Boleware Blogspot

The story of a thinker and a doer One day Jimmy asked Sally if she would like to help him set up a lemonade stand during the upcoming garage sale. Sally was a very creative girl. She had a lot of ideas and she set right to work. “We need a big sign – what should we call ourselves?” she said. “Should we set it up by the street or by the garage?” Sally had a million questions: Homemade lemonade or made from a mix? Regular or pink lemonade? What size should the cups be? Paper or plastic? Would Jimmy mind if they sold the lemonade in pink cups? How much would they charge? She had learned how to make brownies last week; should they sell brownies too? What if some people are on a diet; should they also sell sugar-free lemonade? What if someone just wants water? What if someone likes it sweeter? What if…   What if…   As they talked, it got late. The “what ifs” never seemed to end. They still hadn’t finished going through all the deta...

Mr. Wilson decided to go fishing and he promised his wife he would bring her back some fish. So he walked down to the river under the bright afternoon sun and sat down on a rock with his fishing pole.  But there wasn’t a fish to be seen. Every so often a little bitty fish would zip by where he was sitting, and he would chase it with his net until he would trip on a rock and fall face down into the water.   “Lousy fish!” Mr. Wilson grunted. The day wore on, the sun started to set, and Mr. Wilson still had not caught a single fish. He became frustrated and he was stomping angrily in the water when his next-door neighbor, Mr. Brown and his son Billy, came up to the river’s edge to watch the sunset and catch a few fish.  Mr. Wilson didn’t even speak to them as he stormed off because he was frustrated by his wasted afternoon.   “Gee!” Billy said. “He’s pretty angry, isn’t he?”  “Hungry, I suppose,” Mr. Brown said. “He should’ve waited a bit longer. T...

Three frogs sitting on a log, two decided to jump off, how many were left?  If you said one you were wrong. I will tell you the answer b ut first let me tell you about the f rog in a milk pail.... A careless frog was hopping around a farmyard when all of a sudden he fell into a pail half-filled with fresh milk As he swam about attempting to reach the top of the pail, he found that the sides of the pail were too high and too steep. He stretched his back legs to push off the bottom of the pail but found it too deep.  But this wasn't your average frog, this frog was determined not to give up, and he continued the struggle. He kicked and squirmed and kicked and squirmed, until at last, all his churning about in the milk had turned the milk into a big hunk of butter. The butter was now solid enough for him to climb up on and hop out of the pail.   The lesson is, Never Give Up.   Keep trying, keep moving and you will get there. Another Frog Story ...

Famous magician and escape artist Harry Houdini claimed he could escape any jail cell in less than an hour. One day, a small town in Britain built a new jail cell and they were proud of it.  They invited Houdini to come test it,  and he agreed. He walked into the prison cell full of confidence. After all, he had done this hundreds of times before. Once the jail cell was closed, Houdini took off his coat and went to work. From his belt, he got a flexible but tough piece of steel that he used as a lock pick. He knelt in front of the door and started working on the lock. He quickly discovered that something was unusual about this particular lock. For 30 minutes he worked and got nowhere.  And his confident expression disappeared. At the end of an hour, he was soaked with perspiration.  He tried all the tricks of his trade but nothing worked. After two hours and totally exhausted, Houdini literally collapsed against the door. And the force of his weight was enou...

I have always enjoyed reading the quotes of famous people. Not just because they are a lot of fun to read, but because there is so much truth in them. I also feel they are the shortcuts to learning, and they can be great motivators. I can remember a time when I had them stuck up all around the house and office. The post it notes work great.  Look what others have said about the quotes:  Winston Churchill said, “Every man who didn’t go to college can largely make up for that lack by reading the wise sayings of the great men of the past.” Thomas Jefferson said, "Mankind would lose half its wisdom built up over the centuries if it lost its great sayings. They contain the best parts of the best books." WM. James said, “To neglect the wise saying of great thinkers is to deny ourselves of our truest education.”  Samuel Johnson said, “He is the most useful teacher who condenses the most knowledge into short sentences.”  Many of the famous people of the world hav...

There was once a man who lived by the side of the road who decided to sell hot dogs. He put up signs on the highway telling everyone how good they were, he also stood on the side of the road and cried out to all that past by 'buy a hot dog, they are the best in town'.   The old man was hard of hearing so he had no radio - he had trouble with his eyes, so he read no newspapers and of course he didn't look at television. But he sold very good hot dogs. As people bought his hot dogs he increased his meat and bun orders. He also bought a bigger stove to take care of all the extra business. With all the new business, he finally got his son to come and help him out with his booming business.   But then something happened, his son who had been well educated said . . . ' Father, haven't you been listening to the radio or reading the newspapers or watching television? There's a big recession happening right now. The current business situation is terrible in t...

“You can make excuses or you can make progress. You choose.” -Brian Tracy “Don't make excuses make good.”  -Elbert Hubbard “I attribute my success to this: I never gave or took an excuse.  -Florence Nightingale “Put all excuses aside and remember this: YOU are capable.”  -Zig Ziglar “He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else.”  -Benjamin Franklin

It seems that the eagle knows when a storm is approaching long before it comes. The eagle flies to some high spot and waits for the high wind to come. When the storm approaches, it sets its wings so that the wind will pick it up and lift it above the storm. While the storm rages below, the eagle is soaring above it. The eagle does not escape the storm.  It simply uses the storm to lift it higher.  The lesson: When the storms of life come upon us, and all of us will experience them, we can rise above them by simply setting our minds to sail a little higher.

A little boy was having difficulty lifting a heavy stone. His father came along and as he noticed the boy struggling, he asked, "Are you using all your strength?" "Yes, I am," the little boy said.  As he continued to watch, the father asks again, "Are you sure you using all your strength?" "Yes, I am," the little boy said.   "No, you are not," the father answered. "I am right here just waiting, and you haven't asked me to help you."  Asking is the key to getting. Some never ask yet they wonder why they didn't get. If you want something you should ask for it. Perhaps Gandhi said it best when he said, “If you don’t ask, you don’t get.”  Never Be Afraid To Ask

A young man asked Socrates, an ancient Greek philosopher, for the secret to Success. Socrates told the young man to meet him near the river the next morning.   They met and Socrates asked the young man to walk with him toward the river. When the water got up to their shoulders, Socrates took the young man by surprise and ducked him into the water. The man struggled to get out but Socrates was much stronger and kept him under the water until he started turning blue. The young man kept struggling and finally managed to get up. The first thing he did was to gasp and take a deep breath. Socrates asked, “What did you want the most when you were under the water?” The man replied “Air”. "I wanted Air." Socrates said: “That’s the secret to success. When you want success as badly as you want air, you will get it. There is no other secret.”

Once upon a time a man planted a bamboo tree. It was a small seedling and the man cared for it each day.  He watered it and made sure it had the proper sunlight to grow.  After a year's time, the man saw that the plant had not grown at all, but he continued the watering and caring for it.   After the second year the plant had not grown, but he continued watering and caring for it through the third and the fourth year. Suddenly, as if by magic, in the fifth year it began growing. In fact, it grew two and a half feet a day until in six weeks it was ninety feet tall. The bamboo tree's growth is not magic. During its first five years, when it seems nothing is happening, it develops miles of roots beneath the ground. Though no growth is visible, the foundation is being established and strengthened. The lesson:  There are times when we feel our lives are standing still and nothing is changing.  In reality, those are the days we are building our own roots a...

The story goes that.... A successful American investment banker was at the pier of a small coastal Mexican village when a small boat with just a fisherman docked.  Inside the small boat were several large yellow-fin tuna.  The American complimented the Mexican on the quality of his fish and asked how long it took to catch them. The Mexican replied, “Only a little while. The American then asked why didn’t he stay out longer and catch more fish? The Mexican said he had enough to support his family’s immediate needs. The American then asked, “But what do you do with the rest of your time?” The Mexican fisherman said, “I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take siestas with my wife, Maria, stroll into the village each evening where I sip wine, and play guitar with my amigos.  The American scoffed, “I am a Harvard MBA and could help you. You should spend more time fishing and with the proceeds, buy a bigger boat. With the proceeds from the bigger boat, you c...