Here’s a poem I found called “Staying Young“:

I’ve something to say to you older folks, and you young folks listen too,
For what I’m about to say, will some day apply to you.

I know that some of you older folks are happily retired,
And have no ties to bind you, and work is no longer required.

So you’re sitting around in idleness, each day becomes a bore,
You’re beginning to start thinking, there’s nothing worth living for.

You’d like to be in some business, but think it’s too late to begin,
Well, I’ll tell you about a business, that all of you can be in.

Be in the business of staying young, make staying young a career,
Don’t live in the past; plan a future: look forward to each added year.

Don’t sit around and sigh, and let the world pass you by,
Get with it, and stay with it, all you have to do is to try.

Be willing to forget yourself, for at least once in awhile,
Place yourself second, and cause someone else to smile.

Kindness pays a thousand fold, this fact is more than true,
Try doing a favor here and there, and it will work for you.

Be willing to admit mistakes, humility is always grand,
The humble people are the ones that need a helping hand.

Be willing to work for what is right however rough the way,
For in the end the righteous always have the final say.

This life can be wonderful, tender and thrilling,
You can always find happiness, that is if you’re willing.

There’s a place for you in this world, work that needs to be done,
So make up your mind you’re not too old to try to help someone.

I’ve been in the business of staying young since I hit the fifty mark,
And it’s a wonderful business, in which all of us can embark.

It gives you that happy feeling of starting your life anew,
But like any other business, it requires time and attention too!

So be in the business of staying young, and the heights of joy you will reach,
Make staying young your new career, and practice what you preach.

Age can be a frightening thing, if you let yourself fear it…
You can’t help being up in years, but needn’t be down in spirit.

Take pride in your appearance, always look up to par,
It’s a way of making others forget just how old you are.

I know I’m not indestructible, time is taking it’s toll,
But I have a goal to reach, and I know I’m not too old.

So get busy and be useful each day of your life on this earth
With your talents and your efforts, find a way to prove your worth.

And be grateful that you’re living in a world of youth today,
And you, too, can be youthful, if you think and live that way.

Always be serene and gentle: if in this life things don’t go your way,
Turn your left cheek, and be happy, to the unkind words that people say.

God has given us all a cross to bear, but first he measured us and found,
That when we reach the portals, He will exchange our cross for a crown.

It’s there we’ll meet our loved ones that have gone on before,
It’s there we’ll wear the robes of white, and dwell forevermore.

So let us live from day to day, while here upon this earth,
To do someone a golden deed, and our duty let us not shirk.

God will keep us strong and healthy, if in His hands we place our life,
We’re living in a world that needs us, though it’s filled with envy, sin and strife.

Let’s help make it a better place, so all can plainly see,
That each hour we spend here, is part of our eternity.

-Author unknown

In case you didn’t see the email, I caved to peer pressure and started a SECOND *new* thought of the day email list, just like the old one.

By now you’ve noticed that THIS email (if you’re getting this via an RSS email) looks very different from my usual old “Aspire Higher Thought-of-the-Day” email.

Well, some people don’t like this format…or expressed that they had trouble signing up for it.  Well, just so you know, I HAVE actually closed the OLD email, along with the 35,000 subscribers that were on it.  Why did I close it?  It was getting too expensive….

But like I said above, I started a nice new one from scratch.   (it’s cheaper this way…plus, now I know the people who really love me!)  A few of you have already subscribed to it.  Now it’s your turn.

There are 2 ways to sign up:

1. Go to one of my older pages like this greatness quotes page and scroll to the bottom, then fill out the form.
2. You can send a blank email to sayingsdaily @ aweber . com (I wrote it like that to stop bots from signing up for it) BUT be ready for a confirmation email to come to you.  You’ll have to click the link in that email.

Sound good?

See you on the other side!

-Shawn

PS: in case you’re wondering, only about 4000 of you signed up for this since I started pushing it.  4000 out of the original 35,000 isn’t great, but I expected those numbers.  Of course, I’d rather talk to 4000 people who WANT TO HEAR FROM ME, than to continue sending out emails to 31,000 others who don’t even know who I am…!

Here’s a few good quotes I’ve shared on FB in the last week:

• A human being is happiest and most successful when dedicated to a cause outside his own individual, selfish satisfaction. -Benjamin Spock

• Hope sees the invisible, feels the intangible, and achieves the impossible. -Charles Caleb Colton

• If you can still read this, you still have a chance! -Ronny M. Cole

• Humility is like underwear; essential, but indecent if it shows. -Helen Nielsen  (I like this one)

• It is the around-the-corner brand of hope that prompts people to action, while the distant hope acts as an opiate. -Eric Hoffer

• Men & women are limited not by the place of their birth, not by the color of their skin, but by the size of their hope. -John Johnson

• The hopeful man sees success where others see failure, sunshine where others see shadows and storm. -Orison Swett Marden

• There is no medicine like hope, no incentive so great, and no tonic so powerful as expectation of something tomorrow. -OS Marden

• Let your hopes, not your hurts, shape your future. -Robert Schuller

• Hope is the companion of power, and mother of success; for who so hopes strongly has within him the gift of miracles. -S Smiles

Which ones do you like the most?  Please write your comments below.

Here’s a few of the quotes that’s I’ve shared in the last few days on FB and Twitter:

• There is clearly much left to be done, and whatever else we are going to do, we had better get on with it. -Rosalynn Carter

• If you’re in a good profession, it’s hard to get bored, because you’re never finished…there will always be work you haven’t done. -J Child

• The only thing that separates successful people from the ones who aren’t is the willingness to work very, very hard. -Helen Gurley Brown

• Maxim for life: You get treated in life the way you teach people to treat you. -Wayne Dyer

• The actions of men are the best interpreters of their thoughts. -John Locke

• If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it. -Marcus Aurelius

• I realized that with hard work, the world was your oyster. You could do anything you wanted to do. I learned that at a young age. -C Evert

• There is a wild, splendid, intoxicating joy that follows work well done. -Elbert Hubbard (1859-1915)

Hope you liked some of them.  Have a great weekend!  Me, I have to mow the lawn, move a piano, etc, etc.

BTW, I also updated the Experience Quotes page and the Genius Quotes page.  Please check them out.

Here are some of the latest quotes I’ve shared this week on Facebook and Twitter:

• If I am anything, which I highly doubt, I have made myself so by hard work. -Sir Isaac Newton

• Whoever looks for easy work goes to bed very tired. -Yiddish Proverb

• The only way to enjoy anything in this life is to earn it first. -Ginger Rogers

• By working hard, you get to play hard, guilt-free. -Jim Rohn

• I believe in hard work. It keeps the wrinkles out of the mind and spirit. -Helena Rubinstein

• Hard work beats all the tonics and vitamins in the world. -Col. Sanders

• When I was a young man I observed that 9 out of 10 things I did were failures. I didn’t want to be a failure, so I did 10x more work. -Shaw

Have a great day!

If you catch yourself doing too much, these Focus Quotes might help to get you focussed like a laser again:

• No steam or gas drives anything until it is confined. No life ever grows great until it is focused, dedicated, disciplined. -Harry Emerson Fosdick

• Decide upon your major definite purpose in life and then organize all your activities around it. -Brian Tracy

• You are more likely to acquire power by narrowing your focus and applying your energies, like the sun’s rays, to a limited range of activities in a small number of domains. -Jeffrey Pfeffer

• Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand. The sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus. -Alexander Graham Bell

• The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook. -William James

• Every year of my life I grow more convinced that it is wisest and best to fix our attention on the beautiful and the good, and dwell as little as possible on the evil and the false. -Richard Cecil

• Nothing can add more power to your life than concentrating all your energies on a limited set of targets. -Nido Qubein

• Only when your consciousness is totally focused on the moment you are in can you receive whatever gift, lesson, or delight that moment has to offer.-Barbara De Angelis

• Do the hard jobs first. The easy jobs will take care of themselves. -Dale Carnegie

• Don’t aim for success if you want it; just do what you love and believe in, and it will come naturally. -David Frost

• Most people have no idea of the giant capacity we can immediately command when we focus all of our resources on mastering a single area of our lives -Tony Robbins

• Nothing focuses the mind better than the constant sight of a competitor who wants to wipe you off the map. -Wayne Calloway

• Only when your consciousness is totally focused on the moment you are in can you receive whatever gift, lesson, or delight that moment has to offer. -Barbara De Angelis

If you’re looking for a different topic, you can find the main big page of quotes here.

• Presence is more than just being there. -Malcolm S. Forbes (1919-1990)

• A person who is gifted sees the essential point and leaves the rest as surplus. -Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881)

• If you focus on results, you will never change. If you focus on change, you will get results. -Jack Dixon

• Rather than viewing a brief relapse back to inactivity as a failure, treat it as a challenge and try to get back on track as soon as possible. -Jimmy Connors

• Determine what specific goal you want to achieve. Then dedicate yourself to its attainment with unswerving singleness of purpose, the trenchant zeal of a crusader. -Paul J. Meyer

• If you surrender completely to the moments as they pass, you live more richly those moments. -Anne Morrow Lindbergh (1906-2001)

• Slow down and enjoy life. It’s not only the scenery you miss by going too fast; you also miss the sense of where you are going and why. -Eddie Cantor (1892-1964)

• The future must be seen in terms of what a person can do to contribute something, to make something better, to make it go where he believes with all his being it ought to go. -Frederick R. Kappel

• One reason so few of us achieve what we truly want is that we never direct our focus; we never concentrate our power. Most people dabble their way through life, never deciding to master anything in particular. -Tony Robbins

• If you chase two hares at the same time, you will catch neither of them. -Ukrainian Proverb

• What I focus on in life is what I get. And if I concentrate on how bad I am or how wrong I am or how inadequate I am, if I concentrate on what I can’t do and how there’s not enough time in which to do it, isn’t that what I get every time? And when I think about how powerful I am, and when I think about what I have left to contribute, and when I think about the difference I can make on this planet, then that’s what I get. You see, I recognize that it’s not what happens to you; it’s what you do about it. -W. Mitchell

• The shortest way to do many things is to do only one thing at a time. -Sydney Smiles

• Most people have no idea of the giant capacity we can immediately command when we focus all of our resources on mastering a single area of our lives. -Anthony Robbins

• To me, the definition of focus is knowing exactly where you want to be today, next week, next month, next year, then never deviating from your plan. Once you can see, touch and feel your objective, all you have to do is pull back and put all your strength behind it, and you’ll hit your target every time. -Bruce Jenner

• Don’t dissipate your powers; strive to concentrate them. Genius thinks it can do whatever it sees others doing, but it will surely repent of every ill-judged outlay. -Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749-1832)

• If you try to do too much, you will not achieve anything. -Confucius (BC551-479)

Sometimes we get wrapped up in way too many things in life.  Our very happiness and success depend on being able to weed out the non-essentials and focus on a few key aspects of life.  Which of these Focus Quotes do you like the most?  Please share your comments below.

We all need to grow and progress.  If we don’t, we’re simply not happy. We need to be striving for some great goal, which is why I decided to share these “Growth Quotes”.  Enjoy:

• Growth means change and change involves risk, stepping from the known to the unknown. -George Shinn

• We find comfort among those who agree with us — growth among those who don’t. -Frank A. Clark

• Unless you try to do something beyond what you have mastered, you will never grow. -Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)

• Close scrutiny will show that most “crisis situations” are opportunities to either advance, or stay where you are. -Maxwell Maltz

• One can choose to go back toward safety or forward toward growth. Growth must be chosen again and again; fear must be overcome again and again. -Abraham H. Maslow (1908-1970)

• Good timber does not grow with ease. The stronger the wind the stronger the trees. -Willard J. Marriott (1900-1985)

• We grow a little every time we do not take advantage of somebody’s weakness. -Bern Williams

• Only by contending with challenges that seem to be beyond your strength to handle at the moment you can grow more surely toward the stars. -Brian Tracy

• The perfecting of one’s self is the fundamental base of all progress and all moral development. -Confucius (BC551-479)

• Don’t go through life, grow through life. -Eric Butterworth

• I don’t know what it’s like for a book writer or a doctor or a teacher as they work to get established in their jobs, but for a singer, you’ve got to continue to grow or else you’re just like last night’s cornbread…stale and dry. -Loretta Lynn

• Ever since I was a child I have had this instinctive urge for expansion and growth. To me, the function and duty of a quality human being is the sincere and honest development of one’s potential. -Bruce Lee (1940-1973)

• All growth is a leap in the dark, a spontaneous, unpremeditated act without benefit of experience. -Henry Miller (1891-1980)

• The sculptor will chip off all unnecessary material to set free the angel. Nature will chip and pound us remorselessly to bring out our possibilities. She will strip us of wealth, humble our pride, humiliate our ambition, let us down from the ladder of fame, will discipline us in a thousand ways, if she can develop a little character. Everything must give way to that. Wealth is nothing, position is nothing, fame is nothing, manhood is everything. -Orison Swett Marden (1850-1924)

• We need 4 hugs a day for survival. We need 8 hugs a day for maintenance. We need 12 hugs a day for growth. -Virginia Satir (1916-1988)

• The growth of affluence, the growth of education, has led to a shortage of morons. -Leonard Neal

• Progress has not followed a straight ascending line, but a spiral with rhythms of progress and retrogression, of evolution and dissolution. -Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749-1832)

• All growth depends upon activity. There is no development physically or intellectually without effort, and effort means work. -Calvin Coolidge (1872-1933)

That’s all I could find.  Do you have any growth quotes you could share?  Please leave them in the comments section below.