“Life is a daring adventure or nothing.”

I didn’t say that but it has been a guiding principle in good times and bad. That insight comes from Hellen Keller - and who to know better than she?

And one of my favorite poets, Langston Hughes, wrote: “Hold fast to dreams for if dreams go, life is a barren field frozen with snow.” In contrast, his guiding life principal was as follows: “My motto as I live and learn is dig and be dug in return.” Not sure where that fits in here thematically, but that was the whole poem, and reflects the buddhist understanding that the purpose of life is “to be happy” per the current Dalai Lama. Nowhere in these does it say that life is about putting oneself last, that the purpose of life is to make sure nobody else feels badly, to make sure everybody else is happy. No, '“Mother holds back” and the admonition never to take the last cookie for fear of spinsterhood, came from -yup, mom herself- who learned it before we did, as did her mom and hers. Lets end that here and now.

Another favorite of mine, another sort-of motto, comes from Ghandi: “Nobody can hurt me without my permission.” That says that even if it was Mom who taught me, it’s up to me to take care of myself. That leads me to the blog post: “The Art of Saying No” below.