What ARE They Thinking?

 

WHAT ARE THEY THINKING?

By Jim “Gymbeaux” Brown, August 1, 2023

I have thought about writing this Nugget for quite a while.  Even though I am putting my thoughts to paper, I am not at this moment sure I will actually post it on my blog given the sensitive nature of the subject.  Still, these are things that I now think of and I am guessing that if you are over 70, you may be as well.

My thoughts began while sitting at a table at a Sam’s Club and just watching\observing the customers as they check out and leave the club.  The customers come in all shapes and sizes, many of them extremely obese, actually a great many of them extremely obese.  Some, who from outward appearances, appear older than my 78 years, some appearing younger.  Some people need assistance with motorized scooters, others have walkers, and many more are using canes all to help them go from place to place.  I too have been using a cane now and then due to a recent hip replacement.

As I watch, I can’t help but wonder what a lot of these people are thinking at this very moment in their lives.  I immediately go to the people who are very obese.  Surely, they have seen the multitude of health warnings of what being over weight can do to a person’s health.  As I see them struggle to do the smallest of tasks, I can’t help but recall what I read in Dr. Nichole Saphire’s book, Make America Healthy Again.  She wrote that if America just eliminated PREVENTABLE diseases, we would save enough money to pay for everyone’s health care. 

That was startling to me!  She listed her number one disease that could easily be eliminated to be obesity.  I can attest that it is not fun to live with a disease for which there is no cure.  I have diabetes.  I have no clue as to how I acquired the disease and for years I did not want anyone to know that I had it.  The “experts” believe that being overweight is a pathway to diabetes but, and this is a HUGE but, obesity for most people is PREVENTABLE.  It is also a pathway to heart issues, and even cancer.  As for me, I spent 20 years in the military.  Just hearing that, a lot of people might think that I drank a lot of alcohol, smoked cigarettes and didn’t take care of my body.  In fact, I don’t smoke and the only alcohol I drink is an occasional (like twice a month) draft beer when we go out for dinner.  I was not a workout freak but I did a lot of running before my knee told me to stop, which I did.  Even so, I had a 5-by-pass heart procedure, 10 left knee surgeries, two shoulder surgeries, 3 major and one minor back surgery, and most recently as I said, a hip replacement.

Why am I telling you this?  Because to see me sitting at the table in Sam’s, you would never know that I have had all these surgeries nor that I still have difficulty walking for any length of time.  But that’s my story and the reason I tell it is that every person that passed me by this evening all have THEIR own stories that few if anyone really knows about.  My children are aware of my surgeries but I seriously doubt they are aware of some of the issues I still face every day.  The people that passed me by this evening have their issues as well and those issues remain hidden within them for no one to know but for their closest friends or relatives; even some of them are probably clueless.

The one question that began surfacing for me occurred in 2012 when I had my heart by-pass procedure.  It happened so suddenly and without warning.  I climbed the stairs in my home to the second floor and stopped at my dresser out of breath.  I then asked maybe the dumbest question ever asked, “I wonder if I should go to the emergency room?”  I thought about it for about 20 seconds and then went downstairs and told my wife and daughter who was visiting, that I thought I should go to the emergency room.  We went and within minutes I was lying on a gurney being examined by several doctors and within about and hour or so I was in a room being prepped for surgery.  I was told that they may just go take a look, or that they may insert a stint or stints as needed, or they may have to do a by-pass; they wouldn’t know for sure until they went in.  As mentioned earlier, it turned out to be a 5-by-pass surgical procedure.  For me it was like in the movies.  I was being wheeled down a long hospital corridor with fluorescent lights passing by overhead.  I thought to myself, “if this is it, I’m okay with it.  I’ve had a good life.”  Seriously, those were my exact thoughts.

Since that procedure, I began to wonder what other people were thinking about their lives as I do my own life.  At 78 I understand I am in the winter of my life and you don’t have to look very hard to see that there are a lot of people on this planet that never make to 78 so in that regard I have been fortunate.  That brings up the question that has bugged me since 2012.  Do people think of how they will eventually die because we all will?  I don’t dwell on it but it is getting harder and harder not to think about it.  As I look at a lot of the people checking out at Sam’s Club it is difficult not to wonder if they think about the same thing.  I really hate to say this but many of them look as though they may already be on death’s doorstep.  I know I should not say things like that or even think them, but it is hard not to when you see how difficult it is for them to just get out of the door without help.  I used to worry about the very obese people I would see but then I realized that it is fruitless to worry about a person you don’t know and that you know they had to have seen all the warnings about being grossly overweight.  It’s their life and they can choose to live it as they wish, difficult or not.  But as Dr. Saphire said, it is preventable!

The reason I write the Nuggets I write is that I like to think that they could be a lesson for anyone who may read them.  That is definitely the purpose behind this Nugget.  I challenge you, the reader, that the next time you are in a Sam’s Club type business and instead of just passing fellow shoppers by in the isle, pause as you start to pass them and simply smile, or even better, smile and say good morning or good afternoon.  Don’t wait for a response, just move on but watch the look on their face change.  Your smile, your comment, may be the catalyst for them to feel better about themselves because remember, you have no clue what they are thinking at that very moment in time.  I have found that in most instances, their faces immediately light up and the frown that was there moments before, melts away.  I know this because I have practiced this for decades.  I write about it now because I realize I have been so wrapped up in my own physical issues, that I stopped doing it.  That will come to an immediate end as of July 10, 2023 and I will return to doing it every chance I get; I hope you do as well.

Ignorance is not bliss as the proverbial saying indicates otherwise.  Ignorance is ignorance!  The world is in a serious mess and ignoring it won’t make it go away.  What will cause people with their heads buried in the sand and ignoring what has been happening to awake one day to life changing historical events that are going to happen probably sooner rather than later.  It matters little what race you are, what your religion is or isn’t, how much money you have or not have, or what you believe in or not believe in; we all live in this world as messed up as it is.  We will all live through whatever is about to happen be it a war or be it a new found peace, only time will tell.  What I know with certainty is that we all need each other and time will prove that comment to be correct.  Meeting that need can be as simple as a random smile to a passing shopper, trust me on this one, I believe it is true.  Time will prove me right or wrong but I’ll take my chances on being right on this one.

You can go through your entire life “hoping” for something to happen to you or for you.  Dr. John Maxwell said it best when he said, “hope is not an effective strategy!”  Dr. Maxwell is right!

Instead of wishing something to be true or for something to come your way, why not turn that wish into a prayer.  I have not been a religious person for a very long time but that does not mean I do not believe in God.  It only means that I feel betrayed by the beliefs of almost every religion in that they believe you must believe as they want you to believe or you are not welcomed within their congregation.  If you look back over history, almost every major conflict was fought over religious beliefs and that includes Nazi Germany and especially includes Japan.  But I digress. 

Back to my original thought, what are these people thinking at this very moment in time; that is the question?  How difficult would it be to just pause and say a short prayer asking God to grand them their most sincere wish or desire?  What is it that you want?  Here’s my list of wants:

·         I pray that my wife, should she live longer than I do, live a long and happy life without want.

·         I pray that something should occur that will awaken the leaders of the world and they will suddenly bring an end to all wars that serve no purpose other than to make a lot of people very rich while others die to make that happen and not for a worthy cause as they might have been led to believe.

·         I pray that my physical ailments will disappear or that I learn to better live with them as they are and as they probably will remain for the rest of my life

·         I pray that I will be able to continue to pay all my bills on time without any interruptions and that has been no easy task in 2023 with the ever-increasing cost of living in every area of my life.

·         I pray that my children and their children all live a long, happy and healthy lives and that they are free to pursue whatever life they choose.

·         I pray that the world that I will be leaving to my children and their children awakens to realize the polices and beliefs that seem to be permeating the globe are all leading the world to its own moral destruction unless there is an intervention.  I don’t know what that would look like, only that an intervention is definitely needed.

·         I pray that someone finds all that I have written and stored on my computer and that they find it important enough to share with others and to not let it just find its way into the trash can or simply erased from the hard drive.

·         My final prayer is that I pray that at least one person will read this and make a decision to make someone else’s life better every day they are alive.  Such a small prayer to make and ask. but that is my desire.  It has been my life’s mission and I need to get back on that mission’s path.  “To help people to do what they do, to do it better!”

When I was working in real estate for 30 plus years, I lived by that Life’s Mission Statement.  I would oftentimes ask myself very simple questions like is what I am about to say or do consistent with my life’s mission statement.  If the answer was YES, I would say or do it.  If the answer was no, I would not.  It was that simple and it worked every time and kept me firmly committed to what I should be doing versus what I might otherwise be doing.

There is no way to know what is going through another person’s mind; what troubles they are working through; what physical issues they are enduring; or what grief they may be experiencing.  You just don’t know.  My advice would be never to assume you know what someone else is thinking or asking themselves.  Remember, it only takes a second to smile and say hello; give it a try!

The following excerpt from Harry Browne’s book How I Found Freedom in an Un-Free World best describes what I have been trying to say: