Monday 25 May 2009

Monday Morning Inspiration # 71

The 92-year-old, petite, well-poised and proud lady, who is fully dressed each morning by eight o'clock, with her hair fashionably coifed and makeup perfectly applied, even though she is legally blind, moved to a nursing home today. Her husband of 70 years recently passed away, making the move necessary.

After many hours of waiting patiently in the lobby of the nursing home, she smiled sweetly when told her room was ready. As she maneuvered her walker to the elevator, I provided a visual description of her tiny room, including the eyelet sheets that had been hung on her window. "I love it," she stated with the enthusiasm of an eight-year-old having just been presented with a new puppy.

"Mrs. Jones, you haven't seen the room .... just wait."

"That doesn't have anything to do with it," she replied. "Happiness is something you decide on ahead of time. Whether I like my room or not doesn't depend on how the furniture is arranged, it's how I arrange my mind. I already decided to love it. It's a decision I make every morning when I wake up. I have a choice; I can spend the day in bed recounting the difficulty I have with the parts of my body that no longer work, or get out of bed and be thankful for the ones that do. Each day is a gift, and as long as my eyes open I'll focus on the new day and all the happy memories I've stored away, just for this time in my life."

She went on to explain, "Old age is like a bank account, you withdraw from what you've put in. So, my advice to you would be to deposit a lot of happiness in the bank account of memories Thank you for your part in filling my Memory bank. I am still depositing."

And with a smile, she said, "Remember the five simple rules to be happy:
1. Free your heart from hatred.
2. Free your mind from worries.
3. Live simply.
4. Give more.
5. Expect less."

To read other Monday morning Inspirations click here.

9 comments:

Vasanthan said...

reading this gave me goosebumps!

Arv said...

loved it :)

and I did read it this time on a MOnday Morning... thanks to US time :)

Dhanya said...

Just love your monday morning inspirations... you post such meaningful ones!

Vinod said...

those 5 rules were simple but powerful :)keep inspiring :)

Shalini Gowrisankar said...

@Vasanthan

:) Glad you liked it ..

Shalini Gowrisankar said...

@Arv

Thanks Arv. Well, for once I actually posted it on a monday morning , not really early morning thou ' :)

Shalini Gowrisankar said...

@Dhanya

Thanks gal :) there are more such MMI s which you might have missed before you started dropping into my blog .. Do have a look at them as well when your free .

Will drop by your blog soon gal. Blame it one my exams that i don blog hop much.

Shalini Gowrisankar said...

@Vinod

Thank you so much! Life s always simple ;) except that we bring in all complications to ourselves :)

Ponnarasi Kothandaraman said...

Nice rules but very difficult to follow! :P