Thoughts for today.

Today's Thought:

All power is a trust. We are accountable for its exercise. From people and for people all power springs, and all must exist. --Benjamin Disraeli

The sun is power. It warms, it burns, it feeds the plants without which we could not live. Yet, for all its power, the sun cannot make so much as a rainbow by itself. For that, it needs the rain, at just the right time and angle.

No matter how strong we are--or smart or talented or attractive--we realize our full power only by filtering it through others. Our most meaningful achievements are born of combined efforts. Even when we do something that feels like ours alone--paint a painting, win an award, hit a home run--there is always a constellation of friends and family and teachers, even enemies, who've been a part of our success.

Like the rain's part in the rainbow, the contributions of others do not detract from our achievements, but enhance them and bring them to their fullest light.

The beauty of the sunbeam lies partly in the fact that God does not keep it; He gives it away to us all. -- David Swing

The bough, which has been downward thrust by force of strength to bend its top to earth, so soon as the pressing hand is gone, looks up again straight to the sky above.
--Boethius

When we are down, low, depressed, why can't we ignore the desire to rise up again? Because we're like plants that need pure air, water, and sun. Because no matter how bent and old, we just keep wanting to grow up. Because there is a natural spring in us like that which makes flowers leap from the earth in May. Because we have hidden wings. And if we listen, we can feel the difference between wrong and right: we know the difference even with our eyes closed. Therefore we should not try putting ourselves down, for we will spring up again, sure as Spring.

You don't develop courage by being happy in your relationships everyday. You develop it by surviving difficult times and challenging adversity. -- Barbara DeAngelis

No matter how we have strayed or wandered, and whoever has
strayed and wandered, it is not really our concern except
that we are our brother's and our sister's keeper. We are
called upon to care, to extend ourselves, and to forget what
we might think against someone for what they've done or
said. Instead, we hold out whatever we have in love and
support and then celebrate. So we dance, and we feast, for
we have God amongst us, as we are those who are gathered in
His name.

- John Morton