It Could Be Worse>> Shakespeare & The Reading Rainbow

There Is Nothing Good Or Bad But Thinking Makes It So

-William Shakespeare

There are two main things that I remember about PBS's Reading Rainbow:

1. We used to watch full episodes in class when I was in the second grade 
2. I thought it was fascinating that LeVar Burton played the dude with funky specs on Star Trek: The Next Generation

Despite watching several episodes of Reading Rainbow over time there is only one portion of one episode that comes to mind.   In this episode they read a book about a grandfather, his grandchildren and the book centered on  the grandfather's favourite catch phrase "it could be worse."     Basically the book was about several misadventures suffered by the grandchildren and the parents to which the grandfather would always respond with a  "it could be worse."   The moral of the books story was a childhood summation of William Shakespeare's famous quotation "There Is Nothing Good Or Bad But Thinking Makes It So". 

 What a great philosophy and way to live life.    How might you think differently if anytime something 'bad' happened to you you just told yourself "it could be worse?"    Also, can you imagine if you responded to anything and everything that happened to you with a "that's good" regardless of the event?    If the event is so unfavorable you can even follow up with your "that's good" comment with the question "what could be good about this"  and you will immediately start to think things differently.

The moral of today's story is there is no such thing and good events or bad events there are just events.   Now, there are positive, negative and neutral interpretations but it is up to us as individuals as to how we want to view the world and navigate throughout the situations in your life. 

Until we read again, 

Jaxon

p.s.    Were you a Reading Rainbow fan?   Share your favourite memories....