General Admission

On the virtue of gratitude

AL-MENDOZA-GEN-ADMISSION

By Al S. Mendoza

 

THE golden rule is the most invincible saying of all time.

As the New Year has just dawned upon us, it is but fitting that this motto is recalled anew if only to serve as guidance for us in our journey for the next 12 months.

To absorb its full efficacy, the golden rule must be preached and practiced with vigor and zeal.

As the golden rule commands us, “Do not do unto others what you don’t want others do unto you.”

Thus, if you do not want to be judged, do not judge.

If you do not want to be criticized, do not criticize.

You abide by the golden rule unconditionally, you are the best thing next to John Lennon aka “Mr. Give Peace A Chance.”

Who can top John Lennon’s “Imagine there is no heaven…no hell below us, above us only sky.”

And more of Lennon: “Imagine there’s no country, it isn’t hard to do…nothing to kill or die for, and no religion, too.”

And to conclude: “Imagine no possession, I wonder if you can, no need for greed nor hunger, a brotherhood of man.”

No heaven and so no hell.

No country and so no wars.

No religion and so God is one for all.

No possession and so no rich nor poor.

No greed nor hunger and so wealth be dispersed.

Didn’t Zuckerberg dispose 90 percent just recently of his Facebook fortune of nearly $90 billion to charity?

He merely followed in the footsteps of Microsoft founder Bill Gates and his wife Melissa, whose wealth—most of it anyway—also went to charity in the mold of billionaire Warren Buffett.

While honesty is the best policy, generosity is a policy worth embracing, too.

But there’s also beauty of unimaginable magnitude in being grateful at all times.

To me, gratitude is man’s most admirable and profoundly unassailable attitude.

So that if there’s one adage we should all embrace with all our might, with all our soul and with all our heart, it is this:  Gratitude is the highest virtue on Earth.

I like Grace Poe the way I also like her adoptive father, FPJ—Da King FPJ being not only my beloved “lost” town mate in Mangatarem but also my most unforgettable partner three times in San Miguel Beer commercial ads.

But sorry to say that Grace Poe seemed to have become our lost sheep when she turned down P-Noy’s offer to be Mar Roxas’s running mate in the May polls.

How quickly Grace Poe had forgotten.

It was P-Noy who practically, if not literally, gave Grace Poe her golden chance to come home for good from the US and retake her Filipino roots when P-Noy the newly-elected President in 2013 appointed Grace Poe Movie/TV chair.

How easily Grace Poe could turn her back on her benefactor.

If there’s one person who unequivocally, exceedingly and magnificently adheres to the saying, “Gratitude is the highest virtue on Earth,” it is Mayor Teddy Cruz (by the way, his 9-year term is over in May, and so no politicking here whatsoever).

Ask anyone in Mangatarem.

(For your comments and reactions, please email to: punch.sunday@gmail.com)

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