do you really have weaknesses, or are they actually strengths?

Several years ago I heard a song that I liked. I was telling Mandy (my sig other) about it today and she had never heard it so I started searching online about it. It turned out that I was inspired by the creator of the song.

John Paul Larkin was born in 1942. He became a famous Jazz musician and the creator of a new type of music and singing. He was never extremely well known in the U.S. but in other country's he was very well known, however even in the US he had a #1 hit.

The interesting thing about John is that he was born with a severe stutter. Later in life news interviewers would say that he could hardly speak one sentence without repeating something 6-7 times. John began paying Jazz piano and was well known for his playing. He decided to add singing to his performances and got standing ovations.

In 1995 and 1996 his albums outsold Bon Jovi and Michael Jackson.

The interesting thing about this is that John could not speak without stuttering so he would "scat" sing and he was known as Scatman John.

John said of his stuttering "this was a process of "turning my biggest problem into my biggest asset."

John was diagnosed with lung cancer and died in 1999. Johns attitude toward the cancer was "Whatever God wants is fine by me... I've had the very best life. I have tasted beauty."

Something that most would say is a stumbling block made this man wealthy and famous. His perseverance and positive attitude created a chance for him to help many people in this world, which he did. He received many awards for his service.

I believe that whatever we are struggling with can be turned into a blessing with the right attitude and vision and with the help of God. After all he says that he will turn weak things into strong things.

As of today John's (Scatman John) "Ski Ba Bop Ba Dop Bop" greatest hit can be found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpHLEm9-0bg

PS. One quote from John in the song "scatman's world" he says "Scatman, fat man, black and white and brown man, tell me about the color of your soul." - I enjoy what that thought empowers.

friends

Wow,
I just got off the phone with a person that is becoming one of my favorite and best of friends.

It is reaffirmed to me that who you are around strongly affects who you become and who you are. I really really want to be around more people like her all the time. It is a desire I will create in my life.

True honest open inspiring no holds barred friendships. Ones that are more important than life events, weather, or sports, but ones that are based on eternal thoughts and principals including God, philosophy, laughter, spirit, and love.

"Our original state is Joy" Wayne Dyer

So I'm a little tired now and prob wont go into great detail on this one, but you can study it more if you want and learn some great things.

Corinthians chapter 8 has some amazing things in it.

1st is "Charity Edifieth" Edify means to improve spiritually or morally by instruction or example.

So Charity instructs you. That is quite interesting. Ponder on how a virtue such as charity can "instruct" you. What do other virtues teach, and does having and feeling the virtue teach similar to a college professor. How does this learning come about?

Now the real meat of the chapter...

talking about idol worship and eating the meat worshiped to idols. Christ explains that there is no such thing as idols so it does not hurt to eat meat worshiped to idols because in all reality its just meat. However he also basically says..

If you are weak conscience or if you believe in idols then eating the meat actually does defile you. In other words, if you believe in something false and act upon this thing, even though the thing does not exist at all you are defiled.

Again I am not going into great detail on what this means right now, other than there are some deep meanings there.

He even continues on to explain that if you do something that is not wrong, but weak people are around you and view what you do, your actions may cause them to think what you are doing is wrong, and they may be defiled by there beliefs on what you are doing. He further says that you should not do things that would make others be defiled due to their beliefs.

I also have many toughs on this. (one example, a girl in a bikini can make a man become defiled by his thoughts)

So, don't believe in sin and in evil and dont see sin or evil. Then it can have no hold on you, for all that you can see is good. This could be the summary of what I am not currently explaining the math to reach the summary.

Finally, your purpose in life

I was reading today and really enjoyed this though.

The author was talking about how many people come to him concerned in life about what there life purpose is. They loose sleep and stress over the idea of a life purpose. He tells them that......

Your life purpose is exactly what you are doing right now at this moment. If you are reading this blog then your life purpose is to read the blog. If you are thinking about or desiring or wanting to do something else then you are not focused on your purpose, and you are not truly happy and aware.

The idea is not that you read blogs the rest of your life. The idea is that what ever you are doing in life at this moment, that is your purpose. Now your purpose may change every 10 minutes but it is still your purpose.

One of my mentors, Virgle Slintz, would say that people are not ballanced in their mind and that they go to work and are thinking all day that they should spend more time with their family. So they go home to the family feeling guilty. When they get home they are thinking that they really should be at work and that they are not getting anything accomplished.

They are always focused on what they are not doing instead of focused on what they are doing. They are focused on the past or future instead of the now. Their life purpose when they are at work is to be with there family and there life purpose when they are with their family is to be at work, or at least that is what they think it should be.

The truth is when you are at work your life purpose is to be at work and do a good job at your job. So, I went to work today with this additutde. After all I must be there, so for today for 8 hours my purpose was to simply work for "the man."

My day was much more enjoyable. Nothing really changed, as far as the work that I do, but what changed was that for 8 hours I was fulfilling my life purpose.

As I write this my life purpose is to write something that teaches me for my learning and also something that others can read if they desire to hear my thoughts and my learning.

So from now on I will be my life purpose always by understanding that what I am doing right now is the most important thing right now, and thus this is my purpose.

After all I could die before I get to what I think I should or should not be doing so I better make this the most important thing in the moment, aware and alive.