Smart

My dad gave me a dollar
`Cause I’m his smartest son
And I swapped it for two shiny quarters
`Cause two is more than one!

And then I took the quarters
And traded them to Lou
For three dimes — I guess he don’t know
That three is more than two!

Just then, along came old blind Bates
And just ‘cause he can’t see
He gave me four nickels for my three dimes,
And four is more than three!

And I took the nickels to Hiram Coombs
Down at the feed-seed store,
And the fool gave me five pennies for them,
And five is more than four!

And then I went and showed my dad,
And he got red in the cheeks
And closed his eyes and shook his head
Too proud of me to speak!

Birds in a Cage

While walking in the woods, a girl found two songbirds on the ground. The nest had fallen off the branch and the mother was no where to be found. The girl decided to take them home. She nurtured the birds in a small cage with love until they grew bigger and stronger each day. Every morning they greeted her with beautiful songs that were sung together in harmony. The girl felt great love for the birds. She wanted their singing to last forever.

One day, the cage door was accidentally left open. One of the birds flew out from the cage towards the window. The girl rushed outside and watched anxiously as it circled high above the sky. But it was too late, the bird was gone. She became more cautious this time around with the other songbird she had left. So she began tying one of its leg to the rail with a tiny thread, to prevent it from escaping. 

The next morning, the girl woke up to a bird that sang the sweetest melody she had ever heard. It was the same songbird that had flown away yesterday. Suddenly the bird flew closer to the tree near the window and landed softly on its nest that he built himself. The bird never forgot about her. It was here to stay and sing to her every morning.

Then she noticed the other bird teetering on the edge of the cage. She finally realized the bird’s great need for freedom. Their need to soar into the clear, blue sky. She lifted him from the cage and tossed him softly into the air. The bird circled freely several times. The girl watched delightfully at the bird’s enjoyment. Her heart was no longer concerned with her loss. She just wanted the birds to be happy because she loved them.

The fastest way to lose someone is being too possessive. The tighter you clench, the more likely you are to push them away. They need freedom to live their life and pursue in whatever makes them happy. When love flows with freedom, there is beauty. True love will never leave you. If it’s meant to be, it will always come back.

The Waitress

In the days when an ice cream sundae costed much less, a 10 year old boy entered a fancy coffee shop and sat at a table. A waitress put a glass of water in front of him.

“How much is an ice cream sundae?” asked the boy.
“Fifty cents,” replied the waitress.

The little boy pulled his hand out of his pocket and studied the number of coins he had.

“How much is a dish of plain ice cream?” he inquired. Some people were now waiting for a table and the waitress grew a bit impatient.

“Thirty-five cents,” she said brusquely. The little boy again counted the coins.
“I’ll have the plain ice cream,” he said. The waitress brought the ice cream, placed the bill on the table and frustratedly walked away.

As the boy finished the ice cream, he paid the cashier and departed. When the waitress came back, she began wiping down the table and then was surprised at what she saw. There, placed neatly beside the empty dish, were fifteen cents - her tip.

The boy could have bought himself an ice cream sundae with the total amount he had. But instead, bought the plain ice cream and was very considerate enough to leave the rest as tip. The waitress then realized her attitude was discouraging in contrast to the boy. Age does not really define your level of maturity.

The Tree

Long ago, there was a man who had four sons. He wanted each son to learn not to judge things too quickly. So he sent each of them on a quest. They must observe a tree at a valley far away from home. The father sent the first son during the Winter, the second son during the Spring, the third son during the Summer, and the youngest son during the Fall. 

When they had all gone and come back, he called them together to describe what they had seen. The first son said that the tree was ugly, bent, and twisted. The second son said it was covered with green buds and full of moss. The third son said he saw more than that. The tree was overlaid with blossoms that smelled very sweet and the flowers had grown beautifully. The last son disagreed with all of them. He said the tree had a barren of brownish wispy leaves that easily descended from the branch to the ground. There were hardly any green vegetation.

The man then explained to his sons that they were all right. But the truth of the matter is they’ve each seen only one season in the tree’s life. He told them that you cannot judge a tree by only one given time period. A first impression is not good enough. The same concept goes for humans as well. The essence of who they are can only be measured by spending a substantial amount of time enough to extract the qualities of people at their worst, and at their best. Don’t judge life by just one difficult season.

The Echo

A young toddler and his father were walking up the mountains. Suddenly, his son falls and hurts himself. “Owww!!!” he screamed. To his surprise, he hears the voice repeating somewhere out in the mountain, “Owww!!!”

Curious, he yells: “Who are you?”
He receives the answer: “Who are you?”
Then he screams to the mountain: “I hate you!”
The voice answers: “I hate you!”
Angered at the response, he screams: “Stupid!”
He receives the same answer: “Stupid!”

He looks to his father and asks: “What’s going on?”
The father smiles and says: “Son, pay attention.”
The man screams: “You are awesome!”
The voice answers: “You are awesome!”
The boy was surprised, but still doesn’t understand.

Then the father explains, “People call this an echo, but really this is what I call life. It gives you back everything you say or do. Our life is simply a reflection of our actions. If you want more love in the world, create more love in your heart. If you want more respect, you must show respect first and be open minded. This relationship applies to everything, in all aspects of life. Life will give you back everything you have given to it.”

The Butterfly

A man found a cocoon of a butterfly. One day a small opening appeared. He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could, and it could go no further.

So the man decided to help the butterfly. He took a pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the cocoon. The butterfly then emerged easily. But it had a swollen body and small, shriveled wings. The man continued to watch the butterfly because he expected that, at any moment, the wings would enlarge and expand to be able to support the body, which would contract in time. Neither happened. 

In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around with a swollen body and shriveled wings. It never was able to fly. Naturally, a mature butterfly emerges after about two pupal weeks and hangs from the split chrysalis for several hours until its wings are dry. 

What the man, in his kindness and haste, did not understand was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly to get through the tiny opening were nature’s way of forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly into its wings until they become full and stiff. Then it would be ready for flight once it achieved its freedom from the cocoon.

The moral of the story is that sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our lives. We need to let people learn on their own instead helping them too much. If God allowed us to go through our lives without any obstacles, it would cripple us. We wouldn’t be as strong as we could have been. We would never be able to fly.

The Brick

A young and very successful executive named Josh was traveling down a Chicago neighborhood street. He was driving a bit too fast in his sleek black Jaguar, which was only two months old.

As his car passed, a brick sailed out and smashed into the Jaguar’s shiny black side door. The brakes screeched as he madly spun the car back to the spot where the brick had been thrown. Josh jumped out of the car, grabbed the kid and pushed him up against a parked car. He shouted at the kid, “What the hell was that all about!” Building up a head of steam, he went on. “That’s my new Jag dammit! That brick you threw is gonna cost you a lot of money little punk!”

“Please, mister, please… I’m sorry! I didn’t know what else to do!” Pleaded the youngster. “I threw the brick because no one else would stop!” Tears were dripping down the boy’s chin as he pointed around the parked car. “It’s my brother, mister,” he said. “He rolled off the curb and fell out of his wheelchair and I can’t lift him up.” Sobbing, the boy asked the executive, “Would you please help me get him back into his wheelchair? He’s hurt and he’s too heavy for me.”

Moved beyond words, the young executive tried to recover from his temper. Straining, he lifted the brother back onto the wheelchair and took out his handkerchief to wipe the scrapes and cuts, making sure everything is going to be okay. 

“Thank you so much mister! I’m terribly sorry for the damage I’ve done to your car. I don’t know how I could ever repay you!” said the boy. Josh let out a sigh of relief, “It’s alright. You don’t have to pay for the damage of my car. Just be careful next time okay? And make sure you look out for your brother more often.” He then watched the younger brother push him down the sidewalk toward their home. 

Josh never did fix the side door of his Jaguar. He kept the dent as a reminder, not to go through life so fast and shallow. Life does not revolve around materialistic things. Saving a life is far more important and valuable than pampering our luxuries of desire.

The Fisherman & The Businessman

There was once a businessman who was sitting by the beach in a small Brazilian village. As he sat down, he saw a fisherman rowing a small boat towards the shore having caught quite a few big fishes.

The businessman was impressed and asked the fisherman, “How long does it take you to catch so many fish?”
The fisherman replied, “Oh, just a short while.”
“Then why don’t you stay longer at sea and catch even more?” The businessman was astonished.
“This is enough to feed my whole family,” the fisherman said.
The businessman then asked, “So, what do you do for the rest of the day?”
The fisherman replied, “Well, I usually wake up early in the morning, go out to sea and catch a few fish, then go back and play with my kids. In the afternoon, I take a nap with my wife, and when evening comes, I join my buddies in the village for a drink — we play guitar, sing and dance throughout the night.”

The businessman offered a suggestion to the fisherman.
“I am a PhD in business management. I could help you to become a more successful person. From now on, you should spend more time at sea and try to catch as many fish as possible. When you have saved enough money, you could buy a bigger boat and catch even more fish. Soon you will be able to afford to buy more boats, set up your own company, your own production plant for canned foods and distribution network. By then, you will have moved out of this village to Sao Paulo, where you can set up headquarters to manage your other branches.”

The fisherman asks, “And after that?”
The businessman laughs heartily, “After that, you can live like a King in your own house, and when the time is right, you can go public and float your shares in the Stock Exchange, and you will be rich.”
The fisherman continues, “And after that?”
The businessman says, “After that, you can do whatever you want! Do anything that makes you happy. You can finally retire, you can move to a house by the fishing village, wake up early in the morning, catch a few fish, then return home to play with kids, have a nice afternoon nap with your wife, and when evening comes, you can join your buddies for a drink, play the guitar, sing and dance throughout the night!” 

 The fisherman was puzzled, “Isn’t that what I am doing now?”

The Elephant

As my friend was passing the elephants, he suddenly stopped, confused by the fact that these huge creatures were being held by only a small rope tied to their legs. It was obvious that the elephants could, at anytime, break away from the ropes they were tied to but for some reason, they did not. My friend saw the trainer nearby and asked why these beautiful, magnificent animals just stayed there and made no attempt to get away.

“Well,” he said, “when they are very young and much smaller we used the same size rope to tie them and at that age, it’s enough to hold them. As they grow up, they are conditioned to believe they cannot break away. They believe the roof can still hold them, so they never try to break free.” My friend was amazed. These animals can at any time break free from their bonds but because they believe they couldn’t, they were stuck right where they were.

It’s all about the mindset. Like the elephants, how many of us go through life holding onto a belief that we cannot do something, simply because we failed at it once before? How many of us refused to attempt something new and challenging because we underestimate our potential and abilities. Choose not to accept the limitations created by the past.