“All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten” by American author Robert Fulghum was published in 1986. The messages that the author wished to convey still ring true today.
The 192-page book contains essays on childhood, work, learning, spiders, laundry, life balance, and other topics and has a subtitle “Uncommon Thoughts on Common Things”.
Below are quotes and excerpts from this fun-to-read book:
Share everything.
Play fair.
Don’t hit people.
Put things back where you found them.
Clean up your own mess.
Don’t take things that aren’t yours.
Say sorry when you hurt somebody.
Wash your hands before you eat.
Flush.
Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.
Live a balanced life-learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some.
Take a nap every afternoon.
When you go out into the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands and stick together.
Be aware of wonder. Remember the little seed in the Styrofoam cup: The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that.
Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup – they all die. So do we.
Everything you need to know is in there somewhere: The Golden Rule and love and sanitation; ecology and politics and equality and sane living.
Take any one of those items and extrapolate it into sophisticated adult terms and apply it to your family life or your work or your government or your world and it holds true and clear and firm.
Peace is not something you wish for, it’s something you make, something you do, something you are, and something you give away.
What effect did the charity have on the man who was robbed and beaten and taken care of by the Good Samaritan? Did he remember the cruelty of the robbers and shape his life with that memory? Or did he remember the nameless generosity of the Good Samaritan and shape his life with that debt? What did he pass on to the strangers in his life, those in need he met?
The man said he would like to go about doing good without knowing about it. God granted his wish. And then God decided that it was such a good idea, that He would grant that wish to all human beings. And so it has been to this day.
I thank Joy Subido, the charming daughter of my late mentor, Dr. Lourdes Subido, (a motherly figure to us her trainees), for lending me in 2001 her copy of Mr. Fulghum’s book.
On May 12, we celebrate Mother’s Day. We honor them and we celebrate their lives, for without them we would not be who we are, what we are, where we are. The lessons we may have missed in kindergarten we learned from our beloved mothers.
To my mother Amparo, happy Mother’s Day in heaven. I love you and miss you so much.
Happy Mother’s Day to all mothers!
