Lovely Leo

Lovely Leo

 

 

Leo Leo

You played guitar

And shine as brightly

As any star

 

You always played

And smiled 

And laughed

You practiced

Practiced

Honing your craft

 

You love old houses

Just like Dad

We were proud of you

You made us glad

 

Your Sisters loved you

And cared for you too

Just like an Angel

With eyes of blue

 

You danced among us

With that glint in your eye

But your time was short

You had to fly

Off to the heavens

Among the Angels

You belong

Sharing your joy

And beautiful song

Godspeed!

With Love,

Coach K

A Knowing

Knowing

A Knowing.  Interesting word.  Interesting concept.  Shakespeare wrote, "To Thine Own Self Be True." We are many things, many talents, ideas, and possibilities but at our core we are these wonderfully Divine beings.  We are powerful, gentle, souls that are gliding through this dance called life. 

How many of us are even aware of this fact.  In this Christmas season of giving, give yourself the gift of true life.  The gift of Knowing your Divine essence and your ability to create miracles in your life and others.  

Jesus said, "You can do all that I have done and more if you but believe.  And with the faith of the tiniest mustard seed, you can move mountains."

Think of the times you were inspired and you created or achieved something wonderful.  A great performance, a great game, a story, a painting, an idea, a solution, overcoming an obstacle, changing a life, saving a life.  These moments of Light are within us, surround us, and are available to us at all times. We can access our Holy Spirit when we live from our higher selves. The Self that is gentle, kind, loving, compassionate, charitable, calm, and omnipotent.  

We have this ineffable power that resides dormant because we dwell in the everyday noise of human activity.  The hustle and bustle of everyday life that often comes with negativity, violence, low energy, anger, and frustration.  Our lifestyles often sap our energy leaving us tired and listless which limits our ability to access our creative, intelligent, inspired part of ourselves.  When we spend to much of our time on our human wants and needs and not enough feeding our divine spiritual selves we risk having that wonderful part of us, our Souls, become dormant and even non existent. 

When we feed ourselves both physically and spiritually the good stuff, we can reactive our spiritual selves and live a richer more fulfilling life. Turn down the noise, turn off the negative news, movies, and entertainment.  Seek out the better, fine qualities in all parts of your life and see how it enriches you and others. When we quiet ourselves and seek solitude and peace we can access and live more purposely from our higher selves. 

We can start by  praying or simply talking to God.  We are reminded that we should "Ask and it should be given unto you.  Ask and Receive.  Give and Receive"  A simple prayer of Thanks is  incredibly powerful.  When we give thanks it focuses our awareness on gratitude on the sublime gift of Life, of each wonderful moment, of each precious breath.  

We have our divine human bodies, our holy temples that house our divine soul and spirit.  Feed your body good health food, feed your mind good knowledge and literature, and above else feed yourself the Word of God and let your Divine essence and spirit shine throughout your life and the lives of others. 

Because each of us has a Light that can truly change the world. 

Merry Christmas!

With Love,

Coach K

A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens

A Christmas Carol

"No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of others." 

From the wonderful movie, "The Man Who Invented Christmas" with Dan Morgan and the fantastic Christopher Plumber from Sound of Music fame. The movie recounts the story of how Charles Dickens came to write his most famous story, A Christmas Carol.  

Dickens was already established as one of the great novelists of our time with Oliver Twist, David Copperfield, A Tale of Two Cities, and Great Expectations among many other writings. Dickens just returned from a trip to America and was working on his next book Martin Chuzzlewit early in 1943.

A Christmas Carol was written in October 1843 and published in December that same year.  After visiting America in 1842, Dickens returned to home to London and was looking for another idea for his next book after some recent efforts failed to achieve the same success as his earlier works.  His publishers Chapman & Hall were not excited by a Christmas book and since it was already October they didn't see how they would be able to publish the work in six weeks by Christmas when the book was not even written yet. 

Dickens belief in the story of Scrooge and the Ghosts of Christmas was so strong he paid for the illustration and publishing costs himself. He hired the best illustrator in London, John Leech, who struggled drawing a Merry Ghost. 

The book was a tremendous success and sold out 6000 copies within in a week.  The story continues to be enjoyed today with numerous popular movie versions. My favorite is the is the 1999 version with Patrick Stewart as Scrooge and Ian McNiece as Fezziwig.

And as Tiny Tim says, 

"God Bless Us Everyone"

Merry Christmas!

Coach K

 

Walt Whitman

 The Sunshine

Another lovely quote from the American poet Walt Whitman - 

"Keep your face always toward the sunshine, and shadows will fall behind you"

 Born on Long Island, NY in 1892 Walt Whitman lead a hard scrabble life.  He was the second of nine children and spent his time growing up in Brooklyn, NY.  He started in the printing trade at the age of 12 and was a writer and editor of several papers, similar to Ben Franklin in 1770's Philadelphia. 

He spent his time reading books, going to the library, and seeing plays and operas. He also worked as a school teacher, printer, and journalist.  

He introduced a new form of poetry with Leaves of Grass and Song of Myself.  He visited his brother during the Civil War and was deeply impacted with the realities of war and he lived among the sick and dying which shaped his writing going forward. 

Keep looking toward the sun and cast a long shadow. 

With Love,

Coach K

Getting Dirty

 Beautiful Flowers

I came across a lovely quote the other day

"Every flower must grow through the dirt"

It got me thinking on how many of us resist getting dirty or just rolling around in the mud.  We are part of the earth and come to think of it everything that we need to survive comes from the dirt.  The plants, flowers, crops, animals are all dependent on the soil.  

And of course the struggle of the flower toiling away in the dark damp dirt yearning and striving to reach and ultimately be born in the golden sunlight, is similar to our journey from darkness to Light. 

We are born in darkness emerging from our mother's womb into our first light of day.  From there we take take our first blessed breath and begin our journey of life. Throughout our lives we will be knocked down or knocked out but we get up and keep moving forward.  We all struggle at times but with God's help we will come through the dirt and blossom into the unique beautiful flowers we were meant to be. 

And just like the unsurpassed beauty of the lilies in the field, each of us has our own uniqueness, scent, and beauty to share.

God wants us to blossom and shine our beauty on the world. 

Let it be so. 

With Love,

Coach K

Truly Love

 Charlotte Bronte - Jane Eyre

"I have for the first time found what I can truly love–I have found you. You are my sympathy–my better self–my good angel–I am bound to you with a strong attachment. I think you good, gifted, lovely: a fervent, a solemn passion is conceived in my heart; it leans to you, draws you to my centre and spring of life, wrap my existence about you–and, kindling in pure, powerful flame, fuses you and me in one.” 

"The human heart has hidden treasures, in secret kept, in silence sealed; The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures, Whose charms were broken if revealed. "

With Love,

Coach K

 

Capitalism - Berkshire Hathaway

Charlie Munger

Investing legend and Vice Chairman of Warren Buffet's Berkshire Hathaway passed away this week at the age of 99.  Charlie and Warren were the Capitalism's Investing Dynamic Duo.  Berkshire Hathaway was a tired fading textile company in New England that Buffet acquired in the early 1970's, and he would use that company as his acquisition vehicle to build one of the most successful business investment companies in American history.  Creating jobs, tax revenue, wealth, and improving standard of living for millions throughout the world. 

Charlie and Warren despite being billionaires are notoriously cheap or shall we say frugal. Forgoing glitz and glamour and life comfortably but modestly.  They are donating much of their wealth to philanthropic causes. 

A word about Capitalism which seems to get a bad rap these days. There has been no other system of industry that has lifted more people from poverty and made more advances to improve the quality of lives  in the history of the world.  From electricity, fresh water, aviation, and human rights Capitalism has bettered humankind.

 One of Charlie's favorite classic investing adages according to Warren Buffet,

It's far better to buy a wonderful company at a fair price than a fair company at a wonderful price," he wrote. "Charlie understood this early; I was a slow learner.

God Bless and  safe travels Charlie, may we all be slow learners.  

With Love,

 Coach K