promotional price will only be offered for a limited time. Get your copy of the meditation today by visiting LivingHour.org/ocean. Thank you. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Peace, Power, and Plenty by Orison Swett Marden, published in 1909. The miracles of civilization have been performed by men and women of great self-confidence, people who had unwavering faith in their power to accomplish the tasks they undertook. The human race would be centuries behind what it is today had it not been for their grit, their determination, their persistence in finding and making real the thing they believed in, and which the world often denounced as chimerical or impossible. There is no law by which you can achieve success in anything, without expecting it, demanding it, assuming it. There must be a strong, firm self-faith first, or the thing will never come. There is no room for chance in God's world of system and supreme order. Everything must have not only a cause, but a sufficient cause — a cause as large as the result. A stream cannot rise higher than its source. A great success must have a great source in expectation, in self-confidence, and in persistent endeavor to attain it. No matter how great the ability, how large the genius, or how splendid the education, the achievement will never rise higher than the confidence. You can if who think you can, and you can't if you think you can't. This is an inexorable, indisputable law. It does not matter what other people think of you, of your plans, or of your aims. No matter if they call you a visionary, a crank, or a dreamer, you must believe in yourself.

Listen to episode 279 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Rules of Civility & Civil Discourse. Edited and adapted from the writings of George Washington. Inspirational Podcast Transcript: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. I’d like to start today with a special thank you our newest patrons: Kevin Steele, Javier Rivera, Martin Nyoike, and Jacob McWherter. If you would like to help support our podcast and get access to free transcripts and the series Our Sunday Talks, visit LivingHour.org/patron. Thank you. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from 110 Rules of Civility & Decent Behavior, which was written by a 16 year old George Washington, and believed to be based on rules of behavior composed by the French Jesuits in 1595. Play not the Peacock, looking everywhere about you, to See if people are noticing your dress or virtues. Let your Conversation be without Malice or Envy. And in all situations where Passions run hot, seek to cool and govern them with Reason. When a person does their Best and fails, do not Criticize them. Do not Blame them for trying. When you must give Advice or Criticism, consider the timing, and whether it should be given in public or private. Also consider the Manner in which you give it. Above all be gentle. If you are Corrected, take the correction without Argument. If you are Wrongly judged, correct it later. Take all Admonitions thankfully at the Time or Place they are given. If the Warning proves Unwarranted, choose a later, more convenient Time, to let the person know. Do not Make Fun of anything that is Important to others. If you say anything Witty or Humorous, refrain from Laughing at your own joke. If you Criticize someone else of something, make sure you are not Guilty of it yourself. Actions speak louder than words. Use no Disparaging Language against anyone, nor ever Curse or Revile them. Do not be quick to believe Bad Reports about other people. Do not show yourself glad at the Misfortune of another person, even if they are your Enemy. Do not go where you are not Wanted. Give not Advice without being Asked; and when desired, do it briefly.

Listen to episode 278 of the Inspirational Living podcast: The Soul of a River. Edited and adapted from “Little Rivers” by Henry van Dyke. Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. Get the best of our podcast in hardcover or e-book by visiting our book website InspirationalLifeLessons.com. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from the book “Little Rivers” by Henry van Dyke, published in 1895. A river is the most human of all inanimate things — and the one most capable of offering companionship. It has a life, a character, a voice of its own, and is as full of good fellowship as a sugar-maple is of sap. It can talk in various tones, loud or low — and of many subjects, grave and joyful. Under favorable circumstances, it will even sing — not in a fashion that can be reduced to notes and set down on a sheet of paper, but in a vague, refreshing manner, and to a wandering air that goes: "Over the hills and far away…" For real company and friendship, there is nothing outside of the animal kingdom that is comparable to a river. I will admit that a very good case can be made in favor of some other objects of Nature. For example, a fair argument has been made by those who have fallen in love with the sea. But that is a formless and disquieting passion. It lacks solid comfort and mutual confidence. The sea is too big for loving, and too uncertain. It will not fit into our thoughts. It has no personality, because it has so many. It is, in many ways, a salty abstraction. There is also a love for the Mountains, which is more satisfying because they are more individual. It is possible to feel a very strong attachment for a certain mountain range whose outline has grown familiar to our eyes — or a clear peak that has looked down, day after day, upon our joys and sorrows, moderating our passions with its calm aspect. We come back from our travels, and the sight of a well-known mountain is like meeting an old friend unchanged. But it is a one-sided affection. The mountain is voiceless and self-possessed. And its very loftiness and serenity sometimes make us the more lonely.

Listen to episode 277 of the Inspirational Living podcast: How to Cultivate Courage | Mastering Fear & Anxiety. Edited and adapted from “Thoughts Are Things” by Prentice Mulford. Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: COURAGE and presence of mind mean the same thing — for presence of mind implies command of mind. Cowardice and lack of mental control also mean about the same thing — for cowardice is rooted in hurry, the habit of hurry or lack of repose. All degrees of success are based on courage — mental or physical. All degrees of failure are based on timidity. You can cultivate courage and increase it at every minute and hour of the day. You can have the satisfaction of knowing that in everything you do, you have accomplished two things — namely, the doing of the thing itself and (by the manner of its doing), adding eternally to yourself another atom of the quality of courage. You can do this by the cultivation of deliberation — deliberation of speech, of walk, of writing, of eating — deliberation in everything. There is always a bit of fear when there is a bit of hurry. When you hurry to the airport, you are in fear that you may be left behind, and with that comes fear of other possibilities resulting from that. When you hurry to work, or a meeting, or an appointment, you are in fear of some negative consequence of not being on time.... Today's podcast is sponsored by Audible, which has an unrivalled collection of audiobooks by both contemporary and classic authors. Take advantage of a 30 day trial membership + 1 free audiobook by visiting: https://audible.com/inspirational.

Listen to episode 276 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Writers on Writing | Authors and Literature. Edited and adapted from “Campfires & Guideposts” by Henry van Dyke. Inspirational Podcasts Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. A special thanks to our newest patrons, Steve Crews, Wayne Sanday, and Naima Shea. If you would like to support our podcast and gain access to full transcripts of our more than 270 podcasts, please visit LivingHour.org/patron. Thank you. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Campfires & Guideposts by Henry Van Dyke, published in 1921. IT is a curious fact that there is no good guide book to authorship. There are, of course, lots of self-portraits of authors at work. And there are many essays upon the craft of writing in general. The best of these portraits and advice are excellent reading, full of entertainment and instruction for the alert and candid mind, and touched with a special, sympathetic interest for those young persons who have sternly resolved, or fondly dreamed, that they will follow a literary career. A volume of carefully selected material of this kind might be made attractive and rewarding to readers who wish to be authors. But the one thing which such a book ought not to be mistaken for, is a manual for the profession of writing literature. Why not? Well, the answer is an open secret — an instructive paradox. Because there is no certain pathway to authorship. It is a voyage, if you like. But there are no guideposts in the sea. It is a flight, if you like. But there are no tracks in the air. It is certainly not a journey along a railway line, or a highway, or even a well-marked trail. In this it differs from other vocations like the Bar, Engineering, Medicine, or Accounting. For each of these there is a pretty clearly defined path of preparatory study, with fixed gateways of examination along its course. When the last gate is passed and the young doctor is licensed to practice, the young lawyer admitted to the bar, the accountant certified to crunch numbers, the path broadens into a road, which leads from one professional duty to another with the regularity of a time-table — and, it must be added, with something of the monotony of a clock.

Listen to episode 275 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Death & Eternal Life | Spirituality Life Lessons. Edited and adapted from “On the Threshold” by Charles Wagner. Spirituality Podcast Transcript: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast, brought to you with the kind financial support of listeners like you. Support our podcast for as little as 1 dollar a month. Learn more at LivingHour.org/patron. Thank you. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from On Life’s Threshold by Charles Wagner, published in 1905. SOME people think it is better never to speak of death, or even consider it. I know parents who have tried to hide it from their children, carefully avoiding any encounter that might reveal it to them. This is one of those desperate feats that serve only to make more formidable what we are obliged to look at sometime in the face. Death comes without any care on our part. Its manifestations are part of the daily spectacle of nature and of human society. We need not look at a corpse or a coffin to see it, for to note only an insect or animal falling lifeless is to have our attention directed to that mysterious Something called death. Of course we should not spend our whole life watching for its end. That would be the worst way to prepare for it. Students who spend their school hours thinking about recess are poor workers, as are those employees occupied all day long in counting the minutes that separate them from the evening. Like them, we lose our time when we spend it in fruitless contemplation of death. We are here to live — not to waste time in mournful preoccupations and to have our souls dulled by constant thoughts of the last hour. It is not a bad idea, of course, to become familiar with the fact that we shall not stay forever on the earth, and I do not think it necessary to wait for old age to consider death. Indeed, it is well to consider it while we are young. The person who thinks at times that their days are numbered is disposed to utilize them better. The thought of death makes us a better human being. We watch more scrupulously our conduct toward friends and family, thinking that perhaps we will not always have them with us.