The Prized Treasures

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  “Will the prized treasures of today always be the cheap trifles of the day before? Will rows of our willow-pattern dinner-plates be ranged above the chimneypieces of the great in the years 2000 and odd? Will the white cups with the gold rim and the beautiful gold flower inside (species unknown), that our Sarah Janes now break in sheer light-heartedness of spirit, be carefully mended, and stood upon a bracket, and dusted only by the lady of the house? . . . .   The “sampler” that the eldest daughter did at school will be spoken of as “tapestry of the Victorian era,” and be almost priceless. The blue-and-white mugs of the present-day roadside inn will be hunted up, all cracked and chipped, and sold for their weight in gold, and rich people will use them for claret cups; and travellers from Japan will buy up all the “Presents from Ramsgate,” and “Souvenirs of Margate,” that may have escaped destruction, and take them back to Jedo as ancient English curios.” Jerome K. Jerome, “T...

Truly Exist

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Seneca wrote, "It’s not in my power how long I will live, but rather how long I will truly exist.”

The wisdom offered here is plain: it's not how long one lives, but what one does with the time he or she has that counts. Some people who die at a very old age have hardly lived at all. Some die as slaves, and they don't even know it. Seneca wrote in another place, "I could name a former Consul who is a slave to a little old woman, a millionaire who is the slave of the cleaning woman . . ."

How much time has been lost, frittered away, wasted? There is a difference between rest time and wasted time. We need rest, some measure of distraction, but that's no place to live. Rest is how we recharge for life! I once heard a doctor warn a patient who obviously got laziness confused with living: "get busy living, or get busy dying!"


There is no return on wasted time. There is no going back. Time well spent being creative, writing, playing music, investing in others, contributing to the world in which you live, loving, giving honor where it's due, showing respect, engaging opportunity, learning from mistakes--giving yourself away--the return is a fulfilled life. 

Use what is within your power to live while you can.


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