In Memory of Brendan Thomas O'Toole

"Happiness doesn't depend on any external conditions, it is governed by our mental attitude."
- Dale Carnegie

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Happy Thanksgiving!!!

"Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more.

It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity.

It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend.

Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow."
- Melody Beattie

Happy Thanksgiving to all!!!! Please take the time today to focus on all the blessings and good in our lives.  Despite the trials and challenges all of us face, we all have so much to be grateful for today and should really, sincerely, give thanks for it all!!! 

God Bless and Stay Strong!

Appreciation

"Appreciate again and again, freshly and naively, the basic goods of life, with awe, pleasure, wonder and even ecstasy, however stale these experiences may have become to others."
  - Abraham Maslow

We cannot do it alone.....

"Just as the wave cannot exist for itself, but is ever a part of the heaving surface of the ocean, so must I never live my life for itself, but always in the experience which is going on around me."

- Albert Schweitzer

Happy Monday!!! Inner Peace ....preserve it!!

"Never be in a hurry;  do everything quietly and in a calm spirit.

Do not lose your inner peace for anything whatsoever, even if your whole world seems upset."
 
-  Saint Francis de Sales

Do not let a rainy Monday get you down today!!  We control our moods, not the cliche of days of the week!  

It takes practice but it can be accomplished by ANYONE regardless of who we are....it is our mind that must be mastered, not the rest of the world! 

Start today by focusing ONLY on your blessings and what you are striving to accomplish in this life!!! 

Forget the past, focus on solutions to your current problems, put them in perspective to the rest of the world, and remember that no matter how alone you feel, you are NEVER ALONE!!!

Pray for guidance and strength! Help others as much as you can, especially when you don't feel like it.....this is the path to inner Peace!!!

Stay Strong!!!

Thomas O'Toole. 11/18/1996

Today is the 15th death anniversary of a Great man, Thomas O'Toole. 

Here was a man who truly lived life to its fullest, in service to others and constantly spending his time making others feel good, joyous and special! 

He is truly missed by all who knew him or had the good fortune to have had him in their lives.  I am sure his work is still being carried on in Heaven and that is a blessing for all of us!

God Bless and Rest in Peace Mr .OT.

No man is an Island - Thomas Merton

Just now a friend of mine handed me a passage he thought I would appreciate, and I sure do.  Enjoy and take it to heart as it carries much truth and food for thought!!

"Why do we spend our lives striving to be something that we would never want to be, if only we knew what we wanted?

Why do we waste our time doing things, which, if we only stopped to think about them, are just the opposite of what we are made for?

We cannot be ourselves until we know ourselves. But self-knowledge is impossible when thoughtless and automatic activity keeps our souls in confusion.

In order to know ourselves it is not necessary to cease all activity in order to think about ourselves. That would be useless, and would probably do most of us a great deal of harm.

But we have to cut down our activity to the point where we can think calmly and reasonably about our actions. 

We cannot begin to know ourselves until we see the REAL reasons we do the things we do, and cannot be ourselves until our actions correspond to our intentions, and our intentions are appropriate to our own situation.

But that is enough.

It is not necessary that we succeed in everything.

A man can be perfect and still reap no fruit from his work, and it may happen that a man who is able to accomplish very little is much more of a person than another who seems to accomplish very much."

Keep up the good fight!!!

For those of us in the midst of battles, challenges, trials and periods of doubt, despair or strife, perhaps this may help us today, to get back up and keep up the good fight for Peace and Joy:

Finding the Strength

"O, Mighty Lord, I pray that you will be my shield as I do battle against ignorance, cruelty and injustice.

Through your unending love, I pray that you will grant me goodness and steadfastness, so that I might lead others to do your will and glorify your name.

Amen"

Stay Strong!!!

For those in need of a little Strength today!!

St Terese, the Little Flower, is always ready and willing to lend strength of Spirit and hope to all who seek it from her! 

All you need to do is ask!!

Stay Strong!

All we need is within!!!

"The resources we need to turn our dreams into reality are within us, merely waiting for the day when we decide to wake up and claim our birthright."
   - Anthony Robbins

We all have a purpose and reason for being here on this earth and it is our DUTY to explore and search and discover exactly what that purpose is!!! 

We all have gifts and talents given by God that the world needs to see so today, start BELIEVING in ourselves today and go after that dream!! 

Do not second guess, do not hesitate, act as if what you seek and desire HAS ALREADY HAPPENED!  and lo and behold it will occur!!!

Stay Strong!!

Happy Sunday!!

Nothing like taking a quiet moment on a beautiful Sunday to reflect and seek guidance from a higher authority and give thanks for all of our many many blessings!

"We feel secure even in trials, knowing that trials produce patience, from patience comes merit, merit is the source of hope, and hope does not disappoint us because the Holy Spirit has been given to us, pouring into our hearts the love of God."

--Romans 5:3-5

Compassionate God.
Send the Power of yourHoly Spirit upon us.
Give us STRENGTH to walk in the footsteps of Jesus.
Let not the trials or difficulties of life discourage us from following His Gospel.
We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, Who lives and reigns with the Holy Spirit.
One God forever and ever.
Amen.

Stay Strong!!

Do What You Love and Love What You Do

"Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful."
- Albert Schweitzer

"People rarely succeed unless they have fun in what they are doing."
- Dale Carnegie

"Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life." - Confucius

If you hate your job, you aren't going to please your boss or your customers, so you aren't going to succeed in the long run.

In a perfect world, each of us would have a job doing what we most enjoy doing - for example writing or testing video games if that is what you love.

At the very least, choose a career that matches your strongest preferences and abilities.

If you hate dealing with complaints, don't work in customer service. If you want some room to be innovative, choose a smaller company. If you love being outdoors and working with your hands, don't confine yourself with a desk job.

Be flexible, but remember that you won't be successful in a job you hate, and more important, you will have spent your life in unnecessary misery.

Great advice!!!!  Act on it and Stay Strong!!!

Human nature but completely avoidable...

"These roses under my window make no reference to former roses or to better ones; they are for what they are;

They exist with God today.

There is no time for them. There is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence.

But man postpones or remembers;
he does not live in the present, but with reverted eye laments the past, or heedless of the riches that surround him, stands on tiptoe to forsee the future.

He cannot be happy and strong until he too lives with nature in the present, above time."

―Ralph Waldo Emerson: "Essays and Lectures"

Do not Quit!! Do not Surrender!!

We all have our daily battles to fight in our lives.

No one escapes this fact, no matter your lot in life, your situation, or your circumstances.

From the very Richest people to the most impoverished, we all have our crosses to bear on a daily basis.

Granted, they are often different concerns and worries, but they are challenges, fears, unrest and loneliness nonetheless.

We all possess the POWER and STRENGTH inside of us to not only face these hourly battles, but to defeat and overcome anything life throws us!

A critical step in this is to put your challenge in perspective!!

To every one of us, our own problems are Mountainous!!!  Often there does not appear to be anything more important going on in the world!!!

And sometimes we do have challenges and trials that large and overwhelming!

However, if we truly size up the trials and problems we struggle with daily and put them into a range of true urgency and importance, we will probably find that we are more often than not making a mountain out of a mole hill!

Try and look at the big picture when faced with a trial and place a level on it if that helps!

Rely on the faith you have in whomever you choose to put your faith in and reflect, pray and believe that a solution will surface - and it will.

Excessive worry and fear brought on by our ranking every issue we face as "critical" serves no purpose to anyone but to create more worry and fear, and distraction from the true solution and course of action!!

You are never alone in this world!

Even the birds and insects find a way to live and survive!!!

Ask for help!  Ask for guidance!

You will be answered!

Replace Fear with Faith and Hope and Love!!!

There is no challenge we face that cannot be dealt with and a solution found if we believe and receive guidance!!

Pray for others who may be down on their knees with worry and fear, ask that they may find strength and hope and a solution to whatever ails them! 

Stay Strong and never ever give up!!!

Sage Advice on becoming worry free!

Laugh at yourself and at life.

Not in the spirit of derision or whining self-pity, but as a remedy, a miracle drug, that will ease your pain, cure your depression, and help you to put in perspective that 'seemingly terrible defeat and worry' with laughter at your predicaments, thus freeing your mind to think clearly toward the solution that is certain to come.

Never take yourself too seriously."

-Og Mandino

The Bright side of any situation...

"There are people who make the worst of everything. I always see the good side of things, and even if my portion be suffering, without a glimmer of solace, well, I make it my joy."

--St Therese de Lisieux

Happy Sunday!! No matter the darkness, there is always Hope!

"Become a possibilitarian.

No matter how dark things seem to be or actually are, raise your sights and see possibilities --
always see them, for they're always there."

~ Dr. Norman Vincent Peale

What will you shoot for today?

"Let me today do something that shall take A little sadness from the world's vast store,

And may I be so favoured as to make Of joy's too scanty sum a little more

Let me not hurt, by any selfish deed
Or thoughtless word, the heart of foe or friend;

Nor would I pass, unseeing, worthy need, Or sin by silence when I should defend.

However meagre be my worldly wealth,Let me give something that shall aid my kind -

A word of courage, or a thought of health, Dropped as I pass for troubled hearts to find.

Let me to-night look back across the span'Twixt dawn and dark, and to my conscience say -

Because of some good act to beast or man -

"The world is better that I lived to-day."

- Ella Wheeler Wilcox
"Morning Prayer"

The Little Flower

"I am a spring flower which the Divine Master culls for His pleasure.

We are all flowers, planted on this earth, and God will gather us in His own good time--some sooner, some later...

I, little flower of one day, am the first to be gathered! But we shall meet again in Paradise, where lasting joy will be our portion."

----Sister Teresa of the Child Jesus, using the words of the angelic martyr-- Theophane Venard

Perspective on life's trials and daily challenges

"The souls that are most dear to My Father," Our Lord once said to Saint Teresa, "are those He tries the most, and the greatness of their trials is the measure of His love."

-The Story of a Soul (L'histoire d'une Ame): The Autobiography of Saint Therese de Lisieux, 1873-1897

Happy Friday All!!

"What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us."

--Ralph Waldo Emerson

A poem worth reading in it's entirety...and with something for everybody today!

"If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too:

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies, Or being hated don't give way to hating,

And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream, and not make dreams your master;

If you can think, and not make thoughts your aim,

If you can meet with triumph and disaster And treat those two impostors just the same:

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, Or walk with kings, nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much:

If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,

And—which is more—you'll be a Man, my son!"

-- "If"
Rudyard Kipling

Stay Strong

All Souls Day

Today, remember all who have gone before us.

Stay Strong

Await and Receive Guidance

"You can't live a perfect day without doing something for someone who will never be able to repay you."

- John Wooden