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Coming Together to Love, Heal & Empower

Inspiring Stories of Love, Healing, & Empowerment

Inspirations

February 2002
Issue Number 4

Welcome to Inspirations! Global Community For All sends out this e-zine filled with short, inspiring stories of love, healing, and empowerment once every three months. We share these wonderfully inspiring stories to encourage and inspire each other to be the best we can be each day of our lives. Thanks for joining us, and may these words inspire us to ever deepen our commitment to love, heal, and empower; to open to divine guidance; and to choose what's best for all.


THE GOLD WRAPPING PAPER -
Author unknown

Once upon a time, a man punished his 5-year-old daughter for using up the family's only roll of expensive gold wrapping paper. Money was tight and he became even more upset when on Christmas Eve, he saw that the child had pasted the gold paper so as to decorate a shoebox to put under the Christmas tree.

Nevertheless, the next morning the little girl, filled with excitement, brought the gift box to her father and said, "This is for you, Daddy!" As he opened the box, the father was embarrassed by his earlier overreaction. But when he opened it, he found it was empty and again his anger flared. "Don't you know, young lady," he said harshly, "when you give someone a present there's supposed to be something inside the package!"

The little girl looked up at him with tears rolling from her eyes and said: "Daddy, it's not empty. I blew kisses into it until it was all full."

The father was crushed. He fell on his knees and put his arms around his precious little girl. He begged her to forgive him for his unnecessary anger.

An accident took the life of the child only a short time later and it is told that the father kept that little gold box by his bed for all the years of his life. And whenever he was discouraged or faced difficult problems he would open the box, take out an imaginary kiss, and remember the love of this beautiful child who had put it there.

In a very real sense, each of us as human beings have been given an invisible golden box filled with unconditional love and kisses from our children, family, friends and God.

There is no more precious possession anyone could hold.


A Year of Going Inward Yields Extraordinary Results

Fred Burks


1995 was a very special year for me. Early in the year I realized that I was tired of always being so busy, busy, busy and never having time to myself. My schedule was always packed to the max and had been that way for years. So instead of continually complaining about it, I finally decided to do something about it. I declared the year 1995 to be my year of going inward.

To make sure I succeeded, I made a promise to myself to say no to all invitations unless they were truly important. Within a week or two, I found myself actually having some free time! It wasn't easy telling so many people no. Yet when I told them the reason, they generally understood–particularly as many of them were overly busy, just as I had been.

With all of this wonderfully refreshing free time on my hands, I found myself coming up with all sorts of wonderful ideas on how to use the time to enhance going inward. I realized that I had been packing my appointment calendar full of dates with friends, but never made a date with myself. So first, I took my appointment book and set aside one evening each week just for me to do whatever my heart desired on my own. Later, I set aside an evening each week to spend totally in silence in my room. In that time of silence, I lit candles, played beautiful music, and spent at least two hours contemplating, meditating, praying, and finding other ways to open as fully as I could to my own heart and my connection with God and the realm of Spirit.

Those evenings of silence turned out to be powerful ways of quieting myself, and especially of quieting the incessant thinking that too often dominated my mind. I got so much out of these times of silence that I soon set aside one day each month to spend in complete silence, often fasting to add to the depth. Wow!!! Those were powerful days of getting in touch deeply with who I am, where I'm going, my spiritual connection with all around me, and lots more!

I also did an incredibly powerful Vision Quest–three days of silence and fasting in nature. I experienced many little miracles and inspirations in those three days, like finding my first Indian arrowhead right in the middle of my prayer circle! I also had a powerful vision of all good people of all religions being able to unite in sincere prayer for whatever is truly best for all of us. To this day, I continue to do an evening of silence every week and a day of silence at least once every two months as I find them so powerful in keeping me focused and centered in my life.

I also decided to go back and read through all the journals and diaries in which I had been writing fairly consistently for 24 years (since age 13). I had all my photos and slides from over the years, too, to add color to all I was reading. What an amazing experience, over the course of the year, to relive in so much depth so many parts of my life–all the incredible joys and peak experiences along with the occasional pain and suffering!

When I finished reading the diaries at the end of the year, I was amazed and inspired by all that I had experienced. At the same time, the nostalgia I had always felt toward my rich late teen years disappeared. I still had the wonderful memories of rich times spent with the amazingly loving, supportive group I was involved in then, but I no longer felt I always wished I could go back to that time. I felt very full and complete in the present and ready to create new and even more inspiring experiences in the present! So refreshing!!!

I also took out my tape recorder and had a great time filling two hours of tape with all the inspiring and difficult events of my life on tape. What a fun experience and great thing to have! And most importantly, as a result of this year, I was able to let go of my busyness and open fully to meaningful connection with the divine and with deep, powerful parts of myself which were more than happy to come out to teach me, guide me, and fill me with inspiration.

This extraordinary year of going inward set the stage for more incredible breakthroughs in several areas of my life as I moved back outward in the following year. I am so thankful for the inspiration which led me to choose to do this year filled with depth and Spirit. For anyone who has not experienced something like this, I would highly recommend finding a way to make going inward a significant part of your life for some period of time. Who knows what inspirations you might find yourself opening to! Thanks for sharing in this extraordinary experience with me. I wish you lots of love and support in your continued journey through life. With love and best wishes, Fred

Thanks for sharing in these inspiring stories with us. We wish you lots of inspiration and all the very best in the coming month.


Explore the mind and heart expanding websites managed by the nonprofit PEERS network:
www.peerservice.org - PEERS websites: Spreading inspiration, education, & empowerment
www.momentoflove.org - Every person in the world has a heart
www.personalgrowthcourses.net - Dynamic online courses powerfully expand your horizons
www.WantToKnow.info - Reliable, verifiable information on major cover-ups
www.weboflove.org - Strengthening the Web of Love that interconnects us all

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