My Virtual Reading Room

"Most of us think of ourselves as standing wearily and helplessly at the center of a circle bristling with tasks, burdens, problems, annoyances, and responsibilities which are rushing in upon us.  At every moment we have a dozen different things to do, a dozen problems to solve, a dozen strains to endure.  We see ourselves as overdriven, overburdened, overtired.

This is a common mental picture--and it is totally false.  No one of us, however crowded his life, has such an existence.

What is the true picture of your life?  Imagine that there is an hourglass on your desk.  Connecting the bowl at the top with the bowl at the bottom is a tube so thin that only one grain of sand can pass through it at a time.

That is the true picture of your life, even on a super-busy day.  The crowded hours come to you always one moment at a time.  That is the only way they can come. The day may bring many tasks, many problems, strains, but invariably they come in single file.

You want to get emotional poise?  Remember the hourglass, the grains of sand dropping one by one...."

(Dr. James Gordon Gilkey)