Category Archives: Inspiration

Quotation Inspiration: Padre Pio’s Embroidery Parable

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“There is a mother who is embroidering. Her son, sitting on a low stool, sees her work, but upside down. He sees the knots of the embroidery, the tangled threads and says, ‘Mother, what are you doing? Your work is not at all clear.’ The mother lowers the embroidery frame and shows the good part of her work, each color in its place and the variety of threads forming a harmonious design. We are seeing the reverse side of the embroidery; we are sitting on the low stool.” -Padre Pio

Planting the Poetry Garden

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This morning, I put the final touches on our Poetry Garden. It’s outside my classroom and is full of flowers that my students decorated with Spring haiku (for the most part).

We’ve gotten lots of compliments so far, and it definitely raised my rainy-day spirits. 🙂

Here are some closeups:

And here’s my haiku:

Tiny flowers burst
into a symphony of
hue: Springtime Revisited.

Quotation Inspiration: Attitude

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I took this one behind my parents’ house. I love the incongruity of the dainty flowers flourishing amid the hardy cacti.

As we were sitting in a meeting waiting for someone to return the other day, Kevin pointed out a photocopied quotation thumb-tacked to a board. It’s by Charles (Chuck) Swindoll.

“The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill. It will make or break a company … a church … a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past … we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude … I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it. And so it is with you … we are in charge of our attitudes.”

Imagine people reading this, taking it to heart, and actually acting on it. The world could be changed for the better in an instant.

It brings out some points that I try to instill in my students and my own kids, advice that I’m always giving myself, as well:

  • You don’t always have control over where you are, but you can choose to make the best of it. Bloom where you’re planted.
  • The only person you can change is you. Be the change you want to see.
  • Don’t spend too much time looking back. Reflect on what happened, learn from your successes and mistakes, and move on. Don’t let your past alone define you. You are who you choose to be.

I also really like the analogy of the “one string” we have to play. If our attitude is our string, our instrument, then with it …

  • You can blow everyone else out of the room, or you can tone down to a pleasing volume, so they can actually enjoy what they hear.
  • You can be loud and proud, blocking others from being heard, or you can be team players, contributing to the overall composition.
  • You can play so low nobody can hear just in case, or you can do your very best, defeating that nasty old insecurity (for this battle, anyway).
  • You can lay down your instrument and sit out altogether because you messed up last week or last month or year or decade, or you can determine to do your very best this time, regardless.

We make choices every second of every day. Think about it.

Vibrancy

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Even after the most irritatingly exhausting day, Spring’s vibrant hues can energize.

And no wonder!

That word “vibrant” … what a sensory word: sight, sound, touch, hearing, smell — every one!

A Lesson on Becoming

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Isn’t it funny how something can look almost dead on the surface — bumpy trunk, spotted and holey leaves, shriveled limbs, knotholes from limbs cut off or shed — then surprise you with new growth?

What you thought had already become is instead continuing its becoming.

We should take a lesson.

Never assume you know the whole story from what you see, not from nature, people, or situations. All we see is what we’re shown and what we’ve experience and imagination enough to decipher.

But God’s plan is so much bigger than our own.

So hold onto your hopes and dreams, but let them breathe and grow.

Let them continue to become.

Writing with my Students

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I have tons of these little pictures that I printed from a website, laminated, and cut up. They’re of all kinds of things: people, famous and not; animals; objects; places.

I asked students to pick one that appealed to them. First, they described it. Then, they responded to it creatively by telling the story behind the picture or writing a poem about what’s happening or writing from the point of view of one of the people, animals, or objects in the picture.

Afterward, I let them share with each other what they’d written.

This was mine.

Sunshower

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Strange weather today. Chilly and windy with bright sun, fabulously fluffy clouds, and spotty stormy blurs.

Down the road a bit, we ran through about five minutes of sideways rain with the sun still bright as can be. People used to say that meant the Devil was beating his wife. I wonder where that came from. (Hold on; I’ll go check.)

Well, according to Wikipedia, it’s a Southern thing, although in Tennessee, they say, “The Devil’s kissing his wife.” Hmm…

There are a lot of other devil references that go along with this “sunshower” phenomenon.

And just the word, “sunshower.” Wow. I don’t think I’d ever really heard it before. It’s blowing me away. SUNSHOWER. It’s my new favorite!!

p.s. One of my favorite singers, Chris Cornell, has a song called “Sunshower”: