World Digital Library

This is an incredible free resource made available by the Library of Congress, the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and partner libraries, archives, and educational and cultural institutions from the United States and around the world. The project brings together on a single website rare and unique documents – books, journals, manuscripts, maps, prints and photographs, films, and sound recordings – that tell the story of the world’s cultures. The site is intended for general users, students, teachers, and scholars.

Click here to enjoy this magnificent resource.

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Give up your birthday

Here's a new way to celebrate your birthday: Donate it! Helping others is one of the best ways I have found to feel good about me. How about using YOUR birthday to MAKE other people's day? Check this out. Type rest of the post here

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Wisdom from a 90 year old woman

Written by Regina Brett, 90 years old, of The Plain Dealer, Cleveland, Ohio.

"To celebrate growing older, I once wrote the 45 lessons life taught me. It is the most-requested column I've ever written. My odometer rolled over to 90 in August, so here is the column one more time."

1. Life isn't fair, but it is still good.

2. When in doubt, just take the next small step.


3. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.

4. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and family will. Stay in touch...

5. Pay off your credit cards every month.

6. You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

7. Cry with someone. It's more healing than crying alone.

8. It's OK to get angry with God. He can take it.

9. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.

10. When it come to chocolate, resistance is futile.

11. Make peace with your past so it won't screw up your future.

12. It's OK to let your children see you cry.

13. Don't compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.

14. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn't be in it.

15. Everything can change in the blink of an eye. But don't worry; God never blinks.

16. Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.

17. Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful or joyful.

18. Whatever doesn't kill you really does make you stronger.

19. It's never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.

20. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.

21. Burn the candles, use nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don't save it for a special occasion. Today is special.

22. Over prepare, then go with the flow.

23. Be eccentric now. Don't wait for old age to wear purple.

24. The most important sex organ is the brain.

25. No one is in charge of your happiness but you.

26. Frame every so-called disaster with these words "In five years, will this matter?"

27. Always choose life.

28. Forgive everyone for everything.

29. What other people think of you is none of your business.

30. Time heals almost everything. Give time time.

31. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

32. Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

33. Believe in miracles.

34. God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn't do.

35. Don't audit life...Show up and make the most of it now.

36. Growing old beats the alternative -- dying young.

37. Your children get only one childhood.

38. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.

39. Get outside everyday. Miracles are waiting everywhere.

40. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else's, we'd grab ours back.

41. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.

42. The best is yet to come.

43. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.

44. Yield.

45. Life isn't tied with a bow, but it's still a gift.

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Give a dollar. Tell two people. Save many lives!

Back in 2007 I did a podcast with Azim Khamisa where he shared his remarkable story of how he turned a horrifying experience into a beautiful mission. Please read below and contribute your dollar as well as play the chain game. It is a very worthwhile cause.

Do YOU want to play the
TKF Chain Game?
Date:
January 1, 2010 - December 31, 2010

Goal:
Raise awareness among 1 milllion people and reach $1 million to help fund TKF's effective violence prevention programs, evaluations and research.

Questions:
Email us at: info@tkf.org
View: www.stopkidsfromkillingkids.org

___________________________________________

Remember the Chain Game?
We need to start a chain reaction to save the
valuable lives of our youth– will you help?

16 young people are murdered on average each day in the
United States* to violence.
We are tired of the senseless violence against our youth;
they deserve more from us than this.

Please reach out and make a dollar donation, THEN ask two others to do the same and THEN have them
continue this chain reaction.

Together, with your help, we can reach our goal and create a
more peaceful existence for our youth and communities.


*Childrens Defense Fund- Oct 2007

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The power of context

This is a great example of how context has a lot to do with the meaning of words. Without changing a single word, you will get an entirely different message during the first part of the video and the second one.

A palindrome reads the same backwards as forward. This video reads the
exact opposite backwards as forward. Not only does it read the
opposite, the meaning is the exact opposite.

This is only a 1 minute, 44 second video and it is brilliant. Make
sure you read as well as listen…forward and backward.

This is a video that was submitted in a contest by a 20-year old.
The contest was titled "u @ 50" by AARP. This video won second
place. When they showed it, everyone in the room was awe-struck and
broke into spontaneous applause. So simple and yet so brilliant. Take
a minute and watch it.

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Change is good

I received this short (3 minutes) slide presentation that I think you will enjoy. It has some great quotes and is very uplifting. Click here to enjoy.

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Japanese Rice Fields - Amazing art

Stunning crop art has sprung up across rice fields in Japan. But this is no alien creation - the designs have been cleverly planted.

Farmers creating the huge displays use no ink or dye. Instead, different colors of rice plants have been precisely and strategically arranged and grown in the paddy fields.

As summer progresses and the plants shoot up, the detailed artwork begins to emerge.

A Sengoku warrior on horseback has been created from hundreds of thousands of rice plants, the colors created by using different varieties, in Inakadate in Japan The largest and finest work is grown in the Aomori village of Inakadate, 600 miles north of Toyko, where the tradition began in 1993.

The village has now earned a reputation for its agricultural artistry and this year the enormous pictures of Napoleon and a Sengoku-period warrior, both on horseback, are visible in a pair of fields adjacent to the town hall.

More than 150,000 visitors come to Inakadate, where just 8,700 people live, every summer to see the extraordinary murals. Each year hundreds of volunteers and villagers plant four different varieties of rice in late May across huge swathes of paddy fields.



Napoleon on horseback can be seen from the skies, created by precision planting and months of planning between villagers and farmers in Inkadate

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Photographs from Patrick Notly

Remember that this fellow has Autism. What a beautiful way to communicate

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Enjoy the ride; there is no return ticket!

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Another powerful message from the late George Carlin. Enjoy!

George Carlin's Views on Aging
Do you realize that the only time in our lives when we like to get old is when we're kids? If you're less than 10 years old, you're so excited about aging that you think in fractions.

'How old are you?' 'I'm four and a half!' You're never thirty-six and a half. You're four and a half, going on five! That's the key.

You get into your teens, now they can't hold you back. You jump to the next number, or even a few ahead.

'How old are you?' 'I'm gonna be 16!' You could be 13, but hey, you're gonna be 16! And then the greatest day of your life! You become 21. Even the words sound like a ceremony. YOU BECOME 21. YESSSS!!!

But then you turn 30. Ooooh, what happened there? Makes you sound like bad milk! He TURNED; we had to throw him out. There's no fun now, you're Just a sour-dumpling. What's wrong? What's changed?

You BECOME 21, you TURN 30, then you're PUSHING 40. Whoa! Put on the brakes, it's all slipping away. Before you know it, you REACH 50 and your dreams are gone.

But wait!!! You MAKE it to 60. You didn't think you would!

So you BECOME 21, TURN 30, PUSH 40, REACH 50 and MAKE it to 60.

You've built up so much speed that you HIT 70! After that it's a day-by-day thing; you HIT Wednesday!

You get into your 80's and every day is a complete cycle; you HIT lunch; you TURN 4:30; you REACH bedtime. And it doesn't end there. Into the 90s, you start going backwards; 'I Was JUST92.'

Then a strange thing happens. If you make it over 100, you become a little kid again. 'I'm 100 and a half!'
May you all make it to a healthy 100 and a half!!

HOW TO STAY YOUNG
1. Throw out nonessential numbers. This includes age, weight and height. Let the doctors worry about them. That is why you pay 'them.'

2. Keep only cheerful friends. The grouches pull you down.

3. Keep learning. Learn more about the computer, crafts, gardening, whatever, even ham radio. Never let the brain idle. 'An idle mind is the devil's workshop.' And the devil's name is Alzheimer's.

4. Enjoy the simple things.

5. Laugh often, long and loud. Laugh until you gasp for breath.

6. The tears happen. Endure, grieve, and move on. The only person, who is with us our entire life, is ourselves. Be ALIVE while you are alive.

7. Surround yourself with what you love , whether it's family, pets, keepsakes, music, plants, hobbies, whatever. Your home is your refuge.

8. Cherish your health: If it is good, preserve it. If it is unstable, improve it. If it is beyond what you can improve, get help.

9. Don't take guilt trips. Take a trip to the mall, even to the next county; to a foreign country but NOT to where the guilt is.

10. Tell the people you love that you love them, at every opportunity.

AND ALWAYS REMEMBER:

"Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take your breath away."

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More Amazing Photographs from Patrick Notly

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The power of the Elbs

I was recently struggling with a task when I received a wonderful article. Rather than paraphrase it, I decided to post it here for your enjoyment. The article is by Roy H. Williams, The Wizard of Ads. Hope you find it as useful as I did.

Makers of miracles have magical little helpers. Is there a miracle you'd like to make?

Would you like to learn the magic of the elbs?

Elbs are Exponential Little Bits, tiny but relentless changes that compound to make a miracle. The power of an elb lies not in its size, but in its daily occurrence. For an elb to work its Exponential magic, the Little Bit must happen every day... every day... every day.

Every day.

Funny thing... When daily progress meets with progress, it doesn't add, it multiplies. To harness the magic of Exponential Little Bits you must learn to ask yourself, "What difference have I made today?" And never go to sleep until you have done a Little Bit to move yourself closer to your goal. But you must do a Little Bit every day, no matter how tiny the thing might be.

Exponential Little Bits work both ways. They can lift you up or hold you down. There is much power in the ELBs.

Start with a dollar. Double it every day for just 20 days and you'll have 2,097,150 dollars. But if you diminish each day's total by just 10 percent (a Little Bit) before the next day's doubling, you'll amass only 793,564 dollars. Diminish each day's doubling by 35 percent and you'll have only 56,784 dollars - a holdback of 95.83 percent.

There's a line in Robert Frost's "Mending Wall" that says, "Something there is that doesn't love a wall, that wants it down! I could say 'Elves' to him, but it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather he said it for himself."

Is there a wall between you and your miracle?

I could say how to bring it down.

But I'd rather you said it for yourself.

Roy H. Williams

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Free directory assistance calls from Google

Image via Wikipedia

Here's a number worth putting in your cell phone, or your home phone speed dial: 1-800-goog411 (1-800-466-4411.) This is an awesome service from Google, and it's free -- great when you are driving on the road with no pen, pencil or paper handy.

Don't waste your money on information calls and don't waste your time manually dialing the number. I am driving along in my car and I need to call the golf course and I don't know the number. I hit the speed dial for information that I have programmed.

The voice at the other end says, "City & State." I say, " Garland , Texas ." He says, "Business, Name or Type of Service." I say, Firewheel Golf Course." He says, "Connecting" and Firewheel answers the phone. How great is that? This is nationwide and it is absolutely free!

Click on the link below and watch the short clip for a quick demonstration.

http://www.google.com/goog411

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Amazing photography by Patrick Notly

Patrick Notly is a German photographer who happens to be Autistic. Below are some of his amazing pictures. I will be sharing more in the future. Enjoy!

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You can't judge a book by its cover

Click on this link to watch proof that you can get unexpected performances from unlikely sources. Enjoy!

Technorati Tags: Susan boyle, Xtraordinary Living, Amazing Performances, Xtraordinary Living, www.productivelearning.com, Rick Itzkowich

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Four finger pianist

Impressive mother/daughter duo


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How to fail successfully!

Excellent 30 second video to reframe failure.



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It's never too late

One of the few things I regret in my life is that I never fully went after my dream of playing professional baseball. I've always regretted this because I never knew what might have been had I gone after this dream. Well, after watching this short 3-minute video, I may finally have a chance to find out.


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Adversity creates heroes - Picaboo Street

Tiger Woods II? Kyle Lograsso is an amazing talent with an amazing story. Enjoy


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Practicing Silence

Image via Wikipedia

Has your cell phone gone off at an inappropriate time? The following tip came from CoolPeopleCare. There's nothing more distracting than an ill-timed 10-second rendition of Fur Elise or Hakuna Matata. But how can you remember to turn your cell off when attending an important meeting, lecture or funeral?

The answer is PRACTICE.

Try it out. Walk in and out of your building 10 times tomorrow. (Yes, we're serious.) Each time, take your phone out and silence it before you take another step. Soon enough, you'll develop a very beneficial nervous habit. That way, the next time you're somewhere else (like a movie, wedding or trial), you won't be able to take another step until your mobile is quiet.

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Ready for an interesting challenge?

Seeking to make some simple lifestyle changes by giving something away for 29 days, Cami Walker soon started a revolution. Check out the 29 day of giving challenge.

I've taken the challenge. Will you?

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