Wednesday, February 06, 2008

A lesson for living

I found an old pile of Reader´s Digests from the year of the Ark´s landing and found this article which I felt to be very fitting for me at this time and thought it might be an encouragement to you. ...... enjoy!!


Condensed from PLUS: The magazine of Positive Thinking by Ronald Reagan
(Found in Readers Digest Magazine May edition 1990)

"Everything happens for the best," my mother said whenever I faced disappointment.

"If you carry on, one day something good will happen. And you´ll realize that it wouldn´t have happened if not for that previous disappointment."

Mother was right, as I discovered after graduation from college in 1932. I had decided to try for a job in radio, then work my way up to sports announcer. I hitchhiked to Chicago and knocked on the door of every station and got turned down every time.

In one studio, a kind lady told me that big stations couldn´t risk hiring an inexperienced person. "Go out in the sticks and find a small station that´ll give you a chance."

I thumbed home to Dixon, Ill. While there were no radio-announcing jobs in Dixon, my father said that in a sports department they were looking for a local athelte to manage it. Since Dixon was where I had played high-school football, I applied. The job sounded just right for me. But I wasn´t hired.

My disappointement must have shown. "Everything happens for the best," Mom reminded me. Dad offered me the car to drive 70 miles to the Tri-Cities. I tried WOC RAdio in Davenport, Iowa. The program director, a wonderful Scotsman , told me they had already hired an announcer.

As I left his office, my frustration boiled over. I asked aloud, "How can a fellow get to be a sports announcer if he can´t get a job in a radio station?"
I was waiting for the elevator when I heard the director calling, "What was that you said about sports? Do you know anything about football?" Then he stood me before a microphone and asked me to broadcast an imaginary game.

The preceding autumn, my team had won a game in the last 20 seconds with a 65 yard run. I did a 15 min buildup to that play, and the director told me I would be broadcasting Saturday´s game!!!!

On my way home, as I thought of my mother´s words: "If you carry on, one day something good will happen - something that wouldn´t have happened if not for that previous disappointment."




8 comments:

Mari said...

That's a great story with such a good lesson.

luvmy4sons said...

There's a wonderful children's book...I think it might be a series called, "It's good. No, it's bad." I might not have the title right. But it goes through all these circumstances and just when you think it is either good or bad a reason comes up to make it the opposite. I loved reading it to the children. It helped me too to realize that our circumstances are not good or bad, because God works all things together for good to those who love Him and are called according to His purpose. A traffic ticket may have just saved you from a fatal accident a few minutes down the road. We often don't know what God has hidden in our greatest disappointments. GREAT post!

Masked Rabbit said...

Yup, it happens that way. I remember my husband not getting a job in London and we were really saddened. A year later that company closed its doors. We'd have been in real trouble had we moved!

Terri said...

That is so true. So many times we find out later that what we wanted would not have been the best for us. Makes me glad I'm not in control of it all!

Mari said...

Ally - I enjoyed your 3 visits in one day and laughed when I read your last comment!

Brandi said...

As I have been studying geography with my kindergartener, it has been so neat to point to places on the globe and say, "I have a bloggy frend there!" I thought of you the other day when we were listing the countries in Europe.

Meeting other believers in cyber space has been such a blessing!

Demara said...

Oh Ally thank-you for those words of encouragement! I needed to read something like that after the horrific nightmare I just had (about my husband being found dead on the driveway at our first owned house.). I had so many of them today! That happens when I'm sick and sleeping with medication in me, but the scariest part of them is that I've had them come true before and they are ALWAYS VERY realistic, so they FREAK ME RIGHT OUT! So thanks again for this story, it turned me from tears to a smile.

She Rose Up said...

You know, I have been blessed to believe this way all my life. (Thank the Good Good Lord for a Godly mother to train me) But, it NEVER ceases to thrill my heart & soul to hear the testimony of others who experience it. Because let's face it. We all get ample opportuity to fear, to doubt, to think we are experiencing the 1 exception to this rule. (at least I know I have fallen prey for brief times with this)

Thanks for posting this! I love it!