The Greatest Influence of My Life

"Tonight I want to tell you the story of an empty stocking. Once upon a midnight clear, there was a child's cry. A blazing star hung over a stable and wise men came with birthday gifts. We haven't forgotten that night down the centuries; we celebrate it with stars on Christmas trees, the sound of bells and with gifts. But especially with gifts. You give me a book; I give you a tie. Aunt Martha has always wanted an orange squeezer and Uncle Henry could do with a new pipe. We forget nobody, adult or child. All the stockings are filled... all that is, except one. And we have even forgotten to hang it up. The stocking for the child born in a manger. It's his birthday we are celebrating. Don't ever let us forget that. Let us ask ourselves what he would wish for most... and then let each put in his share. Loving kindness, warm hearts and the stretched out hand of tolerance. All the shining gifts that make peace on earth."

-Bishop Broughm, The Bishop's Wife (1947)

You know when you are younger and something makes such a great impression on you? And that impression at first is simply something you absolutely love, but then one day you realize how much it really influences you as a person? In your goals, your actions, your perspective, your feel for life?

Every Christmas I watch my favorite Christmas movie, and my favorite Carey Grant movie called The Bishop's Wife. I am very close with my grandfather and growing up I would watch Turner Classic Movie or AMC (when it was good) and learned very young to appreciate old classics and stars that unfortunately very few people know today. I also grew up knowing my great grandparents and great great aunts and uncles and having a relationship with them. That has influenced me to appreciate all people I come in contact with and to share all I enjoy. And when I got very sick in my teens, I also learned that not every day is a given and you should go for what you want and believe in.

These are a few major influences to why I am the person I am today, besides martial arts training. However, this movie I found as I watched it was yet another MAJOR influence on my life, I never realized it until I watched it again this past Christmas.

The movie in a nut shell is this once loved Bishop has become an ambitious workaholic, trying to raise funds to build a cathedral, rubbing elbows with the rich, and neglecting his wife, child, and work. He prays so hard when he becomes so overwhelmed that an angel (Carey Grant) named Dudley appears to help him. Dudley at first seemed to be no help at all. In fact, the Bishop nearly rejected he could do anything to help him. But his guidance turns out not to be about fundraising...

Everyone Dudley came in contact with was affected in the most positive way, touched by the soul, and left him transformed. I remember how much I wanted to be just like Dudley. I wanted to be the guy who made amazing things happen for people and the audience would be in awe. The opening of the movie is Dudley the angel walking the streets of NY city and walking the blind man across the street, stopping the oncoming traffic dead in its spot to do so or stopping the baby carriage from rolling into the street.When people first met him, they were mesmerized by his smile and pleasant personality.

When Dudley first visits, he organizes the mail for the Bishop and the Bishop sneers, "Isn't that petty work for an angel? I think you are wasting time on unimportant details." And Dudley's response is "Ah, nothing is unimportant. We are interested even in the lowliest sparrow." O.M.G. That is me. I am all about the details. In my training, in my work, in my conversations, the smallest detail is important to me. I remember hearing that when I was a boy in this movie, remembering the smallest little thing even has importance, and so I saw in my own experience growing up.

One of my most favorite parts of the movie is when Dudley runs into the Bishop's wife, Julia, and their daughter Debbie in the park. The kids on the playground rejected little Debbie and wouldn't let them in their snow ball "battle." Dudley showed up and walked up with Debbie asking is she could play. One boy said "She can't throw a snowball as far as I could spit," leading the others away laughing. Dudley mutters, we'll show them, puts a snowball in Debbie's hand, and magically as she throws it hits the kid square in the middle of the head! And before you know it, the full fledged acceptance, all the kids were fighting to have her on their team. What a magical moment from Dudley!

Another scene, Dudley takes Julia to a French restaurant and Julia says that he scares her because he knows so much and that he seemed to know himself so well, when she knew so little about herself. And hence came one of my most favorite quotes about age and beauty. Julia thought a problem of living in this world is that people grow old. And Dudley says "Those who grow old were born old to begin with." He says youth and beauty are two things that remain constant and they are one in the same. As "old" as I may act sometimes, I live my life to be young and never allow myself to grow "old" in the sense Dudley talks about.

My other most favorite scene of the movie is when Julia and Dudley go to the Bishop's old church to hear their all boy choir do a rehearsal. However when they arrive only two boys are there. And Dudley begins talking to one boy and has him begin singing. As the two boys sing, Dudley just points to different entrances and slowly but surely all the boys come from different directions joining in on this beautiful performance. I remember seeing this as a boy and its impact still gives me goosebumps to this day, such a celestial moment! Could I have that celestial power one day? Like Dudley?

Another saying I always have used all my life, and forgot where the quote even came from until I watched the movie again was from Sylvester the taxi driver. He asks Dudley and Julia "Do you know the trouble with the world today?!" And Dudley answered he has heard many iterations and inquired what his was. Sylvester says "The trouble with the world today is that there are too many people not knowing where they're going and they're trying to get there too fast!" (A future blog).

As they drive through Central Park they decide to go ice skating and Dudley out of no where invites this perfectly good stranger who drove their taxi to go ice skating. The entire scene is yet again a magical masterpiece as the three mesmerize all in the park ice skating and Dudley transforming Sylvester into this ice skating professional! He charged them nothing at the end of their route stating he has been paid through his new found faith in human nature that Dudley and Julia presented to him.

Whenever I go someplace, like out to eat, or at a cash register, I always look at the name tag and call them by their names. Why? Because they are people. I remember my friend Jessie and I going out to eat and having the time of our lives with whoever our waiter and waitress were, knowing their whole life story by the end of the night and having an enthusiastic time. Just like Dudley did with this stranger of a taxi driver. How many smiles did I put on for strangers I never knew over my lifetime, because I remembered Dudley's interaction with Sylvester? Imagine that...

And of course the rich snob Ms Hamilton who was transformed from this stuck up, egotistical, stingy example of a woman to a soft, gentle, charitable, sympathetic philanthropist. And it was all because Dudley gave this woman what no one was willing to give: ultimate understanding and perspective. He was willing to hear his story and empathize, to understand her, and give her a new perspective. I wanted to have that effect with anyone I ever talked to. I learned from Dudley to have appropriate means of empathy and understanding.

I never realized how much that movie inspired me and influenced me. It's a remarkable, feel good movie. And a lot of lessons from the angel Dudley. And there are great lessons that I myself want to continue to live by and teach. I want to be like Dudley and have that positive affect on all I come in contact with, being sure people are accepted into the world, live their lives with youth and beauty, not rush their way through life aimlessly, treating people with respect and warmth, giving an understanding and empathetic ear, and making sure we make "our little planets" a wonderful place to be (see video below).

Yours in service,
MASTER TRENTO