Tag: life

“The one thing you have that nobody else has is you. Your voice. Your mind. Your creativity. Your vision. Your story, so write and draw and build and play … and live as only you can.”

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These are the words of Ted Kennedy Watson. I met him by way of his book, Guide to Stylish Entertaining. I discovered Ted’s book when visiting the gift shop at The Red Lion Inn, my very favorite country inn in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Ted owns a retail shop in Seattle, Washington and has a blog, and a love for entertaining as I do. His book is very inspiring but his philosophy has been even more inspiring to me..

I thought about Ted’s words, “Live only as you can”. Do you stay true to your vision no matter what others think of it? I’ve been guilty of doubting my vision, my mission, simply because some people weren’t enthusiastic about it. I suppose I was expecting enthusiasm when I first announced what I was planning to do. But why should I expect anyone to get excited about my vision? They are not me. They have their own likes and dislikes. These things shouldn’t affect my vision at all. It’s certainly helpful when our ideas are met with enthusiasm, but we must not depend on the enthusiasm of others in order to press forward with our own ideas. I realize that now.

I happen to love the art of letter writing. I really, really love it, and I feel terrible that so many modern people are missing out on the pleasure of a letter, and why? I think it’s because people today don’t hear anything about this beautiful art. No one is talking about letters – not the post office or the stationery companies, not movies, magazines, or even my many pen friends who are simply enjoying their letter writing and keeping the fun to themselves. Therefore, most people never hear a word about this art. Out of sight means out of mind and out of mind means dead and gone. I have often lamented, “Somebody should do something about this” and then, as Lily Tomlin said, “I realized I was a somebody.” I realized it was for me to do something. I must be the one to spread the word, to share my joy, and sharing doubles the joy so I’m pretty joyful about now as I proceed with my mission to promote the art of letter writing.

Rachel Carson, the environmentalist wrote, “The subject chooses the author” and I’m quite sure the art of letter writing has chosen me to be its advocate. What subject has chosen you? Of course, when I would mention this, my letter writing mission, to people who had no interest in letters and may never have any interest in letters, I was met with a cool reaction. This dimmed my enthusiasm immensely, but now I realize letter writing has chosen me to be its advocate not these other people. This is a job for me to do and I certainly don’t expect every person to love writing and receiving letters as much as I do, but I’m quite sure there are many who would, and so I will proceed undaunted to spread the word about the lovely art of letter writing. After all, I am Carol Ann, Lady of Letters.

Ted Kennedy Watson inspired me with his quote and I hope sharing my reflections on his words have inspired you to move forward on your mission in life too. Ah life! We’re all in it together and we should encourage each other but even if we get no encouragement from others, we know in our heart what it is that we must do.

Are you writing and building and playing as only you can? Are you sharing your story as I’ve shared mine? The writer, Sark, wrote in her book Succulent Wild Woman, “A story can travel without you and inspire many. The tiniest story in your life can deeply touch another. You cannot know the affect your story might have.”

“Don’t be afraid . It won’t be perfect. The only thing to be afraid of, really, is that it won’t be.”

Stephen Sondheim

“Kind words can be short and easy to speak but their echoes are truly endless”

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These words were spoken by Mother Teresa, that tiny Catholic nun who founded the Missionaries of Charity in India. She is now considered to be a saint in the Catholic church. After reading Mother Teresa’s thoughts concerning the endless echoes of the words we speak I couldn’t help but relate the idea to the art of letter writing. What an opportunity we have to send kindness into the world with each letter we write.

I have the ritual of writing a letter each morning with my first cup of coffee. What I should ask myself each morning is whose life can I make brighter today? Sure, it’s fun to share what I’ve been up to and some days that can be pretty interesting and entertaining reading, but what does that sort of news really do for my friend? Not much I’m sure. If however I look for opportunities to say “yes” to their ideas or praise them for something they did, or encourage them for something they’re thinking of doing, well, those words could really make a difference in my pen friend’s day.

I’m happy to say I always have lots of wonderful letters waiting to be answered. I’m blessed to have many penfriends. I hope you have many penfriends too. Each letter friend is important to me. I love the one to one conversations and Mother Teresa was also about the one to one. She writes, ” I do not agree with the big way of doing things. What matters is the individual. To get to love a person, we must come into close contact with them. If we wait until we get the numbers then we will be lost in the numbers and we will never be able to show that love and respect for the person.

Every time we write a letter we have the opportunity to show someone the love and respect Mother Teresa talks about. In this way letter writing is more than a fun free-time activity. It becomes a ministry of love, a ministry we can carry on all by ourselves, in our comfy slippers, any hour of the day or night. While some people spew hate, fear and retribution around our world we can be working against those nasty efforts by sending out kind words which echoe melodiously all the way up to heaven.

Don’t just write any old kind of letters. Write love letters. What the world needs now more than anything is love sweet love and we are all capable of sending that needed love out into the world one letter at a time. Our penfriends may be so moved by our kindness they’ll start writing their own love letters too and on and on it could go.

Mother Teresa was only one person, and so am I, and so are you, but we just might be able to accomplish more than we think. Mother Teresa’s way was not in big things but in doing small things with great love. We should all try that too. We may never know the full extent of what our kind letters will accomplish until we get to heaven, but once there we’ll have to look up Mother Teresa and tell her how she inspired us. At least I hope she inspired you. She sure inspired me.

“Whoever is happy will make others happy too”

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So says Anne Frank. Do you agree? Happy people certainly could lighten the mood in a room, but I think for happiness to be transferred from one person to another there must be some sort of personal sharing. It could be a compliment, a warm smile, some understanding words or a bit of welcome good news. Nothing comes from nothing.

Every letter we write has the potential to be a gift of caring and sharing but some letters show we care more than others. If our letter is entirely about us, as interesting as our lives might be, we can’t expect our letter to warm the heart of our pen friend. Share your news, yes, but include kind words about your pen friend. You might be thinking those kind words, but unless your friend is a mind reader it’s best to put those words into print.

When my penfriend shares happy thoughts concerning the times we’ve spent together that makes me feel happy too. You see, it’s a compliment to know someone is thinking of us, to know we matter to others. We feel appreciated and who doesn’t like to feel appreciated? Simply finding a personal letter in our mailbox is a delight, but if that letter includes kind words and compliments, well, it can make someone’s day. We all have the power to lift the spirits of others with every interaction, and every letter we write. As we do this good deed we not only make others happier but we feel better about ourselves too.

You might just write “Smile” on your letter envelope as my friend Andy does. It’s a simple gesture but it really has made me smile. It just might make your friends smile too. Any attempt to share our joy with others is a good thing and it’s good for us because sharing doubles the joy. It really does. Don’t take my word for it. Write a kind letter full of compliments and see how you feel. You just might get a kind letter in return. Your kindness may start a chain of kind events happening all around.

So next time you’d like to make the world a better place just by being you try writing a loving letter to a friend or acquaintance or long lost family member or anyone at all. When we care about others not just about ourselves magic happens. I’ve felt this magic and you will too.