Many years ago a childhood friend of mine, due to a gambling addiction, got into a difficult situation involving some very significant debts. One day he shared with me that the organized crime group involved had threatened to break every bone in his body or worse if he did not pay up. He said when he told them he had no funds available and asked if he could repay the debt in some other way he was told that if he married the crime lord’s daughter they would let him off.

He said the offer was made because she was an ugly witch you could smell a mile away. The problem was that, unbeknownst to the underworld characters involved, my friend was already married. He said he felt there was no hope for him and his addiction would cost him his life. At this point I volunteered to marry the witch and save him. He argued but I persisted and to make a long story short the marriage was arranged and a few weeks later the witch and I were wed at a big blast in a well known New York Hotel.

What does every woman want?

I did the best I could to put on a pleasant face for the evening but as it grew late I told my bride I needed to go to our hotel room and get some rest and she agreed to come with me. When we got to the room I went into the bathroom to catch my breath and try to figure out how I was going to manage to just get through the night; let alone the years that lay ahead of us. After spending as much time as I could in hiding I stepped out of the bathroom to find a beautiful woman sitting on the edge of the bed.

When asked to write an article about how to measure success in your spiritual life the answer seemed obvious. If you have been asked to be an outside consultant to the Board of Directors of Heaven, as I have, then you have made it. Let me share with you some of what I have learned at various board meetings in this article and help you on your path to success in the spiritual world.

I meet many young men and women from well to do families who’s lives are spiritual wrecks because their family defines success as accumulating more and more material things. When a young man walked into my office and said, “My father ruined my life.”

He came to understand that being a success does not make you happy and he needed to learn that being happy makes you a success.

At workshops I frequently ask people if they would like to be free of all pain; emotional and physical. However, I tell those who sign up for what they think will be a gift to take my phone number with them so when they experience the problems associated with feeling no pain they can call and cancel the supposed gift.

Life is like a mountain railroad with an engineer that’s brave
We must make the trip successful from the cradle to the grave
Watch the curves, the hills and tunnels, do not falter, do not fail
Keep your hand upon the throttle and your eye upon the rail
Blessed Savior’s love will guide us
‘Til we reach that distant shore
Where the angels wait to join us
In that great for ever more.
- Gospel Song, Life’s Railway To Heaven

“Life is no brief candle to me, it is a sort of splendid torch which I’ve got hold of for the moment and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations”

Dear God,

First I want to thank You for answering my previous letters. When as a doctor I couldn’t understand why You made a world filled with disease, war, cruelty and all kinds of difficulties You pointed out to me that a perfect world is not creation. That there would be no need for doctors or anyone else and we would all become totally bored by life and find it meaningless. I remember You saying it would be far worse than a spending a lifetime in Hawaii. But what really made the point for me was your letting me visit the Garden of Eden.

When I saw all the traffic backed up at street corners because everyone was saying, “I love you. You go first.” “No you go first. I love you.” Everybody was loving everyone else and no one was going anywhere. I saw what a problem a supposed perfect world would be and got the point.