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How to Overcome the World's Negativity · Raising Daughters

0:13
Speaker 1: Hello friends, Doctor Tim Jordan back here with a brand
0:17
Speaker 1: new podcast. It's a brand new day, it's a brand
0:19
Speaker 1: new year, and I thought for this podcast, I would
0:24
Speaker 1: start out this new year with some stories. As you know,
0:28
Speaker 1: I love to read. If you've been listening to these
0:30
Speaker 1: podcasts for a while, I especially love to read stories,
0:34
Speaker 1: and I have collected so many stories over the year.
0:37
Speaker 1: I can show you my bookshelf behind me. I have gosh,
0:41
Speaker 1: probably fifty books with just stories. So let me start
0:44
Speaker 1: with the story. Just to introduce this particular podcast. There's
0:48
Speaker 1: a little kid one time who was in first grade
0:50
Speaker 1: and he was behind and he was an art class.
0:53
Speaker 1: One day, the teacher gave him a piece of clay
0:56
Speaker 1: to do some modeling. So he goes to the corner
0:58
Speaker 1: of the room all by him, and the teacher walked
1:02
Speaker 1: over and said, hey, what do you have in your hand,
1:04
Speaker 1: and this little boy said he had a lump of
1:07
Speaker 1: cow dung. He said, oh, what are you making? And
1:10
Speaker 1: little boy said, I'm making a teacher. So this kind
1:14
Speaker 1: of disturbed excuse me the teacher. So she runs down
1:18
Speaker 1: to the principal's office and said, please come here, I
1:19
Speaker 1: need some help. Johnny's regressing, so the principal goes to
1:24
Speaker 1: Johnny and asks him what's in his hand. He said,
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Speaker 1: I've got a lump of cow dung. And the principal says, well,
1:29
Speaker 1: what are you making out of it? And Little Johnny says,
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Speaker 1: a principal. So that freaked out the principle. Oh my gosh,
1:37
Speaker 1: he's regressing even more so they called a psychologist and
1:41
Speaker 1: the psychologist asked him what was in his hands, and
1:45
Speaker 1: Johnny once again said a lump of cow dung. And
1:48
Speaker 1: then he glibally asked, says you know what, little boy,
1:52
Speaker 1: I know what you're making. And Little Johnny said, well
1:55
Speaker 1: what And the psychologist said, I think you're making a
1:58
Speaker 1: psychologist and Johnny respond oh, no, that's wrong. There's not
2:02
Speaker 1: enough cow dung. Sometimes when I tell that story, I
2:08
Speaker 1: say a developmental and behavioral pediatrician, because that's why I am.
2:12
Speaker 1: But I decide not to today, so you can take
2:16
Speaker 1: my advice with a grain of salt like that little
2:19
Speaker 1: boy kind of did with those with those specialists, if
2:22
Speaker 1: you will. But I hope these stories will be meaningful
2:25
Speaker 1: to you. There are stories that I've gathered from different
2:28
Speaker 1: places and they have a point and the message. I
2:31
Speaker 1: want to get across today is that we are in
2:33
Speaker 1: charge of our attitude. There are a lot of things
2:36
Speaker 1: in our life that we are not in charge of.
2:38
Speaker 1: We are not in control that we were always in
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Speaker 1: charge of our attitude. I heard about this man one
2:44
Speaker 1: time who was a regular customer at a restaurant, and
2:47
Speaker 1: they tried their very best to please him. But one
2:50
Speaker 1: night he complained to the waiter because he only got
2:54
Speaker 1: served one piece of bread. So the waiter promptly went
2:58
Speaker 1: back and brought him force license. The man said, well,
3:01
Speaker 1: that's better, but it's not good enough because he wanted
3:03
Speaker 1: plenty of it. So he returned to the same restaurant
3:07
Speaker 1: about a week later, and the waiter brought him twelve
3:09
Speaker 1: slices of bread, and the man said that was better,
3:13
Speaker 1: but he thought they were still being a little bit frugal,
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Speaker 1: and so the waiter brought over a huge basket full
3:19
Speaker 1: of bread the next week, and even that didn't stop
3:21
Speaker 1: his complaints. So the owner's side to fix him by
3:26
Speaker 1: having a colossal, huge loaf of bread baked just for him.
3:30
Speaker 1: It was six feet long and three feet wide. The
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Speaker 1: next time he came in, the manager, along with two waiters,
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Speaker 1: brought to his table the man glared at the huge loaf,
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Speaker 1: and they looked at the odor. He said, Oh, so,
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Speaker 1: I guess we're back to one piece again. I bet
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Speaker 1: some of you know somebody who's that way, constantly complaining,
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Speaker 1: constantly focusing on the negative. And so that to me
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Speaker 1: brings home the point of we are not in charge
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Speaker 1: of a lot, but we do always have control over
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Speaker 1: our our mood, our attitude, and our mindset and how
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Speaker 1: we react to things. One of my favorite stories is
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Speaker 1: about Buddha. I've told us before in a previous podcast
4:16
Speaker 1: a while back, but so I'm sorry for those of
4:18
Speaker 1: you who may have heard it before, but it's a
4:20
Speaker 1: story worth repeating. One day, Buddha was sitting with his
4:24
Speaker 1: followers and he was telling them some stories and things,
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Speaker 1: and for some reason a general from the army came
4:30
Speaker 1: storming up. He was very angry at Buddha. He started
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Speaker 1: yelling at him, and Buddha just sat there peacefully, didn't
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Speaker 1: angry back, just sat there peacefully, which of course made
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Speaker 1: the general even more angry, so he started screaming and
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Speaker 1: cursing and yelling. Buddhast sat there peaceful as can be,
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Speaker 1: which made the general even more angry. And frustrated. So
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Speaker 1: at that point he withdrew his sword and he threatened
4:54
Speaker 1: Buddha's life. And again buddhast sat there unperturbed, just sat there,
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Speaker 1: peaceful and did not react. And so General finally put
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Speaker 1: the sword back in the sheet and he stomped off.
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Speaker 1: And when he was gone, that Buddha's follower said, I
5:11
Speaker 1: can't believe you didn't do anything. That guy was screaming
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Speaker 1: at you, he was cursing at you. He even threatened
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Speaker 1: your life, and you didn't say anything to him. You
5:19
Speaker 1: didn't do anything. I don't understand. And Buddhist said some
5:24
Speaker 1: very important words. He said, if someone in life offers
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Speaker 1: you something and he refused to accept it, to whom
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Speaker 1: does the gift belong? And of course the gift belongs
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Speaker 1: to the person who tried to give it, just like
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Speaker 1: that general's anger belonged to him, not Buddha, because he
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Speaker 1: refused to react and accept it. We're always in charge
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Speaker 1: of our emotions, were always in charge of our reactions
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Speaker 1: to people. I don't think our kids have learned that.
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Speaker 1: Lesson enough, let me give to tell you another really
5:55
Speaker 1: interesting story about a stonecutter. One day he was working
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Speaker 1: on the mountain as he did every day, happily singing
6:03
Speaker 1: as he chipped away, until he saw this nobleman's splendid
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Speaker 1: carriage traveled past him, and all of a sudden, he
6:10
Speaker 1: got this intense desire to be more wealthy for the
6:13
Speaker 1: first time in his life, and he cried out, Oh,
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Speaker 1: if only I were rich, and a voice called out
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Speaker 1: that his wish had been granted and anything he desired
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Speaker 1: would be given to him. He went home and found
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Speaker 1: a huge mansion in place of his old shack. He
6:30
Speaker 1: was so happy until he saw a king ride by
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Speaker 1: with a large group of servants, and the stonecutter wished
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Speaker 1: that he were a king sitting in the cool of
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Speaker 1: that carriage, and snap, his wish came to be. He
6:43
Speaker 1: looked at the sun, and he marveled at the Sun's power,
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Speaker 1: and so he started wishing to be the sun, and
6:50
Speaker 1: so he became the sun. But when the clouds blocked
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Speaker 1: his rays, he then started to wish to become a
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Speaker 1: cloud that turned into a rain, a rain which was
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Speaker 1: blocked by huge rock in his path. So then he
7:02
Speaker 1: wished to be a rock. But once again he heard
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Speaker 1: a strange chipping noise and he saw a tiny human
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Speaker 1: man cutting chunks of him from his feet, and he
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Speaker 1: cried out, A puny creature like that is more powerful
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Speaker 1: than a mighty rock like me, I want to be
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Speaker 1: a man. And he found himself once again as a stonecutter,
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Speaker 1: but now he had a much more joyful song in
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Speaker 1: his heart because he was now content with what he
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Speaker 1: had and with who he was. How many people, how
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Speaker 1: many of our kids are never content? They look at
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Speaker 1: their social media science that they're constantly comparing themselves to
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Speaker 1: other people, and then they get so upset, so uptight,
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Speaker 1: so tense, so frustrated, so stressed, so unhappy, so discontented,
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Speaker 1: not knowing that they're in charge of their state of mind.
7:55
Speaker 1: They're in charge of their sense of self, how they
7:58
Speaker 1: viewed themselves. I heard a funny story one time about
8:02
Speaker 1: this girl who was born with a golden belly button.
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Speaker 1: But what to some people may have been a source
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Speaker 1: of pride, to her, it was a huge embarrassment, making
8:12
Speaker 1: her feel different and weird. Every time she swam or
8:15
Speaker 1: took a shower, she was teased, so she prayed that
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Speaker 1: her belly button would be taken away. One night, she
8:22
Speaker 1: dreamed an atrew came down from heaven unscrewed her belly
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Speaker 1: button and went back up to heaven. And she awoke
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Speaker 1: the next morning. The first she did was a check
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Speaker 1: to see if the dream had come true, and it had.
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Speaker 1: There on the bedside table was the unscrewed belly button,
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Speaker 1: all bright and all shiny, and the girl was so
8:40
Speaker 1: excited she jumped out of bed, and when she did,
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Speaker 1: her bottom fell off. Every one of our daughters must
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Speaker 1: learn to accept their bodies, to accept the changes in
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Speaker 1: their bodies as they go through puberty, and also to
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Speaker 1: become a word the cost to them when they spend
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Speaker 1: so much time and so much energy comparing themselves to
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Speaker 1: other people, which all of our girls do. It starts,
9:06
Speaker 1: I think in sort of middle grade school. I see
9:09
Speaker 1: girls as young as third fourth grade these days by
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Speaker 1: the time they're in middle school foreshore, and most of
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Speaker 1: the time, almost all the time, they compare themselves unfavorably,
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Speaker 1: wishing they were more like they're friends, because their friends,
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Speaker 1: in their mind are prettier, smarter, faster, more athletic, more popular,
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Speaker 1: more social, more skinny, And so they can never be
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Speaker 1: content because they're always judging themselves based upon other people,
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Speaker 1: people outside of themselves, and also people's judgments of them.
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Speaker 1: I heard this, really, this really interesting story one time.
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Speaker 1: But this woman who was walking down the street and
9:51
Speaker 1: suddenly she stopped a man who was walking down the
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Speaker 1: street the other way, and she said, Henry, I'm so
9:56
Speaker 1: happy to see you after all these years. But my,
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Speaker 1: how you've chan changed. Used to be so tall and
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Speaker 1: now you've grown so short. You were so well built,
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Speaker 1: and now you've gotten so thin. You were so fair,
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Speaker 1: and now you've become so dark. Good grief, How have
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Speaker 1: you changed so much in five years? What happened to you, Henry.
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Speaker 1: Finally the man got a chance to say something. He said, ma'am,
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Speaker 1: my name is not Henry, my name is John to Wish.
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Speaker 1: The persistent woman calmly responded, oh, so you changed your
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Speaker 1: name too. I think our daughters and we oftentimes spend
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Speaker 1: way too much time and energy worrying about other people's
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Speaker 1: judgments and opinions of us, of us, way too much
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Speaker 1: time trying to please other people, live up to other
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Speaker 1: people's expectations. It's okay for people not to get us,
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Speaker 1: and that's a huge lesson for our girls. I work
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Speaker 1: with girls a lot, as you know, in my counseling practice.
10:54
Speaker 1: Might retreats my summer camps, and I work a lot
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Speaker 1: with girls for them to not worry so much about
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Speaker 1: other people's judgments, to not be so unhappy when other
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Speaker 1: people don't get them, including their parents. Some parents, because
11:13
Speaker 1: of our stories, have a hard time accepting our daughters
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Speaker 1: the way they are because they're different than us. And
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Speaker 1: so girls, you have to learn that it's okay. I
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Speaker 1: have my own life, my own passions, my own interests,
11:27
Speaker 1: and it's okay if other people don't get it. It's
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Speaker 1: even okay if my family doesn't understand me. It's okay.
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Speaker 1: It's not because of you. You don't need to judge them,
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Speaker 1: just say they just don't get you because of their
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Speaker 1: own conditioning, their own stories. And that conditioning, by the way,
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Speaker 1: is a huge piece. I heard one time about this
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Speaker 1: camel trader who was walking across the Sahara desert and
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Speaker 1: his parties sitting decide to stop and pitch a tent
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Speaker 1: for the night. The slaves started driving pegs into the
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Speaker 1: ground and they tied the camels to these pegs. Then
12:02
Speaker 1: they came to them to save the master. They're only
12:05
Speaker 1: nineteen pegs and we've got twenty camels. How do we
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Speaker 1: tie the twentieth camel? And the master said, these campbells
12:13
Speaker 1: are just stupid animals. Just go through the motions of
12:16
Speaker 1: tying the camel until stay put. Just pretend you're doing it.
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Speaker 1: And that's what they did, and the camels stood there
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Speaker 1: all night long. The next morning they lifted the tent
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Speaker 1: and they continued on their journey, and the slaves came
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Speaker 1: to complain that all the camels were following except as one,
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Speaker 1: the one who had this imaginary peg. He refused to budge,
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Speaker 1: and the master said, oh, you forgot to quote unquote
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Speaker 1: untie him. They said, oh, So they went back and
12:45
Speaker 1: they went through the motions of pretending to untie him,
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Speaker 1: and the camel came forward. None of us are in
12:52
Speaker 1: control of our childhoods, are past histories, our old stories.
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Speaker 1: Stuff happened to us, stuff has happened to your kid.
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Speaker 1: Our job is to become aware of any old conditioning,
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Speaker 1: any old patterns we have brought with us the parents
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Speaker 1: from our childhoods that maybe causing us to parent in
13:10
Speaker 1: ways that are n't healthy for our kids, maybe causing
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Speaker 1: us to be overreactive, over sensitive to things that our
13:16
Speaker 1: kids are saying, are doing, it's not because of our kids,
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Speaker 1: it's because of our stories and our conditioning. And I
13:23
Speaker 1: also work with girls a lot to become aware of
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Speaker 1: things they've already absorbed from their parents, from their families,
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Speaker 1: from their friends, from the way they've been treated, and
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Speaker 1: also from the culture. That conditioning is so strong, and
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Speaker 1: that's what is going to guide us. It's going to
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Speaker 1: cause us to make decisions and act in certain ways
13:42
Speaker 1: if we don't become aware and make sure we're in
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Speaker 1: charge of it. I heard about this little girl named
13:49
Speaker 1: Mary who was at the beach with her mom one
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Speaker 1: day and she was asking to play in the sand
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Speaker 1: and her mom said, no, no, darling, you'll probably get
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Speaker 1: your dress dirty. And she said, well then I wait
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Speaker 1: into the and mom said no, you'll get all wet
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Speaker 1: and maybe catch a cold. And she said, well then
14:05
Speaker 1: I can play with those kids over there. And mom said, well, no,
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Speaker 1: you don't really know them. You might get lost in
14:11
Speaker 1: the crowd. You might they may be mean kids. And
14:14
Speaker 1: then the little girl said, well, now, can you buy
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Speaker 1: me an ice cream? Please? And mom said no, that's
14:19
Speaker 1: bad for your allergies. And little Mary sat down and
14:22
Speaker 1: started to cry, and the mom turned to a woman
14:25
Speaker 1: who was sitting nearby, and she said, for Heaven's sake,
14:28
Speaker 1: have you ever seen such a neurotic child? Become aware
14:34
Speaker 1: of what your kids are absorbing and have been absorbing
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Speaker 1: from us, from us their parents. Have we been too vigilant?
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Speaker 1: Have we been doing too much for them? Have we
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Speaker 1: been adding our fears to them where they don't belong?
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Speaker 1: That's so important. I see a lot of kids in
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Speaker 1: my counseling practice, my retreats who were carrying way too
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Speaker 1: much anxiety and stress that's been absorbed from their families
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Speaker 1: where it does belong, doesn't belong to them, But it's
15:03
Speaker 1: hard for them sometimes to set that boundary internally. So
15:07
Speaker 1: become aware of how you're parenting and what's coming across
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Speaker 1: and are you parenting with confidence? Are you giving your
15:15
Speaker 1: kids a sense of I believe in you, You're awesome,
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Speaker 1: You're great, you can do it. Are they looking at
15:21
Speaker 1: you with and seeing somebody who was anxious and doesn't
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Speaker 1: have that sense of confidence in them? So important for
15:30
Speaker 1: them to look at us and for them to feel
15:32
Speaker 1: mirrored back. You got this. I saw one I heard
15:37
Speaker 1: one time about Andrew Carnegie, the famous banker. He was
15:43
Speaker 1: asked one time why he hadn't stopped working so much
15:46
Speaker 1: as he could have stopped at any time, as he
15:48
Speaker 1: had much much more money than he could ever need.
15:50
Speaker 1: He was a multi gazillionaire. And Andrew Carnegie said, I
15:54
Speaker 1: couldn't stop because I had forgotten how a lot of
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Speaker 1: people who are sleepwalking through life because they've never taken
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Speaker 1: the time to step back and say, what do I want?
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Speaker 1: What's important to me? What do I need? We need
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Speaker 1: to slow down, check in with ourselves. Otherwise we're an autopilot,
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Speaker 1: and autopilot may not be healthy for us are our children.
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Speaker 1: If your kids were interviewed and they said, when you
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Speaker 1: watch your parents and the way they live their life,
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Speaker 1: what do you notice. I want them to be able
16:33
Speaker 1: to say that they're seeing people who are healthy, who
16:36
Speaker 1: have healthy balance, who take care of themselves, take care
16:39
Speaker 1: of their friendships, take care of their emotions, all those things,
16:45
Speaker 1: because otherwise, if we're not conscious of that, again, we
16:48
Speaker 1: just kind of go with our conditioning. There's an ancient
16:53
Speaker 1: book described that described the secret of the touchtone. This
16:57
Speaker 1: is a really nice story. The touchtone is a tiny
17:00
Speaker 1: pebble that could turn anything it touched into pure gold.
17:05
Speaker 1: And the writing declared that the precious pebble was lying
17:08
Speaker 1: somewhere on the shore of the Black Sea, amongst thousands
17:12
Speaker 1: and thousands of pebbles that looked very similar. But whereas
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Speaker 1: all the other pebbles were cold to the touch, the
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Speaker 1: touchtone was warmed to the touch, as if it were alive.
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Speaker 1: A man read about this touchstone, he sold everything he
17:26
Speaker 1: owned to try and go and find this stone. And
17:29
Speaker 1: he got to the beach and he saw all these stones.
17:31
Speaker 1: He spent every day for a whole year, picking up pebbles,
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Speaker 1: one at a time, and if it was cold to
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Speaker 1: the touch, he would throw it right back into the ocean.
17:41
Speaker 1: And he kept doing that over and over and over again,
17:44
Speaker 1: day after day. He ran out of money, he borrowed
17:47
Speaker 1: more money. He continued to do this for another two years,
17:51
Speaker 1: all to no avail. All the stones he touched were cold.
17:55
Speaker 1: One evening he picked up a pebble and it was
17:57
Speaker 1: warm to the touch, but out of habit, sheer habit,
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Speaker 1: he threw it back into the Black Sea. We can
18:06
Speaker 1: get so focused on our lives, on the drudgery, on
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Speaker 1: the routine of our lives, that we miss the golden
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Speaker 1: moments and their golden people. And their golden opportunities that
18:18
Speaker 1: are right in front of us. A lot of people
18:21
Speaker 1: today are not in the present moment enough, including your children.
18:26
Speaker 1: They're so busy, so stressed with all their activities, all
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Speaker 1: the conditioning, that they're not focused on the moment, and
18:33
Speaker 1: so there are a lot of things that might be
18:35
Speaker 1: good for them that pass through them because they're so
18:39
Speaker 1: wrapped up and everything else, so wrapped up in the
18:43
Speaker 1: day by day and the monotony of the day by
18:45
Speaker 1: day that they don't notice things. They don't notice their emotions,
18:49
Speaker 1: they don't notice opportunities, they don't notice good friends that
18:53
Speaker 1: could be there for them. They get so focused on
18:56
Speaker 1: being popular and all that that they don't notice the
18:59
Speaker 1: kids who could be great eight people that good, healthy
19:03
Speaker 1: people that could be a great friend. So we need
19:06
Speaker 1: to teach our kids not to do that. We need
19:08
Speaker 1: to teach our kids to be present. Another thing that
19:13
Speaker 1: I want all our kids to take at responsibility for
19:16
Speaker 1: and you parents, is your attitude and your spirit. I
19:20
Speaker 1: heard the story I read it a long long time ago.
19:23
Speaker 1: It was about a prisoner during World War Two in
19:26
Speaker 1: a concentration camp, and he was this feelers and free,
19:30
Speaker 1: willing kind of guy. And so one day, even in
19:33
Speaker 1: this concentration camp, somehow he had a guitar that had
19:36
Speaker 1: been smuggled in. He started playing in the prison square
19:41
Speaker 1: for all his fellow prisoners, and the guards came and
19:44
Speaker 1: they forbade him to play. But the next day he
19:46
Speaker 1: was out there again, playing and singing to a larger
19:49
Speaker 1: crowd of prisoners. So what the guards did was they
19:53
Speaker 1: dragged him away and they chopped off his fingers. But
19:57
Speaker 1: the next day he was back there in the square,
20:00
Speaker 1: singing and making whatever music he could with his bloody,
20:02
Speaker 1: bloody fingers. The guards got more frustrated, they dragged him
20:07
Speaker 1: off and they smashed his guitar. The next day he
20:10
Speaker 1: was back, singing with all of his might, and the
20:14
Speaker 1: crowd joined in, and their hearts were filled with joy,
20:17
Speaker 1: which of course made the guards mad, so they had
20:20
Speaker 1: his tongue torn out, thinking that would end this nonsense,
20:25
Speaker 1: to their astonishment. To their astonishment, the very next day,
20:28
Speaker 1: he was back in his place in the in that square,
20:31
Speaker 1: swaying and dancing to a silent music that only he
20:34
Speaker 1: could hear. And soon all the other prisoners were holding
20:38
Speaker 1: hands and dancing around this bleeding, broken figure whose spirit
20:43
Speaker 1: could never be broken. I want our kids to have
20:48
Speaker 1: that kind of attitude, that kind of spirit. I want
20:52
Speaker 1: them to take fully full control of their emotions, their spirit,
20:57
Speaker 1: their outlook in life. I encourage all of you to
21:01
Speaker 1: do the very same thing. I hear a lot of
21:04
Speaker 1: kids sometimes blaming things. They blame their schedules, they blame
21:08
Speaker 1: their parents because they're unhappy, they're discontented, because they're stressed out,
21:14
Speaker 1: because they're anxious. There and I think there's the culture
21:18
Speaker 1: parents fail, all kinds of people that have a piece
21:21
Speaker 1: in that, and and our kids can learn to be
21:26
Speaker 1: responsible for their attitude and their reactions to what's going
21:29
Speaker 1: on around them. It's not so easy to do, but
21:33
Speaker 1: it's possible, and if they want to be happy and content,
21:37
Speaker 1: they're going to need to learn to take responsibility from
21:42
Speaker 1: My favorite stories involves some people who were on vacation
21:47
Speaker 1: and they were traveling through the gorgeous Tuscany countryside in Italy.
21:52
Speaker 1: But it's interesting because on this bus that they were
21:54
Speaker 1: traveling in, all the shades were pulled down so that
21:58
Speaker 1: nobody could see beyond the windows, and so what they
22:02
Speaker 1: were doing the whole trip with those because they couldn't
22:05
Speaker 1: see how it was. They spent the whole trip arguing
22:07
Speaker 1: over who got to set in the front of the us,
22:10
Speaker 1: who got the set, who got to sit by the window,
22:12
Speaker 1: who was in charge, who is to be applauded, and
22:16
Speaker 1: so they remained until the journey's end. How does that
22:21
Speaker 1: fit for your life or the lives of people? You know,
22:27
Speaker 1: people spend so much time with negativity, complaining, focusing on
22:31
Speaker 1: what they don't have and what they don't like, and
22:35
Speaker 1: they don't focus enough on what they do have, what
22:38
Speaker 1: they could be grateful for. It's important that we learned
22:43
Speaker 1: to focus on what's important, and to decide first and
22:47
Speaker 1: foremost what's important, and to focus on that, focus on
22:51
Speaker 1: things that are going well, focus on gratitude, focus on
22:56
Speaker 1: the good things and the good people and the good
22:57
Speaker 1: opportunities that have come their way. That's how you can
23:01
Speaker 1: be happy and contented in this new year by taking
23:05
Speaker 1: that kind of responsibility because you were always in control
23:09
Speaker 1: of that. Let me finish with the stories I just
23:13
Speaker 1: read recently about the famous actor Danny Thomas in Detroit
23:23
Speaker 1: in the nineteen thirties. Danny Thomas was a struggling entertainer
23:29
Speaker 1: and he actually only had seven dollars left to his name,
23:32
Speaker 1: the last money for him and his family. He was
23:36
Speaker 1: pretty downcast. So he was walking around the city in
23:39
Speaker 1: Detroit and he saw a church and he walked inside
23:43
Speaker 1: and he stood before Saint Jude's statue, and Saint Jude
23:47
Speaker 1: is a patron saint of hopeless causes. He dropped every
23:51
Speaker 1: one of those seven dollars into the collection box and
23:55
Speaker 1: he prayed, please show me the way, and if you do,
23:58
Speaker 1: I'll build you a shrine. And very soon after that
24:03
Speaker 1: his career turned around. He went from a nobody to
24:06
Speaker 1: a TV star, and he never forgot his promise. In
24:12
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty two, he opened up Saint Jude Children's Hospital
24:16
Speaker 1: in Memphis. It was a revolutionary thing because the families
24:21
Speaker 1: who came to Saint Jude's Children's Hospital never had to
24:24
Speaker 1: pay for their treatment. They didn't have to pay for
24:26
Speaker 1: their travel, their housing, or their food. Nothing. When it opened,
24:31
Speaker 1: childhood leukemia survival rates was only four percent. Today ninety
24:37
Speaker 1: four percent, and since nineteen sixty two, Saint Jud's Children's
24:42
Speaker 1: Hospital has treated over two hundred and sixty thousand children.
24:47
Speaker 1: Danny Thomas gave everything when he had nothing. That desperate
24:52
Speaker 1: faith became hope for thousands of kids. Seven dollars became
24:56
Speaker 1: countless saved lives. This sometimes giving your last when you
25:02
Speaker 1: had the least can change everything this year. Share with
25:08
Speaker 1: people who need hope, Share that with your kids, Share
25:12
Speaker 1: that with your relatives. Share your attitude of gratitude with
25:16
Speaker 1: people because it might uplift their spirits. It doesn't cost
25:19
Speaker 1: a thing. It doesn't cost a thing. Also, to take
25:23
Speaker 1: charge of your attitude, to take charge of your mindset,
25:27
Speaker 1: to take charge of what you can, what you focus on,
25:31
Speaker 1: to take charge of your emotions, all those things we
25:35
Speaker 1: have control over it. It can make all the difference in
25:37
Speaker 1: the world for your year, just like Danny Thomas's gift
25:40
Speaker 1: has made all the difference in the world for hundreds
25:43
Speaker 1: of thousands of children. Thank you so much for stopping
25:47
Speaker 1: by Hope. This has been interesting for you. Repeat these
25:52
Speaker 1: stories are fun, Repeat them to your kids or let
25:55
Speaker 1: your kids listen to them on this podcast. Check me
25:58
Speaker 1: out on my website at w WW dot d r
26:01
Speaker 1: Tim Jordan dot com. I also will have some show
26:05
Speaker 1: notes in there that will include one of my favorite
26:07
Speaker 1: books that has some of these stories in it. I
26:10
Speaker 1: will be back here as always with the brand new podcasts.
26:14
Speaker 1: My weekend retreat start in February. We have one in
26:18
Speaker 1: February for high schoolers, in April for middle schoolers, and
26:21
Speaker 1: then in May for grade schoolers. If you're interested to
26:24
Speaker 1: just look on the website. All the dates are there. Also,
26:27
Speaker 1: all the other things that my wife and I are resources.
26:31
Speaker 1: I've written seven books. All the podcasts that I've done
26:35
Speaker 1: there's three hundred and sixty six of them, I think
26:37
Speaker 1: at this point. So look for all those resources and
26:40
Speaker 1: hopefully they're helpful for you. I'll be back here as
26:43
Speaker 1: always in one week with a brand new topic and
26:46
Speaker 1: that brand new podcast. Thanks again, as always for stopping by.
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Speaker 1: He A