What's the best advice you ever received?

Lovely story crimson. Many thanks

Nothing stays the same. This reminds me of something that happened to me a long time ago. We had a French student staying whose English was very poor [even worse than my French . We muddled along for a few days feeling a bit awkward, and then one day I asked her the meaning of the name of a racehorse I adored at that time. He was called Sabin du Loire. She didn't know [I think it was the name of a place]. I also tried to explain how beautiful I found the name, and that I often said it out loud. Wasn't sure that she'd understood me. Anyway, later that day she came up to me and said that she had some English words that made her feel the same, and the words were 'All things change', and I realised we had undertood one another and, even though we couldn't communicate very well language wise we understood each other in a way that was beyond language. I then learned that she loved films, so we spent the rest of her stay going to the cinema and watching dvd's. When Sabin du Loire retired from racing [thankfully to a long and happy retirement] I wrote to his trainer and told him this story. I received a lovely letter from his wife saying how horses bring people together [Martin Pipe it was OGM will know who I mean]. Perhaps when I win the lottery and buy myself a racehorse that'll be his name. All Things Change.

Butty Very true!

Nothing stays the same.

forgot to say that was one of my late Mum`s sayings. Along with you can always stoop and pick up nothing, can understand that now she meant if you lower your standards to other peoples it will not benefit you.

a little help is worth a deal of pity often think of that!!

is very true lot of people like to gloat at others problems but few actually try and help!!

'Its only an Internet forum'

When I was very young I was given a ticking off by my boss to the effect that my caustic tongue would get me in trouble. Advice I never listened to. Thank the lord.

He was obviously of the opinion that 'the meek shall inherit the earth'.

My mum always believed in 'Do as you would be done by' & ' never judge a book by its cover and never judge a person by their colour' and have tried to always follow those rules.

And my dad, when DH & I got married as students said 'Love is important but it won't pay the bills!' Remembered that often!!

Don't marry her - from my dad. It ended in divorce after 16 years.

Do as you would be done by - difficult some times!

Some of the best advice I have had is to clear up as you go along. another I like is you can do a lot more with a little bit of sugar than with a pint of vinegar. You can achieve a lot more with love than with hate.

My dad, a pianist (not classical, he played in pubs and for strippers) always told us 'Always B sharp, never B flat.'
And to my mum 'I never looked.'

Never listen to advice. Never give advice. Although I did once suggest to absent daughter that she should let the mascara dry on her top eyelashes before applying it to the bottom ones.

I never give advice. However, I have been thanked by a lot of people and on a number of occasions for my "wise advice". Of course, what I did was sit and listen while they talked through their problems, providing tea and biscuits or gin and tonic, and they came to their own conclusions.

Beware of desperate steps. The darkest day,
Live till to-morrow, will have pass'd away.

This is from a poem by William Cowper, and it's stayed in my mind since I read it.

You can still be assertive even if you are feeling small and weak.
Not sure if I always live up to it but it gives me courage to know remember this.

Humberbear - I think I must have heard the Wendy Greengross programme on sibling jealousy (unfortunately after I'd tried unsuccessfully to stop first child being jealous of the second) as now I always tell parents to accept it's natural & to help their kids understand and deal with it rather than suppress it.

My mother was about as relaxed as it is possible to get. We were never taken to the doctor as she remembered having to pay, so we all enjoyed very good health! Our home was clean but only stayed tidy because we had so few possessions! I have inherited her insouciant attitude to life a nd expect the best to happen, but I am sensible enough to prepare for the worst. I follow the serenity prayer and have learned to accept what I cannot change, even when it is painful.

Elle thank you. I will get on to Amazon immediately!

wisewoman. Yes, the book is a great help because it explains why those thoughts are negative, it's like having a counsellor on your coffee table.

Yes it is possible to ruin one' life by worrying. I have to work at it, having had a mother who could have got a gold medal for it. But i have lots of practice am pretty good at not doing so these days.
My grandmother used to say, if someone was fussing about their clothes or something "Nobody's going to stop their horse and cart!" In other words, other people are not that interested in you.

My dad still quotes his father who was in the Dutch army before the war....
Do normal, and you do daft enough!

Quite true

ELLE. I'm very lucky I think in that I don't worry! Maybe it don't have the gene.
I think it's because I'm pretty much a fatalist. I generally couldn't care less what people think of me and my ways...not because I am nasty, I am generally a very caring person but I just don't get the hassle of it all.
My parents are both worritts and so is one of my sisters and they waste so much energy thinking about what might go wrong and what people might think. I would find it exhausting. Friends say:- you must worry about your children being so far away! I'm afraid I don't, they are sensible grown ups and know what they are doing and I expect them to get on with it just like we had to do and if they need help they will either ask or pay someone to do it.

Generally people don't think the bad things you attribute to them. Just a thought - if your knickers fall down in the street in front of lots of people, how many would even know you or give it a thought after a few titters. So you might blush at the thought of it but the world hasn't ended.

Don't sweat about what you can't change and you will have more energy for the things you can. ��

The smallest act of kindness is worth more than the grandest of intention.

Good old Oscar Wilde.

follow your instincts, they are usually good

Worry never climbed a hill
Worry never paid a bill
from a Mormon cookbook I bought in the States
and I like my mother's saying-Do as you would be done by
Do as you would be did
Don't sit on the boiling pot
Don't sit on the lid
from The Water Babies. And Dorothy Parker's Offal is Awful so true especially as I'm married to a man who loves the ghastly stuff