The Metamorphosis
By Ernie Delfin, PP
Fountain Valley Rotary Club
District 5320, Southern California, USA
RANDOM THOUGHTS AS WE AGE
FOR THE NEW YEAR
Another year, are you still making another set of New
Year’s Resolution? Many people do.
About twenty years ago, I stopped making them. Instead, daily after my personalized morning prayers, I remind myself that today may be the last day
of my earthly life, that whatever work I do for the day is also a
form of a prayer, an offering to serve my own God and my fellowmen.
Unconsciously, I direct my life’s true north compass daily to a framed “RESOLUTION” (below) that hangs in my office.
How about you, as one human being, or as a Rotarian? Many of us seem dead at age 40 but only buried
at age 80! Some of us contribute our
energy (or the lack of it) to our own clubs or any organization, and cumulatively that degree of positive (negative) energy sipped into our
own clubs and soon it contaminates
others and then our club declines and
for some weaker clubs they even die from
man-made causes of death.
I am glad and have been blest that on my own way to heaven here on earth I
have met many interesting, lively, inspiring
individuals in and out Rotary who
have contaminated me with their vigor, spirit and love for life. One man I admire and respect is one who was
not degreed (no college diploma) but quite educated about life and living, who
told me early on, here in America that
education happens every day, even
outside the classroom. The secret to success and fulfillment he shared with me
is to be forever curious and excited all the time, like a toddler with a new toy, and become passionate with a new cause and/or engaged in noble projects that also benefit
others aside from one self. There should
be a great project year after year, like
an African safari or a religious pilgrimage that you totally engaged and
excited just preparing for it. That is
a very demanding formula but it is not
impossible to do. I have applied that formula for several years now
and it worked for me.
* * *
Decades ago, sources of our excitement were different as younger people
tend to be more materialistic and motivated by physical attributes. To be young means you feel invincible. Trappings of worldly success such as new car,
a bigger home, yachts, expensive vacations, excite many people. After 60, those “things” appear less important. I think I now understand why. But there are still many people,
however, who grew older but never matured nor have become
wiser. Bereft of spirituality or a sense
of ethics and morality, they were caught in their own cobwebs of false pride
and materialism, wearing their invisible
masks daily pretending that they were
super rich to be a able to buy their way
out. For instance, lately I knew a few educated
people, M.D.’s at that, in their sixties and seventies who were still
trying to prove to themselves that they were invincible by trying to out-smart
the USA’s Medicare system and continued
to bilk the system via fraudulent Medicare billings. But lo and behold, they were finally caught and
finally been convicted. I really pity
these people, (two are even a husband
and wife team) as they will experience
wearing those colorful prisoners’ garbs
in their senior citizen years. Very sad. (If you want to know more details, email me
and I will email you back the court docket
numbers and/or L.A. Times
stories)
When we become older (hopefully
wiser) we begin to realize that many things are not that important after
all. Other intangible things appear to manifest and become more important, like our families and friends,
our good health and balanced social and
spiritual life. When we see our children and their own children playing, we are
reminded daily of our faded youth. Even
our theme songs change from “Hey Jude”
by the Beatles and other energetic songs
like ”Let’s Do it, Baby” to nostalgic
songs like “Remember When” or The
Impossible Dream” by Frank Sinatra.
At 60, our vocabulary or topics of conversations also
metamorphose from career paths to our kids education and now what healthy
maintenance pills we are taking!
At 65, we feel so guilty not at home at 7:00 pm whereas at 21, we were just preparing to leave home at 7 :00 pm
to hang out with friends. Our
life’s paradigm and the same world seem different with another
eyeglasses that offer you another
perspectives. And with that
change, we relive what our own parents often
told us “Wait till you become a parent yourself”. For some of us, that is now being relieved by
our own children who do not yet understand our own parental
“wisdom”.
Ah, life is indeed a mystery to
be lived, and not a problem to be solved…. That is the way it was, the way it
is and the way it will be. Life simply
is.
When you are gone, the world will continue as
if you never lived on this planet… unless you are truly missed by those whom
you have touched. And that is one area that true Rotarians are doing everyday
to leave a legacy, to make this world a
better place than we found it.
Service Above Self as we Rotarians Share with our thinking, time, talent
and treasures. And as Socrates admonished
centuries ago, An unexamined life is not
worth living for. That should be our
“New Year’s Resolution” today and
everyday!
Happy and Prosperous and Peace 2008
everyone!
Now here is :
R E
S O L
U T I
O N S
By Lloyd Shearer
No one will ever get out of this world
alive.
Resolve therefore to maintain a reasonable
sense of values.
Take care of yourself.
Good health is everyone’s
major source of wealth.
Without it, happiness
is almost impossible.
Resolve to be cheerful
& helpful. People will repay you in kind.
Avoid angry, abrasive
persons. They are generally vengeful.
Avoid zealots. They are generally humorless.
Resolve to listen more
& to talk less.
No one ever learns
anything by talking.
Be chary of giving
advice. Wise men don’t need it
and fools won’t heed it.
Resolve to be tender
with the young, compassionate with the aged,
sympathetic with the striving &
tolerant of the weak and strong.
Sometime in life you will have been all of these.
Do not equate money
with success.
There are many successful money-makers who are
miserable
failures as human beings.
What counts most about
success is how a person achieves it.
---- The end
---
Email writer: ernie.delfin@gmail.com
or edelfin@blueoceanmarketingandconsulting.com
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