Blessings arrive in unexpected packages -- in my case, cancer. Those of us with potentially fatal diseases find ourselves in the odd position of coping with our mortality while trying to fathom God's will. Although it would be the height of presumption to declare with confidence What It All Means, Scripture provides powerful hints and consolations.

The first is that we shouldn't spend too much time trying to answer the "why" questions: Why me? Why can't someone else get sick? We can't answer such things, and the questions themselves often are designed more to express our anguish than to solicit an answer.

Second, we need to get past the anxiety. The mere thought of dying can send adrenaline flooding through your system. A dizzy, unfocused panic seizes you. You fear partings; you worry about the impact on family and friends.

Third, we can open our eyes and hearts. We want lives of simple, predictable ease -- smooth, even trails as far as the eye can see -- but God likes to go off-road. He places us in predicaments that seem to defy our endurance and comprehension -- and yet don't.

The natural reaction is to turn to God and ask Him to serve as a cosmic Santa. "Dear God, make it all go away."

But another voice whispers: "You have been called." Your quandary has drawn you closer to God, closer to those you love, closer to the issues that matter.

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

* Snow's essay, "Cancer's Unexpected Blessings," was published in Christianity Today. Read the full text here.

Too often, aggressive objectors bully administrators into quick surrender with the threat of contentious and prolonged opposition. This has created a tyranny of the minority. Five percent can make so much noise that they seem like 25 percent. When it comes to a decision, they’re often treated as if they were 55 percent.

I support the right of all people to speak their minds and the corollary duty of administrators to listen to and consider what everyone has to say. My concern is, we seem to have elevated the right to be heard into a right to win. We seem to be turning the basic democratic principle of “the majority rules” upside down so that “the minority controls.” That’s not how democracy’s supposed to work.

Of course, the will of the majority never should be allowed to trample basic human rights of a minority. I’m not talking about persecution or discrimination. I’m talking about how to deal with disagreements.

Just as we must always guard against oppressive majorities, we must also guard against dictatorial minorities. We need leaders who have the moral courage to stand up to those who would thwart the will of the majority with demands, protests, and backdoor politicking.

We also need more people who are willing to lose and to subject their personal preferences to the will of the majority. Democracy requires respect from all sides.

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

Then the levee broke, and the water got so high he had to climb onto the roof. A man in a rowboat came by and urged him to get aboard. Again Bart declined: “God will provide.”

Soon the waters rose even farther, and Bart had to climb to the top of the chimney. But that didn’t help, and the water swept him away. Bart yelled to the sky, “God, why have you forsaken me?”

A helicopter pilot who was maneuvering to rescue Bart heard his plea and shouted back, “God didn’t forsake you – he sent a truck, then a boat, and now this helicopter! Now use the arms He gave you and grab the rope.”

Bart reminds me of people who moan and whine about never getting the breaks other people receive while passing up opportunities that could help them get what they want. Remember the Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Cowardly Lion? They expected the Wizard of Oz to give them the one thing they thought they needed, only to find out they already possessed what they were looking for. Many of us underestimate and underuse the power within us or the resources around us.

Wanting, wishing, and worrying aren’t enough. Real success and personal happiness come to those who accept responsibility for their lives. They seize obvious opportunities, search out and find hidden ones, and make their own when necessary.

As golfer Gary Player once said, “It’s amazing. The harder I practice, the luckier I get.”

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

Ahead of them was a full year of supervised field training, and it was unlikely all of them would make it through their probation.

It’s difficult to cut hard-working and hopeful probationers, but if an organization wants to create a culture of excellence, its gatekeepers (those in charge of hiring, training, retention, and promotion) must exercise clear-eyed objectivity and demonstrate unflinching courage by weeding out those who are unwilling or unable to be excellent.

In policing as in many other fields, the stakes are simply too high to knowingly accept less. No one wants a surgeon, teacher, or peace officer with marginal skills or a shaky character.

Yet everywhere we see signs of declining standards. Public and private organizations regularly lower their expectations due to political expediency, misplaced loyalty, forced diversity, or perceived necessity. Adequacy has become the shifting standard defined as “the best we can get.”

Two results are inevitable when we lower standards: The quality of service sinks as fewer people strive for the best within them, and mediocrity becomes the norm as good people move up and out, leaving behind a growing proportion of so-so performers.

Two results are inevitable when we insist on excellence: Performance increases as everyone does better than they otherwise would, and some people are asked to leave.

Management can avoid its responsibility, but it can’t dodge the consequences of shirking it. Excellence is achievable, but not without sacrifice and discipline.

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

Sure enough, when she got home at 2:00 a.m., her mom was waiting for her, enraged that Sarah had violated her promise but relieved she was safe.

“Breaking your word was bad enough,” her mom said, “but how could you be so cruel and selfish not to call and say you were safe? I was worried sick.”

Sarah finished off an evening of bad choices with another: “You forced me into agreeing. The curfew was unfair. As to your worrying, that was your choice. I was perfectly safe. Just tell me the punishment and let me go to bed.”

This is ugly.

Sarah’s first mistake was to think she had the right to break her promise because she was “forced” into it. Mom’s proposition was “Deal or no deal?” Sarah made a deal and, like it or not, she was morally bound to keep her word.

Her second mistake was to think she could buy off the moral duty to keep her promise simply by accepting punishment. Her mom’s trust wasn’t mended because Sarah paid the penalty. Ultimately, the issue wasn’t about curfews or parties; it was about trust and credibility. Her lack of remorse and accountability only made things worse, critically damaging her relationship with her mom.

Her third mistake was to think, despite her refusal to accept responsibility for inflicting mental anguish on her mom, she wasn’t responsible. She was. If she bothered to think about it, Sarah knew her conduct would cause gut-wrenching worry, every bit as painful as a punch to the stomach. A person is ethically accountable for the predictable consequences of their actions.

In a nutshell, Sarah didn’t act with character. She was untrustworthy, irresponsible, disrespectful, and unkind. It will take her a long time to build the healthy bonds of trust that both she and her mom want and need.

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

A frequent workplace complaint is waiting for the boss to make a decision or take needed action. It might be about a pending promotion, filling an open position, giving an overdue performance review, pricing a new product, or dealing with a sticky customer complaint. Whatever the issue, failure to make a decision can make big problems out of little ones. What’s more, indecisiveness can generate resentment and undermine confidence in the manager’s ability.

It was Frank’s responsibility to set the tone of the work environment. In management (or parenting, for that matter), what you allow, you encourage. As Frank learned the hard way, indecision and inaction can cause as much harm as a poor decision.

Sure, it’s important to be careful, and it’s sometimes wise to put off a decision or delay action – for instance, to get more information or buy-in, to let things cool off, or for other strategic reasons – but failing to make a needed decision is not acceptable because a manager is too busy, is avoiding an unpleasant confrontation, is hoping things will work themselves out, or is just procrastinating.

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

A good example is the poem “If” by Rudyard Kipling. It includes some of the best advice a parent could give a child:

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good nor talk too wise;

If you can dream – and not make dreams your master;
If you can think – and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on”;

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings – nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And – which is more – you’ll be a Man, my son!

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

On the appointed day, Jimmy was solemn but brave when the nurse put a needle into his vein and began to drain his blood. After a few minutes of watching the bag fill, he looked scared. Finally he asked the nurse, “How much longer will it be before I die?”

The nurse was shocked. “You’re not going to die!" she said.

Then she wept when she realized he thought he had to give all his blood to save his sister.

This parable, adapted from a story in Chicken Soup for the Soul, touched and inspired me because it reveals one of the noblest distinguishing qualities of humankind: the willingness to sacrifice oneself for another.

It’s usually assumed that Darwin’s survival of the fittest evolutionary theory favors development of competitive characteristics and behavior strategies. Yet in our complex interdependent society, our capacity to care and willingness to sacrifice for the benefit of others is the real evolutionary advantage.

Having more people like Jimmy is a major social asset, but it’s more than that. Personal happiness is more attainable when we heed the voice of our souls and find purpose and meaning through service and kindness.

Despite the dog-eat-dog culture that prevails today, lasting happiness depends more on what we give than what we get.

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

A teacher assigned her 12th graders an essay about a leader they admired. Most kids wrote about famous people, but one student turned in this:

Benny: The Man on the Bus

I’ve been taking a public bus to school for years. Most passengers go to work and never talk to anyone else.

About a year ago, an elderly man got on the bus and said loudly to the driver, “Good morning!” Most people looked up annoyed, and the bus driver just grunted.

The next day the man got on at the same stop and again said loudly, “Good morning!” to the driver.

On the fifth day, the driver greeted the man first with a cheerful “Good morning!” and Benny replied loudly, “My name’s Benny. What’s yours?” The driver said his name was Ralph.

That was the first time any of us had heard the driver’s name. Soon all the passengers began talking to each other and saying hello to Ralph and Benny.

After a month, Benny extended his cheerful greeting to the whole bus. Within a few days, his “Good morning!” was returned by a whole bunch of “Good mornings.” The entire bus seemed friendlier. If a leader is someone who makes something happen, Benny was our leader in friendliness.

A month ago, Benny didn’t get on the bus. Some of us thought he had died. No one knew what to do. The bus got quiet again.

So I started to act like Benny by saying “Good morning!” to everyone, and they cheered up again. I guess I’m now the leader.

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

Companies that annually set overly ambitious performance objectives for their employees employ this greyhound principle. To a point, it works. Most people achieve more when expectations are set high.

The strategy turns negative, however, when firms chasing Wall Street’s rabbit continually set “no-excuses” double-digit growth goals without regard to market realities (including multiple competitors driving toward the same goals) or systemic understaffing (part of the “do more with less” philosophy). Consequently, many corporate leaders are caught up in a ceaseless upward spiral of stress.

Yes, the financial rewards for such success are ample, but the driving motivation is usually not greed, and certainly not job satisfaction. It’s fear. This can often morph into desperation, a dangerous mindset that in turn can spawn imprudent short-term decisions and outright cheating.

It’s unwise and unethical to ignore the business and moral implications of aggressive growth strategies that put executives under unprecedented, unrelenting, and unreasonable pressure.

On one level, it’s a matter of values. Work-life balance should be more than a rhetorical ideal. A good company cares about its people. The path to career success should not be littered with the ruins of failed marriages and neglected children.

On another level, it’s long-term self interest. Without an abundant and replenishing pool of talented and committed leaders, no company will succeed for long. The organizations that will pull away in the next decades are those that can attract and retain the best talent because they’re places where those people want to work – and that will take a lot more than money.

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

Reading my own commentaries reminded me of all the momentous events that have changed our world, our country, and my personal life.

Just consider some of the events that have made our world so different – cataclysmic natural disasters in the form of tsunamis, hurricanes, earthquakes, floods, and fires; Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky; sexual scandals rocking the Catholic Church; Enron and a host of unprecedented business frauds; the mortgage crisis; steroids in sports; the contest between a woman and a black man to see who would be the Democratic candidate for President; and of course the attacks of 9/11 and the aftermath (including our search for weapons of mass destruction, our invasion and occupation of Iraq, and the controversies about interrogation and detention of suspected terrorists).

Finally, think how much our culture has been changed by IMing, text-messaging, MySpace, Facebook, and YouTube.

On the personal front, I have more children and they’re older. The joys and challenges of fathering two toddler daughters then are much different as I’m now raising four girls ages 10-15. During it all, I turned 65 and transitioned into senior-citizen status.

The world is so different. Yet, when looked at from a higher level, we see the same issues. As they say, “The more things change, the more they stay the same.”

Although the names of our natural disasters and the people and events generating new scandals are different, our need for courage, compassion, integrity, accountability, and justice is the same.

And the toughest and most important part of my job as a dad is still to give a moral compass to my children to help them traverse through a minefield of temptations that constantly pull at them to be dishonest, disrespectful, irresponsible, or self-indulgent.

In the end, it’s still all about character.

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

Don’t Miss the Chance

They said I was lucky my mom lived near,
But she was pretty old and it wasn’t so clear.
Sure, I was grateful for all she did for me,
But I was so very busy. I had no time free.

I had my job, my kids, my own life to live.
There really was nothing left for me to give.

I couldn’t visit often, but I did help out.
I gave money, did chores, and ran her about.

But truth be told, I didn’t like it that much.
The conversation was dull, and she was frail to touch.

She complained a lot and I just felt worse.
I didn’t have time to be handyman or nurse.

I could have done more – of course I could –
But she loved me and she understood.

I know she did because she told me so.
She wanted me to be happy – and I pretended not to know
That she was lonely, uncomfortable, and scared of dying.
I closed my eyes to how hard she was trying
To be brave, independent, and not needy at all.
She assured me she’d be fine even after her fall.

But now she’s gone and I miss her so,
And I’m so sorry I pretended not to know
How much a call, a card, or a hug brightened her day
Or how easy it was to chase her blues away.

I’m ashamed I felt burdened, pressured, and put out.
She deserved more than I gave her, without a doubt.

So if your mom or dad is still with you,
Don’t lose the chance – do all you can do.
Make time, not excuses. Go the extra mile.
Because your chance to do so lasts only a while.

This is Michael Josephson, reminding you that character counts.

* After writing this poem, I realized many would think the poem reflected my personal experience. It’s not autobiographical. Actually, my mother died in her early 40s (I’ve talked about her cheerfulness and courage many times before). As I remind my listeners and readers from time to time, I see myself not as a journalist but as a teacher. I often use poems and parables to convey an insight or feeling that I think will inform, enlighten, or uplift others. We received quite a few requests for this commentary. I hope I captured the emotions of people who have been in this situation.

That night he got up the nerve to interrupt his dad’s work to ask: “How much do lawyers make?”

Annoyed, his father gruffly answered, "My clients pay me $300 an hour."

Tim gulped, “Wow, that’s a lot. Would you lend me $100?"

"Of course not," his father said. "Please, just let me work."

Moments later, he heard his son sobbing and he called him back. "Son," he said, "I’m sorry. If you need some money, of course I’ll lend it to you. But can I ask why you need it?"

Tim said, "Well, I’ve saved $200 and if you lend me a hundred, I’ll have enough.”

“Enough for what?”

“To buy an hour of your time so you can come to our banquet on Friday and see me get the most valuable player award. Will you come?”

The father felt like he was stabbed in the heart as he realized the cost of his priorities.

None of his clients needed him as much as his son, and nothing he could do as a lawyer was more important than what he could do as a father. How had he missed that insight?

It’s always difficult to balance job demands and family needs, but the test of whether you work too much is simple: Are you able to be the kind of parent your child deserves?

Few people look back on their lives and wish they’d spent more time at the office; a lot of them wish they’d spent more time with their kids.

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

* This story is derived and adapted from one that was circulated on the Internet without attribution. The original source is unknown.

** In celebration of the 12th anniversary of these commentaries we invite you to tell us in 200 words or less how the commentaries have positively impacted your life. The authors of the three most powerful letters will receive signed copies of one of my poems and two of my books, and they will be invited to a private luncheon with me in Los Angeles (transportation not included – as we're a nonprofit, we unfortunately don't have the resources to fly folks in). Send your letter to charactercounts@jiethics.org.

Ready or not, some day it will all come to an end.
There will be no more sunrises, no minutes, hours, or days.
All the things you collected, whether treasured or forgotten, will pass to someone else.
Your wealth, fame, and temporal power will shrivel to irrelevance.
It will not matter what you owned or what you were owed.
Your grudges, resentments, frustrations, and jealousies will finally disappear.
So too your hopes, ambitions, plans, and to-do lists will expire.
The wins and losses that once seemed so important will fade away.
It won't matter where you came from or what side of the tracks you lived on at the end.
It won't matter whether you were beautiful or brilliant.
Even your gender and skin color will be irrelevant.
So what will matter? How will the value of your days be measured?
What will matter is not what you bought, but what you built. Not what you got, but what you gave.
What will matter is not your success, but your significance.
What will matter is not what you learned, but what you taught.
What will matter is every act of integrity, compassion, courage, or sacrifice that enriched, empowered, or encouraged others to emulate your example.
What will matter is not your competence, but your character.
What will matter is not how many people you knew, but how many will feel a lasting loss when you're gone.
What will matter is not your memories, but the memories that live in those who loved you.
What will matter is how long you will be remembered, by whom, and for what.
Living a life that matters doesn't happen by accident.
It's not a matter of circumstance but of choice.
Choose to live a life that matters.

In celebration of the 12th anniversary of these commentaries, we invite you to send us a note of 200 words or less describing specifically how the commentaries have positively impacted your life. The authors of the three most powerful letters will receive signed copies of this poem and two of my books, and they will be invited to a private luncheon with me in Los Angeles (transportation not included -- as we're a nonprofit, we unfortunately don't have the resources to fly folks in). Send your letter to charactercounts@jiethics.org.

At the core of the Declaration is the profound assertion that each of us has an unalienable right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

Unfortunately, too many Americans believe they’re entitled not simply to pursue happiness, but to be happy. This breeds an “I deserve it” mentality and “whatever it takes” strategies to help them get or keep the things they think will make them happy.

But alongside our unalienable rights to pursue happiness are unalienable responsibilities to be good and decent people. There’s nothing wrong with wanting and going after money, possessions, power, or status, provided we do so honorably. The deeper question is whether the pursuit of happiness is an adequate life goal.

Helen Keller said, “True happiness is not attained through self-gratification but through fidelity to a worthy purpose.”

The men who signed the Declaration of Independence weren’t simply pursuing happiness. Instead, they pledged their “lives, fortunes, and sacred honor” to establish a government based on moral principles. This took character. And character is what life is really about.

According to philosopher George Santayana, “Character is the basis of happiness, and happiness is the reward of character.”

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.