Yitzhak Perlman, the great violinist, was playing in New York. Yitzhak Perlman was crippled by polio as a young child, so the bottom part of his body doesn’t work well and he wears these very prominent leg braces and comes on in crutches, in a very painful, slow way, hauling himself across the stage. Then he sits down and, very carefully, unbuckles the leg braces and lays them down, puts down his crutches, and then picks up his violin. So, this night the audience had watched him slowly, painfully, walk across the stage; and he began to play. And, suddenly, there was a loud noise in the hall that signaled that one of his four strings on his violin had just snapped.
Month: November 2012
How many lives have I touched?
“When I was in my mid-forties, my father died. His death stopped me in my tracks and changed my life. Before he died, I was a hot-shot professor at the London Business School – teaching ambitious young men and women, publishing well-received articles, writing best-selling business books, jetting around the world, lecturing at major universities, consulting for big-name companies. I was on the edge of the big time. And, I have to admit, I was pretty pleased with myself. Continue reading
There is a place called, “beyond hope and fear”
What if, at the end of our lives, we die having watched destruction and not been able to create any good effect?
What, really, is available to us if we can’t save the world? What do we fund our work for? Where do we gain energy if we don’t believe that we’re going to be successful? How can we do our work without hope that we will succeed? Continue reading
Physical Healing, Emotional Wellbeing
What are you leaving in your wake?
I had a wonderful day, thanks in no small part to hearing George Harrison’s “Here Comes the Sun” on the radio while I ate breakfast. I walked into town relishing the sunshine, and enjoyed every minute of today. George moved his last block in 2001. Continue reading
Modern medicine has given illness care a miss
The quote below is one of the many brilliant sayings of that great brain, Sir William Osler. “One of the first duties of the physician is to educate the masses not to take medicines.” Continue reading
You are the greatest story ever told
I have great news.
You are the star of the most poignant film ever conceived. An unprecedented epic saga, it is filmed in one continuous shot, from the first-person perspective. The sets are rich with detail, the lighting always underlines the mood perfectly, the cinematography always magnificent yet unpretentious. Continue reading
you cannot lose something that you are
Give up defining yourself – to yourself or to others. Continue reading
a friend who cares
“When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. Continue reading
ONE TUSK 