The Serenity Prayer, First Corollary

God grant me ...
the serenity to accept the people I cannot change...
the courage to change the one I can ...
and the wisdom to know it's me.

You're likely to be familiar with the opening lines of Reinhold Niebuhr's poem The Serenity Prayer. As you probably noticed, the lines opening this post are not the lines as Neibuhr wrote them, but an insightful and inspirational corollary (source unknown) that I've found be every bit as powerful Neibuhr's original verse.

For the record, here's the original from Niebuhr:

God grant me...
the serenity to accept the things I cannot change...
the courage to change the things I can...
and the wisdom to know the difference.

Jackie Kelm made me aware of a re-phrasing of the Serenity Prayer that she had heard from a friend. I've come to refer to this re-phrasing as the First Corollary to the Serenity Prayer. By the way, Jackie Kelm is the author of Appreciative Living and a new book, The Joy of Appreciative Living. Visit her website at http://appreciativeliving.com and consider buying her book. It's on my list of recommended reading.