The last #sunday thought

This is the last #Sunday Thought of MDY3 –
It has been an amazing summer and tomorrow is that amazing sunset that we all have been working towards….

one more sleep before the last sunset of this summer…

one last Sunday to go and do, one more thing, one more hour or even all of it again…..

It has been a busy summer – I honestly in my heart am a bit sad that it is at the end….

I even cried this morning thinking about this MDY3, its hours, its goals, its people, its everything….

As I sip this tea, I think this last quote should be directly from me.

But I am lost for words…… the only thing I can think is –

 

Thank you.  You are amazing people doing amazing things. Thank you very much.

Truly thank you.

#sunday thought

The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why. –Mark Twain

#Sunday Thought – silly hat style

With SO MANY MANY MANY MANY people out there in the world doing the Silly Hat Big Clean this weekend – (Big thank you BTW!)

this quote is for you!

 

“Grab your coat, and get your hat,

Leave your worry on the doorstep,

Just direct your feet,

To the sunny side of the street.”

 

Dorothy Fields

 

 

 

#sunday thought week 8

Of the many hours reported, there are many different projects going on in this world.
We don’t have enough time in our lives to tell you all the stories we have read and happy tears of joy this MDY3 has brought into our lives.

We humbly thank you for doing all the hours that you have been doing and look forward to the rest of the summer as we are passed the half-way mark and heading for home base- that wonderful sunset –

Here is something to think about –

 

 

#Sunday Thought Week Six

Sometimes I am the mouse, sometimes I am the cheese….

A jewel is just a pebble that is worth something to someone

It has not been a stellar week.

Here I sit at a bus stop in the the middle of a bad rain storm in the middle of a very long week.

Personally I have spent too much time looking for a package, waiting and worrying for calls and emails on a variety of things and everything else plus work and other life stuff.

Then I am reminded of  a phrase from an old college science professor.

“A jewel is just a pebble that is worth something to someone”

I am reminded of the small things that do the most good are how you see them. Sure, there is bad everywhere and anywhere, but there is good at the same places.

The raindrops aren’t tears from heaven, they are water leaking from cloud, right?

I am losing it – I am wet, scared, tired, unsuccessful and beyond frustrated.

The wind is making the rain dance on the puddles in a rhythm pattern. And I am so wet that I don’t think anybody can tell the difference between the rain and my tears. I am a large very wet to the bone sobbing mess and I am thinking about rocks.

A truck hits the puddles. I didn’t think I could get more wet, but I did.

There is nowhere to escape the rain, the wet, the heat or the fact that I am officially spent emotionally and it is only Wednesday.

I see the next truck coming, I know the puddles are deep. I know that I don’t have the package that I have spent all of this week looking for. I know I am waiting and worrying on many areas of life stuff. I know that it is still raining. I know the puddle is coming to me.

And it did. I wasn’t any wetter this time.

Just mad that I couldn’t do anything to change the situation – the moment of time that I was in.

Still no bus, still raining, still wet.

I decided to pick up the trash so it doesn’t go into the storm drain.

Cans, wrappers and plastic bottles and a pretty cool rock…..

I think I will keep it….

And I am walking home, can’t get any wetter and I can’t make the package appear, the emails and calls happen or the world to stop being crazy but I pick up the trash here and I can enjoy a walk in the rain in a new rock in my pocket.

 

Note: This was written yesterday, but because of storms and the internet being funky – it was finally posted today.

 

 

 

 

 

#Sunday Thought

Summer is starting to truly heat up!!!

Thank you for all the hours that you have done this far!!
(Keep sending your hours in!! -With the subject line “reporting hours”)

The quote for this delightful Sunday is:

It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop. –Confucius

Keeping going – keep doing – YOU ARE A MOVING DIFFERENCE!!!

#Throwback Wednesday/Thursday

Instead of a guest blogger this week, we are doing a throwback post from our very first Moving Difference year…. yup – 2012.

It seems like yesterday, but the truth is two years has flashed by and we are now here in this moment… the current moment.

If this is your first time reading this post, welcome and enjoy – if you remember it from years ago, then it is a friendly reminder to update your wishes…

 

And as always, be bold.

 

Originally posted in July 22, 2012

 

Let my life speak for itself.

Sometimes in my life, I take on the world and lose. Sometimes in my life, I take on the world and win, all of the rest of the time are a draw.

But it is my life and I live it to the fullest, all throttle and on the fringes just about everyday. There are a lot of things that many people don’t know about me, and that is fine with me. You don’t need to know me to know that I will gladly help you if I can, you just need to know that you can get help when you need it. I live my life as close to no regrets, some mercy, full justice and simple compassion as I can get.

I tell you this because none of us know the future. Card readers, horoscopes even trick knees can only paint what might happen to us each in the future. The future actually lies in us and what we do in our lives to that last moment can speak volumes about our lives themselves.

That is what I want to talk to you about – that last moment. The moment where death happens, where a shell of a body and a soul separate, where you go wherever you are to go and you are gone.

Death- a subject that something happy like the Moving Difference project probably shouldn’t talk about. Wrong! Death, like time, tide and taxes happen. It happens to each of us at some point, and it will happen, you and I can’t change that fact.

So why bring death up? Because in my life, I have known a great number of people that always put off what they should have taken care of today and I still know a few. I know people that are afraid of death, even I am. I know that the only way sometimes with something like death is to meet it head on and deal with it.

Here is the thing: This is a very personal side of me that I am going to share with you. It isn’t easy but if it helps one person out, then it was worth it.

I know that death will happen to me, I don’t know the when and where and I am not certainly encouraging it to come pay me a visit. But I have sat down and I thought about organ donation, about donating my body and about what to do with my remains.

Now stop freaking out – this is important. This is being a moving difference way after I am gone. Taking the hour to think about this, to write down wishes and to have the forethought to face death with a positive is courageous. It is time to be bold.

For me personally, I have decided that if my organs can be used to help someone else, then please take them. I don’t need them at that point and if they help someone else, great! After that, please ship my body to medical students to learn on. Have those future brains of tomorrow poke, test and learn. I can only hope that they find the solutions to the diseases of the world. And after that, cremated me. There is no reason for my whole body to be put in a box and put in the earth. Ashes are just fine. In fact, I am going to have my ashes put in a man-made concrete reef, and then that reef goes out to one of the eroding coast lines to help stop the wave erosion. The fishes and other aquatic life forms get to feed and live in that reef as it protects the shoreline.

For me, there is no reason to be a named slab in a garden of stone. I don’t want people to visit me and put more dead things on my grave after I am gone. It would be a waste, because I am not there. At that point, I have lived my life, and you knew me or you didn’t, either way I probably will not be interested in what kind of flowers you bring. See when I am gone, I am gone, I either did my life right or not. The simple fact remains there are no reasons for me not to have my body go forward to help others – humans or animals or the world.

Let’s face it; no one wants to talk about death. Death of themselves, or a loved one or any one, it is a scary subject. It is a hard subject no matter your beliefs, but it is a subject that should be thought about and discussed. I hope you have the courage to think about it, to discuss it and write down your decisions in a timely fashion.

My decisions are written down and written above. They are extremely personal to me. They are extremely hard to make public too. I share these decisions with you not to make you fearful. I share so that you will stop and think about it. See, I don’t want to leave this life that I have, I love my life, I love many things in it but in that same moment, I know that I will face death someday, so I am going to deal with it and move on. I know that by me taking the time and making these decisions, by thinking about that unpleasant thought of death, I am staying true to myself, to my entire life’s work and even into the future. I am taking away the unknown, and making it a known. I don’t know when that last moment is coming – asleep on the couch; in a hospital; skydiving or whenever. I might be scared out of my mind or laughing, I don’t know. Yet when that last moment of my life happens, I am going to go into it knowing that I have done everything that I could to let my life speak for itself. I am going to go on giving and be a difference even after my death. There is strength and comfort in knowing that death doesn’t have any power over me. Bottom line is even death isn’t going to stop me from doing what I already do every day –  be a Moving Difference.

Be bold, my friends, live life to the fullest every day.

Reasons – Reasons – Reasons

We all have our reasons why we do something and why we don’t do something, but do we have a reason to search for a reason?

It is a rather interesting question.

I give this example that happened just today.

We are waiting at a stop light, traffic is bad, there is a man, he has a sign that says he is hungry.

We only have $5 between us in cash, just a $5 and that is it. We don’t usually give more than $2 dollars, but there was something in the actions of the man and in the eyes, you could tell he was hungry.

The traffic is still bad, we haven’t moved, we talked to each other and it is decided that the best use of this $5 right then and there, was to give it to the guy. The reason – we had food at home, he didn’t. We had a home, he had a backpack and it was in that moment – we knew….

This isn’t the happily ever after story – this is the part of the story where it gets weird.

We roll down the window and call the man over in a friendly manner, with the $5 in hand to give to him.

We smile, we say this is all we have, hope it helps, the man asks if we are Christians- puzzled by the question, we reply no but here is some money to help with that hunger, the man asks if we are Jewish, mmm no – we are not religious is our reply – the man starts to rant at us that he has given all his worldly possessions away to follow Christ – our reply is okay – awkward pause – the man continues to tell us that he has been robbed, molested and a few other things in his journey across the country…another awkward silence… then the rant goes to the gold standard and the Nixon era… awkward is an understatement at this point.

Finally I ask – do you want the money or not?

The man says “no” and a few other things with regards to us needing to find Christ and walks off.

 

The window is back up, the a/c is on and we are still in traffic, this time stunned into the awkwardness of what just happened. The worst part is that isn’t even the strangest encounter that both of us have had.

Then we continue with traffic, trying to find the reason that just happened.

The reason.

Mental health, homeless, poverty, drugs.

We sought a reason for the strange behavior, the rant and the hat.

We wanted to explain it away, but there is no logical answer to it.

 

I will never know why that guy had a sign saying he was hungry but didn’t accept my monetary donation for food. I don’t see the reason, and after thinking hard about it, I don’t need a reason either.

He didn’t know my reason to give, I don’t know his reason to refuse.

 

See, my reason to give is equally as valuable as his reason to refuse.

 

It doesn’t matter if I am Jewish, Black, Christian, Hispanic, Muslim, Woman, White, Man, alien, something else, all of it, or none of it. What matters is that I didn’t turn the search for the reason into an excuse not to try again to help someone else or to justify this man’s actions.

Everybody has the right to refuse accepting help whether poor or rich or in-between.

Everybody has the privilege to give what they wish whether poor or rich or in-between.

 

It took me several hours to stop looking for a reason in this guy’s actions, and start thinking -I hope finds what he is looking for- and let it go. Moving on the next thing in life….

We all have our reasons, our beliefs, our thoughts, our hopes and even our excuses.

I leave you with this –

“For every action there is an equal and opposite re-action.” Newton’s Third Law on Motion.

AND the lyrics from an old Buddy Guy song….

I sat my little child down
when he was old enough to know
I said I fell in this big wide world
You’re gonna meet all kinds of folks
I said son it all comes down to just one simple rule
That you treat everybody just the way
You want them to treat you
Yeah

Skin Deep    Skin Deep
Underneath we’re all the same
Skin Deep
Skin Deep
Underneath we’re all the same
We’re all of the same

 

 

 

 

 

 

#Sunday Thought Week 4

Straight up – simple thought for Sunday!

Do what you can, where you are, with what you have. –Teddy Roosevelt