Dear Friends, Today I learned an invaluable lesson which had such resonance with me that I care to share it with you. While discussing issues which are closely related to family and friends and to ourselves, I discovered upon a few seconds of meditation the following: It is always easier to gossip about other people's mistakes than to face the reality of your own. Also, a gossip will always have an advantage over the subject of gossip: the gift of retrospect without action. You see, when a person makes a mistake that has tarnished some aspect of the aforesaid's life, one tends to reflect upon the past with regret. However, this impedes us from moving on and facing the possibility of making another horrible mistake, which, in all likelihood, will occur because we are too preoccupied with angst over our fooolish pasts. In other words, it is easier o be the gossip than to be the subject matter of the gossip, because the gossip can reflect rationally (although often not impartially, because if you value the person enough to actually talk behind their back, you probably already had some negative, preconceived notion of what that person meant to you in the first place. In addition, please remember this: Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones. Or perhaps, the translated version of how my mother would say it: don't preach in your underwear! Take an in-depth look at your own life and how you are living it before trashing the lifestyles and choices of others. You may come to find that your own lifestyle is more negatively noteworthy than that of your contemporaries. Lastly, please don't forget that when you remind others of how badly a person has behaved, you are already meeting them halfway by talking behind their back in the first place! If you don't want to stoop to their level, then I suggest that you just listen to the gossip you are told without really listening or offering your opinion, or just turn a deaf ear and forget whatever it was that your best friend heard Sodom and Gomorra were doing. Besides...you never know when the next person you hear about will be your best friend. In Him and with my absolute best regards, Laurita ;)