Wisdom and Warmth from Charles Schulz

(This is marvelous!!  Scroll thru slowly and read the entire e-mail carefully.)

The following is the philosophy of Charles Schulz, the creator of the ‘Peanuts’ comic strip.

You don’t have to actually answer the questions.

Just read the e-mail straight through, and you’ll get the point.

1. Name the five wealthiest people in the world.

2. Name the last five Heisman trophy winners.

3. Name the last five winners of the Miss America pageant.

4. Name ten people who have won the Nobel or Pulitzer Prize.

5. Name the last half dozen Academy Award winners for best actor and actress.

6. Name the last decade’s worth of World Series winners.

How did you do?

The point is , none of us remember the headliners of yesterday.

These are no second-rate achievers.

They are the best in their fields.

But the applause dies..

Awards tarnish.

Achievements are forgotten.

Accolades and certificates are buried with their owners.

Here’s another quiz. See how you do on this one:

1. List a few teachers who aided your journey through school.

2. Name three friends who have helped you through a difficult time.

3. Name five people who have taught you something worthwhile.

4. Think of a few people who have made you feel appreciated and special!!

5. Think of five people you enjoy spending time with.

Easier?

The lesson:

The people who make a difference in your life are not the ones with the most credentials..

the most money…or the most awards.

They simply are the ones who care the most.

Pass this on to those people who have made a difference in your life, like I did.

‘Don’t worry about the world coming to an end today. It’s already tomorrow in Australia !’

”Be Yourself. Everyone Else Is Taken!’

I remember the week that Charles Schulz died for two reasons. First of all, it was the very week he wrote his final strip. He “retired,” and then left us.

Yet the second reason I remember his death was because it occurred the exact same week as another legend and all around good man. Dallas Cowboys Coach Tom Landry roamed the sidelines from 1960 through 1989. A deeply religious man, he inspired many.

One of the gentlest and most heartwarming cartoons I have read in a newspaper involved these two men. Tom Landry and Charles Schulz had their backs toward us, getting ready to enter heaven. Tom Landry was wearing his famous fedora, while Charles Schulz was wearing the Charlie Brown t-shirt with the wavy lines. Landry has his arm around Schulz and says to him, “Chuck, it’s time I showed you a thing or two about kicking a football.”

What Tom Landry and Charles Schulz both taught people over their decades behind the bench and the comic strip was that every human being had dignity.

Tom Landry at one point was the Charlie Brown of coaching. He “couldn’t win the big one.”

Coach Landry finished with a pair of Super Bowl rings. He did it the right way, always maintaining his integrity.

Charles Schulz never compromised his integrity with his comic strip. Charlie Brown lost with honor. There was no cheating.

They both left a legacy, and are still influencing people today.

Somewhere up in heaven, they are watching games during the season. Charles Schulz must be better at football now, with Tom Landry teaching fundamentals.

That is all life is about…the fundamentals.

When we get those right, the rest falls into place.

eric

6 Responses to “Wisdom and Warmth from Charles Schulz”

  1. Micky 2 says:

    Everytime I hear Charlie Browns teacher speak I think of Arianna Huffington.

    And yes, you’re right, it was Neil Abercrombie when he had almost no credentials smoking a joint with me and my dad when I was 16 that had a serious impact on my life.
    That was the beggining of a long hard ride thru liberalism that damn near killed me.
    And it was all those ordinary everyday Americans that died on 911 that finally brought me to conservatism.

  2. No way! You smoked a joint with Abercrombie??? I love that guy!

    I think the lesson here is that we are all products of our environment. And that gets to something I think libertarians and conservatives just don’t seem to understand – life really is about half just plain ol’ stupid luck. And it starts at the very beginning – You don’t choose to whom you’re born. If your parents are idiots, there’s a good chance that you’ll be an idiot. If your parents are compassionate, there’s a good chance that you’ll be compassionate. This has nothing to do with genes, but rather this is because they are the most important factors in your personal development into adulthood. The people that impact us the most are the people who, usually just by pure chance, we are exposed to as we grow up – family, extended family, neighbors, teachers, clergy, authorities, etc. We do not choose this. We are born to an immediate family that is a part of a the broader family of community, with neighbors and schools and churches and police and so forth. The ol’ “it takes a village” is not a philsophy – it is a fact. If you are isolated from that “village” as you develope, if anything, you will probably be unable to function within one later. That is a the primary lesson of the above Shultz moral play.

    As for 9/11, just remember, Micky, most of them were “liberals” and still are. Please don’t foist your own hawkishness on other people’s tragedies. It’s uncoothe at best. 9/11 had little or nothing to do with you. In fact, it had little or nothing to do with most of the hawks from Flyoverland who shed their crocodile tears for New York – a place they always viscerally hated. Everytime I hear one of these shmucks cry “we will never forget 9/11,” all I think is “well, we wish we could forget you.”

    JMJ

  3. Laree says:

    Eric

    North To Alaska,

    The Big Dog Race Started Yesterday In Alaska Gov Sarah Palin was there. I voted For Gov Sarah Palin and Cindy McCain’s husband:)

    http://youhavetobethistalltogoonthisride.blogspot.com/2009/03/iditarod-7-march-2009-race-begins.html

  4. Rosemary says:

    Very sweet and special. (I voted for Sarah as well. I would never vote for Juan MexiCain.)

  5. Micky 2 says:

    “It’s uncoothe at best. 9/11 had little or nothing to do with you. In fact, it had little or nothing to do with most of the hawks from Flyoverland who shed their crocodile tears for New York – a place they always viscerally hated. Everytime I hear one of these shmucks cry “we will never forget 9/11,” all I think is “well, we wish we could forget you.”

    Spare me your disgustingly partisan attempt at discrediting a tragedy that nearly cost me my life as I lost my sobriety after watching a neigborhood I worked in with people I knew for 2 years get crushed and my buddies fiance` whom I’d met quite a few times died on flight 93
    Everyone has some personal reason to grieve over what happened, some more than others, its f***ing disgusting of you to try and imply that we are some kind of facade just so we can espouse patriotism.
    You really oughta start “trying” to think before you go opening your stupid insensitive yap.

    Neil Abercrombie was the rep for our district in which my father was the GM of a tourist attraction/theme park much like Parrot Jungle in florida where my father was bird trainer.
    Because of the parks location and zoning laws it was hard for the park to get a liquor license.
    My dad would often invite Abercrombie over for dinner to discuss some means of agreeing on liquor licensing terms and whatever. We had a lot in common, we’d listen to Santana, Herbie Hancock and of course the stash would come out after dinner
    Yup, Neil, my dad and myself would it on the sofa listening to our Bose 901s, get stoned and eat all kinds of munchies.
    Should of seen Neil in those days, full blown hippie driving a black and yellow checkered cab with a black silouette of him on the side with his campaign logo.
    Hes thinking of running for governor, probably wants me to steer clear of any news cameras.
    :-)

  6. Micky 2 says:

    I cant stop dwelling on the complete idocy, arrogance and partisan hatred in this remark.

    “As for 9/11, just remember, Micky, most of them were “liberals” and still are.”

    So let me ask you something.
    What the hell does that have to do with anything and where did I mention that it mattered to me if they were liberals or conservatives ?
    I have this knot in my gut that tells me you would of had less remorse if the towers were full of conservatives.

    “Please don’t foist your own hawkishness on other people’s tragedies.”

    After you just foisted your political arrogance on me by making a point that most of the dead were liberals ? How the hell do you know this and who the hell are you to determine what is and is not someones tragedy ?
    How did I “foist” anything ? As much capital enterprise as there was going on in the towers I’m willing to bet there werent as many conservatives as you think there were.
    All I did was describe a defining moment in my life.
    Where did I display any hint of hawkishness in remorsing the death of 3000 innocent Americans ?
    If you must know my first thought, which was my final breaking point with the democratic party, was realizing that this would not of happened if someone was doing his job after repeated warnings in the form of repeated attacks.
    And if you want to define my desire at that moment to kill the bastards that did it as hawkishness then I’m no more hawkish than the millions of democrats and republicans that all felt the same way I did that day.

    People like you were ready to just bend over, take it, and say we deserved it and frown upon any of us who saw it as an injustice.
    Your bunch of woosy a$$ apologestic butt kissers are still doing it today.

    “It’s uncoothe at best. 9/11 had little or nothing to do with you.”

    Yea, right, your the kind of guy who would blow a big smelly fart right in the middle of someones dinner and find someway to get them to accept as their fault.

    “In fact, it had little or nothing to do with most of the hawks from Flyoverland who shed their crocodile tears for New York – a place they always viscerally hated.”

    Your ideological hatred has you actually believing that good Americans everywhere didnt genuinely hurt inside for the loss of these people ?
    Just because they werent city folk ?
    Are you saying the remorse was fake just to cover up their relishing of watching something they supposedly hated be destroyed and killed ?

    “Everytime I hear one of these shmucks cry “we will never forget 9/11,” all I think is “well, we wish we could forget you.”

    You really are a self serving hypocrite, arent you ?

    You feel pain for your leechs on the left that do nothing but run around with their hands out thinking the government owes them something and expect us to have all the compassion in the world for them, or denegrate or troops servicemen who were mostly conservatives volunteering to protect your ungrateful rump, or protect those who come here illegaly and steal from our taxpayers, sell dope to our kids and you have the nerve to question the patriotism of simple people who are simply making sure we dont become complacent in allowing threats to our country ?

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