“Let no one weep for me, or celebrate my funeral with mourning; for I still live, as I pass to and fro through the mouths of men.” ~ Quintus Ennius
Sifting through the annals of recorded human history in search of pearls of timeless wisdom is an extremely rewarding process. Whether sown as specific seeds to be watered and germinated by the minds and hearts of future generations or extracts of a more complete line of thought, sharing and breathing new life into the remarkable statements made by men and women who led uncommon lives and hearing what resonates with you, dear readers, is gratifying and encouraging.
No matter what you believe about what happens after death, it’s hard to deny that a life well-lived will continue to bless others many years after the vehicle for the expression of that life gives way, especially now that we record our thoughts in ways that make them much more accessible than was possible in previous generations. One downside to the breakthroughs in communication technology is that readers must now sift through tons of literary dross before finding the gold, but the fact is that the gold is much closer to the surface than ever before!
Separating the pure, unadulterated truth from everything else requires a touchstone. Historically speaking, touchstones were small tablets of dark stone used to assay precious metal alloys. The purity of gold and silver were determined by the color of the line left when the metal was rubbed on the touchstone. We now use more precise methods, but the new approaches are just different applications of the same underlying principle.
Metaphorically speaking, a touchstone is a test or criterion for the quality of a thing. Very few people nowadays can – please pardon the vulgarity – tell shit from Shinola when it comes to separating literary dross from the gold. This is especially true in the literary genre known as “self-help” or “self-improvement.” I’ve read and heard a great many things that sound good on the surface, but put them into practice, under pressure, with real lives at risk and you see very quickly what works and what doesn’t.
Rare is the person who does not love a “feel-good” story. People love to be inspired, but most tend to prefer to be inspired in ways that doesn’t require much of them. Package a product that makes a person feel good without having to do or being good and you have a hot commodity. Require something of them and the crowd of prospective buyers quickly thins.
If you wish to live an uncommon life you must be willing to develop a personal touchstone, a means of sorting through the mountain of information you encounter from day-to-day. What is true and what is not? Which are the diamonds and which are cubic zirconia? There are no comprehensive guidebooks that I am aware of and these daily blogs are my attempt to share my touchstone with you.
Your life can be one that passes to and fro through the mouths of men for many decades and centuries to come once your touchstone is in place. Your legacy will quickly evaporate if you leave it to be recognized or for other selfish reasons, but it will last forever if it is paved with the bricks of blessing, blessings given to others without expectation of return.
Gregory Hake 
Great history! The touchstone is a great principle to work with.
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Thank you for the daily “shinola” your blog offers. Happy New Year!
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We all have talents and our legacy will be how we used them; this includes poets, writers, musicians, scholars,teachers, artists and myriad disciplines. By developing a touch stone or as I call it my “litmus paper” we can give our lives to the things that last and gather momentum as they are shared; love, blessing, kindness, compassion, forgiveness. We build today the house we live in tomorrow and we build the roads for those that will follow in the future.I appreciate the people you have used as examples in your posts that have left us a legacy of nobility and truth.
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Wow, beautiful description of what a touchstone should be in our lives, thanks!
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I was writing my year end analysis of 2010 the other
evening. I have 3 categories of blessings I look at, things that
worked well, things I could have done better, things that didn’t
work. Finding your blog was among my blessings that worked well. It
is a resource that fortified me.Thank you. I am now working on my
“state of the union” address to myself. What do I want to
accomplish in 2011, what do I need to work on personally to assist
myself and who or where can I look to for help to reach my goals?
Again your blog is among my assets for reaching my goals in 2011.
Thank you for your time, and I’m sure hard work, in bringing this
collection of bright lights to me in 2010. The path of a true
legacy is sometimes difficult to trace but as I looked back on 2010
I saw that many of my “things that worked well” could be traced
back to posts you wrote. Thanks for igniting my thoughts on many
days this year.To use a quote from your Dec. 1 post, “Light gives
of itself freely, filling all available space. It does not seek
anything in return; it asks not whether you are friend or foe. It
gives of itself and is not thereby diminished. ~ Michael Strassfeld
Great post again today, thanks.
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Amen and Amen to both of the above!! Thank you, Gregg.
🙂
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Gregg, it is a tremendous priveledge to share your touchstone on a daily basis, a dependable guiding influence which has proven to be set upon a solid foundation, This is a real commodity, and I trust others (Many others) will come to know the truth through this avenue for expression. Uncountable, are the blessings I have come to know as a direct result of the inspiration you provide here, and so what if it involves work what else are we here to do?
I trust you, and I trust that others will be blessed as a direct result of that fact!
Onward and upward!
Thanks Gregg!
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Your readers, past, present and future have been given an unprecedented opportunity to share in your “touchstone”. Your hard work and mindful considerations are truely blessings in this world. My hope is that I and all the others take the information you have offered and increase the blessings through our own revelations, putting our touchstones in place, creating a path of blessing, one touchstone to another. Thanks!
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