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The Victoria GAZETTE |
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Almost every weekday afternoon at 4 o'clock for these past many years, I've watched and listened to The Oprah Winfrey Show on Channel 4 as I sit here and work on the Gazette. I've said before that I usually have company in my Gazette office. Sometimes it's Mozart or Beethoven. Sometimes it's Clint Eastwood or Gregory Peck. Sometimes Father Mitch Pacwa or Joyce Meyer. But on a regular basis, it's been Oprah Winfrey. As with much of the rest of the world, I'll miss her. It's not news that Oprah quit her show after 25 continuous years of an enormously successful run. With more than 44 million viewers each week, Oprah will be leaving a hole in a lot of afternoons, but not for long I suspect. I'll miss her for a while and then I'll fill that time slot with something else. Darel Geske, our late friend and neighbor, had a saying if he ever thought we were taking our work or our lives too seriously, if we ever thought we couldn't be replaced, to the point where there wasn't time for fishing or hunting. He'd say, "Stick your thumb in a pail of water, then pull it out and see what kind of a hole you left." The only thing is, Oprah wasn't -- isn't -- swimming in a pail of water. She swims on worldwide waves and when she moves, she creates a tsunami. The Oprah Tsunami turns things upside down. It takes little known people like Dr. Phil and Dr. Oz and turns them into household names. It takes unread classics of yesteryear like Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy and Great Expectations by Charles Dickens and turns them into best selling novels of today. Unlike other tsunamis, Oprah doesn't break and smash things into oblivion. Instead, she builds and uplifts and creates. Her tsunami builds big business out of people's little pastries and fancy bars of soap. It uplifts the spirits of souls floundering due to drugs or poverty and pain. It creates courage, kindness, and generosity among those it washes over. For her very last show Oprah talked to us for the whole time, only herself, and it was pretty amazing. Maybe you watched it. How a personality can stand on stage, without notes or teleprompters, and just talk on and on, keeping our rapt attention in her easygoing manner, never boring us for a moment, speaks to Oprah's incredible talent and intellect and charisma. Unlike Oprah, I take notes and depend on notes. I share with you at this time a few that I took from this very last show of Oprah's. They resonated with me. Oprah said: "This will be my last class from this stage. I want to leave you with the lessons of my life ... I've never missed a day of work in 25 years. This is what I was called to do. People get joy and juice from doing what they're called to do. A calling is a passion. It lights you up. Embrace the life that is calling you ... You must live from the heart of yourself ... "You will receive in whatever portion you give. These 25 years are the greatest gift you could have given me ... I saw that people were making bad choices and then blaming everybody else. Nobody but you is responsible for your life. It doesn't matter what your mama did or what your daddy did ... "You are responsible for the energy you bring yourself and for the energy you give others ... All life is energy and we are transmitting it at every moment. The abiding law is, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction ... All the energy you use to hurt someone turns around and slays yourself. All the energy you use to help someone turns around and helps you ... When you get it, that you are responsible for yourself, you get free ... "We often block our own blessing because we don't feel worthy enough. But being born makes you worthy. Being alive makes you worthy ... Every single person has a common desire. They want to be heard, to be seen. So I ask you to validate people. Tell them they matter to you ... "I know I've never been alone. I've had the grace of God. I have felt the presence of God my whole life. I wait and listen for that small voice, the whispers, for the guidance that is greater than my meager mind ... God is love. God is life. What are the whispers in your life? "You all have been a safe haven for me. I hope you will be a safe haven for others. Connect. Embrace. Liberate others. Do for others ... Let me hear from you. Email Oprah@Oprah.com. What you have to say, matters to me. You and this show have been the great love of my life. Being embraced by all of you is one of the greatest gifts of all time. I thank you all for this yellow brick road of blessings ... "I won't say goodbye, just, till we meet again. To God be the glory." And so I was caught up with the emotion of the moment, the passing of another era, the passing of time. I hope Oprah has continuing good fortune and a life filled with even more love and truth -- not the kind she's talked about over the years ("your truth and my truth"), but the truth. |
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June 2011 |
