Rudyard Kipling

Rudyard Kipling 1865 -1936

Yesterday I heard some very disturbing information at work. Disbelief would be the only way to describe it. It is at times like this that I am grateful that I learned how to knit as a child. The repetitive movement of the knitting needles seem to soothe the hurt and allow me to think things over in a calmer state of mind.

Life is not easy and no matter how old we get, we continue to be amazed at the ignorance of human nature and their need for power and control. It takes a weak man to use his ego to bring down others, especially a female who goes against the control.

Ahhh such is life and there has to be reasons for it. The lesson here is to remain calm, remain solid when attacked with untruths and live through it with kindness and the knowledge that they are to be more pitied than to waste your anger on them. This too shall come to pass as my Mom used to say.

Please read this poem which is hanging on the wall here in my office written by Rudyard Kipling. On days like today, I read it to remind myself how I have lived though so many events in my life and today the words are very fitting.......

IF.....
IF you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,

Or being hated, don't give way to hating,

And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream and not make dreams your master;

If you can think and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,

And stoop and build 'em up with worn out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: 'Hold on!'
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,'

Or walk with Kings nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it

And which is more you'll be a Man, my son!