Some of us fly, some of us fall
Emotional abuse is the leading reason
for suicide victims
A forgotten necklace, a misread text
You don’t know what it’s like, but you
think you do
I had to hold my friend who was sobbing in the shower
But I can’t tell you. You wouldn’t
understand.
___ AKSHR
The Presentation
There is a fine balance between
honoring the past and losing yourself in it. everyday.
Who was this sad, exhilarating man,
this wide-eyed boy who wandered the
world?
What brought him out of his body and into ours?
How does one leave a room?
How can
someone so alive be dead?
If You Keep It to Yourself, It Will Never Heal
Part of the healing process is sharing
with other people who care.
Everyone wants to tell you how to do
it,
how to stand up, how to sit down.
Everyone wants to tell you what you
should or shouldn’t be doing.
But no one has any idea what it is like
in your shoes.
No one knows what it’s like when the
fear rises up inside,
when the panic sets in, when you can’t
breathe.
No one knows what it is like to stand
up and go out in public.
No one knows what it is like to have to
face your fears everyday.
No one knows what it is like to be
afraid all the time.
So please, don’t keep it to yourself; share with other people who care.
___AKSHR
Coffee
Emotional abuse is a major epidemic in
our culture
Remember the last time you were told
you were a good person
by someone who was not your therapist
or your mother?
I don’t. I don’t remember anyone
telling me that I was a good person.
In fact, they told me quite the
opposite.
How could they say such a thing to me?
Don’t they know what I did?
I don’t remember the last time I was
told I was a good person
but I still have the scars.
__ AKSHR
If You Feel
That You Are Endangered by Your Job, Quit
If you feel that you are indispensable,
put your finger in a glass of water,
withdraw it, and note the hole you have left.
Climb a mountain. Then come
down.
The wealth of the world
The real measure of your wealth is how much you'd be worth
if you lost all your money.
Without it, you're just a
man. With it, you're just a number.
The real measure of your
wealth is how much money you make per hour.
Without it, you're just a
man. With it, you're just a number.
The real measure of your wealth is how much money you have
in the bank and the amount on your credit
card.
Without it, you're just a
man. With it, you're just a number.
The real measure of your wealth is how much money go to
charity and how much is wasted on meaningless
things?
Without it, you're just a
man. With it, you're just a number.
The real measure of your wealth is what kind of car do I drive
and what kind of house do I live in?
Without it, I'm not showin' off too much because
I don't have that much to show for my life (what's left of
this life).
With it, I'm just a number.
The real measure of your
wealth is how much money you make per hour.
Without it, you're just a
man. With it, you're just a number.
____ AKSHR
Of all the things you wear
Of all the things you wear,
your expression is the most important.
Your eyes are the sun, but
your mouth is the sky.
Without a word, you can
make me fall in love with you.
You say a lot with your
smile but you say more with your eyes.
That’s why they’re called
“windows to the soul.”
Your voice is like an
instrument, and I can hear every note.
And when I hear it ring, my
heart sings along.
I know that everything you
wear has a purpose and a meaning;
But without your
expression, you would be naked and incomplete.
____ AKSHR
A Chant for Laughter
Laughter is a tranquilizer
with no side effects.
In laughter, the airway is opened and the heart is calmed.
It increases pressure in the lungs and improves blood circulation.
Without it, we might forget
how to breathe.
Laughter can be like a hug, a kiss or a daydream -
an act of love, even a form of prayer.
Without it we are lost in
our troubles and too serious for our own good.
Laughter is the best
medicine and a good laugh
cuts through the tension
like a hot knife.
Thank goodness for
laughter, thank goodness for laughter.
It's the answer to all our
problems.
In laughter, there is hope.
____AKSHR
The Lunar Beauty
The average woman would rather have beauty than brains
because the average man can see better than he
can think.
His eyes are drawn to the
curve of a neck or the swell of a breast,
and he’s thinking no thoughts, just feeling.
And if she has those things plus long hair and smooth skin and full lips,
then she can get away with being dull as dishwater.
___ AKSHR
All of the biggest technological inventions created by man - the airplane, the automobile, the computer - says little about his intelligence, but speaks volumes about his laziness. - Mark Kennedy
“If future generations are to remember us more with gratitude than sorrow, we must achieve more than just the miracles of technology. We must also leave them a glimpse of the world as it was created, not just as it looked when we got through with it.”
Lyndon B. Johnson, Former President of the United States of America
This is the Way the World Is
Government is a trust
and the officers of the government are trustees,
and both the trust and the trustees are created
for the benefit of the people
—the people, not the government.
Without trust there is no government,
and without government we have no freedom.
____AKSHR
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Lock up your libraries if you like
Lock up your libraries if you like,
but there is no gate, no lock, no bolt that
you can set upon the freedom of my mind.
Without paper and ink,
without poring over dusty volumes,
I will live.
Without books, without poems, without stories
to take me beyond my own small life,
I will live.
Lock up your libraries if you like;
but there is no gate, no lock, no bolt that you can set
upon the freedom of my mind.
___ AKSHR
The Road Not Taken
New opinions are always suspected,
and usually opposed,
without any other reason but
because they are not common.
Nothing can be said in their favor but
what can be said of anything new.
It is much easier to disparage
than to defend them.
___AKSHR
The Banned Book
There are worse crimes than burning books.
One of them is not reading them.
If you love a book, read it.
Read it in
the morning, read it at night.
Read it while eating lunch and while waiting in line.
Read it on the subway and on the plane.
Read it everywhere you
go.
Don't just read one book.
Read as many
books as you can.
Books are an escape from the real world,
so don't be afraid to get lost in them.
Read all the books that you want to read.
____AKSHR
Freedom
Freedom is when the people can speak,
democracy is when the government listens.
Without freedom,
the people listen to
the government speak.
Without freedom,
the people listen to
those who have money speak.
Without freedom,
the people listen to
those who have power speak.
Without freedom,
the people are silent
and do not speak.
Freedom is when a journalist
can write
whatever he or she wants to write.
Freedom is when a journalist does not have
to censor what he or she writes
because of fear of death or imprisonment.
Freedom is when the people can speak,
democracy is when the government listens.
____AKSHR
A Solidarity of Owls
Intellectual liberty is the air of the soul,
the sunshine of the mind and without it,
the world is a prison, the Universe is a dungeon.
Without it, no one can think or learn.
There is no greater power than the mind
of a free man
and for that man to remain free he must
be vigilant.
He cannot speak openly or teach what he
knows,
to any who will listen, if he wishes to
remain free.
He cannot teach the joy of thinking
freely in a free country
if he does not wish his thoughts to be
silenced.
If he does not want his mind to be
caged.
For if he speaks out, or teaches what
he knows,
he is subjecting himself to persecution
and punishment.
He is giving up his liberty when he
refuses to learn.
He is giving up his freedom when he
chooses ignorance over education.
There is no such thing as an educated slave and without it, we are all slaves.
____AKSHR
The Cow
Journalists must seek and speak the truth,
for we are the voice of the voiceless millions of the planet.
Our mission is to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable
and our responsibility is to seek truth and report it,
for without a free press, there is no democracy.
I will support freedom of expression and freedom of the press
throughout my career and defend the
rights of journalists everywhere to write and say what they think
without fear of retribution.
I will only hold myself accountable to an ethics code that
protects rather than restricts my ability to be
truthful in gathering, reporting and editing the news.
____AKSHR