Why rent? To get richer
A contrarian's view: Houses don't appreciate any faster than the level of inflation over the long term, so forget about buying a home and put your savings into stocks.
I have something un-American to confess: I rent an apartment despite having enough money to buy a house. I plan to keep renting for as long as I can. I'm not just holding out for better prices. Renting will make me richer.
I normally write about stocks for SmartMoney.com, but the boss asked me to explain to readers my reason for renting. Here goes: Businesses are great investments while houses are poor ones, so I'd rather rent the latter and own the former.
Stocks versus houses: Returns
Shares of businesses return 7% a year over long periods. I'm subtracting for inflation, gradual price increases for everything from a can of beer to an ear exam. (After-inflation, or "real," returns are the only ones that matter. The point of increasing wealth is to increase buying power, not numbers on an account statement.)
Shares have been remarkably consistent over the past two centuries in their 7% real returns. In Jeremy Siegel's book "Stocks for the Long Run," he finds that real returns averaged 7% over nearly seven decades ending in 1870, then 6.6% through 1925 and then 6.9% through 2004.
The average real return for houses over long periods might surprise you: It's virtually zero.
Shares return 7% a year after inflation because that's how fast companies tend to increase their profits. Houses have their own version of profits: rents. Tenant-occupied houses generate actual rents, while owner-occupied houses generate ones that are implied but no less real: the rents their owners don't have to pay each year.
House prices and rents have been closely linked throughout history, with both increasing at the rate of inflation, or about 3% a year since 1900. A house, after all, is an ordinary good. It can't think up ways to drive profits like a company's managers can. Absent artificial boosts to demand, house prices will increase over long periods at the rate of inflation, for a real return of zero.
Robert Shiller, a Yale economist and the author of "Irrational Exuberance," which predicted the stock-price collapse in 2000, has recently turned his eye to house prices. Between 1890 and 2004, he says, real house returns would've been zero if not for two brief periods: one immediately after World War II and another since about 2000. (More on them in a moment.) Even if we include these periods, houses returned just 0.4% a year, he says.
The average pundit, planner, lender or broker making the case for ownership doesn't look at returns since 1890. Sometimes they reduce the matter to maxims about "building equity" and "paying yourself" instead of "throwing money down the drain." If they do look at returns, they focus on recent ones. Those tell a different story.
Between World War II and 2000, house prices beat inflation by about 2 percentage points a year. (Stocks during that time beat inflation by their usual 7 percentage points a year.) Since 2000, houses have outpaced inflation by 6 percentage points a year. (Stocks have merely matched inflation.)
Stocks versus houses: Valuations
But though stock returns have come from increased earnings, house returns have come from ballooning valuations, not increased rents. The ratio of share prices to company earnings (the price-earnings ratio) has remained relatively steady. It's about 16 today, close to both its 1940 value of 17 and to its 130-year average of about 15. Not so the ratio of house prices to rents. In 1940, the median single-family house price was $2,938, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, while the median rent was $27 a month, including utilities. That means the ratio of prices to annual rents was 9. By 2000, the ratio had swelled to 17. In 2005, it hit 20. We can adjust for the size of dwellings, but it doesn't make much difference. The ratio of single-family house prices to three-bedroom apartments is 19. In SmartMoney's hometown of Manhattan, where more detailed data is available, the ratio of condo prices per square foot to apartment rents per square foot is 22.
Video: Should you rent or buy?
Two main events have caused house valuations to inflate since World War II. First, the government subsidized housing by relaxing borrowing standards. Before the creation of the Federal Housing Authority (FHA) in 1934, homebuyers who borrowed typically put up 40% of the purchase price in cash for a five- to 15-year loan.
By insuring mortgages, the FHA permitted terms of up to 20 years and down payments of just 20%. It later expanded the repayment periods to 30 years and reduced down payments to 5%. Today, down payments for FHA loans are as low as 3%. Aggressive lenders offer loans with no down payments or even negative ones so that homebuyers can borrow the full purchase price plus closing costs. Some require little documentation of income, assets or ability to pay.
That means more Americans can win loans for homes, and they can win them for far more expensive homes than their incomes had previously allowed. Two-thirds of American households own homes today, up from 44% in 1940, even though the percentage of Americans living alone has tripled during that time. The ratio of house values to incomes has risen 260% in just under four decades.
A second event helped boost house demand in recent years. Share prices plunged in 2000. The Federal Reserve, fearing that the decline in stock wealth would cause consumers to stop spending, reduced the federal-funds rate, the core interest rate that determines the cost of everything from credit cards to mortgages, to 1% by summer 2003 from 6.5% at the start of 2001. Since most of the cost of financing a house over 30 years is interest, monthly house payments shrank and demand for houses soared. In some markets a string of big yearly increases in house prices led to panic buying.
Stocks versus houses: Conclusion
For house returns over the next 20 years to match those over the past 20, the government and private lenders would have to "up the ante" by relaxing borrowing standards further. Given the recent attention paid to swelling foreclosures, that seems unlikely. I suspect real returns will turn negative over most of the next two decades, but that house prices won't necessarily dip. Since 1963, they've done so in only two years versus 18 for stocks.
That's because homeowners mostly just stick it out rather than sell during soft markets. But if house prices remain flat, they produce negative real returns due to the creep of inflation. According to calculations made by The Economist in summer 2005, house prices would have to stay flat for 12 years with annual inflation at 2.5% for the ratio of prices to rents to fall from its 2005 perch to merely its 1975-to-2000 average.
So to sum up why I rent: Shares right now cost 16 times earnings and over long periods return 7% a year after inflation. Houses right now cost 19 times their "earnings" and over long periods return zero after inflation. And they look likely to return less than that for a while.
Questions and objections
In what follows I've tried to anticipate and address questions and objections:
"You can't live in your stocks" or "Renters throw money down the drain."
Rent is the cost of owning shares with money you would otherwise spend on a house. Houses have ownership costs, too: taxes, insurance and maintenance. Rent costs about 5% of house prices each year if we apply the price-rent ratio of 19. House incidentals often cost around 2%.
If you have $300,000 and a choice between spending it on a house or shares, you'll pay $6,000 a year in incidentals if you buy the house or about $15,000 a year ($1,250 a month) in rent if you buy the shares. But the shares will return $21,000 a year after inflation while the house will return zero. (My numbers work out even better than these. I pay a smidgen less than $1,250 a month for rent, while house prices in my neighborhood are far higher than $300,000.)
Note that houses and shares have transaction costs, too. Homebuyers pay around 1% in closing costs when they buy and 6% in broker commissions when they sell. Share buyers pay $10 trading commissions, which are negligible for buy-and-hold investors.
"Homebuyers get tax breaks."
So do share buyers, but both are a bad deal. The interest on loans for houses (mortgages) and shares (margin balances) is tax-deductible. But the rates are almost always too high. A big house loan presently costs 6.1% interest, while a big stock loan costs about 9%. For the returns, we can forget about inflation because it helps debtors while hurting investors, making it a wash for those who borrow to invest. Still, nominal returns of 3% for houses and 10% for stocks aren't high enough to justify those rates. The tax breaks aren't really breaks at all. Moreover, a majority of homeowners don't claim them. Their incomes are low enough to make the standard deduction a better deal.
"What about the pride of homeownership?"
It's not for me. I define ownership as no longer having to pay for something and being able to do as I please with it. I own my coffee maker. Homeowners must pay taxes each year even when their mortgage payments are done. In certain markets they can't even make changes to the houses they've paid for without seeking the approval of others. Personally, I feel the pride of ownership for shares of businesses, and I'm proud to occupy a nice place while leaving the burden and poor returns and maintenance to someone else.
"You seem to knock government housing subsidies, but they've helped many Americans afford homes."
My inner socialist agrees. My other inner socialist worries that the government has effectively raised prices to the point where the middle class can't afford houses or buries itself in debt to own them. My inner capitalist is too busy watching shares to care about house prices. My inner conspiracy theorist notes that while politicians tout the social benefits of homeownership, none mentions its tax benefits to the government. I pay no taxes on the overall value of my stock portfolio, just on my cashed-in gains and collected dividends. But Americans pay taxes on the full $11 trillion worth of housing they own plus the $10 trillion worth of it they're still paying off.
"Houses are bigger than apartments."
True, and both can be rented. A third of renters live in single-family houses. I prefer an apartment for now. I like not having to fill it with stuff. I like using a fifth of the energy of the average American. I like being 20 minutes from work and not having owned a car in 10 years. I like not stressing over whether to get the marble countertops or the imported tiles or the 52-inch flat screen. I'm not especially frugal; I spend a teacher's salary each year on restaurants and travel. But I guess I'm too busy or lazy right now to bother with a big house and its innards.
"Are you saying I should sell my big house and rent an apartment instead?"
No, unless you have more space than you need and moving wouldn't be disruptive to your family, and you want to cash in on recent housing gains, make more money over the next couple of decades, use less energy while simplifying your life, and you don't mind seeming odd to friends. In which case, yes. But really, I'm not trying to win anyone over. Strong demand for houses keeps my rent cheap.
"Renting is for poor people."
True. But it's for rich people, too. The average renter makes about $34,000 a year, but while the percentage of renters declines after incomes exceed $20,000 and rents exceed $600 a month, it jumps again once incomes top $150,000 and rents top $1,200 a month. In other words, poor people rent modest apartments for lack of choice. Middle-income people buy houses. High-income people, presumably with a dose of financial savvy, often rent nice apartments instead of buying.
"You say houses return zero. But I've made a fortune on my house in recent years."
I'm referring to inflation-adjusted returns over long periods, absent external boosts to demand. You're referring to gross returns over a short time period that combined lax borrowing standards and ultra-low interest rates. Over the next 20 years I believe houses will return zero or slightly less after inflation, and that stocks will return 7%.
"So you're never going to buy a house? What about raising a family?"
I might buy one eventually, but the longer I can put it off the more I'll get out of the shares I'll have to sell to afford it. I'm 34 now with a fiancée and a fish. I'm going to try to rent for at least 10 more years. If I have kids I'll probably move into a big apartment or a house once they reach running-around age. I'll rent, most likely.
This article was reported and written by Jack Hough for SmartMoney.
Monday, August 20, 2007
Monday, July 16, 2007
Balloon and lawn chair trip - new adventure
105 balloons put lawn chair pilot in air
BEND, Ore. - Last weekend, Kent Couch settled down in his lawn chair with some snacks — and a parachute. Attached to his lawn chair were 105 large helium balloons.
With instruments to measure his altitude and speed, a global positioning system device in his pocket, and about four plastic bags holding five gallons of water each to act as ballast — he could turn a spigot, release water and rise — Couch headed into the Oregon sky.
Nearly nine hours later, the 47-year-old gas station owner came back to earth in a farmer's field near Union, short of Idaho but about 193 miles from home.
"When you're a little kid and you're holding a helium balloon, it has to cross your mind," Couch told the Bend Bulletin.
"When you're laying in the grass on a summer day, and you see the clouds, you wish you could jump on them," he said. "This is as close as you can come to jumping on them. It's just like that."
Couch is the latest American to emulate Larry Walters — who in 1982 rose three miles above Los Angeles in a lawn chair lifted by balloons. Walters had surprised an airline pilot, who radioed the control tower that he had just passed a guy in a lawn chair. Walters paid a $1,500 penalty for violating air traffic rules.
It was Couch's second flight.
In September, he got off the ground for six hours. Like Walters, he used a BB gun to pop the balloons, but he went into a rapid descent and eventually parachuted to safety.
This time, he was better prepared. The balloons had a new configuration, so it was easier to reach up and release a bit of helium instead of simply cutting off a balloon.
He took off at 6:06 a.m. Saturday after kissing his wife, Susan, goodbye and petting his Chihuahua, Isabella. As he made about 25 miles an hour, a three-car caravan filled with friends, family and the dog followed him from below.
Couch said he could hear cattle and children, and he said he even passed through clouds.
"It was beautiful — beautiful," he told KTVZ-TV. He described the flight as mostly peaceful and serene, with occasional turbulence, like a hot-air balloon ride sitting down.
Couch decided to stop when he was down to a gallon of water and just eight pounds of ballast. Concerned about the rugged terrain outside La Grande, including Hells Canyon, he decided it was time to land.
He popped enough balloons to set the craft down, although he suffered rope burns. But after he jumped out, the wind grabbed his chair, with his video recorder, and the remaining balloons and swept them away. He's hoping to get them back some day.
Brandon Wilcox, owner of Professional Air, which charters and maintains planes at the Bend airport, said Thursday that Couch definitely did it. Wilcox said he flew a plane nearby while Couch traveled, and a passenger videotaped the flying lawn chair.
Whether Couch will take a third trip is up to his wife, and Susan Couch said she's thinking about saying no. But she said she was willing to go along with last weekend's trip.
"I know he'd be thinking about it more and more, it would always be on his mind," she said. "This way, at least he's fulfilled his dream."
BEND, Ore. - Last weekend, Kent Couch settled down in his lawn chair with some snacks — and a parachute. Attached to his lawn chair were 105 large helium balloons.
With instruments to measure his altitude and speed, a global positioning system device in his pocket, and about four plastic bags holding five gallons of water each to act as ballast — he could turn a spigot, release water and rise — Couch headed into the Oregon sky.
Nearly nine hours later, the 47-year-old gas station owner came back to earth in a farmer's field near Union, short of Idaho but about 193 miles from home.
"When you're a little kid and you're holding a helium balloon, it has to cross your mind," Couch told the Bend Bulletin.
"When you're laying in the grass on a summer day, and you see the clouds, you wish you could jump on them," he said. "This is as close as you can come to jumping on them. It's just like that."
Couch is the latest American to emulate Larry Walters — who in 1982 rose three miles above Los Angeles in a lawn chair lifted by balloons. Walters had surprised an airline pilot, who radioed the control tower that he had just passed a guy in a lawn chair. Walters paid a $1,500 penalty for violating air traffic rules.
It was Couch's second flight.
In September, he got off the ground for six hours. Like Walters, he used a BB gun to pop the balloons, but he went into a rapid descent and eventually parachuted to safety.
This time, he was better prepared. The balloons had a new configuration, so it was easier to reach up and release a bit of helium instead of simply cutting off a balloon.
He took off at 6:06 a.m. Saturday after kissing his wife, Susan, goodbye and petting his Chihuahua, Isabella. As he made about 25 miles an hour, a three-car caravan filled with friends, family and the dog followed him from below.
Couch said he could hear cattle and children, and he said he even passed through clouds.
"It was beautiful — beautiful," he told KTVZ-TV. He described the flight as mostly peaceful and serene, with occasional turbulence, like a hot-air balloon ride sitting down.
Couch decided to stop when he was down to a gallon of water and just eight pounds of ballast. Concerned about the rugged terrain outside La Grande, including Hells Canyon, he decided it was time to land.
He popped enough balloons to set the craft down, although he suffered rope burns. But after he jumped out, the wind grabbed his chair, with his video recorder, and the remaining balloons and swept them away. He's hoping to get them back some day.
Brandon Wilcox, owner of Professional Air, which charters and maintains planes at the Bend airport, said Thursday that Couch definitely did it. Wilcox said he flew a plane nearby while Couch traveled, and a passenger videotaped the flying lawn chair.
Whether Couch will take a third trip is up to his wife, and Susan Couch said she's thinking about saying no. But she said she was willing to go along with last weekend's trip.
"I know he'd be thinking about it more and more, it would always be on his mind," she said. "This way, at least he's fulfilled his dream."
true freedom lies in your ability to choose your thoughts and how you feel
Written by Jeannette Maw
The 4th of July annual celebration reminds us not to take our freedom for granted. We're prompted to consciously acknowledge and appreciate the independence won years ago and to support our government's continuing efforts to maintain our citizen rights.
However, with many citizens at odds with our leaders, feeling misrepresented, unheard and deceived, some feel anything but gratitude for our unperceived freedoms. Frustration and disempowerment are sometimes more typical feelings for those who oppose the leadership of our government.
But true freedom isn't dependent on outside conditions; it doesn't require that particular circumstances be in place for us to feel peace. In fact, if we require certain situations to exist before we acknowledge freedom, we are anything but free.
True freedom lies within. Until we tap into that truth, we're at the mercy of the world around us for our peace of mind, joy and any other emotions we attach to liberty.
What is freedom?
The word "freedom" itself invites the idea of being able to do as we please. The dictionary definition includes "being exempt from external control or interference," "at liberty rather than in confinement or under physical restraint," and "the state of political or national independence."
Many Americans - arguably the most privileged citizens to walk the planet - don't feel strongly connected to independence and liberty in their daily lives. We speak as if we're slaves to a job or life responsibilities or even time. We believe that without an abundance of time, money or health, we aren't free to live the lives we really want. And with those thoughts we would be right; we are enslaved. Not by our job or position in life, but by our thoughts of such.
True freedom lies in our ability to deliberately choose our thoughts and feelings. When we exercise that ability, we no longer require things "out there" to be a certain way to feel peace "in here." Our "feel good" comes from within. And it's there waiting for us whenever we choose to entertain it.
Developing the discipline to choose how we think and feel is where we meet true freedom. When we realize we don't have to have a certain amount of money in the bank, a particular brand of government in office, a certain health status, or whatever else we might condition our "feel good" on, we embrace authentic personal liberty.
Who knows it?
How many of us exercise this power of freedom? And how often? Do you regularly experience liberation from thoughts that otherwise hold you trapped, not just in painful feelings but in the reality created by those thoughts?
Whereas many across the globe consider the U.S. to be the epitome of independence and freedom, as long as we are stuck in fearful, angry thoughts directed toward terrorists, Republicans, environmentalists, corporations, Mormons, immigrants, employers, or whomever, we are anything but free.
Author Victor Frankl practiced his freedom of thought under the particularly challenging conditions of a Nazi concentration camp. In his book, "Man's Search For Meaning," Frankl shared his belief that we each have the freedom to discover what has meaning for us.
His death camp experience offers an extreme example of how it is possible to choose what we think and feel despite the conditions surrounding us. As we break that chain of relying on external circumstances to be happy or at peace, we are truly free.
Last week a friend spent a night in jail for destroying public property, after swatting at a street sign in a late night, Cosmopolitan-induced gleeful moment. Although he briefly argued the ridiculousness of not being free to have a happy moment in public or even to question officers without repercussion, he at least realized his ability to choose personal freedom once he was behind bars.
He could either be in jail as an ornery, insulted miscreant, or he could be in jail as a peaceful, go-with-the-flow cooperative citizen. He chose peaceful. And each time he tells the story, he has another opportunity to choose whether to be indignant and angry or to laugh at himself and consider himself better educated about police protocol.
He is always free to choose his perspective and can exercise or abdicate that power any time. As he does, he dramatically alters his experience and satisfaction with life. The same is true for each of us.
How to be free
Since the foundation of freedom lies in our power to choose thoughts and feelings, we can embrace that power by developing a discipline of conscious choice - releasing knee-jerk reactive thoughts that don't feel good and finding our way, one better-feeling thought after another, to more pleasant feelings.
If Dr. Frankl can do it, so can we.
As we practice conscious choice of thought, we no longer need the boss to acknowledge our contribution to feel good about our job. We don't have to get an anniversary present from our spouse to appreciate the relationship. We don't require six months of living expenses saved up in order to sleep well at night.
The additional beauty of this practice is that once we regularly spend time with more pleasant thoughts, we attract a more pleasant life. One where bosses offer generous acknowledgements, spouses treat us like gold, and money flows in abundance - which just turns out to be icing on the cake, since we didn't need any of that to enjoy life beforehand.
So next time you find yourself in a stressful conversation about the importance of patriotism, evils of terrorism, or whatever topic might inspire your negative feelings, remember your true freedom lies in your ability to choose your thoughts and how you feel. Instead of being stuck in anger or resentment, exercise your liberty to find your way to a better-feeling thought. Be picky about the thoughts you entertain.
Similarly, when you recognize you're resisting a situation or circumstance in life, use it as an opportunity to come back to your personal freedom. Remember you are free to choose how you perceive it and how you feel. As you do so, you'll find your sense of freedom increasing dramatically without anything else around you needing to change.
Our thoughts create our world. Until we consciously choose our thoughts, we are slaves to our perceptions of reality and are abandoning the freedom that is our human birthright. This holiday, celebrate your internal liberty to find your way to thoughts that create the world you want. Namaste.
Jeannette Maw is an Attraction Coach and founder of Good Vibe Coaching in Salt Lake City, with more deliberate creation musings on her blog at www.loaplayground.blogspot.com.
The 4th of July annual celebration reminds us not to take our freedom for granted. We're prompted to consciously acknowledge and appreciate the independence won years ago and to support our government's continuing efforts to maintain our citizen rights.
However, with many citizens at odds with our leaders, feeling misrepresented, unheard and deceived, some feel anything but gratitude for our unperceived freedoms. Frustration and disempowerment are sometimes more typical feelings for those who oppose the leadership of our government.
But true freedom isn't dependent on outside conditions; it doesn't require that particular circumstances be in place for us to feel peace. In fact, if we require certain situations to exist before we acknowledge freedom, we are anything but free.
True freedom lies within. Until we tap into that truth, we're at the mercy of the world around us for our peace of mind, joy and any other emotions we attach to liberty.
What is freedom?
The word "freedom" itself invites the idea of being able to do as we please. The dictionary definition includes "being exempt from external control or interference," "at liberty rather than in confinement or under physical restraint," and "the state of political or national independence."
Many Americans - arguably the most privileged citizens to walk the planet - don't feel strongly connected to independence and liberty in their daily lives. We speak as if we're slaves to a job or life responsibilities or even time. We believe that without an abundance of time, money or health, we aren't free to live the lives we really want. And with those thoughts we would be right; we are enslaved. Not by our job or position in life, but by our thoughts of such.
True freedom lies in our ability to deliberately choose our thoughts and feelings. When we exercise that ability, we no longer require things "out there" to be a certain way to feel peace "in here." Our "feel good" comes from within. And it's there waiting for us whenever we choose to entertain it.
Developing the discipline to choose how we think and feel is where we meet true freedom. When we realize we don't have to have a certain amount of money in the bank, a particular brand of government in office, a certain health status, or whatever else we might condition our "feel good" on, we embrace authentic personal liberty.
Who knows it?
How many of us exercise this power of freedom? And how often? Do you regularly experience liberation from thoughts that otherwise hold you trapped, not just in painful feelings but in the reality created by those thoughts?
Whereas many across the globe consider the U.S. to be the epitome of independence and freedom, as long as we are stuck in fearful, angry thoughts directed toward terrorists, Republicans, environmentalists, corporations, Mormons, immigrants, employers, or whomever, we are anything but free.
Author Victor Frankl practiced his freedom of thought under the particularly challenging conditions of a Nazi concentration camp. In his book, "Man's Search For Meaning," Frankl shared his belief that we each have the freedom to discover what has meaning for us.
His death camp experience offers an extreme example of how it is possible to choose what we think and feel despite the conditions surrounding us. As we break that chain of relying on external circumstances to be happy or at peace, we are truly free.
Last week a friend spent a night in jail for destroying public property, after swatting at a street sign in a late night, Cosmopolitan-induced gleeful moment. Although he briefly argued the ridiculousness of not being free to have a happy moment in public or even to question officers without repercussion, he at least realized his ability to choose personal freedom once he was behind bars.
He could either be in jail as an ornery, insulted miscreant, or he could be in jail as a peaceful, go-with-the-flow cooperative citizen. He chose peaceful. And each time he tells the story, he has another opportunity to choose whether to be indignant and angry or to laugh at himself and consider himself better educated about police protocol.
He is always free to choose his perspective and can exercise or abdicate that power any time. As he does, he dramatically alters his experience and satisfaction with life. The same is true for each of us.
How to be free
Since the foundation of freedom lies in our power to choose thoughts and feelings, we can embrace that power by developing a discipline of conscious choice - releasing knee-jerk reactive thoughts that don't feel good and finding our way, one better-feeling thought after another, to more pleasant feelings.
If Dr. Frankl can do it, so can we.
As we practice conscious choice of thought, we no longer need the boss to acknowledge our contribution to feel good about our job. We don't have to get an anniversary present from our spouse to appreciate the relationship. We don't require six months of living expenses saved up in order to sleep well at night.
The additional beauty of this practice is that once we regularly spend time with more pleasant thoughts, we attract a more pleasant life. One where bosses offer generous acknowledgements, spouses treat us like gold, and money flows in abundance - which just turns out to be icing on the cake, since we didn't need any of that to enjoy life beforehand.
So next time you find yourself in a stressful conversation about the importance of patriotism, evils of terrorism, or whatever topic might inspire your negative feelings, remember your true freedom lies in your ability to choose your thoughts and how you feel. Instead of being stuck in anger or resentment, exercise your liberty to find your way to a better-feeling thought. Be picky about the thoughts you entertain.
Similarly, when you recognize you're resisting a situation or circumstance in life, use it as an opportunity to come back to your personal freedom. Remember you are free to choose how you perceive it and how you feel. As you do so, you'll find your sense of freedom increasing dramatically without anything else around you needing to change.
Our thoughts create our world. Until we consciously choose our thoughts, we are slaves to our perceptions of reality and are abandoning the freedom that is our human birthright. This holiday, celebrate your internal liberty to find your way to thoughts that create the world you want. Namaste.
Jeannette Maw is an Attraction Coach and founder of Good Vibe Coaching in Salt Lake City, with more deliberate creation musings on her blog at www.loaplayground.blogspot.com.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Vatican issues 10 commandments of driving
The Vatican on Tuesday issued a set of "Ten Commandments" for drivers, telling motorists not to kill, not to drink and drive, and to help fellow travelers in case of accidents.
It warned about the effects of road rage, saying driving can bring out "primitive" behavior in motorists, including "impoliteness, rude gestures, cursing, blasphemy, loss of sense of responsibility or deliberate infringement of the highway code."
It urged motorists to obey traffic regulations, drive with a moral sense, and to pray when behind the wheel.
Cardinal Renato Martino, who heads the office, told a news conference that the Vatican felt it necessary to address the pastoral needs of motorists because driving had become such a big part of contemporary life.
The "Drivers' Ten Commandments," as listed by the document, are:
1. You shall not kill.
2. The road shall be for you a means of communion between people and not of mortal harm.
3. Courtesy, uprightness and prudence will help you deal with unforeseen events.
4. Be charitable and help your neighbor in need, especially victims of accidents.
5. Cars shall not be for you an expression of power and domination, and an occasion of sin.
6. Charitably convince the young and not so young not to drive when they are not in a fitting condition to do so.
7. Support the families of accident victims.
8. Bring guilty motorists and their victims together, at the appropriate time, so that they can undergo the liberating experience of forgiveness.
9. On the road, protect the more vulnerable party.
10. Feel responsible toward others.
It warned about the effects of road rage, saying driving can bring out "primitive" behavior in motorists, including "impoliteness, rude gestures, cursing, blasphemy, loss of sense of responsibility or deliberate infringement of the highway code."
It urged motorists to obey traffic regulations, drive with a moral sense, and to pray when behind the wheel.
Cardinal Renato Martino, who heads the office, told a news conference that the Vatican felt it necessary to address the pastoral needs of motorists because driving had become such a big part of contemporary life.
The "Drivers' Ten Commandments," as listed by the document, are:
1. You shall not kill.
2. The road shall be for you a means of communion between people and not of mortal harm.
3. Courtesy, uprightness and prudence will help you deal with unforeseen events.
4. Be charitable and help your neighbor in need, especially victims of accidents.
5. Cars shall not be for you an expression of power and domination, and an occasion of sin.
6. Charitably convince the young and not so young not to drive when they are not in a fitting condition to do so.
7. Support the families of accident victims.
8. Bring guilty motorists and their victims together, at the appropriate time, so that they can undergo the liberating experience of forgiveness.
9. On the road, protect the more vulnerable party.
10. Feel responsible toward others.
Thursday, June 14, 2007
Emerson quotes
"Do not be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better. What if they are a little course, and you may get your coat soiled or torn? What if you do fail, and get fairly rolled in the dirt once or twice. Up again, you shall never be so afraid of a tumble." - RWE
"Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood." RWE
"He who is not everyday conquering some fear has not learned the secret of life." - RWE
"Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood." RWE
"He who is not everyday conquering some fear has not learned the secret of life." - RWE
Emerson" to Laugh Often and Love Much ...this is to have suceeded.
"To laugh often and love much... to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others, to give one's self... this is to have succeeded." -- (Ralph Waldo Emerson)
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"To laugh often and love much; to win the respect of intelligent persons and the affection of children; to earn the approbation of honest citizens and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to give of one's self; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to have played and laughed with enthusiasm and sung with exultation; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived - this is to have succeeded." -- (Ralph Waldo Emerson)
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"To laugh often and love much; to win the respect of intelligent persons and the affection of children; to earn the approbation of honest citizens and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to give of one's self; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to have played and laughed with enthusiasm and sung with exultation; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived - this is to have succeeded." -- (Ralph Waldo Emerson)
Love is everything it's cracked up to be...
"Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it's cracked up to be. That's why people are so cynical about it. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don't risk anything, you risk even more." (Erica Jong, American Author)
"Where there is love there is life." (Mahatma Gandhi)
"I love a hand that meets my own with a grasp that causes some sensation." (Samuel Osgood)
"Where there is love there is life." (Mahatma Gandhi)
"I love a hand that meets my own with a grasp that causes some sensation." (Samuel Osgood)
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