The Life That Is Mine

My mom forwarded me an email this morning that I found to be simple, yet brilliant. I immediately wanted to share it with everybody that I possibly could...so I decided to post it:

A lecturer, when explaining stress management to an audience, raised a glass of water and asked, "How heavy is this glass of water?" The answers called out ranged from 20g to 500g. The lecturer replied, "The absolute weight does not matter. It depends how long you try to hold it. If I hold it for a minute, that's not a problem. If I hold it for an hour, I'll have an ache in my arm. If I hold it for a day, you'll have to call an ambulance. In each case, it is the same weight, but the longer I hold it, the heavier it becomes."
He continued, "And that's the way it is with stress management. If we carry our burdens all the time, sooner or later, as the burden becomes increasingly heavy, we won't be able to carry on."
"As with the glass of water, you have to put it down for a while and rest before holding it again. When we're refreshed, we can carry on with the burden."
"So, before you return home tonight, put the burden of work down. Don't carry it home. You can pick it up tomorrow. Whatever burdens you are carrying now, let them down for a moment if you can. Don't pick it up again until after you've rested for a while."

Here are some great ways of dealing with the burdens of life:

1. Accept that some days you're the pigeon, and some days you're the statue.
2. Always keep your words soft and sweet, just in case you have to eat them.
3. Always read stuff that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it.
4. Drive carefully. It's not only cars that can be recalled by their maker.
5. If you can't be kind, at least have the decency to be vague.
6. If you lend someon $20 and never see that person again, it was probably worth it.
7. It may be that your sole purpose in life is simply to be kind to others.
8. Never put both feet in your mouth at the same time, because then you won't have a leg to stand on.
9. Nobody cares if you can't dance well. Just get up and dance!
10. Since it's the early worm that gets eaten by the bird, sleep late.
11. The second mouse gets the cheese.
12. When everything's coming your way, you're in the wrong lane.
13. Birthdays are good for you. The more you have, the longer you live.
14. You may be only one person to the world, but you may also be the world to one person.
15. Some mistakes are too much fun to only make once.
16. We could learn a lot from crayons...some are sharp, some are pretty and some are dull. Some have weird names, and all or different colors...but they all have to live in the same box.
17. A truly happy person is one who can enjoy the scenery on a detour.