Gilbert K. Chesterton (1874-1936) was a great English writer, poet, philosopher, and overall intellectual. He was described by George Bernard Shaw as his “friendly enemy,” and a “man of colossal genius.” Chesterton inspired us with this memorable advice:

When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude.

Consistent with his well-known nickname as “Prince of Paradox,” Chesterton never clearly indicated which of the two options—taking things for granted or take things with gratitude—he himself would choose.

Regardless of Chesterton’s playful ambiguity, I believe that gratitude should be a vital part of our daily lives. Gratitude connects us to other people and thereby leads us to develop a larger and more expansive view of life.
Psychologically, gratitude helps us cultivate feelings of love, appreciation, generosity, and compassion.

With these thoughts about gratitude in mind, I would like to invite readers to join me in paying a tribute to the great French-German humanitarian, philosopher, and physician, Albert Schweitzer (1875-1965) who, in 1952, received the Nobel Peace Prize. Conference attendees, when considering the efforts of the conference organizer, moderator and the panelists, should remember what Schweitzer reminded us.

We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit.

If you spend time with professional orchestral musicians, you will likely hear them recall this or that performance by referring to the number of encores they enjoyed: “When we played in Kaohsiung last year, we received one encore;” or “in 2010 we had one of our best performances ever…we played three encores, and the audience still was not satisfied.” In other words, the metric of success for the performers is oftentimes the level of satisfaction expressed by the audience.