Tag Archives: love

Wisdom in Action

Seniors and Children: An Ideal Relationship

By Kevin Brown | Bio

Like me, you can probably remember a relationship you had as a child with an elderly relative or friend of the family. Some of my best memories of such a time involve Mrs. Cowling, an elderly lady who lived next door to us. We had just moved to a new neighborhood in Calgary, and there were only two completed homes on the block. Our home had the only family of children for about three blocks. There was my older sister Paulette (13 years old), myself (7) , and my brand new brother Ken who was not

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Fearless Aging

Fear

By Jim Selman | Bio

In “A Course in Miracles”, there is an aphorism at the beginning of the book that says “Nothing real can be threatened and nothing unreal exists.” Although I have never formally studied the program, I have read the book and it is a beautiful and compelling insight in the realm of spiritual wisdom. For millions, the Course has given access to a higher power or transformation of their relationship to the world. What I found for myself was a clarity and simplicity that

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Personal Empowerment

Elegy

By Jim Selman | Bio

I saw the movie Elegy last night
starring Sir Ben Kingsley and Penèlope Cruz. It was an exceptionally
intense love story between a man and a much younger woman. He is a
professor and she his student. What begins for him as a casual romp is
true love for her and soon he too is in love, but is tortured and
insecure because of their age difference.  Patricia Clarkson is his
stable ‘partner/wife’ who has her own career, is exceptionally

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Wisdom in Action

My Funny Valentine

By Jim Selman | Bio

This is one of those nights when I am up early in Madrid—still having a little ‘time zone’ fatigue. I am writing today’s blog while listening to Miles Davis play “My Funny Valentine” on my headset. Now for those who are into music and listen to it all the time, this may seem like a “so what?” But strange as it seems and even though I enjoy music when I hear it, I am not very conscious of it. Music is just background for me most of the time. The other day I was talking to a friend who also does a lot of blogging who said she couldn’t think of writing without carefully choosing the music to listen to while she is writing. So, here I am at four in the morning listening to my jazz favorites on iTunes.

Valentine’s Day is coming up in a couple of days and it has me thinking about romance. I am a romantic and always have been. I think I may be getting more romantic as I get older. This has me wondering what romance is. Diana Kroll is singing “You may call it romance, but I call it love”. The fact is that romance is a lot of what I think makes life worth living. Romance isn’t just about seducing the ‘objects of our desire’. Maybe it is the recognition that the ‘other’

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Fearless Aging

Benjamin Button

By Jim Selman | Bio

Assuming you’ve been to the museums a couple of times and don’t speak Spanish very well, what can you do in Madrid on a cold and wet winter day except find an English-speaking film? I did, and finally caught up with everyone else and saw The Strange Case of Benjamin Button. Put me down as a fan, but the funny thing is that it is one of those films that you’re not quite sure if or why you like it.

First of all, it is about age. Brad Pitt is born ‘old’ and gets progressively

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Wisdom in Action

Compassion

By Jim Selman | Bio

Compassion is word that for me has special significance at Christmas, partly because it is the quality of “being love” embodied in the stories of Jesus and most of the great spiritual masters and reincarnations of God throughout the ages. It is also because it may be the ultimate gift we can give each other and ourselves during this special season of giving (as well as at every other time of year). When times are tough, compassion is sometimes all we have to give.

Compassion is not ‘feeling’ bad for others. It is not sympathy.

Compassion is a deep emotional and spiritual connection and recognition of others and ourselves. It is the profound experience of ‘otherness’ and the nature of who we are. Compassion is, I think, love at its purest and most primal level. Compassion is the line between human beings and other animals. It is the choice to be alive and present and acknowledge that each of us is making or can exercise that choice

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Wisdom in Action

Christmas 2008

By Jim Selman | Bio

Well, here we are, another Christmas Day, almost another year gone by and people everywhere are at home or, if not, are hopefully getting ‘something special’. I am saying a special ‘thanks’ to all those people who are working today so the rest of us can relax and do whatever it is we’re doing on Christmas day—the soldiers, the firemen, the police, the health care workers and even lots of people in the hospitality and transportation industries.

I woke up today thinking about other Christmas mornings when I was a child or when my own children were young. There is nothing quite like the squeal of anxious toddlers peering with wonder at gifts left by the magical Santa. I remember one Christmas when we left chocolate kisses on the stairs for the children to follow while “Jingle Bells” played on the stereo. The memory fills me with joy and happiness and just a touch of nostalgia for those times when we were young.

There

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Wisdom in Action

Giving and Getting

By Jim Selman | Bio

We’re in the middle of the holiday season and, from all reports, we’re buying a lot less ‘stuff’. Yet from where I am sitting, it looks like there is a lot more ‘giving’. I see and hear about more ‘charity’—from giving some paper money to the homeless man we pass everyday to my father’s adopting an out-of-work mother and three children who are members of his church community. A lot of people seem to be generally nicer to each other, which is a wonderful gift anytime.

I suppose you can attribute this kind of mood-shift to the increasingly tough times and say it is just an anomaly of people pulling together in a crisis. On the other hand, however, consider that all this “economic meltdown” news and conversation may be just symptomatic of something much deeper and profound. I think this is the ‘wake up call’ that reminds us how interconnected we all are and that none of us is going to ‘make it through’ this economic storm alone.

We’ve

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Wisdom in Action

Priceless Gifts

By Rick Fullerton | Bio

My last blog anticipated the arrival of a new grandchild, and now I am pleased to announce that Angus Fullerton Beauregard arrived on March 14th—much to the delight of family and friends! As grandparents, it seems appropriate to us that he shares Einstein’s birthday.

Births, like graduations and marriages, are major milestones of life. These events trigger other feelings and reflections, in addition to the natural joy of celebration. For example, newborns bring concerns

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