Mother Teresa couldn't have said it better herself....

Sooooooo....we all know I am a poetry/quote/music/song lyric/art/photography/NUT.....

.ok, lets be honest - I have a lot of passions in life! I think it would be safe to say, collectively, I am just a nut for anything I see as beautiful in the world. I came across one of my favorite poems today and was reminded of just how true it's words ring. I have always believed that words are one of the most powerful things we have. Strategically used, they can make someone feel as though they are on top of the world, or completely and utterly worthless. Once spoken, they cannot be taken back and will never be forgotten. Words are the only inanimate objects that can touch a person's very soul. I have always been someone who could express my feelings with so much more exactness by writing them rather than trying to vocalize them. I think, the first time I ever realized that fact about my personality, was the first time I read one of my favorite poems of all time. I found that the words in this poem were the closest thing I had ever come across to the way actual human love feels. I have loved poetry and quotation ever since.

If you have ever had the curse of listening to me step up onto one of my personal soapboxes of life, you know that one of my deepest beliefs about life itself is the fact that there isn't a single person on this earth who is better, or more important to humanity than another. We have got to get past this idea of stereotyping and placing ourselves on our own personal pedestals. Everyone has something to offer to the rest of the world and all of the people in it. Usually, when we point the finger at someone else, it is actually proof of our failure to acknowledge our own shortcomings. This poem, couldn't answer this problem more honestly or more fully. I often pull it out and read it again when I find myself judging others and forgetting that I, myself, am nowhere near perfection or the person I would like to be someday. It is called "Watch yourself go by" and it says:

WATCH YOURSELF GO BY

Just stand aside and watch yourself go by;
Think of yourself as "he" instead of "I."
Note closely as in other men you note
The bag-kneed trousers and the seedy coat.
Pick flaws; find fault; forget the man is you,
And strive to make your estimate ring true.
Confront yourself and look you in the eye –
Just stand aside and watch yourself go by.

Interpret all your motives just as though
You looked on one whose aims you did not know.
Let undisguised contempt surge through you when
You see you shirk, O commonest of men!
Despise your cowardice; condemn whate'er
You note of falseness in you anywhere.
Defend not one defect that shares your eye –
Just stand aside and watch yourself go by.

And then, with eyes unveiled to what you loathe,
To sins that with sweet charity you'd clothe,
Back to your self-walled tenement you'll go
With tolerance for all who dwell below.
The faults of others then will dwarf and shrink,
Love's chain grows stronger by one mighty link,
When you, with "he" as substitute for "I,"
Have stood aside and watched yourself go by.

How quickly we find fault in others, and forget to look at our own reflection in the mirror. I can only imagine what this hateful world would be like if we could just step outside of ourselves for a moment to realize just how small we are. Just as no one lives without fault, there is no such thing as superiority. It simply does not exist. Superiority, and the social classification of society is merely a mindset that we created. As cliche as it may sound, we truly are all the same. The sooner we, not only understand that, but believe it, the sooner we will begin to find ourselves moving closer to the individuals we aspire to be.