From April: This is a guest post from Brenda Cowlishaw. I used to babysit Brenda’s children back when they were just babies. Since then we had lost touch until I moved my son to the school that her teenage children went to. Brenda has a great attitude toward life and loves spending time with her family. I am blessed to have Brenda posting today.
One hot summer day, my four year old daughter and I were running errands. We stopped at a gas station to fuel the mini-van and because of the heat, I had her step outside with me. As we waited for the tank to fill up, a pickup truck pulled in beside us. In the bed of the truck was a happy dog, clearly excited to be on a trip with his master. Tail wagging and tongue hanging out, he sat patiently while his master fueled the truck.
Always looking for ways to teach my children new things, I seized the opportunity. I told my daughter, “Look at that dog. See him in the back of the truck? He’s panting. He pants because he is hot. Dogs can’t sweat so they pant to cool off.” I love these days, these moments when I can teach my children.
My daughter, with big brown eyes, looks up at the dog and smiles. She then looks at me, tilts her head, and says quite matter-of-factly, “Momma, that dog is not hot! He is just tasting the wind!”
Charles Swindoll said it best, “The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failure, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness, or skill. It will make or break a company… a church… a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice everyday regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past… we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude. I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. And so it is with you… we are in charge of our Attitudes.”
I pray that every day I will choose to have a wind tasting kind of day.
I’ve gotta add this to my list of “things to quote.” It is awesome. I too need to have that perspective and it takes a little reminder once in a while. This is a good one, and clever too!