Today I am going to borrow from a man that has been responsible for bringing a significant joy to my life. Whether large or small, no matter the color (I prefer brown actually) teddy bears have played a key role in my happiness.
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| From left to right: Little Lion, Teddy Bar and Teddy Bunny. |
At age 46 I still sleep with teddy bears, take them on business trips, my honeymoon, on our cruise, to my mothers when we visit (but I have back up teddy bears there). When I die, I want to be buried with my favorite teddy bear rapped in my arms (perhaps a little Egyptian there but no cats will die, no soldiers entombed, just the bear)---and currently that role would fall to "Teddy Bar". Originally he was a gift to my youngest from his grandparents. Sensitive to his allergies, they bought him an "allergy" bear that could be washed a million times to reduce the dust and dust mites. My son was a year old and thought the bear was cute, but as kids do, he latched on to another stuffed toy----a gift from a friend upon meeting him--- "Little Lion"(you can see my son was not big on naming his stuffed friends as anything else than what they were) as his favorite a year or so after receiving him. So "Teddy Bar" became mine.
Below is a quote from Teddy Rosevelt---an excerpt from the speech "Citizenship In a Republic" delivered at the Sorbonne, in Paris, France 23 of April, 1910. It is commonly referred to as "The Man in the Arena" and is one of the things that inspired Brene Brown's book "Daring Greatly".
"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man
stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit
belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by
dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short
again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but
who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the
great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best
knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he
fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with
those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."
Lessons I take from this:
Every day, showing up as your perfectly imperfect self counts
Every day, acknowledge you are doing your best in a world that is imperfect
You will make mistakes--you are not perfect and neither is anyone else.
Failure does not define you. Do not let what you can't do stop you from doing what you can
Every day, giving your best effort is enough
Every day, there may be someone who judges you - let them - just don't judge yourself
Continuing to try at something that matters means more chance of joy, learning, and success
Trying and failing is better than not trying at all
I wonder if everyone would see it this way?
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