Never Give Up!
Meme’s are not things that I normally participate in, mainly because it does not benefit my readers much, so when I get tagged, normally I will just delete the email. Yesterday I was checking out Deb_Inside, a friend of mines Blog and she had been tagged. This was a unique one, and used a interesting concept of receiving a message from a book.
The way it works is that you grab the nearest book to your computer that contains at least 123 pages, and turn to page 123. Next you find the 5th sentence and then post the next 3 sentences and see what the message reveals to you. So I thought that it would be interesting to see what I came up with, and not to mention, the message that I would receive would make for a good post anyways.
So the book that was closest to my computer was “Buddhism For Today, A Modern Interpretation of the Threefold Lotus Sutra” by Nikkyo Niwano, one of the co-founders of the Rissho Kosei Kai sect of Buddhism. (of which my whole family belongs to)
So lets see what this book has to teach us for the day!
“The following story about Purna has been handed down from old times. When Sakyyamuni Buddha permitted certain of his disciples to preach his teachings, Purna, desiring to preach in Sronaparanta, a region he knew well, asked the Buddha’s permission to do so. The Buddha said, It will be very difficult for you to do missionary work in Sronaparanta, where the people are very stubborn.
So after thinking about this for a while, “Teaching to the choir” came to mind. We have all heard the statement your preaching to the choir. Teaching to those who already believe your message in a sense is a waste of time. Sure there are always new bits and pieces we can pick up, here and there. But if you want maximum effect you have to project your message to people who have never heard it before, or put a seed into the minds of stubborn people, who are set in their ways.
Now I in no way ever advocate pushing your values off on others, in fact the reason that our World is in the situation it is in today is because of the “If you don’t believe what I believe, your going to hell” mentality, or on the extreme, “if you don’t convert to my beliefs, then I will kill you”. There has been enough of that throughout history and continuing still today.
That is the exact reason that I turned to Buddhism as a philosophy, I never once have heard a Buddhist say that you have to believe my way or Buddha will send you to a fiery pit, where you will suffer and burn forever. In fact that philosophy turned me totally away from that form of thinking. So digressing and getting back to the topic of what Purna was faced with.
Purna felt strong enough about his convictions to go into the heart of adversity to get his message across. It seems like this is a metaphor for if you truly believe in 
something and want to accomplish a given task, that you will not let a little adversity deter you from reaching your goal. In a simple statement to sum this up “Never Give Up”. The reason that most people don’t reach their goals is that the first sign of adversity, the “It’s too difficult” mindset sets in and then they give up.
“A bend in the road is not the end of the road, unless you fail to make the turn”
“If your going through hell, keep going” Winston Churchill
Bumps in the road only make us stronger, If achieving our dreams were easy, then everyone would not wish for anything. We were never told that life would be easy, but the guaranteed losers are the ones who avoid risk at all costs. The quitters are always the ones to exclaim “Why me” when negative things happen, yet when the good things happen you never hear “Why me” from their lips.
The successful are the ones who see opportunity in adversity, they are not born like this, but rather learn from trial and error. By seeing things from this perspective, life to them is a land of opportunities. Did you know that Thomas Edison failed 10,000 times before finally succeeding with the electric light. Napoleon Hill said that “Most people have attained their greatest success just one step beyond their greatest failure. Don’t wait my friends till the time is right to pursue your dreams, for if you do you will have nothing but regret lying on your deathbed. Take Care my friends!
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Comments
Hey Charles,
Did you notice I broke rule 5 of that meme and did
not tag anyone else. LOL
What I like to do for inspiration is to grab a book,
and just turn to any page, read a couple of lines.
I just did that now with the book… A Gift From Daniel
by Karen Alexander.
The line I opened to was…
“Peace be with you, and know that we are God”.
I love the Never Give Up message…
Have you ever read this one ?
It’s been an inspiration for many years in my life…
Don’t Quit
by Leo Piggoti
(1931)
When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you’re trudging seems all uphill
When the funds are low and the debts are high.
And when you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit -
Rest if you must, but don’t quit.
Life is queer with its twists and turns.
As everyone of us sometimes learns.
And many a fellow turns about
When he might have won had he stuck it out.
Don’t give up though the pace seems slow -
You may succeed with another blow.
Often the goal is nearer than
It seems to a faint and faltering man;
When he might have captured the victor’s cup;
And he learned too late when the night came down.
How close he was to the golden crown.
Success is failure turned inside out -
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems afar;
So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit -
It’s when things seem worst that you mustn’t quit.
Great post Charles, thanks for the words.
I always remember that about Thomas Edison when I’m faced with a challenge. And it is often right in my face, since you need light to do just about anything…
There was a great post on Self Made Chick yesterday, and towards the end of the comments was a link to a speech that Steve Jobs made in 2005. It is well worth watching the video:
http://www.stevejobsspeech.com/
(If for some reason this link stops working, the video is also available on YouTube.)
Steve talked about times in his life when he was faced with adversity, and how he did not give up. It is very inspiring, much like your words.