The Four Agreements

1. Be Impeccable With Your Word
Speak with integrity. Say only what you mean. Avoid using the word to speak against yourself or to gossip about others. Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love.

2. Don't Take Anything Personally
Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you wonít be the victim of needless suffering.

3. Don't Make Assumptions
Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want. Communicate with others as clearly as you can to avoid misunderstandings, sadness and drama. With just this one agreement, you can completely transform your life.

4. Always Do Your Best
Your best is going to change from moment to moment; it will be different when you are healthy as opposed to sick. Under any circumstance, simply do your best, and you will avoid self-judgment, self-abuse and regret.

The Value of A Smile At Christmas

It costs nothing, but creates much
It enriches those who receive, without impoverishing those who give
It happens in a flash and the memory of it sometimes lasts forever
None are so rich they can get alone without it, and none so poor but are richer for its benefits
It creates happiness in the home, fosters good will in a business, and is the countersign of friends
It is rest to the weary, daylight to the discouraged, sunshine to the sad, and Nature's best antidoge for trouble
Yet is cannot be bought, begged, borrowed, or stolen, for it is something that is no earthly good to anybody till it is given away
And if in the last minute rush of Christmas buying some of our salespeople should be too tired to give you a smile, may we ask you to leave one of yours?
For nobody needs a smile so much as those who have none left to give!

Memory Stacking

I met a man at a conference once
and he had on a name tag
He turned it over
and on the back was a map of the world
I then saw a big purple house
when I looked into the window
I saw a family
they were petting their dog
The father had on a glove
and he was holding a golf club
I then realized that I had been
looking into a crystal ball.

Memory Pegging

One Day I was running through the Zoo
I passed an oak Tree and came to four red doors
Suddenly, I got hives and began getting sick
I died and went to heaven
I was standing at the pearly gates
when God himself greeted me with a big bottle of wine
He escorted me to his Den filled with books
It was a sunday and football was on TV
We watched eleven men on each team
run up and down a big green field
God was so excited that twelve books fell from the shelves
hurting our heads
We began sorting through the books
Lifting them one at a time
God even had a book on Licking
can you imagine on page sixteen
were seventeen virgins with ice cream
watching a movie screen
On page eighteen, a young boy
had his tongue stuck to a pole on Xmas day
and was waiting for help to arrive
On page Nineteen, was a man with a shining stud
in his tongue and he was kissing his girlfriend
both were plenty horny at age twenty
which most kids are at that age
so much in love was he
that when another man tried to steal her away
He challenged him to a dueling of guns
He was only twenty one

June 19th, 2006

MGBTTT - June 19th, 2006

Dear Anthony-

Today is a beautiful sunny day in South Florida. I am sitting here studying in my room and taking notes for a class that I am having this evening.

Your birthday just passed and I had a card for you that I did not send. Just like so many gifts that I had bought for you. That went undelivered or returned to sender.

Thirty years on this earth, there are so many things that I do not understand. Perhaps the greatest of these misunderstandings is not being able to be a part of your life. A silent observer... A monthly paycheck... nothing more.

They say that the only regrets a person will have at the end of his life are the things that we don't do. Never have I regretted the decision to bring you into this world... you have been my anchor, my savior and my greatest hope. And I look forward, patiently to the day when you will come searching for me. And I pray, that on that day, we will both find peace.

Son, do not fear or worry,
The winds of time can only bring us closer.

Love,
Dad