mysignsoflife

Today marks the first of weekly posts on Mentors.  Each Wednesday you’ll find a post on My Signs of Life on an author, philosopher, writer, activist or simply someone I’ve met who has had a positve influence on my life.  Someone who I feel has shaped my thoughts and views on the world and this journey we all call “Personhood”.

Todays mentor is Leo Buscaglia.  

Below is an excerpt from Leo’s biography:

Buscaglia was teaching in the Department of Special Education at the University of Southern California in the late 1960s when one of his students committed suicide. 

She had been one of the sets of “kind eyeballs” he always looked for in the large auditorium, because her responses showed him that at least one student was hearing what he said, so the news that she killed herself had a great impact on him. 

[”What are we doing stuffing facts into people and forgetting that they are human beings?”] 

This incident led him to form a non-credit class titled Love 1A. 

There were no grades. (How could you potentially fail someone in this class? That wouldn’t be very loving!) The class led to lectures and a manuscript loosely based on what was shared in those weekly classes. 

The book found a publisher - and an author surprised to find that the simple title LOVE had never previously been claimed, allowing him to say “I have the copyright on LOVE!” 

Buscaglia said he never taught this class, only facilitated it, adding that he learned as much as anyone. 

You can read the rest of Leo’s biography here.

Without a doubt, reading the works of Leo Buscaglia had and continues to have an inspiring impact on my life.  I don’t know how I happened upon his book “Personhood”, I was about 15 or 16 years old.  I think the title caught my eye ~

“PERSONHOOD, The Art of Being Fully Human”. 

Ok, this looks interesting, I read the first few paragraphs, he said things like” “Only when we give joyfully, without hesitation or thought of gain, can we truly know what love mean.”  Right on!  I knew I was going to love him and learn a lot.

Buscaglia talked about his childhood and what he learned from his mamma and papa; “I’ve learned that to take from life was a priviledge and that to give my uniqueness to life was my responsibility”.  How true…

There were chapters on the stages we go through at certain ages in our lives and how those stages effect our “personhood”.  Buscaglia quotes Confucious, Abraham Maslow, Henry David Thoreau, Buddha, Tao Tzu and Gandhi just to name a few, all of whom I knew little about.  But not for long…

I devoured the book!  Which at that age, was not like me, but his book had me mesmerized.  In addition to “Personhood”, I went on to read his book “Love” and “Living, Loving and Learning”.  I am proud to say that twentysome years after reading Dr. Buscaglia’s books, the books are worn and ragged, but I am a better person because of it.  

I hope you have the chance to read any book by Leo Buscaglia, you’ll be glad you did.

Here are some of my favorite Buscaglia quotes:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I still get wildly enthusiastic about little things… 

I play with leaves. 

I skip down the street and run against the wind. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Change is the end result of all true learning.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Death is a challenge. 

It tells us not to waste time… 

It tells us to tell each other right now that we love each other.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Don’t brood. 

Get on with living and loving. 

You don’t have forever.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Don’t smother each other. 

No one can grow in the shade.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Find the person who will love you because of your differences

and not in spite of them and you have found a lover for life.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I believe that you control your destiny, 

that you can be what you want to be. 

You can also stop and say, No, I won’t do it, 

I won’t behave his way anymore. 

Maybe I have to change 

MY methods of behaving and then you do it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I have a very strong feeling 

that the opposite of love is not hate - it’s apathy. 

It’s not giving a damn.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Your talent is God’s gift to you. 

What you do with it is your gift back to God.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“It’s not enough to have lived.

We should be determined to live for something.

May I suggest that it be creating joy for others,

sharing what we have for the betterment of personkind,

bringing hope to the lost and love to the lonely.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Leo F. Buscaglia1924-1998

Check back next Wednesday for another 

“Mentor of the Week”

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