Be a Strong Woman: Carnegie's Book of Spiritual Growth for Women

Chapter 29 Gratitude and Cherishing Blessings, Living Gently with the World (1)
High knowledge is far less important than a small moral character.

cherish everything

Gratitude is the highest state of happiness.Women tend to have less happiness than men because they are more greedy than men.Women can obtain short-term happiness through specific things, but after a while they go to pursue other things.As long as a man reaches the established goal, he can be satisfied for a while.In fact, to be happy, you must first know how to be grateful. Only when you are satisfied with what you have and cherish what you have can you truly feel happy.

In fact, there are not many things in life that belong to you forever.Many things will gradually drift away in our life journey until they disappear.For example, youth, fame and fortune, years, wealth... just disappear quietly without our knowing it.When we look back, we can't even find the trace, as if it never appeared in our life.Therefore, many things are not worth pursuing desperately.

In life, as long as a woman has a love in her heart, many things can make people satisfied.For example, the family sits around the dining table and eats delicious meals; while doing housework, they watch their husband and children play together; in their spare time, they sit in their own little world to read, write, and answer questions that their children can’t stop asking; Strolling on the path full of moonlight with your husband and children, smelling the faint fragrance of flowers, listening to the low singing of insects... all these can make you immersed in happiness.

Be a woman who is grateful and cherishes blessings, and does not pursue a life of great wealth and wealth.Have a job and a family to live in harmony, and spend every day with peace of mind.Like most women, go to the store, buy a few sets of clothes that fit, and dress yourself neatly and brightly.Or, read the newspaper when you have nothing to do, chat with friends, and talk about the happiness and troubles in your heart.I also read novels, wandering in the real and touching plots of the novels.

Walk the road of life, always be grateful

When you were 1 year old, she nursed and bathed you and in return you cried all night;

When you were 3 years old, she lovingly cooked for you, and in return, you threw a plate of her cooking on the ground;
When you were 4 years old, she bought you colored pencils, and in return, you painted abstract paintings all over the wall;
When you were 5 years old, she bought you beautiful and expensive clothes, and in return, you played in mud puddles in them;
When you were 7 years old, she bought you a ball, and in return, you broke the glass of the neighbor's house with the ball;

When you were 9 years old, she paid you a lot of money to teach piano, and in return, you often skipped class and didn't practice;

When you were 11, she went to the movies with you and your friends, and in return, you let her sit in the other row...

When you read this, who do you think of?
As long as people are alive, they should be grateful.Gratitude is a kind of morality, a philosophy of life, and great wisdom in life.Those who know how to be grateful are often those who have the virtue of humility and awe.When dealing with people who are weaker than yourself, knowing how to bend down belongs to the former; thank God, knowing how to look up, this is the latter.Therefore, even if someone who is weaker than you gives you even a little bit of help, such a person should not despise or forget it.We say "thank you", make a phone call, send a greeting card, write a letter, pay a visit, have a dinner party, send a gift, etc., because of each other's sincerity, we will experience the relationship between people. camaraderie.

The opposite of gratitude is ingratitude.But in reality, the truly ungrateful people are a minority after all, and most people often take the help, friendship, favor and virtue given to them by others for granted, and thus ignore or forget them.The love our parents give us is often trivial but meticulous. They are always concerned about our warmth and our birthdays.But how many people remember their parents' birthday?In any case, each of us should learn to be grateful, and never forget the support and help from relatives and friends on the way of growth, and repay each other with gratitude.

Count your thousand and one blessings

There was a story in Time Magazine about a non-commissioned officer who was wounded in a certain place. He was shot in the throat by shrapnel and had seven blood transfusions.He wrote a note to the doctor asking, "Can I live?" The doctor replied, "Yes." He wrote another note asking, "Can I still talk?" The doctor answered him again: "Yes." Then he wrote another note and asked, "Then what the hell am I worrying about?" Then, why don't you immediately stop and ask yourself, "Then what the hell am I worrying about? "

At this time, you are likely to find that the things you worry about are really trivial.In fact, about 90% of the things in our lives are right and 10% are wrong.If we want to be happy, what we should do is to focus on the 90% right things and ignore the 10% wrong things.If we want to be sad, worry, or get sick, then we only need to focus on the 10% of the wrong things and ignore the 90% of the good things.

In life, we only need to count the favors we have received, and we don't have to ask for too much.Many new churches in the UK are engraved with the words "Think much" and "Be grateful", and these two words should also be engraved in our hearts.

Swift, the author of "Gulliver's Travels", once said: "The three best doctors in the world are Diet, Quiet, and Happy." You and I can get "Happy Doctor" free every hour of every day. Serve, as long as we focus on the incredible wealth we have.How much would you sell your legs for?Would you sell your eyes for $1 million?And your hearing, your two hands, your family... Add all your assets together and you'll never sell what you have now.Even if the gold owned by the three wealthiest families of Rockefeller, Ford and Morgan is added together, they will not be sold.But can we appreciate these?Unfortunately, it is difficult for us to do so.As Schopenhauer said: "We seldom think of what we have, but always of what we do not have."

Starting today, please completely delete all pessimistic and negative concepts from your mind.For everything that God has bestowed on us, we will always be grateful and cherish the beautiful life.I would like to share the following words with my dear friends:
Be diligent in thinking and learn to be grateful, and get rid of the dilemma of self-pity.Even if you have encountered thousands of setbacks, you must bravely count a thousand and one blessings.Your life will therefore enter a new realm of boundless seas and sky!

Don't forget to thank those around you

For every little thing, say thank you.

After a man gets married, he really hopes to hear his wife's thanks.If everything he does is taken for granted by his wife without thanks, there is no doubt that the husband will stop pleasing his wife.Some of us have no idea how much our husband does for us every day—we are used to him doing things for us.

A wife once thought her husband hadn't done her any favors.She thought it would be a big project for him to get a glass of water to drink.He doesn't change a child's diaper or tighten a leaky faucet.However, when he went abroad that summer, she was surprised to find that he did so many trivial things for herself every day - without saying thank you to her husband - and now she had to do those things by herself .

In the life of husband and wife, gratitude is reflected in mutual understanding and consideration.

When my husband wants to change into his slippers and take a rest, we get dressed and want to go out, which is not acceptable.A wife with deep love should first understand the needs of her husband after working outside every day, and then meet her own needs.

The wife has generously dedicated her husband's love in her life. Doesn't the husband know how to be grateful?
Your husband will definitely thank you!

Many happy husbands will say thank you words like this: "I am happier than most men because I married this girl", and any success I have achieved comes directly from the company of this lovely wife".

Yes, what's the point of being successful without love?Without love, wealth and power are waste and ashes.If your husband gets peace of mind and happiness from your deep love, then his chances of bringing you a higher standard of living are greatly increased.

Thank your husband as the greatest person in your life.There will be more and more lucky things around you.

Gratitude is the way the strong sing of life
There is a scientist who has lived in a wheelchair for more than 30 years.Someone asked him if he felt fate was unfair to him?He replied:

"My fingers can still move, and my brain can still think; I have the ideals I pursue throughout my life, and I have loved ones and relatives and friends who love me; by the way, I still have a grateful heart..."

Life is like this, if you smile at it, it will smile at you; if you cry at it, it will cry at you too.As long as you have a grateful heart, you will benefit for life.In this way, you will feel that what you have is the best, and you don't care about your gains and losses and successes or failures.In your eyes there is only joy, without sorrow and misfortune, this is the highest state that life can achieve.With a grateful heart, even where life is dying, there will be clear springs gushing out.

If instead of having one Thanksgiving every year and be done with it, we can continue to be grateful throughout the year, and that can be a powerful force in creating a better life for us.In this world, you will have more and more things to be grateful for, and fewer and fewer things you take for granted.Thank you to everyone who has helped you, to everyone around you.Be grateful to the person who hurt you, because he tempered your mentality; grateful to the person who deceived you, because he increased your knowledge; grateful to the person who whipped you, because he eliminated your inertia; grateful to the person who abandoned you, because he Teach you to be self-reliant.The more things you are grateful for, the more you will get in life.

Once, Roosevelt's home was burglarized and many things were lost.After a friend heard the news, he hurriedly wrote a letter to comfort him and advised him not to take it too seriously.

Roosevelt wrote a reply to his friend: "Dear friend, thank you for your letter to comfort me. I am safe now. Thank God, because: first, the thief stole my things and did not hurt me; second, The thief only stole some of my things, not all; thirdly, the most fortunate thing is that he was the thief, not me."

When you encounter misfortune, gratitude is not purely a kind of psychological comfort, nor is it an escape from reality; it is the way the strong sing about life, and it comes from the deepest love and hope for life.

Thanks for everything God has given us

Only those with a grateful heart can accept others, accept everything, and regard everything as a gift.If you accept and tolerate, the world will look extremely beautiful in your heart, and the bitter taste will become sweet in your mouth.You can't help yearning to visit the countryside, to fly with the butterflies, play with the fish, and sing with the birds.You can compare wealth and joy with rich people.You can proudly say to them: "The happiness that comes from goodness far exceeds the happiness that comes from money. Money belongs to you, and you can only enjoy it yourself. But goodness belongs to God, and you can give it to all beings!"

Whatever God has given us, we should accept unconditionally.The vastness of the sea is due to acceptance; the majesty of the mountains is due to acceptance.If a person cannot accept the reality, he will develop resistance, paranoia and narrowness, he will oppose the environment, and it will not be conducive to his rapid growth.

We can train "acceptance" from three aspects:
[-]. Get rid of your "rejection" mentality

If you want to change this state, you have to reshape your values, and you have to send a series of positive commands to your brain until these commands can be turned into behavioral habits.In short, if a person "refuses" for a long time, then he will close off the energy flow with the outside world, and he will become more and more isolated and more and more failed.

[-]. Get rid of the "I have" mentality

In order to have a truly accepting psychology, only by practicing the Buddhist concept of "emptiness" is the most effective.The Buddha said that all things are in flux and change, and there has never been a fixed existence.Everything is combining and forming, everything is disintegrating and splitting.Life is just a moving movie.There is nothing in the world, so why talk about this is yours and that is mine?Therefore, regardless of any unfavorable external factors, you can do "empty" concept, then you will stay away from all troubles.

[-]. Get rid of the psychology of "angle conflict"

The reason why we don't accept it is mainly because the angle of standing is different from that of the other party.There is a saying that "Looking horizontally, it becomes a ridge and a side becomes a peak, and the distance and height are different".Therefore, one angle is unacceptable, and one should immediately switch to watch and listen again.We need to have a pair of dynamic eyes.No matter how unfavorable, we can change our perspective and accept it.

Don't think about the past, live in the present

Life consists of three days, yesterday, today and tomorrow.If you cry during your busy day because of yesterday's failure or misfortune, your day will be nothing but tears.Just ask, where will your tomorrow go?

Many people cannot let go of the past.It is extremely unwise to stand in the long river of time, not to focus on the beautiful today and tomorrow, but to always be immersed in the past.Yesterday is still relevant to us, but hope cannot be born from yesterday.The miracle of life is always the theme of today.The sun is new every day, don't dwell on yesterday.Whether it was brilliant or dark yesterday, it has become history.As a page that has already been turned, why should we spend energy blaming ourselves and regretting it?Grasp today, prepare for tomorrow, not cry for yesterday.

Life cannot be peaceful forever.Sailing in the sea of ​​reality, if you give up today's route because of yesterday's storm, I am afraid that those new continents of life will never be discovered.The same is true for successful people. Looking through the legendary history of those great people, there are some wounds in almost every growth stage.So don't give up easily and don't allow yourself to get bogged down in the past.Maybe it was precious yesterday, but today it is even more expensive.

Former U.S. President Nixon has been in politics for many years. He experienced the "Watergate Incident" and resigned because of it. He was the first president in the history of the United States in the 20th century to be forced to resign.When he was over eighty years old, he encountered something that made him extremely sad-his wife left him forever.

Facing the misfortunes in his career and personal life, Nixon said with emotion: "The secret of longevity is that you can't look back, but look forward. You have to find something that allows you to live for it, otherwise it will be the end of your life." .” Because of this, he buried his head and pen after leaving office.So far, he has written nine books, seven of which are bestsellers in the world.In his view, too much reminiscence will only bring sadness to one's psychology and make the mood greatly tense.

From a psychological point of view, memory is a source of psychological stress.Of course, the taste of memories varies from person to person and from scene to scene.But when the memory hits my heart, it always has a different taste.Whether it is the glorious past or the gloomy past, memories will not be a good enjoyment. The sweet ones have faded with the passage of time, and the bitter ones will become astringent due to old accounts.Therefore, if you don't recall the unbearable past events, your mind will be much easier.

Count the happiness in your hands

A rich man and a poor man are talking about what happiness is.

The poor say: "Happiness is now."

The rich looked at the huts and shabby clothes of the poor, and said contemptuously: "How can this be called happiness? My happiness is a hundred mansions and a thousand servants."

The world is impermanent, a fire burns down the rich man's hundreds of mansions, and the servants go their separate ways.Overnight, the rich became beggars.

Just in the middle of the summer, the sweaty beggar passed by the huts of the poor, wanting to beg for saliva.The poor man brought a bowl of cool water and asked him, "What do you think is happiness now?"

(End of this chapter)