Neither in Webster  nor Oxford........what do you think?

 

Wonderful Definitions

School:
A place where parents pay and children play

Life Insurance:
A contract that keeps you poor all your life
so that you can die rich.

Nurse:
A person who wakes you up to give you sleeping pills.

Marriage:
It's an agreement in which a man loses his bachelor
degree and a woman gains her masters..

Divorce:
Future tense of Marriage.

Tears:
The hydraulic force by which masculine willpower is
defeated by feminine waterpower.

Lecture:
An art of transferring information from the notes of the
Lecturer to the notes of the students without passing through "the minds of either"

Conference:
The confusion of one man multiplied by the number present.

Compromise:
The art of dividing a cake in such a way that everybody
believes he got the biggest piece.

Dictionary:
A place where success comes before work.

Conference Room:
A place where everybody talks, nobody listens and everybody disagrees later on.

Father:
A banker provided by nature.

Criminal:
A person no different from the rest
....except that he/she got caught.

Boss:
Someone who is early when you are late and  late when you are early.

Politician:
One who shakes your hand before elections and
your Confidence after.

Doctor:
A person who cures your ills by pills, and kills you by
bills.

Classic Books:

Books which people praise, but do not read.

Smile:
A curve that can set a lot of things straight.

Office:
A place where you can relax after your strenuous home life...

Yawn:
The only time some married men ever get to open their
mouth.

Etc.:
A sign to make others believe that you know more than you actually do.

Committee:
Individuals who can do nothing individually and sit to
decide that nothing can be done together.

Experience:
The name men give to their mistakes.

Atom Bomb:
An invention to end all inventions..

Philosopher:
A fool who torments himself during life, to be wise.   

Precious Time

With a timid voice and idolizing eyes, the little boy greeted his father as he returned from work,"Daddy, how much do you make an hour?"

Greatly surprised, but giving his boy a glaring look, the father said,
"Look, son, not even your mother knows that. Don't bother me now, I'm tired."

"But Daddy, just tell me please! How much do you make an hour, " the boy insisted.

The father, finally giving up, replied: "Twenty dollars per hour."

"Okay, Daddy? Could you loan me ten dollars?" the boy asked.

Showing his restlessness and positively disturbed, the father yelled, "So that was the reason you asked how much I earn, right? Go to sleep and don't bother me anymore!"

It was already dark and the father was meditating on what he said and was feeling guilty? Maybe he thought, his son wanted to buy something.

Finally, trying to ease his mind, the father went to his son's room.
"Are you asleep, son?" asked the father.

"No, Daddy. Why?" replied the boy, partially asleep.

"Here's the money you asked for earlier," the father said.

"Thanks, Daddy!" rejoiced the son, while putting his hand under his pillow and removing some money. "Now I have enough!! Now I have twenty dollars!" the boy said to his father, who was gazing at his son, confused at what his son had just said.

"Daddy, could you sell me one hour of your time?"

Time is too precious to spend it all on work!
Appreciate your love ones and don't take them for granted.

--- Submitted by Gary Lee --- Maryland  

THE BIG FADE…

I'm lost
Like a TV show that doesn't make sense
Unless you watch it from the beginning

I'm lost…
But I'm always gonna try
And I have no need to lie
Being who I am
Is something that I can't deny

I look up to the sky
And sometimes I wonder why
But I know I have to make
A better past before I die

Sometimes I say too much
Sometimes I don't make sense
If I get too drunk and rowdy
Then I might get too intense

I see the path
But through a blur
And sometimes I don't feel sure
I can shake it off for now

But how much more can I endure
I do the best I can
I try to do the right thing

I'm a poet,
I'm a writer
And I wish that I could sing

Sometimes I'm found
Sometimes turn it around
But beat myself into the ground
If I can't make the right sound

You look to be specific
And measure bullshit by the pound
If you don't try to be prolific
Then you might end up profound… ;

Breaking the Habit of Negative Thinking

One behavioral symptom of stress is negative thinking or self-talk, which usually contains self-defeating or self-diminishing statements. For example, "I just know I'm going to fail." or "Things just never work out right for me." or "I always get the short end of the stick."

I've noticed that negative self-chatter is pervasive with many people. One example comes from a conversation I had a while back with a desperate woman who somehow found my phone number. Negativity and depressive beliefs dripped from her lips. No matter what I said, she insisted that she had nothing to be happy about and that her heart had closed. I tried to help her see that as long as she looked only at what was wrong with herself and her life, she would continue to find more things wrong, and that she could not get to happiness from where she now stood. But she kept interrupting me to share more problems.

Amazingly, this woman also told me how happy and successful she used to be, but she had lost it all. It was clear to me that she had allowed the conditions and circumstances of her life to determine her level of happiness. As long as things went well, she was happy. But as soon as circumstances changed, she lost her happiness. Yet try as I might, I couldn't help her break through her wall of self-defeating talk.

After thirty minutes of trying to help her remember something - anything - that would bring her a feeling of hope or happiness, I began feeling hopeless myself when I was suddenly inspired to say, "This may be a little thing, but when you hear a bird sing, does it bring you joy?"

Her response was immediate: "That's not a small thing to me. I love to hear birds sing."

"And hearing the laughter of a child playing?" I countered. I could almost hear the rush of relief (mine or hers?) that broke forth as she shifted her perception.

For the first time in our conversation she stopped insisting that she had nothing to be happy about. In her silence I could tell that my message had finally penetrated her resistance. I've found that negative thinking derives from beliefs about ourselves that were formulated long ago - about who we think we are and what we're capable of doing.

In our early years, many of us had parents who didn't know how to be loving, nurturing or supportive, so we learned from them how to criticize and judge ourselves. As a result, we often treat ourselves exactly as we were treated as children, scolding ourselves for being afraid or for making a mistake and often taking on a distorted view of how things are without ever questioning its validity.

But the past is ancient history, gone, dead and buried (at least if you allow it to be), and now it's time to treat yourself exactly as you've always wanted to be treated. When you catch yourself beating yourself up, remind yourself to be gentle and loving. After all, if you aren't that way with yourself, how do you expect others to be that way with you?

--- Carol James --- Submitted by Lauren C. --- New Jersey