At 10 minutes to seven on a dark, cool evening in Mexico City in 1968, John Stephen Akwari of Tanzania painfully hobbled into the Olympic Stadium-the last man to finish the marathon. The winner had already been crowned, and the victory ceremony was long finished. So the stadium was almost empty and Akwari - alone, his leg bloody and bandaged - struggled to circle the track to the finish line. When asked why he had continued the grueling struggle, the young man from Tanzania answered softly: My country did not send me 9,000 miles to start the race. They sent me 9,000 miles to finish the race.

True hope responds to the real world, to real life; it is an active effort.

Nothing quells anxiety like action!

Trust is like a vase.. once it's broken, though you can fix it, the vase will never be same again.

I read myself out of poverty, long before I worked myself out of poverty.

Smile. Have you ever noticed how easily puppies make human friends? Yet all they do is wag their tails and fall over.

It is your choices that make you uniquely you.