The vow of the Auschwitz surviver

Today is Holocaust Day, a day to remember.  I don't very often reuse posts but today I think we need to remember:

A while back I shared Benjamin Zander with you, and a little further back even.  Here is another story of his:

"It really makes a difference what we say,… the words that come out of our mouth. I learned this from a woman that survived Auschwitz, one of the rare survivors, she went to Auschwitz when she was just fifteen years old. And her brother was eight. And the parents were lost. And she told me this, she said

"We were in the train going to Auschwitz and I looked down and saw my brother’s shoes were missing. And I said why are you so stupid, why can’t you keep your things together for goodness sake." The way an elder sister would speak to a younger brother.

Unfortunately it was the last thing she ever said to him because she never saw him again. He did not survive. And so when she came out of Auschwitz she made a vow. She told me this, she said

"I walked out of Auschwitz into life and I made a vow and the vow was:

 I will never say anything that couldn’t stand as the last thing I ever say."

Now can we do that? No, and we’ll make ourselves wrong, and others wrong, but it is a possibility to live into.

Go take a look at his book.  Art Of Possibility