For Laughs Only

"What did the hurricane say to the coconut tree? - Hold on to your nuts, this is no ordinary blow job."

     A blind man walked into a restaurant. "I can’t read the menu," he told the owner, "but you bring me a dirty fork from the previous customer, I’ll sniff it and order from that."
     The owner was baffled by such a request, but went along with it. He went into the kitchen, fetched a dirty fork and handed it to the blind man who smelled it and promptly ordered meatloaf with mashed potato.
     A week later, the blind man came in again and repeated his request for a dirty fork. The owner obliged, the blind man sniffed it and ordered spaghetti Bolognese.
     The third time the blind man came into the restaurant, the owner decided to try and catch him out. He went into the kitchen and said to his wife Angela: "Will you rub this fork around your vagina before I take it to the blind man?"
     The wife did so and the owner took the fork out to the blind man who sniffed it and said: "Hey, I did not know Angela worked here!"

     A lonely widow put an advertisement in the newspaper for a dream man. She wanted someone who (a) won’t beat me up; (b) won’t run away; (c) must be great in bed. For weeks, she didn’t receive a single reply and had almost given up hope when there was a ring at her doorbell. She answered it to find a man with no arms and no legs lying on the doormat.
    "Who are you?" she asked.
    "I’m your dream man," he replied.
    "What makes you think you fit the bill?" she asked frostily.
    "I’ve got no arms so I can’t beat you up, and I’ve got no legs so I can’t run away."
    "What makes you think you’re great in bed?"
    "Well, I rang the doorbell, didn’t I?"

     A man complained to a friend about a pain in his elbow and the friend recommended a computer at the local drug store. “It’s amazing,” said the friend. "It can diagnose anything cheaper and much quicker than a doctor. All you have to do is pay ten dollars, feed a urine sample and the computer will tell you what the problem is. Just like that."
     The man like the sound of it and so he went to the drugstore, paid ten dollars and fed in his urine sample. Two minutes later, the computer issued a print-out. It read: "You have a tennis elbow. Soak your arm in warm water. Avoid heavy labor. It will clear up in two weeks."
     The man was intrigued and that evening decided to try and outsmart the computer. He mixed together some tap water, a stool sample from his dog, urine sample from both his wife and his daughter. And to complicate the sample even more, he masturbated into it. The he went down to the drugstore, paid his ten dollars, fed in the sample and waited for the computer’s reply. Two minutes later, came the print-out: "Your tap water is too hard – get a water softener. Your dog has ringworm – bathe him with anti-fungal shampoo. Your daughter is using cocaine – put her in rehab. Your wife is pregnant with two girls. They are not yours – get a lawyer. And if you don’t stop jerking off, your tennis elbow will never get better."

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Features

"If you always put limit on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them." ---Bruce Lee (1940 - 1973)

Self-Exploration, Discovery and Reconstruction (Part 3)

Clem S. Estrera, Jr., CIM '72

To change or not to change
    Believe me. Anyone of us at any age can re-program our mind and change our self-image to a more positive one. But first we've got to learn to take full responsibility of our own thoughts, attitudes, actions and behaviors rather than succumb too easily to justifying them by blaming, complaining and making excuses. There is no question that permanent change for the better is terribly hard to achieve, let alone keep. It doesn’t happen fast because our brain was not designed to make fast, permanent changes. It is not constructed to jump from one pattern of behavior to another. It is constructed to follow patterns of habit - repetitious thoughts and actions that have gone on for years and have programmed our mind. It's the reason why we are called creatures of habit.

     When we try to make a major rapid change, we are basically asking the brain to do something it is not designed to. It will resist. Thus it takes time and conscious effort to make a major change in our personalities, attitudes and patterns of behavior. Habits, we must understand, are easier to make than break. So why not make the habit of "accentuating the positive and eliminating the negative?"

    No one can change the past so that when you embark on your own re-programming, look out the windshield and do not stare in the rare view mirror. You’ve got to focus on the future because it’s the only part of life that is still up for grabs. If you find it hard to change and re-program your mind because you cannot resist comparing yourself to others or comparing your family to your friends' and neighbors' families who look a lot happier than you do, just keep in mind that there is always a mystery behind closed doors. You don't really know what others are going through behind what you saw unless or until they tell you like what I have been telling you about mine.

Understanding our past
    Many of us grew up with a programming that has been one of stifling conformity; of being forced to behave within the prescribed patterns of our families or within the rules set and strictly imposed by our parents. It leads us to a rigid, stuck behavior that to behave differently is fraught with fear, worry, anxiety and insecurity. So we imposed the same conformity on our children and when the children rebel against such conformity, we get upset, angry, frustrated, discouraged, disillusioned or disappointed. We fail to realize that we are following the same patterns our parents set for us when we were kids. We also fail to realize that change is an inevitable part of life and it is our inability to accept change and change ourselves that are the sources of our frustrations and unhappiness. If we insist on our own self-righteousness, we won't be able to accept change we don't want and what we get most out of life is chronic frustration and discontent.

    We are all products of our family environment most of all, products of our past. Our past family life, together with our schooling, peer-conditioning, social biases, religious-training and superstitious and cultural beliefs play a large part in shaping up our thinking, attitude and behavior. The reward-punishment ethics that many of us had to follow molded us into a level of conformity that those of us who were rebellious saw passivity, appeasement and accommodation as the only avenues to self-preservation. We realized that if we were to win the affection and approval of others, we have to massage their ego, yield to their wants and wishes and thus have to act in ways contrary to our own convictions. Yet a constant conflict between action and conviction would ultimately result in doubts, fears, cynicism, insecurity and oversensitivity - all constitute to a syndrome that brings out the negative attitudes and behaviors in a person.

     But just because of our past, it doesn't mean that we and our family have to continue maintaining the same level of conformity. It doesn't mean that those who simply express their individualism deserve to be judged and penalized with criticism or admonition, or that those who don't conform should be shunned or despised. We all had different past. We must keep in mind and understand that none of us had the opportunity to choose our parents in order to make it a little easier to accept what we are and to start making some changes. Indeed some of us were not fortunate enough to be born into a family with parents that were highly critical and disapproving particularly of things that don't conform to their wishes, while some of us were fortunate enough to be born into a family with parents that were loving and supportive, parents that encouraged independent thinking and self-responsibility.

     Because we all grew up following different levels of conformity or following the harsh reward-punishment ethics, you must have noticed that there are always others who would like to take a swing at your head if you stick it above the crowd – others who are ready to criticize, shun, despise and even express their hostility on you if, by bringing out the best in you, it makes them feel bad about themselves. Obviously, a certain conformity can make excellence dangerous. In order to play it safe, you have to stick with mediocrity. To get along you have to go along. Bernard Berenson wrote: “Life has taught me that it is not for our faults that we are disliked and even hated but for our qualities.”

Beliefs and you
    When you become aware and understand the influence and control of the past, you’d begin to question their validity, rationality and even sanity, and sooner or later, you’d learn not to simply sit on your power and hide it or not let others see it. You’d realize that excellence is actually an exciting prospect, and that this danger you used to fear is in fact fun. You’d also learn how to deflect the pathetic swings of others coming at you, know how to handle criticisms graciously, let go your mistakes easily and become more creative in what you do. In other words, you’d start dismissing the myths of the past that you’ve been believing. You'd learn to see the world not just one way but in different ways and you'd release or set yourself free from dependency of the programming that came from a dysfunctional past.

    The only difference between you and those in the Ivy League is the past. Those in the Ivy League have been taught creative and critical thinking and they've learned to believe in themselves. They can think and reason intellectually. But why can't you? Is your brain different than theirs? If you believe it is, then there you are - it's your belief that makes it different. It's your belief that makes you look up and look down on others. It's your belief that makes you judgmental and keeps you from treating everyone as equal. But the truth of the matter is, you are more than you think you are and you're as smart as everyone else.

     You don’t have to remain prisoner of your past environment. You don’t have to stay tune in your past programming. But first you need to re-examine your own beliefs for its validity in your life’s situation, for beliefs don’t have to be true to dictate your way of thinking. Beliefs are the origins of our thoughts, philosophies and perceptions. The thoughts we think produce feelings or emotions; feelings dictate attitudes; attitudes determine our actions and behaviors. Therefore, our beliefs are crucial to what we are and who we are as well as what kind of person we want ourselves to be.

     True or not, beliefs can ruin yourself and your relationships with others even that with your friends and family. They can destroy personal responsibility, not to mention character and personality. Consider that if you believe that others are born to win and you are born to lose or are destined to fail, you’d lose your will to exercise personal responsibility to achieve. Instead of learning from your losses and failures, you'd simply justify them. You'd indulge on self-pity because you think of them as parts of your destiny. It’s like you’re given rags and you expect yourself to wear them all the time – thus no chance to go from rags to riches. What if you believe that your husband or wife is cheating on you? Can you imagine what would that belief lead you to?

Beliefs and their awesome power
    You must have heard of someone or a patient in particular who, physicians have been at a loss to explain how such patient with seemingly fatal disease has not responded to the very best medical treatment, and then somehow recovered completely. Indeed there are patients that physicians are baffled about how spontaneous remission from cancer occurs. Their recovery is considered miraculous. But one thing these patients have in common is that they have acknowledged a genuine belief in a Higher Power, or a power greater than anything else. They surrender themselves completely to this Higher Power. They have accepted themselves as they are and become truly grateful for all that they are and all that they have.

     When you believe in a Higher Power or in God, you simply believe Him, period. You don’t ask questions unlike the man in a story who was beset with incredibly bad luck. Although the man was moral, ethical, religious and he went to church regularly every Sunday and holy days, his wife and his friend cheated on him and his children humiliated him. As if that weren’t enough, he was laid off from his job and he came home only to find his house burned down to the ground. His wife had left him and his children had stolen his savings.

     Despite the terrible misfortune, the man went out in his field to pray, trying to keep his faith intact. He flung his arms in supplication and looked up at the sky. Just then, at that precise moment, a flock of birds flew by and a bird’s dropping hit him squarely in the eye. In utter defeat, he wiped his eye, looked up heavenward again, and cried, “Why God? Why me? For other people, they sing!”

     All of us have many different beliefs and most of these beliefs have been with us since childhood or since we can remember, while there are perhaps few that we have acquired along the way to our adulthood and old age. Some of these beliefs may need re-examination every now and then as to whether or not they are still valid, or whether they bring out the best in you …… or the worst. Do they make sense? Could your life have been better or worse without them? Could you have achieved more and have been happier if you simply believe in yourself and your ability instead of someone else like your parents, brothers or sisters? Beliefs, whatever they are even if they are only myths, can be powerful. They are the bases on how we live our lives. It would be ill-advised to take their power for granted.

Lovely words to say
    Have you ever listened to Paul Harvey's The Rest of the Story on radio? There is this one particular story I like because it's something that could tenderly touch our heart and soothe the sting of anything that hurts. This story is trying to tell us that love will always remain the most potent healing power, and that when it's expressed in gentle, tender and reassuring words, it could give us pleasant memories to last a lifetime. Now here's the rest of the story:

        "Carl Coleman was driving to work one morning when he had a bump with another motorist. Both cars stopped, and the woman who was driving the other car got out and survey the damage. She was distraught; it was her fault, she admitted, and hers was a new car less than two days out of the showroom. She dreaded having to tell her husband.
         Coleman was sympathetic, but he had to pursue the necessary exchange of license, registration, insurance and police reporting. The lady was so badly shaken that Coleman had to reach into her glove compartment and retrieve her documents from an envelope. On the first paper to tumble out, written in her husband's distinctive handwriting, were these words: "In case of accident, remember, honey, it's you I love, not the car!"

     Overreacting to the accident which was relatively minor because no one was hurt, the woman was badly shaken. She could no longer think what to do, for her focus was probably on the potential negative reactions of her husband like what her parents had reacted to her blunder when she was a child. Her good husband must have loved her very much and must have known and understood all along about her fear, worry and insecurity and wanted to reassure her by writing those beautiful words, words that could heal even the most disturbed mind and keep the magic in their relationship. As Johnson Wolfgang von Goethe said: "Love grants in a moment what toil can hardly achieve in an age."

    It's a basic principle that you can only give what you have. You cannot distribute what you haven't produced, for production comes before distribution. So if you keep your heart open for love to enter and accumulate, you can have lots of love to give away. If you haven't been giving love to others, then it's likely that you have been closing the door to your heart and thus you don't have enough love to give away. Anger, resentment, fear, cynicism, pessimism, envy, guilt and grudges are like substances that even in small amount are toxic to love and happiness. Get rid of them. They are not gifts nor favors to give. They are poisons to destroy. They are not worth even a moment of your life.

A lovely story
    To many of us, and as the saying goes: "Life is a rat race," and some wise guy added that "even if you win the race, you're still a rat." I don't know about you, but I used to wonder why this guy has compared us, humans, to a rat? Why not a dog or a cat? Why it has to be a rat - the most repulsive rodent in the animal kingdom. I've found it something to ponder and not easy to grasp. Nevertheless, I came to guess that perhaps this guy is one of those who got disgusted of the way people busy themselves racing against each other in the relentless struggle for success, power, privilege and money for the affluence they want to have.

     One person by the name of Tony Campolo used the term affluenza – it's like a virus that when one catches it, one would spend endless hours working to achieve more and more and more, and thus have no more time for family and friends. Many in the race are so preoccupied with material considerations that they become oblivious of others’ needs and concerns, and insensitive to others’ feelings. Yet their houses and cars keep trying to teach them that all material objects are in a constant state of disintegration, but they don't want to believe them. So the wise guy who added the phrase “even if you win the race, you’re still a rat” is probably repulsed by such human behavior.

     This story by James Dobson reminds us that life is not built on things, but on relationships, and that unconditional love is the greatest gift we can ever give or receive. It is a gift that God gives us all the time in the form of children's smiles, hugs, kisses and laughters that many of us are not even aware of all because of the busyness that we always manage to get ourselves into. Now here is the story:

        "Some time ago a friend of mine punished his three-year-old daughter for wasting a roll of gold wrapping paper. Money was tight, and he became upset when her daughter tried to decorate a box to put under the Christmas tree.
         Nevertheless, the little girl brought the gift to her father the next morning and said, 'This is for you, Daddy.' The father was embarrassed by his earlier over-reaction. But his anger flared again when he opened the box and found it empty. He yelled at her, 'Don't you know that when you give someone a present, there's supposed to be something inside?' The little girl looked up at him in tears and said, 'Oh, Daddy, it's not empty. I blew kisses into it. I filled it with my love and I wrapped it up just for you.' He was crushed. Quickly he put his arms around her and begged for her forgiveness.
        My friend told me that he kept that gold box by his bed for years and whenever he got discouraged, he'd take out an imaginary kiss and remember the love of the child who'd put it there. In a very real sense, each of us as parents has been given a gold container filled with unconditional love of our children. There's not a more precious possession anyone could hold."

     Now what are you waiting for? Don't just sit there. Pick up the phone, call your kids and tell them you love them. Or, go to them, or to your grandchildren, nephews, or nieces and give them a hug. What about a friend you haven't talked to in years? Give him or her a call. How about an e-mail greeting message? Is it too much to do? No time? If not now, when? So do it now, or you'll only go back to the bad habit of procrastinating it and end up never having done it at all.

A thought to ponder
     The difference between God and everyone else is unconditional love. Unlike many of us who would pluck a flower and start picking off its petals one by one saying, "She loves me. She loves me not," God’s very essence is love and He doesn’t need to decide. Whether we accept or reject it, God loves us, period. He doesn’t have to explain, and even if God explains it to us, we still wouldn’t understand it, anyway.

     Unconditional love is something we don’t need to understand, let alone explain, but something we simply accept and give. When we accept God’s love, we have something great, if not beautiful, that we can pass it on to others.

     In humans, the difference between a man of faith and a man of doubt is the ability to love unconditionally. A man of faith is capable of developing such ability. A man of doubt isn’t. I don't know about you, but to me, the best way to show God we love Him is to love our family, friends and others around us. God's children we are and God's children we ought to be. Wouldn't you think so that if we love one another, God would be pleased and happy with us the same way as we are pleased and happy with our children who behave well and love each other?

The End

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"I care not what others think of what I do, but I care very much about what I think of what I do. That is character. " -- Theodore Roosevelt

Decision

Clem S. Estrera, Jr., CIM '72

Regret
     I regret to inform everyone that this is the last issue of Brain Waves at least until further notice. Speaking for myself, it’s been a pleasure sharing with every one of you my experiences, thoughts, philosophies, knowledge and wisdom. I haven’t hesitated to tell you all my secrets including those of my family in exchange for nothing more than the simple hope that you may find something to learn from them.

    Honestly, I have struggled for the past few months to make this decision because the number of readers has never diminished but has increased instead as a matter of fact, and so with the number of readers that have expressed their gratitude. I have to believe that Brain Waves is making a difference to at least one, or two, or few of its readers. It’s something that pleases me more than anything else, for the hope of making a difference is the main reason for having started Brain Waves. And what makes the decision even more difficult is that I have truly enjoyed what I have been doing with Brain Waves which to me is a unique newsletter.

Difference
     Speaking of making a difference, have you seen the movie Radio? The movie is based on true story. It is starred by Cuba Gooding, Jr. as Radio, and Ed Harris as a great football coach a town in South Carolina could not live without. This movie could tear all your emotions apart, scatter and shuffle them. But what I want to point out in this movie is Ed Harris’ stubborn determination. All Harris ever wanted was to pursue what he believed in and make a difference in just one person – a mentally-retarded young man who loves radio and thus was called Radio. Because Radio is not only mentally-retarded but also black in a school whose students are almost all white, understandably Harris had to put up with people who did not like, much less approve what he was doing. But Harris was not discouraged, let alone deterred by any of the distractions, sneers, threats, and even the possibility of losing his job. Boy, what a difference did he make in that poor mentally-retarded young man who later on became the most beloved and admired football coach of the school.

     I believe that the main reason why many of us fail to pursue what we believe in to make a difference even if we have the desire and the time to do it, is because we could not resist equating our time and efforts with the number of persons whom we may be able to make a difference and the number of people who would appreciate our endeavor. We focus on the maximum number and get readily turned off before we could even begin because we succumb too easily to the negative idea that it’s not worth it particularly if nobody is supportive with what we plan to do.

    As we begin to consider that there may only be one or two persons who would be affected by our endeavor, our attention is shifted to the many who would not even acknowledge, let alone appreciate what we are doing, and the many more who would watch and wait for us to make a blunder or a slight on their sensitivity so they can jump on us and justify their cynism and negativism. Thus we almost always end up putting off doing what we believe in. And without even trying, we conclude that it’s not really worth it. It’s sad for the one or the two who could have benefited from what we could have done, all because of the mathematical equation that readily gets in our way in our pursuit of what we believe in - of making a difference.

     This reminds me of the story of a boy who, one morning went to the beach and was astonished to find so many starfish all over the beach. He thought for a moment and then he started picking up the starfish one by one and threw them back into the water. A man saw him and asked what he was doing. The boy told him that the starfish needed to get back to the water, or they'll die. Seeing the so many starfish scattered all over the beach, the man told the boy that he is wasting his time and that whatever he is doing would not make any difference because there are too many starfish. It would take him weeks and even months, and by that time, the starfish would all be dead anyway. The boy picked up another starfish, threw it back into the water and said: "It would certainly make a difference in that one starfish." The man was struck by the boy’s response. He started picking up the starfish and did what the boy was doing.

Devotion
     At one time, Mother Theresa was asked by a reporter how could she bear to go on working at such a hopeless task day after day and year after year. As we know, the people Mother Theresa cared for were wretchedly poor, and many of them were very sick. I believe that years before she died, Mother Theresa was also taking care of people with terminal AIDS disease. It was not hard for many people to wonder how could she continue with such dedication, knowing that all the poverty and sickness will still be there long after she's dead. Didn't she realize she couldn't win? Mother Theresa's explanation was simple: Of course she knows the task is immense, but "finishing" isn't her purpose. Her work is what she believes to be God's will for her, and so, she devoted to the task itself, not the completion of it. Then she said: "God hasn't called me to be successful. He called me to be faithful."

    Well, writing for and publishing Brain Waves were originally my idea of nothing to do. I had been devoted to it because I had more free time and I thought I could use my time to do something different, something that would energize the spirit, something that could add dimension to life and put color, shape and substance to who we are. I thought that by sharing my thoughts, philosophies and experiences and expressing them as creatively as I could, I would be expanding my own horizon and at the same time offering light to those who are interested in another ways of seeing things.

    The practice of medicine that is basically the same every day of my professional life had started to lead me to dullness, and I began to realize that dullness would soon lead to boredom, and boredom would lead to an unfulfilling or unrewarding life. I did not want to get stuck in sameness, because when we get so used to the way things are in our life, maintaining the status quo would only become far more important than learning and growing by seeking something new or different, or seeking some kind of intellectual endeavor and spiritual adventure.

Boredom and creativity
     Boredom is the worse enemy of life and it comes to us sooner or later unless we channel our energy into doing something challenging if not enjoyable, or something different and interesting in order to nourish the vital part of our life and keep life's spark and sparkle as well as its glow and glitter. Boredom weakens our spirit and makes our outlook on life lose sight of the good, and we begin to behave as though we see only the bad. As our spirit weakens and wanes, our negative and troublesome attitudes and behaviors would take over and dominate. We’d lose our enthusiasm and excitement for living. Instead of young at heart that we’d rather feel, we’d feel our age in years. As a result, we’d live out the rest of our life in much the same way as we have lived out the years that have already passed – unfulfilling or unrewarding.

     Nevertheless, it was the hope and prospect of making a difference that motivated me to write. It has stimulated and enhanced my creativity. Creativity is an important force in our lives that makes us live our life fully, that makes life more rewarding and fulfilling. It’s the stuff that dreams are made of. It makes you do your best and makes you feel that whatever you do, you want it to be a benefit, not a liability.

     There are many ways of helping others and of making a difference, and many of the good ways would require not just time and efforts but also money. Since money is something that I have been chronically short of, I thought that writing and publishing Brain Waves the way it has been uniquely structured would also be one of the good ways.

    Thus much like Julia Roberts in the movie Mona Lisa Smile who, as an art teacher in a most prestigious school in the New England area, was not motivated to keep her teaching position but to make a difference, I, too, have not cared about the mathematical equation of winning and losing anyone’s approval and appreciation, but about the prospect of making a difference. To me, if I could make a difference in just one person, it would be worth it. And anyone else over one is a bonus.

A shift in priority
     Particularly in someone like me with children that aren't yet capable of making on their own, priority changes and thus devotion has to shift to another priority. As you must have known from the January issue, I have so many things that I need to do these days both personally and for my family. I have family priorities to press and push and to devote my time on at least temporarily. I've been taking extra calls to make extra money, not out of choice, but out of necessity. Also, I've been taking college courses a couple of nights a week and a weekend a month although they're mostly done online or through the Internet. I just want to keep educating myself with different kinds of knowledge. It helps me maintain a positive outlook on life.

    Continuous learning helps us stay young, or at least makes us feel young. When you feel like a beginner in things you want to learn, it opens new doors for humility and it cleanses your ego rather than massages it. You learn to look carefully to find wisdom that actually comes in all shapes and forms. It makes you realize that many of your most important teachers are actually those to whom you came to feel superior. I've learned so many practical things in life from our housekeeping employees, nursing aides, technicians, electricians, etc. The more you acquire knowledge of different kinds, the more open-minded you become, and the less pretentious you are of things you are ignorant of. Your biases and prejudices no longer easily find their way to your inbox, but stay in the trash of your mind.

     Taking college courses or adult education is a lot cheaper hobby than going out taking lessons in sports like golf, for example. It's something I can definitely afford and am enthusiastic about. It beats watching TV anytime. Also, it's challenging to me at my age having to compete with college kids. Youth has the quickness that age must compensate in mental sharpness. We all will lose our quickness at least part of it as we age so that if we don't stay sharp, what do we have left in our old age? A shaky slow body and a dull and confused mind.

     Because of the change in priorities, I could no longer have the optimum mental condition and time to do my best for Brain Waves. I certainly don't want to give our dear readers anything less than the best.

Gratitude
     Again, thank you all so much for reading Brain Waves. If you change your e-mail address, it would be great if you keep me posted.

     My special thanks to the staff of Brain Waves and to its contributors, previous and present. I hope you did not mind that I didn't ask anyone of you to send your article contribution on a certain date or on a regular basis and for a certain edition. It's not my style to put pressure on anyone for something that is completely voluntary. I have absolutely no right to ask or even request, let alone demand to use even a minute of your time for Brain Waves. I may have accepted and published whatever articles you have sent, but I believe I have never asked you to promise to contribute more, because for someone with your integrity, a promise could only become a pressure since you would have to keep whatever promise you make. Hopefully, we can work together again in the future.

     Emmanuel Swedenborg said: “Love consists in desiring to give what is our own to another and feeling his delight as our own.” Believe it or not, I love you all, unconditionally!

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