Sand and Stone

A story tells of two friends who were walking through
the desert.  During some point of the journey, they
had an argument, and one friend slapped the other
one in the face. The one who got slapped was hurt,
but without saying anything, he wrote in the sand:

”Today my best friend slapped me in the face.”

They kept on walking, until they found an oasis,
where they decided to take a bath. The one who had
been slapped got stuck in the mire and started
drowning, but his friend saved him. After he
recovered from the near drowning, he wrote on a stone:

”Today my best friend saved my life.”

The friend, who had slapped and saved his best
friend, asked him, "After I hurt you, you wrote in
the sand, and now, you write on a stone, why?"

The other friend replied: "When someone hurts us,
we should write it down in sand, where the winds of
forgiveness can erase it away, but when someone
does something good for us, we must engrave it in
stone where no wind can ever erase it.

Learn to write your hurts in the sand and to carve
your blessings in stone.

Author Unknown

When you're criticizing others

And are finding here and there

A fault or two to speak of

Or a weakness you can't bear;

When you're blaming someone's weakness

Or accusing some one else

It's time that you went out

To walk around yourself

There are lots of human failures

In the average of us all

And lots of grave shortcomings

In the short ones and the tall;

But when we think of evils

Men should lay upon the shelves,

It's time we all went out

To take a walk around ourselves

We need so often in this life

This balancing of scales;

This seeing how much in us wins

And how much in us fails.

But before you judge another

Just to lay him on the shelf...

It would be a splendid plan

To take a walk around yourself

(author unknown)