Last Sunday concludes my autumn teaching programs. At the very moment I ended the lesson in your applause, I knew every 25 hours fully dedicated to one particular class -- would never be exactly the same.

Time really flies. One minute you were all new in my class, then seemingly overnight 10 weeks fly by and we wake to find it’s time to say goodbye. Hopefully you're leaving with a mind full of real knowledge and skills, and a heart filled with sustaining hope and strength, to guide you through the long journey of language study.

You said: If only time could progress at slower pace. How I wish too, at many moments in my life.

Remember when we were young and could not wait to be adults? It seemed like forever before we would finally grow up and be on our own. Then before we know it, we are already shouldering our own responsibilities, and our prime of life is more than half over. And the older we get, the faster the years race by.

Do you still remember a well-known saying I shared with you in class? “The past is history, tomorrow’s a mystery, so today is all we have. It’s a GIFT, that’s why it’s called the PRESENT.”

Well, no matter how much you wish you hadn’t skipped those classes so that you wouldn’t be so worry about your final exams right now, no matter how much I wish I had kept in touch with some of my friends so that we wouldn’t be drifted apart…It’s simply impossible to change the past. Yesterday is gone…forever. There is almost nothing any of us can do to bring it back. So, whatever mistakes, problems, or hurts we had yesterday, we can’t undo what’s already done, nor take back what we’ve already said. Hopefully we have learnt our lessons from yesterday’s mistakes. But don’t dwell on them, let it go. Life goes on, we’d better move on with it.

Tomorrow could be anticipated but none of us can control what might happen tomorrow. Pessimistically speaking, we don’t even know whether or not we’ll still be here. What is supposed to happen will happen whether we worry about it or not. But if we think positively, it is the unknown part of life that makes us expect a better, a more beautiful, a more fruitful tomorrow. However, that rosy picture of tomorrow won’t be pulled together without a fulfilled TODAY.

How many times in your life have you heard about the expression -- “Seize the day!” So, do you treasure today – the only day that you can actually do something about, and do you live every day to the fullest?

Jesus Christ said: “Who can add a single hour to his life by worrying! Don’t worry about tomorrow. Each day has enough trouble of its own. Live just one day at a time.” All we have is right now, and today has enough problems, responsibilities, and worries of its own. The last thing we need to do is to pile up yesterday’s and tomorrow’s concerns over today’s. Make sure today, you’re doing your very best in your responsibilities. As long as you’re living up with your principles and moving towards your goals, you know for sure you have nothing to worry about.

There is a metaphor about time -- Every morning when you wake up, somebody put 86,400 Dollars in your bank account. Every night when you go to sleep, whatever you didn’t spend that day would be taken out of your account and thrown away. It's called the Bank of Time, which gives us 86,400 seconds every day. We use it or we lose it. Then have you ever thought about what are the best bargains and deals in life that are worth our investment of valuable time?

Someone once wrote:

If you want to know the value of one year, just ask a student who failed a course. 

If you want to know the value of one month, ask a mother who gave birth to a premature baby. 

If you want to know the value of one hour, ask the lovers waiting to meet. 

If you want to know the value of one minute, ask the person who just missed the flight.  

If you want to know the value of one second, ask the person who just escaped death in a car accident. 

And if you want to know the value of one-hundredth of a second, ask the athlete who won a silver medal in the Olympics.

So, are you making your days count? Have you taken out every cent in your account today? What will you do with the life you have left? 

“The success of our life is not measured by its duration, but by its donation.” It’s not how long we live that counts, it’s how well and wisely we live. Make smart investment with your given asset of time. Spend some time on the people you love, for at the end of your life, you will never be sorry for the time you spent with your family and friends. Spend some time on searching real knowledge, for it brings real wealth, both tangible and mental, that you can never lose. 

Life is too short to waste on worrying and regretting our living in the past. Before you go to sleep, get prepared to wisely allocate your 86,400 Dollars tomorrow. Seize the day and good night.

posted on 2007-01-09 22:11 江晓弘 阅读(9498) 评论(52)  编辑  收藏 所属分类: 讲台之上 网摘收藏