Teneisha Johnson
"First Man, First Phone"....Caribbean Quantum Leap!
Hello World!
Think of the career towards which you are working as a long-term accomplishment and investment. Who writes best-selling novels? The person who only dreams of becoming a bestselling author or the one who also spends four hours a day doing research and working at a computer?
Who writes screen plays? According to Merriam Webster's definition - a screen play is the written form of a movie that also includes instructions on how it is to be acted and filmed : the script for a movie.
Who loses weight? The person who thinks about being thin or the one who also plans a healthy diet and runs or walks three miles a day? You can even make it fun by exercising for a great cause!
Thomas Carlyle said, "The purpose of man is in action, not thought". Do you agree?
I believe if you prepare for your success in little ways, you will eventually see results in big ways. It would almost be magical!
We serve God by serving others. The world defines greatness in terms of power, possessions, prestige, and position.
Acting like a servant is not a popular concept. Jesus however; measured greatness in terms of service, not status.
God determines your greatness by how many people you serve, not how many people serve you. Everyone wants to lead; no one wants to be a servant. Sometimes that can mean doing menial tasks.
Jesus specialized in menial tasks that everyone else tried to avoid: washing feet, helping children or even serving lepers.
During the last supper he displayed his humility and servant-hood when he washed the feet of his disciples.
In Philippians 2:6-8 it states, “Who, although being essentially one with God and in the form of God did not think this equality with God was a thing to be eagerly grasped or retained, but stripped Himself (of all privileges and rightful dignity) so as to assume the guise of a servant, in that He became like men and was born a human being.
And after He had appeared in human form, he abased and humbled Himself and carried His obedience to the extreme of death, even the death of the cross!
We should all be grateful for his sacrifice for us and that is why we Christians celebrate Easter.
Nothing was beneath him- because he came to serve.
Sometimes great opportunities disguise themselves in small tasks and there is a sweet distinction in being the first for any given task- be it great or small.
If we were to select a first miracle for Jesus to perform, no doubt we would pick something grand such as a healing or raising someone from the dead or feeding five thousand with five loaves and two fish.
But God chose to use a social gathering for Christ’s first miracle.
I believe Jesus purposely chose a social event for his first miracle. He wanted us to realize that he cares for our everyday needs. They may not seem very important.
Certainly, running out of wine at a wedding would not be considered a world crisis, but God loves us so much that he wants us to know that he cares about the little things in our life.
He wants to meet the needs in every area of our life. There is no prayer that is unimportant to God.
Christ came to bring redemption to the soul, healing to the body, and joy to the spirit. But he also came to help us with socially embarrassing situations.
How wonderful and marvelous is God’s love toward us!
History has spoken kindly of one of the Islands most influential early residents, a man by the name of William Bodden who was regarded as an unofficial Governor.
He lived in Bodden Town and was Chief Magistrate from 1798 until his death in 1823.
He was responsible for the first roads on the Island, the construction of the first church and schooner, and the forts at George Town and Prospect.
Bodden Town also boasts of providing the Cayman Islands with their first, second and third college-trained teachers, the islands first professionally trained nurse and the first seminary trained minister of religion.
Bodden Town was also the first Capital of the Cayman Islands and was the seat of the Legislative Assembly for many years.
Now we have the modern Legislative Assembly building in George Town that was erected in the early 1970's on the site of the former Princess Royal Park. It also has the distinction of being the first poured concrete structure on the Islands.
According to the accurate records of the Cayman Compass - Bodden Town served as the seat of Cayman’s government and various governmental activities were held in the town but over the years, Bodden Town lost its prominence as the harbor silted in, and most trading took place in East End or Hog Sty Bay in George Town.
George Town is now the capital.
Interestingly enough I once lived beside a "Forget me not" street in Bodden Town in 2009 and unfortunately there are memories there which I wish I could forget.
Experiences that caused me great distress. All my things were ripped away from me. I felt like I was literally raped that day.
I recently read in the Caymanian Compass that you can now be forgotten online, but apparently not in the British Library.
U.K. law has already recognized a “right to be forgotten” but it had applied primarily to search engine results such as those generated by Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Microsoft Corp.’s Bing.
The article stated that people generally had to prove that the information they wish to remove had caused damage or distress.
Now U.K. Digital Minister Matt Hancock said in early August 2017 that the government would introduce privacy legislation that would expand “the right to be forgotten” beyond just search engine results to any personal data held by a third party.
However Max Campbell, a privacy lawyer at Brett Wilson Solicitors in London said, “Instead of individuals having to prove damage or distress, material will now be removed on request unless private companies can prove a compelling public interest in keeping the information online”.
This “right to be forgotten” law will bring the U.K. in line with the European Union’s existing General Data Protection Regulation, which takes effect in May 2018.
But the new privacy rules contain exceptions for some official information, including medical records, collected by the National Health Service.
Exceptions are also being made for the Internet archives maintained by the British Library, which by law is required to collect a copy of all published material in the U.K.
Since 2013, the Library has also been required to archive the entire U.K. web domain once per year. Wow!
We could also look into American history and talk about the first man to walk on the moon, Neil Alden Armstrong. He was the first to step on the surface during the Apollo 11 mission.
It is not enough just to know a name; you need to know a little bit about the man and his career.
He was the command pilot of the Gemini 8 mission in 1966; this was the first of the two missions that he manned.
He cooperated with pilot David Scott to perform the first manned docking of two spacecraft on this mission.
His second mission was the Apollo 11 moon mission on which he was the mission commander.
The lunar landing took place on July 20, 1969. Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin spent 2 ½ hours on the lunar surface, but Armstrong was the first one to set his foot on the Moon’s surface.
As he put his left foot down first Armstrong declared: "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind."
BULGARIA
Bulgaria’s Rose Valley stretches for about 87 miles across a narrow interval between the Balkan mountain range, dressing up in pink every May and June.
Once known for making pistols, ammunition, and automatic weapons under Communism, now the region is famous as one of the world’s biggest sources of an oil likened to “liquid gold.” Rose oil earned the nickname for a reason:
It takes more than 3,180 pounds of roses to produce just one pound of rose oil, valued between 3,468 and 6,000 dollars.
Today the roses’ edible, highly fragrant flowers are idolized as Bulgaria’s national symbol of pride, but economic pressures and changing climate make their future unclear.
For more information visit:
According to James R. Hansen a professor of history at Auburn University in his important and authorized biography (First Man, The Life of Neil A. Armstrong), Neil was very humble despite his success. His family however were extremely proud. Especially his parents.
For his wife, the pressure on all astronauts’ wives were extraordinary. Each bore a heavy burden, trying as they did to appear before the public as Mrs. Astronaut and the All-American Mother.
They knew what NASA and even the white house expected of them. For an astronauts’ wife, deciding what to wear was about much more than just a woman’s sense of style or even her vanity.
It was about maintaining that wholesome and sanctified image of the entire U.S. space program, and of America itself.
Janet stated, “Our lives were dedicated to a cause, to try to reach the goal of putting a man on the Moon by the end of 1969. It was an all-out effort on everyone’s agenda.”
For his father, Steve, a thirty-seven-year veteran employee of the state of Ohio, it was a tremendous honor to show off his family to government officials, including his boss in the Department of Mental Hygiene and Correction.
Even the Governor at the time, James Rhodes, during his speech announced that the state would be involved in the construction of a new airport to be named after Neil. Wow!
For his mother, Viola, the happy outcome of her son’s Gemini VIII flight was, as always, a vindication of her Christian faith.
Another first was the inventor of the telephone by Alexander Graham Bell who was born on March 3, 1847 and was an eminent scientist, inventor, engineer and innovator.
Bell's father, grandfather, and brother had all been associated with work on elocution and speech, and both his mother and wife were deaf, profoundly influencing Bell's life's work which validates my earlier article about Influence never stopping with a generation or disability.
Many times obstacles in life can be used as stepping stones to achieve greater goals. His research on hearing and speech further led him to experiment with hearing devices which eventually culminated in Bell being awarded the first U.S. patent for the telephone in 1876.
Many other inventions marked Bell's later life, including groundbreaking work in optical telecommunications, hydrofoils and aeronautics.
In 1888, Alexander Graham Bell became one of the founding members of the National Geographic Society. Wow!
There are so many people, inventions or ground breaking historical events that I could state- but there is something distinctive about great women or men.
For the ones of the present, it is something that radiates outward into the lives of those around them.
They encourage, inspire and cause their country, city or state, friends, employees or coworkers to feel proud of being apart of their lives.
The best way to work is to work with people to build teams and develop synergy.
We must refuse to allow hurts, insults, or injuries we've received to dissolve our optimism and faith in humanity.
To fail here is to limit our own hearts and therefore the progression of our lives.
