I Can See Clearly Now

"Thank You for Believing Me Well"

As a young social worker in a New York City psychiatric
clinic, I was asked to see Roz, a 20-year-old woman who had
been referred to us from another psychiatric facility. It
was an unusual referral in that no information was received
ahead of her first appointment. I was told to "play it by
ear" and to figure out what her problems were and what she
needed.
Without a diagnosis to go on, I saw Roz as an unhappy,
misunderstood young woman who hadn't been listened to in her
earlier therapy. Her family situation was unpleasant. I
didn't see her as disturbed, but rather as lonely and
misunderstood. She responded so positively to being heard. I
worked with her to start a life worth living - to find a
job, a satisfying place to live and new relationships. We
hit it off well, and she started making important changes in
her life right away.
The records from the previous psychiatric facility
arrived a month after Roz and I began our successful work
together. To my complete surprise, her records were several
inches thick, describing a number of psychiatric
hospitalizations. Her diagnosis was "paranoid
schizophrenic," with a comment on her being "hopeless."
That had not been my experience with Roz at all. I
decided to forget those pieces of paper. I never treated her
as if she had that "hopeless" diagnosis. (It was a lesson
for me in questioning the value and certainty of diagnoses.)
I did find out about the horrors for Roz of those
hospitalizations, of being drugged, isolated and abused. I
also learned a lot from her about surviving such traumatic
circumstances.
First Roz found a job, then a place to live away from
her difficult family. After several months of working
together, she introduced me to her husband-to-be, a
successful businessman who adored her.
When we completed our therapy, Roz gave me the gift of
a silver bookmark and a note that said, "Thank you for
believing me well."
I have carried that note with me and I will for the
rest of my life, to remind me of the stand I take for
people, thanks to one brave woman's triumph over a
"hopeless" diagnosis.

By Judy Tatelbaum
from Chicken Soup for the Soul at Work
Copyright 1996 by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Maida
Rogerson, Martin Rutte & Tim Clauss

Important Work

The last to board the plane from Seattle to Dallas were
a woman and three children. "Oh please don't sit next to
me," I thought. "I've got so much work to do." But a moment
later an eleven-year-old girl and her nine-year-old brother
were climbing over me while the woman and a four-year-old
boy sat behind. Almost immediately the older children
started bickering while the child behind intermittently
kicked my seat. Every few minutes the boy would ask his
sister, "Where are we now?" "Shut up!" she'd snap and a new
round of squirming and whining would ensue.
"Kids have no concept of important work," I thought,
quietly resenting my predicament. Then in my mind a voice as
clear as a song simply said, Love them. "These kids are
brats, and I've got important work to do," I countered to
myself. My inner voice simply replied, Love them as if they
were your children.
Having heard the "Where-are-we-now?" question
repeatedly, I turned to the in-flight magazine map, in spite
of my important work.
I explained our flight path, dividing it into quarter-
hour flight increments and estimated when we would land in
Dallas.
Soon they were telling me about their trip to Seattle
to see their father who was in the hospital. As we talked
they asked about flying, navigation, science and grown-ups'
views about life. The time passed quickly and my "important"
work was left undone.
As we were preparing to land, I asked how their father
was doing now. They grew quiet and the boy simply said, "He
died."
"Oh, I'm so sorry."
"Yeah, me too. But it's my little brother I'm most
worried about. He's taking it real hard."
I suddenly realized what we'd really been talking about
was the most important work we ever face: living, loving and
growing in spite of heartbreak. When we said good-bye in
Dallas the boy shook my hand and thanked me for being his
"airline teacher." And I thanked him for being mine.

By Dan S. Bagley
from A Cup of Chicken Soup for the Soul
Copyright 1996 by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen & Barry
Spilchuk

Heaven and Hell - The Real Difference

A man spoke with the Lord about heaven and hell. The
Lord said to the man, "Come, I will show you hell." They
entered a room where a group of people sat around a huge pot
of stew. Everyone was famished, desperate and starving. Each
held a spoon that reached the pot, but each spoon had a
handle so much longer than their own arm that it could not
be used to get the stew into their own mouths. The suffering
was terrible.
"Come, now I will show you heaven," the Lord said after
a while. They entered another room, identical to the first -
the pot of stew, the group of people, the same long-handled
spoons. But there everyone was happy and well-nourished.
"I don't understand," said the man. "Why are they happy
here when they were miserable in the other room and
everything was the same?"
The Lord smiled, "Ah, it is simple," he said. "here
they have learned to feed each other."

By Ann Landers
from A 2nd Helping of Chicken Soup for the Soul
Copyright 1995 by Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen

To Remember Me

The day will come when my body will lie upon a white
sheet neatly tucked under four corners of a mattress located
in a hospital busily occupied with the living and the dying.
At a certain moment a doctor will determine that my brain
has ceased to function and that, for all intents and
purposes, my life has stopped.
When that happens, do not attempt to instill artificial
life into my body by the use of a machine. And don't call
this my deathbed. Let it be called the Bed of Life, and let
my body be taken from it to help others lead fuller lives.
Give my sight to the man who has never seen a sunrise,
a baby's face or love in the eyes of a woman. Give my heart
to a person whose own heart has caused nothing but endless
days of pain. Give my blood to the teenager who was pulled
from the wreckage of his car, so that he might live to see
his grandchildren play. Give my kidneys to one who depends
on a machine to exist from week to week. Take my bones,
every muscle, every fiber and nerve in my body and find a
way to make a crippled child walk.
Explore every corner of my brain. Take my cells, if
necessary, and let them grow so that someday, a speechless
boy will shout at the crack of a bat and a deaf girl will
hear the sound of rain against her window.
Burn what is left of me and scatter the ashes to the
winds to help the flowers grow.
If you must bury something, let it be my faults, my
weaknesses and all prejudice against my fellow man.
Give my sins to the devil. Give my soul to God.
If, by chance, you wish to remember me, do it with a
kind deed or word to someone who needs you. If you do all I
have asked, I will live forever.

By Robert N. Test
Submitted by Ken Knowles
from A 3rd Serving of Chicken Soup for the Soul
Copyright 1996 by Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen

Making Jeffrey's "Best Day!"

When three of my grandchildren acquired a half-grown
mongrel I agreed to help them build a dog house.
As we began the project, I knew that keeping them
involved was going to be a challenge. Much of my energy was
spent calling them back to the job and finding parts of the
project that could be handled by small children. I held to
my initial determination that building this dog house was to
be a group project.
Early in the project I had promised the grandkids that
we would roast wieners in the back yard as soon as we
finished painting the canine residence. Selecting three of
the largest house-painting brushes I could find, I
supervised the painting of our homemade structure. Kids and
paint. How could I have forgotten the potential mayhem that
such a combination can create?
After cleaning up the paint mess - kids, brushes,
carport - I suggested that we would probably eat earlier if
we just asked Gramma to heat the wieners in water on the gas
range. A pain of guilt came over me as I realized I was
trying to weasel out of an earlier promise.
As Jamie, Jeffrey and Kimberley looked on, I built a
first-class fire in our back yard pit, whittled some
roasting sticks, and prepared for the outdoor cooking event
When we finished eating I leaned back on the cool grass
and watched the last flickering remnants of our fire. Six-
year-old Jeffrey was leaning back against my chest, and I
began to think about what it meant to be a Grampa. The
silence was broken when Jeffrey quietly reflected, "Know
what Grampa?" And without breaking his gaze at the dying
embers he continued, "This is the best day of my whole
life."
After a few moments of continued silence he glanced up
and said, "Are you crying, Grampa? You've got a tear on your
cheek." Clearing my throat I explained that it must be from
the smoke.

By Frank Cooper
from A Cup of Chicken Soup for the Soul
Copyright 1996 by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen & Barry
Spilchuk


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