The Gift of Pennies

Positive Pensées

Kathy King

The Gift of Pennies

“So don’t pass by that penny, when you’re feeling blue. It may be a penny from heaven, that an Angel has passed to you.”.

Charles Marshburn

Pennies. 

Most people overlook these small coins.

After all, what does one cent mean to anyone?

A penny can’t buy you much.

But a penny can help you in a crunch.

A penny may be the one cent that you need, to pay for a purchase of the items you need.  

A penny can help a fellow human to get the last few coins to make an otherwise impossible purchase. 

A penny may be an antiquated notion today ,but let’s think about the penny and what it was meant to convey.

Some used to ask, “A penny for your thoughts?” To inquire about  a person who looked pensive and did not have the desire to share their struggles of life.

So be like a penny each and every day.  You could contribute to their life in a small way. 

To uplift, to propel, to encourage each person to reach their full potential, their shiny penny that they are intended to be.  

A penny is rarely if ever used these days.  This is the time of digital currency.  I can’t help but confess that I get a small feeling of giddiness when I find a penny on the ground.  I always pick it up.  My mother used to tell me that when I found a random penny it meant that God was thinking about me or an Angel had passed my way.  Each time I found that penny I would look up in the sky and say a small prayer of thanks. Before life was more cashless I can remember many situations where that penny enabled me to make the purchase that I needed to make.  If we were to take that concept into human life, how can you be a penny to someone?  Recently, my husband and I attended a funeral for a woman who had a long and fulfilling life.  She gave her “pennies” to children in her area.  During the quite amazing Methodist little old lady grief fest after the funeral, my husband and I sat beside a school teacher.  As our conversation continued, he shared with us that recently he had a former student come to him and thank him.  He asked why, she said that one day she came to school for “one last time” before going home to commit suicide.  He saw that she was forlorn and took her aside to say, “I see that you are down, you are worth it, you are smart, you are a great student to me.” She shared that these simple words changed her mind about committing suicide that day.  Basically, she is alive because he took a few moments to tell her that she was deserving.  Such a small gesture, but he was a penny to her that day.  Never underestimate how much your words mean to someone else who is struggling.  Be a penny.  Give a little. Those deposits will climb over time and spill over onto others.  

The Gift of Everyday Chores

It is so important to count our blessings...  even when doing chores.

Positive Pensées

Kathy King

The Gift of Everyday Chores

“When I started counting my blessings my life turned around.”

Willie Nelson

Some look at chores as a drudgery. 

A task that you need to do to subsist daily.

The laundry, the dishes, the dusting, and general household chores. 

We complain, we whine, and wonder why we have to do it. 

While chores are redundant and a part of everyday life. 

Let us find a way to do them that does not create strife. 

While doing chores, try to make a way to count your blessings and maybe even pray.

Pray for your neighbor, your partner, or your friends. 

Dwell on all the blessings that you have been given.

Take a mundane task and make it into an exercise in thankfulness. 

In doing those chores you can bring your mind into a place of gratefulness.  

Take a task that could make you groan, turn it around and make this task a place of joy. 

Chores.  Who likes them?  I don’t think many folks would say willingly that the tasks of everyday life are a great source of joy and delight.  I have a dear friend who is always asking if she can pray for my family or myself.  I always find that question very touching.  Several years ago when my husband was having some significant health issues she shared with me that every time she brushed her teeth she prayed for him.  She brushed her teeth three times a day so those prayers were uttered three times a day.  That act really touched my heart.  Fast forward to this afternoon at my home.  There were 3 loads of laundry to fold, some dishes to be washed, the pets had shed everywhere, so there was some much needed vacuuming as well.  After drinking coffee and brooding a bit about the chores, I finally resolved to get these suckers done.  Before groaning and grunting I remember the simple but kind act of my friend saying prayers when she was doing the most mundane of tasks. With each action in our home, I tried to think of a person or situation that needed prayer.  Also during the chore time I made the mindful decision to start counting just how many blessings graced our lives.  When everything was finished, the blessings much outweighed the drudgery of the household tasks.  How many daily happenings that we look at with disdain can we turn around to actions where we pray, and we list what occasions in our life that are truly great?  In counting our blessings how can we become a blessing to others?  By passing this simple, yet effective mindset around.  Is it okay to get annoyed with chores?  Absolutely.  But to break the monotony up, why not put a meaningfully different mindset to the tasks at hand?  A spirit of thankfulness will open our eyes into a much more meaningful existence, a more purposeful mindset and a much deeper sense of meaning.  Take the mundane and make it imaginative. “Count your gains instead of your losses, Count your joys instead of your woes, Count your friends instead of your foes, Count your courage instead of your fears, Count on your health instead of your wealth, Count on God instead of yourself.”  Anonymous

The Gift of Laying Bricks

Le Mont Saint Michel

Positive Pensées

Kathy King

The Gift of Laying Bricks

“Rome wasn’t built in a day, but they were laying bricks every hour.  You don’t have to build everything you want today; just lay a brick.”

James Clear

You have heard the phrase, “Rome wasn’t built in a day”. 

But what does that phrase really convey?

This simple idiom holds a great and mighty truth. 

To build something great you have to start with this small yet important concept.

Lay the bricks to make a firm and strong foundation. 

Lay those bricks even if it is just one a day. 

Don’t make your house of straw or sticks. 

These structures can fall easily to the rain and wind. 

The vermin can come in at will along with the creepy crawly things. 

But the brick is stable, bonded together and will stand even under the most dire of circumstances. 

Lay those bricks!  One by one.  Become a strong structure even if it is one by one.  

Do you ever have a day where you just do not have the energy to do much of anything but exist?  We all have them.  We do the bare minimum, our work, our sustenance almost in a robot like fashion.  You reach the end of the day and realize that you did not lay one single brick of that new skill you wanted to learn, or that book you wanted to read, or even the person you need to check on.  While yes, some days that is perfectly ok.  But if we are as humans truly pursuing a better view, a more positive action then we must start to lay bricks.  Do you dear readers recall the childhood fairy tail of Three Little Pigs?  The first pig built his home out of straw, when the wolf came he huffed and puffed and blew his house down.  The second pig built his house of sticks and once again the wolf huffed and puffed and blew his house down.  When our fated pigs found themselves in the third house, it was built with bricks.  The wolf was not able to blow down the firm foundation of the bricks.  Such a simple story but what lessons can be drawn from this age old tale?  When you build the structure of your life from something as simple as straw, what will happen when your big bad wolf of life comes through and tries to blow your house down?  You will crumple from the stress, the wind, the force of that blow.  The same was true of the house built of sticks.  While they are a little bit more stable than the hay that blows in the wind we certainly could not classify a home built of this material as stable and safe, right?  The rain comes through the cracks, I would imagine you would never quite feel warm enough on a cold winter night and then of course, there are the bugs and spiders that can come right in!  No thanks.  The straw is a shortcut, it temporarily covers up from the elements in a pinch but in life we can’t build a life of straw.  We need to lay those bricks.  Why is brick so strong?  Bricks are strong because the clay is fired at extremely high temperatures, the clay fuses together to form a super strong bond that makes clay bricks like metamorphic rocks.  Clay bricks are stronger than concrete if you can believe it!  The Great Wall of China has been standing for about two thousand years and guess what the structure mainly contains?  Four billion bricks.  My husband constantly uses the phrase, “Take the long view, look ahead.  What kind of foundation are you building?” Take a moment, look ahead and instead of using straw or sticks have the patience to lay a little brick into your life.  There is a castle in France that is called Le Mont-Saint-Michel, it is located on an island outside of Normandy, France.  This spectacularly built castle was built during the one hundred years war long ago.  This castle has not fallen once during its historical stint on the planet Earth.  Do you know why?  The castle is so well built that when low tide is in residence the water recedes but the walk to the castle is fraught with wet sand.  Walking through wet sand as we all know is quite hard.  By the time that you get perhaps half way there the tide comes in and surrounds the castle.  This castle built of brick makes a land invasion almost impossible and a naval blockade not even a concept.  History has shown us that a firm foundation is key to standing even through tough times.  I will leave you with this little story, our daughter really wanted to be on the rifle team at school from the time she was about the age of fourteen.  The sport is very safety conscious, certain rules have to be followed and a strict behavior of decorum has to be used at all times.  Our daughter is about 5’4 and tiny.  At first when she started to shoot the unwieldy air rifle caused her to fall backwards from the intensity of the air that was expelled when shooting the rifle.  The other seasoned team members laughed at her and said she was just too small to be on the rifle team.  She showed up every day after school for practice and practiced breath control and core control.  She layed those bricks of discipline each and every day.  Pretty soon she was the best marksman on the team.  She won competitions and eventually became the rifle team commander. She ended up competing and doing very well on the national level because of her sheer will to build that strong foundation of hard work.  We all make this trip around this planet once. Let us do what Eleanor Roosevelt’s words conveyed: “The purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for a newer and richer experience.”  Lay those bricks one at a time.  Find your bricks so that when times get hard you won’t fall over.  

Source:wonderpolis.com

Architectureofcities.com

The Gift of Brimming

We absolutely love a proper cup of tea at our house.  LOVE.  My favourite is a Builder's Tea from England.  It is brimming with English goodness. 

Positive Pensées

Kathy King

The Gift of Brimming

“Be that person that roots for others.  Who tells a stranger they look amazing and encourages others to believe in themselves and their dreams” 

Star Child Collective.

What are you brimming with?  Is it love, joy, and generosity?

Is it malice, hurt, anger and animosity?

When you wake up and greet each day are you brimming with anticipation for a brand new day?

Are you brimming with a desire smile, a gesture that someone may need to see?

What are you feeding your soul from day to day?

Are you spending time meditating in a positive way?

Are you reading and watching inspiring or calamitous things?

What you put in your spirit will directly convey what you are brimming with in each and every way.

What are you brimming with? Is it warmth on a cold day? Is it a refreshing breeze on a hot summer’s day?

What are you brimming with?  Ask yourself each day.  The gift of brimming can be a delight for both you and a stranger by making the day more bright. 

Be full, be brimming, be chocked-full of love so the brimming can spill over into another person’s cup.

The dictionary defines brimming as: fill something completely until it overflows. To be full of a particular quality, feeling, etc. As I was watching one of my guilty pleasures recently, I got to thinking about the concept of brimming. This little scenario came to mind: puppies! Most folks love them right?  I know not everyone likes animals, but watching cute puppy videos is just wonderful.  There is a particular set of pups that I quite enjoy on Youtube.  I get so excited when their owner releases new videos!  One particular video was so cute I wanted to comment on the post. Generally speaking, I am not a commenter on videos. I just hit a thumbs up and move on.  When I opened up the comments section I was floored at all the negative sentiments. “You are a terrible owner.”  “You are fat and ugly.”  “Your dogs are so stupid.”  All the cute doggies were playing in the water! I then went to her other videos to see the comments.  There was more of the same.  There is one channel that has at the beginning, “Please angry typists, save yourself the time.  If you are ugly, your comments will be deleted and you will be blocked.”  Why is that necessary for puppy videos?  One answer.  Folks are filling their cups to the top with noisome and ugly ideas.  Ideas that keep producing the desired result. It is an odious, unlovely echo chamber of hate. Sure, there are trolls everywhere but some of these folks are real.  One of my favorite scriptures in the Bible talks about dwelling on things that are true, honest, just, pure, of good report, if there be any virtue or praise, center your mind on them and implant them in your heart. Or, in the pretty succinct words of Clint Eastwood: “What you put into life is what you get out of it.” Let us be brimming with goodwill, complement the stranger.  Offer a smile or a kind word to someone who looks like they need it. I know, in some instances it can be quite hard but it is worth a try.  Tell someone to have a wonderful day sincerely.  Lift someone up on a social media post. Let us start an attitude of Positively brimming goodness to others.  

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The Gift of Butter

There is nothing like a piece of homemade buttered bread. 

Positive Pensées

Kathy King

The Gift of Butter

“With enough butter anything is good.”

Julia Child

Butter is one of life’s great blessings, some would say. 

You spread it on toast or bake cookies and it really tastes so very great. 

Butter is special you see because even if it melts it can cool and be reshaped with ease. 

How can you be smooth like butter each and every day?

Well, that is for you to say. 

If your day is really awful just pause and think, this too shall pass, I can cool and reshape the next day. 

If someone else is suffering, be butter to them.  

Spread on the joy when their mirth is quite thin. 

Butter is so versatile you can eat it just on toast.

Or you can take butter and bake a cake that is quite delicious and moist. 

Think about all the various ways butter can be used. 

Find your butter, spread it all around and change and bless your current point of view. 

You’ve heard that phrase, “Smooth like butter” I am sure, but what does it really mean? Some would say it means to be a smooth talker or someone who likes to schmooze to get their way.  Yesterday it occurred to me that we can take that phrase and change it for the better.  Every single day we make toast at our house, it is something that my mother started when I was little.  I am sure in some way it is supported by her very humble upbringing during the 40’s.  Money was tight, her mother would make bread and the kids would make butter for the family to consume during the week.  Some may disagree but there really is nothing better than a nice piece of toasted bread with butter.  The butter melts and invades the little porous parts of the bread making for a taste bud delight.  If butter can do something like that for just a single piece of toast just think about what a life lived with the purpose of butter can do?  What do I mean?  If someone is having a bad day or a bad experience.  Spread a little butter on the situation.  If you are having a challenging day or experience remember yes, butter can melt but it can also cool and be reshaped.  Recently I read that a particular person who is a little famous shared her morning routine with her family on a social media site.  It was a simple post that said she and her husband enjoy a cup of coffee and toast before working on their farm. It was delightful and meant to be uplifting.  The comments section however had a completely different view altogether.  The vile spewing of comments such as: “It must be nice to have coffee in the morning when other people have to actually get up and go to work.”  What the commenters did not realize is this person had decided to eschew a life of notoriety and embrace a simpler life.  This was her family's “bread and butter” now, their main source of income.  Some other comments were even more upsetting, calling her “out of touch,” “how dare you share something like this when people are suffering in the world”.  Suffice it to say, all of the commenters were not even remotely involved in her life and were just judging based on a simple picture.  Why could the commenters not just be happy that she could farm?  Or, that she could just have a simple cup of coffee?  Because dear readers, they have lost that sweet butter in their life.  To take that thought even further another common phrase that has been used over the years is referring to one’s job as their “bread and butter”.  The activity that enables them to eat, to have a place to stay, to subsist.  Humanity has lost their bread and butter.  For us to reclaim a modicum of decorum we have to very purposefully find a way to butter up our lives and the lives of others.  Find that pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.  Make that positive comment in the absolute deep ocean of negativity.  Reach across the aisle and find what brings us together, not what tears us apart.  I have said this many times since starting to write these Pensees.  We can do it one day at a time, one person at a time, and change our direction to one of edification rather than obtuseness.  Spread the butter! 

The Gift of C# Minor

The Rhine Falls in Switzerland.  The sound of the falls is like music, in varying keys.

Positive Pensées

Kathy King

The Gift of C # Minor

“Music is the universal language of mankind.”

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

C# minor.  What a key. 

It has 4 sharps that make it an interesting key.

There is C#, G#, F# and D#. 

All black keys. 

Those sharps can be a difficult key in which to play but those small changes in tonality can produce a beautiful melody. 

The bumps, the elevation of the keys are much like life for you and me. 

There are days when our melody is in the key of C.

No sharps, no flats, just a clear path on the scale from C.

Other days we encounter sharps in our life situation. 

Those sharps, those bumps can serve as a lesson.  

To grow, to learn, much like a piano lesson.

Because those sharps can help us to see that life is one Beautiful harmony.

In music there are a variety of keys that a musician can play.  The key of C is quite possibly the easiest key to play because there are no sharps or flats.  Sharps basically make the note higher by a ½ step.  A flat makes the tone or note lower by a ½ step.  As a pianist, there are times when I see a key and think, ugh.  I don’t want to play in this key.  But, is not a scale or a tone much like life?  Think about a lot of the most beautiful pieces in history.  The Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven was written in C# Minor.  Chopin, the great pianist wrote many a piece in C# minor.  He thought it was so beautiful he wrote a Waltz in C# minor.  Even Bach, who I consider to be the absolute epitome of musicality wrote a Prelude and Fugue in C# minor.  If these pioneers of classical music can take a minor key and make an absolutely gorgeous melody what can we do when we encounter a day where it just seems like everything is in C# minor?  We can weave those moments, those C# minor moments into the melody and harmony of life. If you were to look at the song of your life what would it be?  In the key of C?  I doubt many folks have led a life with no sharps or flats.  I think of Beethoven who wrote some of the greatest pieces in his life after he lost his hearing.  He wrote his 9th symphony with no real way to hear it.  That is absolutely mind boggling.  If you have never heard it the song that is the most well known was Joyful Joyful We Adore Thee.  This Symphony was more than 1 hour long!  I often think, why did Beethoven keep writing even after he could not hear those melodious tones?  I really believe he kept those sharps, those flats, those melodious key signatures in his heart and soul.  So much so that he could compose very intricate pieces that have stood the test of time. Let us take those moments, those moments of C# minor and weave it into the symphony of our life.  

The Gift of a Sunrise

My husband captures beautiful photos of the sunrise.  This is one of them.  

Positive Pensées

Kathy King

“There is a moment in every dawn when light floats, there is the possibility of magic. Creation holds its breath.” — Douglas Adams, The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

The light is simmering, it is barely there. 

The shadows begin to lighten, the trees outline the sky.

The darkness is dissipating, a new day is here. 

The sun starts with a painting that lights the sky. 

The colors are pink, blue, red, and yellow. 

A palette of a new day’s painting is here. 

What will you do with it?

How will you make this a better day?

The sunrise presents a new opportunity to paint a new painting in a new and different way.

Take in a sunrise every now and then, let that new palette sharpen your artistry, your life, your attitude.  

Make the sunrise your new and gorgeous painting that brightens each day.

After spending several days at a military base hearing tank fire (that is startling), it was nice to be home.  It was a long drive home, the traffic in our area is always completely terrible.  What should be a four hour drive turned out to be a six hour drive with accidents, volume, etc..  I was tired, I had one more day before I had to do some work.  I was looking forward to sleeping in.  One of my sons came through and asked if I could drive him to his armory for his annual training.  Of course I said yes.  I always want to help my “kids,” errr…. Adults in any way I can.  They are giving of their time to be soldiers, the least I can do is wake up at 4:30 am to drive him where he needs to be.  Well, the much anticipated sleep in was not possible.  As we left with blurry eyes and yawns we made our way to his unit.  I dropped him off, gave him hugs and told him to please be safe.  On the drive back, I saw one of the most beautiful sunrises I have seen in quite some time.  The sky was the most verdant colors of pink, blue, yellow and even some purple mixed in.  I was driving up the foothills of North Georgia, there was little to no traffic, there was mist rising from the ground around the cows.  It was the most peaceful and serene sunrise.  As I was driving I realized that this was a gift, each sunrise is a gift.  A chance to paint a new day with beautiful colors.  One of my most favorite books in the whole world is Anne of Green Gables.  One particular passage came to mind as I watched the sun rise.  “Tomorrow is fresh, with no mistakes in it.” What a powerful phrase.  Sure, we have things that we have to do, choices we have made, words we have said. But what are you doing with it today on this fresh new canvas?  You may not be a morning person.  I certainly am not.  Just once in a little while take in a sunrise.  Contemplate your painting each day.  I leave you dear readers with this quote: “Rest but never quit. Even the sun has a sinking spell each evening. But it always rises the next morning. At sunrise, every soul is born again.”

Muhammad Ali