08/18/2024

thoughts-7/20/2020- do things exist? mysterianism, monism, pantheism

An extremely prevalent and useful model of the Universe is that there are many different things that exist, each of which has an edge to it, which separates it from all that is not that thing. Examples of things are: elementary particles, such as electrons, individual molecules, such as water, individual living things, such as a bacterium, fungal organism, plant, animal or person, and large things such as stars and galaxies. These things fill a four dimensional space in the Universe (3 spatial dimensions and one time dimension)-- one electron cannot share the same space and time as another; one person cannot share the same space and time as another. Things are different from and separate from each other. My wife is different than me. Paris is different than London. The Earth is different from, and separate from, Mars or the Sun or the Milky Way.

And, many would say, that there exists a separate thing, or entity, which they call God, which is different than all the other things. Many find it useful to say that God is that thing which created the other things, or has power over all things (omnipotent), or is Lord of all things, or has knowledge of all things (omnicent), or is above all things (transcendent), or has been present throughout time (everlasting), or is present in all places (omnipresent), or who is in all things (immanent), or who loves all things, or is perfect., or is impossible to understand (ineffable). The belief that one God exists is called monotheism, that many exist is called polytheism, that none exist is called atheism.

And, many would say, that in this prevalent model of reality, there are also metaphysical things, such as minds, souls, religions, mathematical entities (e.g. the number pi, or seventeen) . . . or my subjective experiences of warmth, or happiness, or devotion, or hatred, or racism. . . or truth, or justice, or luck, or fairies, or grace, or fate. The belief that that physical things are of a different nature than metaphysical things is called dualism. The belief that only metaphysical things exist is called idealism. The belief that only physical things exist is called materialism.

And most people would say that these things all somehow miraculously interact with each other through various forces (gravity, electromagnetism, the strong nuclear force, the weak nuclear force, love, cooperation, etc). Somehow, the position and movement of all of the atoms that make up my brain can cause my subjective experiences to happen in my mind. And things in my minds, such as my desire to move my finger can cause the atoms in my nerves to bring about contraction of muscles which then cause movement of my finger. Dualists have trouble explaining the mind-body problem-- how can mental things and physical things cause each other to happen. This is called the hard problem of consciousness.

It’s natural and good that there have been, in different times and cultures, various models of reality and spirituality which have evolved and which have helped people in their innate quest to understand reality. Most people would say they are striving to understand the truth about the real nature of themselves and the Universe (I.e. all that exists). What works for me though, is mysterianism, the belief that a human mind can never grasp the nature of reality. Reality is ineffable and can never be understood by a human or any other creature. Models may be useful, but they will always be incomplete. The map is not the territory. I should be humble about my knowledge and abilities and strive to often doubt my beliefs. But it’s ok and natural that I have beliefs about reality that are different than those of others.

What works for me is holism, the belief that an improved understanding of reality involves defocusing on small parts or short-lived parts of a system and, instead, studying the big picture, the whole system. In the 50’s, this was called General Systems Theory. Scientific knowledge has burgeoned in the last 500 years mainly from a belief in reductionism, that a system can be understood well by studying each of it’s tiny, contributing parts. This approach has been astonishingly successful, and has allowed humans to develop instruments of discovery and masters of technology, so as to become masters of our Earthly environment. But the utility of reductionism has, perhaps, blinded us to the real nature of the Universe, and wedded us to a delusion that there are actually, little, separate things, called elementary particles, that exist, and which have an inside and an outside that is bounded by an edge, and which take up a finite amount of3 or 4 dimensional space, and which interact through mysterious physical, knowable forces such as gravity and electromagnetism. An alternative idea, and a model that works for me, is that there are no things with definite edges. An edge in a purely human abstract concept that doesn’t exist in reality. There is no edge to an electron, which separates electron ‘stuff’ within, from the Universe outside of it. An electron is not a discrete thing. The double slit experiment of 120 years ago suggested that electrons often act as if they had a wave nature, not a particle nature. They are not just tiny billiard balls careening around in the Universe (although it’s often useful to think of them as such). Quantum mechanical models of the electron from the 1930’s suggest that electrons are better thought of as probability waves, because they seem to exist in more than one place at the same time, and they can somehow ‘jump’ from one energy state (or orbital) of an atom to another, without ever existing in the intermediate places. They seem to exist here and now, and then disappear and then reappear in another, unlike a billiard ball. They are best seen as the solution to, or collapse of, the Schrodinger equation. They are energy, not matter . . . or somehow, energy and matter are the same thing (E=mc squared), which is a difficult thing to imagine. Somehow, ‘particles’ can become “entangled” with other particles which are extremely far away from them in space and/or time. So, they are not really separate particles. They are indelibly tied to one another. Each elementary particle is not bounded by an edge; rather, they, and their influence, extend infinitely in space (and perhaps also in time, and in other dimensions that we have trouble understanding), albeit their influence or power, or existence, if you will, seems to fall off in a way that is inversely related to the square of the distance from their center. So also, collections of elementary particles (atoms, molecules, clouds, lakes, bacteria, plants, and animals) do not have a discrete edge which separates the thing from the rest of the Universe. The cloud, the rain, the groundwater, the roots, the water in the trunk and leaves . . . where is separateness of these ‘things’. At what point does the water or oxygen molecule that I take into me, become me? Were they ever separate from me? In this holistic view, the Universe is not really made up of tiny, discrete things; the Universe is one thing, the only thing. William Blake was a mystic who thought that, “if the lenses of perception were cleansed everything would appear as they are, infinite.” Although it works well to think of the Universe as a place (space) containing many things, this delusion of our species traps us in inaccurate concepts of reality which prevent us from appreciating the oneness of all. What works for me, which has worked for some, but not all, mystics, is the belief that the Universe is one thing or process that is happening, which only seems to us humans (who have aged past the age of 8 months) to have many parts. (it should be noted that some mystics believe in monotheism.) I believe that this one thing, the universe, is ineffable to humans, and worthy of extreme respect and awe, so I believe it is Divine. So I am quite comfortable equating the Universe with God; this is called pantheism. God is the Universe happening. God is the only being, not one of many beings. Only God is happening. The thing that we call an electron is God happening there and now. The bacterium is God happening there and now. The water molecule is God happening there and now. So also, the thing we call a sensation, a thought, a cloud, a tree, a worm, a person, and a soul. Your soul is not separate from God. No things are separate from God. Our separateness is a delusion, and not a harmless one at that. Humans have too-often been egocentric, disrespectful, unappreciative of other beings and our earthly home.

Instead of there being two types of things in the Universe (material things, or “concreta” and metaphysical things like sensations, thoughts and abstract ideas, “abstracta”) as in dualism, I believe there’s much benefit to the belief in monism-- there is actually only one type of thing happening. And, if you believe that one thing is divine, as I do, you believe in religious monism. So the brain and the mind, the atoms and the thoughts, are just different, useful ways of conceiving of the one thing. This is one solution to the quandry of how mental things or events and physical things can ‘cause’ one another; it’s because they are not, actually, separate things (although, admittedly they seem have different natures and qualities).

Pondering and living out the abstract idea of love is a way of freeing us from our incessant delusion of separateness. Skillfully choosing to often have loving thoughts, and skillfully choosing to often do loving actions, involves intimately connecting with, appreciating the strengths of, accepting the imperfections of, and caring well for the holistic health and wellness of the beloved, whether that be another person, animal, a sunset, or the whole shebang, aka God. It involves understanding and sometimes feeling our fundamental oneness with the beloved.

Much of my daily prayer time involves loving thoughts about God, the Universe, and the seemingly separate manifestations of God. And much of my prayer time involves practicing the types of thoughts which optimize joy (e.g. appreciation, gratefulness, mudita and kindness) and peace (acceptance, humility, low expectations, soft preferences) These strategies work for me, and help me to more skillfully play the Game of Life.

Aug 18, 2024 4:39:12 PM

07/09/2023

My Spiritual Wellness Practice, as of 7/9/23

Each morning after a cup of coffee, I choose to get out of my usual mode of verbal consciousness (i.e.with random, wandering, verbal, discursive thoughts about the past and future) by visualizing different aspects of what’s happening in nine breathing cycles (see addendum 1). Then, in my ‘trance’, I mentally say these 37 phrases, and practice these virtues for the next 40-100 minutes. This is my current, evolved version of shorter Buddhist metta (lovingkindness) meditations/prayers that many find to be worthwhile and wholesome; typically only 5 phrases are repeated for oneself, and then for others.

This practice is quite similar to self-hypnosis, or mindful hypnosis, or affirmations, so the phrases are worded as positive virtues, without any negative words. Self hypnosis works well to help us practice thought patterns that work for us, in the game of life, to meet our current goals. Our sensations and thoughts are our inner reality. Good, skillful intentions are key for virtuous thoughts and actions to manifest.

Like music, intention can influence our mood, thoughts, and feelings—setting an intention in the morning we set the tone for the day.- Thupten Jinpa

Thomas Merten used the word contemplation for this mode of consciousness:

Contemplation is the highest expression of man’s intellectual and spiritual life. It is that life itself, fully awake, fully active, fully aware that it is alive. It is a spiritual wonder. It is spontaneous awe at the sacredness of life, of being. It is gratitude for life, for awareness, and for being. - Thomas Merton, in New Seeds of Contemplation

After mentally saying each phrase in bold during a breathing cycle, for a few minutes I think about and visualize the related ideas, amplifying ideas, and other wordings from various spiritual traditions . . . and I actually practice those virtues and thoughts in the here and now (as opposed to just thinking about them). This is prayer for me.

When the mind and body are restless, nothing in life can be accomplished. Success is the result of control - Hazrat Inayat Khan

We become what we think about.- Earl Nightingale

I will practice gratefulness - I have much // to be grateful for. (2 slashes signifies the time of transition from an inhalation to an exhalation)For me, gratefulness is the most important spiritual virtue to practice. . . the most important prayer to practice, the most important skill to practice, in the The Game of Life. It leads to practice of joy and peace, which are prominent goals for me these days. As I first say this phrase I activate my smile muscles just a tad; this trick works well to facilitate my practice of gratefulness (my main strategy for practicing joy). My body and mind are connected (or the same thing, just from different perspectives). Gratitude is another word for gratefulness; thankfulness means that you appreciate something that another ‘being’ (or a personified God) did for you. Appreciation is closely related; we should appreciate the diverse components (holons) that make up living systems (cells, bodies, families, communities, ecosystems). It’s probably helpful and wellness-enhancing (salutogenic) to holons (e.g. people) to be appreciated.

The Nembutsu practice to foster gratefulness, in the Pure Land Buddhist manner, is to chant “Namo Amida Bu”. In Islam, Alhamdulillah, means all praise and gratefulness to God. This gratefulness aspect of God is Ash-Sha-KOOR, the 35th name (of 99) or aspect of Allah/God. Repeating one or two names of God while feeling, invoking, praising or manifesting that aspect of God (wazifa, zikr, dhikr), is helpful practice for most Muslim mystics (e.g. Sufis, see addendum 2).

Gratitude begins in our hearts and then dovetails into behavior. It almost always makes you willing to be of service, which is where the joy resides.- Anne Lamott

Gratitude celebrates life with a joyful "yes" at every knot of the great network in which everything is connected to everything.- Br. David Steindl-Rast

Gratefulness is a setting of the heart, one that I can choose like a wavelength on the radio. - Susan Mazrolle.

To be alive in this beautiful, self-organizing universe — to participate in the dance of life with senses to perceive it, lungs that breathe it, organs that draw nourishment from it — is a wonder beyond words. - Joanna Macy

Gratitude places you in the energy field of plentitude. Glow with gratitude and see how awe and joy will make their home in you. - Michael Bernard Beckwith

Take time to celebrate the quiet miracles that seek no attention. - John O'Donohue

I am grateful that conscious awareness is happeningagain here and now . . . Conscious awareness of things or processes in the environment (e.g. light, sound, odors), my body (over 15 sorts of sensations) and in my mind/heart/brain (perceptions & thoughts) is happening now, once again, after the pause that is sleep. I am grateful that this stream of consciousness, these qualia, is happening again. One of the many aspects of my self, or the helpful model that I have of my (illusory) self, is that I am the subject who is experiencing the awareness. My self can be thought of as an “experiencing self,” or a “sensing self.” But while in non-REM sleep and while under general anesthesia this awareness, this self awareness, temporarily disappears, and the self that seems to have subjective experiences seemingly disappears. During sleep afferent nerves continue to deliver information to my CNS, but they are not salient enough to trigger awakening into cousciousness. Buddhists remember this frequent disappearance of a self to support their idea that the self is insubstantial, and should perhaps best be considered a delusion, albeit a crucially important and useful one that seems to make us human. Bacteria, plants, and most animals probably don’t have this sense that they are a separate self. Awake humans over the age of 9 months usually have this self awareness. But it’s a skillful spiritual practice to dis-identify with this separate, experiencing self, practice self-transcendent modes of consciousness, and see our essential, inherent, oneness with all else that is happening (the divine Universe/God).

Spiritual practice is stepping out of the assumed reality of “me” by understanding what the “me” is and withdrawing energy from its perceptual fixations.- Rodney Smith, “Undivided Mind”

Through our eyes, the universe is perceiving itself. Through our ears, the universe is listening to its harmonies. We are the witnesses through which the universe becomes conscious of its glory, of its magnificence. - Alan Watts

I am grateful that agency is happening again here and now. . . that I have continuing opportunities to be an agent, or actor, or extemporaneous musician, or choreographer, or player, or a ‘choosing self’in this evolving Universe. It’s an awesome privilege to be able to step up to the plate in ‘the game of life’ and try my best to do what I can to improve the evolving universe. It sure does seem that there is an “I” that has free will to choose the next thoughts in my mind/heart/brain . . . and choose what to say or do in the next few moments. A major aspect of my sense of self is that I am a choosing self. But, as Buddhism reminds us, it’s hard to pin down a discrete, substantial, continuing ‘thing’ that is my self, or my ego, or my soul. But it seems like there is an I which can choose to dwell on problems, or count my blessings, or move one of my fingers, or give someone a complement. During sleep or while a human is under general anesthesia this agency, this ability to choose, this aspect of me, this “choosing self”, seems to disappear for awhile. When there is no more chance that both awareness and agency (my experiencing self and my choosing self) will happen in my body/mind/heart/soul, I will be “dead”.

You are not a passive observer in the cosmos. The entire universe is expressing itself through you at this very minute.- Deepak Chopra

Life is a field and you are born to cultivate it. And if you know how to cultivate this field you can produce anything you like.- Kabir

When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive – to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love." – Marcus Aurelius

Life, what an exquisite privilege. - Katie Rubinstein

Through the direction and nature of our attention, we prove ourselves to be partners in creation, both of the world and of ourselves. - Iain McGilchrist, “Examining Attention”

May we each discover our own form of spiritual electricity — and light up our world. - Eileen Rivers

I am grateful for continuing opportunities to be a lover, especially to love my awesome wife. Today and every waking moment I have a precious opportunity to choose loving thoughts, words and gestures. . . and thereby beautify the here and now that is me happening. I can be a “loving self.” My “relational self” is a key part of my sense of self. I aspire to be, and often am, a loving husband. Loving well and joy are tightly associated. Loving well--caring about and caring for the holistic health and wellness of others and God, may be the most important contributor to one’s own joy. There are many features that can be nourished to create more relationship wellness, or Love, if you will.possible to define quality in great relationships.

Wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving. - Kahlil Gibran

I will practice kindness. . . now and in the future. . . I will care about and care for the happiness of others, with my thoughts, feelings, words and gestures. Kindness is one of the top 3 or 6 skills to choose to practice often if one is to love well (along with appreciation and acceptance).

Making other people happy is a superhappiness. - Muhammad Yunus

Kindness is in our power, even when fondness is not. - Samuel Johnson

I am grateful for the opportunity to be a beloved, and thankful that Linda loves me so well. . . I am, or can be, a receiver of nourishment and loving energies. I am a beloved, that which experiences thoughts & feelings of being loved. To be an integral participant in two-way love and loving is beautiful, divine and salutogenic (wellness enhancing), and fosters joy and peace. I am grateful that I am a node or nexus in the web of many loving relationships; I both receive and put out/emanate loving energies from many. I’m grateful to be able to practice a dynamic balance of both yin and yang.

We need to become newly aware of the love that has infused our lives all along, to turn our attention to it afresh with the eyes of a child. - Lama John Makransky, “Love Is All Around”

The organic process that is ‘me’ is dynamic, and oscillates between: yin/yang, beloved/lover, observer/actor, spectator/player, listener/speaker, reader/writer, impotent/powerful, passive/active, watcher/chooser, witness/participant. It seems like each holon in the Universe is constantly evolving in a yin/yang way. I’m grateful and thankful for my ancestors, extended family, friends, teachers, coaches, and the myriad living and nonliving things in our ecosystem that have loved, supported, nourished and taught me.

I am grateful that this body, this miraculous living system, continues to function. This collection of interdependent cells is extremely complex and ordered. This body, this subsystem of the vast Universe, is unimaginably far from equilibrium, so it has oodles of negentropy. That it does is probably way beyond anyone’s ability to comprehend. But increasing complexity (from simple atoms, to stars, to larger atoms, to molecules, to seemingly small living systems, to our biome) seems to be a feature of the evolving Universe (aka God), to counterbalance the seemingly opposite trend towards increasing entropy and disorder. Each cell and each microbe in this body is an open system that takes in nutrients and (usually) oxygen, burns the nutrients in mitochondria so as to produce ATP (the energy currency for cellular function), and then excretes waste (unneeded atoms and molecules) out to the environment. Through reproduction of the information encoded in genes (which get transcribed and translated into proteins) the dance of life goes on and on. Practicing awe, amazement, wonder, respect, humility, and appreciation for these ineffable ever-evolving processes is the gist of the spiritual practice (prayer) in my life, a major component of my loving of God (aka the Divine Universe).

I am grateful that my nervous system continues to function, which allows for my awareness, my thoughts, my agency and my sense of self. Humans have 100 trillion synapses firing every second, fueled by hundreds of different neurotransmitters that have been created in their 900 billion nerve cells, each with dozens of mitochondria which create millions of atp molecules each second to keep the needed imbalance of sodium and potassium across the cell membranes (through the action of the ATPase sodium/potassium pump that life as we know it needs) sodium out, out, out//potassium in, in, in. . .
.I am grateful that my vascular systems continue to function- the living pipes and infrastructurewhich enable nutrients and oxygen to be delivered to each of my cells, and wastes to be carried away. . May my (our) vessels continue to be shiny, smooth, selectively permeable, uninflamed and elastic.
.I am grateful that my heart continues to pump my blood. Pump, pump, pump (during a slow, 3 second, inhalation)// pump, pump, pump, pump. And/or: down,up; down,up; down,up//down,up; down,up; down, up. Usually I then visualize blood flowing to and from many parts of my body (right brain, left brain, left arm, left leg, right leg, right arm, left circumflex artery, left anterior descending, right lung, left lung. I’m grateful for the hearts of my friends and relatives . . .
my lungswhich maintain an optimal blood oxygen level (via my 25 sextillion (10 to the 21^st) hemoglobin molecules) . . . and maintain a low blood carbon dioxide level. I visualize carbon dioxide in the blood (85% as bicarbonate, 15% attached to hemoglobin and 5% attached to the iron in the porhryn ring inside the hemoglobin) in my pulmonary arteries going out to my alveoli during inhalations, then leaving through my airways during exhalations . over, over, over//back, up, out. Then I visualize oxygen going into my lung’s alveoli during inhalations, then, during exhalations entering the pulmonary veins and attaching to hemoglobin and going back to the four entrances to my left atrium.
I am grateful for my gut which stands ready to addnutrients to my blood. Water &food in // wastes out. . . .
I am grateful for my liverwhich continues to metabolize and optimize organic molecules in my serum. Good blood in//improved blood back to my right atrium (my glistening, maroon liver creates glucose, hormones, essential fats and about 12,000 proteins, 150 of which are not made in other types of cells) anabolism//catabolism. . .
I am grateful for my bone marrow which nurtures hemocytoblasts to mature into the 7 types of blood cells; they create over 2 million fresh red blood cells every minute, and countless megakaryocytes (releasing platelets into my blood), macrophages (to collect debris and dead cells for recycling), dendritic cells (to collect and display antigens for other immune cells to analyze) and the dozens of types of other immune cells that keep the peace amongst my cells, my potentially cancerous mutated cells and ‘my’ microbes.
I am grateful for the osteoblasts in my 206 bones . .
I am grateful for my chondrocytes that continue to very slowly produce cartilage tissue . . .
I am grateful for the fibroblasts that create the extracellular collagen triple-helices in my ligaments . . .
I am grateful for my tendons . . .
I am grateful for my muscles. . .
I am grateful for my kidneys.Each of my 2 million nephrons serves as an inorganic chemistry lab to optimize the levels of inorganic atoms in my blood, and clean it of nitrogenous wastes, urea and oxalate. Good blood in//improved blood back to my right atrium. Needed sodium back into my blood//excess sodium out into my bladder. (repeat for magnesium, potassium, calcium, Z= 12, 19, 20) . . .
I am grateful for my reproductive systemwhich has passed on the genes of my ancestors, and provides me delicious pleasure, happiness, ecstasy, joy, peace and bliss with my wife. I then practice gratefulness for the reproductive systems of my ancestors and other humans.
I will practice joy . . .nowI remember (and thereby relive) a recent joyful time. Quite often it’s the last time I was enveloped in my beloved’s embrace. For me, joy manifests here and now thru my free-will choice to practice love, gratefulness, kindness, mudita and appreciation. I'm doing my part, I'm fulfilling my responsibility (or purpose) to beautify this part of space-time, if I'm practicing joy. Some Muslims repeat: yaa-WAA-jid (64), the source of ecstasy, or Al-BAA-sit (21), expansion, ecstasy, joy.

Gratitude begins in our hearts and then dovetails into behavior. It almost always makes you willing to be of service, which is where the joy resides.- Anne Lamott

I will practice mudita.I don't limit my joy to times when good or pleasurable things are happening in my life or experience. A sufficient reason to practice joy is the fact that other sentient beings (other divine, dynamic, living systems in our family, which are not as separate from me as they seem) are experiencing happiness or pleasure. I like to think that I am not a separate being or entity; I am we, I am all.

Mudita is the virtuous skill of practicing this sort of empathetic (or sympathetic, or vicarious) joy. It’s fair and wise, and its not cheating in the Game of Life. I choose to practice joy now because: thousands of couples are embracing . . . or looking forward to their marriage today . . . 2700 fathers are quite happy because their baby was born in the last 10 minutes . . . thousands of grandpas are experiencing the happiness and pride of holding their first grandchild for the first time . . . and hundreds of thousands are singing, dancing or getting massages, etc.

(Mudita) is a natural expression of our best humanity…[it] cheers for the happiness and success of others and celebrates buoyancy, health, and happiness wherever they are encountered. - Judith Simmer-Brown, in Transforming the Green-Ey’d Monster.

One of the sanest, surest, and most generous joys of life comes from being happy over the good fortune of others. - Archibald Rutledge.

I will appreciate the strengths of myself- I define a strength as an attribute, virtue or skill of a living thing that puts them in the top 20% of the distribution curve compared to others like themselves. (e.g. other 66 year old men in Lorain County). Others set a higher bar, which is valid, but decreases the number of strengths we have. We all have many strengths that we should appreciate, so as to love ourselves well.
I will appreciate the strengths of others- Loving well involves often choosing to appreciate the many strengths of the beloved; joy ensues.

Everything flourishes in the nourishment of our appreciation; plants, people, the Earth, moments. When we live with that appreciation, we flourish.- Kristi Nelson

May I appreciate the Divine in all beings- It works for me to see the evolving Universe as one, miraculous, ineffable, Divine process . . . to equate the Universe with God happening. This pantheism (or religious monism) works better for me than monotheism (with one creator being, called God, who is often thought to have a human-like abilities & virtues, who exists (or is happening) and is different from the created beings and things in the Universe. And pantheism works better for me than humanism or materialism (with a Universe full of inanimate, physical, material things, composed of elementary particles which interact via knowable physical forces). There are no beings (e.g. me, plants, bacteria) or souls, or processes that are separate from God. The tree, the worm, my sensations, perceptions, thoughts and feelings are beautiful manifestations of God happening in their respective space-times. This attitude of love and respect for the Divine in all beings (regardless of their species, gender, ethnicity, beliefs, etc.) is expressed by Hindus as Namaste. God, for me, is ever-present, all-pervading (immanent), beyond space and time (transcendent) and the only being or process (Al-A-had, 66, the One Unity. Al-WAA-see, 45, the all-pervading, "yet another magnificent face of Divine Life Energy."). A common Muslim chant is "La 'illaha 'illa allah" -- there are no other Gods (?or beings) than God.

Every face is the face of God. - the Koran

Each being is a verse in the sacred manuscript of nature. - Hazrat Inayat Khan.

Seek Him in all souls, good or bad, wise and foolish, attractive and unattractive; in the depths of each there is God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan.

The one who knows himself truly knows God.- Hazrat Ali.

My religion is nature. That’s what arouses those feelings of wonder and mysticism and gratitude in me.- Oliver Sacks

May I appreciate plants. . . which have the superpower to harness light from our star (receive the kiss of Father Sun) and combine water, carbon dioxide and atoms from the soil to produce oxygen, carbohydrates, proteins, fats and beauty to nourish all lifeforms in Earth’s biosphere.
May I appreciate fungi. . . which enable plant roots to function . . .and which digest cellulose, so as to keep the carbon cycle turning (return it to the Cosmic Library).
May I appreciate protista- the kingdom of life with single cells containing membrane bound nuclei and mitochondria. They were the most complicated life form on Earth between 1 and 1.5 billion years ago
May I appreciate bacteria. . . which are essential for dna and protein metabolism in all living things. There are 38 trillion in the ever-changing holobiont that is my body, and 5x10 to the 30^th on Earth. They became imbedded within early plant cells to become plastids, and inside early animal cells to become mitochondria. . . the awesome powerhouses that charge up ADP into ATP, the energy currency needed by all life. They are all my cousins, since we all, perhaps, descended from an universal common ancestor (a membrane bound bacteria or archaea) about 3.8 billion years ago.
May I appreciate archaea- the ancient kingdom or “domain” of life which continues, and which is able to live in oxygen-free environments and has different ribosomal proteins and different components in their fatty membranes than organisms in the other 5 domains.
May I appreciate the Divine in all places- God is happening/manifesting in beautiful, divine nonliving ways as well . . . in ways which don’t involve metabolism.
I am grateful for viruses. . which have probably always been in every living thing. The ongoing evolution and complexification of the Universe continues to depend upon viruses. About 380 trillion are happening in my body now; about 10x10 to the 31^{st (nonillion)} are happening on Earth. They are non-living, non-metabolizing, always mutating strands of dna or rna encapsulated by proteins. Incorporation of viral genes into nucleic acids of living things has allowed for the evolution of mammals, and perhaps every living thing.

Viruses have enriched the evolutionary options of cellular creatures over the past several billion years by depositing new genetic material in their genomes. - David Quammen

I am grateful for molecules(e.g. oxygen, ATP, hemoglobin, chlorophyll, silicon dioxide, water, nitrogen), atoms, the space between the nucleus and electrons in an atom, rocks, clouds, sunsets,
I am grateful for thestars. (btw, divine 2^nd generation stars of various sizes, 5-12 eons ago, evolved into planetary nebulae, supernova and kilonova, to create all of the atoms in our solar system). A glass that is half full of water is non-living, but it is divine. Some would bemoan that it is half empty. Others would appreciate that it is half full of divine water. What works for me is to choose to see the glass as always 100% full-- with trillions of divine water molecules (10 to the 41^st on Earth) and trillions of divine molecules of nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide and trillions of other molecules that were created eons ago. God is manifesting in all places and all times. It works for me to believe that there is no edge to God in space or time. And that God is not a thing or a being or a creator; rather, God is the only process that is happening. Of course, in everyday life, I need to have a model of the Universe to make it comprehensible, so that I can function. And this model, which is perhaps a useful delusion, is that the Universe consists of separate things happening IN space.

“When a man walks along the beach and picks up rock and skips it across a lake as the sun shines down, that is God walking across God and picking God up and skipping God across God as God shines down.” - Khan Willie Sawyer II

We are all as continuous with the physical universe, as a wave is continuous with the ocean. - Alan Watts

"Everything is a mirror for God's face"

“May I See the face of the Divine everywhere I turn.”

"Love is the Religion. The Universe is the Book." ~Rumi.

"All the particles of the world are in love and looking for lovers." ~Rumi.

“Appreciation can turn our planet into a sacred home and our communities into extended family. - KRISTI NELSON.

Muslims venerate ya-WAA-hid (65)-- the oneness that underlies all differentiated, unique forms. Or yaa-ma-JEEED (48).

I will practice humility- My thoughts, actions and life are significant, but small in the big picture. I should always try to recognize and avoid surety, egocentricity, sanctimoniousness, self-righteousness, and self-importance.
I will remember my body is small- relative to the Earth (10 to the 21st times bigger than me--a billion trillion times) . . . and our Solar System . . . and our Galaxy, and our Universe. (if our solar system was the size of a quarter, the Milky Way would be the size of the USA)
I will remember that my lifetime is short- relative to the 200 thousand years since our grandparents walked out of Africa, or the 3.5 billion years since the first life on Earth (single-celled oceanic archaea and bacteria of unknown origin). But, of course, I could be infinite in space-time, depending on one's concept of the ineffable "I".

If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite. - William Blake

I will remember that my disappointments are minor - Our biosphere has sufferred 10 mass extinctions. Others have much worse life situations and sufferings than I. Things don't always happen as I think they should, but in the big picture, things are probably evolving as they should, and I’m quite fortunate.
I will remember that my knowledge is limited- I habitually see through thick filters. The big picture is ineffable to my small mind/heart/brain. There are many, many reasons why the Universe (God) is evolving as it is . . .and other beings are thinking and acting the way they are. Many of those reasons, or forces, are ineffable to the limited thinking of people (mysterianism). God is not just immanent in things we see (and think we understand), but is also transcendent, beyond space and time (and perhaps happening in other ineffable dimensions?)

Knowing is a veneer our minds create and lay over the landscape like a painter’s drop cloth set upon a forest floor. Its uniformity protects us from the pine needles and beetles, but it also obscures them, as well as the soft moss, fragrant soil, and teeming complexity of nature’s bed.- Gregory Kramer

I will remember that my models are incomplete- Our mental models are useful maps of reality. They are codified and limited by our language, and work quite well to help us to survive, adapt, and be agents to change our environment. Scientific models are great, and are evolving well, but they often are reductionistic (not holistic) and miss the big picture (especially Dark Energy, Dark Matter and metaphysical things, like love, intentionality, beauty, synergy). The Whole System is much more significant and incomprehensible than its subsystems (aka holons).
I will doubt my beliefs - Most suffering comes from false or dysfunctional beliefs about things that are happening which we don't accept or appreciate. Believing that things or others should be different, or that events that are happening should be different, is quite natural and inevitable, but it causes the disappointments and suffering that hurt our inner peace. "Don't always believe what you think" and “may we doubt our beliefs” are good maxims. Only the closed mind is certain.- anon
May I often see my own imperfections. I define an imperfection as an attribute, virtue or skill of a living thing that puts them in the middle 60% of the distribution curve compared to others like themselves; others have different, valid definitions, which have significantly different implications. We all have many imperfections, and that's natural, normal and OK. Usually I see through thick filters that disable clear views of my imperfections and my contributions to discord. Only if I’m aware of my imperfections can I develop the strong intentions needed to minimize them, so as to become more virtuous and skillful in the Game of Life.
May I accept the imperfections of others. Other beings and processes are happening the way they are for thousands of reasons. Who am I to be judgemental or self-righteous? Practicing those ideas are dysfunctional and diminish inner peace, outer peace and great loving. Acceptance of imperfections is one of the top 3 or 4 skills to choose to practice if one is to love oneself, another, or God well (along with kindness and appreciation). It is the key for maintaining inner peace and practicing equanimity (mental/emotional resilience). Adventurers on the many valid spiritual paths are challenged to foster inner and outer peace. For the inner peace which comes from acceptance, Muslims invoke As-sa-LAAM (5); their most common greeting is As-sa LAMM ah LAY kum. Jews often use the salutation, “Shalom” (peace).

"Each moment is a chance for us to make peace with the world."-Thich Nhat Hanh.

May I tolerate most weaknesses. . . in myself and others. It's usually much more skillful to accept imperfections rather than tolerate them. Tolerance might best reserved for weaknesses (?bottom 20% of the Bell curve), or things like pain, mental and physical illnesses and disabilities, and death. But, to help humankind evolve well, it's probably skillful to even be intolerant of some choices that our culture declares are clearly bad (e.g. rape, murder). But often, "When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves." -VIKTOR FRANKL.
May I usually have realistic expectations. . . so as to minimize disturbances of my inner peace. High expectations lead to disappointment. But sometimesit’s wise to have high expectations, which foster high achievements. A healthy balance is wise.
May I practice compassion. . . now and in the future . . .for the suffering of others, and say and do what I can to minimize it. Two people die every second, so many families are now practicing appropriate sadness.
May I practice equanimity. . . when I experience pains, sadness or disappointment (which, by my nature I will) may I soon come back to a peaceful balance. May the keel of my ship prevent it from being capsized. Shit happens; pain happens; potholes in the path happen. But choosing to often practice acceptance (or at least tolerance) minimizes our suffering and is the key to equanimity. (Equanimity, along with compassion, loving-kindness and mudita, are the four noble virtues to be practiced in Buddhism.)

Being free of fear (or sadness, disappointment, anxiety, anger, etc.) is not a matter of never feeling it, but of not being flattened when we do. We can feel it and know it is a natural phenomenon, also an impermanent one, which will have its say and be gone. - David Guy

May my body be resilient - Resilience (a close synonym for health) is the ability or skill of a system to return to a balance point through homeostatic mechanisms after experiencing a stressor which takes it away from a balance point.May I recover well from stresses, illnesses and injuries. Some Muslims venerate (and try to model) Ya-'ADL (29)-- balance, resilience, or, Ya jab-BAAR (9)- healing.
May I resonate with Divine sustaining forces- . . . (now I reactivate the muscles needed to cause a smile, and try to keep them activated thru the rest of my morning prayers.) . . . may I be aware of, respectful of, open to, venerate, appreciate, resonate with, synchronize with . . . and thereby be fertile ground for all the ineffable metaphysical forces that keep the Universe and its subsystems running well. Christians and Jews call these ineffable metaphysical forces Divine Grace. Hindus who sometimes personify God as triune honor and praise Vishnu, their name for the aspect of God that sustains and preserves. Muslims call the personified aspect of God (the Universe) Al MuQEET(39)- the sustainer, nourisher, maintainer. Now in my practice is when I do wazifa or zikr for Al-MuQEET. (either silently, or out loud, to better attune to the vibrational energy of metaphysical sustaining forces. see addendum 2). . . Others praise/love Al ma-JEED (48)- divine life energy. Pluralism seems wise; there are many valid ways to appreciate metaphysical forces: gratefulness, thankfulness, piety, prayer, praise, awe, humility, zikr, dance, music, poetry, art.
May I resonate with Divine protective forces- May I be aware of, respectful of, open to, venerate, appreciate, resonate with, synchronize with, praise, and be welcoming to the Divine, miraculous, ineffable forces which (perhaps) keep living systems safe. Monotheists (and sometimes myself) find it useful to name these personified protective forces “angels”, as if they are separate beings. I often find it useful and effective to imagine that the talisman I rub, or the buckeye in my pocket, or the 4 leaf clover in my wallet act as magnets to attract angelic beings or protective metaphysical forces.In a significant way, our thoughts create our reality.

Positive illusions make us more resilient and more likely to succeed. - Bruce Hood

Now I mentally repeat, 3 or 11 times, the 38^th name of God, Al-Ha-FEEZ (38)- guardian, protector, preserver. May I honor and welcome Al-Ha-FEEZ into my life, here and now. Muslims also praise Al-Mu-HAI-min (7), or Al-MU-min (6)- granter of security, safety.

May I harmonize in the Divine Cosmic Symphony- May I be aware of, respectful of, and play along with all the many vibrating living systems . . . and molecules, and atoms. On a micro scale, everything vibrates/oscillates; nothing is steady. Sounds are oscillations in the density of air which cause my eardrums to vibrate at the same frequency (20-20,000 Hz. The lowest note I can sing is D2, 73 Hz, which also happens to be the base frequency of my 32” gong). Microwaves which are tuned to vibrate, “rock”, and rotate water molecules oscillate at 2.45 gigahertz.

To play well in an orchestra we need to listen well, be in tune with others, keep the shared rhythm, respect the other instruments, and not play too loud. Each participant in a symphony plays an instrument which plays with different pitches and timbres. Egocentric, conceited or power-hungry people who aren’t skillful at respecting the other voices in the symphony detract from the beauty of the Symphony. They create discord instead of harmony. They don’t have the skill of an artistic or skillful Spiritual Musician in the Divine Cosmic Symphony (aka, God evolving, the Universe happening). May I practice and thereby develop the skills to play on many different instruments. May I harmonize well with God in all His/Her/Its many manifestations. May I Harmonize well with Saraswati, the Hindu incarnation/aspect/personification of God (music, sound, vibration).

"Real peace is not simply the absence of violent conflict but a state of harmony: harmony between people; harmony between humanity and nature; and harmony within ourselves." - Bhikkhu Bodhi, “Fostering Peace, Inside and Out”.

Pir (the title given to the guide of a Sufi order) Shabda Kahn says that "a Sufi is one who harmonizes with all things". Or at least tries to. Muslims appreciate, praise or invoke As-sa-MEE' (26), which represents God manifesting as sound and music.

Love produces harmony and harmony creates beauty. Therefore the chief motto in life is 'Love, harmony and beauty'. Love, in all things and beings, the beloved God, in harmony with all in the right understanding, and beautify your life by observing the beauty within and without.- Hazrat Inayat Khan.

Once we see and know for ourselves the toxic taste of disharmony and constantly wanting the world to be other than it is, we know change of ourselves is the wiser response. . . In life, our instruments are the body, heart, and mind. -Georgianna Wasia Reid.

A harmonized mind produces harmony in this world of seeming discord. - Paramahansa Yogananda

May I will dance well with God, and all the manifestations of God . . . in the Divine Cosmic Dance. . . in the here and now. (aka, in this space-time) . . . and in the future. On a macro scale, above absolute zero, it seems true that nothing is stable; everything (all space-time) is moving and evolving; God is always moving. So my goal in life, as the choreographer of this space-time, should be to move my body/mind/heart/soul well, by often choosing skillful and graceful thoughts, feelings, words, gestures and movements.

When I am grateful, I am neither rushing nor slouching through my day – I’m dancing. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance. - Alan Watts

When before the beauty of a sunset or a mountain, you pause and exclaim, "Ah," you are participating in divinity. – Ancient Hindu text . . . i.e. you are dancing well with God. i.e. Loving God well. When the Divine is seen as personal and triune in Hinduism, it is Shiva (as his incarnation Nataraja) that is the dancer and drummer in the circle of flames-- the aspect of God that is responsible for the incessant change of the Universe, which is, of course, needed for transformation, growth and evolution. It's skillful practice to honor Shiva by welcoming change, by looking forward to new chapters in the book of life, by surfing the waves of change, by dancing well with all the manifestations of God (aka the Universe). The skillful Spiritual Dancer in the Divine Cosmic Dance is sensitive to their many partners, and gracefully moves with them to augment joy in the Universe (or other wholesome goals that are sought after or that seem appropriate for the situation (e.g. sadness, compassion, peace, holistic wellness, harmony, loving relations, etc.)

The Holy Spirit dances across space and time.- Rev. Erica Saunders.

Dance from here to the other world—and don't stop. ~Rumi

Process Philosophy (favored by Buddhists, Heraclitis, Whitehead, Watts, etc) posits that "...reality is not a constellation of things at all, but one of processes. The fundamental "stuff" of the world is not material substance, but volatile flux, namely "fire", and all things are versions thereof (puros tropai). Process is fundamental: the river is not an object, but a continuing flow; the sun is not a thing, but an enduring fire. Everything is a matter of process, of activity, of change (panta rhei). - an interpretation of Heraclitus's concepts into modern terms by Nicholas Rescher.

You never step in the same river twice. - Heraclitus

Panta rhei or “everything flows,” stated Heraclitus two and a half millennia ago. This is the fundamental feature of reality. It never stays the same. - Peter Burns

Often I prefer to think of things, entities, organisms as interrelated processes that are incessantly evolving and happening instead of existing. And I prefer to think of the entire Universe as one big, Divine PROCESS (aka God), instead of as a thing or entity that “exists”.

May I love God well.In these skillful and loving ways, in my choice of thoughts, words and actions, may I appreciate, care about and care for the holistic health and wellness of all aspects of the divine living system that we call Mother Earth.

Every kind of power lies in this one thing which we call by the simple name: love. Charity, generosity, kindness, affection, endurance, tolerance, and patience -- all these words are different aspects of one; they are different names of only one thing: love. Whether it is said, 'God is love,' or whatever name is given to it, all the names are the names of God; and yet every form of love, every name for love, has its own peculiar scope, has a peculiarity of its own. Love as kindness is one thing, love as tolerance is another, love as generosity is another, love as patience another; and yet from beginning to end it is just love. ... True love must have free flow; and to learn that free flow the teachers have taught us first to love from the limited, and thence to advance in love till we attain to the love of God, the Unlimited. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Love for one person, to whatever depth it may have reached, is limited. Perfection of love lies in its vastness. 'The tendency of love is to expand, even from one atom to the whole universe, from a single earthly beloved to God.' When love is for the human being it is primitive and incomplete, and yet it is needed to begin with. He can never say, 'I love God,' who has no love for his fellow man. But when love attains its culmination in God, it reaches its perfection. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

May I often realize the oneness of all . . . now, and in the future. May I often dis-identify with my self, or ego, so as to better identify with other aspects and manifestations of God. In a deep, profound way I am one with: the new grandpa in India now holding his first grandchild for the first time, the chickadee at my feeder, the nucleic acid in the virus in my nose, the nitrogen atom in the fiber of this blanket, the propane molecule now burning in our furnace, the copper atom in my gong, the supernovas and kilonovas on the far side of the Milky Way that are now creating new copper and gold atoms.

The work of the spiritual man is to forget his false self and so to realize the true self which is God, and this true self not only in him, but in his neighbor also.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

The first lesson of the mystic is, "Thou art, and not I." It is not only complete surrender to God, it is self-effacement. And what does the symbol of the cross explain? That "Thou art, not me, my hands are not for me, my feet are not for me, my head is not for me, they are all Thine." The saying of the [Hadith], "Die before death," does not mean suicide, it means the death of the "I", the separate self.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

I asked the leaf whether it was frightened because it was autumn and the other leaves were falling. The leaf told me, "No. During the whole spring and summer I was completely alive. I worked hard to help nourish the tree, and now much of me is in the tree. I am not limited by this form. I am also the whole tree, and when I go back to the soil, I will continue to nourish the tree. So I don’t worry at all. As I leave this branch and float to the ground, I will wave to the tree and tell her, 'I will see you again very soon'." That day there was a wind blowing and, after a while, I saw the leaf leave the branch and float down to the soil, dancing joyfully, because as it floated it saw itself already there in the tree. It was so happy. I bowed my head, knowing that I have a lot to learn from the leaf. - Thich Nhat Hanh.

A common Muslim chant/zikr that I often repeat is: La 'illaha 'illa allah-- there is only the One/God/the Universe. The Hindu & Buddhist chant of OM can help us resonate with the One/God/the Universe. I take a deep breath, then . . . Oooooooooooooooommmmmm . . . as I flex and circle my head three times.

After (or during) this practice, I often do a shortened version of these practices for at least one loved one. But I don't know what their mental/emotional/spiritual/physical goals currently are, so I start with, “May (their name) skillfully practice the thoughts, feelings and actions that work to optimize their joy, peace and progress towards their other wholesome goals."

I suggest that you make up your own mantram phrases, to repeat in a trance, as a prayer that actually works to achieve your current goals. In addendum 3 are a few others to consider. Namaste.

* * *

Addendum 1: There are dozens of helpful techniques to transition into the here and now without discursive thinking or judgementalism (i.e. practice mindfulness, prayer or trance). Formerly, I would count my breath (e.g. 3 or 4 on inhalations and4 or 5 on exhalations) or repeat a mantram phrase with each breath (e.g. I have much . . . //to be grateful for). For the last few years, during 3 inhalations, I mentally say and/or visualize: "Flattening" (of my 2 hemispherical diaphragms), and "down, out"); during those 3 exhalations I say and visualize, “in, up, relaxing (the radial muscles of my diaphrams)”. During the next three breaths I say/visualize, air “in, down, over”,into the alveoli in the 2 lobes of my left lung, //air “back, up, out”. Then I visualize the air in and out of my right, and then both lungs. For the last 3 breaths I say/visualize, air “in,flattening, belly out// belly in, relaxing, air out,” as my mental focus follows a back and forth path in my body along one half of an oval. Some find 4-7-8 breathing to be quite relaxing and helpful: mentally count 4 on inbreaths, then hold for 7 counts, then exhale for 8 counts. Sometimes I visualize figure 8 breathing: starting at the back of my left chest I count 1,2,3, coming around to the front, then 1,2,3,4 coming across and back to the back of my right chest. Then complete the 8 by 1,2,3//1,2,3,4 around the right chest then back to the starting point.

Addendum 2: There are many valid, helpful styles of repeating a divine name of Allah/God. What works for me these days is to: flex my neck, then, on the inhale, I extend my neck back and circle it counter clockwise to the 9 o’clock position, where I exhale and mentally (or outloud) say the first syllable. At the 6 o’clock position I say the 2^nd syllable. At the 3 o’clock position I say the final syllable and continue it to 12 o’clock, then flex down to 6 o’clock. I repeat this with each breath/incantation 11 times. My way to keep count, that minimizes distraction from my focus, is to briefly focus on my left little finger by activating the muscles which would cause it to flex. With the 2^nd repetition I briefly focus on my left 4^th finger, etc, around to 10. And then I do one more. Zikr done in a group is also, evidently, quite effective and nourishing.

Addendum 3: May (I) skillfully Play the Game of Life. i.e. choose thoughts, words and behaviors which work to get you and your loved ones closer to holistic wellness, or joy or peace, etc.. A skillful Spiritual Athlete has many different plays in his playbook to choose from, to get him closer to his current goals in the Game of Life.

May (I) Struggle well in the Greater Jihad. In Islam, the Greater Jihad is the struggle in a Spiritual Warrior to overcome the barriers in himself to loving God (and all His many manifestations) better. Our main enemies are the dysfunctional, habitual tendencies within us, not beings or things outside of us or separate from us. God's "will" is for us to struggle well in this Jihad by skillfully choosing virtuous thoughts, feelings and actions for the good of all (i.e. selflessly, humbly, lovingly, piously). The Spiritual Warrior has many different weapons, or types of arrows in his quiver, to puncture holes in the curtain of our main delusion-- that we are separate beings in space and time, apart from the other divine manifestations of God (aka other beings and things and phenomena). We are called to "fight" this Jihad well, and not let the counsel (inner voices) of metaphysical "Devils" take us off course. Jews, Christians and Muslims believe we will be judged by God on our efforts, and may be rewarded with eternal life in Heaven. Many Hindus and Buddhist believe in karma, that our thoughts and actions determine the quality of our rebirth in future lives. I'm pleased that this belief works for them, but it doesn't seem to work for me. I'm less inclined to worship a personified God who has characteristics of human beings, e.g. who is judgemental, or 'who' has a will, or can hear or see us, or who is omniscent, or was/is a creator of things and beings which are then separate from "Him/Her". Pantheism works better for me than monotheism, but most theologies are valid and helpful.

May (I) Embrace the flow that is the Universe

May ( I ) Be safe

Here are some metta phrases that work for Melvin Escobar, a Buddhist in Oakland :

May (I/you/all beings) be safe and protected, free from inner and outer harm.

May (I/you/all) be happy.

May (my/your/everyone’s) body support the practice of loving awareness.

May (I/you/all) be free from ill-will, affliction, and anxiety.

May (I/you/everyone) love (myself/yourself/themselves) as (I am/you are/they are).

May (I/you/all) be happy and free from suffering.

May (I/you/all) find peace in an uncertain world.

May (I/you/all) find ease on the middle path between attachment and apathy.

Jul 9, 2023 7:32:30 PM

quoatations about theology

The God of each is the God of all, but in order to comprehend that God we each have to make our own God. Some of us seek justice, we can seek for God Who is just. Some of us look for beauty, we must find it in the God of beauty. Some of us seek for love, we must find it in the God of mercy and compassion. Some of us wish for strength and power, we must find it in the God Almighty. The seeking of every soul in this world is different, distinct and peculiar to himself, and he can best attain to it by finding the object of his search in God. - Hazrat Inayat

When a man walks along the beach and picks up rock and skips it across a lake as the sun shines down, that is God walking across God and picking God up and skipping God across God as God shines down. - Khan Willie Sawyer II

In the swinging of the branches, in the flying of the birds, and in the running of the water,

Beloved, I see Thy waving hand, bidding me good-bye.

In the cooing of the wind, in the roaring of the sea, and in the crashing of the thunder,

Beloved, I see Thee weep and I hear Thy cry.

In the promise of the dawn, in the breaking of the morn, in the smiles of the rose,

Beloved, I see Thy joy at my homecoming. - Hazrat Inayit Khan

Hazrat Ali says, 'Know thyself, and thou shalt know God. - Hazrat Ali

One day Inayat was praying on the roof of the house, offering his prayers and he thought to himself that there had not been an answer yet to all the prayers he had offered to God and he did not know where God was to hear his prayers and he could not reconcile himself to going on praying to the God whom he knew not. He went fearlessly to his father and said: "I do not think I will continue my prayers any longer, for it does not fit in with my reason. I do not know how I can go on praying to a God I do not know." His father, taken aback, did not become cross lest he might turn Inayat's beliefs sour by forcing them upon him without satisfying his reason and he was glad on the other hand to see that, although it was irreverent on the child's part, yet it was frank, and he knew that the lad really hungered after Truth and was ready to learn now, what many could not learn in their whole life. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

He said to him: "God is in you and you are in God. As the [drop of wter] is in the ocean and the [drop of wter] is a part of the ocean and yet not separate from the ocean. For a moment it has appeared as a [drop of wter], then it will return to that from which it has risen. So is the relation between man and God. The Prophet has said that God is closer to you than the jugular vein, which in reality means that your own body is farther from you than God is. If this be rightly interpreted, it will mean that God is the very depth of your own being." This moment to Inayat was his very great initiation, as if a switch had turned in him, and from that moment onward his whole life Inayat busied himself, and his whole being became engaged in witnessing in life what he knew and believed, by this one great Truth. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

* *

The innermost being of man is the real being of God; man is always linked with God. If he could only realize it, it is by finding harmony in his own soul that he finds communion with God. All meditation and contemplation are taught with this purpose: to harmonize one's innermost being with God, so that He is seeing, hearing, thinking through us, and our being is a ray of His light. In that way we are even closer to God than the fishes are to the ocean in which they have their being. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

* *

Many think that spiritual attainment can only be achieved by great labor. It is not so; labor is necessary for material attainment, but for spiritual attainment what one needs is a seeking soul like that of Moses. Moses falling upon the ground may be interpreted as the cross, which means, 'I am not; Thou art.' In order to be, one must pass through a stage of being nothing. In Sufi terms this is called Fana, when one thinks, 'I am not what I had always thought myself to be.' This is the true self-denial, which the Hindus called Layam, and the Buddhists annihilation. It is the annihilation of the false self which gives rise to the true self; once this is done, from that moment man approaches closer and closer to God, until he stands face to face with his divine ideal, with which he can communicate at every moment of his life. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

There is a poem by the great Persian poet Iraqi in which he tells, 'When I went to the gate of the divine Beloved and knocked at the door, a voice came and said -- Who art thou?' When he had told, 'I am so and so', the answer came, 'There is no place for anyone else in this abode. Go back to whence thou hast come'. He turned back and then, after a long time, after having gone through the process of the cross and of crucifixion, he again went there -- with the spirit of selflessness. He knocked at the door; the word came, 'Who art thou? ', and he said, 'Thyself alone, for no one else exists save Thee'. And God said, 'Enter into this abode for now it belongs to thee'. It is such selflessness, to the extent that the thought of self is not there, it is being dead to the self, which is the recognition of God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Mystics of all ages have not been known for their miraculous powers or for the doctrines they have taught, but for the devotion they have shown throughout their lives. The Sufi in the East says to himself, 'Ishq Allah Ma'bud Allah, which means 'God is Love, God is the Beloved', in other words it is God who is love, lover, and beloved. When we hear the stories of the miraculous powers of mystics, of their great insight into the hidden laws of nature, of the qualities which they manifested through their beautiful personalities, we realize that these have all come from one and the same source, whether one calls it devotion or whether one calls it love. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Science is learned by analysis and esotericism by synthesis. If a person who wants to obtain esoteric knowledge breaks things up into bits, he is analyzing them; and as long as he does this he will never come to understand esotericism. In psychology two things are needed: analysis and synthesis; and when through a better understanding of psychology one has accustomed oneself to synthesize as well as to analyze, then one prepares oneself to synthesize only, which leads to a fuller understanding of esotericism. Therefore, the acquisition of esoteric knowledge is quite different from the study of science. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

* *

It is the lover of God whose heart is filled with devotion, who can commune with God; not the one who makes an effort with his intellect to analyze God. In other words, it is the lover of God who can commune with Him, not the student of His nature. It is the 'I' and 'you', which divide, and yet it is 'I' and 'you', which are the necessary conditions of love. Although 'I' and 'you' divide the one life into two, it is love that connects them by the current which is established between them; and it is this current which is called communion, which runs between man and God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well…for there is a Force of love moving through the universe that holds us fast and will never let us go. - Julian of Norwich

* *

God and man are like the two ends of one line. When a believer in God conceives of God as a separate entity and of man as a being separate from Him, he makes himself an exile, an exile from the kingdom of God. He holds fast to the form of God created by himself, and he does not reach the Spirit of God. However good and virtuous he has been in life, however religious in his actions, he has not fulfilled the purpose of his life. ...

Those who think that God is not outside but only within are as wrong as those who believe that God is not within but only outside. In fact God is both inside and outside, but it is very necessary to begin by believing in that God outside. From our childhood we have learned everything outside. We learn what the eye is by looking at the eyes of others; everything we see in ourselves we have always learned from outside.

So even in order to learn to see God we must begin by seeing God outside: as the Creator, the Judge, the Knower of all things, the forgiver; and when we have understood Him better, the next step is that the God that we have always seen outside we now also find within, and that completes our worship. If we have only found Him outside then we are His worshippers, but we remain separate from him and there is no communion, which is the purpose of life. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

There is One Truth, the true knowledge of our being, within and without, which is the essence of all wisdom. Hazrat Ali says, 'Know thyself, and thou shalt know God.' ... The Sufi recognizes the knowledge of self as the essence of all religions; he traces it in every religion, he sees the same truth in each, and therefore he regards all as one. Hence he can realize the saying of Jesus; 'I and my Father are one.' The difference between creature and Creator remains on his lips, not in his soul. This is what is meant by union with God. It is in reality the dissolving of the false self in the knowledge of the true self, which is divine, eternal, and all pervading. 'He who attaineth union with God, his very self must lose,' said Amir. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

The eye through which I see God is the same eye through which God sees me. - a French mystic

I feel most spiritual when I’m out in the woods. I feel part of nature. Or looking up at the stars. I used to say I was an atheist. Now I say, it’s all according to your definition of God. According to my definition of God, I’m not an atheist. Because I think God is everything. Whenever I open my eyes I’m looking at God. Whenever I’m listening to something I’m listening to God. - Pete Seeger

The wave realizes, 'I am the sea', and by falling into the sea prostrates itself before its God. Hazrat Inayat Khan

Jul 9, 2023 7:28:52 PM | quotations

quotations from Thich Nhat Hanh

Thich Nhat Hanh, “Please call me by my true names”

“Don’t say that I will depart tomorrow –
even today I am still arriving.

Look deeply: every second I am arriving
to be a bud on a Spring branch,
to be a tiny bird, with still-fragile wings,
learning to sing in my new nest,
to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower,
to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry
to fear and to hope.
The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death
of all that is alive.

I am a mayfly metamorphosing
on the surface of the river.
And I am the bird
that swoops down to swallow the mayfly.

I am a frog swimming happily
in the clear water of a pond.
And I am the grass-snake
that silently feeds itself on the frog.

I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones,
my legs as thin as bamboo sticks.
And I am the arms merchant,
selling deadly weapons to Uganda.

I am the twelve-year-old girl,
refugee on a small boat,
who throws herself into the ocean
after being raped by a sea pirate.
And I am the pirate,
my heart not yet capable
of seeing and loving.

I am a member of the politburo,
with plenty of power in my hands.
And I am the man who has to pay
his “debt of blood” to my people
dying slowly in a forced-labor camp.

My joy is like Spring, so warm
it makes flowers bloom all over the Earth.
My pain in like a river of tears,
so vast it fills the four oceans.

Please call me by my true names,
so I can hear all my cries and laughter at once,
so I can see that my joy and pain are one.

Please call me by my true names,
so I can wake up
and the door of my heart
could be left open,
the door of compassion.

* *

People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don’t even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle.”

“Because you are alive, everything is possible.”

“Waking up this morning, I smile. Twenty-four brand new hours are before me. I vow to live fully in each moment and to look at all beings with eyes of compassion.”

“Life is a miracle, and being aware of simply this can already make us very happy.”

“Birth is okay and death is okay, if we know that they are only concepts in our mind. Reality transcends both birth and death.”

“Breathing in, I know I am breathing in.

In this simple statement is the essence of Buddhist practice. You can build a satisfying and fruitful life on it. You can help yourself and others. You can experience the world as pure and joyful. You can even become enlightened.

* At this very moment, the Earth is above you, below you, all around you, and even inside you. The Earth is everywhere. You may be used to thinking of the Earth as only the ground beneath your feet. But the water, the sea, the sky, and everything around us comes from the Earth. Everything outside us and everything inside us comes from the Earth. We often forget that the planet we are living on has given us all the elements that make up our bodies. The water in our flesh, our bones, and all the microscopic cells inside our bodies all come from the Earth and are part of the Earth. The Earth is not just the environment we live in. We are the Earth and we are always carrying her within us.

Realizing this, we can see that the Earth is truly alive. We are a living, breathing manifestation of this beautiful and generous planet. Knowing this, we can begin to transform our relationship to the Earth. We can begin to walk differently and to care for her differently. We will fall completely in love with the Earth. When we are in love with someone or something, there is no separation between ourselves and the person or thing we love. We do whatever we can for them and this brings us great joy and nourishment. That is the relationship each of us can have with the Earth. That is the relationship each of us must have with the Earth if the Earth is to survive, and if we are to survive as well.

If we think about the Earth as just the environment around us, we experience ourselves and the Earth as separate entities. We may see the planet only in terms of what it can do for us. We need to recognize that the planet and the people on it are ultimately one and the same. . . .

Thich Nhat Hanh, Love Letter to the Earth (Berkeley, CA: Parallax Press, 2013), 8–9

* *

Please do not build a stupa for me. Please do not put my ashes in a vase, lock me inside, and limit who I am. I know this will be difficult for some of you. If you must build a stupa though, please make sure that you put a sign on it that says, ‘I am not in here.’ In addition, you can also put another sign that says, ‘I am not out there either,’ and a third sign that says, ‘If I am anywhere, it is in your mindful breathing and in your peaceful steps. - -Thich Nhat Hanh

The seed of suffering in you may be strong, but don’t wait until you have no more suffering before allowing yourself to be happy. - Thich Nhat Hanh

This body is not me.

I am not limited by this body.

I am life without boundaries.

I have never been born,

and I shall never die.

Look at the ocean and the sky filled with stars,

manifestations from my wondrous true mind.

Since before time, I have been free.

Birth and death are only doors through which we pass,

sacred thresholds on our journey.

Birth and death are a game of hide-and-seek.

So laugh with me,

hold my hand,

let us say good-bye,

say good-bye, to meet again soon.

We meet today.

We will meet again tomorrow.

We will meet at the source every moment.

We meet each other in all forms of life.

-Thich Nhat Hanh

There’s no beginning and no end. I will never die. There will be a dissolution of this body, but that does not mean my death. I will continue, always. - Thich Nhat Hanh, at the close of “At Home in the World”

Don’t pretend you’re walking mindfully when in reality you’re planning your grocery shopping or your next meeting.

Walk with your whole body and mind.

Each step contains insight.

Each step has happiness. Each step has love — love and compassion for the Earth and for all beings, as well as for ourselves.

Why do we walk like that? To be in touch with the great Earth, to be in touch with the world around us. When we’re in touch, when we’re fully aware of the wonder of walking on the Earth, each step nourishes and heals us. - Thich Nhat Hanh

Tomorrow I will continue to be. But you will have to be very attentive to see me. I will be a flower, or a leaf. I will be in these forms and I will say hello to you. If you are attentive enough, you will recognize me, and you may greet me. I will be very happy. - Thich Nhat Hanh

Be in touch with what is wondrous, refreshing, and healing inside and around you. Plant seeds of joy, peace , and understanding in yourself in order to facilitate the work of transformation. - Thich Nhat Hanh

Breathing in, I calm my body. Breathing out, I smile. - "Being Peace"

You can see everything in the universe in one tangerine. When you peel it and smell it, it’s wonderful. You can take your time eating a tangerine and be very happy. - "Peace Is Every Step"

Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet. - "Peace Is Every Step"

From time to time we look at each other and smile. It is the smile of awareness. It proves that we are happy; that we are alive. - "The Path of Emancipation"

Sitting is an art. The art of resting first. It’s very important that we learn how to rest. - "Sitting, Resting, and Not Worrying"

If we set aside time each day to be in a peaceful environment, to walk in nature, or even just to look at a flower or the sky, then that beauty will penetrate us and feed our love and our joy. - "How to Love"

Our breath is also like a wave, gently rocking us into a deep peace. In this state of rest, our body and mind can release their burdens. A lot of healing happens just by letting go and sinking into this state of total relaxation. - "Buddha Mind, Buddha Body"

If we take good care of ourselves, we help everyone. - "How to Love"

Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor. - "Present Moment Wonderful Moment"

We are safe… Come with me and be in the present moment. - "Reconciliation"

The first exercise is to identify the in-breath and out-breath. Breathing in, I know this is my in-breath. Breathing out, I know this is my out-breath. - "Chanting from the Heart"

Love is treating your heart with a great deal of tenderness, with understanding, love, and compassion. - "You Are Here"

Go back and take care of yourself. - "Reconciliation"

Silence is something that comes from your heart, not from outside. Silence doesn’t mean not talking and not doing things; it means that you are not disturbed inside. If you’re truly silent, then no matter what situation you find yourself in you can enjoy the silence. - Thich Nhat Hanh, “The Heart of the Matter”

Every day we are engaged in a miracle… a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle. - "The Miracle of Mindfulness"

Sitting also can be very enjoyable. Sitting and doing nothing. Just enjoying your sitting, enjoying your breathing. Feel that you are alive. - "Sitting, Resting, and Not Worrying"

Even when the cloud is not there, it continues as snow or rain. It is impossible for a cloud to die. It can become rain or ice, but it cannot become nothing. The cloud does not need to have a soul in order to continue. There’s no beginning and no end. - From the poem ‘I Am Not in Here’ (2016) by Vietnamese monk Thich Nhat Hanh

Breathing in, I calm my body. Breathing out, I smile. - "Being Peace"

You can see everything in the universe in one tangerine. When you peel it and smell it, it’s wonderful. You can take your time eating a tangerine and be very happy. - "Peace Is Every Step"

Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet. - "Peace Is Every Step"

From time to time we look at each other and smile. It is the smile of awareness. It proves that we are happy; that we are alive. - "The Path of Emancipation"

Sitting is an art. The art of resting first. It’s very important that we learn how to rest. - "Sitting, Resting, and Not Worrying"

If we take good care of ourselves, we help everyone. - "How to Love"

Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor.— "Present Moment Wonderful Moment"

We are safe… Come with me and be in the present moment. - "Reconciliation"

The first exercise is to identify the in-breath and out-breath. Breathing in, I know this is my in-breath. Breathing out, I know this is my out-breath. - "Chanting from the Heart"

Love is treating your heart with a great deal of tenderness, with understanding, love, and compassion. - "You Are Here"

Go back and take care of yourself. - "Reconciliation"

Every day we are engaged in a miracle… a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle. "The Miracle of Mindfulness"

Sitting also can be very enjoyable. Sitting and doing nothing. Just enjoying your sitting, enjoying your breathing. Feel that you are alive. - "Sitting, Resting, and Not Worrying"

The flower, when it wilts, becomes the compost. The compost can help grow a flower again. Happiness is also organic and impermanent by nature. It can become suffering, and suffering can become happiness again.

No mud, no lotus.

Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy. - Thich Nhat Hanh

We are here to awaken from our illusion of separateness. - Thich Nhat Hanh

Pay attention to the world around you, to the leaves and the flowers, to the birds and the rain. If you can stop and look deeply, you will recognize your beloved manifesting again and again in many forms. - Thich Nhat Hanh, “Free from Fear”

Jul 9, 2023 7:26:22 PM | quotations

quotations from Buddhist wisdom

The bird of paradise alights only on the hand that does not grasp. - John Berry

That people are unknowing does not mean that they are

unknowing like cows or goats. Even ignorant people look for a

pathway to reality. But, searching for it, they often

misunderstand what they encounter. They pursue names and

categories instead of going beyond that name to that which is

real. - Digha Nikaya- from "Buddha Speaks," edited by Anne Bancroft, 2000.

Whatever attitudes we habitually use toward ourselves, we will

use on others, and whatever attitudes we habitually use

toward others, we will use on ourselves. The situation is

comparable to our serving food to ourselves and to other

people from the same bowl. Everyone ends up eating the same

thing--we must examine carefully what we are dishing out.

- Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, "Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness"

While practicing generosity, we should always remember how

very fortunate we are to have this opportunity.

- Gomo Tulku, "Becoming a Child of the Buddhas"

We make every effort to keep things as they are, because human beings, alone, lament transience. Yet no matter how we grieve or protest,

there is no way to impede the flow of anything. If we but see things as they are and flow with them, we may find enjoyment in transience.

Because human life is transient, all manner of figures are woven into its fabric. Shundo Aoyama, Zen Seeds

Heedful among the heedless,
wakeful among those asleep,
just as the fast horse advances,
leaving the weak behind:
so the wise.

-Dhammapada, 2, translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu

Just like a blossom,
bright colored
and full of scent:
a well-spoken word
is fruitful
when well carried out.

-Dhammapada 52, translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu

When you have only two pennies left in the world, buy a loaf of bread with

one, and a lily with the other. -Chinese proverb

In my own experience, the period of greatest gain in knowledge and experience is the most difficult period in one's life. ...Through a difficult period, you can learn, you can develop inner strength, determination, and courage to face the problem. Who gives you this chance? Your enemy. - His Holiness the Dalai Lama

From "The Pocket Dalai Lama," edited by Mary Craig, 2002. Reprinted by arrangement with Shambhala Publications

It is very important that you do not compare your actions to your partner's or judge your partner's behavior as unskillful. Rather, focus on your own actions and take responsibility for them. Recall those times when you looked into your partner's eyes and saw the pain you caused this person you love to suffer. If you can admit your own faults, if you can see how hurtful your actions were and tap into a sense of concern for your partner's well-being, then compassion and loving-friendliness will flow. - -Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, "Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness"

Friends, I know nothing which brings suffering as does an untamed, uncontrolled, unattended and unrestrained heart. Such a heart brings suffering. - Anguttara Nikaya

Bereavement can force you to look at your life directly, compelling you to find a purpose in it where there may not have been one before. When suddenly you find yourself alone after the death of someone you love, it can feel as if you are being given a new life and are being asked: “What will you do with this life? And why do you wish to continue living?”

My heartfelt advice to those in the depths of grief and despair after losing someone they dearly loved is to pray for help and strength and grace. Pray that you will survive and discover the richest possible meaning to the new life you now find yourself in. Be vulnerable and receptive, be courageous and patient. Above all, look into your life to find ways of sharing your love more deeply with others now. Rigpa

The more often you listen to your discriminating awareness, the more easily you will be able to change your negative moods yourself, see through them, and even laugh at them for the absurd dramas and ridiculous illusions that they are.

Gradually you will find yourself able to free yourself more and more quickly from the dark emotions that have ruled your life, and this ability to do so is the greatest miracle of all.

The Tibetan mystic, Tertön Sogyal, said that he was not really impressed by someone who could turn the floor into the ceiling or fire into water. A real miracle, he said, was if someone could liberate just one negative emotion. –Rigpa

Someone who is about to admonish another must realize within himself five qualities before doing so [that he may be able to say], thus:

"In due season will I speak, not out of season. In truth I will speak, not in falsehood. Gently will I speak, not harshly. To his profit will I speak, not to his loss. With kindly intent will I speak, not in anger."

-"Vinaya Pitaka," translated by F.S. Woodward

Difficulties and obstacles, if properly understood and used, can turn out to be an unexpected source of strength. Gesar was the great warrior king of Tibet, whose escapades form the greatest epic of Tibetan literature. Gesar means “indomitable,” someone who can never be put down. From the moment Gesar was born, his evil uncle Trotung tried all kinds of means to kill him. But with each attempt Gesar only grew stronger and stronger.

For the Tibetans, Gesar is not only a martial warrior but also a spiritual one. To be a spiritual warrior means to develop a special kind of courage, one that is innately intelligent, gentle, and fearless. Spiritual warriors can still be frightened, but even so they are courageous enough to taste suffering, to relate clearly to their fundamental fear, and to draw out without evasion the lessons from difficulties. –Rigpa

If happiness hasn't been recognized when alone, a group of people will be a cause of distraction.

-Adept Godrakpa, "Hermit of Go Cliffs"

There is no pleasure without some degree of pain.
There is no pain without some amount of pleasure.

-Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, "Mindfulness in Plain English" Copyright Wisdom Publications 2001. Reprinted from "Daily

Negligence produces a lot of dirt. As in a house, so in the mind, only a very little dirt collects in a day or two, but if it goes on for many years, it will grow into a vast heap of refuse.

-Commentary to Sutta Nipata

From "365 Buddha: Daily Meditations," edited by Jeff Schmidt

Anger is the real destroyer of our good human qualities; an enemy with a weapon cannot destroy these qualities, but anger can. Anger is our real enemy. - His Holiness the Dalai Lama

If false thinking suddenly stops for an instant, and you see through your own mind, the vastness of its original perfect light, the purity of its original state, no thing in it at all, this is called awakening. There is nothing to be awakened or cultivated other than this mind. - Han-shan

“But what makes these 'experts' preach their own opinion and call it truth?" asked the inquirer. "Is it an inheritance of humankind to do this, or is it merely something they gain satisfaction from?". "Apart from consciousness," answered the Buddha, "no absolute truths exist. False reasoning declares one view to be true and another view wrong. It is delight in their dearly held opinions that makes them assert that anyone who disagrees is bound to come to a bad end. But no true seeker becomes embroiled in all this. Pass by peacefully and go a stainless way, free from theories, lusts, and dogmas." - -Majjhima Nikaya

Invitation to Meditate

Everything can be used as an invitation to meditation. A smile, a face in the subway, the sight of a small flower growing in the crack of cement pavement, a fall of rich cloth in a shop window, the way the sun lights up flower pots on a windowsill. Be alert for any sign of beauty or grace. Offer up every joy, be awake at all moments, to “the news that is always arriving out of silence.”

Slowly, you will become a master of your own bliss, a chemist of your own joy, with all sorts of remedies always at hand to elevate, cheer, illuminate, and inspire your every breath and movement.

--Remember the View

Rigpa, Glimpse of the Day

September 22. 2003

All the spiritual teachers of humanity have told us the same thing, that the purpose of life on earth is to achieve union with our fundamental, enlightened nature.

From a Rigpa thought of the day

One of the greatest Buddhist traditions calls the nature of mind “the wisdom of ordinariness.” I cannot say it enough: Our true nature and the nature of all beings is not something extraordinary.

The irony is that it is our so-called ordinary world that is extraordinary, a fantastic, elaborate hallucination of the deluded vision of samsara. It is this “extraordinary” vision that blinds us to the “ordinary,” natural, inherent nature of mind. Imagine if the buddhas were looking down at us now: How they would marvel sadly at the lethal ingenuity and intricacy of our confusion!

***
The realm of reality is as vast as cosmic space; it is the knowing mind of sentient beings that is small. Just as long as you do not become egotistic and selfish, you will be ever sated with the spiritual food of nirvana. - Pao-chih

Isn’t it extraordinary that our minds cannot stay still for longer than a few moments without grasping after distraction? They are so restless and preoccupied that sometimes I think that living in a city in the modern world, we are already like the tormented beings in the intermediate state after death, where the consciousness is said to be agonizingly restless.

We are fragmented into so many different aspects. We don’t know who we really are, or what aspects of ourselves we should identify with or believe in. So many contradictory voices, dictates, and feelings fight for control over our inner lives that we find ourselves scattered everywhere, in all directions, leaving nobody at home. Meditation, then, is bringing the mind home. - Rigpa thought for the day

Wars arise from a failure to understand one another's humanness. Instead of summit meetings, why not have families meet for a picnic and get to know each other while the children play together? - His Holiness the Dalai Lama, 1981

If we were to put our minds to one powerful wisdom method and work with it directly, there is a real possibility we would become enlightened.

Our minds, however, are riddled with confusion and doubt. I sometimes think that doubt is an even greater block to human evolution than is desire or attachment. Our society promotes cleverness instead of wisdom, and celebrates the most superficial, harsh, and least useful aspects of our intelligence. We have become so falsely “sophisticated” and neurotic that we take doubt itself for truth, and the doubt that is nothing more than ego’s desperate attempt to defend itself from wisdom is deified as the goal and fruit of true knowledge.

This form of mean-spirited doubt is the shabby emperor of samsara, served by a flock of “experts” who teach us not the open-souled and generous doubt that Buddha assured us was necessary for testing and proving the worth of the teachings, but a destructive form of doubt that leaves us nothing to believe in, nothing to hope for, and nothing to live by. **

Hatred can be the greatest stumbling block to the development of compassion and happiness. If you can learn to develop patience and tolerance towards your enemies, then everything becomes much easier—your compassion towards all others begins to flow naturally. - His Holiness the Dalai Lama

If you wish to understand yourself, you must succeed in doing so in the midst of all kinds of confusions and upsets. Don't make the mistake of sitting dead in the cold ashes of a withered tree. - Emyo From "The Pocket Zen Reader," edited by Thomas Cleary, 1999.

Meditation is bringing the mind back home, and this is first achieved through the practice of mindfulness.

Once an old woman came to Buddha and asked him how to meditate. He told her to remain aware of every movement of her hands as she drew water from the well, knowing that if she did, she would soon find herself in that state of alert and spacious calm that is meditation.

And better than a hundred years
lived without seeing
the Deathless state, is
one day
lived seeing
the Deathless state.

-Dhammapada, 114, translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu

Because in our culture we overvalue the intellect, we imagine that to become enlightened demands extraordinary intelligence. In fact, many kinds of cleverness are just further obscurations. There is a Tibetan saying: “If you are too clever, you could miss the point entirely.”

Patrul Rinpoche said: “The logical mind seems interesting, but it is the seed of delusion.” People can become obsessed with their own theories and miss the point of everything. In Tibet we say: “Theories are like patches on a coat, one day they just wear off.”

There is no evil like hatred.
And no fortitude like patience.

-Santideva, "Bodhicaryavatara"

The practice of mindfulness, of bringing the scattered mind home, and so of bringing the different aspects of our being into focus, is called Peacefully Remaining or Calm Abiding.

All the fragmented aspects of ourselves, which had been at war, settle and dissolve and become friends. In that settling we begin to understand ourselves more, and sometimes even have glimpses of the radiance of our fundamental nature.

'I am breathing in and making my whole body calm and at peace. I am breathing out and making my whole body calm and at peace.' This is how one practices." -The Sutra on Full Awareness of Breathing

Nothing has any inherent existence of its own when you really look at it, and this absence of independent existence is what we call “emptiness.” Think of a tree. When you think of a tree, you tend to think of a distinctly defined object; and on a certain level it is. But when you look more closely at the tree, you will see that ultimately it has no independent existence.

When you contemplate it, you will find that it dissolves into an extremely subtle net of relationships that stretches across the universe. The rain that falls on its leaves, the wind that sways it, the soil that nourishes and sustains it, all the seasons and the weather, moonlight and starlight and sunlight—all form part of this tree.

As you begin to think more and more about the tree, you will discover that everything in the universe helps to make the tree what it is; that it cannot at any moment be isolated from anything else; and that at every moment its nature is subtly changing. This is what we mean when we say things are empty, that they have no independent existence.

Whether you believe in God or not does not matter so much, whether you believe in Buddha or not does not matter so much. You must lead a good life. - His Holiness the Dalai Lama

None of the means employed to acquire religious merit, O monks, has a sixteenth part of the value of loving-kindness. Loving-kindness, which is freedom of heart, absorbs them all; it glows, it shines, it blazes forth. - "Itivuttaka," translated by Justin H. Moore

The cells of our body are dying, the neurons in our brain are decaying, even the expressions on our face are always changing, depending on our mood. What we call our basic character is only a “mindstream,” nothing more. Today we feel good because things are going well; tomorrow we feel the opposite. Where did that good feeling go?

What could be more unpredictable than our thoughts and emotions: Do you have any idea what you are going to think or feel next? The mind, in fact, is as empty, as impermanent, and as transient as a dream. Look at a thought: It comes, it stays, and it goes. The past is past, the future not yet risen, and even the present thought, as we experience it, becomes the past.

The only thing we really have is nowness, is now.

***

Everything that we see around us is seen as it is because we have repeatedly solidified our experience of inner and outer reality in the same way, lifetime after lifetime, and this has led to the mistaken assumption that what we see is objectively real. In fact, as we go further along the spiritual path, we learn how to work directly with our fixed perceptions. All our old concepts of the world or of matter or of even ourselves are purified and dissolved, and an entirely new, what you could call “heavenly” field of vision and perception opens up. As William Blake said:

If the doors of perception were cleansed
Everything would appear . . . as it is, infinite.

***

We live under an assumed identity, in a neurotic fairy-tale world with no more reality than the Mock Turtle in Alice in Wonderland. Hypnotized by the thrill of building, we have raised the houses of our lives on sand.

This world can seem marvelously convincing until death collapses the illusion and evicts us from our hiding place. And what will happen to us then if we have no clue of any deeper reality?

***

Just as Buddha said that of all the buddhas who attained enlightenment, not one accomplished it without relying on the master, he also said: “It is only through devotion, and devotion alone, that you will realize the absolute truth.”

So then, it is essential to know what real devotion is. It is not mindless adoration; it is not abdication of your responsibility to yourself, nor indiscriminately following of another’s personality or whim. Real devotion is an unbroken receptivity to the truth. Real devotion is rooted in an awed and reverent gratitude, but one that is lucid, grounded, and intelligent.

***
We are what we think.

All that we are arises with our thoughts.

With our thoughts we make the world.

Speak or act with an impure mind
And sorrow will follow you As the wheel
follows the ox that draws the cart.

Speak or act with a pure mind
And happiness will follow you As your
shadow, unshakeable.

-THE BUDDHA

***

Buddha sat in serene and humble dignity on the ground, with the sky above him and around him, as if to show us that in meditation you sit with open, skylike attitude of mind, yet remain present, earthed, and grounded. The sky is our absolute nature, which has no barriers and is boundless, and the ground is our reality, our relative, ordinary condition.

The posture we take when we meditate signifies that we are linking absolute and relative, sky and ground, heaven and earth, like two wings of a bird, integrating the skylike deathless nature of mind and the ground of our transient, mortal nature.

***

Anyone looking honestly at life will see that we live in a constant state of suspense and ambiguity. Our minds are perpetually shifting in and out of confusion and clarity. If we could be confused all the time, that would at least make for some kind of clarity. What is really baffling about life is that sometimes, despite all our confusion, we can also be really wise!

This constant uncertainty may make everything seem bleak and almost hopeless; but if you look more deeply at it, you will see that its very nature creates “gaps,” spaces in which profound chances and opportunities for transformation are continuously flowering—if, that is, they can be seen and seized.

***
Nothing is born, nothing is destroyed. Away with your dualism, your likes and dislikes. Every single thing is just the One Mind. When you have perceived this, you will have mounted the Chariot of the Buddhas.

-Huang Po, "Zen Teaching of Huang Po"

***

In his very first teaching, Buddha explained that the root cause of suffering is ignorance. But where exactly is this ignorance? And how does it display itself? Let’s take an everyday example. Think about those people—we all know some—who are gifted with a remarkably powerful and sophisticated intelligence. Isn’t it puzzling how, instead of helping them, as you might expect, it seems only to make them suffer more? It is almost as if their brilliance is directly responsible for their pain.

What is happening is quite clear: This intelligence of ours is captured and held hostage by ignorance, which then makes use of it freely for its own ends. This is how we can be extraordinarily intelligent and yet absolutely wrong, at one and the same time.

***

Sometimes we have fleeting glimpses of the nature of mind. These can be inspired by an exalting piece of music, by the serene happiness we sometimes feel in nature, or by the most ordinary everyday situation. They can arise simply while watching snow slowly drifting down, or seeing the sun rising behind a mountain, or watching a shaft of light falling into a room in a mysteriously moving way. Such moments of illumination, peace, and bliss happen to us all and stay strangely with us.

I think we do, sometimes, half understand these glimpses. But then, modern culture gives us no context or framework in which to comprehend them. Worse still, rather than encouraging us to explore them more deeply and discover where they spring from, we are told in both obvious and subtle ways to shut them out. We know that no one will take us seriously if we try to share them. So we ignore what could be really the most revealing experiences of our lives, if only we understood them. This is perhaps the darkest and most disturbing aspect of modern civilization—its ignorance and repression of who we really are .

***

Know all things to be like this:
A mirage, a cloud castle,
A dream, an apparition,
Without essence, but with qualities that can be seen.

Know all things to be like this:
As the moon in a bright sky
In some clear lake reflected,
Though to that lake the moon has never moved.

Know all things to be like this:
As an echo that derives
From music, sounds, and weeping,
Yet in that echo is no melody.

Know all things to be like this:
As a magician makes illusions
Of horses, oxen, carts and other things,
Nothing is as it appears.

BUDDHA

***

A person of wisdom should be truthful, without arrogance, without deceit, not slanderous and not hateful. The wise person should go beyond the evil of greed and miserliness.

Do not get excited by what is old, do not be contented with what is new. Do not grieve for what is lost or be controlled by desire. - Sutta-nipata, translated by H. Saddhatissa

***

Although the results of our actions may not have matured yet, they will inevitably ripen, given the right conditions. Usually we forget what we do, and it is only long afterward that the results catch up with us. By then we are unable to connect them with their causes. “Imagine an eagle,” says Jikmé Lingpa.” It is flying, high in the sky. It casts no shadow. Nothing shows that it is there. Then suddenly it spies its prey, dives, and swoops to the ground. And as it drops, its menacing shadow appears.”

***

The nature of everything is illusory and ephemeral,
Those with dualistic perception regard suffering as happiness,
Like they who lick the honey from a razor’s edge.
How pitiful are they who cling strongly to concrete reality:
Turn your attention within, my heart friends.

NYOSHUL KHEN RINPOCHE

*** Lifetimes of ignorance have brought us to identify the whole of our being with ego. Its greatest triumph is to inveigle us into believing its best interests are our best interests, and even into identifying our very survival with its own. This is a savage irony, considering that ego and its grasping are at the root of all our suffering.

Yet, ego is so terribly convincing, and we have been its dupe for so long, that the thought that we might ever become egoless terrifies us. To be egoless, ego whispers to us, is to lose all the rich romance of being human, to be reduced to a colorless robot or a brain-dead vegetable.

***

You can’t ever get everything you want. It is impossible. Luckily, there is another option: You can learn to control your mind, to step outside of this endless cycle of desire and aversion. You can learn not to want what you want, to recognize desires but not be controlled by them.

-Bhanta Henepola Gunaratana, "Mindfulness in Plain English"

***

Lifetimes of ignorance have brought us to identify the whole of our being with ego. Its greatest triumph is to inveigle us into believing its best interests are our best interests, and even into identifying our very survival with its own. This is a savage irony, considering that ego and its grasping are at the root of all our suffering.

***

I always tell my students not to come out of meditation too quickly. Allow a period of some minutes for the peace of the practice of meditation to infiltrate your life. As my master, Dudjom Rinpoche, said: “Don’t jump up and rush off, but mingle your mindfulness with everyday life. Be like a man who’s fractured his skull, always careful in case someone will touch him.”

***
As a single slab of rock
Won't budge in the wind,
So the wise are not moved
By praise,
By blame.

Like a deep lake,
Clear, unruffled, & calm;
So the wise become clear,
Calm,
On hearing words of the Dhamma.

-Dhammapada, 6, translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu.

***

Worldly afflictions are as extensive as an ocean, noisy and clamorous; but they all arise from the thoughts in your own mind. When not a single thought is conceived, you are liberated from them all. - Ta-t

***

Our mind is like an onion, and each day and month of practice progressively peels away the layers of delusion. - Geshe Ngawang Dhargyey, "Advice From a Spiritual Friend"

***

The most important thing is not to get trapped in what I see everywhere in the West, a “shopping mentality”: shopping around from master to master, teaching to teaching, without any continuity or real, sustained dedication to any one discipline. Nearly all the great spiritual masters of all traditions agree that the essential thing is to master one way, one path to the truth, by following one tradition with all your heart and mind to the end of the spiritual journey, while, of course, remaining open and respectful toward the insights of all others. In Tibet we used to say: “knowing one, you accomplish all.” The modem faddish idea that we can always keep all our options open and so never need commit ourselves to anything is one of the greatest and most dangerous delusions of our culture, and one of ego’s most effective ways of sabotaging our spiritual search.

***

The practice of mindfulness defuses our negativity, aggression, and turbulent emotions, which may have been gathering power over many lifetimes. Rather than suppressing emotions or indulging in them, here it is important to view them—your thoughts and whatever arises—with an acceptance and generosity that are as open and spacious as possible. Tibetan masters say that this wise generosity has the flavor of boundless space, so warm and cozy that you feel enveloped and protected by it, as if by a blanket of sunlight.

***

One of the major aims and purposes of religious practice for the individual is an inner transformation from an undisciplined, untamed, and unfocused state of mind towards one that is disciplined, tamed and balanced.

-His Holiness the Dalai Lama

***

Enlightenment for Gautama [the Buddha] felt as though a prison which had confined him for thousands of lifetimes had broken open. Ignorance had been the jailkeeper. Because of ignorance, his mind had been obscured, just like the moon and stars hidden by the storm clouds. Clouded by endless waves of deluded thoughts, the mind had falsely divided reality into subject and object, self and others, existence and non-existence, birth and death, and from these discriminations arose wrong views—the prisons of feelings, craving, grasping, and becoming. The suffering of birth, old age, sickness, and death only made the prison walls thicker. The only thing to do was to seize the jailkeeper and see his true face. The jailkeeper was ignorance. . . . Once the jailkeeper was gone, the jail would disappear and never be rebuilt again. - THICH NHAT HANH, inTHE BUDDHA’S ENLlGHTENMENT

***

Taking impermanence truly to heart is to be slowly freed from the idea of grasping, from our flawed and destructive view of permanence, from the false passion for security on which we have built everything. Slowly it dawns on us that all the heartache we have been through from grasping at the ungraspable was, in the deepest sense, unnecessary.

At the beginning this too may be painful to accept, because it seems so unfamiliar. But as we reflect, slowly our hearts and minds go through a gradual transformation. Letting go begins to feel more natural, and becomes easier and easier.

It may take a long time for the extent of our foolishness to sink in, but the more we reflect, the more we develop the view of letting go. It is then that a complete shift takes place in our way of looking at everything. - THE DALAI LAMA

***

Since everything is but an apparition,
Perfect in being what it is,
Having nothing to do with good or bad,
Acceptance or rejection

You might as well burst out laughing!

LONGCHENPA

***

One moon appears everywhere in all bodies of water; the moons in all bodies of water are contained in one moon. This is a metaphor for one mind producing myriad things and myriad things producing one mind. This refers to dream illusions, flowers in the sky, half-seeming, half empty. - Hsueh-yen

***

At the time of Buddha, there lived an old beggar woman called Relying on Joy. She used to watch the kings, princes, and people making offerings to Buddha and his disciples, and there was nothing she would have liked more than to be able to do the same. But she could only beg enough oil to fill a single lamp. However, as she placed it before Buddha she made this wish: “I have nothing to offer but this tiny lamp. But through this offering, in the future may I be blessed with the lamp of wisdom. May I free all beings from their darkness. May I purify all their obscurations, and lead them to enlightenment.”

That night, the oil in all the other lamps went out. But the beggar woman’s lamp was still burning at dawn, when Buddha’s great disciple Maudgalyayana came to collect the lamps. He saw no reason why one lamp was still alight and tried to snuff it out. But whatever he did, the lamp kept burning.

Buddha had been watching all along, and said: “Maudgalyayana, do you want to put out that lamp? You cannot. You could not even move it, let alone put it out. If you were to pour the water from all the oceans over this lamp, it still wouldn’t go out. The water in all the rivers and lakes of the world could not extinguish it. Why not? Because this lamp was offered with devotion, and with purity of heart and mind. And that motivation has made it of tremendous benefit.”

***

Non-violence means dialogue, using our language, the human language. Dialogue means compromise; respecting each other’s rights; in the spirit of reconciliation there is a real solution to conflict and disagreement. There is no hundred percent winner, no hundred percent loser—not that way but half-and-half. That is the practical way, the only way. - His Holiness the Dalai Lama

***

Visualize someone to whom you feel very close, particularly someone who is suffering and in pain. As you breathe in, imagine you take in all their suffering and pain with compassion, and as you breathe out, send your warmth, healing, love, joy, and happiness streaming out to them.

Now, gradually widen the circle of your compassion to embrace first other people to whom you also feel very close, then to those about whom you feel indifferent, then to those whom you dislike or have difficulty with, then even to those whom you feel are actively monstrous and cruel. Allow your compassion to become universal, and to enfold in its embrace all sentient beings, and all beings, in fact, without any exception.

***

In the ordinary mind, we perceive the stream of thoughts as continuous, but in reality this is not the case. You will discover for yourself that there is a gap between each thought. When the past thought is past, and the future thought has not yet arisen, you will always find a gap in which the Rigpa, the nature of mind, is revealed. So the work of meditation is to allow thoughts to slow down, to make that gap become more and more apparent.

***

Even within the human realm, all of us have our own individual karma. Human beings look much the same, but we perceive things utterly differently, and we each live in our own unique, separate, individual world. As Kalu Rinpoche says:

“If a hundred people sleep and dream, each of them will experience a different world in his dream. Everyone’s dream might be said to be true, but it would be meaningless to ascertain that only one person’s dream was the true world and all others were fallacies. There is truth for each perceiver according to the karmic patterns conditioning his perceptions.”

***

A man was rowing his boat upstream on a very misty morning. Suddenly, he saw another boat coming downstream, not trying to avoid him. It was coming straight at him. He shouted, “Be careful! Be careful!” but the boat came right into him, and his boat was almost sunk. The man became very angry, and began to shout at the other person, to give him a piece of his mind. But when he looked closely, he saw that there was no one in the other boat. It turned out that the boat just got loose and went downstream. All his anger vanished, and he laughed and he laughed.

-Thich Nhat Nanh, "Being Peace"

***

Ego plays brilliantly on our fundamental fear of losing control, and of the unknown. We might say to ourselves: “I should really let go of ego, I’m in such pain; but if I do, what’s going to happen to me?”

Ego will chime in sweetly: “I know I’m sometimes a nuisance, and believe me, I quite understand if you want me to leave. But is that really what you want? Think: If I do go, what’s going to happen to you? Who’ll look after you? Who will protect and care for you like I’ve done all these years?”

Even if we see through the lies of the ego, we are just too scared to abandon it; for without any true knowledge of the nature of our mind, or true identity, we simply have no other alternative. Again and again we cave in to ego’s demands with the same sad self-hatred as the alcoholic feels reaching for the drink that he knows is destroying him, or the drug addict feels groping for the drug that she knows after a brief high will only leave her flat and desperate

***

Don’t be in too much of a hurry to solve all your doubts and problems. As the masters say: “Make haste slowly.” I always tell my students not to have unreasonable expectations, because it takes time for spiritual growth. It takes years to learn Japanese properly or to become a doctor. Can we really expect to have all the answers, let alone become enlightened, in a few weeks?

The spiritual journey is one of continuous learning and purification. When you know this, you become humble. There is a famous Tibetan saying: “Do not mistake understanding for realization, and do not mistake realization for liberation.” And Milarepa said: “Do not entertain hopes for realization, but practice all your life.”

***

ON BODHICITTA:

The Compassionate Heart of the Enlightened Mind

It is the supreme elixir
That overcomes the sovereignty of death.
It is the inexhaustible treasure
That eliminates poverty in the world.
It is the supreme medicine
That quells the world’s disease.
It is the tree that shelters all beings
Wandering and tired on the path of conditioned existence.
It is the universal bridge
That leads to freedom from unhappy states of birth.
It is the dawning moon of the mind
That dispels the torment of disturbing conceptions.
It is the great sun that finally removes
The misty ignorance of the world.

SHANTIDEVA

***

If you were to draw one essential message from the fact of reincarnation, it would be: Develop a good heart that longs for other beings to find lasting happiness, and acts to secure that happiness. Nourish and practice kindness.

The Dalai Lama has said: “There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; my philosophy is kindness.”

***

Nature’s Law dictates that, in order to survive, bees must work together. As a result, they instinctively possess a sense of social responsibility. They have no constitution, no law, no police, no religion or moral training, but because of their nature, they labor faithfully together. Occasionally, they may fight, but in general, based on cooperation, the whole colony survives. We human beings have a constitution, laws and a police force. We have religion, remarkable intelligence and a heart with a great capacity for love. We have many extraordinary qualities, but in actual practice, I think we are lagging behind those small insects. In some respects, I feel we are poorer than the bees. - His Holiness the Dalai Lama, From "The Pocket Zen Reader," edited by Thomas Cleary, 1999. Reprinted by arrangement with Shambhala Publications, Boston, www.shambhala.com

***

Always recognize the dreamlike qualities of life and reduce attachment and aversion. Practice good-heartedness toward all beings. Be loving and compassionate, no matter what others do to you. What they will do will not matter so much when you see it as a dream. The trick is to have positive intention during the dream. This is the essential point. This is true spirituality.

CHAKDUD TULKU RINPOCHE

***

Whatever joy there is in this world
All comes from desiring and helping others to be happy,
And whatever suffering there is in this world
All comes from desiring myself to be happy.

SHANTIDEVA

***

To end the bizarre tyranny of ego is why we take the spiritual path, but the resourcefulness of ego is almost infinite, and it can at every stage sabotage and pervert our desire to be free of it. The truth is simple, and the teachings are extremely clear; but I have seen again and again, with great sadness, that as soon as they begin to touch and move us, ego tries to complicate them, because it knows it is fundamentally threatened.

However hard ego may try to sabotage the spiritual path, if you really continue on it, and work deeply with the practice of meditation, you will begin slowly to realize just how gulled you have been by ego’s promises: false hopes and false fears. Slowly you begin to understand that both hope and fear are enemies of your peace of mind; hopes deceive you, and leave you empty and disappointed, and fears paralyze you in the narrow cell of your false identity. You begin to see also just how all-encompassing the sway of ego has been over your mind, and in the space of freedom opened up by meditation, when you are momentarily released from grasping, you glimpse the exhilarating spaciousness of your true nature.

***

When you see others’ errors and you want to guide them because you think they are wrong and you feel compassion for them, you should employ tact to avoid angering them, and contrive to appear as if you were talking about something else.

-Tact, Dogen

***

The times when you are suffering can be those when you are open, and where you are extremely vulnerable can be where your greatest strength really lies.

Say to yourself: “I am not going to run away from this suffering. I want to use it in the best and richest way I can, so that I can become more compassionate and more helpful to others.” Suffering, after all, can teach us about compassion. If you suffer, you will know how it is when others suffer. And if you are in a position to help others, it is through your suffering that you will find the understanding and compassion to do so.

***

Never give up
No matter what is going on
Never give up
Develop the heart
Too much energy in your country is spent
Developing the mind instead of the heart.
Be compassionate not just to your friends but to everyone
Be compassionate.
Work for peace in your heart and in the world.
Work for peace and I say again
Never give up.
No matter what is happening,
No matter what is going on around you,
Never give up.

-His Holiness the Dalai Lama

***

It is essential to realize now, in life, when we still have a body, that its convincing appearance of solidity is a mere illusion. The most powerful way to realize this is to learn how, after meditation, to “become a child of illusion”: to refrain from solidifying, as we are always tempted to do, the perceptions of ourselves and our world; and to go on, like the “child of illusion,” seeing directly, as we do in meditation, that all phenomena are illusory and dreamlike. The realization that this deepens the body’s illusory nature is one of the most profound and inspiring we can have to help us to let go.

What is born will die,
What has been gathered will be dispersed,
What has been accumulated will be exhausted,
What has been built up will collapse,
And what has been high will be brought low.

TRADITIONAL BUDDHIST SCRIPTURE

***

Fleeting is this world
Growth and decay its very nature
Things spring to being and again they cease
Happy the marvel of them and the peace.

-Nidana Vagga

***

It is precisely because our present life is so inseparably linked with desire that we must make use of desire’s tremendous energy if we wish to transform our life into something transcendental.

-Lama Thubten Yeshe, Introduction to Tantra

***

“Training” the mind does not in any way mean forcibly subjugating or brainwashing the mind. To train the mind is first to see directly and concretely how the mind functions, a knowledge that you derive from spiritual teachings and through personal experience in meditation practice. Then you use that understanding to tame the mind and work with it skillfully, to make it more and more pliable, so that you can become master of your mind and employ it to its fullest and most beneficial end.

***

A good motivation is what is needed: compassion without dogmatism, without complicated philosophy; just understanding that others are human brothers and sisters and respecting their human rights and dignities. That we humans can help each other is one of our unique human capacities.

-His Holiness the Dalai Lama

***

Since the old days, it is said that "anger is the fire in one's mind that burns away all of one's virtuous deeds." Anger should be absolutely surrendered.

-Jae Woong Kim, "Polishing the Diamond"

For the one who has no inner, angry thoughts,
Who has gone past being a someone, a this or a that,
That one is free from fear and is blissful.
Even the gods cannot win such serenity.

-Udana Sutta

***

I see all the different religious traditions as paths for the development of inner peace, which is the true foundation of world peace. These ancient traditions come to us as a gift from our common past. Will we continue to cherish it as a gift and hand it over the the future generations as a legacy of our shared desire for peace? - His Holiness the Dalai Lama

***

Slowly, you will become a master of your own bliss, a chemist of your own joy, with all sorts of remedies always at hand to elevate, cheer, illuminate, and inspire your every breath and movement.

***

When we have really grasped the law of karma in all its stark power and complex reverberations over many, many lifetimes, and seen just how our self-grasping and self-cherishing, life after life, have woven us repeatedly into a net of ignorance that seems only to be ensnaring us more and more tightly; when we have really understood the dangerous and doomed nature of the self-grasping mind’s enterprise; when we have really pursued its operations into their most subtle hiding places; when we have really understood just how our whole ordinary mind and actions are defined, narrowed and darkened by it, how almost impossible it makes it for us to uncover the heart of unconditional love, and how it has blocked in us all sources of real love and real compassion, then there comes a moment when we understand, with extreme and poignant clarity, what Shantideva said:

If all the harms
Fears and sufferings in the world
Arise from self-grasping,
What need have I for such a great evil spirit?

And then a resolution is born in us to destroy that evil spirit, our greatest enemy. With that evil spirit dead, the cause of all our suffering will be removed, and our true nature, in all its spaciousness and dynamic generosity, will shine out.

***

To recognize the nature of your mind is to engender in the ground of your being an understanding that will change your entire worldview and help you discover and develop, naturally and spontaneously, a compassionate desire to serve all beings, as well as a direct knowledge of how best you can do so, with whatever skill or ability you have, in whatever circumstances you find yourself.

***

There is a spark of hope, a playful humor about the posture we take in meditation, which lies in the secret understanding that we all have the buddha nature. So when you assume this posture, you are playfully imitating a buddha, acknowledging and giving real encouragement to the emergence of your own buddha nature. You begin to respect yourself as a potential buddha.

At the same time, you still recognize your relative condition. But because you have let yourself be inspired by a joyful trust in your own true buddha nature, you can accept your negative aspects more easily and deal with them more generously and with more humor.

When you meditate, invite yourself to feel the self-esteem, the dignity, and the strong humility of the buddha that you are. If you simply let yourself be inspired by this joyful trust, it is enough: Out of this understanding and confidence, meditation will naturally arise.

***

You can have no greater ally in the war against your greatest enemy, your own self-grasping and self-cherishing, than the practice of compassion. It is compassion, dedicating ourselves to others, taking on their suffering instead of cherishing ourselves, that, hand in hand with the wisdom of egolessness, destroys most effectively and most completely that ancient attachment to a false self that has been the cause of our endless wandering in samsara. That is why in our tradition we see compassion as the source and essence of enlightenment and the heart of enlightened activity.

***

My call for a spiritual revolution is thus not a call for a religious revolution. Nor is it a reference to a way of life that is somehow other-worldly, still less to something magical or mysterious. Rather, it is a call for a radical re-orientation away from our habitual preoccupation with self towards concern for the wider community of beings with whom we are connected, and for conduct which recognizes others’ interests alongside our own.

-His Holiness the Dalai Lama

***

As Buddhists, our task is to manifest compassion in everyday life, beginning with members of our own family and extending it to all of society.

Taitetsu Unno (Shin Buddhist professor at Smith C)

for Pure Land Buddhists, the key to being illuminated with the divine light of compassion and transcending delusions, is single-hearted recitation of NEMBUTSU, the name of Amida, the Buddha of Infinite Light. . . .”Namu-Amida-Butsu”

We cultivate the aspiration to benefit others as an antidote to self-cherishing.

Dalai Lama

We perceive conventional truth , that is , the relative world in all its diversity, through our everyday use of mind and our sense faculties. However, it is only through penetrating analysis that we are able to perceive ultimate truth, the true nature of things and events.

Dalai Lama

(after the first stage of accumulation of knowledge to gain total clarity of insight, comes the second stage of preparation, when) The use of concepts in meditation gradually recedes. When all dualistic perceptions of subject and object, of conventional reality, and of intrinsic existence are removed, one enters the path of seeing. At this point, there is no separation of subject and object.

-Dalai Lama

the 5 spiritual friends, or powers: faith, energy, mindfulness, concentration, wisdom

Two fundamental tenets of Buddhist practice are to want little and to be easily satisfied. Is that your aim? Are you helping people to live a life of less suffering and more happiness through continuous practice of meditation, virtue and insight?

Venzin Wangyal Rinpoche

(There are 3 pillars of all schools of Buddhism:) the method of mindfulness, the motivation of compassion, and the liberating wisdom of non-clinging.

Joseph Goldstein

I think one can call oneself a Buddhist because one is inspired by various and sundry aspects of the Buddhist teachings (even if one hasn’t taken refuge in the 3 jewels).

Jeffry Hopkins (Buddhism professor at U. of Va.)

The mind plays a game called “Attachment” and is fooling itself by pretending that external forces are responsible for your happiness. Attachment is the root cause of all mental disturbances, and expectations play the biggest role. Your expectations breed likes and dislikes. Then you get attached to your likes and dislikes and cling to them. It is your expectations that create distractions and disturbances when you do your meditation practice—not the outside world and not the people around you.

. . .If we expect worldly objects and relationships to secure our happiness, we will be disappointed. Disappointment leads to misery.

. . .How foolish I have been to forget that invisible, benevolent force that accompanies us always, protecting, guiding, and nurturing. Instead of remembering that force, I am complaining and worrying.

. . .Once the virtue of pure faith begins to blossom in your heart, you will no longer be dependent on the world and worldly relations to make you happy. Contentment will become your nature.

- Pandit Rajmani Tigunait (spiritual head of the Himalayan Instit)

***

As Buddha said: “What you are is what you have been, what you will be is what you do now.” Padmasambhava went further: “If you want to know your past life, look into your present condition; if you want to know your future life, look at your present actions.”

***

The quality of life in the realm of the gods may look superior to our own, yet the masters tell us that human life is infinitely more valuable. Why? Because of the very fact that we have the awareness and intelligence that are the raw materials for enlightenment, and because the very suffering that pervades this human realm is itself the spur to spiritual transformation.

Pain, grief, loss, and ceaseless frustration of every kind are there for a very real and dramatic purpose: to wake us up, to enable, almost to force us to break out of the cycle of samsara and so release our imprisoned splendor.

***

Compassion is not true compassion unless it is active. Avalokiteshvara, the Buddha of Compassion, is often represented in Tibetan iconography as having a thousand eyes that see the pain in all corners of the universe, and a thousand arms to reach out to all corners of the universe to extend his help.

***

Anger or hatred is like a fisherman's hook. It is very important for us to ensure that we are not caught by it.

-His Holiness the Dalai Lama

***

Karma means that whatever we do, with our bodies, speech, or minds, will have a corresponding result. Each action, even the smallest, is pregnant with its consequences. It is said by the masters that even a little poison can cause death, and even a tiny seed can become a huge tree. And as Buddha said: “Do not overlook negative actions merely because they are small; however small a spark may be, it can burn down a haystack as big as a mountain.”

Similarly he said: “Do not overlook tiny good actions, thinking they are of no benefit even tiny drops of water in the end will fill a huge vessel.”

Karma does not decay like external things, or ever become inoperative. It cannot be destroyed “by time, fire, or water.” Its power will never disappear, until it is ripened.

***

The problem is not materialism as such. Rather, it is the underlying assumption that full satisfaction can arise from gratifying the senses alone. Unlike animals whose quest for happiness is restricted to survival and to the immediate gratification of sensory desires, we human beings have the capacity to experience happiness at a deeper level which, when achieved, can overwhelm unhappy experiences. - His Holiness the Dalai Lama

***

Gradually, as you remain open and mindful, and use a technique to focus your mind more and more, your negativity will slowly be defused; you begin to feel well in your own skin, or, as the French say, être bien dans sa peau (“well in your own skin”). From this comes release and a profound ease. I think of this practice as the most effective form of therapy and self-healing.

***

Every single negative thing we have ever thought or done has ultimately arisen from our grasping at a false self, and our cherishing of that false self, making it the dearest and most important element in our lives. All those negative thoughts, emotions, desires, and actions that are the cause of our negative karma are engendered by self-grasping and self-cherishing. They are the dark, powerful magnet that attracts to us, life after life, every obstacle, every misfortune, every anguish, every disaster, and so they are the root cause of all the sufferings of samsara.

***

All things are free-flowing, untrammeled—what bondage is there, what entanglement? You create your own difficulty and ease therein. The mind source pervades the ten directions with one continuity; those of the most excellent faculties understand naturally.

-Tzu-hu

***

How hard it can be to turn our attention within! How easily we allow our old habits and set patterns to dominate us! Even though they bring us suffering, we accept them with almost fatalistic resignation, for we are so used to giving in to them. We may idealize freedom, but when it comes to our habits, we are completely enslaved.

Still, reflection can slowly bring us wisdom. We may, of course, fall back into fixed repetitive patterns again and again, but slowly we can emerge from them and change.

***

Karma is not fatalistic or predetermined. Karma means our ability to create and to change. It is creative because we can determine how and why we act. We can change. The future is in our hands, and in the hands of our heart.

Buddha said:

Karma creates all, like an artist,
Karma composes, like a dancer.

***

The still revolutionary insight of Buddhism is that life and death are in the mind, and nowhere else. Mind is revealed as the universal basis of experience—the creator of happiness and the creator of suffering, the creator of what we call life and what we call death.

***

Not thinking about anything is zen. Once you know this, walking, standing, sitting, or lying down, everything you do is zen. To know that the mind is empty is to see the Buddha...Using the mind to look for reality is delusion. Not using the mind to look for reality is awareness. Freeing oneself from words is liberation.

-Bodhidharma

***

A wave in the sea, seen in one way, seems to have a distinct identity, an end and a beginning, a birth anda death. Seen in another way, the wave itself doesn’t really exist but is just the behavior of water, “empty” of any separate identity but “full” of water. So when you really think about the wave, you come to realize that it is something that has been made temporarily possible by wind and water, and is dependent on a set of constantly changing circumstances. You also realize that every wave is related to every other wave.

***

If a man should conquer in battle a thousand and a thousand more, and another should conquer himself, his would be the greater victory, because the greatest of victories is the victory over oneself.

-Buddha

***

When anger arises,
whoever keeps firm control
as if with a racing chariot:
him
I call a master charioteer.
Anyone else;
a rein-holder--
that's all.

-Dhammapada, 17, translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu.

***

Let us rise up and be thankful,
for if we didn’t learn a lot today,
at least we learned a little,
and if we didn’t learn a little,
at least we didn’t get sick,
and if we got sick,
at least we didn’t die;
so, let us be thankful.

-The Buddha

***

We have been taught to spend our lives chasing our thoughts and projections. Even when the “mind” is talked about, it is only thoughts and emotions that are referred to; and when our researchers study what they imagine to be the mind, they look only at its projections. No one ever really looks into the mind itself, the ground from which all these expressions arise; and this has tragic consequences.

***

As Buddhists, our task is to manifest compassion in everyday life, beginning with members of our own family and extending it to all of society.

Taitetsu Unno (Shin Buddhist professor at Smith C)

We cultivate the aspiration to benefit others as an antidote to self-cherishing.

Dalai Lama

Dalai Lama

-Dalai Lama

the 5 spiritual friends, or powers: faith, energy, mindfulness, concentration, wisdom

Venzin Wangyal Rinpoche

(There are 3 pillars of all schools of Buddhism:) the method of mindfulness, the motivation of compassion, and the liberating wisdom of non-clinging. - Joseph Goldstein

I think one can call oneself a Buddhist because one is inspired by various and sundry aspects of the Buddhist teachings (even if one hasn’t taken refuge in the 3 jewels).

Jeffry Hopkins (Buddhism professor at U. of Va.)

. . .If we expect worldly objects and relationships to secure our happiness, we will be disappointed. Disappointment leads to misery.

. . .Once the virtue of pure faith begins to blossom in your heart, you will no longer be dependent on the world and worldly relations to make you happy. Contentment will become your nature.

- Pandit Rajmani Tigunait (spiritual head of the Himalayan Instit)

***

At present, our body is undoubtedly the center of our whole universe. We associate it, without thinking, with our self and our ego, and this thoughtless and false association continually reinforces our illusion of their inseparable, concrete existence. Because our body seems so convincingly to exist, our “I” seems to exist, and “you” seem to exist, and the entire illusory, dualistic world we never stop projecting around us looks ultimately solid and real.

When we die, this whole compound construction falls dramatically to pieces.

***

There is a famous saying: “If the mind is not contrived, it is spontaneously blissful, just as water, when not agitated, is by nature transparent and clear.”

I often compare the mind in meditation to a jar of muddy water: The more we leave the water without interfering or stirring it, the more the particles of dirt will sink to the bottom, letting the natural clarity of the water shine through. The very nature of the mind is such that if you only leave it in its unaltered and natural state, it will find its true nature, which is bliss and clarity.

***

Even though that which is usually called “mind” is widely esteemed and much discussed,
Still it is not understood or it is wrongly understood or it is understood in a one-sided manner only.
Since it is not understood correctly, just as it is in itself,
There comes into existence inconceivable numbers of philosophical ideas and assertions.
Furthermore, since ordinary individuals do not understand it,
They do not recognize their own nature,
And so they continue to wander among the six destinies of rebirth within the three worlds, and thus experience suffering.

Therefore, not understanding your own mind is a very grievous fault.

PADMASAMBHAVA

***

The absolute truth cannot be realized within the domain of the ordinary mind. And the path beyond the ordinary mind, all the great wisdom traditions have told us, is through the heart. This path of the heart is devotion.

***

Renunciation has both sadness and joy in it: sadness because you realize the futility of your old ways, and joy because of the greater vision that begins to unfold when you are able to let go of them. This is no ordinary joy. It is a joy that gives birth to a new and profound strength, a confidence, an abiding inspiration that comes from the realization that you are not condemned to your habits, that you can indeed emerge from them, that you can change, and grow more and more free.

***

Quietly sitting, body still, speech silent, mind at peace, let thoughts and emotions, whatever rises, come and go, without clinging to anything.

What does this state feel like? Dudjom Rinpoche used to say: Imagine a man who comes home after a long, hard day’s work in the fields, and sinks into his favorite chair in front of the fire. He has been working all day and he knows that he has achieved what he wanted to achieve; there is nothing more to worry about, nothing left unaccomplished, and he can let go completely of all his cares and concerns, content, simply, to be.

***

Adopting an attitude of universal responsibility is essentially a personal matter. The real test of compassion is not what we say in abstract discussions but how we conduct ourselves in daily life.

-His Holiness the Dalai Lama, "Imagine All the People"

It is very important that you do not compare your actions to your partner's or judge your partner's behavior as unskillful. Rather, focus on your own actions and take responsibility for them. Recall those times when you looked into your partner's eyes and saw the pain you caused this person you love to suffer. If you can admit your own faults, if you can see how hurtful your actions were and tap into a sense of concern for your partner's well-being, then compassion and loving-friendliness will flow.

-Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, "Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness"

Copyright Wisdom Publications 2001. Reprinted from "Daily Wisdom: 365 Buddhist Inspirations," edited by Josh Bartok, with permission of Wisdom Publications, 199 Elm St., Somerville MA 02144 U.S.A, www.wisdompubs.org.

When someone is suffering and you find yourself at a loss to know how to help, put yourself unflinchingly in his or her place. Imagine as vividly as possible what you would be going through if you were suffering the same pain. Ask yourself: “How would I feel? How would I want my friends to treat me? What would I most want from them?”

When you exchange yourself for others in this way, you are directly transferring your cherishing from its usual object, yourself, to other beings. So exchanging yourself for others is a very powerful way of loosening the hold on you of the self-cherishing and the self-grasping of ego, and so of releasing the heart of your compassion.

Slowly, you will become a master of your own bliss, a chemist of your own joy, with all sorts of remedies always at hand to elevate, cheer, illuminate, and inspire your every breath and movement.

One of the greatest Buddhist traditions calls the nature of mind “the wisdom of ordinariness.” I cannot say it enough: Our true nature and the nature of all beings is not something extraordinary.

If we were to put our minds to one powerful wisdom method and work with it directly, there is a real possibility we would become enlightened.

When little obstacles crop up on the spiritual path, a good practitioner does not lose faith and begin to doubt, but has the discernment to recognize difficulties, whatever they may be, for what they are—just obstacles, and nothing more. It is the nature of things that when you recognize an obstacle as such, it ceases to be an obstacle. Equally, it is by failing to recognize an obstacle for what it is, and therefore taking it seriously, that it is empowered and solidified and becomes a real blockage.

For us to survive on the spiritual path, there are many challenges to face, and there is much to learn. We have to discover how to deal with obstacles and difficulties; how to process doubts and see through wrong views; how to inspire ourselves when we least feel like it; how to understand ourselves and our moods; how really to work with and integrate the teachings and practices; how to evoke compassion and enact it in life; and how to transform our suffering and emotions.

On the spiritual path, all of us need the support and the good foundation that come from really knowing the teachings, and this cannot be stressed strongly enough. For the more we study and practice, the more we shall embody discernment, clarity, and insight. Then, when the truth comes knocking, we will know it, with certainty, for what it is, and gladly open the door, because we’ll have guessed that it may well be the truth of who we really are.

Similarly he said: “Do not overlook tiny good actions, thinking they are of no benefit even tiny drops of water in the end will fill a huge vessel.”

Karma does not decay like external things, or ever become inoperative. It cannot be destroyed “by time, fire, or water.” Its power will never disappear, until it is ripened.

The beginner’s mind is an open mind, an empty mind, a ready mind, and if we really listen with a beginner’s mind, we might really begin to hear. For if we listen with a silent mind, as free as possible from the clamor of preconceived ideas, a possibility will be created for the truth of the teachings to pierce us, and for the meaning of life and death to become increasingly and startlingly clear.

My master Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche said: “The more and more you listen, the more and more you hear; the more and more you hear, the deeper and deeper your understanding becomes.”

Realizing the View subtly but completely transforms your vision of everything. More and more, I have come to realize how thoughts and concepts are all that block us from always being, quite simply, in the absolute. Now I see clearly why the masters so often say: “Try hard not to create too much hope and fear,” for they only engender more mental gossip. When the View is there, thoughts are seen for what they truly are: fleeting and transparent, and only relative. You see through everything directly, as if you had X-ray eyes. You do not cling to thoughts and emotions or reject them; you welcome them all within the vast embrace of Rigpa. The things you took so seriously before—ambitions, plans, expectations, doubts, and passions—no longer have any deep and anxious hold on you, for the View has helped you to see the futility and pointlessness of them all, and born in you a spirit of true renunciation.

We must never forget that it is through our actions, words, and thoughts that we have a choice. And if we choose to do so, we can put an end to suffering and the causes of suffering, and help our true potential, our buddha nature, to awaken in us. Until this buddha nature is completely awakened and we are freed from our ignorance and merge with the deathless, enlightened mind, there can be no end to the round of life and death. So, the teachings tell us, if we do not assume the fullest possible responsibility for ourselves now in this life, our suffering will go on not only for a few lives but for thousands of lives.

It is this sobering knowledge that makes Buddhists consider that future lives are more important even than this one, because there are many more that await us in the future. This long-term vision governs how they live. They know if we were to sacrifice the whole of eternity for this life, it would be like spending our entire life savings on one drink, madly ignoring the consequences.

To realize what I call the wisdom of compassion is to see with complete clarity its benefits, as well as the damage that its opposite has done to us. We need to make a very clear distinction between what is in our ego’s self-interest and what is in our ultimate interest; it is from mistaking one for the other that all our suffering comes.

Self-grasping creates self-cherishing, which in turn creates an ingrained aversion to harm and suffering. However, harm and suffering have no objective existence; what gives them their existence and their power is only our aversion to them. When you understand this, you understand then that it is our aversion that attracts to us every negativity and obstacle that can possibly happen to us, and fills our lives with nervous anxiety, expectation, and fear.

Wear down that aversion by wearing down the self-grasping mind and its attachment to a nonexistent self, and you will wear down any hold on you that any obstacle and negativity can have. For how can you attack someone or something that is just not there?

***

Each time we begin our practice of meditation, we are moved by the awareness that we and all other sentient beings fundamentally have the Buddha nature as our innermost essence, and that to realize it is to be free of ignorance and to put an end, finally, to suffering.

We are inspired with the motivation to dedicate our practice, and our life, to the enlightenment of all beings in the spirit of this prayer, which all the buddhas of the past have prayed:

By the power and the truth of this practice:
May all beings have happiness, and the causes of happiness;
May all be free from sorrow, and the causes of sorrow;
May all never be separated from the sacred happiness which is sorrowless;
And may all live in equanimity, without too much attachment and too much aversion,
And live believing in the equality of all that lives.

The practice of mindfulness, of bringing the scattered mind home, and so of bringing the different aspects of our being into focus, is called Peacefully Remaining or Calm Abiding.

To learn how to die is to learn how to live; to learn how to live is to learn how to act not only in this life but in the lives to come. To transform yourself truly and learn how to be reborn as a transformed being to help others is really to help the world in the most powerful way of all.

Let us dare to imagine now what it would be like to live in a world where a significant number of people took the opportunity, offered by the teachings, to devote part of their lives to serious spiritual practice, to recognize the nature of their minds, and so to use the opportunity of their deaths to move closer to buddhahood, and to be reborn with one aim, that of serving and benefiting others.

Our minds can be wonderful, but at the same time they can be our very worst enemy. They give us so much trouble. Sometimes I wish the mind were like a set of dentures, which we could take out and leave on our bedside table overnight. At least we would get a break from its tiring and tiresome escapades.

We are so at the mercy of our minds that even when we find that the spiritual teachings strike a chord inside us, and move us more than anything we have ever experienced, still we hold back, because of some deep-seated and inexplicable suspicion.

Somewhere along the line, though, we have to stop mistrusting. We have to let go of the suspicion and doubt, which are supposed to protect us but never work, and only end up hurting us even more than what they are supposed to defend us from.

Grasping is the source of all our problems. Since impermanence to us spells anguish, we grasp on to things desperately, even though all things change. We are terrified of letting go, terrified, in fact, of living at all, since learning to live is learning to let go. And this is the tragedy and the irony of our struggle to hold on: Not only is it impossible, but it brings us the very pain we are seeking to avoid.

The intention behind grasping may not in itself be bad; there’s nothing wrong with the desire to be happy, but what we try to grasp on to is by nature ungraspable.

The Tibetans say that you cannot wash the same dirty hand twice in the same running river, and “no matter how much you squeeze a handful of sand, you will never get oil out of it.”

Whatever we have done with our lives makes us what we are when we die. And everything, absolutely everything, counts.

A human being is part of a whole, called by us the ‘Universe,’ a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest—a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.

ALBERT EINSTEIN

Ego is the absence of true knowledge of who we really are, together with its result: a doomed clutching on, at all costs, to a cobbled together and makeshift image of ourselves, an inevitably chameleon charlatan self that keeps changing, and has to, to keep alive the fiction of its existence.

In Tibetan, ego is called dakdzin , which means “grasping to a self.” Ego is then defined as incessant movements of grasping at a delusory notion of “I” and “mine,” self and other, and all the concepts, ideas, desires, and activities that will sustain that false construction.

Such grasping is futile from the start and condemned to frustration, for there is no basis or truth in it, and what we are grasping at is by its very nature ungraspable. The fact that we need to grasp at all and to go on grasping shows that in the depths of our being we know that the self doesn’t inherently exist. From this secret, unnerving knowledge spring all our fundamental insecurities and fears.

As we follow the teachings and as we practice, we will inevitably discover certain truths about ourselves that stand out prominently: There are places where we always get stuck; there are habitual patterns and strategies that are the legacy of negative karma, which we continuously repeat and reinforce; there are particular ways of seeing things—those tired old explanations of ourselves and the world around us—that are quite mistaken yet which we hold onto as authentic, and so distort our whole view of reality.

When we persevere on the spiritual path, and examine ourselves honestly, it begins to dawn on us more and more that our perceptions are nothing more than a web of illusions. Simply to acknowledge our confusion, even though we cannot accept it completely, can bring some light of understanding and spark off in us a new process, a process of healing.

If the doors of perception were cleansed
Everything would appear . . . as it is, infinite.

When we die we leave everything behind, especially this body we have cherished so much and relied upon so blindly and tried so hard to keep alive. But our minds are no more dependable than our bodies. Just look at your mind for a few minutes.

You will see that it is like a flea, constantly hopping to and fro. You will see that thoughts arise without any reason, without any connection. Swept along by the chaos of every moment, we are the victims of the fickleness of our minds. If this is the only state of consciousness we are familiar with, then to rely on our minds at the moment of death is an absurd gamble.

Since everything is but an apparition,
Perfect in being what it is,
Having nothing to do with good or bad,
Acceptance or rejection

You might as well burst out laughing!

LONGCHENPA

Wrong views and wrong convictions can be the most devastating of all our delusions. Surely Adolf Hitler and Pol Pot must have been convinced that they were right too? And yet each and every one of us has that same dangerous tendency as they had: to form convictions, believe them without question, and act on them, so bringing down suffering not only on ourselves but on all those around us.

On the other hand, the heart of Buddha’s teaching is to see “the actual state of things, as they are,” and this is called the true View. It is a view that is all-embracing, as the role of spiritual teachings is precisely to give us a complete perspective on the nature of mind and reality.

To contemplate impermanence on its own is not enough: You have to work with it in your life. Let’s try an experiment. Pick up a coin. Imagine that it represents the object at which you are grasping. Hold it tightly clutched in your fist and extend your arm, with the palm of your hand facing the ground. Now if you let go or relax your grip, you will lose what you are clinging to. That’s why you hold on.

But there’s another possibility: You can let go and yet keep hold of it. With your arm still outstretched, turn your hand over so that it faces the sky. Release your hand and the coin still rests on your open palm. You let go. And the coin is still yours, even with all this space around it.

So there is a way in which we can accept impermanence and still relish life, at one and the same time, without grasping.

ON BODHICITTA: The Compassionate Heart of the Enlightened Mind

SHANTIDEVA

The Dalai Lama has said: “There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; my philosophy is kindness.”

CHAKDUD TULKU RINPOCHE

Sometimes when we see too much truth about ourselves suddenly mirrored in front of us by the teacher or the teachings, it is simply too difficult to face, too terrifying to recognize, too painful to accept as the reality about ourselves. We deny and reject it, in an absurd and desperate attempt to defend ourselves fromourselves,from the truth of who we really are. And when there are things too powerful or too difficult to accept about ourselves, we project them onto the world around us, usually onto those who help us and love us the most—our teacher, the teachings, our parent, or our closest friend.

How can we possibly penetrate the tough shield of this defensive system? The very best solution is when we can recognize ourselves that we are living duped by our own delusions. I have seen how for many people a glimpse of the truth, the true View, can bring the whole fantastic construction of wrong views, fabricated by ignorance, tumbling instantly to the ground.

When we are in a negative frame of mind, it is only natural to doubt rather than to believe.

From a Buddhist point of view, doubt is a sign of a lack of complete understanding and a lack of spiritual education, but it is also seen as a catalyst in the maturing of faith. It is when we face doubts and difficulties that we discover whether our faith is a simplistic, pious, and conceptual one, or whether it is strong, enduring, and anchored in a deep understanding in the heart.

If you have faith, sooner or later it may well be put to the test, and wherever the challenge may come from—from within you or from outside—it is simply part of the process of faith and doubt.

The teachings tell us what it is we need to realize, but we also have to go on our own journey, in order to come to a personal realization. That journey may take us through suffering, difficulties, and doubts of all kinds, but they will become our greatest teachers. Through them we will learn the humility to recognize our limitations, and through them we will discover the inner strength and fearlessness we need to emerge from our old habits and set patterns, and surrender into the vaster vision of real freedom offered by the spiritual teachings.

In today’s highly interdependent world, individuals and nations can no longer resolve many of their problems by themselves. We need one another. We must therefore develop a sense of universal responsibility . . . It is our collective and individual responsibility to protect and nurture the global family, to support its weaker members, and to preserve and tend to the environment in which we all live.

THE DALAI LAMA

A direct reflection on what death means and the many facets of the truth of impermanence can enable us to make rich use of this life while we still have time, and ensure that when we die it will be without remorse or self-recrimination at having wasted our lives.

As Tibet’s famous poet-saint, Milarepa, said: “My religion is to live—and die—without regret.”

The greatest of victories is the victory over oneself.

-the Thammapada

If all the harms
Fears and sufferings in the world
Arise from self-grasping,
What need have I for such a great evil spirit?

* * *

If we were to put our minds to one powerful wisdom method and work with it directly, there is a real possibility we would become enlightened.

* * *

Is karma really so hard to see in operation? Don’t we only have to look back at our own lives to see clearly the consequences of some of our actions? When we upset or hurt someone, didn’t it rebound on us? Were we not left with a bitter and dark memory, and the shadows of self-disgust? That memory and those shadows are karma. Our habits and our fears too are also due to karma, the results of our past actions, words, and thoughts. If we examine our actions, and become really mindful of them, we will see that there is a pattern that repeats itself. Whenever we act negatively, it leads to pain and suffering; whenever we act positively, it eventually results in happiness.

* * *

Similarly he said: “Do not overlook tiny good actions, thinking they are of no benefit even tiny drops of water in the end will fill a huge vessel.”

Karma does not decay like external things, or ever become inoperative. It cannot be destroyed “by time, fire, or water.” Its power will never disappear, until it is ripened.

* * *

I often think of the great masters and imagine beings who have their depth of realization as magnificent mountain eagles, who soar above both life and death and see them for what they are, in all their mysterious, intricate interrelation.

To see through the eyes of the mountain eagle, the view of realization, is to look down on a landscape in which the boundaries that we imagined existed between life and death shade into each other and dissolve. The physicist David Bohm has described reality as being “unbroken wholeness in flowing movement.”

What is seen by the masters, then, seen directly and with total understanding, is that flowing movement and that unbroken wholeness. What we, in our ignorance, call “life” and what we, in our ignorance, call “death” are merely different aspects of that wholeness and that movement.

* * *

When you have learned, through discipline, to simplify your life, and so practiced the mindfulness of meditation, and through it loosened the hold of aggression, clinging, and negativity on your whole being, the wisdom of insight can slowly dawn. And in the all-revealing clarity of its sunlight, this insight can show you, distinctly and directly, both the subtlest workings of your own mind and the nature of reality.

* * *

Just as the ocean has waves, and the sun has rays, so the mind’s own radiance is its thoughts and emotions. The ocean has waves, yet the ocean is not particularly disturbed by them. The waves are the very nature of the ocean. Waves will rise, but where do they go? Back into the ocean. And where do the waves come from? The ocean.

In the same manner, thoughts and emotions are the radiance and expression of the very nature of the mind. They rise from the mind, but where do they dissolve? Back into the mind. Whatever rises, do not see it as a particular problem. If you do not impulsively react, if you are only patient, it will once again settle into its essential nature.

When you have this understanding, then rising thoughts only enhance your practice. But when you do not understand what they intrinsically are—the radiance of the nature of your mind—then your thoughts become the seed of confusion. So have a spacious, open, and compassionate attitude toward your thoughts and emotions, because in fact your thoughts are your family, the family of your mind. Before them, as Dudjom Rinpoche used to say: “Be like an old wise man, watching a child play.”

* * *

The Buddhist meditation masters know how flexible and workable the mind is. If we train it, anything is possible. In fact, we are already perfectly trained by and for samsara, trained to get jealous, trained to grasp, trained to be anxious and sad and desperate and greedy, trained to react angrily to whatever provokes us. In fact, we are trained to such an extent that these negative emotions rise spontaneously, without our even trying to generate them.

So everything is a question of training and the power of habit. Devote the mind to confusion and we know only too well, if we’re honest, that it will become a dark master of confusion, adept in its addictions, subtle and perversely supple in its slaveries. Devote it in meditation to the task of freeing itself from illusion, and we will find that with time, patience, discipline, and the right training, the mind will begin to unknot itself and know its essential bliss and clarity.

* * *

Still, reflection can slowly bring us wisdom. We may, of course, fall back into fixed repetitive patterns again and again, but slowly we can emerge from them and change.

* * *

We all have the karma to take one spiritual path or another, and I would encourage you, from the bottom of my heart, to follow with complete sincerity the path that inspires you most.

If you go on searching all the time, the searching itself becomes an obsession and takes you over. You become a spiritual tourist, bustling about and never getting anywhere. As Patrul Rinpoche says: “You leave your elephant at home and look for its footprints in the forest.” Following one teaching is not a way of confining you or jealously monopolizing you. It’s a compassionate and practical way of keeping you centered and always on your path, despite all the obstacles that you, and the world, will inevitably present.

* * *

BUDDHA

* * *

There are rough as well as gentle waves in the ocean; strong emotions come, like anger, desire, jealousy. The real practitioner recognizes them not as a disturbance or an obstacle but as a great opportunity. The fact that you react to arisings such as these with habitual tendencies of attachment and aversion is a sign not only that you are distracted but that you do not have the recognition and have lost the ground of Rigpa. To react to emotions in this way empowers them and binds you even tighter in the chains of delusion.

The great secret of Dzogchen is to see right through them, as soon as they arise, to what they really are: the vivid and electric manifestation of the energy of Rigpa itself. As you gradually learn to do this, even the most turbulent emotions fail to seize hold of you and instead dissolve, as wild waves rise and rear and sink back into the calm of the ocean.

* * *

Rest in natural great peace
This exhausted mind
Beaten helpless by karma and neurotic thought,
Like the relentless fury of the pounding waves
In the infinite ocean of samsara.

Rest in natural great peace.

NYOSHUL KHEN RINPOCHE

* * *

When we die, this whole compound construction falls dramatically to pieces.

* * *

CHAKDUD TULKU RINPOCHE

* * *

Even in the greatest yogi, sorrow and joy still arise just as before. The difference between an ordinary person and the yogi is how they view their emotions and react to them.

An ordinary person will instinctively accept or reject them, and so arouse the attachment or aversion that will result in the accumulation of negative karma.

A yogi, however, perceives everything that rises in its natural, pristine state, without allowing grasping to enter his perception.

* * *

TRADITIONAL BUDDHIST SCRIPTURE

* * *

If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything; it is open to everything. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind there are few.

SUZUKI-ROSHI

* * *

What is compassion? It is not simply a sense of sympathy or caring for the person suffering, not simply a warmth of heart toward the person before you, or a sharp clarity of recognition of their needs and pain, it is also a sustained and practical determination to do whatever is possible and necessary to help alleviate their suffering.

* * *

“If you try to subdue your selfish motives—anger and so forth—and develop more kindness and compassion for others, ultimately you yourself will benefit more than you would otherwise. So sometimes I say that the wise selfish person should practice this way. Foolish selfish people are always thinking of themselves, and the result is negative. Wise selfish people think of others, help others as much as they can, and the result is that they too receive benefit.”

* * *

What really matters is not just the practice of sitting but far more the state of mind you find yourself in after meditation. It is this calm and centered state of mind you should prolong through everything you do. I like the Zen story in which the disciple asked his master:

“Master, how do you put enlightenment into action? How do you practice it in everyday life?”
“By eating and by sleeping,” replied the master.
“But Master, everybody sleeps and everybody eats.”
“But not everybody eats when they eat, and not everybody sleeps when they sleep.”

From this comes the famous Zen saying, “When I eat, I eat; when I sleep, I sleep.”

To eat when you eat and sleep when you sleep means to be completely present in all your actions, with none of the distractions of ego to stop you from being there. This is integration.

* * *

Buddha was a human being, like you or me. He never claimed divinity, he merely knew he had the buddha nature, the seed of enlightenment, and that everyone else did too. The buddha nature is simply the birthright of every sentient being, and I always say: “Our buddha nature is as good as any buddha’s buddha nature.

* When we have really grasped the law of karma in all its stark power and complex reverberations over many, many lifetimes, and seen just how our self-grasping and self-cherishing, life after life, have woven us repeatedly into a net of ignorance that seems only to be ensnaring us more and more tightly; when we have really understood the dangerous and doomed nature of the self-grasping mind’s enterprise; when we have really pursued its operations into their most subtle hiding places; when we have really understood just how our whole ordinary mind and actions are defined, narrowed and darkened by it, how almost impossible it makes it for us to uncover the heart of unconditional love, and how it has blocked in us all sources of real love and real compassion, then there comes a moment when we understand, with extreme and poignant clarity, what Shantideva said:

If all the harms
Fears and sufferings in the world
Arise from self-grasping,
What need have I for such a great evil spirit?

* * *

It is said that when Buddha attained enlightenment, all he wanted to do was to show the rest of us the nature of mind and share completely what he had realized. But he also saw, with the great sorrow of infinite compassion, how difficult it would be for us to understand.

For even though we have the same inner nature as Buddha, we have not recognized it because it is so enclosed and wrapped up in our individual ordinary minds.

Imagine an empty vase. The space inside is exactly the same as the space outside. Only the fragile walls of the vase separate one from the other. Our buddha mind is enclosed within the walls of our ordinary mind. But when we become enlightened, it is as if the vase shatters into pieces. The space “inside” merges instantly into the space “outside.” They become one: There and then we realize that they were never separate or different; they were always the same.

* * *

Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche describes a yogi wandering through a garden. He is completely awake to the splendor and beauty of the flowers, and relishes their colors, shapes and scents. But there is no trace of clinging or any “after-thought” in his mind.

As Dudjom Rinpoche says:

“Whatever perceptions arise, you should be like a little child going into a beautifully decorated temple; he looks, but grasping does not enter into his perception at all. You leave everything fresh, natural, vivid and unspoiled. When you leave each thing in its own state, then its shape doesn’t change, its color doesn’t fade and its glow does not disappear. Whatever appears is unstained by any grasping, so then all that you perceive arises as the naked wisdom of Rigpa, which is the indivisibility of luminosity and emptiness.”

* * *

Similarly he said: “Do not overlook tiny good actions, thinking they are of no benefit even tiny drops of water in the end will fill a huge vessel.”

Karma does not decay like external things, or ever become inoperative. It cannot be destroyed “by time, fire, or water.” Its power will never disappear, until it is ripened.

* * *

We may say, and even half-believe, that compassion is marvelous, but in practice our actions are deeply uncompassionate and bring us and others mostly frustration and distress, and not the happiness we are all seeking.

Isn’t it absurd that we all long for happiness, yet nearly all our actions and feelings lead us directly away from that happiness?

What do we imagine will make us happy? A canny, self-seeking, resourceful selfishness, the selfish protection of ego, which can as we all know, make us at moments extremely brutal. But in fact the complete reverse is true: Self-grasping and self-cherishing are seen, when you really look at them, to be the root of all harm to others, and also of all harm to ourselves.

* * *

We are inspired with the motivation to dedicate our practice, and our life, to the enlightenment of all beings in the spirit of this prayer, which all the buddhas of the past have prayed:

* * *

The intention behind grasping may not in itself be bad; there’s nothing wrong with the desire to be happy, but what we try to grasp on to is by nature ungraspable.

The Tibetans say that you cannot wash the same dirty hand twice in the same running river, and “no matter how much you squeeze a handful of sand, you will never get oil out of it.”

* * *

Mindfulness- the aware, balanced acceptance of present experience. – Sylvia Boorstein

* * *

Mind-tangles and suffering are universal, and the desire for happiness and the end of suffering is also universal.

. . .Mind habits are hard to change.

Awareness, clarity, compassion, generosity, understanding-these are in the middle of everyone’s spiritual road.

The Buddha taught that it doesn’t make sense to upset ourselves about what is beyond our control. We don’t get a choice about what hand we are dealt in this life. The only choice we have is our attitude about the cards we hold and the finesse with which we play our hand.

The First Noble Truth is that life is difficult and painful, just by its very nature, not because we’re doing it wrong. . . . Dukkha: ultimate unsatisactoriness.

All relationships end in loss. . . . Becoming aware of fragility, of temporality, of the fact that we will surely all be lost to one another, sooner or later, mandates a clear imperative to be totally kind and loving to each other always. . . . Holding onto anything, in addition to being painful, is totally futile. . . . Since everything is change happening, there is no one who owns the changes and no one to whom the changes are happening. We are verbs, not nouns, experiences unfolding . . .(awareness of this is anatta)

The Second Noble Truth is that craving anything is suffering.

I once heard someone say that a sign of enlightenment was the ability to say (and mean it) in any moment, “Well, this isn’t what I want, but it’s what I got, so okay.” . . . spacious acceptance . . . the Third Noble Truth says it is indeed possible. . . . suffering is manageable. . . . When I love, I’m happy.

In contact with pleasant experience, desire arises. Nor is it necessarily naughty to act on desire; sometimes desires are wholesome, expecially sense desires. . . . The way the mind works is that in contact with pleasant experience, we feel a kind of pull, an energy of wanting, and the mind moves toward pleasant sense experiences. . . . we scan the horizon for possible pleasant experiences and then dwell on them. It’s part of our conditioning. . . . The antidote for the hindrance of lust is restraint. It means waiting around long enough to see two things. The first thing one hopes to see is whether or not the object of the desire is wholesome and whether or not acting on the desire would be a moral, responsible, and appropriate thing to do. The second thing that waiting around allows us to see is that the desire itself is just a mind energy. It’s a mind energy that colors our feelings and motivates our behavior, but if we recognize it as just an energy, we realize it’s not an imperative to action. It’s not a demand; it’s a suggestion. If the diesire is wholesome and the time is appropriate, we can act on it. If the desire is not wholesome and the time is wron, we can restrain ourselves, and the energy will pass.

–Sylvia Boorstein

* * *

Before admonishing another, one should reflect thus . . .

In due season will I speak, not out of season.

In truth will I speak, not in falsehood.

For his (her) benefit will I speak, not his (her) loss.

Gently will I speak, not harshly.

In kindness will I speak, not in anger.

-the Buddha

* * *

Don’t worry, be happy.

-Meher Baba

* * *

When I love, I’m happy.

When we see clearly, we understand that, given the history of all creation, each of us is the only person we could be and the world is the only world it could be. The truth is: “It’s all okay.”

The five confusing energies: lust, aversion, torpor, restlessness, doubt.

The four Divine Abodes: lovingkindness (metta, complete and unrestrained friendliness), sympathetic joy (mudita, shared delight in another’s joy, happiness or good fortune), compassion, equanimity.

-Sylvia Boorstein

* * *

I once heard the Dalai Lama teaching about how sensible it was to put other people’s good fortune on a par, at least, with one’s own. There are, he explained, so many other people that your chances for delight are immeasurably increased if the joys of others are experienced as your own.

Whatever mood is present is serving as a grid for our experience.

The most magic mind balancer is clear seeing.

You can’t see wisdom, but you can see its reflection. Its reflection is happiness, fearlessness, and kindness.

We can, with practice, begin to decondition the mind from its unconscious reactivity. Even without changing the habitual tendencies, we can be alert to them and work around them. If the mind is clear and steady, we can recognize filters as being just filters and choose the most wholesome response.

-Sylvia Boorstein

* * *

To integrate meditation in action is the whole ground and point and purpose of meditation. The violence and stress and the challenges and distractions of this modern life make this integration urgently necessary.

How do we achieve this integration, this permeation of everyday life with the calm humor and spacious detachment of meditation? There is no substitute for regular practice, for only through real practice will we begin to taste unbrokenly the calm of our nature of mind and so be able to sustain the experience of it in our everyday lives.

If you really wish to achieve this, what you need to do is practice not just as occasional medicine or therapy but as if it were your daily sustenance or food.

* * *

I once heard the “Dalai Lama teaching about how sensible it was to put other people’s good fortune on a par, at least, with one’s own. There are, he explained, so many other people that your chances for delight are immeasurably increased if the joys of others are experienced as your own.

Every pain is important pain to whomever is feeling it. …It’s ridiculous to decide what “should” grieve someone else. Everyone’s attachments are unique.

Since everything is change happening, there is no one who owns the changes and no one to whom the changes are happening. We are verbs, not nouns, experiences unfolding.

Life is so difficult, how can we be anything but kind.

What the Buddha taught was simple: when we see clearly, we behave impeccably, out of love, on behalf of all things.

Breathing in, I calm my body. Breathing out, I smile.

I know I’m not paying attention if I’m not feeling kind.

The 10 Perfections of the heart (Paramitas): Generosity, Morality, Renunciation, Wisdom, Energy, Patience, Truthfulness, Determination, Lovingkindness and Equanimity . . . together are the one path to goodness and kindness. Each particular quality is an entryway into that path.

Virtue is both the cause of happiness and the expression of happiness.

The Buddha taught that suffering is the extra pain in the mind that happens when we feel an anguished imperative to have things be different from how they are.

It is possible-- indeed, imperative—to change course, or to repair an action, whenever it is a mistake.

Everyone’s mind is outrageous.

The discovery that everything is always changing, that everything has multiple causes, most of them beyond our control, and that struggling to have things a certain way or to keep things a certain way is both futile and painful is the key, the Buddha taught, to developing the mind habit of noncontentious, gentle, wise response.

When we are relaxed and reasonably content, we are naturally wise. We accept that life is unpredictable, unreliable.

There is only one Dharma talk: How are we going to live this life, invevitably challenged, gracefully, with kindness and compassion.

Everything that is dear to us causes pain. . . . caring makes us vulnerable.

Now is the only time anything happens.

The Buddha’s criteria for Wise Speech include—in addition to the obvious expectation that speech be truthful—that it be timely, gentle, motivated by kindness, and helpful.

When I feel loved and loving, I am protected and my speech is protected.

Every day I bump into “mind walls”, walls that feel solid because the impact is painful. Only when I remember that the walls are the habits of my own mind, that I built them and they will continue to exist as long as I insist that they are real, can I stop building. Then my mind relaxes and I see clearly. . . . Practice is about recognizing traps and choosing freedom. . . .day after day, little by little, and more and more often.

People who practice lovingkindness (metta)

Sleep peacefully,

Wake peacefully,

Dream peaceful dreams.

People love them,

Angels love them,

Angels will protect them.

Poisons and weapons and fire don’t harm them.

Their faces are clear.

Their minds are serene.

They die unconfused.

And when they die, their rebirth is in heavenly realms.

Hatred will never cease by hatred,

Only love will erase hatred,

This is the eternal law. (from the Dhammapada)

“You did great!”—is probably the universal, livesaving password for human connection.

Meet each arriving moment—each breath, or each mood, each thought, or each idea—as the next word of the song that needs to get sung. You can choose what line of the score to sing—breath, mood, thought, idea—and still hear the others in the background. . . . just do now, now.

We couldn’t any of us be beter, ever, than how we are.

Only connect. Wherever you are, right now, pay attention. Forever.

-Sylvia Boorstein

* * *

Life is so short, we should all move more slowly.

-T. N. Hahn

* * *

If the doors of perception were cleansed
Everything would appear . . . as it is, infinite.

* * *

The Dalai Lama has said: “There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; my philosophy is kindness.”

* * *

CHAKDUD TULKU RINPOCHE

* * *

* * It is essential to realize now, in life, when we still have a body, that its convincing appearance of solidity is a mere illusion. The most powerful way to realize this is to learn how, after meditation, to “become a child of illusion”: to refrain from solidifying, as we are always tempted to do, the perceptions of ourselves and our world; and to go on, like the “child of illusion,” seeing directly, as we do in meditation, that all phenomena are illusory and dreamlike. The realization that this deepens the body’s illusory nature is one of the most profound and inspiring we can have to help us to let go.

* * *

If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything; it is open to everything. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind there are few.

* * *

If we are interdependent with everything and everyone, even our smallest, least significant thought, word, and action have real consequences throughout the universe.

Throw a pebble into a pond. It sends a shiver across the surface of the water. Ripples merge into one another and create new ones. Everything is inextricably interrelated: We come to realize that we are responsible for everything we do, say, or think, responsible in fact for ourselves, everyone and everything else, and the entire universe.

* * *

Whatever you do, don’t shut off your pain; accept your pain and remain vulnerable. However desperate you become, accept your pain as it is, because it is in fact trying to hand you a priceless gift: the chance of discovering, through spiritual practice, what lies behind sorrow.

“Grief,” Rumi wrote, “can be the garden of compassion. If you keep your heart open through everything, your pain can become your greatest ally in your life’s search for love and wisdom.”

* * *

Give all profit and gain to others,
Take all loss and defeat on yourself.

* * *

When the teachings “click” for you somewhere deep in your heart and mind, then you really have the View. Whatever difficulties you face, you will find you have some kind of serenity, stability, and understanding, and an internal mechanism—you could call it an “inner transformer”—that works for you, to protect you from falling prey to wrong views. In that View, you will have discovered a “wisdom guide” of your own, always on hand to advise you, support you, and remind you of the truth. Confusion will still arise, that’s only normal, but with a crucial difference: No longer will you focus on it in a blinded and obsessive way, but you will look on it with humor, perspective, and compassion.

* * *

The fear that impermanence awakens in us, that nothing is real and nothing lasts, is, we come to discover, our greatest friend because it drives us to ask: If everything dies and changes, then what is really true? Is there something behind the appearances? Is there something in fact we can depend on, that does survive what we call death?

Allowing these questions to occupy us urgently, and reflecting on them, we slowly find ourselves making a profound shift in the way we view everything. We come to uncover in ourselves “something” that we begin to realize lies behind all the changes and deaths of the world.

As this happens, we catch repeated and glowing glimpses of the vast implications behind the truth of impermanence. We come to uncover a depth of peace, joy, and confidence in ourselves that fills us with wonder, and breeds in us gradually a certainty that there is in us “something” that nothing destroys, that nothing alters, and that cannot die.

* * *

"Live with skillful nonchalance and ceaseless concern."

~ Prajnaparamita Sutra ~

* * *

When a much larger number of people know the nature of their minds, they’ll know also the glorious nature of the world they are in, and will struggle urgently and bravely to preserve it. It’s interesting that the Tibetan word for “Buddhist” is nangpa . It means “insider”: someone who seeks the truth not outside but within the nature of his or her mind. All the teachings and training in Buddhism are aimed at that one single point: to look into the nature of mind, and so free us from the fear of death and help us realize the truth of life.

* * *

Buddha said:

Karma creates all, like an artist,
Karma composes, like a dancer.

* * *

The intention behind grasping may not in itself be bad; there’s nothing wrong with the desire to be happy, but what we try to grasp on to is by nature ungraspable.

The Tibetans say that you cannot wash the same dirty hand twice in the same running river, and “no matter how much you squeeze a handful of sand, you will never get oil out of it.”

* * *

Doubts demand from us a real skillfulness in dealing with them, and I notice how few people have any idea how to pursue doubts or to use them. It seems ironic that in a civilization that so worships the power of deflation and doubt, hardly anyone has the courage to deflate the claims of doubt itself—to do as one Hindu master said: turn the dogs of doubt on doubt itself, to unmask cynicism, and to uncover what fear, despair, hopelessness, and tired conditioning it springs from. Then doubt would no longer be an obstacle, but a door to realization, and whenever doubt appeared in the mind, a seeker would welcome it as a means of going deeper into the truth.

* * *

A meditation technique used a great deal in Tibetan Buddhism is uniting the mind with the sound of a mantra. The definition of mantra is “that which protects the mind.” That which protects the mind from negativity, or which protects you from your own mind, is mantra.

When you are nervous, disoriented, or emotionally fragile, inspired chanting or reciting of a mantra can change the state of your mind completely, by transforming its energy and atmosphere. How is this possible? Mantra is the essence of sound, the embodiment of the truth in the form of sound. Each syllable is impregnated with spiritual power, condenses a deep spiritual truth, and vibrates with the blessing of the speech of the buddhas. It is also said that the mind rides on the subtle energy of the breath, the prana, which moves through and purifies the subtle channels of the body. So when you chant a mantra, you are charging your breath and energy with the energy of the mantra, and so working directly on your mind and your subtle body.

* * *

Since everything is but an apparition,
Perfect in being what it is,
Having nothing to do with good or bad,
Acceptance or rejection

You might as well burst out laughing!

LONGCHENPA

* * *

Listening is a far more difficult process than most people imagine. Really to listen in the way that is meant by the masters is to let go utterly of ourselves, to let go of all the information, all the concepts, all the ideas, and all the prejudices that our heads are stuffed with. If you really listen to the teachings, those concepts, which are our real hindrance—the one thing that stands between us and our true nature—can slowly and steadily be washed away.

* * *

If we are interdependent with everything and everyone, even our smallest, least significant thought, word, and action have real consequences throughout the universe.

* * *

There could be no bigger mistake than to think that ignorance is somehow dumb and stupid, or passive and lacking in intelligence. On the contrary, it is shrewd and cunning, versatile and ingenious in the games of deception, and in our wrong views and their burning convictions we find one of its deepest and, as Buddha said, most dangerous manifestations:

What do you have to fear from the wild elephant
Who can only damage your body here and now,
When falling under the influence of misguided people and wrong views
Not only destroys the merit you have accumulated in the past,
But also blocks your path to freedom in the future?

* * *

We are so addicted to looking outside ourselves that we have lost access to our inner being almost completely. We are terrified to look inward, because our culture has given us no idea of what we will find. We may even think that if we do, we will be in danger of madness. This is one of the last and most resourceful ploys of ego to prevent us from discovering our real nature.

So we make our lives so hectic that we eliminate the slightest risk of looking into ourselves. Even the idea of meditation can scare people. When they hear the words egoless or emptiness, they think that experiencing those states will be like being thrown out the door of a spaceship to float forever in a dark, chilling void. Nothing could be further from the truth. But in a world dedicated to distraction, silence and stillness terrify us; we protect ourselves from them with noise and frantic busyness. Looking into the nature of our mind is the last thing we would dare to do.

* * *

The masters tell us that there is an aspect of our minds that is its fundamental basis, a state called “the ground of the ordinary mind.” It functions like a storehouse, in which the imprints of past actions caused by our negative emotions are all stored like seeds. When the right conditions arise, they germinate and manifest as circumstances and situations in our lives.

If we have a habit of thinking in a particular pattern, positive or negative, then these tendencies will be triggered and provoked very easily, and recur and go on recurring. With constant repetition our inclinations and habits become steadily more entrenched, and continue increasing and gathering power, even when we sleep. This is how they come to determine our life, our death, and our rebirth.

* * *

Today, more than ever before, life must be characterized by a sense of Universal responsibility, not only nation to nation and human to human, but also human to other forms of life.

- His Holiness the Dalai Lama

* * *

What most of us need, almost more than anything, is the courage and humility really to ask for help, from the depths of our hearts: to ask for the compassion of the enlightened beings, to ask for purification and healing, to ask for the power to understand the meaning of our suffering and transform it; at a relative level to ask for the growth in our lives of clarity, peace, and discernment, and to ask for the realization of the absolute nature of mind that comes from merging with the deathless wisdom mind of the master.

* * *

This existence of ours is as transient as autumn clouds
To watch the birth and death of beings is like looking at the movements of a dance.
A lifetime is like a flash of lightning in the sky,
Rushing by, like a torrent down a steep mountain.

BUDDHA

* * *

The real glory of meditation lies not in any method but in its continual living experience of presence, in its bliss, clarity, peace, and, most important of all, complete absence of grasping.

The diminishing of your grasping is a sign that you are becoming freer of yourself. And the more you experience this freedom, the clearer the sign that the ego and the hopes and fears that keep it alive are dissolving and the closer you will come to the infinitely generous “wisdom of egolessness.” When you live in that wisdom home, you’ll no longer find a barrier between “I” and “you,” “this” and “that,” “inside” and “outside”; you’ll have come, finally, to your true home, the state of nonduality.

* * *

Gradually you will find yourself able to free yourself more and more quickly from the dark emotions that have ruled your life, and this ability to do so is the greatest miracle of all.

* * *

Suffering is the sandpaper of our life. It does its work of shaping us.

Suffering is part of our training program for becoming wise.-Ram Dass

* * *

Fundamentally, what everyone needs is mental strength and confidence, to manage the mind, just as we manage the outside world. -Amma (Sudhamani)

* * *

Do your best and then relax. Let things go on in a natural way, rather than force them.

- Paramahansa Yogananda

* * *

The happiness of one's own heart alone cannot satisfy the soul; one must try to include, as necessary to one's own happiness, the happiness of others. - Paramahansa Yogananda

* * *

The period of greatest gain in knowledge and experience is the most difficult period in one's life. Through a difficult period you can learn; you can develop inner strength, determination, and courage to face the problems. - His Holiness the Dalai Lama

* * *

Slowly, you will become a master of your own bliss, a chemist of your own joy, with all sorts of remedies always at hand to elevate, cheer, illuminate, and inspire your every breath and movement.

* * *

The belief in reincarnation shows us that there is some kind of ultimate justice or goodness in the universe. It is that goodness that we are all trying to uncover and to free. Whenever we act positively, we move toward it; whenever we act negatively, we obscure and inhibit it. And whenever we cannot express it in our lives and actions, we feel miserable and frustrated.

* * *

It has often intrigued me how some Buddhist masters I know ask one simple question of people who approach them for teaching: “Do you believe in a life after this one?” They are not being asked whether they believe in it as a philosophical proposition but whether they feel it deeply in their hearts. The master knows that if a man believes in a life after this one, his whole outlook on life will be different, and he will have a distinct sense of personal responsibility and morality. What the masters must suspect is that there is a danger that people who have no strong belief in a life after this one will create a society fixated on short-term results, without much thought for the consequences of their actions.

Could this be the major reason why we have created a world like the one we are now living in, a world with hardly any real compassion?

* * *

As Dudjom Rinpoche says:

Whatever perceptions arise, you should be like a little child going into a beautifully decorated temple; he looks, but grasping does not enter into his perception at all. You leave everything fresh, natural, vivid and unspoiled. When you leave each thing in its own state, then its shape doesn’t change, its color doesn’t fade and its glow does not disappear. Whatever appears is unstained by any grasping, so then all that you perceive arises as the naked wisdom of Rigpa, which is the indivisibility of luminosity and emptiness.

* * *

Although we have been made to believe that if we let go we will end up with nothing, life reveals just the opposite: that letting go is the real path to freedom. -Sogyal Rinpoche- Glimpse After Glimpse

* * *

* * *

Although we have been made to believe that if we let go we will end up with nothing, life itself reveals again and again the opposite: that letting go is the path to real freedom.

Just as when the waves lash at the shore, the rocks suffer no damage but are sculpted and eroded into beautiful shapes, so our characters can be molded and our rough edges worn smooth by changes. Through weathering changes, we can learn how to develop a gentle but unshakable composure. Our confidence in ourselves grows, and becomes so much greater that goodness and compassion begin naturally to radiate out from us and bring joy to others.

* * *

My master Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche said: “The more and more you listen, the more and more you hear; the more and more you hear, the deeper and deeper your understanding becomes.”

* * *

When you practice meditation, rather than “watching” the breath, let yourself gradually identify with it, as if you were becoming it. Slowly the breath, the breather, and the breathing become one; duality and separation dissolve.

You will find that this very simple process of mindfulness filters your thoughts and emotions. Then, as if you were shedding an old skin, something is peeled off and freed.

* * *

Still, reflection can slowly bring us wisdom. We may, of course, fall back into fixed repetitive patterns again and again, but slowly we can emerge from them and change.

* * *

Buddha said:

Karma creates all, like an artist,
Karma composes, like a dancer.

* * *

The only thing we really have is nowness, is now.

* * *

Of all the practices I know, the practice of Tonglen, Tibetan for “giving and receiving,” is one of the most useful and powerful. When you feel yourself locked in upon yourself, Tonglen opens you to the truth of the suffering of others; when your heart is blocked, it destroys those forces that are obstructing it; and when you feel estranged from the person who is in pain before you, or bitter or despairing, it helps you to find within yourself and then to reveal the loving, expansive radiance of your own true nature. No other practice I know is as effective in destroying the self-grasping, self-cherishing, self-absorption of the ego, which is the root of all our suffering and all hard-heartedness.

Put very simply, the Tonglen practice of giving and receiving is to take on the suffering and pain of others and give to them your happiness, well-being, and peace of mind.

* * *

If you really wish to achieve this, what you need to do is practice not just as occasional medicine or therapy but as if it were your daily sustenance or food.

* * *

If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything; it is open to everything. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind there are few.

SUZUKI-ROSHI

* * *

TRADITIONAL BUDDHIST SCRIPTURE

* * *

If we are interdependent with everything and everyone, even our smallest, least significant thought, word, and action have real consequences throughout the universe.Throw a pebble into a pond. It sends a shiver across the surface of the water. Ripples merge into one another and create new ones. Everything is inextricably interrelated: We come to realize that we are responsible for everything we do, say, or think, responsible in fact for ourselves, everyone and everything else, and the entire universe.

* * *

Because the law of karma is inevitable and infallible, whenever we harm others, we are directly harming ourselves, and whenever we bring them happiness, we are bringing ourselves future happiness. The Dalai Lama says: “If you try to subdue your selfish motives—anger and so forth—and develop more kindness and compassion for others, ultimately you yourself will benefit more than you would otherwise. So sometimes I say that the wise selfish person should practice this way. Foolish selfish people are always thinking of themselves, and the result is negative. Wise selfish people think of others, help others as much as they can, and the result is that they too receive benefit.”

* * *

Imagine vividly a situation where you have acted badly, one about which you feel guilty, and about which you wince even to think of it.

Then, as you breathe in, accept total responsibility for your actions in that particular situation, without in any way trying to justify your behavior. Acknowledge exactly what you have done wrong, and wholeheartedly ask for forgiveness. Now, as you breathe out, send out reconciliation, forgiveness, healing, and understanding.

So you breathe in blame, and breathe out the undoing of harm; you breathe in responsibility, breathe out healing, forgiveness, and reconciliation.This exercise is particularly powerful and may give you the courage to go to see the person whom you have wronged, and the strength and willingness to talk to him or her directly and actually ask for forgiveness from the depths of your heart.

* * *

As a mother would risk her life to protect her child, her only child, even so should one cultivate a limitless heart with regard to all beings. So with a boundless heart should one cherish all living beings; radiating kindness over the entire world. -The Buddha, Sutta Nipata I, 8

* * *

Any kind of expectation creates a problem. We should accept, but not expect. Whatever comes, accept it. Whatever goes, accept it. The immediate benefit is that your mind is always peaceful.

Sri Swami Satchidananda

* * *

Those who are awake live in a constant state of amazement.

Jack Kornfield

* * *

True compassion is not just an emotional response, but a firm commitment founded on reason. Therefore, a truly compassionate attitude toward others does not change, even if they behave negatively. Through universal altruism, you develop a feeling of responsibility for others: the wish to help them actively overcome their problems. -His Holiness the Dalai Lama

* * *

If you touch one thing with deep awareness, you touch everything. - Thich Nhat Hanh

Enlightenment, for a wave in the ocean, is the moment the wave realizes it is water.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh

People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar
- Thich Nhat Hanh

It is possible to live happily in the here and now. So many conditions of happiness are available—more than enough for you to be happy right now. You don't have to run into the future in order to get more. - Thich Nhat Hanh

People suffer because they are caught in their views. As soon as we release those views, we are free and we don't suffer anymore. - Thich Nhat Hanh

Life is available only in the present. That is why we should walk in such a way that every step can bring us to the here and the now - Thich Nhat Hanh

When you love someone, the best thing you can offer is your presence. How can you love if you are not there?
- Thich Nhat Hanh

Life is filled with suffering, but it is also filled with many wonders, like the blue sky, the sunshine, the eyes of a baby. To suffer is not enough. We must also be in touch with the wonders of life. They are within us and all around us, everywhere, any time. - Thich Nhat Hanh

Each day 40,000 children die of hunger. The superpowers now have more then 50,000 nuclear warheads, enough to destroy our planet many times. Yet the sunrise is beautiful, and the rose bloomed this morning along the wall is a miracle. Life is both dreadful and wonderful. To practice meditation is to be in touch with both aspects. Please do not think we must be solemn in order to meditate. In fact, to meditate well, we have to smile a lot. - Thich Nhat Hanh

If you are motivated by loving kindness and compassion, there are many ways to bring happiness to others right now, starting with kind speech. ~Thich Nhat Hanh

You are me, and I am you. Isn’t it obvious that we “inter-are”? You cultivate the flower within yourself, so that I will be beautiful. I transform the garbage within myself, so that you will not have to suffer. I support you, you support me. I am in this world to offer you peace, you are in this world to bring me joy. - Thich Nhat Hanh

* * *

Unceasing change turns the wheel of life,

and so reality is shown in all its many forms.

Dwell peacefully as change itself

liberates all suffering sentient beings

and brings them great joy.

-from a Buddhist sutra

* * *

We are here to awaken from our illusion of separateness.

Thich Nhat Hanh

* * *

Given the scale of life in the cosmos, one human life is no more than a tiny blip. Each one of us is a just visitor to this planet, a guest, who will only stay for a limited time. What greater folly could there be than to spend this short time alone, unhappy or in conflict with our companions? Far better, surely, to use our short time here in living a meaningful life, enriched by our sense of connection with others and being of service to them. ~ His Holiness the Dalai Lama

* * *

Believe nothing merely because you have been told it. Do not believe what your teacher tells you merely out of respect for the teacher. But whatsoever, after due examination and analysis, you find to be kind, conducive to the good, the benefit, the welfare of all beings -- that doctrine believe and cling to, and take it as your guide. – Buddha

* * *

The source of a true smile is an awakened mind. Smiling helps you approach the day with gentleness and understanding. – Thich Nhat Hanh

* * *

Health is the greatest gift,
contentment is the greatest wealth,
a trusted friend is the best relative,
Liberated mind is the greatest bliss.

-The Buddha

* * *

When a person lives heedlessly, his craving grows like a creeping vine. He runs now here and now there, as if looking for fruit: a monkey in the forest. If this sticky, uncouth craving overcomes you in the world, your sorrows grow like wild grass after rain. If, in the world, you overcome this uncouth craving, hard to escape, sorrows roll off you, like water beads off a lotus. -The Dhammapada

* * *

Any kind of expectation creates a problem. We should accept, but not expect. Whatever comes, accept it. Whatever goes, accept it. The immediate benefit is that your mind is always peaceful. – Sri Swami Satchidananda

* * *

all conditioned things have the nature of vanishing. Keep on diligently with your practice.

subject to breaking up are all compounded things. with mindfulness strive on

* * *

With our thoughts,
we make our world,
Our mind is central
and precedes our deeds.
Speak or act with a pure mind
and happiness will follow you
like a shadow that never leaves.

As long as space remains
and as long as sentient beings remain,
until then may I, too, remain
and help dispel the misery of the world.

HH Dalai Lama from US Senate Prayer

* * *

You are the sky. Everything else is just the weather. - PEMA CHÖDRÖN

Simply by turning on the light, you can instantly destroy the darkness. Likewise, even a rather simple analysis of ego-clinging and afflictive emotions can make them collapse. — Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche, “An Investigation of the Mind”

At its most basic level, dana [generosity] in the Buddhist tradition means giving freely without expecting anything in return.

—Gil Fronsdal, “The Joy of Giving”

To experience the everyday sublime one needs to dismantle piece by piece the perceptual conditioning that insists on seeing oneself and the world as essentially comfortable, permanent, solid, and mine. — Stephen Batchelor, “The Everyday Sublime”

If a mind state or emotion or mood becomes strong—feelings such as sadness or happiness or anger or desire, restlessness or excitement, interest or rapture, joy or calm—make the mental note of that mind state, feeling it and observing how that too is part of the passing show. It arises, it is there for some time, it passes away. - Joseph Goldstein, “Breathing”

From a practice perspective, there is great power in intention and how it can shape the present moment and even the future—because if you approach this present moment with wisdom, kindness, and a sense of responsibility, you won’t have to worry about the future. It will take care of itself. - —Dawa Tarchin Phillips, “What to Do When You Don’t Know What’s Next”

We have to be careful not to think that meditation is about getting rid of thoughts. On the contrary, I would say that meditation helps us to creatively engage with our thoughts and not fixate on them. - Martine Batchelor, “Meditation, Mental Habits, and Creative Imagination”

When layered, perceptions become distorted, sticky, and weighty. Essentially, we think we know something, then we are off and running—all based on past experiences, preferences, and beliefs. [But] usually . . . it’s all in our minds.—Ruth King, “Mindful of Race”

Awareness is nothing special. It’s natural. In fact, it may be the most natural—the only natural—thing there is. —Andrew Olendzki, “Keep It Simple”

His Holiness the XIVth Dalai Lama
- An Aspiration Prayer -

May I become at all times, both now and forever,
A protector for those without protection,
A guide for those who have lost their way,
A ship for those with oceans to cross,
A bridge for those with rivers to cross,
A sanctuary for those in danger,
A lamp for those without light,
A place of refuge for those who lack shelter,
And a servant to all in need.

We don’t have to take the story as truth. - JACK KORNFIELD

The transformation of envy & jealousy through the cultivation of mudita (sympathetic joy, the choice to participate in the joy, happiness and pleasure of others] bolsters the awakening of the enlightened heart. -

—Jorge Ferrer, “What’s the Opposite of Jealousy?”

Every wave on the ocean is the whole ocean waving... So, the ocean of being waves every one of us, and we are its waves. - ALAN WATTS

We can get dragged back into the past, which can lead to depression, or we can become anxious about the future, which can lead to fear. Conscious breathing returns us to the here and the now, where we really belong. - Gary Gach, “Brief Teachings”

In situations of conflict, lovingkindness and compassion grow when we understand them to be the most beneficial motivation for responsive and effective action. —Joseph Goldstein, “Triumph of the Heart”

How do we develop this appreciation of things just as they are, especially if we are sick and in pain? We must treat our pain gently, respectfully, not resisting it but living with it. - Darlene Cohen, “The Practice of Nonpreference”

The act of giving purifies intention, the quality of mind with which any action is unThoughts are like clouds and can vanish just as clouds naturally disperse into space.

—Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche and Tsoknyi Rinpoche, “As the Clouds Vanish”dertaken. For a brief moment, the giver’s self-absorption is lifted, attachment to the gift is relinquished, and kindness towards the recipient is developed. - Andrew Olendzki, “The Wisdom of Giving”

Thoughts are like clouds and can vanish just as clouds naturally disperse into space. - Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche and Tsoknyi Rinpoche, “As the Clouds Vanish”

To live is to let go, and in order to live fully we must learn to let go fully and to embrace the flow that is the universe. - —Bodhipaksa, “What You’re Made Of”

Loss is a fact of life. Impermanence is everywhere we look. We are all going to suffer our losses. How we deal with these losses is what makes all the difference. For it is not what happens to us that determines our character, our experience, our karma, and our destiny, but how we relate to what happens. —Lama Surya Das, “Practicing With Loss”

When we are not attached to who we think we are, life can move through us, playing us like an instrument. Understanding how everything is in continual transformation, we release our futile attempts to control circumstances. When we live in this easy connection with life, we live in joy. —James Baraz, “Lighten Up!”

Appreciative joy (mudita) is a natural expression of our best humanity…[it] cheers for the happiness and success of others and celebrates buoyancy, health, and happiness wherever they are encountered. - Judith Simmer-Brown, “Transforming the Green-Ey’d Monster

If we act constructively, happiness will ensue; if we act destructively, problems will result…We create the causes by our actions, and we experience their results. - Ven. Thubten Chodron, “What Is Karma?”

People who are awake see the manifestation of the dharma in everything. A pebble, a bamboo tree, the cry of a baby, anything can be the voice of the dharma calling. We should be able to practice like that. —Thich Nhat Hanh, “The Three Gems”

Each moment is a chance for us to make peace with the world. - THICH NHAT HANH

Mindful speech and the ability to really listen are at the heart of all relationships. And thoughtful, kind, and effective interactions are at the center of our ethical core, the foundation of any spiritual practice. - Marshall Glickman, “Talk Like a Buddha”

Real peace is not simply the absence of violent conflict but a state of harmony: harmony between people; harmony between humanity and nature; and harmony within ourselves. - Bhikkhu Bodhi, “Fostering Peace, Inside and Out”

Learning to drop what we’re doing, however momentarily, and to genuinely pay attention in the present moment, without attachment or bias, helps us become clear, just as a snow globe becomes clear when we stop shaking it and its flakes settle. - Lama Surya Das, “The Heart-Essence of Buddhist Meditation”

As your mindfulness develops, your resentment for the change, your dislike for the unpleasant experiences, your greed for the pleasant experiences, and the notion of selfhood will be replaced by the deeper awareness of impermanence, unsatisfactoriness, and selflessness. - Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, “Sitting Still”

The Now does not come and go, but includes everything all at once. When we’re aware of being in the Now, present moments come and go, like ripples and waves in the ocean of awake awareness. - Loch Kelly, “When Am I?”

Changing ourselves involves learning how to develop those states, behaviors, and dispositions that are healthy, while allowing the unhealthy ones to atrophy from neglect… Generosity, kindness, and wisdom can save us from ourselves. - Andrew Olendzki, “Turning the Corner”

Sympathetic joy is a heartfelt gratification that accompanies the awareness of another’s well-being. It’s a joy entirely devoid of expectations. Instead, it carries one of life’s greatest pleasures: celebrating the happiness of others. - Ellen Agler, “In the Spirit of Service”

With a strong foundation in how to practice meditation, we can begin to live in a way that enables us to respect ourselves, to be calm rather than anxious, and to offer caring attention to others instead of being held back by notions of separation. - Sharon Salzberg, “Sticking With It”

The mind is very powerful. Therefore, it requires firm guidance. A powerful jet plane needs a good pilot; the pilot of your mind should be the wisdom that understands its nature.—Lama Thubten Yeshe, “Your Mind Is Your Religion”

By widening the gap between action and reaction, you can gain some distance from your automatic responses and also gain an opportunity to know your emotions. You can stop being ruled by these emotions and instead begin to rule your experience of life.-

Trungram Gyalwa Rinpoche, “The Power of the Third Moment”

The content of life, the what, is always what it is at any given moment, just the fact, but it’s how we relate to that moment that will either lead us toward or away from more suffering.- Mark Van Buren, “Relating to Life”Emptiness does not mean that things don’t exist, nor does “no self” mean that we don’t exist. Emptiness refers to the underlying nonseparation of life and the fertile ground of energy that gives rise to all forms of life. - Jack Kornfield, “Identity and Selflessness in Buddhism: No Self or True Self?”

When Buddhist teachings talk about emotions, such as love and hate, they are describing our disposition toward the things we encounter. - Andrew Olendzki, “What’s in a Word? Dukkha”

When we resist change, it’s called suffering. But when we can completely let go and not struggle against it, when we can embrace the groundlessness of our situation and relax into its dynamic quality, that’s called enlightenment. - Pema Chödrön, “The Fundamental Ambiguity of Being Human”

Karma teaches us that every action that we take has a very powerful impact. It also reminds us that the state of consciousness in which we live has a long-term impact on our own life as well as on the lives of the people around us. - Anam Thubten, “Karma: Not Just Action”

We do not become less human by purging toxins from our emotional life but rather more nobly human. Abandoning greed, hatred, and delusion at every opportunity, we are still left with a rich, nuanced, and healthier emotional life. - Andrew Olendzki, “The Buddha’s Smile”

Like the Buddha, we examine our mind state, accept it, and watch it change. We are transformed simply by being fully in the present moment. - Elizabeth Napp, “Mindfulness and the Bad Class”

Teach this triple truth to all: A generous heart, kind speech, and a life of service and compassion are the things which renew humanity. - The Buddha

Right livelihood involves mindfulness of our place in the whole, and thus becomes the foundation for intelligent social activism and ecological responsibility. - Krishnan Venkatesh, “Why Right Livelihood Isn’t Just About Your Day Job”

When we begin to feel the benefits of meditation practice, it is like putting on glasses for the first time. Once we learn to sit with the breath, be with the present moment, and create space between ourselves and our thoughts, our lives come into focus and we awaken to the possibility of something else—the alleviation of suffering. - Jessica Angima, “The High of New Beginnings—and the Joy of What Comes Next”

You don’t escape from your delusions in zazen. Instead, you look straight at them, since you have to work with them. This is the paradox. You never enter a promised paradise in which there will be no delusion. But all your delusions are workable. If they weren’t, I think we’d all go mad. - Jakusho Kwong-roshi, “Emptying into Spaciousness”

Awakening reveals the no-thingness of things—that no thing is apart from all other things. To realize truly that there is only this nature, with no “other” outside us, is to naturally want to refrain from causing harm, just as we refrain from doing harm to one of our own limbs or eyes. - Bodhin Kjolhede, “Pain, Passion, and the Precepts”

Samsara, the world of being, is a gigantic, endless, and beginingless ocean of impermanent instability. Even if you were to ascend to the heaven of a god, you would not escape karma. Misery happens when you don’t see this situation as what it is, and refuse to do anything about it — such as obtaining a boat in order to stay afloat and reach the far shore.- anon

When passing thoughts appear in our mind, we often take them personally, as though we were the owner and controller of such thoughts. We’re not. In fact, there is no thinker behind passing thoughts. They merely exist without an owner. Once you see this truth clearly, it becomes easier to allow thoughts to simply pass by. - Haemin Sunim, “Three Methods for Letting Go of Thoughts”

Mindfulness is not a state but an action, a cultivation of openness, again and again in each moment. - Alex Tzelnic, “‘Blindfulness’: How to Avoid Moral and Attentional Licensing”

The Buddha taught that there is no birth and no death. Our belief that these ideas about birth and death are real creates a powerful illusion that causes us a great deal of suffering. When we understand that we can’t be destroyed, we’re liberated from fear. It’s a huge relief. We can enjoy life and appreciate it in a new way. - Thich Nhat Hanh, “Free from Fear”

Fulfilling the true commitment of a relationship is extraordinary, unrelenting selfless activity. It is one of the most authentic ways that humanity can experience self-transcendence. This is authentic selflessness, not the endorphin-intoxicated spiritual trance that some mistakenly think of as the transcendent experience. - Anam Thubten, “What We Can Learn from the Haunted Ground of Relationships”

Become still, quiet the mind, sit like the mountain and sky—stable and undivided in the face of everything that comes up. - Diane Musho Hamilton, “Practice Is the Way”

Past karma shapes your experience of the world. It exists; there is not much you can do about it. Yet you are also constantly creating new karma, and that gives you a golden opportunity. With your reaction to each experience, you create the karma that will color your future. -

Trungram Gyalwa Rinpoche, “The Power of the Third Moment”

A sense of ease and wellbeing with the breath can do a lot more for you than any amount of status, material gain, praise, outside pleasures—any of the ways of the world. - Thanissaro Bhikkhu, “Less is More”

It is not necessary to be a prisoner of old karma. It is always possible to change your karma. You can make new karma. But there is only one time that you ever have to do it. Can you guess when that might be? - Jon Kabat-Zinn, “Changing Karma”

Desirable things do not have to beguile the mind, and undesirable ones do not have to bring endless resistance. We can let the winds blow through us instead of letting them buffet us about. - Mark Epstein, “How Meditation Failed Me”

The practice of dharma is akin to the practice of art. With the tools of ethics, meditation, and understanding, one works the clay of one’s confined and anguished existence into a bodhisattva. Practice is a process of self-creation. - Stephen Batchelor, “A Democracy of the Imagination”

If we really understand that nothing lasts and that everything is unreal and illusory, then letting go is easy. Actually, it happens by itself without effort. - Chökyi Nyima Rinpoche, “The Secret Strength of Sadness”

Reality is always falling apart. In this fleeting situation, the only thing that makes sense is for us to reach out to one another. - Pema Chödrön

Metta, or lovingkindness, is first practiced toward oneself, since we often have difficulty loving others without first loving ourselves. Sitting quietly, mentally repeat, slowly and steadily, the following or similar phrases: May I be happy. May I be well. May I be safe. May I be peaceful and at ease. - Barry Magid, “Five Practices to Change Your Mind”

Everything that exists depends on everything else: this is the heart of the Buddha’s core teaching of dependent arising. . . Everything in life is conditioned by other factors—they don’t just arise out of nowhere. A flower needs the conditions of sunlight, soil, and water to grow, just as a calm or agitated mind arises from a set of conditions. Deep contemplation of this important teaching can guide us to a liberating view of life. - Tricycle

Everything that exists depends on everything else: this is the heart of the Buddha’s core teaching of dependent arising. All things are conditioned by other factors—they don’t just arise out of nowhere. A flower needs the conditions of sunlight, soil, and water to grow, just as a calm mind requires the condition of relaxation. This is common sense. But if we follow this important teaching all the way, it guides us to a profound and liberating view of life. - Christina Feldman

Nothing is static. Nothing has an independent existence. Nothing stands alone. We are the children of the conditions in our lives. But we have the potential, with mindfulness, with awareness, with stillness, to step out of our patterns and cycles of habitual reactivity and grasping. There is nothing deterministic in dependent arising. - Christina Feldman

Personal responsibility is the lynchpin of Buddhist ethics. We have choices in how we respond to situations- Akincano Weber

If you distinguish between pain and suffering, change is possible. As the saying goes, “Pain is inevitable; suffering is optional. - Jon Kabat-Zinn, “At Home In Our Bodies”

Compassion and tolerance are not a sign of weakness, but a sign of strength. - Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama

Imperfect, limited, and vulnerable as I am, the sun still shines upon me, things do work out, food appears, rain falls, wonderful conversations take place, and the grass grows without any help from me. - Dharmavidya David Brazier, “Unconditional Love”

Learning to walk out of thinking mind into flow mind or awareness mind is the ultimate medicine. - Jan Chozen Bays, “How to Break Free of the Inner Critic”

By starting our meditation practice with joy in our hearts, we begin to associate all dharma activity with joy and we will, in time, begin to look forward to practice. - Pema Düddul, “Awakening to Joy”

Sometimes we have to use diplomacy or deflection to work with our wily mind. Sometimes we have to be our own cheerleaders, other times tough taskmasters. The most important thing is to watch and respond. - Vanessa Zuisei Goddard, “Switching Off Unskillful Thoughts”

You are always entering through the doorway of this very moment. There is no retreat. No heading for the exits. Just a continual “going in” to this eternal now. - Gary Thorp, “Crossing the Threshold”

Our capacity to meet and dissolve habits is awakened and sustained by applying active capacities to “go beyond”—generosity, ethical conduct, patient endurance, diligence, contemplative cultivation, and discerning wisdom. - Steven D. Goodman, “The Spiritual Work of a Worldly Life”

Awareness itself is the primary currency of the human condition, and as such it deserves to be spent carefully. - Andrew Olendzki, “Busy Signal”

When we are happy, healthy, safe, and at ease, we can model those qualities for others as well as make choices and take action from a place of sanity and lovingkindness. - Cyndi Lee, “May I Be Happy”

The key to development along the Buddhist path is repetitive routine guided by inspirational vision. - Venerable Bhikkhu Bodhi, “Vision and Routine”

If there is no regarding of phenomena as “mine,” then the self who suffers is not constructed. -

Andrew Olendzki, “A Universal Formula”

Our hearts and minds change from moment to moment, just as the clouds shift in the evening sky as the sun goes down. Who are we to think we have grasped the true nature of our souls? The Buddha-mind within us will not be constrained by the limits of language. - Abbess Fushimi, “Shedding Light”

Jul 9, 2023 7:21:03 PM | quotations

quotations about the nature of the self

By reasoning with oneself and by trying to study oneself analytically it is possible to get nearer to the true knowledge of one's being. If we consider that every part that constitutes our being has its own name -- the hand, the foot, every part of our being has a different name, quality and purpose, and even a separate form -- what is it then in man which says 'I' and identifies itself with what it sees? It is not our head, hand or foot which says 'I' nor is it the brain. It is something that we cannot point out which identifies itself with all these different parts and says 'I' and mine and knows itself to be the person who sees. This in itself is ignorance, and it is this which the Hindus have called avidya.

How can you be that which you possess? You cannot be the horse and rider at the same time, nor can you be carpenter and tool at the same time. Herein lies the secret of mortality and immortality. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

It is the blessed soul whose heart is empty of self, who is filled with the light of God.

There are many ideas which intoxicate man, many feelings there are which act upon the soul as wine, but there is no stronger wine than the wine of selflessness. It is a might and it is a pride that no worldly rank can give. To become something is a limitation, whatever one may become. Even if a person were to be called the king of the world, he would still not be emperor of the universe. If he were the master of earth, he would still be the slave of Heaven. It is the person who is no one, who is no one and yet all.

The Sufi, therefore, takes the path of being nothing instead of being something. It is this feeling of nothingness which turns the human heart into an empty cup into which the wine of immortality is poured. It is this state of bliss which every truth-seeking soul yearns to attain. It is easy to be a learned person, and it is not very difficult to be wise. It is within one's reach to become good. And it is not an impossible achievement to be pious or spiritual. But if there is an attainment greater and higher than all these things, it is to be nothing.

The bubbles are to be found on the surface of the sea. The depth of the sea is free from bubbles. The commotion is to be seen on the surface, the depth of the sea is still. The mind is the commotion of that something that is within us, that something which we call heart. The happiness, knowledge, pleasure and love that is stored in our innermost being is in our profound depth. Changing emotions and passions, dreams, ever-rising thoughts and imaginations, all belong to the surface, as the bubbles belong to the surface of the sea.

* *

And it is, therefore, in the knowledge of self that there lies the fulfillment of life. The knowledge of self means the knowledge of one's body, the knowledge of one's mind, the knowledge of one's spirit; the knowledge of the spirit's relation to the body and the relation of the body to the spirit; the knowledge of one's wants and needs, the knowledge of one's virtues and faults; knowing what we desire and how to attain it, what to pursue and what to renounce. And when one dives deep into this, one finds before one a world of knowledge which never ends. And it is that knowledge which gives one insight into human nature and brings one to the knowledge of the whole of creation. And in the end one attains to the knowledge of the divine Being.

~~~ The knowledge of self is the essential knowledge; it gives knowledge of humanity. In the understanding of the human being lies that understanding of nature which reveals the law of creation.

* *

To attain peace, what one has to do is to seek that rhythm which is in the depth of our being. It is just like the sea: the surface of the sea is ever moving; the depth of the sea is still. And so it is with our life. If our life is thrown into the sea of activity, it is on the surface. We still live in the profound depths, in that peace. But the thing is to become conscious of that peace which can be found within ourselves. It is this which can bring us the answer to all our problems. If not, when we want to solve one problem, there is another difficult problem coming. There is no end to our problems. There is no end to the difficulties of the outer life. And if we get excited over them, we shall never be able to solve them. Some think, 'We might wait. Perhaps the conditions will become better. We shall see then what to do.' But when will the conditions become better? They will become still worse! Whether the conditions become better or worse, the first thing is to seek the kingdom of God within ourselves, in which there is our peace. As soon as we have found that, we have found our support, we have found our self. And in spite of all the activity and movement on the surface, we shall be able to keep that peace undisturbed if only we hold it fast by becoming conscious of it.

* *

Spiritual knowledge is nothing but this: that there is a constant longing in the heart of man to have something of its origin, to experience something of its original state, the state of peace and joy which has been disturbed, and yet is sought after throughout its whole life, and never can cease to be sought after until the real source has at length been realized. What was it in the wilderness that gave peace and joy? What was it that came to us in the forest, the solitude? In either case it was nothing else but the depth of our own life, which is silent like the depths of the great sea, so silent and still. It is the surface of the sea that makes waves and roaring breakers; the depth is silent. So the depth of our own being is silent also.

And this all-pervading, unbroken, inseparable, unlimited, ever-present, omnipotent silence unites with our silence like the meeting of flames. Something goes out from the depths of our being to receive something from there, which comes to meet us; our eyes cannot see and our ears cannot hear and our mind cannot perceive because it is beyond mind, thought, and comprehension. It is the meeting of the soul and the Spirit.

* *

Thus the true self abides in its own nature. (तदा द्रष्टुः स्वरूपेऽवस्थानम्) - from the Yoga Sutras

The true self refers to the witness (us) that is conscious of all the happenings of the mind, emotions, and body. After the witness is able to see clearly into its own nature, profound knowledge dawns. This can’t really even be expressed in words or conceptualizations. . .

This line merely hints at what happens when the goal of yoga is reached — when experiential understanding arises of what our consciousness is, behind all its temporary thoughts, emotions, and behavior patterns. . .

We are not what we think. . .

Look within, and you’ll see that every layer of yourself is simply a shell with no real personality or self of its own. They simply fulfill their purpose to help or hinder you in a certain context. - Rami Dhanoa

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You are the sky. Everything else is just the weather. - Pema Chödrön

Self-denial is not renouncing things, it is denying the self; and the first lesson of self-denial is humility. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Your ability to recall enables you to look back on your history and thus know that you have a history. This experience is the origin of ‘I.’ ‘I’ is the identification with “your” history: “That’s me. I experienced all this.” - Bernhard Kutzler

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There are three stages of morals. The first stage is the moral of reciprocity. This moral is natural to the one who sees the difference between himself and another, who recognizes every man as such and such.

The second stage is the law of beneficence, where man, recognizing himself as an entity separate from others and recognizing others as distinct entities themselves, yet sees a cord of connection running through himself and all, and finds himself as a dome in which rises an echo of good and evil; and in order to have a good echo he gives good for good and good for evil.

But the third stage is the moral of renunciation, where the difference of 'mine' and 'thine' and the distinction of 'I' and 'you' fade away in the realization of the one Life that is within and without, beneath and beyond; and that is the meaning of the verse in the Bible, 'In Him we live, and move, and have our being.' - Hazrat Inayat Khan

. . .

When we can touch God in everyone then God tells us about Himself, because He sees that we have no hate, no prejudice. We have seen our Beloved, and our Beloved tells us all. Still, realization is difficult, for it involves discerning the difference between you and me. What is this difference? It is a great question, a great problem. Our 'I' and 'you' are just like a compass with which we draw circles on paper. The one point of the compass is the 'I', the other point is the 'you', and where they join there is no 'I-you.' The 'I' and 'you' only remain as long as we see ourselves; but when we rise above them or beyond them, the thought brings us nearer and nearer to God in that consciousness in which we all unite. ... Perfection and annihilation is that stage where there is no longer 'I' and no longer 'you', where there is what there is. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

It’s not that there’s no self, because that’s ridiculous. You’re you, and I’m me. But the self doesn’t exist in the way we imagined it does. . . . Try to find it as it really exists, not as you think it should. - “The Zen of Therapy”, Mark Epstein

Sometimes as Buddhists, we can develop an orientation that somehow we need to go beyond our sense of self or get rid of it. But I’d say the process is more about discovering through inquiry how the sense of self arises. - Laura Bridgman, “Seeing the Emptiness of Self”

The ego has two sides: the first one is the one we know, and the next one we must discover. The side we know is the false ego which makes us say, 'I'. What is it in us that we call 'I'? We say, 'This is my body, my mind, these are my thoughts, my feelings, my impressions, this is my position in life.' We identify our self with all that concerns us and the sum total of all these we call 'I'. In the light of truth this conception is false, it is a false identity.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

What has taken possession of this accommodation? A deluded ego that says, 'I.' It is deluded by this body and mind and it has called itself an individual. When a man has a ragged coat he says, 'I am poor'. In reality his coat is poor, not he. What this capacity or accommodation contains is that which becomes his knowledge, his realization, and it is that which limits him. It forms that limitation which is the tragedy of every soul.

Now, this capacity may be filled with self, or it may be filled with God. There is only room for one. Either we live with our limitation, or we let God reign there in His unlimited Being.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

As life unfolds itself to man the first lesson it teaches is humility; the first thing that comes to man's vision is his own limitedness. The vaster God appears to him, the smaller he finds himself. This goes on and on until the moment comes when he loses himself in the vision of God. In terms of the Sufis this is called fana, and it is this process that was taught by Christ under the name of self-denial. Often man interprets this teaching wrongly and considers renunciation as self-denial. He thinks that the teaching is to renounce all that is in the world. But although that is a way and an important step which leads to true self-denial, the self-denial meant is the losing oneself in God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Nature, earth, the world—whatever you call it—is not simply something I am on but something I am. It is not outside of me: it is me, and I am it. - Paul Kingsnorth, “The Witness”

This is what is meant by union with God. It is in reality the dissolving of the false self in the knowledge of the true self, which is divine, eternal, and all pervading. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

The mystic's work is to forget the self, to lose himself like a bubble in the water. The wave realizes, 'I am the sea', and by falling into the sea prostrates itself before its God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

We may ask ourselves, 'Who is another?' Then we realize that in the true sense of being there is but One. When the veil of ignorance is raised there is no longer any 'I' and 'you', but only the One exists. This is the teaching of the Bible and of all scriptures. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

This “I” is for most of us the first thing that pops into our minds when we think about who we are. The “I” represents the idea of our individual self, the one that sits between the ears and behind the eyes and is “piloting” the body… . . . This I/ego is what we think of as our true selves, and this individual self is the experiencer and the controller of things like thoughts, feelings, and actions. The pilot self feels like it is running the show. - Chris Niebauer, in No Self, No Problem

The worldly struggle is outward struggle. The struggle on the spiritual path is inward struggle. No sooner does one take the spiritual direction than the first enemy one meets is one's own self. What does the self do? It is most mischievous. When one says one wants to fight it, it says, 'I am yourself. Do you want to fight me?' And when it brings failure, it is clever enough to put the blame on someone else. Do all those who have failed in life accuse themselves? No, they always accuse another person. When they have gained something they say, 'I have done it.' When they have lost something they say, 'This person got in my way'. With little and big things, it is all the same. The self does not admit faults; it always puts the blame on others. Its vanity, its pride, its smallness, and its egotistical tendency which is continually active, keep one blind. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

By a study of life the Sufi learns and practices the nature of its harmony. He establishes harmony with the self, with others, with the universe and with the infinite. He identifies himself with another, he sees himself, so to speak, in every other being. He cares for neither blame nor praise, considering both as coming from himself. If a person were to drop a heavy weight and in so doing hurt his own foot, he would not blame his hand for having dropped it, realizing himself in both the hand and the foot. In like manner the Sufi is tolerant when harmed by another, thinking that the harm has come from himself alone. ... He overlooks the faults of others, considering that they know no better. He hides the faults of others, and suppresses any facts that would cause disharmony. His constant fight is with the Nafs (the self-centered ego), the root of all disharmony and the only enemy of man. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

There are many beings, but at the same time there is one, the only Being. Therefore objects such as streams and mountains are also living, but they only exist separately to our outer vision. When our inner vision opens then the separation is shown as a veil; then there is one vision alone, and that is the immanence of God.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

As soon as the soul begins to say 'I' he is exiled from heaven, for all blessings belong to the state which the soul experienced before he claimed to be 'I', a separate entity, separate from others. It is because of this that man, whatever his position, whatever his situation in life, is not fully happy. The trouble of one may perhaps be greater than that of another, but both he who resides in heavenly palaces and the inhabitant of a grass hut have their troubles; both have their pain. But man finds the reason for all afflictions in the life outside him. The Sufi finds it in that one sin: that of having claimed to be 'I'. With this claim came all the trouble, it continued, and it will always continue. This sin has such a hold upon the soul that it is just like the eclipse of the sun, when its light is covered and cannot shine. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

True self-denial is losing one's self in God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

* *

Human beings are therefore seen ‘as collective assemblages that zigzag across time’ (Hickey et al, 2013,p183).

Self or ‘identity’ in postmodern ontologies is a fluid and fragmented process,

continually shaped and reshaped in interaction with the social world (see Giddens,

1991).

I explore self, experience and reality in the context of Childhood Studies, suggesting

that narrative is not synonymous with ‘self’, nor does it represent the experiencer. I

argue that a core subjectivity is the primary ‘dative’ of all experience (Kastrup, 2018),

located ‘within’ and ‘without’ human and non-human beings.

Subjectivity and agency is an entangled affair. Delueze & Guitarri (1987) and Barad (2007) make significant contributions in destabilising a core, subjective and separate self.

Kastrup(201 7a, 2017b, 2018, 2019) suggests that the ‘I’ of experience is situated out of

mind, body and time, offering an ontological view that ‘makes more sense of reality

in a more parsimonious and empirically rigorous manner than mainstream

physicalism’ (2018p125). Kastrup (2017a, 2017b ,2018, 2019) proposes an Idealism

ontology, differing from traditional Idealism in its analytical and logical arguments

about the nature of reality, self and experience.

Kastrup (2018) posits how experience cannot be reduced to material ‘ultimates’, that are only constituted by relational qualities (mass, charge and spin). The ‘Hard problem of Consciousness’ (see Chalmers, 1995) asks how subjective experience can emerge from ultimates. As Kastrup points out, there ‘is no fact about ultimates that imply, a priori, facts about experience’ Kastrup, 2018, p129

Relative ‘I’s are manifest and sustained through inner and outer stories, woven by forces which move between private qualitative fields and the whole. The primordial ‘I’ of relative subjects (that is prior to narrative) is the ‘pure dative of experience’ (Kastrup, 2018). It is the experiencer. Experiences, therefore, are not ‘ontologically distinct from cosmic consciousness, just as the dance is not distinct from the dancer’ (Kastrup, 2018. P140).

The ‘I’ to ‘whom things are given or disclosed’ (Kastrup, 2018) is the primordial sense of awareness that is prior to inner stories.

* *

Self-denial is not renouncing things, it is denying the self; and the first lesson of self-denial is humility. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Though you are an individual with your own mind and thoughts and feelings, you are defined more than anything else by your relations with others and the society around you. Your life history of friends, family, community, and learning and your reactions to them define who you are.

There is a [Hadith] which says: Mutu kubla anta mutu, which means, 'Die before death.' A poet says, 'Only he attains to the peace of the Lord who loses himself.' God said to Moses, 'No man shall see me and live.' To see God we must be non-existent. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

What does all this mean? It means that when we see our being with open eyes, we see that there are two aspects to our being: the false and the true. The false life is that of the body and mind, which only exists as long as the life is within. In the absence of that life the body cannot go on. We mistake the true life for the false, and the false for the true. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

With each session of silence the fog lifts a bit more, until one day the ego “I,” with its insistent look-at-me voice, drops away, revealing the true self afloat in a vast blue sky.- Joan Duncan Oliver, “The Sound of Silence”

Our greatest enemy is ourself. All weakness, all ignorance keeps us from the truth of our being, from all the virtues hidden in us and all perfection hidden in our souls. The first self we realize is the false self. Unless the soul is born again it will not see the kingdom of heaven. The soul is born into the false self; it is blind. In the true self the soul opens its eyes. Unless the false self is fought with, the true self cannot be realized. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

A self that goes on changing is a self that goes on living. - Virginia Woolf

This is what is meant by union with God. It is in reality the dissolving of the false self in the knowledge of the true self, which is divine, eternal, and all pervading. 'He who attaineth union with God, his very self must lose,' said Amir.

There never was a self—only our identification makes us think so. So while purification, kindness, and attention can certainly improve our habits, no amount of self-denial or self-torture can rid us of a self, for it was never there. - Jack Kornfield, “Identity and Selflessness in Buddhism: No Self or True Self?”

Jul 9, 2023 7:11:14 PM | quotations

quotations about gratitude

One single gift acknowledged in gratefulness has the power to dissolve the ties of our alienation.- David Steindl-Rast

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There are many things to be grateful "for" but, as I ripen with the seasons of life, the many reasons blend into a sacred mystery. And, most deeply, I realize that living gratefully is its own blessing. - Michael Mahoney

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Recipients of our appreciation are apt to express their own gratitude to others, lengthening the unending, golden chain of connections-in-goodness that stretches across the world. - Mary Ford Grabowsky

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Holiness comes wrapped in the ordinary. There are burning bushes all around you. Every tree is full of angels. Hidden beauty is waiting in every crumb. - Macrina Wiederkehr, O.S.B, A Tree Full of Angels

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There is a calmness to a life lived in Gratitude, a quiet joy. -Ralph H. Blum

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Gratitude can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. It makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow. - Melody Beattie

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Absolutely everything can be enjoyed when it is celebrated. Anything can be enjoyed when we make friends with it. -Arjun Ardagh

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To be a saint is to be motivated by gratitude. -Ronald Rolheiser

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To be profoundly grateful is the most primary of all religious attitudes. -Ronald Rolheiser

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A thankful person can find contentment anywhere.

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As I express my gratitude, I become more deeply aware of it. And the greater my awareness, the greater my need to express it. What happens here is a spiraling ascent, a process of growth in ever expanding circles around a steady center. -David Steindl-Rast

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A grateful heart is the mainspring of happiness. -Ossian Land

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How happy a person is depends upon the depth of his gratitude. -John Miller

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The same stream of life that runs through my veins night and day runs through the world and dances in rhythmic measures. –RabindranathTagore GitanjaliLXIX

* * *

To find the universal elements enough; to find the air and the water exhilarating; to be refreshed by a morning walk or an evening saunter; to be thrilled by the stars at night; to be elated over a bird's nest or a wildflower in spring - these are some of the rewards of the simple life. -John Burroughs

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The sun, with all those planets revolving around it and dependent on it, can still ripen a bunch of grapes as if it had nothing else in the universe to do.- Galileo Galilei

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It is a wise man that does know the contented man is never poor, whilst the discontented man is never rich. -Frank Herbert

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I wonder if gratefulness is the bridge from sorrow to joy, spanning the chasm of our anxious striving. Freed from the burden of unbridled desires, we can enjoy what we have, celebrate what we've attained, and appreciate the familiar. For if we can't be happy now, we'll likely not be happy when. -Philip Gulley, Porch Talk

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To speak gratitude is courteous and pleasant, to enact gratitude is generous and noble, but to live gratitude is to touch Heaven. -Johannes A. Gaertner

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To be alive in this beautiful, self-organizing universe -- to participate in the dance of life with senses to perceive it, lungs that breathe it, organs that draw nourishment from it -- is a wonder beyond words. -Joanna Macy

* * *

Get rich quick. Count your blessings.

* * *

Beauty seen makes the one who sees it more beautiful. -David Steindl-Rast -A Listening Heart

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O how I laugh when I think of my vague indefinite riches. No run on my bank can drain it, for my wealth is not possession but enjoyment. -Henry David Thoreau

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"Like the voice of a bird singing in the rain, let grateful memory survive in the hour of darkness."
-Robert Louis Stevenson

Grant me daily the grace of gratitude, to be thankful for all my many gifts, and so be freed from artificial needs, that I might lead a joyful, simple life. - Edward Hays

Let gratitude be the pillow upon which you kneel to say your nightly prayer. - MAYA ANGELOU

When I am grateful, I am neither rushing nor slouching through my day – I’m dancing. - BR. DAVID STEINDL-RAST

What would it be to awaken to a day devoted to gratitude, a day of thankfulness for what was and yet will be? Grateful for this life in which we have been feeling our way toward the truth. - STEPHEN LEVINE

Gratitude is the sweet fragrance of an opening heart. - Aine Belton

Gratitude begins in our hearts and then dovetails into behavior. It almost always makes you willing to be of service, which is where the joy resides.- Anne Lamott

Wear gratitude like a cloak and it will feed every corner of your life.- Rumi

No one who achieves success does so without the help of others. The wise and confident acknowledge this help with gratitude. - Alfred North Whitehead

There's a self expansive aspect of gratitude. Very possibly it's a little known law of nature: the more gratitude you have, the more you have to be grateful for. - Elaine St. James

Gratitude creates a sense of abundance, the knowing that you have what you need. In that climate of sufficiency, our hunger for more abates and we take only what we need, in respect for the generosity of the giver. - Robin Wall Kimmerer

Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all the others. - Cicero

Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow. - Melody Beattie, author

Let gratitude be the pillow upon which you kneel to say your nightly prayer. Maya Angelou

Acknowledging the good that you already have in your life is the foundation for all abundance. - Eckhart Tolle

Nine-tenths of wisdom is appreciation. Go find somebody's hand and squeeze it, while there's time. - Dale Dauten, business coach

Your bounty is beyond my speaking. But though my mouth be dumb, my heart shall thank you. - Nicholas Rowe, writer

Joy is the simplest form of gratitude. - Karl Barth, theologian

O Lord that lends me life, lend me a heart replete with thankfulness! - William Shakespeare

When I started counting my blessings, my whole life turned around. - Willie Nelson

I know for sure that appreciating whatever shows up for you in life changes your personal vibration. You radiate and generate more goodness for yourself when you're aware of all you have and not focusing on your have-nots. - Oprah Winfrey

I am grateful for what I am and have. My thanksgiving is perpetual. -Henry David Thoreau

The miracle of gratitude is that it shifts your perception to such an extent that it changes the world you see. - Dr. Robert Holden

Gratefulness has three steps: not missing the opportunity, appreciating the opportunity, and using or enjoying the opportunity. By this method we come fully alive, full of joy, which is what we are all longing for. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

Gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us to encounter everyday epiphanies, those transcendent moments of awe that change forever how we experience life…and the world. - Sarah Ban Breathnach

Grateful hearts truly love. Grateful hands reach out. Grateful eyes see generations. Grateful minds imagine big ideas like justice, peace, and health. Our world needs no less than grateful living. - Katie Steedly Curling

Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all the others. - Cicero

Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow. - Melody Beattie, author

Let gratitude be the pillow upon which you kneel to say your nightly prayer. - Maya Angelou

Acknowledging the good that you already have in your life is the foundation for all abundance. - Eckhart Tolle

Your bounty is beyond my speaking. But though my mouth be dumb, my heart shall thank you. - Nicholas Rowe, writer

Joy is the simplest form of gratitude. - Karl Barth, theologian

O Lord that lends me life, lend me a heart replete with thankfulness! - William Shakespeare

When I started counting my blessings, my whole life turned around. - Willie Nelson

I am grateful for what I am and have. My thanksgiving is perpetual. - Henry David Thoreau

Gratitude is a celebration of love. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

Gratitude, the simple and profound feeling of being thankful, is the foundation of all generosity. - Sallie Tisdale, dharma teacher and author

Gratitude places you in the energy field of plentitude. Glow with gratitude and see how awe and joy will make their home in you. - Michael Bernard Beckwith

When I am grateful, I am neither rushing nor slouching through my day – I’m dancing. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

The gate of gratitude is the threshold of a spiritual life. - Rev. Dr. Kenji Akahoshi, “Finding Spirit in the Ordinary”

Joy and gratitude kind of feed on each other. We call it a cycle of virtue. - Philip Watkins

Gratitude makes us feel bursting with delight, just to remember the gifts we have received. Thus we are doubly blessed when we receive something: for the gift itself and later, in recall, for the miracle of having been given it. - M.J. Ryan

The art of deep seeing makes gratitude possible. And it is the art of gratitude that makes joy possible. - Ann Voskamp

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. - Melody Beattie

Gratitude for the gift of life is the primary wellspring of all religions, the hallmark of the mystic, the source of all true art. - Joanna Macy

Take time to celebrate the quiet miracles that seek no attention. - John O'Donohue

Gratitude is not a passive response to something we have been given; gratitude arises from paying attention, from being awake in the presence of everything that lives within and without us. - David Whyte

What brings fulfillment is gratefulness, the simple response of our heart to this given life in all its fullness. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

Jul 9, 2023 7:09:18 PM | quotations

quotations about peace

Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

If our minds are agitated by anger and resentment, our efforts to promote peace are more likely to create more conflict and perhaps ignite more violence. An angry mind is not a reliable instrument for promoting peace. - Ven. Bhikkhu Bodhi, “Fostering Peace, Inside and Out”

It’s hard to listen without judgment, to tolerate ambiguity, paradox, and in some cases, ignorance. But if we are ever to experience any measure of true peace, this is something we will all need to learn. - Tina Lear, “Having Real Conversations (Even with My Sister)”

Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor. - Thích Nhất Hạnh

Don’t believe every worried thought you have. Worried thoughts are notoriously inaccurate. - Renee Jain, author

Rule number one is, don't sweat the small stuff. Rule number two is, it's all small stuff. - Robert Eliot, medical doctor and author

If you can't fly, run; if you can't run, walk; if you can't walk, crawl; but by all means keep moving. - Martin Luther King Jr.

Many of us feel stressed and overwhelmed not because we're taking on too much, but too little of what strengthens us. - Marcus Buckingham, author

You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf. - Jon Kabat-Zinn, author and professor

Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor. - Thích Nhất Hạnh

Your mind will answer most questions if you learn to relax and wait for the answers. - William S. Burroughs

Everything we do is infused with the energy with which we do it. If we’re frantic, life will be frantic. If we’re peaceful, life will be peaceful. - Marianne Williamson

You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them. - Maya Angelou

Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated. - Confucius

Breathe. Let go. And remind yourself that this very moment is the only one you know you have for sure. - Oprah Winfrey

You cannot perceive beauty, but with a serene mind. - Henry David Thoreau

The ideal of calm exists in a sitting cat. - Jules Renard

The nearer a man comes to a calm mind the closer he is to strength. - Marcus Aurelius

Keep Calm and Carry On. - Government of the United Kingdom

If you cannot find peace within yourself, you will never find it anywhere else. - Marvin Gaye

Jul 9, 2023 7:05:39 PM | quotations

quotations from Hazrat Inayat Khan

Every step in evolution makes life more valuable. The more evolved you are, the more priceless is every moment; it becomes an opportunity for you to do good to others, to serve others, to give love to others, to be gentle to others, to give your sympathy to souls who are longing and hungering for it. Life is miserable when a person is absorbed in himself; as soon as he forgets himself he is happy. The more he thinks of himself, his own affairs, work and interests, the less he knows the meaning of life.

* *

If we only understood that every moment in life, every day, every month, and every year, has its particular blessing; if we only knew life's opportunity! But the greatest opportunity that one can realize in life is to accomplish that purpose for which man was sent on earth. And if he has lost that opportunity, then whatever he may have accomplished in the world, whether he has gathered wealth, possesses much property, or has made a great name for himself, he will not be satisfied. Once one's eyes are opened and they begin to look at the world, they will find there is a greater opportunity than they had ever thought before.

Man is as poor as he is, as limited as he is, as troubled as he is; yet there is nothing in this world which could not be accomplished by man if he only knew what thought can do. It is ignorance which keeps a person from what they ought to accomplish. One should know how to operate his thought, how to accomplish certain things, how to focus the mind on the object that should be accomplished. If one does not know, then he has not made use of his mind but has lived like a machine. If people knew the power of feeling, and realized that the power of feeling can reach anywhere and penetrate anything, they could achieve whatever they might wish. ... Every person is a captive in some form or other; one's life is limited in some form or other; but one could get above this limitation by realizing the latent power and inspiration of the soul.

Kabir, the great poet of India says, 'Life is a field and you are born to cultivate it. And if you know how to cultivate this field you can produce anything you like. All the need of your life can be produced in this field. All that your soul yearns after and all you need is to be got from the field, if you know how to cultivate it and how to reap the fruit.' But if this opportunity is only studied in order to make the best of life by taking all that one can take and by being more comfortable, that is not satisfying. We must enrich ourselves with thought, with that happiness which is spiritual happiness, with that peace which belongs to our soul, with that liberty, that freedom, for which our soul longs; and attain to that higher knowledge which breaks all the fetters of life and raises our consciousness to look at life from a different point of view. Once a person has realized this opportunity, they have fulfilled the purpose of Life.

Man's greatest enemy is his ego which manifests itself in selfishness. Even in his doing good, in his kind actions, selfishness is sometimes at work. When he does good with the thought that one day it may return to him and that he may share in the good, he sells his pearls for a price. A kind action, a thought of sympathy, of generosity, is too precious to trade with. One should give and, while giving, close the eyes. Man should remember to do every little action, every little kindness, every act of generosity with his whole heart, without the desire of getting anything in return making a trade out of it. The satisfaction must be in doing it and in nothing else.

* *

Tulsidas, the Hindu poet, says that the essence of religion is kindness. Those who are inclined to do kindness in life must not discriminate among the people around them, between those to whom they must be kind and those to whom they need not be kind. However kind and good a person may be to those he likes, to those he wishes to be kind to, he cannot for this be called kind by nature; real kindness is that which gushes out from the heart to the worthy and to the unworthy. ... Man is the outcome of the development of the whole of creation; therefore the ego, which makes one selfish, is developed in him more than in any other creature. Selfishness keeps man blind through life, and he scarcely knows when he has caused harm to another. ... In this struggle of life, if a man can be considerate enough to keep his eyes open to all around him and see in what way he can be of help to them, he becomes rich; he inherits the kingdom of God.

* * *

The worlds are held together by the heat of the sun. Each of us are atoms held in position by that eternal sun we call God. Within us is that same central power, we call it the light of God, or the love of God, and by it we too hold up the human beings within our sphere; or lacking it, we let them fall. So God keeps all, and so we keep our friends and surroundings. With this knowledge life in the world becomes a glorious vision. Not that we are compelled to keep away from sin, but we learn what power virtue has.

* *

Each individual composes the music of his own life. If he injures another, he brings disharmony. When his sphere is disturbed, he is disturbed himself, and there is a discord in the melody of his life. If he can quicken the feeling of another to joy or to gratitude, by that much he adds to his own life; he becomes himself by that much more alive. Whether conscious of it or not, his thought is affected for the better by the joy or gratitude of another, and his power and vitality increase thereby, and the music of his life grows more in harmony.

* *

Besides having one's (own) wish granted, the joy of giving another (person) happiness, that itself is greater than a wish granted, if one has risen to that plane of human evolution when one can enjoy pleasure with the pleasure of another, when one can feel satisfaction in the satisfaction of another, when one can be happy in bringing happiness to another. No one will give another happiness and will not have the same come to him a thousandfold. There comes a stage of evolution in the life of man when he feels more satisfied by seeing another person satisfied with food than by his having eaten it himself, when he feels comfortable in seeing another person comfortable, when he feels richly adorned by seeing another person clothed nicely; for this stage is a stepping-stone to the realization of God.

Human beings living in their shells are mostly unaware of the privilege of life and so are unthankful to the Giver of it. In order to see the grace of God man must open his eyes and raise his head from his little world. Then he will see -- above and below, to the right and the left, before and behind -- the grace of God reaching him from everywhere in abundance.

A person who is loved by everybody in the world, and yet if he has not loved anybody, he has done nothing. A person who has possessed the wealth of the whole world, but if he has given nothing, he has not earned. A person honored by everyone in the world, but if he has not respected, he has not lived.

What does it mean? It only means that what we gain is nothing, it is what we give that counts. It is nothing -- what has been done to us -- if only we did all we wished to do, that is what counts. Either learning or wisdom, position or power or wealth, all these things gained are very small compared with what one can give to the others.

* *

The Sufi in the East says to himself, Ishq Allah Ma'bud Allah, which means 'God is Love, God is the Beloved', in other words it is God who is Love, Lover, and Beloved. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

A true worshipper of God sees His presence in all forms, and thus in respecting others he respects God. It may even develop to such an extent that the true worshipper of God, the Omnipresent, walks gently on the earth, bowing in his heart even to every tree and plant, and it is then that the worshipper forms a communion with the Divine Beloved at all times. - - Hazrat Inayat Khan

* *

In order to learn forgiveness man must learn tolerance first. And there are people whom man cannot forgive. It is not that he must not forgive, but it is difficult, beyond his power to forgive, and in that case the first thing he can do is to forget. The first step towards forgiveness is to forget. . ..

They say, 'Forgive and forget', which is very expressive of the process of forgiveness. It is impossible to forgive unless you can forget. What keeps man from forgiving his fellow man is that he holds the fault of another constantly before his view. It is just like sticking a little thorn in one's own heart and keeping it there and suffering the pain. It may also be pictured as putting a drop of poison in one's own heart and retaining it until the whole heart becomes poisoned. Verily, blessed are the innocent, who do not notice anybody's fault, and the greater credit is to the mature souls, who, recognizing a fault, forget it and so forgive. How true are the words of Christ, 'Let those throw a stone who have not sinned.' The limitations of human life make man subject to faults. Some have more faults, some have less, but there is no soul without faults. As Christ says, 'Call me not good.'

Forgiveness is a stream of love, which washes away all impurities wherever it flows. By keeping this spring of love, which is in the heart of man, running, man is able to forgive, however great the fault of his fellow man may seem. One who cannot forgive closes his heart. The sign of spirituality is that there is nothing you cannot forgive, there is no fault you cannot forget. Do not think that he who has committed a fault yesterday must do the same today, for life is constantly teaching and it is possible in one moment a sinner may turn into a saint. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

* *The spiritual path is easiest if there is not something pulling one from behind; and that force is the life in the world, one's friends, surroundings, acquaintances, and one's foes. Remain, therefore, in the world as a traveler making a station on his way. Do all the good you can to serve and succor humanity, but escape attachment. By this in no way will you prove to be loveless. On the contrary, it is attachment which divides love, and love raised above attachment is like a rain from above nourishing all the plants upon the earth.

~~~ "Sangita I, Nasihat", by Hazrat Inayat Khan (unpublished)

There is only one thing that helps us to rise above conditions, and that is a change of outlook on life. This change is made practicable by a change of attitude. .. For a Sufi, therefore, not only patience to bear all things is necessary, but to see all things from a certain point of view that can relieve him for that moment from difficulty and pain. Very often it is one's outlook which changes a person's whole life. It can turn hell into heaven, it can turn sorrow into joy. When a person looks from a certain point of view, every little pin-prick feels like the point of a sword piercing his heart. If he looks at the same thing from a different point of view, the heart becomes sting-proof. Nothing can touch it. All things which are sent forth at that person as bullets drop down without ever having touched him.

What is the meaning of walking upon the water? Life is symbolized as water. There is one person who drowns in the water, there is another who swims in the water, but there is still another who walks upon it. The one who is so sensitive that, after one little pin prick he is unhappy throughout the day and night is the man of the first category. The one who takes and gives back and makes a game of life is the swimmer. He does not mind if he receives one knock, for he derives satisfaction from being able to give two knocks in return. But the one whom nothing can touch is in the world and yet is above the world. He is the one who walks upon the water; life is under his feet, both its joy and its sorrow.

Verily, independence and indifference are the two wings which enable the soul to fly.

* *

To become cold with the coldness of the world is weakness, and to become broken by the hardness of the world is feebleness, but to live in the world and yet to keep above the world is like walking on the water. There are two essential duties for the man of wisdom and love; that is to keep the love in our nature ever increasing and expanding, and to strengthen the will so that the heart may not be easily broken. Balance is ideal in life; one must be fine and yet strong, one must be loving and yet powerful.

* *

The first exercise to help the will power to develop would be to check every act, word, and thought which we do not wish to occur; to avoid unintentional actions, speech, and thoughts. The other exercise that is necessary for the development of the will power is that of seeing that neither our mind nor our body rules us, but that we rule our body and our mind. Desires such as appetite, thirst, sleep, even the desire of moving or standing or walking, all these desires should be under control. There should be a time in every day when every desire of the body is checked. See if you can do it; and then as long as you can let the body go without listening to it, do so. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Mastery lies in the control of the mind. If the mind became your obedient servant, the whole world is at your service. The king of mind is greater than the king of a nation. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

* *

There is an innate desire in every human being for knowledge. ... With man this desire is never satisfied. He always wants to know more. There is ever a restless craving within him for knowledge. This is because he does not look for the cause in the right way. He only sees the external causes, and not the cause underlying the cause, and below that, the primal cause. For example, a man who has become estranged from his friend only sees perhaps the superficial cause, and calls his friend unkind; or he may even admit that he himself is at fault, or he may go still deeper and say that owing to a certain planetary influence they cannot be friendly. Yet he has not probed the cause of this cause. ...

For this reason the religions taught the God-ideal, that the primal cause might be sought through the pursuit of God. It is when man has lost the idea of duality and feels himself at one with all creation, that his eyes are opened and he sees the cause of everything.

* *

Our limited self is like a wall separating us from the Self of God. God is as far away from us as that wall is thick. The wisdom and justice of God are within us, and yet they are far away under the covering of the veil of the limited self.

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Humility is the principal thing that must be learnt in the path of training the ego. It is the constant effort of effacing the ego that prepares man for the greater journey. This principle of humility can be practiced by forgetting one's personality in every thought and action and in every dealing with another. No doubt it is difficult and may not seem very practicable in everyday life, though in the end it will prove to be the successful way, not only in one's spiritual life but in one's everyday affairs. The general tendency is to bring one's personality forward, which builds a wall between two souls whose destiny and happiness lies in unity. In business, in profession, in all aspects of life it is necessary that one should unite with the other in this unity, in which the purpose of life is fulfilled.

* *

Love is a continual sacrifice. And what does sacrifice mean? Sacrifice means forgetting of the self. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

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What is real prayer? Praise to God. And the meaning of praise? Appreciating; thus opening the heart more and more to the divine beauty one sees in manifestation.

* *

The forms of worship of all the different religions are necessarily different. It depends upon what one is accustomed to, what is akin to one's nature. One cannot make a common rule and say that this form is wrong and that form is right. One person will perhaps feel more exaltation in a form of worship which includes some art. It stimulates his emotional nature. Music, pictures, perfumes, colors, and light, all these have an effect upon such a person. Another can concentrate better if there is nothing in the place of worship to catch his attention. It is all a matter of temperament. It is not wrong to prefer the one or the other. The Sufi sees the variety of forms as different ideals. He does not attach importance to the outer expression. If there is a sincere spirit behind it, if a person has a feeling for worship, it does not matter what form of worship it is.

* *

In what manner prayer be offered matters little if only the sentiment be right. The orthodox world has fought with each other, each claiming that, "Our manner of prayer is the best. Our church is the best. Our temple is the best. Our sermon is the best. The others are astray;" not knowing that in the house of God it is not asked, "To which church do you belong? To which temple do you belong?" but it is asked, "How sincere were you in your prayer?"

* *

Nature teaches every soul to worship God in some way or other, and often provides that which is suitable for each. Those who want one law to govern all have lost sight of the spirit of their own religion. And it is in people who have not yet learned their own religion that such ideas are commonly found. Did they but know their own religion, how tolerant they would become, and how free from any grudge against the religion of others!

So it is too with the manner of worship. It does not matter in what way a person offers his respect and his reverence to the deity he worships. It only matters how sincere he is in his offering. In one house of God we find that people do not wear hats; in Hindustan, Persia, and Arabia they put on turbans to go to the mosque. That is their custom. It makes no difference whether one person prays standing, another sitting, another kneeling, another prostrating himself, another in company with other people and another alone. All that matters is that the heart of the worshipper is pure, that the mind is connected with God, that there is sincerity and earnestness.

* *

Prayer has been taught by all religions in different forms: by bowing, by prostrations, by recitation or chant. As soon as man begins to feel the immanence of God in nature, he begins to prostrate himself before that Being, calling his limited self helpless before Him, bowing before Him, worshipping Him. ... There are many virtues, but there is one principal virtue. Every moment passed outside the presence of God is sin, and every moment in His presence is virtue. The whole object of the Sufi, after learning this way of communicating is to arrive at a stage where every moment of our life passes in communion with God, and where our every action is done as if God were before us. Is that within everyone's reach? We are meant to be so. Just think of a person who is in love: when he eats or drinks, whatever he does, the image of the beloved is there. In the same way, when the love of God has come, it is natural to think of God in everything we do. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

* *

The Sufi does not need to follow a particular belief or faith, to restrict himself to a particular path. He can follow the Hindu way, the Muslim way, the way of any Church or faith, provided he treads this royal road: that the whole universe is but an immanence of beauty. ... How is the perfection of mind reached that we have to touch? It is reached through contemplation, through realization and understanding of the one current running through the whole of life. We begin to contemplate on that. The mind which we call in religious language the Almighty, and in mystical terms the divine mind, is the depth of life, the depth of activity, with which all activity and every activity is connected.

Therein lies the whole of religion. The mystic's prayer is to that beauty, and his work is to forget the self, to lose himself like a bubble in the water. The wave realizes, 'I am the sea', and by falling into the sea prostrates itself before its God. As it is said, 'Be ye perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect'. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

* *

The Sufi recognizes the knowledge of self as the essence of all religions; he traces it in every religion, he sees the same truth in each, and therefore he regards all as one. Hence he can realize the saying of Jesus; 'I and my Father are one.' The difference between creature and Creator remains on his lips, not in his soul. This is what is meant by union with God. It is in reality the dissolving of the false self in the knowledge of the true self, which is divine, eternal, and all pervading. 'He who attaineth union with God, his very self must lose,' said Amir. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

The sole aim of the mystic is to keep near to the idea of unity and to find out where we unite. There is an Arabic saying, 'If you wish to know God, you must know yourself.' How little man knows while he is in the intoxication of individualism! He thinks, 'I am a separate being; you are another; there is no connection between you and me, and we all have our own joys and free will.' Did man but know it, his life is dependent not only on the objects and things that keep the body alive, but also on the activity of a thousand minds in a day. ... Who then can say, 'I am an individual, independent and free, I can think as I wish, and I can do what I wish? ... We are connected with one another. Our lives are tied together, and there is a link in which we can see one current running through all. There are many globes and lamps, and yet one current is running through all. The mystic seeks to realize this constantly and to impress it on his mind in whatever he may see. What, for him, are the waves of the sea? Are they not the sea itself? - Hazrat Inayat Khan

The first and principle thing in the inner life is to establish a relationship with God, making God the object with which we relate ourselves, such as the Creator, Sustainer, Forgiver, Judge, Friend, Father, Mother, and Beloved. In every relationship we must place God before us, and become conscious of that relationship so that it will no more remain an imagination. ...

The work of the inner life is to make God a reality, so that He is no more an imagination; that this relationship that man has with God may seem more real than any other relationship in the world; and when this happens, then all relationships, however near and dear, become less binding. But at the same time, a person does not thus become cold; he becomes more loving. It is the godless man who is cold, impressed by the selfishness and lovelessness of the world, because he partakes of those conditions in which he lives. But the one who is in love with God, the one who has established his relationship with God, his love becomes living. ...

To him all things appeal, everything unfolds itself, and it is beauty to his eyes, because God is all-pervading, in all names and all forms; therefore his Beloved is never absent. How happy therefore is the one whose Beloved is never absent, because the whole tragedy of life is the absence of the beloved; and to one whose Beloved is always there, when he has closed his eyes the Beloved is within, and when he has opened his eyes the Beloved is without. His every sense perceives the Beloved; his eyes see Him, his ears hear His voice. When a person arrives at this realization he, so to speak, lives in the presence of God; then to him the different forms and beliefs, faiths and communities do not count. To him God is all-in-all; to him God is everywhere. If he goes to the Christian church, or to the synagogue, to the Buddhist temple, to the Hindu shrine, or to the mosque of the Muslim, there is God. In the wilderness, in the forest, in the crowd, everywhere he sees God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Of all the millions of believers in God perhaps only one makes God a reality, and that is because the picture man makes of God is as limited as himself. The knowledge of God is beyond man's reason. Man only perceives things he is capable of perceiving. He cannot raise his imagination above what he is used to, and he cannot reach beyond his imagination to where the being of God is. The secret of God is hidden in the knowledge of unity. ... True life cannot be ours until unity is achieved. It is the work of religion to promote the spirit of unity, in the knowledge and love of God to whom all devotion belongs. Man often seeks for psychic, occult, and magnetic powers. This is not the purpose of religion; these developments come of themselves. Where there is life and love, there is magnetism; love itself is the healing power and the remedy for all pain. All occult powers belong to the divine life, but man should live a natural life and realize the nature of God. The only studies which are worth accomplishing are those which lead to the realization of God, and of unity first with God and then with the self, and so with all. It is not necessary for us to be told that we have progressed; we ourselves will know when our hearts go forward; and by loving, forgiving, and serving, our whole life becomes one single vision of the sublime beauty of God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

One might say, 'How can one love God, God whom one does not know, does not see?' But the one who says this wants to take the second step instead of the first. He must first make God a reality, and then God will make him the truth. This stage is so beautiful. It makes the personality so tender and gentle. It gives such patience to the worshipper of God; and together with this gentleness and patience he becomes so powerful and strong that there is nothing that he will not face courageously: illness, difficulties, loss of money, opposition -- there is nothing that he is afraid of. With all his gentleness and tenderness, inwardly he becomes strong. ... If a friend comes to meet him, to the Sufi it is God who is coming to meet him. If a beggar is asking for a penny, it is God whom the Sufi recognizes in that form. If a wretched man is suffering misery, he sees also in this the existence of God. Only, the difference is that in some he sees God unconscious, in others he sees God conscious. All those who love him, who hate him, who like or dislike him, who look upon him with admiration or contempt, he looks at with the eyes of the worshipper of God, who sees his Beloved in all aspects. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Our minds need to be dusted and swept just as much as our houses, and this we do by meditation and concentration, which wipe away all wrong impressions. We must be masters of our own minds as well as our houses, and not allow them to be like a furniture warehouse with all the furniture mixed up together. We must direct where everything is to be placed, so that complete order may reign therein. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

The more the mind is allowed to go on without purpose, the more likely it is to become a vehicle or machine which all manner of influences around it of other human beings or spirit obsessions will employ instead of its owner. If the user of that mind is a sensible person, then it may perhaps act properly, but otherwise the work of the mind is wasted. In any case it would not be a fulfillment of the purpose of his life. This purpose is to learn mastery, not to be a vehicle for others to use. He who does not direct his own mind lacks mastery. ...

Man is his mind, is the product of his mind, and is also the controller of the activity of mind. If he does not control his mind, he is not a master but a slave. It lies with his own mind whether he shall be master, or whether he shall be slave. He is slave when he neglects to be master; he is master if he cares to be master. ... A man with a perfectly stilled, comforted, and rested mind will at once raise up another who is going through distress, or restlessness, or pain, or ill-temper, or worry, or anxiety. The very presence of one whose mind is stilled gives such hope, such inspiration, such sympathy, such power and life. All the heavenly properties flow so smoothly and freely from the person whose mind is stilled that his words, his voice, his presence, all react upon the mind of others; and as he stills his mind, so his very presence becomes healing. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Sages, such as St. Francis, have spoken with rocks, birds, and animals, not as we talk, but by means of an insight into things. And every object expressed itself to them, speaking to them about its past, its present, and its future. ... The seer will see all in his consciousness, and wherever he casts his glance, he will see still more clearly. As Sadi says, 'Each leaf of a tree becomes a book of revelation to the one who sees. And he reads the whole of nature as a book.' - Hazrat Inayat Khan

The Sufi establishes his relationship with God as the relationship between him and the Beloved. His worship of God is the expansion of the heart. His love for all beings and for every being is his love for God. He cannot find anyone to love except God, because he sees God in all. If his love is shown in devotion to parents, to wife, to children if it is shown to neighbors, to a friend or in tolerating enemies, the Sufi considers this as an action of his love towards God. In this way he fulfills in his life the teaching of the Bible, ' We live and move and have our being in God.' - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Jesus Christ not only told us to love our friends, but also, he went as far as to say we should love our enemies; and the Sufi treads the same path. He considers his charity of heart towards his fellow man to be love for God; and in showing love to everyone, he feels he is giving his love to God.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

When we have gained mastery over the self, we have mastery over all things. ... Self-control is an attribute which distinguishes man from the animal; both have their appetites and passions, but it is man alone who can control them.

* *

Do not bemoan the past, do not worry about the future, but try to make the best of today.

* *

To the eye of the seer every leaf of the tree is a page of the holy book that contains divine revelation, and he is inspired every moment of his life by constantly reading and understanding the holy script of nature. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

It is useless to discuss the peace of the world. What is necessary just now is to create peace in ourselves that we, ourselves, become examples of love, harmony and peace. That is the only way of saving the world and ourselves. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

True self-denial is losing one's self in God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Virtues such as tolerance, mercy, forgiveness and compassion rise of themselves in the heart which is awakened to love. . . . The infirmities such as jealousy, hatred and all manner of prejudice begin to spring up when the shadow of love has fallen on the heart of the mortal. The former love raises man to immortality, the latter turns the immortal soul into a mortal being. A poet has said that the first step in love teaches selflessness, if it is not experienced then one has taken a step in the wrong direction, although one calls it love. For man has learned from the moment he was born on earth the words 'I am'. It is love alone that teaches him to say, 'Thou art, not I'. For no soul can love and yet affirm its own existence. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

The mind of an average person may be pictured as an unruly horse that jumps and kicks and throws anyone that tries to ride it. Masters of the world are those who have mastered themselves, and mastery lies in the control of the mind. If the mind became your obedient servant, the whole world is at your service. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

He who does not direct his own mind lacks mastery. ... If there is any self of which one can say, 'This is man', it is the mind. The three Sanskrit words Mana, Manu, Manusha show that man is his mind, is the product of his mind, and is also the controller of the activity of mind. If he does not control his mind, he is not a master but a slave. It lies with his own mind whether he shall be master, or whether he shall be slave. He is slave when he neglects to be master; he is master if he cares to be master. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Mastery lies not merely in stilling the mind, but in directing it towards whatever point we desire, in allowing it to be active as far as we wish, in using it to fulfill our purpose, in causing it to be still when we want to still it. He who has come to this has created his heaven within himself; he has no need to wait for a heaven in the hereafter, for he has produced it within his own mind now. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

In reality God is within man; man is the instrument of God and through him God experiences the external world. Prayer is the way of conveying the God within to the God without; and thought, speech and gesture make the prayer complete. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Life is a misery for the person absorbed in himself. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

The wave realizes, 'I am the sea', and by falling into the sea prostrates itself before its God

He is thoughtful whose mind is directed by his will, whose mind fulfills his intentions, whose mind is under the control of his intention. ... Only those who have controlled the activity of their minds have given deep thoughts to the world. Those whose minds are working mechanically like a machine, or just reflecting the activity of those around them, may appear to be living beings, but the mystic would say differently; for it is not till a person has gained mastery over his mind, till he is above this activity, that he is a ruling power, a true person.

When we think about it, we find that all the things that are accomplished in this world are accomplished by the power of mind. ... Whatever man creates in science, in art, in phenomena or wonder making, in poetry, in music, in pictures, in everything that he brings into being, is all achieved by the power of mind. ... If he does not control his mind, he is not a master but a slave. It lies with his own mind whether he shall be master, or whether he shall be slave. He is slave when he neglects to be master; he is master if he cares to be master.

Self-control is the most necessary thing to be learned; a person may have great spirituality, illumination and piety, but in the absence of self-control this is nothing. Self-control also is the way of happiness and peace. ... No thought or feeling should arise without our will. When we have gained mastery over the self, we have mastery over all things. ... Self-control is an attribute which distinguishes man from the animal; both have their appetites and passions, but it is man alone who can control them. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

The control of the self means the control of everything. What does it mean when we see a person fail time after time, or another person succeed time after time? It is just a matter of holding the reins of our affairs in our hands. When there is no rein there is failure. Failure means that there has been lack of self-control, whether it is a failure in affairs or in health. Illness always comes when a person has lost the control of the self. It is because this is the main theme of metaphysics that Hatha Yoga has been considered of the greatest value. All the miracles and all the wonders that have ever been known in this world have been done by those who have been able to control themselves by abstinence, and therefore to control life. However much was said upon this subject, it would still not express it. To begin with a person is puzzled by it, and he wonders whether he should believe it or not. That is why in the East the adepts never speak of their experiences in the spiritual life. They only tell their disciples to lead it and practice for years. 'That will make it clear to you', they say. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

While some blame another for causing him harm, the wise one first takes himself to task. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Jul 9, 2023 7:03:48 PM | quotations

quotations- favorites to ponder, about many subjects

Love wholeheartedly, be surprised, give thanks and praise – then you will discover the fullness of your life. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

Our life is frittered away by detail. – H.D. Thoreau

Our perception that we have “no time” is one of the distinctive marks of modern Western culture. – Margaret Visser

Many wealthy people are little more than janitors of their possessions. -Frank Lloyd Wright

To be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness. – Bertrand Russell

Simplicity doesn’t mean to live in misery and poverty.

You have what you need, and you don’t have what you don’t need. - Charan Singh

Who is rich? He that is content. Who is that? Nobody. – Benjamin Franklin

Try to unite the divine in you to the divine in all things. last words of Plotinus

The transcendent One is beyond anything we can conceive. To say that it is absolutely wonderful or perfect or beautiful—in fact, even to say it exists in any sense we can understand—is to fall far short of the reality. It can’t be described, it can only be experienced when the soul releases its attachment to the inner and outer worlds, and plunges deep within into the very heart of reality. . . . The one “exists” beyond space and time, so there is no question of a beginning or an end to the process of creative emanation. It occurs only “now”—which means it occurs throughout all eternity.

– Plotinus (202 – 270 AD)

(Plotinus would say that) The soul does not, strictly speaking, exist in space and time like the body, but is rooted in transcendental reality. . . .While the outer world contains tangible three-dimensional objects like trees and bees and seas, the inner world is non-dimensional and contains the archetypal patterns or “ideas” on which external forms are based. . . .

When consciousness impresses itself on matter, chaos is transformed into cosmos, order emerges from entropy, and the organic world available to our senses appears.

Matter has no creative potency of its own but is the outer substance that the living forces of the inner world use to create a universe in which souls can play. . . .

Plotinus says the soul is, in a sense, “amphibious,” living sometimes “here” in the deep and ever-turbulent waters of material existence, and part of the time “there” in a changeless land of light. “The chains of our senses keep us bound here, as if we’re trapped in a cave.”

-Linda Johnsen

The Man who lives a life of self awareness

is his own driver and skillfully finds his way. -Plotinus

Try to unite the divine in you to the divine in all things. -last words of Plotinus, 270 AD

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He who would follow me must leave self behind. -Jesus

* * *

The value of a human being is determined primarily by the measure and the sense in which he has attained liberation from the self. -Einstein

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There ain’t no devil; he’s just God when he’s drunk. - Don Rollins quoting somebody ?

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Emotional intelligence—Goleman’s term for self-awareness, altruism, personal motivation, empathy, and the ability to love and be loved by friends, spouses, partners, and family members. Emotional Intelligence is not fixed at birth and can be cultivated at any stage of life. – Larry Dossey, MD

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Some day, after we have mastered the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, . . . we shall harness . . . the energies of love. Then, for the second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire. -TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

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Every subatomic interaction consists of the annihilation of the original particles and the creation of new subatomic particles. The subatomic world is a continual dance of creation and annihilation, of mass changing into energy and energy changing into mass. Transient forms sparkle in and out of existence, creating a never-ending, forever newly created reality.

GARY ZUKA

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The most valuable learning is not about memorizing facts and figures. It is not about higher grade point averages and accumulating degrees. It is about life itself, and its impact is on the heart. -Rodney Smith, "Lessons From the Dying"

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What can we gain by sailing to the moon if we are not able to cross the abyss that separates us from ourselves? This is the most important of all voyages of discovery, and without it, all the rest are not only useless, but disastrous. -THOMAS MERTON

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Wisdom does not mean knowledge but experiential understanding. Wisdom helps you to change radically your habits and perceptions, as you discover the constantly changing, interconnected nature of the whole of existence.-Martine Batchelor, "Meditation For Life"

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Because we all share this planet earth, we have to learn to live in harmony and peace with each other and with nature. This is not just a dream, but a necessity.
-His Holiness the Dalai Lama

***

It would indeed be ironic if, in the name of national defense, we would sanction the subversion of one of those liberties which make the defense of our nation worthwhile.

***

Mitakuye oyasin, say the Lakota.

"All beings are my relations."

"So far as prejudice, or prepossession of opinion prevails over our minds, in the same proportion, reason is excluded from our theory or practice. Therefore if we would acquire useful knowledge, we must first divest ourselves of those impediments and sincerely endeavor to search out the truth: and draw our conclusions from reason and just argument, which will never conform to our inclination, interest or fancy but we must conform to that if we would judge rightly." ~ Ethan Allen

A wave in the sea, seen in one way, seems to have a distinct identity, an end and a beginning, a birth and a death. Seen in another way, the wave itself doesn’t really exist but is just the behavior of water, “empty” of any separate identity but “full” of water. So when you really think about the wave, you come to realize that it is something that has been made temporarily possible by wind and water, and is dependent on a set of constantly changing circumstances. You also realize that every wave is related to every other wave.

ALBERT EINSTEIN

Live your life so that when you die, even the undertaker is sad. Mark Twain

If you do not change your direction, you are likely to end up where you are headed.

~Ancient Chinese Proverb

The first part of the spiritual journey should properly be called psychological rather than spiritual because it involves peeling away the myths and illusions that have misinformed us.
Sam Keen

The universe is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.

-Eden Philpotts

May I have the serenity to accept

that which I can’t change,

Courage to change the things I can and should,

And the wisdom to know the difference.

* * *

There is no single effort more radical in its potential for saving the world

than a transformation of the way we raise our children.

-Marianne Williamson

* * *

It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble.

It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.

-Mark Twain

* * *

What everybody knows is usually comfortable and untrue. –Naomi Bliven

* * *

Example is the school of mankind; indeed they will learn at no other.

* * *

The voyage of discovery lies not in seeking new vistas, but in having new eyes. -Proust

* * *

I ASSIGN YOU to be a beautiful, good, kind, awakened, soulful person, a true work of art as we say, ser humano, a true human being. In a world filled with so much darkness, such a soul shines like gold; can be seen from a far distance; is dramatically different.

… Anything you do from the soulful self will help lighten the burdens of the world. Anything. You have no idea what the smallest word, the tiniest generosity can cause to be set in motion. Be outrageous in forgiving. Be dramatic in reconciling. Mistakes? Back up and make them as right as you can, then move on. Be off the charts in kindness. In whatever you are called to, strive to be devoted to it in all aspects large and small. Fall short? Try again. Mastery is made in increments, not in leaps. Be brave, be fierce, be visionary. Mend the parts of the world that are "within your reach." To strive to live this way is the most dramatic gift you can ever give to the world.

Consider yourselves assigned.

—Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Ph.D., from An Assignment for You from Dr. Estés

* * *

ORDINARY RICHES CAN be stolen, real riches cannot. In your soul are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you. – Oscar Wilde

* * *

We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. . .Hatred and bitterness can never cure the disease of fear; only love can do that. We must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love. MLK Jr.

* * *

Business is a good game—lots of competition and a minimum of rules. You keep score with money. –Nolan Bushnell, Atari founder (fascinating, and dangerous)

* * *

In music, in a flower, in a leaf, in an act of kindness ... I see what people call God in all these things. - Pablo Casals

* * *

Man is a credulous animal, and must believe something;

in the absence of good grounds for belief, he will be satisfied with bad ones.

-Bertrand Russell

* * *

It is not disbelief that is dangerous to our society, it is belief. -George Bernard Shaw

* * *

If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. -African proverb

* * *

Common sense and a sense of humor are the same thing, moving at different speeds. A sense of humor is just common sense, dancing. -William James

* * *

A so-called fault is a weak place where character can change. -Robert Aitkin Roshi

* * *

We see the world all wrong, and that’s why we suffer.

-Kate Lula Wheeler

* * *

Terrorism is the war of the poor; war is the terrorism of the rich.

-Peter Ustinov

* * *

Our ancestry streches back through the life forms and into the stars, back into the beginnings of the primeval fireball. This universe is a single multiform energetic unfolding of matter, mind, intelligence and life.

-Brian Swimme

* * *

God has arranged everything in the universe in consideration of everything else.

-Hildegard of Bingen

* * *

The human person is a centre of consciousness which is capable of infinite extension and as it grows it becomes more and more integrated with the whole complex of persons who make up humanity.

-Bede Griffiths

* * *

The supernova is a multivalent event: simultaneously a profound destruction and yet an exuberant creativity.

-Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme

* * *

Relation is the essence of everything that is.

-Meister Eckhart

* * *

Our vitality depends upon the connections we establish and the communion we share. . .

Our gifts, as lifegiving as their full expression can be for us, are foremost for others. . .

Communion that honors the other, that reverences the Holy One in the other and in the self—this is what we embrace. Connectedness is primary. Communion is essential.

-Judy Cannato

* * *

As holons with consciousness, we are able to move to new levels of awareness. We are capable of negotiating the tension between self-preservation and self-adaptation in a way that affirms both our agency and our connectedness to all that is. The capacity for self-transcendene means that we are able to evolve in complexity. Our cognitive, moral, and ethical awareness can develop greater depth as we engage life and grow in our ability to know what is valuable and what is peripheral. We have the ability to question and to dream, to expand our vision and live out of other-centered concern. Our capacity for self-transcendence asserts that healing is possible, that we are more than our wounds and our scars. As we engage this capacity, we grow in freedom. As we embrace the process that allows us to transcend, fear begins to fall away as we recognize our value as part of the whole that is continuing to emerge.

-Judy Cannato

* * *

We all long for heaven where God is, but we have it in our power to be in heaven with Him at this very moment. But being happy with Him now means:

Loving as He loves,
Helping as He helps,
Giving as He gives,
Serving as He serves,
Rescuing as He rescues,
Being with Him twenty-four hours,
Touching Him in his distressing disguise.

-Mother Theresa

* * *

Great people talk about ideas

Average people talk about things

Small people talk about other people.

* * *

"Human beings are not our enemy. Our enemy is not the other person. Our

enemy is the violence, ignorance, and injustice in us and in the other

person. When we are armed with compassion and understanding, we fight not

against other people, but against the tendency to invade, to dominate, and

to exploit."

Thich Nhat Hanh

* * *

Time spent thinking about past and future is time taken away from living. -Barry Bub, MD

* * *

What is a great spiritual practitioner? A person who lives always in the presence of his or her own true self, someone who has found and who uses continually the springs and sources of profound inspiration. As the modem English writer Lewis Thompson wrote:

“Christ, supreme poet, lived truth so passionately that every gesture of his, at once pure Act and perfect Symbol, embodies the transcendent.”

To embody the transcendent is why we are here.

* * *

To be profoundly grateful is the most primary of all religious attitudes. -Ronald Rolheiser

* * *

To be a saint is to be motivated by gratitude. -Ronald Rolheiser

* * *

Proper gratitude is ultimate virtue. It defines sanctity. -Ronald Rolheiser

* * *

Resiliency is the key to love. -Ronald Rolheiser

* * *

Loss and bereavement can remind you sharply of what can happen when in life you do not show your love and appreciation, or ask for forgiveness, and so make you far more sensitive to your loved ones.

Elisabeth Kubler-Ross said: ‘What I try to teach people is to live in such a way that you say those things while the other person can still hear it.” And Raymond Moody, after his life’s work in near-death research, wrote: “I have begun to realize how near to death we all are in our daily lives. More than ever now I am very careful to let each person I love know how I feel.”

* * *

The only devils in the world are the ones running around in our own hearts.

That is where the battle must be fought. -Mahatma Gandhi.

* * *

Sensation of the Mystical
("found poetry")

The most beautiful and profound emotion we can experience
is the sensation of the mystical.
It is the sower of all true science.
He to whom this emotion is a stranger,
who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe,
is as good as dead.
To know that what is impenetrable to us really exists,
manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty,
which our dull faculties can comprehend only in their primitive forms -
this knowledge, this feeling,
is at the center of true religion.

~ Albert Einstein ~

* * *

Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things can not be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.

-- Mark Twain

* * *

The Dalai Lama

* * *

"Washing one's hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless means to side with the powerful, not to be neutral."

-Paulo Freire, educator (1921-1997).

* * *

Absolutely everything can be enjoyed when it is celebrated. Anything can be enjoyed when we make friends with it. -Arjun Ardagh

* * *

Something we were withholding made us weak,until we found it was ourselves. ~Robert Frost

* * *

It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog. -Mark Twain

* * *

At a certain point in our lives, we lose control of what's happening to us, and our lives become controlled by fate. That's the world's greatest lie. -Paulo Coelho

* * *

Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dream.-Paulo Coelho

* * *

What happens once will never happen again. But what happens twice will surely happen a third time.-Paulo Coelho

* * *

God is where you let Him in.-Paulo Coelho

* * *

Don't think about what you've left behind.-Paulo Coelho

* * *

It is said that the darkest hour of the night comes just before the dawn.-Paulo Coelho

* * *

May love be your guide in every moment of your life. -Paulo Coelho

* * *

No matter what he does, every person on earth plays a central role in the history of the world. And normally he doesn't know it. -Paulo Coelho

* * *

The moment we begin to seek love, love begins to seek us. -Paulo Coelho

* * *

Don't you ever allow doubts to paralyze your actions. -Paulo Coelho

* * *

The soul of the world is nourished by people's happiness. -Paulo Coelho

* * *

Perhaps my most important task

is learning how to skillfully and lovingly choose

the mental events I have in the next few moments.

Perhaps that’s the only thing I can control.

-EDM

***

Our greatest glory consists not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.

-Confucius

Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, and today is a gift; that’s why they call it the present. -Eleanor Roosevelt

The most wasted of all days is one without laughter. -E.E. Cummings

* * *

What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly. – Richard Bach

* * *

I cannot say whether things will get better if we change; what I can say is they must change if they are to get better. – Georg C Lichtenberg

* * *

Those who expect moments of change to be comfortable and free of conflict have not learned their history. ~Joan Wallach Scott

* * *

GARY ZUKAV

* * *

Only that day dawns to which we are awake. -Henry David Thoreau
* * *

The real challenge that defines our humanity is this: how do we take on reality as it unfolds, navigate it, and truly stay awake and alive in this moment of life, whatever its contours. -Jon Kabat Zinn

* * *

In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.

-Albert Camus

* **

The whole universe is breathing as our breath; we limit the process by our assumption

that we are doing the breathing. - Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan, Alchemical Wisdom

* * *

Gratitude can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. It makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.- Melody Beattie

* * *

Difficult things provoke all your irritations and bring your habitual patterns to the surface. And that becomes the moment of truth. You have the choice to launch into your lousy habitual patterns, or to stay with the rawness and discomfort of the situation and let it transform you. -Pema Chodron

* * *

Talk about the joys of the unexpected, can they compare with the joys of the expected, of finding everything delightfully and completely what you knew it was going to be?- Elizabeth Bibesco Balloons

* * *

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.- Marcel Proust

* * *

There is a calmness to a life lived in Gratitude, a quiet joy. -Ralph H. Blum

* * *

A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves. -Edward Murrow

* * *

I’m not afraid of storms, for I’m learning how to sail my ship. -Louisa May Alcott

* * *

In the stillness of the quiet, if we listen, we can hear the whisper of the heart giving strength to weakness, courage to fear, hope to despair. - Howard Thurman

* * *

Oh would some power the gift give us, to see ourselves as others see us! - Robert Burns

* * *

A problem is a chance for you to do your best. -Duke Ellington

* * *

A true friend is someone who thinks that you are a good egg even though he knows that you are slightly cracked.

* * *

The future is not some place we are going, but one we are creating.The paths are not to be found, but made. And the activity of making them changes both the maker and their destination. - John Schaar

Providence has hidden a charm in difficult undertakings which is appreciated only by those who dare to grapple with them.Anne-Sophie SwetchineThe Writings of Madame Swetchine

* * *

Holiness comes wrapped in the ordinary. There are burning bushes all around you. Every tree is full of angels. Hidden beauty is waiting in every crumb.

-Macrina Wiederkehr, O.S.B, A Tree Full of Angels

* * *

If you have a strong mind and plant in it a firm resolve, you can change

your destiny.- Paramahansa Yogananda

* * *

Laughter is carbonated holiness.- Anne Lamott

* * *

Recipients of our appreciation are apt to express their own gratitude to others, lengthening the unending, golden chain of connections-in-goodness that stretches across the world.

- Mary Ford Grabowsky The Way of Mary

* * *

A grateful heart is the mainspring of happiness. -Ossian Land

How happy a person is depends upon the depth of his gratitude. -John Miller

Your life is the sum of your present moments. -Jon Kabat-Zinn

It is not the years in your life, but the life in your years that count. -Adlai Stevenson

There are two ways to get enough; one is to continue to accumulate more and more. The other is to desire less. -G.K. Chesterton

A thankful person can find contentment anywhere.

What one loves in childhood stays in the heart forever.

-Mary Jo Putney

The secret of true happiness lies in wanting what you already have.

-Alexandra Stoddard

The older you get the more you realize that kindness is synonymous with happiness.

-Lionel Barrymore

Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.

-Mother Teresa

* * *

A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops. -Henry Adams

The quality of person's life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor. -Vince Lombardi

Real knowledge is to know the extent of one's ignorance. -Confucius

I think self-awareness is the most important thing towards being a champion.

-Billie Jean King

* * *

Fundamentally, what everyone needs is mental strength and confidence, to manage the mind, just as we manage the outside world. - Amma

* * *

Unless we have a certain degree of mastery over the mind, true peace is difficult to attain.

- Amma

* * *

When we do not express love in our words and actions it is like honey hidden in a rock.

-Amma

* * *

The world is perfect, including our efforts to change it.-Ram Dass

* * *

Success depends upon how high you bounce when you hit bottom.

* * *

There is always an easy solution to every human problem - neat, plausible and wrong.

L. Mencken

* * *

If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant; if we did not

sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome. - Anne Bradstreet

* * *

One thing I understand now is that one’s intellect alone won’t pull one through, and that the greatest service it can perform is to open a window for that thing we call the divine spirit.

Hilda Clark (1908), quoted in Plain Living by Catherine Whitmire

* * *

If you look at every human being as a Divine mirror, you will know yourself and understand life. - Sherif Baba

* *

Do all you can with what you have, in the time you have, in the place you are.

- Nkosi Johnson Twelve-year-old Zulu boy, living with AIDS

* * *

A good laugh and a long sleep are the two best cures. –Irish saying

* * *

A well-spent day brings happy sleep. –Leonardo da Vinci

* * *

The higher our flame of altruistic action burns, the more its light will suffuse your life with happiness. Those who possess an altruistic spirit are the happiest people of all.

– Daisaku Ikeda

* * *

Celebrating the spirit of children, may laughter, discovery and wonder guide our way.

–on plaque at Common Ground

* * *

Loss makes artists of us all . . . as we weave new patterns in the fabric of our lives. –Greta Crosby

* * *

Do unto others as they would have you do unto them. -Harville Hendricks

* * *

Sleep is the golden chain that ties health and our bodies together. – Thomas Decker

* * *

Whatever helps an individual to be a better person, find peace, and help others is the best path for him or her. - Andi Young

* * *

Happiness makes up in height for what it lacks in length. -Robert Frost

* * *

Memories of loved ones are like songs in our soul. -Margaret Wakeley

* * *

The foremost teacher is he or she who exposes one's faults, and whose advice resonates. -Bruce Wagner

* * *

Oh would some power the gift give us, to see ourselves as others see us!- Robert Burns

* * *

To meet everything and everyone through stillness instead of mental noise is the greatest gift you can offer to the universe. -Eckhart Tolle Stillness Speaks

* * *

And love will simply have no choice but to go into battle with space and time, and furthermore, to win. - James Baldwin, in Nothing Personal

* * *

One single gift acknowledged in gratefulness has the power to dissolve

the ties of our alienation. - David Steindl-Rast Gratefulness,the Heart of Prayer

* * *

To generous souls every task is noble. - Euripides

* * *

The happiness of one's own heart alone cannot satisfy the soul; one must try to include, as necessary to one's own happiness, the happiness of others. -Paramahansa Yogananda

* * *

Pick battles big enough to matter, small enough to win. -Jonathon Kozol

* * *

Often it is only when people suddenly feel they are losing their partner that they realize how much they love them. Then they cling on even tighter. But the more they grasp, the more the other person escapes them, and the more fragile the relationship becomes.

So often we want happiness, but the very way we pursue it is so clumsy and unskillful that it brings only more sorrow. Usually we assume we must grasp in order to have that something that will ensure our happiness. We ask ourselves: “How can we possibly enjoy anything if we cannot own it?” How often attachment is mistaken for love!

Even when the relationship is a good one, love can be spoiled by attachment with its insecurity, possessiveness, and pride; and then when love is gone, all you have left to show for it are the “souvenirs” of love, the scars of attachment.

* * *

Live in the present. Do the things that need to be done. Do all the good you can each day. The future will unfold. -Peace Pilgrim

* * *

The same stream of life that runs through my veins night and day runs through the world and dances in rhythmic measures. -RabindranathTagoreGitanjaliLXIX

* * *

Instead of looking for love, give it; constantly renew it in yourself

and you will always feel its presence within you. It will always be

there smiling at you, gazing on you kindly.- Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov

* * *

The main thing in one's own private world is to try to laugh as much as

you cry. - Maya Angelou

* * *

How can you not love the one who feeds you? – Vicki Robin

* * *

It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible

to the eye.- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

* * *

The sun, with all those planets revolving around it and dependent on it, can still ripen a bunch of grapes as if it had nothing else in the universe to do.- Galileo Galilei

* * *

People, even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anyone. -Audrey Hepburn

* * *

We do not receive wisdom; we discover it for ourselves by a voyage that no one can take for us, a voyage that no one can spare us.- Marcel Proust

* * *

One of the sanest, surest, and most generous joys of life comes from being happy over the good fortune of others.- Archibald Rutledge

* * *

To imagine the thoughtlessness of a thoughtless thing is useless. The heart must sing of itself to keep awake. - Wendell Berry

* * *

Honor your own complexity.- Mark Gerzon Coming Into Our Own

* * *

There is no way to peace. Peace is the way. -A.J. Muste

* * *

Not one single atom opposes us. -Zen Master Hongzhi

* * *

It is a wise man that does know the contented man is never poor, whilst the discontented man is never rich. -Frank Herbert

Without change, something sleeps inside us, and seldom awakens. The sleeper must awaken. - Frank Herbert

I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. -Frank Herbert

Think you of the fact that a deaf person cannot hear. Then, what deafness may we not all possess? What senses do we lack that we cannot see and cannot hear another world all around us? -Frank Herbert

Understanding requires words. Some things cannot be reduced to words. There are things that can only be experienced wordlessly... The act of saying that things exist that cannot be described in words shakes a universe where words are supreme. -Frank Herbert

To endure oneself may be the hardest task in the universe. You cannot hire a wise man or any other intellect to solve it for you. There's no writ of inquest or calling of witness to provide answers. -Frank Herbert

Too much knowledge never makes for simple decisions.

Stasis is the most dangerous of those things which are not natural. –Paul Atredies

The most dangerous of all creations is a rigid code of ethics. –Paul

Humiliation is a thing no person can forget. –Paul

Choose a good worm. –Fremen parting words

Abandon certainty! That’s life’s deepest command. That’s what life’s all about. –The Preacher

Tend to the wolf within your fences. The packs ranging outside may not even exist.

Knowing is a barrier that prevents learning. –Leto

To claim absolute knowledge is to become monstrous. Knowledge is an unending adventure on the edge of uncertainty. –Leto

Every question, every problem doesn’t have a single correct answer. One must permit diversity. A monolith is unstable. –Leto

My mind controls my reality. –Farad’n

We possess only this moment in which to dedicate ourselves continuously to the sacred presence which we share and create.

To endure oneself may be the hardest task in the universe. –Duncan Idaho’s Ghoula

There are many degrees of sight and many degrees of blindness. –Paul

Every man carries his own past with him. Hayt

If you need something to worship, then worship life – all life, every last crawling bit of it! We’re all in this beauty together. -Paul

* * *

To speak gratitude is courteous and pleasant, to enact gratitude is generous and noble, but to live gratitude is to touch Heaven. -Johannes A. Gaertner

* * *

Expect to have hope rekindled. Expect your prayers to be answered in wondrous ways. The dry seasons in life do not last. The spring rains will come again. -Sarah Ban Breathnach

* * *

There are two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle. -Albert Einstein

* * *

Those who are lifting the world upward and onward are those who encourage more than criticize. -Elizabeth Harrison

* * *

A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart, and can sing it back to you when you have forgotten the words. -Donna Roberts

* * *

Get rich quick. Count your blessings.

* * *

How did the rose ever open its heart and give to this world all of its beauty? It felt the encouragement of Light against its being; otherwise we all remain too frightened.

-Hafiz, translated by Daniel Ladinsky- Love Poems from God

* * *

The acme of skill of the true warrior is to be victorious without fighting. –Sun Tsu

* * *

If the past is unredeemable, and the future unpredictable, what more practical course is open than to safeguard the present by constant remembrance of the divine? -Paul Brunton Notebooks

* * *

Beauty seen makes the one who sees it more beautiful. -David Steindl-Rast -A Listening Heart

* * *

The mystery of God touches us -- or does not -- in the smallest details: giving a strawberry, with love; receiving a touch, with love; sharing the snapdragon red of an autumn sunset, with love. -Marion Woodman -Coming Home to Myself

* * *

O how I laugh when I think of my vague indefinite riches. No run on my

bank can drain it, for my wealth is not possession but enjoyment. -Henry David Thoreau

* * *

Treat everyone you meet as if he or she were going to be dead by midnight. Extend to them all the care, kindness, and understanding you can muster, and do so with no thought of reward. Your life will never be the same. -Og Mandino -The Greatest Salesman in the World

* * *

All the flowers of all the tomorrows are in the seeds of today.

Indian Proverb

* * *

Winning is important to me, but what brings me real joy is the experience of being fully engaged in whatever I'm doing. -Phil Jackson

* * *

The burden which is well borne becomes light. - Ovid

* * *

It is a wholesome and necessary thing for us to turn again to the earth and in the contemplation of her beauties to know of wonder and humility. - Rachel Carson

* * *

Observe the wonders as they occur around you. Don’t claim them. Feel the artistry moving through and be silent.

Jalaluddin Rumi

* * *

Don't be concerned about being disloyal to your pain by being joyous.

-Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan, Alchemical Wisdom

* * *

In a gentle way you can shake the world.- one of Cesar Chavez's favorite quotes from Gandhi

* * *

An optimist isn't necessarily a blithe, sappy whistler in the dark. To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. If we remember those times and places where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us energy to act and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.

Howard Zinn

* * *

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.

Leonardo da Vinci

* * *

The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.

Eleanor Roosevelt

* * * 12-16-10

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. -Margaret Mead

* * *

In the dew of little things, the heart finds its morning and is refreshed. - Kahlil Gibran
The Prophet

* * *

Loss and bereavement can remind you sharply of what can happen when in life you do not show your love and appreciation, or ask for forgiveness, and so make you far more sensitive to your loved ones.

Elisabeth Kubler-Ross said: ‘What I try to teach people is to live in such a way that you say those things while the other person can still hear it.”

* * *

When I started counting my blessings, my whole life turned around. - Willie Nelson

* * *

One powerful way to evoke compassion is to think of others as exactly the same as you. “After all,” the Dalai Lama explains, “all human beings are the same—made of human flesh, bones, and blood. We all want happiness and want to avoid suffering. Further, we have an equal right to be happy. In other words, it is important to realize our sameness as human beings.”

* * *

When we try to pick out anything by itself we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.- John Muir

* * *

God is not attained by a process of addition to anything in the soul, but by a process of subtraction. -Meister Eckhart

* * *

We hold the key to lasting happiness in our own hands. For it is not joy that makes us grateful; it is gratitude that makes us joyful.

Joy is that extraordinary happiness that is independent of what happens to us. -Brother David Steindl-Rast

* * *

When a door closes a stain glass window opens.....you just need to look to the light.

* * *

I used my fine command of language -and kept silent -Author unknown

* * *

Happiness is a matter of one's most ordinary and everyday mode of consciousness being busy and lively and unconcerned with self. ~Iris Murdoch

* * *

Goodness is the only investment which never fails. - Henry David Thoreau

* * *

Tears are often the telescope by which men see far into heaven. -Henry Ward Beecher

* * *

It's better to light a candle than curse the darkness. -Helen Keller

* * *

When you listen generously to people they can hear the truth in themselves, often for the first time. -Rachel Naomi Remen

* * *

Only gratefulness, in the form of limitless openness for surprise, lays hold of the fullness of life in hope. - David Steindl-Rast, in Gratefulness, the Heart of Prayer

* * *

BE SILENT Hear the voices of day and night.

BE STILL Know thyself.

BE AWARE Find the secret.

-Camp Akita sign

* * *

All this hurrying soon will be over. Only when we tarry do we touch the holy. -Rainer Maria Rilke, In Praise of Mortality, translated and edited by Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy

* * *

The art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on. -Havelock Ellis

The contemplative is one who would rather not know than know. -Thomas Merton

As you walk and eat and travel, be where you are. Otherwise you will miss most of your life. -Buddha

The reformer is always right about what is wrong. He is generally wrong about what is right.

A mouse can eat an elephant, one bite at a time.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

One who would gather roses must not fear thorns. -Dutch proverb

One who angers you, controls you. -Buddhist aphorism

Let one who would move the world, first move himself. -Socrates

A good scare is worth more than good advice. -Horace

The whole world is God, but tell me, where are your eyes. -Rumi

Don't sweat the small stuff.

Drop by drop fills the pot. -Duala

Life is not waiting for the storm to pass. It is learning to dance in the rain.

If you can't say something nice, don't say nuthin at all. - Thumper's mother, in Bambi

Life is too important to be taken seriously. -Oscar Wilde

Nature is my church.

We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.

Don't believe everything you think.

* * *

When every situation which life can offer is turned to the profit of spiritual growth, no situation can really be a bad one. - Paul Brunton

* * *

The little things? The little moments? They aren't little. - Jon Kabat-Zinn

* * *

Resentment is like taking poison and waiting for the other person to die.

* * *

Being generous creates an atmosphere that is more sacred. - Bro. David

* * *

My Prayer
May I live this day
Compassionate of heart,
Clear in word,
Gracious in awareness,
Courageous in thought,
Generous in love.

-John O'Donohue

* * *

Maimonides, often called by his acronym RaMBaM (Rabbi Moshe Ben Maimon), was a 12th century Jewish scholar and physician. Rambam wrote a code of Jewish law, the Mishnah Torah, based on the Rabbinic oral tradition.

Rambam organized the different levels of tzedakah (charity) into a list from the least to the most honorable.

8. When donations are given grudgingly.

7. When one gives less than he should, but does so cheerfully.

6. When one gives directly to the poor upon being asked.

5. When one gives directly to the poor without being asked.

4. When the recipient is aware of the donor's identity, but the donor does not know the identity of the recipient.

3. When the donor is aware of the recipient's identity, but the recipient is unaware of the source.

2. When the donor and recipient are unknown to each other.

1. The highest form of charity is to help sustain a person before they become impoverished by offering a substantial gift in a dignified manner, or by extending a suitable loan, or by helping them find employment or establish themselves in business so as to make it unnecessary for them to become dependent on others.

* * *

If the eye of the heart is open, in each atom there will be one hundred secrets.

Attar of Nishapur (c.1142–c.1220), Persian Sufi poet

* * *

I like not to know for as long as possible because then it tells me the truth instead of me imposing the truth.

Michael Moschen

* * *

Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a

listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all

of which have the potential to turn a life around. - Leo Buscaglia

* * *

Have patience with all things, but chiefly have patience with yourself. Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections but instantly set about remedying them – every day begin the task anew.

Saint Francis de Sales

* * *

In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer. - Albert Camus

* * *

A man who works with his hands is a laborer; a man who works with his hands and

his brain is a craftsman; but a man who works with his hands and his brain and

his heart is an artist. -Louis Nizer

* * *

Your life is always working, whether you know it or not. Sometimes it works to bring you what you want, and sometimes it works to keep you from what you think you want.

Neale Donald Walsch

* * *

By saying grace, we release the Divine sparks in our food. - Rabbi Herschel

* * *

A foolish faith in authority is the worst enemy of truth. -Albert Einstein

* * *

Fulfilled life is possible in spite of unfulfilled wishes.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

* * *

Gratitude for the gift of life is the primary wellspring of all religions, the hallmark of the mystic, the source of all true art....It is a privilege to be alive in this time when we can choose to take part in the self-healing of our world.

Joanna Macy

* * *

It is never too late to give up our prejudices. -Henry David Thoreau

* * *

To be a Pantheist is to have a reverence and life passion for the world and universe that naturally surrounds us, is ever changing and evolving, and to have a conviction for the preservation of and sustainability of that nature. A rock, a tree, a flower, a fox, a beetle, a human; we are all irrevocably intertwined and resultant from the same source. None are better or more important than another, all are equals, every aspect of nature has its place and purpose, we support and cherish each other's inherent beauty and being, and we sustain each other's life force or energy. To be a Pantheist is to realize that all there is, ever has been, and ever will be, is nature. - Jason Uh

Rushing is a way of diminishing the depth of something. . . that should matter to us: life before death. - Kirk Jones

I don't know how to pray, but I know how to pay attention... how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields. - Mary Oliver

* * *

You, your life, are worth a Sabbath pause…. These Sabbath, holy pauses that can be found in sunrises and sunsets; and in the striking red on black of a red-winged blackbird; and in the way that hummingbirds rejoice at the newly opened trumpet flowers, and the way those same trumpet vines find their way over, through, around, and under the fences meant to tame them, an elegant refusal of the proposed boundaries. All of these are worth the lingering. - Carmen Emerson

* * *

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.

It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so. -Mark Twain

* * *

All that I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator for all that I have not seen.-Emerson

Think not that you can direct the course of love, for love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course - Kahlil Gibran

The mind is the problem, the mind is the answer." - Osho

My life is my message. Expansion is my life." - Sai Baba

Beauty is an inner response of YES to the world. . . Beauty is power. Beauty bridges inner self and world. -Mary Grigolia

Fulfilled life is possible in spite of unfulfilled wishes.-Dietrich Bonhoeffer

May all beings be safe

May all beings feel joy

May all beings feel strong

May all beings live life with ease

Faith is taking the first step, even when you don't see the whole staircase.-Martin Luther King, Jr.

Practice means to perform, over and over again in the face of all obstacles, some act of vision, of faith, of desire. Practice is a means of inviting the perfection desired. -Martha Graham

The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance. -Alan Watts quotes (American Writer, Thinker and Interpreter of Zen Buddhism, 1915-1973)

I use dancing to embellish, extend or enlarge upon an existing emotion.- Gower Champion quotes (American Dancer and Choreographer noted for his successful Broadway musical comedies. 1921-1980)

Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option.

Unless you're willing to have a go, fail miserably, and have another go, success won't happen. ~Phillip Adams

The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and to let it come in. -Morrie Schwartz

* * *

We are never more than one grateful thought away from peace of heart.

Brother David Steindl-Rast

* * *

Music...gives wings to the mind, a soul to the universe, flight to the

imagination, a charm to sadness, a life to everything.- Plato (?)

* * *

We plant seeds that will flower as results in our lives, so best to remove the weeds of anger, avarice, envy and doubt, that peace and abundance may manifest for all. -Dorothy Day

* * *

Weeds are flowers too, once you get to know them.

A.A. Milne (via Eeyore)

* * *

If you have a strong mind and plant in it a firm resolve, you can change your destiny.

Paramahansa Yogananda

* * *

First thing in the morning, before you meet or greet anyone, remember to greet all of nature, all visible and invisible creatures. Say to them: "I am grateful for your work, I love you and want to be in harmony with you!" At this very moment, in response to your greeting, all of nature will open to you and send you energy for the entire day.

Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov

* * *

When the bridge is gone, the narrowest plank becomes precious.

Hungarian Proverb

* * *

You cannot run away from a weakness; you must sometimes fight it out or perish. And if that be so, why not now, and where you stand?

Robert Louis Stevenson

* * *

By benevolent powers wondrously sheltered, we, confident, await what may come. -Dietrich Bonhoeffer

* * *

It must be borne in mind, however, that the tragedy in life does not lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goal to reach. It isn't a calamity to die with dreams unfulfilled, but it is a calamity not to dream. It is not a disaster to be unable to capture your ideal, but it is a disaster to have no ideal to capture. It is not a disgrace not to reach the stars, but it is a disgrace to have no stars to reach for. Not failure, but low aim is the sin.

-Rev. Dr. Benjamin E. Mays- Dr. King's mentor during his years of study at Morehouse College. from a sermon titled "What Man Lives By.”

* * *

People are like stained glass windows: They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light within.

Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

* * *

You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes.

You can steer yourself, any direction you choose.

~ Dr. Seuss

The Earth is a school that we are born into.

* * *

Every exit is an entry somewhere else.

Tom Stoppard

* * *

A harmonized mind produces harmony in this world of seeming discord.

Paramahansa Yogananda

* * *

We will know what both the fullness and the fulfilment of life mean only when the consciousness that the Spirit is our own very self comes to life within us. -Paul Brunton Perspectives

* * *

Eternal Spirit -- Earth-Maker, Pain-bearer, Life-giver; source of all that is and that shall be; Father and Mother of us all. Loving God, in whom is heaven. The hallowing of your name echoes through the universe!

The New Zealand Prayer Book

* * *

We cannot hope to die peacefully if our lives have been full of violence, or if our minds have mostly been agitated by emotions like anger, attachment, or fear. So if we wish to die well, we must learn how to live well: Hoping for a peaceful death, we must cultivate peace in our mind, and in our way of life.

THE DALAI LAMA

* * *

Being here while getting there...every step of the way.

* * *

Be contented with what you possess in life; be thankful for what does not belong to you, for it is so much care the less; but try to obtain what you need in life, and make the best of every moment of your life. - Hazrat Inayat Khan, Gayan

* * *

It is a sign of the greatest wisdom to resist provocation until ready. – Han Pritcher (Isaac Asimov)

* * *

We don’t know what life will bring, so it is what we bring to life that matters.

Patricia Campbell Carlson

* * *

Our approach to gratefulness has to be big enough to embrace all the difficulties of the world.

Brother David Steindl-Rast

* * *

Fear is the cheapest room in the house. I would like to see you living in better conditions.

Khwajeh Shams al-Din Muhammad Hafez-e Shirazi

* * *

The secret to happiness is not in doing what one likes to do, but in liking what one has to do. - Ingrid Bergman

* * *

GARY ZUKAV

* * *

One can live magnificently in this world if one knows how to work and how to love.

Leo Tolstoy

* * *

We live on the brink of disaster because we do not know how to let life alone. We do not respect the living and fruitful contradictions and paradoxes of which true life is full. - Thomas Merton

* * *

The breezes at dawn have secrets to tell you. Don't go back to sleep.

Jalaluddin Rumi

* * *

Everything can be taken from a man but …the last of the human freedoms – to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way. -Viktor Frankl

“logotherapy”, which considers man as a being whose main concern consists in fulfilling a meaning and in actualizing values, rather than in the mere gratification and satisfaction of drives and instincts. -Viktor Frankl

:* * *

One can live magnificently in this world if one knows how to work and how to love. - Leo Tolstoy

* * *

Take more time, cover less ground. - Thomas Merton- Dancing In The Waters of Life

* * *

Nothing is more honorable than a grateful heart. - Lucius Annaeus Seneca

* * *

Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations. I may not reach them, but I can look up and see their beauty, believe in them, and try to follow where they lead. -Louisa May Alcott

* * *

So much of modern life is a feverish anticipation of future activity and excitement. We have to learn to step back from this into the freedom and possibility of the present.

Fr. Bede Griffiths

* * *

Many persons have a wrong idea of what constitutes true happiness. It is not attained through self-gratification but through fidelity to a worthy purpose.

Helen Keller

* * *

As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world -- that is the myth of the "atomic age" -- as in being able to remake ourselves.

Mahatma Gandhi

* * *

Grateful living: an alchemic operation of converting "disgraceful" things into grateful events.

Raimundo Panikkar

* * *

Wisdom comes from metabolizing what we learn from others and from experience to a point where it can be shared.

Mary Catherine Bateson
Spoken at Legacy of Wisdom conference, April 17, 2011

* * *

There's a self expansive aspect of gratitude. Very possibly it's a little known law of nature: the more gratitude you have, the more you have to be grateful for.

Elaine St. James

* * *

Dive deeply into the miracle of life and let the tips of your wings be burnt by the flame, let your feet be lacerated by the thorns, let your heart be stirred by human emotion, and let your soul be lifted beyond the earth.

Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan- Call of the Dervish

* * *

Outwardly one's life may suffer every kind of limitation, from bodily paralysis to miserable surroundings, but inwardly it is free in meditation to reach out to a sphere of light, beauty, truth, love, and power.

Paul Brunton- Meditations for People in Crisis

* * *

If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything; it is open to everything. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind there are few.

SUZUKI-ROSHI

* * *

Service is the rent we pay for the privilege of living on this earth. It is the very purpose of life, and not something you do in your spare time.

Shirley Chisholm

* * *

The world is evolving from imperfection to perfection. It needs all love and sympathy; great tenderness and watchfulness are required from each one of us.

Hazrat Inayat Khan
A Bowl of Saki

* * *

Where there is great love there are always miracles.

Willa Cather

* * *

Everyone searches desperately for happiness but the price that we must pay for it is generosity. -Jean Giono, in The Man Who Planted Trees: Generosity of Spirit as a Source of Happiness

* * *

I wake up in the morning asking myself what can I do today, how can I help the world today. -Julia Butterfly Hill

* * *

We have a spiritual practice of thinking of a fire hydrant as a saint - it's standing there waiting to be of service. It's a way to start reframing our relation to all the everyday things around us.

Frederic Brussat- 100 Ways to Keep Your Soul Alive

* * *

It is never too late to become what you might have been.

George Eliot

* * *

Kindness does wonderful things to a face.

Dixie Doyle

* * *

As life becomes harder and more threatening, it also becomes richer, because the fewer expectations we have, the more the good things of life become unexpected gifts that we accept with gratitude. -Etty Hillesum
An Interrupted Life

* * *

If we are interdependent with everything and everyone, even our smallest, least significant thought, word, and action have real consequences throughout the universe.

* * *

While you are proclaiming peace with your lips, be careful to have it even more fully in your heart. - St. Francis of Assisi

* * *

Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go out and do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.- Howard Thurman

* * *

Gratitude can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. It makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow. - Melody Beattie

* * *

He who binds to himself to Joy,
Does the winged life destroy;
He who kisses the Joy as it flies,
Lives in Eternity’s sunrise.

WILLIAM BLAKE

* * *

So far as past errors are concerned, forget them and start afresh, as if it were your first day in this body; but so far as your present contacts are concerned, be kind to them, as if it were your last day in this body.

Paul Brunton

* * *

I am not discouraged, because every wrong attempt discarded is another step forward.

Thomas Edison

* * *

So much has been given to me; I have no time to ponder over that which has been denied.

Helen Keller

* * *

Those who would climb to a lofty height must go by steps, not leaps.

St. Gregory the Great
from a letter to Augustine of Canterbury

* * *

The greatest attitude of all is gratitude.

* * *

Our listening creates a sanctuary for the homeless parts within another person. - Rachel Naomi Remen

* * *

Looking behind I am filled with gratitude. Looking forward I am filled with vision. Looking upwards I am filled with strength. Looking within I discover peace. - Quero Apache Prayer

* * *

Just as a flower gives out its fragrance to whomsoever approaches or uses it, so love from within us radiates towards everybody and manifests as spontaneous service. - Swami Ramdas

* * *

Good generally conquers evil. Unless, of course, good is stupid.

* * *

I try to believe what I have to believe, not what I want to believe. - Matt Young, physicist

* * *

You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star. - Frederick Nietzsche

* * *

Lâ ilâha illâ Allâh. (There is nothing other than the One.) - Qur'ân 37:35 and 47:19

* * *

I am not what happened to me. I am what I choose to become. ~ Carl Jung

* * *

You cannot be too gentle, too kind. Shun even to appear harsh in your treatment of each

other. Joy, radiant joy, streams from the face of one who gives and kindles joy in the

heart of one who receives.

-- St. Seraphim of Sarov

* * *

The grateful heart sits at a continuous feast. - Proverbs 15:15

* * *

How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard.

A.A. Milne ,Winnie-the-Pooh

* * *

When we begin to believe that there is greater joy in working with and for others, rather than just for ourselves, then our society will truly become a place of celebration. - Jean Vanier

* * *

Each of us can become a blessed channel of peace for the healing of Earth's wounds: We can awaken from apathy and find creative, non-violent ways to transform the abuses rampant in today's world. - Nan Merrill with Barbara Taylor,
Peace Planet: Light for Our World

* * *

Prosperity depends more on wanting what you have than having what you want.

Geoffrey F. Abert

* * *

The important thing is this: To be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become. -Charles Dubois

* * *

Holiness comes wrapped in the ordinary. There are burning bushes all around you. Every tree is full of angels. Hidden beauty is waiting in every crumb.

Macrina Wiederkehr, O.S.B
A Tree Full of Angels

* * *

Take rest; a field that has rested gives a bountiful crop. – Ovid

* * *

Blessed are the flexible, for they shall not be bent out of shape. –Anonymous

* * *

True wealth is not measured in money or status or power. It is measured in the legacy we leave behind for those we love and those we inspire. -Cesar Chavez, Eulogy for Rufino Contreras, Calexico, CA, Feb. 14, 1979

* * *

No one is as capable of gratitude as one who has emerged from the kingdom of night. -Elie Wiesel

* * *

Confusion is the welcome mat at the door of creativity. -Michael J. Gelb

* * *

Holding a grudge is letting someone live rent-free in your head.

* * *

A few fly bites cannot stop a spirited horse. -Mark Twain

* * *

The moment you can visualize being free from the things that hold you back, you have indeed begun to set yourself free. -Unknown

* * *

Grief and gratitude are kindred souls, each pointing to the beauty of what is transient and given to us by grace.- Patricia Campbell Carlson (Letter to a friend)

* * *

For many years, at great cost, I traveled through many countries, saw the high mountains, the oceans. The only things I did not see were the sparkling dewdrops in the grass just outside my door. -Rabindranath Tagore

* * *

The very least you can do in your life is to figure out what to hope for. And the most you can do is live inside that hope.

Barbara Kingsolver

* * *

Perpetual gratitude toward people around us initiates habits of thankful prayer. It also starts a chain reaction of giving thanks, till our friends and loved ones and our whole world become imbued in grateful living. -Edward Hays, The Great Escape Manual

* * *

At first dreams seem impossible, then improbable, then inevitable.

-Christopher Reeve

* * *

A thankful person is thankful under all circumstances. A complaining soul complains even in paradise. -Baha'u'llah

* * *

We should notice that we are already supported at every moment. There is the earth below our feet and there is the air, filling our lungs and emptying them. We should begin from this when we need support.

Natalie Goldberg
Writing Down the Bones

* * *

Do more than belong, participate. Do more than care, help. Do more than believe, practice. Do more than be fair, be kind. Do more than forgive, forget. Do more than dream, work. - William Arthur Ward

* * *

Happiness is not what makes us grateful. It is gratefulness that makes us happy. -David Steindl-Rast, A Listening Heart

* * *

Trouble creates a capacity to handle it....meet it as a friend, for you'll see a lot of it and had better be on speaking terms with it. -Oliver Wendell Holmes

* * *

If we are to achieve a richer culture, rich in contrasting values, we must recognize the whole gamut of human potentialities, and so weave a less arbitrary social fabric, one in which each diverse human gift will find a fitting place. -Margaret Mead

* * *

The whole universe is breathing as our breath; we limit the process by our assumption that we are doing the breathing.

Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan
Alchemical Wisdom

* * *

a living individual is a persistent pattern rather than a particular collection of particles.

Every instant of your life exists always. Time does not pass.

in order for you to fly it would just be necessary that all the atoms in your body be coincidentally moving upwards at the same time in the course of their random fluctuations. Unlikely, but not impossible! - Rudolf v. B. Rucker

The pessimist and the optimist live in different worlds. - Ludwig Wittgenstein

the world is such-and-such or so-and-so only because we tell ourselves that that is the way it is. If we stop telling ourselves that the world is so-and-so, the world will stop being so-and-so. -Carlos Castaneda

* * *

Wisdom is a deep understanding and realization of people, things, events or situations, resulting in the ability to apply perceptions, judgements and actions in keeping with this understanding. It often requires control of one's emotional reactions (the "passions") so that universal principles, reason and knowledge prevail to determine one's actions. Wisdom is also the comprehension of what is true or right coupled with optimum judgment as to action. -Wikipedia

* * *

Aristotle, in his Metaphysics, defined wisdom as the understanding of causes, i.e. knowing why things are a certain way, which is deeper than merely knowing that things are a certain way.

* * *

wisdom is the capacity to realize what is of value in life, for oneself and others. -Nicholas Maxwell

* * *

a person became wise when they can see what's needed to be done and do it successfully without being told what to do. -an Inuit elder

* * *

wisdom is the coordination of knowledge and experience and its deliberate use to improve well being.

* * *

Buddhist scriptures teach that a wise person is endowed with good bodily conduct, good verbal conduct, and good mental conduct. A wise person does actions that are unpleasant to do but give good results, and doesn’t do actions that are pleasant to do but give bad results. Wisdom is the antidote to the self-chosen poison of ignorance.

* * *

Wisdom is the right use of knowledge. -Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892)

* * *

Wisdom is the ability to navigate the gray zones of life well, so that the holistic health and wellness of oneself, others, and complex systems is maximized. -EDM

* * *

The public likes to plant corn in October because it’s grown so well since April.

* * *

The more you sense the rareness and value of your own life, the more you realize that how you use it, how you manifest it, is all your responsibility. We face such a big task, so naturally we sit down for a while. - Kobun Chino Otogawa Roshi

* * *

A lack of a daily tonic of gratitude results in an anemic soul, which, in turn, contributes to a physical sense of listlessness. A grateful soul, on the other hand, is vibrant and animated and so permeates your body with zest and with an enjoyment of a life littered with gifts.

Edward Hays
Prayer Notes to a Friend, Forest of Peace

* * *

As I express my gratitude, I become more deeply aware of it. And the greater my awareness, the greater my need to express it.

David Steindl-Rast
Friends of Silence newsletter, December 2008

* * *

People who have faith in life are like swimmers who entrust themselves to a rushing river. They neither abandon themselves to its current nor try to resist it. Rather, they adjust their every movement to the watercourse, use it with purpose and skill, and enjoy the adventure.

David Steindl-Rast

* * *

The source of a true smile is an awakened mind. Smiling helps you approach the day with gentleness and understanding.

Thich Nhat Hanh
Peace Is Every Step

* * *

You don't get to choose how you're going to die. Or when. You can decide how you're going to live now.

Joan Baez

* * *

Value is not intrinsic, it is not in things. It is within us; it is the way in which man reacts to the conditions of his environment. -Ludwig von Mises in Human Action

* * *

:* * *

Be content to progress in slow steps until you have legs to run and wings with which to fly.

Padre Pio- Quiet Moments with Padre Pio (Patricia Treece ed.)

* * *

12/5/1012

* * *

A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs -- jolted by every pebble in the road. - Henry Ward Beecher

* * *

Although the world is very full of suffering, it is also full of the overcoming of it. - Helen Keller

* * *

He who loves the world as his body may be entrusted with the empire. -Lao Tzu

* * *

Blessed are the hearts that can bend; they shall never be broken. - Albert Camus

* * *

Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it. -William Arthur Ward

* * *

The best way to predict the future is to invent it. -Alan Kay

* * *

Today is the oldest you have ever been, and the youngest you will ever be. Enjoy the day.

* * *

We must not wish for the disappearance of our troubles but for the grace to transform them.

Simone Weil

* * *

Courage and perseverance have a magical talisman, before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish into air.

John Quincy Adams

* * *

You can't start the new chapter in your life if you keep re-reading the last one.

* * *

Prayer is sitting in the silence until it silences us, choosing gratitude until we are grateful, praising God until we ourselves are a constant act of praise.

Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM
Radical Grace: Daily Meditations

* * *

Travel ennobles the spirit and does away with our prejudices.

Oscar Wilde

* * *

People take different roads seeking fulfillment and happiness. Just because they're not on your road doesn't mean they've gotten lost.

-His Holiness the Dalai Lama

* * *

Everybody is a genius. But, if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will spend its whole life believing it is stupid.

* * *

When the pearl is cast down in the mud it does not become dishonoured the more, nor if it is anointed with balsam oil will it become more precious. But it has its worth in the eyes of its owner at all times. -Philip the Gnostic, translated by R. Wilson, The Gospel of Philip

* * *

The future belongs to those who give the next generation reason for hope. -Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

* * *

When you let go of trying to get more of what you don't really need, it frees up oceans of energy to make a difference with what you have. When you make a difference with what you have it expands. -Lynne Twist

* * *

Life's most persistent and urgent question is: ‘What are you doing for others? -Dr. ML King

* * *

Whoever does not see God in every place does not see God in any place. -Rabbi Elimelech

* * *

If we perceived Life with reverence, we would stand in awe at the experience of physical Life and walk the Earth in a very deep sense of gratitude. -Gary Zukav- Thoughts from the Seat of the Soul

* * *

Those who are awake live in a constant state of amazement.

Jack Kornfield

* * *

The world as pure object is something that is not there. It is not a reality outside us for which we exist....It is a living and self-creating mystery of which I am myself a part, to which I am myself, my own unique door. -Thomas Merton- Contemplation in a World of Action

* * *

Laughing is the shortest distance between two people. -Victor Borge

* * *

People wish to be settled; only as far as they are unsettled is there any hope for them. - Ralph W. Emerson

* * *

The important thing is not to think much, but to love much; and so, do that which best stirs you to love. -Saint Teresa of Avila

* * *

A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep.

– Saul Bellow, writer, Nobel laureate (1915-2005)

* * *

Nothing ever becomes real till it is experienced - even a proverb is not a proverb till your life has illustrated it. -John Keats

* * *

I love you not only for what you are, but for what I am when I am with you. I love you not only for what you have made of yourself, but for what you are making of me. I love you for the part of me that you bring out." -Elizabeth Barrett Browning

* * *

The best way to predict the future is to invent it. -Alan Key

* * *

Human relationships are primary in all of living. When the gusty winds blow and shake our lives, if we know that people care about us, we may bend with the wind, but we won't break. -Fred Rogers

* * *

Gratitude places you in the energy field of plentitude. Perceiving life in a consciousness of gratitude is literally stepping into another dimension of living. Suddenly the seeming ordinariness of your days takes on a divine sparkle. -Michael Beckwith

* * *

It's not who you are that holds you back, it who you think you're not.

* * *

May I see my own limits with compassion, just as I view the limits of others. -Roshi Joan Halifax, Spoken at Legacy of Wisdom conference, April 17, 2011

* * *

“What day is it,?" asked Pooh.
"It's today," squeaked Piglet.
"My favorite day," said Pooh.

* * *

To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.

* * *

Relationships are the oxygen of the psyche. -Jane Fonda

* * *

Acceptance is the universal currency of real friendship. . . .It does not warp or shape or wrench a person to be anything other than what they are. -Joan Chittister, The Friendship of Women

* * *

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. -Melody Beattie

* * *

Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach. -Clarissa Pinkola Estes

* * *

For after all, the best thing one can do when it is raining is to let it rain.

-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

* * *

To me every hour of the light and dark is a miracle,/Every cubic inch of space is a miracle. -Walt Whitman, "Miracles"

* * *

If we are facing in the right direction, all we have to do is keep on walking. -Buddhist Proverb

* * *

Once social change begins, it cannot be reversed. You cannot un-educate the person who has learned to read. You cannot humiliate the person who feels pride. You cannot oppress the people who are not afraid anymore. -Cesar Chavez, Address to the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco, Nov. 9, 1984

* * *

Teach this triple truth to all:, A generous heart, kind speech, and a life of service and compassion are the things which renew humanity. –Buddha

* * *

Healthy discontent is the prelude to progress. -Mahatma Gandhi

* * *

One needn’t go where one’s ticket says. - D.H. Lawrence, in Women in Love

* * *

The goal of life is to make your heartbeat match the beat of the universe, to match your nature with nature. -Joseph Campbell

* * *

A sacred illness is one that educates us and alters us from the inside out, provides experiences and therefore knowledge that we could not possibly achieve in any other way. -Deena Metzger

* * *

A life of gratitude accepts the bad with the good. Genuine gratitude is not a zero sum game in which thankfulness increases the more fortunate you are and decreases the more adversity you experience.

-Dan Clendenin

* * *

The tree that bends survives the storm. - Chinese saying

* * *

Your present circumstances don't determine where you can go; they merely determine where you start. -Nido Qubein

* * *

Turn your face to the sun, and the shadows fall behind you. -Maori proverb

* * *

Every man has his own patch of earth to cultivate. What’s important is that he dig deep" —José Saramago

* * *

Within Siddhartha there slowly grew and ripened the knowledge of what wisdom really was and the goal of his long seeking. It was nothing but a preparation of the soul, a capacity, a secret art of thinking, feeling and breathing thoughts of unity at every moment of life. — Hermann Hesse, "Siddhartha."

* * *

Daring to dream what is deepest in our collective longings is what makes us most human and fully alive. -Wendy Wright, The Vigil

* * *

In the time of your life, live — so that in that wondrous time you shall not add to the misery and sorrow of the world, but shall smile to the infinite delight and mystery of it. -William Saroyan, The Time of Your Life

* * *

There is no large and difficult task that can’t be divided into little easy tasks. -Buddhist Saying

* * *

Though you may not be able to change it, you can handle an ugly situation beautifully. -Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan, Alchemical Wisdom

* * *

Those who love you are not fooled by mistakes you have made or dark images you hold about yourself. They remember your beauty when you feel ugly; your wholeness when you are broken; your innocence when you feel guilty; and your purpose when you are confused. -African saying

* * *

Help your neighbor's boat across, and lo! your own has reached the shore. -Hindu proverb

* * *

A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs. It's jolted by every pebble on the road. -Henry Ward Beecher

* * *

You do not need to know precisely what is happening, or exactly where it is all going. What you need is to recognize the possibilities and challenges offered by the present moment, and to embrace them with courage, faith, and hope. -Thomas Merton

* * *

Expecting is the greatest impediment to living. In anticipation of tomorrow, it loses today.

– Seneca

* * *

The master of the garden is the one who waters it, trims the branches, plants the seeds, and pulls the weeds. If you merely stroll through the garden, you are but an acolyte. – Vera Nazarian

* * *

Penetrate the heart of just one drop of water, and you will be flooded by a hundred oceans. -Mahmûd Shabistarî- The Mystic Rose Garden

* * *

Beware of false gods - and of speed bumps disguised as mountains. – Unknown

* * *

We are able to laugh when we achieve detachment, if for only a moment. -May Sarton

* * *

When it is dark enough, you can see the stars. -Ralph Waldo Emerson

* * *

Count your blessings. Once you realize how valuable you are and how much you have going for you, the smiles will return, the sun will break out, the music will play, and you will finally be able to move forward the life that God intended for you with grace, strength, courage, and confidence.

– Og Mandino

* * *

He who loves with purity considers not the gift of the lover, but the love of the giver.

– Thomas Kempis

* * *

The most beautiful people are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. -Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

* * *

Each of our relationships has a trajectory that death doesn't destroy. We see its arc in the inner changes we undergo when we remember deceased loved ones, and even in outward changes as we continue to mold our lives in response to theirs. -Patricia Campbell Carlson

* * *

Providence has hidden a charm in difficult undertakings which is appreciated only by those who dare to grapple with them. -Anne-Sophie Swetchine, The Writings of Madame Swetchine

* * *

When we persevere with the help of a gentle discipline, we slowly come to hear the still, small voice and to feel the delicate breeze, and so to come to know the presence of Love. -Henri Nouwen

* * *

Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. The more uncivilized the man, the surer he is that he knows precisely what is right and what is wrong. All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral values, not of men who have whooped them up and tried to enforce them. The truly civilized man is always skeptical and tolerant, in this field as in all others. His culture is based on "I am not too sure." – H.L. Mencken, writer, editor, and critic (1880-1956)

* * *

All the children who are held and loved...will know how to love others. Spread these virtues in the world. Nothing more need be done. -Meng Zi, c. 300 BCE

* * *

If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant; if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome. -Anne Bradstreet

* * *

Sticks in a bundle cannot be broken. -Bondei Proverb

* * *

When one leaves for the stars, that person will be the one to blink at you in the night-sky and show you the way. While s/he will no longer be able to touch your hands s/he will forever be able to touch your heart. -Karla A. Claeys, M.A

* * *

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but only words can give me wounds that continue to fester and hurt my mental, emotional, spiritual and social health. –EDM

* * *

When the waves close over me, I dive down to fish for pearls. -Masha Kaleko

* * *

When we dance, the journey itself is the point, as when we play music the playing itself is the point. And exactly the same thing is true in meditation. Meditation is the discovery that the point of life is always arrived at in the immediate moment. -Alan Watts

* * *

Your success and happiness lie in you....Resolve to keep happy, and your joy and you shall form an invincible host against difficulties.-Helen Keller

* * *

I am, therefore I thank. -Cindy Lubar Bishop

* * *

In today's rush we all think too much - seek too much - want too much - and forget about the joy of just being. – Eckhart Tolle

* * *

Only the hand that erases can write the true thing. -Meister Eckhart

* * *

Gratitude is the sweet fragrance of an opening heart. -Aine Belton

* * *

Anger is a wind which blows out the lamp of the mind. – Robert Green Ingersoll

* * *

We will be known forever by the tracks we leave. -Dakota proverb

* * *

So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart. Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life long and its purpose in the service of your people. Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide.

Always give a word or a sign of salute when meeting or passing a friend, even a stranger, when in a lonely place. Show respect to all people and grovel to none.

When you arise in the morning give thanks for the food and for the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies only in yourself. Abuse no one and no thing, for abuse turns the wise ones to fools and robs the spirit of its vision.

When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with the fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero going home. - Shawnee Chief Tecumseh

* * *

Nurture your ties to your tribe. If you don’t have one, create a community that you can belong to. Modern life

can be isolating. When you have a tribe, you have a circle that you are a part of. Its members – loved ones,

friends, or neighbors - can be a source of support, caring, guidance, and companionship. -Daily Om

* * *

It is true that we are called to create a better world. But we are first of all called to a more immediate and exalted task: that of creating our own lives. -Thomas Merton, Love and Living

* * *

Even if you have a lot of work to do, if you think of it as wonderful, and if you feel it as wonderful, it will transform into the energy of joy and fire, instead of becoming a burden. -Tulku Thondup Rinpoche, The Practice of Dzogchen

* * *

Never lose an opportunity of seeing anything that is beautiful; for beauty is God's handwriting - a wayside sacrament. Welcome it in every fair face, in every fair sky, in every fair flower, and thank God for it as a cup of blessing. -Ralph Waldo Emerson

* * *

It may be that when we no longer know which way to go we have come to our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed. The impeded stream is the one that sings. -Wendell Berry, Collected Poems

* * *

Reality is permeated, indeed flooded, with divine creativity, nourishment, and care. -Marcus J. Borg, Conflict, Holiness, and Politics

* * *

Three things in human life are important: the first is to be kind; the second is to be kind; and the third is to be kind. ~Henry James

* * *

If you let go a little, you will have a little happiness.
If you let go a lot, you will have a lot of happiness.
If you let go completely, you will be completely happy.

* * *

If you touch one thing with deep awareness, you touch everything. - Thich Nhat Hanh

Enlightenment, for a wave in the ocean, is the moment the wave realizes it is water.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh

People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar
- Thich Nhat Hanh

People suffer because they are caught in their views. As soon as we release those views, we are free and we don't suffer anymore. - Thich Nhat Hanh

Life is available only in the present. That is why we should walk in such a way that every step can bring us to the here and the now - Thich Nhat Hanh

When you love someone, the best thing you can offer is your presence. How can you love if you are not there?
- Thich Nhat Hanh

If you are motivated by loving kindness and compassion, there are many ways to bring happiness to others right now, starting with kind speech. ~Thich Nhat Hanh

* * *

No problem can be solved from the same consciousness
that created it. —Albert Einstein

And so long as you haven’t experienced
this: to die and so to grow,
you are only a troubled guest
on the dark earth. —Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The problem with the world is that we draw the circle of our family too small. -Mother Teresa

Soul . . . the river of energy that animates who we are. It is the wise and whole and brave part of the self. The soul is the ageless longing for truth that sends scientists into the lab and seekers onto the spiritual path. - Elizabeth Lesser

It doesn't have to be so intense, so fierce, so acrimoniuous. You can work to ease the ills of society, and at the same time you can love the world with all of its sorrow and beauty. - Elizabeth Lesser

My daily mantra is, "Surrender and relax into the mystery." - Elizabeth Lesser

Too much giving to children is not a gift. Rather, it's a taking away. It denies children the skills they will need for life outside the bubble. - Elizabeth Lesser

It is often easier to remain stuck in old behaviors and mind-sets even when they no longer serve us, even when they make us miserable. ... We get attached to the way things are, no matter how ridiculous or destructive they've become. ... We're trapped by our own version of reality. - Elizabeth Lesser

The point of life is not to reach perfection but to befriend the fact that human beings are works in progress. - Elizabeth Lesser

Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. -Friedrich Nietzsche

You always teach others what you most need to learn. You are your own worst student. -sign over faculty lounge at Esalen

I don't think being human has any place for guilt. Contrition, yes. Guilt, no. Contrition means you tell God you are sorry and you're not going to do it again and you start off fresh. . . . It's over. You are willing to forgo the pleasures of guilt. -Sr Wendy Beckett

Waking up in the morning I smile,

Twenty-four brand new hours are before me.

I vow to live fully in each moment

and to look at all beings with the eyes of compassion.

-Thich Nhat Hanh

You will not grow if you sit in a beautiful flower garden, but you will grow if you are sick, if you are in pain, if you experience losses, and if you do not put your head in the sand, but take the pain as a gift to you with a very, very specific purpose. -Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

(Prayer) is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense regardless of how it turns out. -Vaclav Havel

In the middle of the journey of our life

I found myself within a dark woods

Where the straight way was lost.

-Dante Alighieri

We're all bozos on the bus, so we might as well sit back and enjoy the ride. -Wavy Gravy

We are built to make mistakes, coded for error. -Lewis Thomas

The last of the human freedoms is to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances. -Victor Frankl

Nothing is born, nothing can die. -Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier

When we practice dying, we are learning to identify less with Ego and more with Soul. -Ram Dass

The secret in life is enjoying the passage of time. -Richie Havens

It is not ideas that change the world but simple gestures of love given to the people around you, and often to those you feel most at odds with. . . . In order to save the world you must serve the people in your life. You gradually struggle less and less for an idea, and more and more for specific people. In the end, it is the reality of personal relationship that saves everything. -Thomas Merten

Unceasing change turns the wheel of life,

and so reality is shown in all its many forms.

Dwell peacefully as change itself

liberates all suffering sentient beings

and brings them great joy.

-from a Buddhist sutra

* * *

Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich. -Napoleon

* * *

Whatever our individual troubles and challenges may be, it's important to pause every now and then to appreciate all that we have, on every level. -Shakti Gawain

* * *

In ordinary life we hardly realize that we receive a great deal more than we give, and that it is only with gratitude that life becomes rich. -Dietrich Bonhoeffer

* * *

Be still, and the world is bound to turn herself inside out to entertain you. Everywhere you look, joyful noise is clanging to drown out quiet desperation. -Barbara Kingsolver , High Tide in Tucson

* * *

The miracle of gratitude is that it shifts your perception to such an extent that it changes the world you see. -Dr. Robert Holden

* * *

And suddenly you know: It's time to start something new and trust the magic of beginnings. -Meister Eckhart

* * *

Everything comes to us that belongs to us if we create the capacity to receive it. -Rabindranath Tagore

* * *

I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. -Maya Angelou

* * *

Mistakes are the portals of discovery. -James Joyce

* * *

Life is thickly sown with thorns, and I know no other remedy than to pass quickly through them. The longer we dwell on our misfortunes, the greater is their power to harm us. – voltaire

* * *

No matter what accomplishments you achieve, somebody helps you. -Althea Gibson

* * *

Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass; it is about learning to dance in the rain. ~ Author Unknown

* * *

The grateful heart is a manifestation of one's true self. Nothing sidelines the ego more effectively than a grateful heart. -Albert Nolan

* * *

Be content with what you have; rejoice in the way things are. When you realize there is nothing lacking, the whole world belongs to you. -Lao Tzu

* * *

The emergence and blossoming of understanding, love, and intelligence has nothing to do with any tradition, no matter how ancient or impressive--it has nothing to do with time. It happens on its own when a human being questions, wonders, inquires, listens, and looks without getting stuck in fear, pleasure, and pain. When self-concern is quiet, in abeyance, heaven and earth are open. – Toni Packer

* * *

Those two principles: We're supposed to love one another and we're supposed to work together to make the experience better. That's all the religion you need, really, to make a success of this planet... – Mario Cuomo

* * *

Changing the world begins with the very personal process of changing yourself,
the only place you can begin is where you are, and the only time you can begin is always now. – Gary Zukav

* * *

Life exists only at this very moment, and in this moment it is infinite and eternal, for the present moment is infinitely small; before we can measure it, it has gone, and yet it exists forever. – Unknown

* * *

Youth is not a time of life; it is a state of mind; it is not a matter of rosy cheeks, red lips and supple knees; it is a matter of the will, quality of the imagination, a vigor of the emotions; it is the freshness of the deep springs of life. -Samuel Ullman

* * *

Giving frees us from the familiar territory of our own needs by opening our mind to the unexplained worlds occupied by the needs of others. -Barbara Bush

* * *

The main benefit of optimism is resilience in the face of setbacks. - Nobel Prize-winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman

* * *

The best things in life are nearest: Breath in your nostrils, light in your eyes, flowers at your feet, duties at your hand, the path of right just before you. Then do not grasp at the stars, but do life's plain, common work as it comes, certain that daily duties and daily bread are the sweetest things in life. -Robert Louis Stevenson

* * *

Beauty seen makes the one who sees it more beautiful. -David Steindl-Rast, A Listening Heart

* * *

When we come upon beautiful things . . . they act like small tears in the surface of the world that pull us through to some vaster space.

Elaine Scarry
On Beauty and Being Just

* * *

Observe the wonders as they occur around you. Don’t claim them. Feel the artistry moving through and be silent. -Jalaluddin Rumi

* * *

The tongue like a sharp knife, kills without drawing blood. -Chinese proverb

* * *

People who want the most approval get the least and people who need approval the least get the most. ~Wayne Dyer

* * *

Never underestimate your power to change yourself; never overestimate your power to change others. ~Wayne W. Dyer

* * *

The little things? The little moments? They aren't little. -Jon Kabat-Zinn

* * *

He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have. — Socrates

* * *

A thankful person is thankful under all circumstances. A complaining soul complains even in paradise. -Baha'u'llah

* * *

Every act of love is a work of peace no matter how small. -Mother Teresa

* * *

If God sends you down a stony path, may God give you strong shoes. -Irish Blessing

* * *

Through humor, you can soften some of the worst blows that life delivers. And once you find laughter, no matter how painful your situation might be, you can survive it. -Bill Cosby

We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men. ~Herman Melville

In order to change the world, you have to get your head together first. -Jimi Hendrix

The more credit you give away, the more will come back to you. The more you help others, the more they will want to help you. -Brian Tracy

There is only one way to happiness and that is to stop worrying about things which are beyond the power of our will. - Epictetus

* * *

To see a world in a grain of sand, and heaven in a wildflower, hold infinity in the palm of your hand and eternity in an hour. -William Blake

* * *

Seize the moments of happiness, love and be loved! That is the only reality in the world, all else is folly. It is the one thing we are interested in here. -Tolstoy, War and Peace

* * *

I am, therefore I thank. -Cindy Lubar Bishop

* * *

Every morning is like a new reincarnation into this world. Let us take it then for what it is and live each moment anew. -Paul Brunton

* * *

Wealth consists not in having great possessions but in having few wants. -Esther de Waal

* * *

Life does not accommodate you; it shatters you. Every seed destroys its container, or else there would be no fruition. -Florida Scott-Maxwell

* * *

Sometimes our light goes out, but is blown again into instant flame by an encounter with another human being. Each of us owes the deepest thanks to those who have rekindled this inner light. -Dr. Albert Schweitzer

* * *

Welcome the present moment as if you had invited it. Why? Because it is all we ever have. -Pema Chödrön

* * *

We can only control and choose 1) The thoughts we focus on; 2) The emotions we choose to dance in (compassion, anger, resentment, fear, guilt, shame, sense of abandonment, love, etc); and 3) Our actions. You can not choose anything for your loved one- just as he or she can not choose for you. - Tracy Latz, M.D., M.S., Mh.D.

* * *

Worrying is using your imagination to create what you don’t want” – Abraham Hicks

* * *

Give yourself entirely to those around you. Be generous with your blessings. A kind gesture can reach a wound that only compassion can heal. ~Steve Maraboli

* * *

The journey in between what you once were and who you are now becoming is where the dance of life takes place.

-Barbara De Angelis

* * *

The next message you need is always right where you are. -Ram Dass

* * *

Indecision is often worse than wrong action. – Henry Ford

* * *

Sometimes, in order to be happy in the present moment, you have to be willing to give up hope for a better past. – Robert Holden

* * *

You accept certain unlovely things about yourself and manage to live with them. The atonement for such an acceptance is that you make allowances for others - that you cleanse yourself of the sin of self-righteousness.

– Eric Hoffer

* * *

There is no way to peace. Peace is the way.

A.J. Muste

* * *

By saying grace, we release the Divine sparks in our food. -Rabbi Herschel

* * *

A bird does not sing because he has an answer. He sings because he has a song. -Joan Walsh Anglund

* * *

Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom. - Viktor Frankl

* * *

Life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react. – John Maxwell

* * *

The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance. - Alan Watts

A wave looking deeply into herself will see that she is made up of all the other waves and will no longer feel she is cut off from everything around her. She will be able to recognize that the other waves are also her home. When you practice walking meditation, walk in such a way that you recognize your home, in the here and the now. See the trees as your home, the air as your home, the blue sky a

s your home, and the earth that you tread as your home. This can only be done in the here and the now.

Sometimes we have a feeling of alienation. We feel lonely and as if we are cut off from everything. We have been a wanderer and have tried hard but have never been able to reach our true home. However, we all have a home, and this is our practice, the practice of going home. - Thich Nhat Hanh, 'Going Home'

Be content with what you have;
Rejoice in the way things are.
When you realize there is nothing
lacking,
The whole world belongs to you.
- Lao Tzu

When you practice breathing, smiling, and looking at beautiful things around you, you are planting seeds of beauty and happiness. - Thich Nhat Hanh

May I live this day compassionate of heart, clear in word, gracious in awareness, courageous in thought, generous in love. - John O'Donohue

Even after all this time
The Sun never says to the Earth, you owe me.
Look what happens with a love like that,
It lights the whole sky. - Hafiz

Most people are afraid of suffering. But suffering is a kind of mud to help the lotus flower grow. There cannot be a lotus flower without the mud. - Thich Nhat Hanh

* * *

To be astonished is one of the surest ways of not growing old too quickly. -Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette

* * *

What sunshine is to flowers, smiles are to humanity. These are but trifles, to be sure; but, scattered along life's pathway, the good they do is inconceivable. -Joseph Addison

* * *

The elixer is hidden in the poison. –Rumi

* * *

Where love rules, there is no will to power;

and where power predominates, there love is lacking.

The one is the shadow of the other. -Carl Jung

* * *

The grateful heart sits at a continuous feast.

Proverbs 15:15

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Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day. You shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense. -Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Life isn't about waiting for the storms to pass, it's about learning to dance in the rain.

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The grass is not, in fact, always greener on the other side of the fence. No, not at all. Fences have nothing to do with it. The grass is greenest where it is watered. When crossing over fences, carry water with you and tend the grass where ever you may be. -Robert Fulghum

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If you pour some music on whatever's wrong, it'll sure help out. - Levon Helm (1940-2012)

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The thing about quotes on the Internet is that you cannot confirm their validity. — Abraham Lincoln

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The future is not some place we are going, but one we are creating. The paths are not to be found, but made. And the activity of making them changes both the maker and their destination. -John Schaar

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To open deeply, as genuine spiritual life requires, we need tremendous courage and strength, a kind of warrior spirit. But the place for this warrior strength is in the heart. -Jack Kornfield, A Path with Heart

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Optimism is a strategy for making a better future. Because unless you believe that the future can be better, you are unlikely to step up and take responsibility for making it so. -Noam Chomsky

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Dream as if you will live forever; Live as if you will die tomorrow.

– Unknown

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When you let go of trying to get more of what you don't really need, it frees up oceans of energy to make a difference with what you have. When you make a difference with what you have it expands.

-Lynne Twist

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The whole universe is breathing as our breath; we limit the process by our assumption that we are doing the breathing.

-Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan, Alchemical Wisdom

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To me every hour of the light and dark is a miracle,/Every cubic inch of space is a miracle. -Walt Whitman, "Miracles"

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Suffering is the sandpaper of our life. It does its work of shaping us. Suffering is part of our training program for becoming wise. -Ram Dass

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Heaven and earth are threads from one loom. -Shaker proverb

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The burden which is well borne becomes light. –Ovid

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All knowledge is partial, infinitesimally partial. Reason is a net thrown out into an ocean. What truth it brings in is a fragment, a glimpse, a scintillation of the whole truth. – Ursula K. LeGuin

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Nothing ever becomes real till it is experienced - even a proverb is not a proverb till your life has illustrated it. -John Keats

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One must have chaos in oneself in order to give birth to a dancing star.

-Friedrich Nietzsche

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If money be not thy servant, it will be thy master. The covetous man cannot so properly be said to possess wealth, as that may be said to possess him.

– Francis Bacon, essayist, philosopher, and statesman (1561-1626)

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Sometimes, being true to yourself means changing your mind. Self changes, and you follow.

– Vera Nazarian

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A mind that is stretched by new experiences can never go back to its old dimensions.

– Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.

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It's easier to act one's way into a new way of thinking than it is to think one's way into a new way of acting. -anon

Most of us do not retain a lot of what we see or hear. In contrast, we do retain what we practice. - John Diffey, CEO, The Kendal Corp

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Help your neighbor's boat across,

and lo! your own has reached the shore. -Hindu proverb

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Everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while you're climbing it. – Andy Rooney

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The trees, the flowers, the plants grow in silence. The stars, the sun, the moon move in silence. Silence gives us a new perspective.

-Blessed Mother Teresa

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Presume not that I am the thing I was. – William Shakespeare

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There is a calmness to a life lived in gratitude, a quiet joy. – Ralph Blum

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I look upon a year lived as a year earned; and each year earned means a greater treasury of experience and power laid up against time of need. -Anna Botsford Comstock

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You cannot be too gentle, too kind. Shun even to appear harsh in your treatment of each other. Joy, radiant joy, streams from the face of one who gives and kindles joy in the heart of one who receives. -St. Seraphim of Sarov

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Better keep yourself clean and bright;

you are the window through which you must see the world. – George Bernard Shaw

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I've learned from experience that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not on our circumstances.

-Martha Washington

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If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. -- Desmond Tutu

To train a dog, you have to be more interesting than grass. And grass can be pretty interesting. -- Author Unknown

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When a sprout breaks its casing and forces its way to the surface of the earth, it is the climax to a long and deep accumulation of life force, the product of unseen and subtle cycles.
A seedling carries with it the complete pattern for its growth, perhaps the makings of an enormous tree. Although time and the right conditions are necessary, neither of those factors adds anything to the inherent nature of the seedling. It completely embodies its destiny.
- Deng Ming-Dao, 365 Tao: Daily Meditations

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Inside the seed is the unfulfilled potential of the plant
Perhaps the potential to be a great tree.
Inside us, inside our inner world, in our thought patterns
Lies our potential to manifest our gift.
To live a meaningful life. -Heron Dance

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Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet. – Thich Nhat Hanh

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Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. -Rachel Carson

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Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it. -The Dalai Lama XIV

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May your heart be an altar, from which the bright flame of unending thanksgiving ascends to heaven. -St. Mary Euphrasia Pelletier, Embrace the World

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Life is a very narrow bridge between two eternities. Be not afraid.

-Rabbi Nachman of Braslav

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Weeds are flowers too, once you get to know them. -A.A. Milne (via Eeyore)
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Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach.

-Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estés

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Reality is permeated, indeed flooded, with divine creativity, nourishment, and care. -Marcus J. Borg, Conflict, Holiness, and Politics

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Once social change begins, it cannot be reversed. You cannot un-educate the person who has learned to read. You cannot humiliate the person who feels pride. You cannot oppress the people who are not afraid anymore. -Cesar Chavez
Address to the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco, Nov. 9, 1984

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Relationships are the oxygen of the psyche. -Jane Fonda

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The source of a true smile is an awakened mind. Smiling helps you approach the day with gentleness and understanding. -Thich Nhat Hanh

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Prosperity depends more on wanting what you have than having what you want. -Geoffrey F. Abert

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People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within. -Elizabeth Kubler-Ross

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Gratitude for the gift of life is the primary wellspring of all religions, the hallmark of the mystic, the source of all true art . . . It is a privilege to be alive in this time when we can choose to take part in the self-healing of our world. -Joanna Macy

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It's impossible to give love and be depressed. -Carlos Santana

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For me, losing a tennis match isn't failure, it's research. -Billie Jean King

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Each of us can become a blessed channel of peace for the healing of Earth's wounds: We can awaken from apathy and find creative, non-violent ways to transform the abuses rampant in today's world.

-Nan Merrill with Barbara Taylor, Peace Planet: Light for Our World

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Source of all blessings, you bless us with the blessing of birdsong – the ecstasy of a lark, still singing, all lost in the sky; the music of a water-thrush when the sun comes out after a thunderstorm; the bell of a cuckoo that keeps ringing on an island when the hawthorn blooms. May i remember my calling: to sing in my heart with all the songbirds of the world, for sheer gratitude and to give joy to others by my silent song. -Br. David Steindl-Rast

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People are like stained glass windows: They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light within. -Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

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Be still, and the world is bound to turn herself inside out to entertain you. Everywhere you look, joyful noise is clanging to drown out quiet desperation. -Barbara Kingsolver, High Tide in Tucson

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Willingness to personal
Transformation
Is the key to global
illumination !!! - Carlos Santana

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We don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory. -Howard Zinn

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Be content to progress in slow steps until you have legs to run and wings with which to fly. -Padre Pio

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Winning is important to me, but what brings me real joy is the experience of being fully engaged in whatever I'm doing. -Phil Jackson

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Don't be afraid to take a big step if one is indicated. You can't cross a chasm in two small jumps. -David Lloyd George

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The future has many names. For the weak it is unattainable. For the fearful it is the unknown. For the bold it is opportunity. -Victor Hugo

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Growing older is like climbing a mountain: the higher you get, the more strength you need, but the further you see. -Ingmar Bergman

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The future has many names. For the weak it is unattainable. For the fearful it is the unknown. For the bold it is opportunity. -Victor Hugo

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Do not believe what you have heard
Do not believe in tradition because it is handed down many generations
Do not believe in anything that has been spoken of many times
Do not believe because the written statements come from some old sage
Do not believe in conjecture
Do not believe in authority, or teachers, or elders
But after careful observation and analysis, when it agrees with reason
and it will benefit one and all, then accept it and live by it.

– Buddha

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Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. -Margaret Mead

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Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist. – Pablo Picasso

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Source of all blessing, you bless us with the blessing of change – changing seasons of the year from snow to greening, flowering, fruiting, and harvest; seasons of life from childhood to youth, full ripeness, and saging. All living things keep changing. May i welcome change as a blessed opportunity to grow and savor—in each unrepeatable moment’s fleetingness – what IS beyond change. -Brother David Steindl-Rast

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Never cut what you can untie. – Joseph Joubert

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Carpe diem . . . seize the day . . . enjoy the day . . . pluck the day [when it is ripe] . . . enjoy the now

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I believe that if, at the end of it all, according to our abilities, we have done something to make others a little happier, and something to make ourselves a little happier, that is about the best we can do. To make others less happy is a crime. To make ourselves unhappy is where all crime starts. We must try to contribute joy to the world. That is true no matter what our problems, our health, our circumstances. We must try. -Roger Ebert

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We’ve got this gift of love, but love is like a precious plant. You can’t just accept it and leave it in the cupboard or just think it’s going to get on by itself. You’ve got to keep watering it. You’ve got to really look after it and nurture it. ~John Lennon

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When I am silent,
I fall into that place
where everything is music.
-Rumi

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You must weed your mind as you would weed your garden." ~Terri Guillemets

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there is something wrong with any spirituality that does not inspire selfless concern for others. – Karen Armstrong

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Cheerfulness and contentment are great beautifiers and are famous preservers of youthful looks.

– Charles Dickens, novelist (1812-1870)

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The less secure a man is, the more likely he is to have extreme prejudice.

– Clint Eastwood

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A single act of kindness throws out roots in all directions, and the roots spring up and make new trees. – Amelia Earhart

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Peace can exist only in the present moment. It is ridiculous to say “wait until I finish this, then I will be free to live in peace.” What is “this”? A diploma, a job, a house, the payment of debt? If you think that way, peace will never come. There is always another “this” that will follow the present one. If you are not living in peace at this moment, you will never be able to. If you truly want to be at peace, you must be at peace right now. Otherwise, there is only “the hope of peace some day. ~Thich Nhat Hanh

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Knowing how to think empowers you far beyond those who know only what to think. – Neil deGrasse Tyson

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Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything. – George Bernard Shaw

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Our life is an apprenticeship to the truth that around every circle another can be drawn; that there is no end in nature, but every ending is a beginning. -Ralph Waldo Emerson

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If we are always arriving and departing, it is also true that we are eternally anchored. One’s destination is never a place but rather a new way of looking at things.—Henry Miller

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The people to fear are not those who disagree with you, but those who disagree and are too cowardly to let you know. – Napoleon Bonaparte

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With great power comes great responsibility. – Stan Lee

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Every moment is another chance; every chance is a new beginning. – Unknown

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I was perfectly content before I was born, and I think of death as the same state. What I am grateful for is the gift of intelligence, and for life, love, wonder, and laughter....I believe that if, at the end of it all, according to our abilities, we have done something to make others a little happier, and something to make ourselves a little happier, that is about the best we can do. – Roger Ebert

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He who fears he shall suffer already suffers what he fears. – Michel de Montaigne

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Lasting change is not a dream; it can be achieved employing strategies that can be learned and are repeatable. Once you break the habit of being yourself and truly change your mind, your life will never be the same! - Dr. Joe Dispenza, M.D.

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Our lives are like islands in the sea, or like trees in the forest. The maple and the pine may whisper to each other with their leaves ... But the trees also commingle their roots in the darkness underground, and the islands also hang together through the ocean's bottom.

– William James, psychologist and philosopher (1842-1910)

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The quality of a person’s life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor. – Vince Lombardi

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In some mysterious way woods have never seemed to me to be static things. In physical terms, I move through them; yet in metaphysical ones, they seem to move through me. – John Fowles

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It is true that we are called to create a better world. But we are first of all called to a more immediate and exalted task: that of creating our own lives. – Thomas Merton

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The goal of life is to make your heartbeat match the beat of the universe, to match your nature with nature. – Joseph Campbell

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One of the sanest, surest, and most generous joys of life comes from being happy over the good fortune of others. – Archibald Rutledge

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Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place. – Kurt Vonnegut

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The earth community, the Life Community, is not the property of any one religion or group or part of the world; it is the Commons that embraces us all, our planetary home. And it needs us as never before. It calls to us to become, not heroes but community builders, builders of home, gatherers and embracers, bearers of hospitality, keepers of the shared space that nurtures us all. It calls us not to go forth and come back laden with honors but to honor where we are, who we are, and from that place to reach out to connect to and honor each other in the community of life.

– David Spangler

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The universe is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.

Eden Phillpotts

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A lifetime may not be long enough to attune ourselves fully to the harmony of the universe. But just to become aware that we can resonate with it -- that alone can be like waking up from a dream.

– David Steindl-Rast

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Whoever does not see God in every place does not see God in any place. – Rabbi Elimelech

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Try pausing right before and right after undertaking a new action, even something simple like putting a key in a lock to open a door. Such pauses take a brief moment, yet they have the effect of decompressing time and centering you. – David Steindl-Rast

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The past has no power to stop you from being present now. Only your grievance about the past can do that. What is grievance? The baggage of old thought and emotion. ~Lao Tzu

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Happiness: “You Bring Your Own Weather To The Picnic.”- Gretchen Rubin

“Happiness is by choice…not by chance.”-Unknown

“We tend to forget that happiness doesn’t come as a result of getting something we don’t have but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have.”

-Frederick Keonig

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The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time. -Mark Twain

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The best care for the body is a quiet mind. -Napoleon Bonaparte

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If we spoke a different language, we would perceive a somewhat different world. -Ludwig Wittgenstein

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One of the keys to successful aging is to do what you love for as long as you can. -Peter Whitehouse

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Aging is not a game we ever "win"; it is a game we try to stay competitive in. -Peter Whitehouse

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The future belongs to those who prepare for it today. – Malcolm X

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A vision demands certainty in the telling, openness and flexibility in the unfolding.

– Kathryn Elliott

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The greatest obstacle to discovering the shape of the earth, the continents, and the oceans was not ignorance but the illusion of knowledge. – Daniel J. Boorstin, historian, professor, attorney, and writer

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A hungry man is not a free man. – Adlai Stevenson, statesman (1900-1965)

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Society is like a lawn, where every roughness is smoothed, every bramble eradicated, and where the eye is delighted by the smiling verdure of a velvet surface; he, however, who would study nature in its wildness and variety, must plunge into the forest, must explore the glen, must stem the torrent, and dare the precipice. – Washington Irving, writer (1783-1859)

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True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it is not haphazard and superficial. It comes to see that an edifice that produces beggars needs restructuring.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The spirit is never at rest but always engaged in ever progressive motion, in giving itself new form. –Hegel

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Let others lead small lives, but not you. Let others argue over small things, but not you. Let others cry over small hurts, but not you. Let others leave their future in someone else's hands, but not you. – Jim Rohn

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by Dr. Tony Alessandra- We have all heard of the Golden Rule-and many people aspire to live by it. The Golden Rule is not a panacea. Think about it: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." The Golden Rule implies the basic assumption that other people would like to be treated the way that you would like to be treated.

The alternative to the Golden Rule is the Platinum Rule:

"Treat others the way they want to be treated." Ah hah! What a difference. The Platinum Rule accommodates the feelings of others. The focus of relationships shifts from "this is what I want, so I'll give everyone the same thing" to "let me first understand what they want and then I'll give it to them."

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Every moment instructs, and every object; for wisdom is infused into every form. It has been poured into us as blood; it convulsed us as pain; it slid into us as pleasure; it enveloped us in dull, melancholy days, or in days of cheerful labor; we did not guess its essence until after a long time. - Ralph W. Emerson

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We must give more in order to get more. It is the generous giving of ourselves that produces the generous harvest."

-Orison Swett Marde

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If you want trust, trust others. If you want respect, respect others. If you want help, help others. If you want love and peace in your life, give them away. If you want great friends, be one. That's how it works.

– Dan Zadra

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You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view.

– Harper Lee, writer (b. 1926)

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Questions show the mind's range, and answers its subtlety.

– Joseph Joubert, essayist (1754-1824)

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If you let go a little, you will have a little peace. If you let go a lot, you will have a lot of peace. If you let go completely, you will have complete peace. Awakening appears when you stop wanting anything. - Ajahn Sumedho

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A human being is a part of a whole, called by us 'universe', a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. - Albert Einstein

When we pay attention, whatever we are doing...is transformed and becomes a part of our spiritual path. We begin to notice details and textures that we never noticed before; everyday life becomes clearer, sharper, and at the same time more spacious.- Rick Fields

Real enlightenment is not an experience. Real enlightenment is the ongoing work you do to keep from getting caught up in your experiences.- Brad Warner

Flow with whatever is happening and let your mind be free. Stay centered by accepting whatever you are doing. This is the ultimate.- Chuang Tzu

It's not possible to have a problem without believing a prior thought. To notice this simple truth is the beginning of peace.-Byron Katie

By letting go of even the thought ‘I,’ what is left? There is nowhere to stand and no one to stand there. No separation anywhere. Pure awareness. Neither this, nor that. Just clarity and being.- Ram Dass

You are me, and I am you. Isn't it obvious that we “inter-are”? You cultivate the flower within yourself, so that I will be beautiful. I transform the garbage within myself, so that you will not have to suffer. I support you, you support me. I am in this world to offer you peace, you are in this world to bring me joy.- Thich Nhat Hanh

As long as you have certain desires about how it ought to be you can't see how it is.- Ram Dass

You are awareness. Awareness is another name for you. Since you are awareness there is no need to attain or cultivate it. All that you have to do is to unhook awareness from other things, that are contents of awareness. If one gives up being hooked, then pure awareness alone remains, and that is the [real] Self.- Ramana Maharshi

Thoughts are impediments to seeing your deepest nature. Don't give rise to any thought, and discover who you are. That ocean of eternal peace is you. What is the difficulty that we suffer from? It is that we seek peace elsewhere and do not experience that we are peace incarnate itself.- PapaJi

To realize the inexpressible truth, do not manipulate mind or body but simply open into transparency with relaxed, natural grace.- Tilopa

As you gently relax into awareness, into listening, the mind's compulsive contraction around objects will fade. Silence of being will come more clearly into consciousness as a welcoming to rest and abide. An attitude of open receptivity, free of any goal or anticipation, will facilitate the presence of silence and stillness to be revealed as your natural condition.- Adyashanti

To bow to the fact of our life's sorrows and betrayals is to accept them; and from this deep gesture we discover that all life is workable. As we learn to bow, we discover that the heart holds more freedom and compassion than we could imagine.- Jack Kornfield

Life is like an ever-shifting kaleidoscope - a slight change, and all patterns alter.- Sharon Salzberg

When you drop all your ideas, fantasies and projections about who you are and what freedom is and remain completely empty, this is freedom.- Mooji

Acknowledging the good that you already have in your life is the foundation for all abundance.- Eckhart Tolle

If we can allow some space within our awareness and rest there, we can respect our troubling thoughts and emotions, allow them to come, and let them go. Our lives may be complicated on the outside, but we remain simple, easy, and open on the inside.- Tsoknyi Rinpoche

That’s the moment of enlightenment. That is the moment that you become for the first time an unconditioned, sane, really free human being.- Osho

It is only when the mind is free from the old that it meets everything anew, and in that there is joy.- Jiddu Krishnamurti

We should cast aside all childish games that fetter and exhaust body, speech and mind; and stretching out in inconceivable nonaction, in the unstructured matrix, the actuality of emptiness, where the natural perfection of reality lies, we should gaze at the uncontrived sameness of every experience, all conditioning and ambition resolved with finality.- Longchenpa

Zen is a liberation from time. For if we open our eyes and see clearly, it becomes obvious that there is no other time than this instant, and that the past and the future are abstractions without any concrete reality.- Alan Watts

Since all virtuous thoughts and actions motivated by clinging to a concrete reality or to a self-cherishing attitude are like poisonous food, give them up. Learn not to cling, but to know the phantom-like nature of experience.- Jamgon Kongtrul Lodro Thaye

Inability to accept the mystic experience is more than an intellectual handicap. Lack of awareness of the basic unity of organism and environment is a serious and dangerous hallucination. For in a civilization equipped with immense technological power, the sense of alienation between man and nature leads to the use of technology in a hostile spirit—-to the “conquest” of nature instead of intelligent co-operation with nature.- Alan Watts

Give yourself completely to the act of listening. Beyond the sounds there is something greater, a sacredness that cannot be understood through thought.- Eckhart Tolle

For things to reveal themselves to us, we need to be ready to abandon our views about them.- Thich Nhat Hanh

We are not going to change the whole world, but we can change ourselves and feel free as birds. We can be serene even in the midst of calamities and, by our serenity, make others more tranquil. Serenity is contagious. If we smile at someone, he or she will smile back. And a smile costs nothing. We should plague everyone with joy. If we are to die in a minute, why not die happily, laughing?”- Swami Satchidananda

The most creative act you will ever undertake is the act of creating yourself.- Deepak Chopra

Give up defining yourself - to yourself or to others. You won't die. You will come to life. And don't be concerned with how others define you. When they define you, they are limiting themselves, so it's their problem.- Eckhart Tolle

The secret of health for both mind and body is not to mourn for the past, worry about the future, or anticipate troubles, but to live in the present moment wisely and earnestly.- Paramahansa Yogananda

It is because our way of observing things is deeply rooted in our self-centered ideas that we are disappointed when we find everything has only a tentative existence. But when we actually realize this truth, we will have no suffering.- Shunryu Suzuki

Contentment is a wealth that gives the highest satisfaction, and we can gain it simply by mining our own mental resources, and knowing our own mind. We can cultivate the perspective that what we have is enough. We can see that we do not actually need more than we already have, and can be completely satisfied with that.- 17th Karmapa

Impermanence is a principle of harmony. When we don’t struggle against it, we are in harmony with reality.- Pema Chödron

If you see and love the essence in others, it is because you have found the essence of your own Self. This is the purest form of compassion. It is not from one to another but from the Self to the Self. It is all one unity, you see?- Mooji

Breath by breath, let go of fear, expectation, anger, regret, cravings, frustration, fatigue. Let go of the need for approval. Let go of old judgments and opinions. Die to all that, and fly free. Soar in the freedom of desirelessness.

Let go. Let Be. See through everything and be free, complete, luminous, at home -- at ease.- Lama Surya Das

As soon as you concern yourself with the "good" and "bad" of your fellows, you create an opening in your heart for maliciousness to enter. Testing, competing with, and criticizing others weakens and defeats you. - Morihei Ueshiba

Peace is your natural state. It is the mind that obstructs the natural state... Investigate what the mind is, and it will disappear. There is no such thing as mind apart from thought. Nevertheless, because of the emergence of thought, you surmise something from which it starts and term that the mind. When you probe to see what it is, you find there is really no such thing as mind. When the mind has thus vanished, you realize eternal peace. - Ramana Maharshi

People suffer because they are caught in their views. As soon as we release those views, we are free and we don't suffer anymore. - Thich Nhat Hanh

Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor. - Thích Nhất Hạnh

It is only when the mind is free from the old that it meets everything anew, and in that there is joy. - Jiddu Krishnamurti

There is only this now. It does not come from anywhere; it is not going anywhere. It is not permanent, but it is not impermanent. Though moving, it is always still. When we try to catch it, it seems to run away, and yet it is always here and there is no escape from it. And when we turn around to find the self which knows this moment, we find that it has vanished like the past. - Alan Watts

Once you taste the peace, joy and serenity that result from the practice of slow mindful walking – you can practice walking meditation wherever you are. - Thich Nhat Hanh

The process of breathing, if fully understood and experienced in its profound significance, could teach us more than all the philosophies of the world. - Lama Govinda

The great secret of true success, of true happiness, is this: the man or woman who asks for no return, the perfectly unselfish person, is the most successful. - Swami Vivekananda

The ego is a monkey catapulting through the jungle: totally fascinated by the realm of the senses, it swings from one desire to the next, one conflict to the next, one self-centered idea to the next. If you threaten it, it actually fears for its life. Let this monkey go. Let the senses go. Let desires go. Let conflicts go. Let ideas go. Let the fiction of life and death go. Just remain in the center, watching. And then forget that you are there. - Lao Tzu

Enjoy your problems. - Shunryu Suzuki

You build inner strength through embracing the totality of your experience, both the delightful parts and the difficult parts. Embracing the totality of your experience is one definition of having loving kindness for yourself.

Loving kindness does not mean making sure you’re feeling good all the time – trying to set up your life so that you’re comfortable every moment. Rather, it means setting up your life so that you have time for meditation and self-reflection, for kindhearted, compassionate self-honesty. - Pema Chödron

* * *

Everything passes, nothing remains. Understand this, loosen your grip and find serenity. - Lama Surya Das

* * *

True mindfulness is the awareness that everything you encounter is a vigorous expression of the same living universe as you. - Brad Warner

* * *

You find peace not by rearranging the circumstances of your life, but by realizing who you are at the deepest level. - Eckhart Tolle

* * *

Many expressions that are in common usage, and sometimes the structure of language itself, reveal the fact that people don't know who they are. You say: "He lost his life" or "my life," as if life were something that you can possess or lose. The truth is: you don't have a life, you are life. The One Life, the one consciousness that pervades the entire universe and takes temporary form to experience itself as a stone or blade of grass, as an animal, a person, a star or a galaxy. Can you sense deep within that you already know that? Can you sense that you already are That?

– Eckhart Tolle

You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the entire ocean in a drop.

– Unknown

Waking up to who you are requires letting go of who you imagine yourself to be. - Alan Watts

You get peace of mind not by thinking about it or imagining it, but by quieting and relaxing the restless mind. Your nature is absolute peace. You are not the mind. Silence your mind through concentration and meditation, and you will discover the peace of the Spirit that you are, and have always been. - Remez Sasson

* * *

If you can't control what you think, you will not be able to control what you do.

* * *

The dangerous thing about assumptions are that they have the innate tendency to morph into beliefs with the passage of time. Assume, but always be aware of your assumptions and dispose of them at the very earliest, either by confirming them and accepting them as beliefs or disproving them and rejecting them as fallacies. - Unknown

* * *

The key to success is not through achievement, but through enthusiasm. - Malcolm Forbes

* * *

Being extravagantly generous is an enchanting way to become holy and Godlike, for God is awesomely extravagant — as is revealed by even a casual glance at creation. - Edward Hays, The Great Escape Manual

* * *

Help me to travel light, in every area of my life. Especially help me to unclutter my mind, so that I may hear you and see more clearly your mighty hand on my life. Amen.

You are a portal through which the universe is looking at and exploring itself. - Alan Watts

When you rest in quietness and your image of yourself fades, and your image of the world fades, and your ideas of others fade, what's left? A brightness, a radiant emptiness that is simply what you are. – Adyashanti

* * *

Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan 'press on' has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race. - Calvin Coolidge

* * *

How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard. - A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh

* * *

What we have to learn, in both meditation and in life, is to be free of attachment to the good experiences, and free of aversion to the negative ones. - Sogyal Rinpoche

* * *

The chemist who can extract from his heart's elements compassion, respect, longing, patience, regret, surprise and forgiveness and compound them into one can create that atom which is called love. - Kahlil Gibran

* * *

There's a self expansive aspect of gratitude. Very possibly it's a little known law of nature: the more gratitude you have, the more you have to be grateful for.

Elaine St. James

* * *

The mind has to be empty to see clearly. - Jiddu Krishnamurti

The everyday practice is simply to develop a complete acceptance and openness to all situations and emotions and to all people, experiencing everything totally without mental reservations and blockages, so that one never withdraws or centralizes into oneself. - Chogyam Trungpa

* * *

Look at your feet. You are standing in the sky. When we think of the sky, we tend to look up, but the sky actually begins at the earth.

– Diane Ackerman

* * *

The grateful heart is a manifestation of one's true self. Nothing sidelines the ego more effectively than a grateful heart.

Albert Nolan

* * *

Judgments that constrain your giving are the very demons that are keeping you from receiving. - Martha Beck

* * *

What I'm saying is, watch out, for your social conditioning, and how your constant commerce in language with other people shapes the way in which you actually sense the world. - Alan Watts

* * *To find the universal elements enough; to find the air and the water exhilarating; to be refreshed by a morning walk or an evening saunter; to be thrilled by the stars at night; to be elated over a bird's nest or a wildflower in spring - these are some of the rewards of the simple life. – John Burroughs

* * *

Viewing our experience in this world as a dream, the Buddha found that our habit of fixating on the mere appearance of our dreamlike relative world, thinking that it is truly existing, throws us into an endless cycle of pain and anxiety.

We are in a deep sleep, hibernating like a silkworm in a cocoon. We have woven a reality based on our projections, imagination, hopes, fears, and delusions. Our cocoons have become very solid and sophisticated. Our imaginings are so real to us that we are trapped in the cocoon. But we can free ourselves simply by realizing that this is all our imagination. - Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse

* * *

If I could give you only one advice, I would say: Don't identify with anything. Be completely empty - no one. Be no-body and see if you lose anything but delusion. - Mooji

True mindfulness is the awareness that everything you encounter is a vigorous expression of the same living universe as you. - Brad Warner

There is an intuitive knowing within us that we are eternal but this gets covered over with the noise we create while identifying with the impermanent. - Mooji

The final bridge to cross is to let go of the mind-created 'spiritual' self. Burn that bridge behind you. Stay empty of self-image and cease looking back. Remain in the neutrality of being. That's it! - Mooji

* * *

Happiness does not come from having much, but from being attached to little. - Master Cheng Yen

* * *

He who knows that enough is enough will always have enough. - Lao Tzu

* * *

Seek not outside yourself, for all your pain comes simply from a futile search for what you want, insisting where it must be found. -A Course in Miracles

True love does not come by finding the perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly. ~ Jason Jordan

* * *

Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don't resist them - that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like. – Lao Tzu

* * *

All things—all beings and all activities, no matter how ordinary—are equal expressions of the Infinite. – Adyashanti

* * *

By having a reverence for life, we enter into a spiritual relation with the world. By practicing reverence for life we become good, deep, and alive.

– Albert Schweitzer

* * *

We are all connected. When you touch one thing, you are touching everything. Whatever we do has an effect on others. Therefore, we must learn to live mindfully to touch the peace inside each of us. Peace in the world starts with peace in oneself. If everyone lives mindfully, everyone will be more healthy, feel more fulfilled in their daily lives and there will be more peace. This collective mindfulness can bring positive change to our families, organizations, communities, nations and future generations. - Thich Nhat Hanh

Peace isn't an experience free of challenges, free of rough and smooth; it's an experience that's expansive enough to include all that arises without feeling threatened. - Pema Chodron

* * *

My country is the world, and my religion is to do good. – Thomas Paine

* * *

There must always be remaining in every life, some place for the singing of angels, some place for that which in itself is breathless and beautiful. –Rev. Howard Thurman

* *
For things to reveal themselves to us, we need to be ready to abandon our views about them.- Thich Nhat Hanh
We are not going to change the whole world, but we can change ourselves and feel free as birds. We can be serene even in the midst of calamities and, by our serenity, make others more tranquil. Serenity is contagious. If we smile at someone, he or she will smile back. And a smile costs nothing. We should plague everyone with joy. If we are to die in a minute, why not die happily, laughing?”- Swami Satchidananda
The most creative act you will ever undertake is the act of creating yourself.- Deepak Chopra
Give up defining yourself - to yourself or to others. You won't die. You will come to life. And don't be concerned with how others define you. When they define you, they are limiting themselves, so it's their problem.- Eckhart Tolle
The secret of health for both mind and body is not to mourn for the past, worry about the future, or anticipate troubles, but to live in the present moment wisely and earnestly.- Paramahansa Yogananda
It is because our way of observing things is deeply rooted in our self-centered ideas that we are disappointed when we find everything has only a tentative existence. But when we actually realize this truth, we will have no suffering.- Shunryu Suzuki
Contentment is a wealth that gives the highest satisfaction, and we can gain it simply by mining our own mental resources, and knowing our own mind. We can cultivate the perspective that what we have is enough. We can see that we do not actually need more than we already have, and can be completely satisfied with that.- 17th Karmapa
Impermanence is a principle of harmony. When we don’t struggle against it, we are in harmony with reality.- Pema Chödron
If you see and love the essence in others, it is because you have found the essence of your own Self. This is the purest form of compassion. It is not from one to another but from the Self to the Self. It is all one unity, you see?- Mooji
Breath by breath, let go of fear, expectation, anger, regret, cravings, frustration, fatigue. Let go of the need for approval. Let go of old judgments and opinions. Die to all that, and fly free. Soar in the freedom of desirelessness.

Let go. Let Be. See through everything and be free, complete, luminous, at home -- at ease.- Lama Surya Das
As soon as you concern yourself with the "good" and "bad" of your fellows, you create an opening in your heart for maliciousness to enter. Testing, competing with, and criticizing others weakens and defeats you. - Morihei Ueshiba
Peace is your natural state. It is the mind that obstructs the natural state... Investigate what the mind is, and it will disappear. There is no such thing as mind apart from thought. Nevertheless, because of the emergence of thought, you surmise something from which it starts and term that the mind. When you probe to see what it is, you find there is really no such thing as mind. When the mind has thus vanished, you realize eternal peace. - Ramana Maharshi
People suffer because they are caught in their views. As soon as we release those views, we are free and we don't suffer anymore. - Thich Nhat Hanh
Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor. - Thích Nhất Hạnh
It is only when the mind is free from the old that it meets everything anew, and in that there is joy. - Jiddu Krishnamurti
There is only this now. It does not come from anywhere; it is not going anywhere. It is not permanent, but it is not impermanent. Though moving, it is always still. When we try to catch it, it seems to run away, and yet it is always here and there is no escape from it. And when we turn around to find the self which knows this moment, we find that it has vanished like the past. - Alan Watts
Once you taste the peace, joy and serenity that result from the practice of slow mindful walking – you can practice walking meditation wherever you are. - Thich Nhat Hanh
The process of breathing, if fully understood and experienced in its profound significance, could teach us more than all the philosophies of the world. - Lama Govinda
The great secret of true success, of true happiness, is this: the man or woman who asks for no return, the perfectly unselfish person, is the most successful. - Swami Vivekananda
The ego is a monkey catapulting through the jungle: totally fascinated by the realm of the senses, it swings from one desire to the next, one conflict to the next, one self-centered idea to the next. If you threaten it, it actually fears for its life. Let this monkey go. Let the senses go. Let desires go. Let conflicts go. Let ideas go. Let the fiction of life and death go. Just remain in the center, watching. And then forget that you are there. - Lao Tzu
Enjoy your problems. - Shunryu Suzuki
You build inner strength through embracing the totality of your experience, both the delightful parts and the difficult parts. Embracing the totality of your experience is one definition of having loving kindness for yourself.

Loving kindness does not mean making sure you’re feeling good all the time – trying to set up your life so that you’re comfortable every moment. Rather, it means setting up your life so that you have time for meditation and self-reflection, for kindhearted, compassionate self-honesty. - Pema Chödron
* * *
Everything passes, nothing remains. Understand this, loosen your grip and find serenity. - Lama Surya Das
* * *
True mindfulness is the awareness that everything you encounter is a vigorous expression of the same living universe as you. - Brad Warner
* * *
You find peace not by rearranging the circumstances of your life, but by realizing who you are at the deepest level. - Eckhart Tolle
* * *
Many expressions that are in common usage, and sometimes the structure of language itself, reveal the fact that people don't know who they are. You say: "He lost his life" or "my life," as if life were something that you can possess or lose. The truth is: you don't have a life, you are life. The One Life, the one consciousness that pervades the entire universe and takes temporary form to experience itself as a stone or blade of grass, as an animal, a person, a star or a galaxy. Can you sense deep within that you already know that? Can you sense that you already are That?
– Eckhart Tolle
You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the entire ocean in a drop.
– Unknown
Waking up to who you are requires letting go of who you imagine yourself to be. - Alan Watts
You get peace of mind not by thinking about it or imagining it, but by quieting and relaxing the restless mind. Your nature is absolute peace. You are not the mind. Silence your mind through concentration and meditation, and you will discover the peace of the Spirit that you are, and have always been. - Remez Sasson
* * *
If you can't control what you think, you will not be able to control what you do.
* * *
The dangerous thing about assumptions are that they have the innate tendency to morph into beliefs with the passage of time. Assume, but always be aware of your assumptions and dispose of them at the very earliest, either by confirming them and accepting them as beliefs or disproving them and rejecting them as fallacies. - Unknown
* * *
The key to success is not through achievement, but through enthusiasm. - Malcolm Forbes
* * *
Being extravagantly generous is an enchanting way to become holy and Godlike, for God is awesomely extravagant — as is revealed by even a casual glance at creation. - Edward Hays, The Great Escape Manual
* * *

· Help me to travel light, in every area of my life. Especially help me to unclutter my mind, so that I may hear you and see more clearly your mighty hand on my life. Amen.

You are a portal through which the universe is looking at and exploring itself. - Alan Watts
When you rest in quietness and your image of yourself fades, and your image of the world fades, and your ideas of others fade, what's left? A brightness, a radiant emptiness that is simply what you are. – Adyashanti
* * *
Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan 'press on' has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race. - Calvin Coolidge
* * *
How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard. - A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh
* * *
What we have to learn, in both meditation and in life, is to be free of attachment to the good experiences, and free of aversion to the negative ones. - Sogyal Rinpoche
* * *
The chemist who can extract from his heart's elements compassion, respect, longing, patience, regret, surprise and forgiveness and compound them into one can create that atom which is called love. - Kahlil Gibran
* * *
There's a self expansive aspect of gratitude. Very possibly it's a little known law of nature: the more gratitude you have, the more you have to be grateful for.
Elaine St. James
* * *
The mind has to be empty to see clearly. - Jiddu Krishnamurti
The everyday practice is simply to develop a complete acceptance and openness to all situations and emotions and to all people, experiencing everything totally without mental reservations and blockages, so that one never withdraws or centralizes into oneself. - Chogyam Trungpa
* * *
Look at your feet. You are standing in the sky. When we think of the sky, we tend to look up, but the sky actually begins at the earth.
– Diane Ackerman
* * *
The grateful heart is a manifestation of one's true self. Nothing sidelines the ego more effectively than a grateful heart.
Albert Nolan
* * *
Judgments that constrain your giving are the very demons that are keeping you from receiving. - Martha Beck
* * *
What I'm saying is, watch out, for your social conditioning, and how your constant commerce in language with other people shapes the way in which you actually sense the world. - Alan Watts
* * *
To find the universal elements enough; to find the air and the water exhilarating; to be refreshed by a morning walk or an evening saunter; to be thrilled by the stars at night; to be elated over a bird's nest or a wildflower in spring - these are some of the rewards of the simple life. – John Burroughs
* * *
Viewing our experience in this world as a dream, the Buddha found that our habit of fixating on the mere appearance of our dreamlike relative world, thinking that it is truly existing, throws us into an endless cycle of pain and anxiety.

We are in a deep sleep, hibernating like a silkworm in a cocoon. We have woven a reality based on our projections, imagination, hopes, fears, and delusions. Our cocoons have become very solid and sophisticated. Our imaginings are so real to us that we are trapped in the cocoon. But we can free ourselves simply by realizing that this is all our imagination. - Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse
* * *
The world as pure object is something that is not there. It is not a reality outside us for which we exist....It is a living and self-creating mystery of which I am myself a part, to which I am myself, my own unique door. – Thomas Merton
* * *
If I could give you only one advice, I would say: Don't identify with anything. Be completely empty - no one. Be no-body and see if you lose anything but delusion. - Mooji
True mindfulness is the awareness that everything you encounter is a vigorous expression of the same living universe as you. - Brad Warner
There is an intuitive knowing within us that we are eternal but this gets covered over with the noise we create while identifying with the impermanent. - Mooji
The final bridge to cross is to let go of the mind-created 'spiritual' self. Burn that bridge behind you. Stay empty of self-image and cease looking back. Remain in the neutrality of being. That's it! - Mooji
* * *
Happiness does not come from having much, but from being attached to little. - Master Cheng Yen
* * *

There is no greater sign of Divine Presence than being fully engaged in the activities of life while demonstrating loving-kindness, tranquility and ease of being. -

HAZRAT INAYAT KHAN

Whenever you're feeling lonely or sad, try going to the loft on a beautiful day and looking outside. Not at the houses and the rooftops, but at the sky. As long as you can look fearlessly at the sky, you'll know that you're pure within and will find happiness once more.” - From The Diary of a Young Girl (1947) by Anne Frank.

Guard well your spare moments. They are like uncut diamonds. Discard them and their value will never be known. Improve them and they will become the brightest gems in a useful life. - RALPH WALDO EMERSON

Few things can help an individual more than to place responsibility on him, and to let him know that you trust him.– Booker T. Washington

There’s no such thing as bad weather. . . just bad clothing choices. – J Noulin?

God is the DJ. Life is the dance. Love is the rhythm.

In each of us there is a spark that can reverse the trends of violence and depression spiraling within us and in the world around us. By setting in motion the spiral of gratefulness we begin the journey toward peace and joy. – Brother David Steindl-Rast

You only have control over three things in your life—the thoughts you think, the images you visualize, and the actions you take. – Jack Canfield

It’s the perspective we choose—not the places we visit—that ultimately tells us where we stand. Every time I take a trip, the experience acquires meaning and grows deeper only after I get back home and, sitting still, begin to convert the sights I’ve seen into lasting insights.

—Pico Iyer, “Adventures in Going Nowhere”

The most fortunate are those who have a wonderful capacity to appreciate again and again, freshly and naively, the basic goods of life, with awe, pleasure, wonder and even ecstasy. - ABRAHAM H. MASLOW

Good people, like clouds, receive only to give away. – Indian proverb

Gratefulness is a setting of the heart, one that I can choose like a wavelength on the radio. - Susan Mazrolle

We crave that deep place within that cannot be touched by the ups and downs of life, but rather just IS – connected and whole. - KATIE RUBINSTEIN

At some point in life, the world’s beauty becomes enough. - TONI MORRISON

We don’t have to take the story as truth. - JACK KORNFIELD

Every wave on the ocean is the whole ocean waving... So, the ocean of being waves every one of us, and we are its waves. - ALAN WATTS

Everything connects us to everything else. - LEONARDO DA VINCI

We thought of life by analogy with a journey, a pilgrimage, which had a serious purpose at the end, and the thing was to get to that end, success or whatever it is, maybe heaven after you’re dead. But we missed the point the whole way along. It was a musical thing and you were supposed to sing or to dance while the music was being played. – Alan Watts

Willing to experience aloneness, I discover connection everywhere; Turning to face my fear, I meet the warrior who lives within. - JENNIFER WELWOOD

To be alive in this beautiful, self-organizing universe—to participate in the dance of life with senses to perceive it, lungs that breathe it, organs that draw nourishment from it—is a wonder beyond words. -

—Joanna Macy and Sam Mowe, “The Work That Reconnects”

In the time of your life, live — so that in that wondrous time you shall not add to the misery and sorrow of the world, but shall smile to the infinite delight and mystery of it. - WILLIAM SAROYAN

Fear is the cheapest room in the house. I would like to see you living in better conditions. – HAFIZ

To live is to let go, and in order to live fully we must learn to let go fully and to embrace the flow that is the universe. - —Bodhipaksa, “What You’re Made Of”

Do not feel lonely; the entire universe is inside you. - RUMI

When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves. -VIKTOR FRANKL

Reality is permeated, indeed flooded, with divine creativity, nourishment, and care. - MARCUS J. BORG

What nature delivers to us is never stale. Because what nature creates has eternity in it. - ISAAC BASHEVIS SINGER

We are all connected: To each other, biologically. To the earth, chemically. And to the rest of the universe, atomically. - NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON

When it's over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms. - MARY OLIVER

Let gratitude be the pillow upon which you kneel to say your nightly prayer. - MAYA ANGELOU

I felt in need of a great pilgrimage

so I sat still for three days. – KABIR

Conversation is a dynamic interplay between each person’s choice to speak or listen. When those choices are conscious and respectful, conversations tend to be more productive and enjoyable. - Oren Jay Sofer, “When to Speak and When to Listen”

We are each other's harvest;

we are each other's business;

we are each other's magnitude and bond.

GWENDOLYN BROOKS

When I am grateful, I am neither rushing nor slouching through my day – I’m dancing. - BR. DAVID STEINDL-RAST

Life is imperfect. People are imperfect.

Love is the perfect response. - KRISTI NELSON

A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies, said Jojen. The man who never reads lives only one. – Jojen, in George R.R. Martin’s A Dance with Dragons

Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. Let me learn from you, love you, savor you, bless you before you depart. Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. -

MARY JEAN IRION

A loving silence often has far more power to heal and to connect than the most well-intentioned words. - RACHEL NAOMI REMEN

Everything flourishes in the nourishment of our appreciation; plants, people, the Earth, moments. When we live with that appreciation, we flourish. - KRISTI NELSON

Skepticism is the highest of duties, and blind faith the one unpardonable sin. – T.H. Huxley

The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts. – Bertrand Russell

And once the storm is over, you won’t remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about. - From Kafka on the Shore (2002) by Haruki Murakami.

If we are too busy to be kind, we are too busy. - Allan Lokos

Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family. Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one. - Jane Howard

Fine weather is a prejudice of youth. For an old man, the weather can be neither fine nor bad; it is the very texture of the weather that seems priceless, whether brightened by shafts of sunlight or clouded with darkness. - From Nouveaux Mémoires Intérieurs (1965) by François Mauriac, translated from the French by Herma Briffault.

When we meditate, we develop a creative awareness that enables us to see that we are a flow of inner conditions meeting outer conditions.

—Martine Batchelor,“The Woman in the Photograph

This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival”.-Rumi

“There's always a story. It's all stories, really. The sun coming up every day is a story. Everything's got a story in it. Change the story, change the world.”-From A Hat Full of Sky (2004) by Sir Terry Pratchett.

Practicing mindful awareness of...our conditioning and habits of the mind helps us to know what we are up against within ourselves as we seek to make change in the world.-Rhonda Magee,“Making the Invisible Visible”

The purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls.– Pablo Picasso

My soul can find no staircase to Heaven unless it be through Earth's loveliness. -

Michelangelo (1475-1564)

Indigenous traditions also value this balance in relationship to plants, trees, and the natural world. “We say that we know a thing when we know it not only with our physical senses, with our intellect, but also when we engage our intuitive ways of knowing, of emotional knowledge and spiritual knowledge,” she says. “And that’s really what I mean by listening … What is the story that that being might share with us if we know how to listen as well as we know how to see?” - Robin Wall Kimmerer- botanist, member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation

It’s easy to identify with all the places we’ve been hurt and abandoned, but can we identify with the timeless wholeness that weathers every abuse, every condition? —Bonnie Myotai Treace, “The Sword Disappears in the Water”

If you don’t become the ocean, you’ll be seasick every day. - Leonard Cohen

The most precious inheritance that parents can give their children is their own happiness.- Thich Nhat Hanh

Men plan and God laughs.

Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. - Nietzche

All things, we learn, are ourselves. Thus, practice necessarily leads to empathy.

—Charles Johnson, “A Sangha by Another Name”

A good deed doesn’t just evaporate and disappear. Its consequences saturate the universe and the goodness that happens somewhere, anywhere, helps in the transfiguration of the ugliness. - Desmond Tutu

I am in you and I am you. No one can understand this until he has lost his mind. - Rumi

If my decomposing carcass helps nourish the roots of a Juniper tree or the wings of a vulture-that is immortality enough for me. And as much as anyone deserves.-Edward Abbey

This grand show is eternal. It is always sunrise somewhere; the dew is never all dried at once; a shower is forever falling; vapor ever rising. Eternal sunrise, eternal sunset, eternal dawn and gloaming, on seas and continents and islands, each in its turn, as the round earth rolls. -

From John of the Mountains: The Unpublished Journals of John Muir (1938)

The Buddha pointed out that the seeds of liberative understanding and clarity, of kindness and compassion, lie within each of us. And the path to their fruition lies in our commitment. -

—Christina Feldman, “Doing, Being, and the Great In-Between”

God is truth and truth is God.- Hazrat Inayit Khan

The one who knows himself truly knows God.- Hazrat Ali

Practicing contentment is a radical act in a consumption-driven society.- Robin Wall Kimmerer

Trungram Gyalwa Rinpoche, “The Power of the Third Moment”

the sun, the moon, the planets, the air, the water and the earth are all serving you, aiding life's purpose and preparing for your food. Yet you regard all this unthankfully, absorbed in your own little troubles which are as nothing before the great forces of nature, always working, night and day. - Sa’di

Imagine a country whose citizens—maybe even its leaders—are brave, calm, and open towards each other; a country whose people realize that all human beings belong together as one family and must act accordingly; a country guided by Common Sense.-

Br. David Steindl-Rast

While we can’t control what’s happening around us, we can cultivate the capacity to be with what is with more ease, joy, and freedom.- Sebene Selassie

Be Silent

Hear the voices of day and night

Be Still

Know thyself

Be Aware

Find the secret.

-on plaque at Camp Akita

Self-denial is not renouncing things, it is denying the self; and the first lesson of self-denial is humility. - Hazrat Inayit Khan

When the mind and body are restless, nothing in life can be accomplished. Success is the result of control - Hazrat Inayit Khan

You have power over your mind — not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength. - Marcus Aurelius

The Buddha found what he had to see by sitting still, but even he had to travel to get to that point, to see through the other roads that would lead nowhere and come finally to the understanding that the truth we’re looking for is no further than the hair on our arms. - Pico Iyer, “The Long Road to Sitting Still”

We become what we think about.- Earl Nightingale

That day there was a wind blowing and, after a while, I saw the leaf leave the branch and float down to the soil, dancing joyfully, because as it floated it saw itself already there in the tree. It was so happy. I bowed my head, knowing that I have a lot to learn from the leaf. - Thich Nhat Hanh

My religion is nature. That’s what arouses those feelings of wonder and mysticism and gratitude in me.- Oliver Sacks

Appreciation can turn our planet into a sacred home and our communities into extended family. - KRISTI NELSON

Do not fear things that arise in the mind; question them, know them. The truth is more than thought and feelings, so do not believe and get caught by them. See the whole process arising and ceasing. This understanding gives rise to wisdom.- —Achaan Chah, “Walking: Meditation on the Move”

Everything flourishes in the nourishment of our appreciation; plants, people, the Earth, moments. When we live with that appreciation, we flourish.- Kristi Nelson

Gratitude celebrates life with a joyful "yes" at every knot of the great network in which everything is connected to everything.- Br. David Steindl-Rast

One of the sanest, surest, and most generous joys of life comes from being happy over the good fortune of others.- Archibald Rutledge

You are not a passive observer in the cosmos. The entire universe is expressing itself through you at this very minute.- Deepak Chopra

Gratitude begins in our hearts and then dovetails into behavior. It almost always makes you willing to be of service, which is where the joy resides.- Anne Lamott

We are stars wrapped in skin; the light we are seeking has always been within. - Rumi

It is far too easy to discourage, all too easy to criticize, to complain, to rebuke. Let us try instead to see even a small amount of good in a person and concentrate on that. Let us be quicker to praise than to find fault. Let us be quicker to thank others than to complain.- Desmond Tutu

During this time of giving, we should not place too much importance on material gifts; it’s our thoughts, words, and deeds that count. Sincere expressions of appreciation, praise, thanks, and an unexpected helping hand can be the most treasured gifts of all.-Reverend Earl Ikeda, “O Bodhi Tree, O Bodhi Tree”

Experiencing the disappearance of discomfort soothes the mind, makes it confident, and allows for the insight of impermanence: Everything passes.- Sylvia Boorstein, “The Wisdom of Discomfort”

Love produces harmony and harmony creates beauty. Therefore the chief motto in life is 'Love, harmony and beauty'. Love, in all things and beings, the beloved God, in harmony all in the right understanding, and beautify your life by observing the beauty within and without. By love, harmony and beauty you must turn the whole of life into a single vision of divine glory. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Behind us all is one spirit and one life; how then can we be happy if our neighbor is not also happy? - Hazrat Inayit Khan

If I could summarize nonviolence in one word, it would be: patience.- Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan

People never harm others out of joy, they give pain to others because they too are hurt or in pain.- Sobonfu Somé

Spiritual practice is stepping out of the assumed reality of “me” by understanding what the “me” is and withdrawing energy from its perceptual fixations.- Rodney Smith, “Undivided Mind”

There are many paths, and each man considers his own the best and wisest. Let each one choose that which belongs to his own temperament.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

Self-control therefore is the key to all success and happiness. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.- Maya Angelou

What really matters is gratitude. That’s the heart of spirituality. And gratitude connects us: it lets us see that we are all connected.- Kurt Spellmeyer, “Dialogue Across Difference”

‘For last year's words belong to last year's language

And next year's words await another voice.’-T.S. Eliot, From ‘Little Gidding’ in Four Quartets (1943)

Do your best and then relax. Let things go on in a natural way, rather than force them.- Paramahansa Yogananda

There is no other obstacle [for those on the spiritual path]than this false self, and there is no better means of controlling it than by meditation and by practicing the presence of God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

...the truth cannot be put into words; all we can do is make an effort to render the mystery of life intelligible to our minds.. . The ultimate truth is that which cannot spoken, for words are too inadequate to express it.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

How wonderful would it be, while we discover faraway planets, to rediscover the needs of the brothers and sisters orbiting around us.- Pope Francis

The saying of the [Hadith], "Die before death," does not mean suicide, it means the death of the "I", the separate self.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

To meditate upon thoughts is simply to be aware, as thoughts arise, that the mind is thinking, without getting involved in the content.- Joseph Goldstein, “These Are Not ‘Your’ Thoughts”

The conscious mind- the self or soul- is a spin doctor, not the Commander-in-Chief. - Steven Pinker

A man’s self is the sum total of all that he can call his. - William James

Positive illusions make us more resiliant and more likely to succeed. - Bruce Hood

Man's attitude is the secret of life, for it is upon man's attitude that success and failure depend.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

Misbelief alone misleads. Hazrat Inayat Khan . . . so we should doubt our beliefs

Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice. Justice at its best is love correcting everything that stands against love.- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Behind every atom of this world hides an infinite universe. - Rumi (doubtful)

Meditation is learning how to be present and aware of what’s going on and learning to be able to distinguish between your judgment about a moment in time and the actual experience.- Tuere Sala

Like music, intention can influence our mood, thoughts, and feelings—setting an intention in the morning we set the tone for the day.- Thupten Jinpa, “Two Exercises for Turning Intention into Motivation”

Extend the circle of “us” to include as much of the world as you possibly can.- Rick Hanson

Clouds are not something to moan about. They are, in fact, the most dynamic, evocative and poetic aspect of nature. . . . to tune into the clouds is to slow down. It’s a moment of meteorological meditation. . . . We are part of the air. We don’t live beneath the sky. We live within the sky.- Gavin Pretor-Pinney

Remember the plants, trees, animal life who all have their families, their histories too. Talk to them, listen to them. They are alive poems.- Joy Harjo

The universe is like a dome; it vibrates to that which you say in it, and answers the same back to you; so also is the law of action we reap what we sow. . .

Every thing and being on the surface of existence seem separate from one another, but in every plane beneath the surface they approach nearer to each other, and in the innermost plane they all become one. Every disturbance therefore, caused to the peace of the smallest part of existence on the surface, inwardly affects the soul. Thus any thought, speech or action that disturbs peace is wrong, evil, and a sin; if it brings about peace it is right, good, and a virtue. Life being like a dome, its nature is also dome-like. Disturbance of the slightest part of life disturbs the whole and returns as a curse upon the person who caused it; any peace produced on the surface comforts the whole, and thence returns as peace to the producer.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

In, out. Deep, slow. Calm, ease. Smile, release.(during 4 breaths) - anon

The Sufi therefore, finds the only way out of the distress of life... He rises above it, taking all things as they come, patiently. He does not mind how he is treated. His principle is to do his best, and in that is his satisfaction. Instead of depending on another person to be kind to him, the Sufi thinks if he were kind to another person, that is sufficient. Every wise man in the long run through life will find in this principle the solution of happiness. For we cannot change the world, but we can change ourselves.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

A human being is part of a whole, called by us the 'Universe,' a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest--a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.- Albert Einstein

We are all as continuous with the physical universe, as a wave is continuous with the ocean. - Alan Watts

Life is a field and you are born to cultivate it. And if you know how to cultivate this field you can produce anything you like.- Kabir

Life is a mysterious web of intricate interdependent relationships,and diversity is at its heart.- Kenny Ausubel

I have no name,

I am as the fresh breeze of the mountains.

I have no shelter;

I am as the wandering waters.

I have no sanctuary, like the dark gods;

Nor am I in the shadow of deep temples.

I have no sacred books;

Nor am I well-seasoned in tradition.

I am not in the incense

Mounting on the high altars,

Nor in the pomp of ceremonies.

I am neither in the graven image,

Nor in the rich chant of a melodious voice.

I am not bound by theories,

Nor corrupted by beliefs.

I am not held in the bondage of religions,

Nor in the pious agony of their priests.

I am not entrapped by philosophies,

Nor held in the power of their sects.

I am neither low nor high,

I am the worshipper and the worshiped.

I am free.

My song is the song of the river

Calling for the open seas,

Wandering, wandering,

I am Life.

I have no name,

I am as the fresh breeze of the mountains.

- 'I have no name': A poem by Jiddu Krishnamurti

When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive – to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.– Marcus Aurelius

The secret of healing, the mystery of evolving, the power of all attainments, and the way to spiritual realization, all come from the strengthening of that belief which is a conviction, so that nothing can ever change it.- Hazrat Inayit Khan

Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it. - Roald Dahl

When we remember we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained. - Mark Twain

The religion of the future will be a cosmic religion. It should transcend personal God and avoid dogma and theology. Covering both the natural and the spiritual, it should be based on a religious sense arising from the experience of all things natural and spiritual as a meaningful unity.- Albert Einstein

To become enlightened is to awaken to the mad truth that the precious personas we’ve been parading around as all these years, maybe all these lifetimes, are fictional constructs.- Sam Guthrie, “Getting There from Here”

Man forms his future by his actions. His every good or bad action spreads its vibrations and becomes known throughout the universe. The more spiritual a man is, the stronger and clearer are the vibrations of his actions, which spread over the world and weave his future. The universe is like a dome: it vibrates to that which you say in it, and echoes the same back to you. So also is the law of action: we reap what we sow. - Hazrat Inayit Khan

The first and last lesson in love is, 'I am not -- Thou art' and unless man is moved to that selflessness he does not know justice, right or truth.. . .There is no greater teacher of morals than love itself, for the first lesson that one learns from love is, 'I am not, you are.' This is self-denial, self-abnegation, without which we cannot take the first step on love's path. . . - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Grateful living is the awareness that we stand on holy ground—always—in touch with Mystery.- Br. David Steindl-Rast

I no longer know the difference between image and reality. Like the shadow, I an and I am not. - Rumi

It is the blessed soul whose heart is empty of self, who is filled with the light of God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

When one praises the beauty of God, one's soul is filled with bliss. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

It is impossible that you go on as you were before, so you must go on as you never have. - Cheryl Strayad

Worry pretends to be necessary. - Jon Kabat Zinn

You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf. - Jon Kabat Zinn

Drink water from the spring where the horse drinks. A horse will never drink bad water. Make your bed where the cat sleeps. Eat the fruit that was touched by the worm. Freely pick the mushrooms on which the insects sit. Plant your tree where the mole digs. Build your house where the snake suns itself. Dig your well where the birds build their nests in hot weather. Go to sleep and wake up with the chickens and you will reap the golden grain of the day. Eat more green vegetables, and you will have strong legs and an enduring heart. Swim more often and you will feel on land like a fish in the water. Look at the skies more often and not at your feet, and your thoughts will be clear and light. Keep silent more often, speak less, and silence will reign in your soul, and your spirit will be calm and peaceful. - St. Seraphim of Sarov

Self-pity is the worst poverty; it is the source of all unhappiness and blinds man to all he should be thankful for. The constantly complaining habit and the tendency to demand sympathy from others bring the greatest thorn into man's life: he becomes dependent upon the sympathy of others. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

I searched for God and found only myself. I searched for myself and found only God. - Rumi

The Spirit of Guidance is a plant that grows and blossoms when it meets with response and care; and when it is watered by the rainfall of divine inspiration it blooms in the light of the divine sun. The Spirit of Guidance is the light of God, which may be likened to a lantern that the farmer carries when walking on the farm in the darkness of night. It is like a searchlight, which shows up any object upon which it is thrown; and so when the light of the Spirit of Guidance is thrown upon any aspect of life, man receives a keen insight into it. In the Spirit of Guidance one finds a living God active in the heart of every person. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

The map is not the territory. - Korbyski

A true friend is one soul in two bodies. - Aristotle

Concentration is activity of mind in the direction desired; our desire dictates in which way the mind is to be active; the mind acts according to our wishes. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

All that you touch you Change. All that you Change Changes you.  The only lasting truth  is Change. - Octavia Butler

The pull of the future is stronger than the push of the past. - anon

Teleology is like a mistress to a biologist: he cannot live without her but he's unwilling to be seen with her in public. - J. B. S. Haldane

Most of the problems that disturb us are of our own creation. This is why it is so essential that we learn to establish peace of mind. It’s evident that being in a state of constant anger and fear destroy any sense of inner peace, while cultivating compassion and concern for others reduces these destructive emotions. Better to be altruistic and think of your neighbors as brothers and sisters. - Dalai Lama

There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it. - Edith Wharton

He who is not satisfied with a little, is satisfied with nothing. - Epicurus

Acceptance anchors us so that we might focus on the present rather than endlessly drift in a sea of wishing, dreaming, and pining for anything other than what is. - Rose Zonetti

To a mystic, his whole life is one continuous symphony, a playing of music, with each soul contributing his particular part to the symphony. A person's success therefore depends upon the idea he has of harmony. Very few people in the world pay attention to harmony. They do not know that without it, there is no chance of happiness. It is only the harmonious ones who can make others happy and partake of that happiness themselves; and apart from them, it is hard to find happiness in the world. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

The method of attainment is to endeavor always to make others happy and by experiencing happiness in the happiness of others. In the terms of the Sufi, it is Suluk. Any selfishness prevents us from appreciating another's happiness and therefore we shall be kept back, for the happiness of others is the gate to our own happiness. Real happiness is entering the gate. We must feel satisfaction in another's satisfaction ... If a person needs a certain thing and we can supply it, we should be happy, how ever small the thing may be. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

What we grasp of truth is necessarily always partial and limited. No matter how huge your hands and how firm your grip, you can only hold so much. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

A ship is safe in harbor, but that's not what ships are for. - John A. Shedd

Time is what we want most and what we use worst. - William Penn

Gratitude is an ascending reflection of a descending grace. - Beverly Novak

People depend upon peaceful coexistence with each other and with Mother Nature to live in true harmony. No one exists in isolation. - Wu Tong

I think that I shall never see a poem as lovely as a tree. Poems are made by fools like me but only God can make a tree. - Joyce Kilmer

We are not an individual. We are a vast network of molecules, energies and wavelengths. The interconnectedness of being is who we are. - the fungi (in the documentary, Fantastic Fungi)

If there is anything needed in spiritual teaching, in seeking truth, in self-realization, it is the refinement of the ego. For the same ego which begins by being our worst enemy, will in the end, if developed and cultivated and refined, become our best friend. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Everything ultimately depends on one’s own action. If you help others, if you serve others, you benefit. So altruism is a source of happiness. - the Dalai Lama

There are two different kinds of happiness. The first is the enjoyment of pleasure through our senses. But we can also experience happiness at the deeper level through our mind, such as through love, compassion, and generosity characterized by a sense of fulfillment. While the joy of the senses is brief, the joy at this deeper level is much longer lasting. It is true joy. - the Dalai Lama

The root of happiness is altruism — the wish to be of service to others.- the Dalai Lama

The word yoga refers to the integration of body, breath, and mind, and to the dissolution of the sense of separation between the “self” as subject and the “other” as object. Whenever this state manifests—whether one is sitting, walking, cutting carrots, or changing diapers—there is yoga. - —Frank Jude Boccio, “Breath and the Body”

We create anger by a series of thoughts that result in a particular emotional and physiological state. Anger doesn’t just happen to us. If we’re able to catch an angry thought as it’s budding, we can let it go. - John Daido Loori Roshi, “Between Two Mountains”

We are what we repeatedly do. - Will Durant

Practice makes permanent, not perfect. Bad habits are the result of diligently training the wrong things. - Justin Kan

This time, like all times, is a very good one, if we but know what to do with it. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

When we are in harmony with the way everything proceeds from everything else, we cannot act wrongly.- Ram Dass

Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.- Søren Kierkegaard

If in our daily life we can smile, if we can be peaceful and happy, not only we, but everyone will profit from it. This is the most basic kind of peace work.- Thich Nhat Hahn

The game is not about becoming somebody, it’s about becoming nobody. - Ram Dass

All models are wrong but some models are useful. - Carlos E. Perez

You are the sky. The clouds are what happens, what comes and goes. - Eckhart Tolle

If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.- Will Rogers

Difficulties strengthen the mind, as labor does the body. - Seneca

Wisdom tells me I am nothing. Love tells me I am everything. Between the two, my life flows.- Nisargadatta Maharaj

Joy, sorrow, love, all depend on our thought, on the activity of our mind. If we are depressed, if we are in despair, it is still the work of our mind; our mind has prepared that for us. If we are joyful and happy, and all things are pleasant, that also has been prepared for us by our mind. It is only when our mind works without control that unhappiness, sorrow, trouble, pain, or whatever we experience comes without our intention. No one could wish to create hell for himself; all would create heaven for themselves if they could; and yet how many allow their minds to create these things for them, regardless of their own intention. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

The sacred is not in heaven or far away. It is all around us, and small human rituals can connect us to its presence. And of course, the greatest challenge (and gift) is to see the sacred in each other. - Alma Luz Villanueva

The “practice of affirmations”, then, is simply the act of taking back control of our lives and our thoughts. Instead of letting our subconscious tendencies rule our decision-making faculties, we consciously choose the qualities we want to develop through affirmations.- Shivendra Misra

Weeds are flowers too, once you get to know them.- A.A. Milne (via Eeyore)

Wear gratitude like a cloak and it will feed every corner of your life.- Rumi

Education must not simply teach work - it must teach Life.- E.B. Du Bois

Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity. - Seneca

Every scientific “fact” should have an asterisk next to it that reads, “until proven otherwise.” The truth, it seems, is as elusive as a shadow: Once you turn on the light, it vanishes. - Michael Laitman

Attention is the doorway to gratitude, the doorway to wonder, the doorway to reciprocity. - Robin Wall Kimmerer

When we sow a seed, we plant a narrative of future possibility. - Sue Stuart-Smith

Reality is an illusion, albeit a very persistent one. - Albert Einstein

When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe. - John Muir

Tat tvam asi. Thou art that. - the Upanishads

The world is made up of events, not things. Even the things that are most ‘thing-like’ are nothing more than long events. - Carlo Rovelli

Being connected to the sage in the heart, elders become instinctive humanitarians who can embody wisdom and serve the highest ideals of humanity. Having survived their own troubles, elders are not shocked or overwhelmed by the crises and conflicts that exist in the world. Having repeatedly seen how things fall apart, elders have also witnessed the uncanny ways in which both nature and culture find roots of renewal. In the dark times, the archetypal energy of the elders tries to awaken and help find ways for creation to continue. - Michael Meade

Life is not about “or” — it is about “and.” It is magical and messy. It is heartwarming and heartbreaking. It is delight and disappointment. Grace and grief. Exquisite and excruciating, often at the exact same time. - Kristi Nelson

The Sufi in the East says to himself, Ishq Allah Ma'bud Allah, which means 'God is Love, God is the Beloved', in other words it is God who is Love, Lover, and Beloved. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

A harmonized mind produces harmony in this world of seeming discord. - Paramahansa Yogananda

Be like water. - Bruce Lee

You never step in the same river twice. - Heraclitus

Panta rhei or “everything flows,” stated Heraclitus two and a half millennia ago. This is the fundamental feature of reality. It never stays the same. - Peter Burns

Diligence is the mother of good fortune. - Miguel de Cervantes

There is a time to act, and a time to wait, to listen, to observe. Then understanding and clarity can grow. From understanding, action arises that is purposeful, firm, and powerful. - Charles Eisenstein

When we can step back and see everything, that’s when we start experiencing realization and enlightenment. We see the nature of everything because we have the flexibility and the adaptability; we can spread out. - Lama Rod Owens

Mastery lies in the control of the mind. If the mind became your obedient servant, the whole world is at your service. The king of mind is greater than the king of a nation. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

It’s very important to recognize that it’s not other people who are annoying. It’s our mind which reacts to people doing what we don’t want and feeling upset about it. We don’t have to feel upset. That’s up to us. - Tenzin Palmo

Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none. - William Shakespeare

Every being and object which is distinctly separate may be called an entity, but what one calls an individual is a conception of our imagination; and the true meaning of that conception will be realized on the day when the ultimate truth throws its light upon life. On that day no one will speak about individuality; one will say 'God' and no more. . . . There are many beings, but at the same time there is one, the only Being. Therefore objects such as streams and mountains are also living, but they only exist separately to our outer vision. When our inner vision opens then the separation is shown as a veil; then there is one vision alone, and that is the immanence of God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Everything you do, every local change in the universe provokes a change in the rest of the universe. Every action causes a reaction everywhere in the rest of the universe. The universe is interconnected at every level, throughout all levels, from the smallest to the largest. - Nassim Haramein

The greater the difficulty, the more the glory in surmounting it. - Epicurus

The teaching of Sufism is to transform everyday life into a religion, so that every action may bear some spiritual fruit.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

True happiness is in love, which is the stream that springs from one's soul. He who will allow this stream to run continually in all conditions of life, in all situations, however difficult, will have a happiness which truly belongs to him, the source of which is not without, but within. If there is a constant outpouring of love one becomes a divine fountain, for from the depth of the fountain rises the stream and, on its return, it pours upon the fountain, bathing it continually. It is a divine bath, the true bath in the Ganges, the sacred river. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. - Lao Tzu

My formula for greatness in a human being is amor fati: that one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backward, not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary […] but love it

If we affirm one single moment, we thus affirm not only ourselves but all existence. For nothing is self-sufficient, neither in us ourselves nor in things; and if our soul has trembled with happiness and sounded like a harp string just once, all eternity was needed to produce this one event — and in this single moment of affirmation all eternity was called good, redeemed, justified, and affirmed. - Nietzsche

We can always begin again. - Sharon Salzberg

Every man is entitled to his opinion, but no man is entitled to his own facts. - Bernard Baruch

We and the cosmos are one. The cosmos is a vast living body, of which we are still parts… Now all this is literally true, as men knew in the great past, and as they will know again. - D. H. Lawrence, Apocalypse

Joy and sweetness and affection are a spiritual path... You just have to get rid of so much baggage to be light enough to dance, to sing, to play. – Anne Lamott

We plant seeds that will flower as results in our lives, so best to remove the weeds of anger, avarice, envy and doubt, that peace and abundance may manifest for all. - Dorothy Day

We are often the last ones to grasp the impacts of our actions. So we do well not to let our self-concepts get in the way of inviting and deeply considering feedback from others. - Joseph Bobrow Roshi, “Purify Your Motivation”

You can never cross the ocean until you have the courage to lose sight of the shore. - André Gide

{many of]The things that frighten us just want to be held. - Mark Nepo

Joy is the gift of love. Grief is the price of love. - Valarie Kaur

Love is a continual sacrifice. And what does sacrifice mean? Sacrifice means forgetting of the self. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. Let me learn from you, love you, savor you, bless you before you depart. Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. - Mary Jean Irion

We are each cells in the living body of the larger whole. Whatever is happening to us is both personal and part of the whole, just as every cell in our biological body is both unique and part of the body. Whatever we are going through is part of the planetary struggle to evolve. Our personal crises are also births of ourselves as members of the larger body. We do not do this work for ourselves alone. - Barbara Marx Hubbard

The effects of our actions extend through space and time like ripples on a pond, influencing not only our future selves but also our surroundings. If we wish to be a certain kind of person and live in a certain kind of world, we need to be heedful about the seeds we cultivate. - Seth Zuiho Segall, “A More Enlightened Way of Being”

You are the sky. Everything else is just the weather. - Pema Chödrön

Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life. . . . When we are stricken and cannot bear our lives any longer, then a tree has something to say to us: Be still! Be still! Look at me! Life is not easy, life is not difficult. Those are childish thoughts. Let God speak within you, and your thoughts will grow silent. You are anxious because your path leads away from mother and home. But every step and every day leads you back again to the mother. Home is neither here nor there. Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all. - Herman Hesse

A disciplined mind leads to happiness, and an undisciplined mind leads to suffering. - the Dalai Lama

We may therefore regard matter as being constituted by the regions of space in which the field is extremely intense. . . . There is no place in this new kind of physics both for the field and matter, for the field is the only reality. - Albert Einstein

An electron is a quantized ripple of the electron quantum field, which acts as a particle because it travels holistically with its conserved quantities always sustained as a unit. - Mani Bauhmik

A calm and modest life brings more happiness than the pursuit of success combined with constant restlessness. - Albert Einstein

I am happy because I want nothing from anyone. I do not care for money. Decorations, titles or distinctions mean nothing to me. I do not crave praise. The only thing that gives me pleasure, apart from my work, my violin and my sailboat, is the appreciation of my fellow workers.” — Albert Einstein

I am sometimes sorry for men like Ford. Everybody who comes to them wants something from them. Such men do not always realize that the adoration which they receive is not a tribute to their personality but to their power or their pocketbook. Great captains of industry and great kings fall into the same error. An invisible wall impedes their vision. - Albert Einstein

Where there’s a will, there’s a way. - Albert Einstein

brilliantly connected this through one of the great laws of physics (that is written on his tombstone depicted below), which states that the entropy of a system is given by the natural logarithm of the number of possible microstates of the ensemble (in other words, the disorder of the system) times a constant. - on Boltzmann’s gravestone is S=k.logW

Uniformity is not nature’s way; diversity is nature’s way. - Vandana Shiva

This is a dreamlike illusion, a temporary mirage, a fleeting fabrication. Let it go and rest. - Pema Düddul, “Freedom From Illusion”

Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.”- Philip K. Dick

Reality can be distorted when seen through a lens of thought. . . .Thought can create a version of reality, warping what’s actually real through a prism of belief. - Paul Mulliner

Because the mind is the basis of everything good or ill, nothing is more important than gaining control over the mind. - Khenpo David Karma Choephel, “Shantideva on Mental Discipline”

If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle. - Sun Tzu, The Art of War.

Love wholeheartedly, be surprised, give thanks and praise – then you will discover the fullness of your life. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

Patience can demand the most determined effort, especially when the habits of irritation and anger have built up over a lifetime or more, yet it is enlivened by the sweetest of qualities, such as humor, lightness, and perspective. - Sarah Kanowski, “Raging Buddha”

As soon as I wake up in the morning, I remind myself that nothing exists as it appears. Then I think about sentient beings who want happiness, but experience suffering. I generate compassion for them, determined to help them as much as I can to eliminate their negative emotions. - Dalai Lama

The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts. - Marcus Aurelius

Teach this triple truth to all: A generous heart, kind speech, and a life of service and compassion are the things which renew humanity. - The Buddha

Nobody grows old merely by living a number of years. We grow old by deserting our ideals. Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. - Minister and columnist Frank Crane

There is a fountain of youth: it is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives of people you love. When you learn to tap this source, you will truly have defeated age. - Sophia Loren

A stable, solid body is a mental image superimposed onto a stream of events in the same way that a spinning propeller is seen as a circle. The constant succession of discrete acts of cognition or feeling appears as a monolithic event, just as the rapid change of frames in a film appears as a smooth continuum. - The Dalai Lama and Thubten Chodron, “An Unbroken Sequence”

Neither a lofty degree of intelligence nor imagination nor both together go to the making of genius. Love, love, love, that is the soul of genius. - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

The seed of suffering in you may be strong, but don’t wait until you have no more suffering before allowing yourself to be happy. - Thich Nhat Hanh

You build your mind, so make it into something you want to live with. - Marilynne Robinson

The one who plants trees, knowing that he will never sit in their shade, has at least started to understand the meaning of life. - Rabindranath Tagore

Hope just means another world might be possible, not promised, not guaranteed. Hope calls for action; action is impossible without hope. - Rebecca Solnit

Mysticism is the experience, not talking or thinking about it, but the actual experience of Oneness with all. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

Love is like a friendship caught on fire. In the beginning, a flame, very pretty, often hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. As love grows older, our hearts mature and our love becomes as coals, deep burning and unquenchable. - Bruce Lee

Healing comes when you see the opportunity for growth that a painful situation has provided. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

Give me coffee to change the things I can, and wine to accept those that I cannot.

The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses today. - Seneca

All the art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on. - Henry Ellis

* *

Living well involves your reaction to life’s obstacles, uncertainties and misfortunes. - Thomas Oppong

God gave us the gift of life; it is up to us to give ourselves the gift of living well. - Voltaire

Living well is your sole responsibility.

Learning to live in the present is a mindful practice that takes time, but it’s worth it.

Build and improve relationships that put your mental health first.

Embrace lifelong learning: become wiser than you were yesterday today.

If you are in a position to help another human, take the opportunity to put a smile on someone’s face.

Be more conscious about emotional decisions and how you spend your emotional energy.

Worrying about things out of your control is draining. Take proactive steps to fix your problems instead.

“Learn to be indifferent to what makes no difference.” — Marcus Aurelius

Nurture healthy friendships: your happiness depends on them.

Feed your curiosities: you will be surprised at what you find.

Define your life principles, values and morals and learn to live by them.

Read biographies: they are full of incredible life insights for your future.

Enrich your life through contemplation, solitude walks and meditations.

Show and express gratitude. Think about the good things in your life.

Cherish meaningful experiences. “Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away, “ Maya Angelou said.

Your best life is hidden in the uncomfortable experiences you are avoiding. “All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better,” Ralph Waldo Emerson said.

Finally, remember pursuing life-changing wisdom can help you live a meaningful, productive, and fulfilling life.

Living well is a commitment. Find the best wisdom and commit to proactive actions that bring out the best in you daily. - Thomas Oppong

* *

At some point in life, the world’s beauty becomes enough. - Toni Morrison

Great difficulties may be surmounted by patience and perseverance. - Abigail Adams

We should not be too confident in our belief of anything. - Cicero, Tusculan Disputations, I.32

May we be the forces of nature we came here to be. - Aline Ra M

The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge. - Daniel J. Boorstin

The ability to learn is the most important quality a leader can have. - Sheryl Sandberg

This is what is meant by union with God. It is in reality the dissolving of the false self in the knowledge of the true self, which is divine, eternal, and all pervading. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear—not absence of fear. - Mark Twain

We don’t fall in love; we rise in love.

We don’t stop playing because we grow old, we grow old because we stop playing. - George Bernard Shaw

The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance. - Alan Watts

We do not “come into” this world; we come out of it, as leaves from a tree. As the ocean “waves,” the universe “peoples.” Every individual is an expression of the whole realm of nature, a unique action of the total universe. - Alan Watts

Something precious is lost if we rush headlong into the details of life without pausing for a moment to pay homage to the mystery of life and the gift of another day. - Kent Nerburn

Life is a field and you are born to cultivate it. And if you know how to cultivate this field you can produce anything you like. All the need of your life can be produced in this field. All that your soul yearns after and all you need is to be got from the field, if you know how to cultivate it and how to reap the fruit. - Kabir

Let us slow down enough to truly notice all that is presenting itself to us as blessing. - Kristi Nelson

We can remember that today we can be a gift to each person we meet, just by looking at them with eyes of love. - Terry Patten

To listen is to lean in, softly, with a willingness to be changed by what we hear. - Mark Nepo

Gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us to encounter everyday epiphanies, those transcendent moments of awe that change forever how we experience life…and the world. - Sarah Ban Breathnach

The willingness to accept responsibility for one's own life is the source from which self-respect springs. - Joan Didion

Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. - Yoda in Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace

I would love to live like a river flows, carried by the surprise of its own unfolding. --John O'Donohue

Wine is symbolical of the soul's evolution. Wine comes from the annihilation of grapes, immortality comes from the annihilation of self. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

I drink the wine of Thy divine presence and lose myself in its intoxication. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

If one truly loves nature one finds beauty everywhere. - van Gogh

I do not at all understand the mystery of grace–only that it meets us where we are but doesn’t leave us where it found us. - Anne Lamott

Everything flourishes in the nourishment of our appreciation; plants, people, the Earth, moments. When we live with that appreciation, we flourish. - Kristi Nelson

As long as we’re using up our energy to resist our circumstances, we won’t be able to dedicate it to the work of true transformation. - Vanessa Zuisei Goddard, “The Gift of Contemplation”

Wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving. - Kahlil Gibran

Adopt the pace of nature: Her secret is patience. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Equanimity acts like the ballast of a ship. Although the ship is blown one way or the other by the winds of life, it neither sinks nor goes too far off-course. - Christopher Willard, “How Parents and Children Can Learn Balance and Equanimity from the Eight Worldly Winds”

The great twentieth-century Thai forest master, Ajahn Buddhadasa, was once asked how he would describe the state of the world today. He replied, “Lost in thought!”

To pay attention, this is our endless and proper work. - Mary Oliver

Pay attention to what you pay attention to. - Amy Krouse Rosenthal

The world is holy. We are holy. All life is holy. Daily prayers are delivered on the lips of breaking waves, the whisperings of grasses, the shimmering of leaves. - Terry Tempest Williams

The world is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper. - Bertrand Russell

We realize the importance of our voices only when we are silenced. - Malala Yousafzai

The first problem for all of us, men and women, is not to learn, but to unlearn. - Gloria Steinem

Maybe we simply need now and then to look up at the silent stars and lose ourselves to be set free. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

Part of our task is to discover how all our ancestors inform our lives–and the same holds true for all forms of life, for we have been shaped not only by human ancestors but also by the environments in which they lived. - Joan Halifax, “Giving Birth to Ancestors”

O peace-maker, before trying to make peace throughout the world, first make peace within thyself! - Hazrat Inayat Khan

We are dependent on others, yet we also contribute to others. Such is the nature of our existence, which includes our relationships with our family, our friends, our community, the nation, the international community, and the natural world. - Rev. Dr. Kenneth Tanaka, “The Land of Many Dharmas”

I do not think that there is any other quality so essential to success of any kind as the quality of perseverance. - John D. Rockefeller

Hope is a flame that we nurture within our hearts. It may be sparked by someone else—by the encouraging words of a friend, relative, or mentor—but it must be fanned and kept burning through our own determination. - Daisaku Ikeda, “On Hardship & Hope”

When we change the conversation, we change the future. - Juanita Brown

Never forget that justice is what love looks like in public. - Cornel West

Nothing is worth more than laughter. - Frida Kahlo

All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well…for there is a Force of love moving through the universe that holds us fast and will never let us go. - ulian of Norwich

Clouds come floating into my life from other days no longer to shed rain or usher storm but to give colour to my sunset sky. - Rabindranath Tagore

You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty. - Mahatma Gandhi

There is a flow to the universe of giving and receiving. - Deepak Chopra

Life is imperfect. People are imperfect. Love is the perfect response. - Kristi Nelson

You don't have to be a fantastic hero to do certain things — to compete. You can be just an ordinary chap, sufficiently motivated to reach challenging goals. - Sir Edmund Hillary

The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance; The wise grows it under his feet. - James Oppenheim

The deep happiness of well-being comes from caring for yourself and loving the world. It comes from offering what’s good in you to others, giving your gifts to a world that needs it. - - Jack Kornfield, “Finding Freedom Right Here, Right Now”

One man can make a difference and every man should try. - Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

I have no special talents. I am just passionately curious. - Albert Einstein

O cosmic Birther of all radiance and vibration,

soften the ground of our being and carve out a space within us where your Presence can abide.

Fill us with your creativity so that we may be empowered to bear the fruit of your mission.

Let each of our actions bear fruit in accordance with our desire.

Endow us with the wisdom to produce and share what each being needs to grow and flourish.

Untie the tangled threads of destiny that bind us, as we release others from the entanglement of past mistakes.

Do not let us be seduced by that which would divert us from our true purpose, but illuminate the opportunities of the present moment.

For you are the ground and the fruitful vision, the birth, power, and fulfillment, as all is gathered and made whole once again.

And So It Is!

- The Lord's Prayer...a neo-pagan version offered in Theatre in Your Life purportedly (?) translated from Aramaic directly into English, rather than from Aramaic to Greek to Latin to English. From FB post of Rick Archer

It ain’t what you don’t know, that counts; it’s what you know that ain’t so. -anon

But to be overly busy cannot possibly bring peacefulness. It cannot bring contentment. It cannot bring a heart full of love; it cannot bring a heart that can actually bring the mind to meditation. - Ayya Khema, “There’s No Need to be Busy”

The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

You have to believe in the long term plan you have but you need the short term goals to motivate and inspire you. - Roger Federer

To live is to choose. But to choose well, you must know who you are and what you stand for, where you want to go and why you want to get there. - Kofi Annan

Do not take the example of another as an excuse for your own wrongdoing. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

We learn from mistakes, and also from letting others point out our mistakes: when we said things poorly, when we misunderstood, when we completely misjudged another person, when we failed to sustain a harmonious relationship. Mistakes and failures make up the rich seedbed of self-reflection and improvement. - Krishnan Venkatesh, “How to Practice Right Speech Anywhere, Anytime, and with Anyone”

If you distinguish between pain and suffering, change is possible. As the saying goes, “Pain is inevitable; suffering is optional. - Jon Kabat-Zinn, “At Home In Our Bodies”

Compassion and tolerance are not a sign of weakness, but a sign of strength. - Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama

All that is constructed is subject to destruction; all that is composed must be decomposed; all that is formed must be destroyed; that which has birth has death. . . Death is a tax the soul has to pay for having had a name and a form. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Judge each day not by the harvest you reap but by the seeds you plant. - William A. Ward

We need to become newly aware of the love that has infused our lives all along, to turn our attention to it afresh with the eyes of a child. - Lama John Makransky, “Love Is All Around”

Letting your mind play is the best way to solve problems. - Bill Watterson

To be astonished is one of the surest ways of not growing old too quickly. - Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette

If you feel you are in a black hole, don't give up. There's a way out. - Stephen Hawking

For fast-acting relief, try slowing down. - Jane Wagner

Through light and joy is the world opened up, revealed for what it is: ineffable beauty, unending creation. - Henry Miller

Lighthouses don’t go running all over an island looking for boats to save; they just stand there shining. - Anne Lamott

Gratitude celebrates life with a joyful “yes” at every knot of the great network in which everything is connected to everything. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

Those who dwell among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life. - Rachel Carson

Take action! An inch of movement will bring you closer to your goals than a mile of intention. -

– Steve Maraboli

* *

The formula for success is simple: practice and concentration, then more practice and more concentration. - Babe Didrikson Zaharias

My religion is kindness. - H.H. the 14th Dalai Lama

Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor. - Truman Capote

Our ultimate freedom is the right and power to decide how anybody or anything outside ourselves will affect us. - Stephen Covey

While we can’t control what’s happening around us, we can cultivate the capacity to be with what is with more ease, joy, and freedom. - Sebene Selassie

Instructions for living a life: Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it. - Mary Oliver

The best protection any woman can have is courage. - Elizabeth Cady Stanton

You cannot shake hands with a clenched fist. - Indira Gandhi

Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage. - Anaïs Nin

An “imagined reality” is an addictive mental drug that humans are infatuated with. It cures the frustration brought about by the constraints of the actual reality. . . . An imagined reality satisfies an emotional need. - Avi Loeb

The grateful heart is a manifestation of one’s true self. Nothing sidelines the ego more effectively than a grateful heart. - Albert Nolan

The only way we can make the most of our lives is to make the most of our moments. - Cleo Wade

There is no happiness like that of being loved by your fellow creatures, and feeling that your presence is an addition to their comfort. - Charlotte Bronte

Do not feel lonely, the entire universe is inside you. - Rumi

Optimism is a happiness magnet. - Mary Lou Retton

We are here to awaken from our illusion of separateness. - Thich Nhat Hanh

Perhaps the most radical act of resistance in the face of adversity is to live joyfully. - Ari Honarvar

To lead people, walk behind them. - Lao Tzu

The difference between an unwise person and a wise person lies in how they respond to pain, not in whether or not they achieve an absence of pain. - Vidyamala Burch, “A Gateway to Freedom”

You must take life the way it comes at you and make the best of it. - Yann Martel

The facts themselves never speak our language. - Benjamin Cain

If you don't know where you are going, any road will get you there - George Harrison

Art is a language which anneals individuals to each other through experiences that are uniquely human. - Ann Lauterbach

Life is bristling with thorns, and I know no other remedy than to cultivate one’s garden. - Voltaire

We feel like separate water droplets but we are also ocean. - Jane Hirshfield

Who is wise and understanding among you? Let them show it by their good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom. - The Bible, James 3:13

The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. - Tao Te Ching

The person who is always involved in good deeds experiences incessant Divine happiness. - Rig Veda

True wealth is not measured in money or status or power. It is measured in the legacy we leave behind for those we love and those we inspire. - Cesar Chavez

It is a happy talent to know how to play. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Forgiveness condones nothing, but it does cast off the chains of anger, judgment, resentment, denial, and pain that choke growth. In this way, it allows for life, for freedom. - Michele Harper

The brain speaks through words; the heart in the glance of the eyes; and the soul through a radiance that charges the atmosphere, magnetizing all. - Hazrat Inayat Khan

Not what we have but what we enjoy constitutes our abundance. - Jean Antoine Petit-Senn

Individual commitment to a group effort — that is what makes a team work, a company work, a society work, a civilization work. - Vince Lombardi

Love is really more of an interactive process. It’s about what we do, not just what we feel. It’s a verb, not a noun. - bell hooks

Just as cultivating a garden requires turning over the ground, pulling weeds, planting, and watering, doing the work of love is all about taking action. - bell hooks

I never practice, I always play. - Wanda Landowska, pianist, harpsicordist

Like any form of strength, generosity needs to be intentionally cultivated over time, and everyone must begin in whatever state of mind they already happen to be. - Dale S. Wright, “The Bodhisattva’s Gift”

When the best things are not possible, the best may be made of those that are. - Richard Hooker

The perfect is often the enemy of the good. - anon

Knowing that you love the earth changes you, activates you to defend and protect and celebrate. But when you feel that the earth loves you in return, that feeling transforms the relationship from a one-way street into a sacred bond. - Robin Wall Kimmerer

You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you. - Dale Carnegie, “How to Win Friends and Influence People”

When men and women are able to respect and accept their differences then love has a chance to blossom. - John Gray, “Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus”

It is impossible to bring more into your life if you are feeling ungrateful about what you have. - Rhonda Byrne, “The Secret”

When defeat comes, accept it as a signal that your plans are not sound, rebuild those plans, and set sail once more toward your coveted goal. - Napoleon Hill, “Think and Grow Rich”

We are products of our past, but we don’t have to be prisoners of it. - Rick Warren, “The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For?”

Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor. - Thích Nhất Hạnh

Don’t believe every worried thought you have. Worried thoughts are notoriously inaccurate. - Renee Jain, author

Rule number one is, don't sweat the small stuff. Rule number two is, it's all small stuff. - Robert Eliot, medical doctor and author

If you can't fly, run; if you can't run, walk; if you can't walk, crawl; but by all means keep moving. - Martin Luther King Jr.

Many of us feel stressed and overwhelmed not because we're taking on too much, but too little of what strengthens us. - Marcus Buckingham, author

You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf. - Jon Kabat-Zinn, author and professor

I avoid any belief that steals my capacity to wonder, to question, whether it be theist or atheist.

And I think part of what it means to wonder, to question, is to marvel at how far the mystery of the universe exceeds my ability to comprehend it. - James Rocklyn

Pathological religious and political belief systems are based on our natural fear of uncertainty. So we should be putting more effort into skilling ourselves in maintaining equanimity in the face of uncertainty. - Jonathan Fields

Just think happy thoughts and you’ll fly. - J.M. Barrie, “Peter Pan”

Choose the positive. You have a choice. You are the master of your attitude. Choose the positive, the constructive. - Bruce Lee

Optimism is a happiness magnet. If you stay positive, good things and good people will be drawn to you. -Mary Lou Retton, Olympic gymnast

Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier. - Colin Powell, U.S. politician

The choice to be excellent begins with aligning your thoughts and words with the intention to require more from yourself. - Oprah Winfrey

The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up. - Mark Twain

Joy and gratitude kind of feed on each other. We call it a cycle of virtue. - Philip Watkins

We must believe that we are gifted for something. - Marie Curie

Try to think of that flower without the soil from which it grows, without the sunlight that helps it grow and illuminates it, without the very space in which it stands, or without the particular time in which it is there. Suddenly you no longer have a flower at all. - Filip Holm, “Emptiness Explained”

The art of deep seeing makes gratitude possible. And it is the art of gratitude that makes joy possible. - Ann Voskamp

Nature teaches us simplicity and contentment, because in its presence we realize we need very little to be happy. - Mark Coleman, “A Breath of Fresh Air”

Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving. - Albert Einstein

A teacher comes, they say, when you are ready. And if you ignore its presence, it will speak to you more loudly. But you have to be quiet to hear. - Robin Wall Kimmerer

We could never learn to be brave and patient, if there were only joy in the world. - Helen Keller

Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor. - Truman Capote

The best way to lift one’s self up is to help someone else. - Booker T. Washington

A self that goes on changing is a self that goes on living. - Virginia Woolf

Awareness itself is the primary currency of the human condition, and as such it deserves to be spent carefully. - Andrew Olendzki, “Busy Signal”

The gift within the gift of any given moment is opportunity. - Br. David Steindl-Rast

The distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion. - Einstein

If you cannot find peace within yourself, you will never find it anywhere else. - Marvin Gaye

Great things are done by a series of small things brought together. - Vincent van Gogh

All the flowers of all the tomorrows are in the seeds of today. - Proverb

Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world. - Nelson Mandela

He who is not satisfied with a little, is satisfied with nothing. - Epicurus

Each one of us must take responsibility for our own lives, and above all, show respect and love for living things around us, especially each other. - Jane Goodall

We are always seeking something from the outside and forgetting that our fundamental well-being and strength depend on how we relate to our own minds. - Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, “Old Relationships, New Possibilities”

Those who dwell among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life. - Rachel Carson

Creativity takes courage. - Henri Matisse

An investment in knowledge pays the best interest. - Benjamin Franklin

Live in each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influence of each. - Henry David Thoreau

We need joy as we need air. We need love as we need water. We need each other as we need the Earth we share. - Maya Angelou

Going down swinging is central to the culture of repair. You have to be willing to try. - Scott Gilbertson

An elevator can never break, it can only become stairs. Graceful degradation (is a good thing)-- elegant handling of failures. - Scott Gilbertson

The continuous exchange of commodities makes for all the sweetness, gentleness and softness of life. - Thamas Savary

History doesn’t repeat itself, but it rhymes. - anon

Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts. - Senator Patrick Moynihan

Wisely, and slow. They stumble that run fast. - William Shakespeare

A curious, connected mind is poised for insight. This is also the mind that is in awe of this fathomless universe, that can read patterns, make choices, play with language, and use concepts while knowing that the map is not the territory. - Elizabeth Mattis Namgyel, “Finding Freedom”

Making other people happy is a superhappiness. - Muhammad Yunus

A pessimist is one who makes difficulties of his opportunities and an optimist is one who makes opportunities of his difficulties. - Harry Truman

Gratitude for the gift of life is the primary wellspring of all religions, the hallmark of the mystic, the source of all true art. - Joanna Macy

The quality of our relationships determines the quality of our lives. - Esther Perel

Laughter helps you put everything into perspective. - Jim Henson

You exist only in what you do. - Federico Fellini

Take time to celebrate the quiet miracles that seek no attention. - John O'Donohue

Many things which cannot be overcome when they are together, yield themselves up when taken little by little. - Quintus Sertorius

Come quickly – as soon as these blossoms open, they fall. This world exists as a sheen of dew on flowers. - Izumi Shikibu

When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change. - Wayne Dyer

A lot of good things don't get made because of too much thinking. - Agnes Martin

Death can come at any minute, in any way. We do not know what is in store tomorrow, or, whether there is a tomorrow, or even a tonight! But still, we have the golden present. Now we are alive and kicking. What should we do now? Love all, serve all. - Sri Swami Satchidananda

Precision beats power, and timing beats speed. - Conor McGregor, UFC champ

Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you. - Anne Lamott

We can place the self between our ears and have it looking out from our eyes, or we can widen it to include the air we breathe, or at other moments we can cast its boundaries farther to include the oxygen-giving trees and plankton, our external lungs, and beyond them the web of life in which they are sustained. - Joanna Macy, “Positive Disintegration”

Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity. - Simone Weil

Discipline morphs into habit. - Twyla Tharp

The environment we create will determine what prevails. In other words, what we nurture and encourage wins. - Jane Goodall

***************** as of 7/9/23

Jul 9, 2023 6:59:43 PM | quotations

01/29/2021

My Spiritual Wellness Practice, as of 1/27/21

Each morning after a cup of coffee, I choose to get out of my usual mode of verbal consciousness (i.e.with random, verbal, discursive thoughts about the past and future) by visualizing different aspects of what’s happening in nine breathing cycles (see addendum 1). Then, in my ‘trance’, I mentally say these 37 phrases and practice these virtues for the next 30-60 minutes. This is my current, evolved version of shorter Buddhist metta (lovingkindness) meditations/prayers that many find to be worthwhile and wholesome; typically only 5 phrases are repeated for oneself, and then for others.

This practice is quite similar to self-hypnosis, or affirmations, so the phrases are worded as positive virtues, without any negative words. Self hypnosis works well to help us practice thought patterns that work for us, in the game of life, to meet our current goals. Our sensations and thoughts are our inner reality. Good, skillful intentions are key for virtuous thoughts and actions to manifest.

Like music, intention can influence our mood, thoughts, and feelings—setting an intention in the morning we set the tone for the day.- Thupten Jinpa

After mentally saying each phrase in bold during a breathing cycle, for a few minutes I think about the related ideas, amplifying ideas, and other wordings from various spiritual traditions . . . and I actually practice those virtues and thoughts in the here and now (as opposed to just thinking about them).

When the mind and body are restless, nothing in life can be accomplished. Success is the result of control - Hazrat Inayat Khan

We become what we think about.- Earl Nightingale

I will practice gratefulness - For me, gratefulness (aka gratitude) is the most important spiritual virtue to practice. . . the most important prayer to practice, the most important skill to practice, in the The Game of Life. It leads to practice of joy and peace, which are the prominent goals for me these days. As I first say this phrase I activate my smile muscles just a tad; this works well to facilitate my practice of gratefulness. My body and mind are connected (or the same thing, just from different perspectives).

The Nembutsu practice to foster gratefulness, in the Pure Land Buddhist manner, is to chant “Namo Amida Bu”. In Islam, this gratefulness aspect of God is Ash-Sha-KOOR, the 35th name (of 99) for Allah/God. Repeating one or two names of God while feeling, invoking or praising that aspect of God (zikr, dhikr), is helpful practice for most Muslim mystics (e.g. Sufis, see addendum 2). Alhamdulillah, means all praise and gratefulness to God.

Gratitude begins in our hearts and then dovetails into behavior. It almost always makes you willing to be of service, which is where the joy resides.- Anne Lamott

Everything flourishes in the nourishment of our appreciation; plants, people, the Earth, moments. When we live with that appreciation, we flourish.- Kristi Nelson

Gratitude celebrates life with a joyful "yes" at every knot of the great network in which everything is connected to everything.- Br. David Steindl-Rast

Gratefulness is a setting of the heart, one that I can choose like a wavelength on the radio. - Susan Mazrolle.

I am grateful that awareness is happening here and now . . . Awareness of things in the environment and my body (sensations) and in my mind/heart/brain (perceptions & thoughts) is happening now, once again, after the pause that is sleep. I am grateful that this consciousness is happening again. One of the many aspects of my self, or the helpful model that I have of my (illusory) self, is that I am the subject who is experiencing the awareness. My self can be thought of as an “experiencing self,” or a “sensing self.” But while in non-REM sleep and while under general anesthesia this awareness, this self awareness, temporarily disappears, and the self that seems to have subjective experiences seemingly disappears. Buddhists remember this to support their idea that the self is insubstantial, and should perhaps best be considered a delusion, albeit a crucially important one that seems to make us human. Bacteria, plants, and most animals probably don’t have this sense that they are a separate self. Awake humans over the age of 9 months usually have this self awareness. But it’s a skillful spiritual practice to dis-identify with this separate, experiencing self, and see our essential, inherent, oneness with all else that is happening.

Spiritual practice is stepping out of the assumed reality of “me” by understanding what the “me” is and withdrawing energy from its perceptual fixations.- Rodney Smith, “Undivided Mind”

You are not a passive observer in the cosmos. The entire universe is expressing itself through you at this very minute.- Deepak Chopra

I am grateful that agency is happening here and now. . . that I have another opportunity to be an agent, or actor, or extemporaneous musician, or choreographer, or a choosing selfin this evolving Universe. It sure does seem that there is an “I” that has free will to choose the next thoughts in my mind/heart/brain . . . and choose what to say or do in the next few moments. A major aspect of my sense of self is that I am a choosing self. But, as Buddhism reminds us, it’s hard to pin down a discrete, substantial, continuing ‘thing’ that is my self, or my ego, or my soul. But it seems like there is an I which can choose to dwell on problems, or count my blessings, or move one of my fingers, or give someone a complement. During sleep or while a human is under general anesthesia this agency, this ability to choose, this aspect of me, this “choosing self”, seems to disappear for awhile. When there is no more chance that both awareness and agency(my experiencing self and my choosing self) will happen in my body/mind/heart/soul, I will be “dead”.
I am grateful for the opportunity to love my awesome wife. Today and every waking moment I have a precious opportunity to choose loving thoughts, words and gestures. . . and thereby beautify the here and now that is me happening. I can be a “loving self.” My “relational self” is a key part of my sense of self. I aspire to be, and often am, a loving husband. Loving well and joy are tightly associated.
I am grateful for the privilege of being loved by Linda. . . I am, or can be, a receiver of loving energies. I am a beloved, that which experiences thoughts & feelings of being loved. To be an integral participant in two-way love and loving is beautiful, divine and salutogenic (wellness enhancing).
I am grateful for my body, with: my nervous system, which allows for my awareness, my thoughts, my agency and my sense of self. Humans have 100 trillion synapses firing every second, fueled by hundreds of different neurotransmitters that have been created in their 90 billion neurons, each with dozens of mitochondria which create millions of atp molecules each second. . . .my circulatory system which enables nutrients and oxygen to be delivered to each of my cells. . . my heart which tirelessly continues to pump my blood . . . my lungs which maintain an optimal blood oxygen level (via my 25 sextillion (10 to the 21^st) hemoglobin molecules) . . . and maintain a low blood carbon dioxide level. oxygen in . . . carbon dioxide out . . my gut which stands ready to add nutrients to my serum food in. . . . wastes out . . . my liver which continues to metabolize and optimize organic molecules in my serum . . . my kidneys which continue to optimize the ions in my blood, and clean it of nitrogenous wastes. . . my musculo-skeletal system which stands ready to allow me to move.
I am grateful for plants. . . which have the superpower to harness light from our star (receive the kiss of Father Sun) and combine water, carbon dioxide and atoms from the soil to produce oxygen, carbohydrates, proteins and fats to nourish all lifeforms in our biosphere.
I am grateful for fungi. . . which enable plant roots to function . . .and which digest cellulose, so as to keep the carbon cycle turning.
I am grateful for bacteria. . . which are essential for dna and protein metabolism in all living things. There are 38 trillion in the ever-changing holobiont that is my body, and 5x10 to the 30^thon Earth. They evolved inside of early plant cells to become chloroplasts, and inside early animal cells to become mitochondria. . . the awesome powerhouses that produce ATP, the energy currency needed by all life.
I am grateful for viruses. . which have been in every living thing for over 3.5 billion years. The ongoing evolution and complexification of the Universe continues to depend upon viruses. About 380 trillion are happening in my body now; about 10x10 to the 31^{st (nonillion)} are happening on Earth. They are non-living, non-metabolizing, always mutating strands of dna or rna encapsulated by proteins. Incorporation of viral genes into nucleic acids of living things has allowed for the evolution of mammals, and perhaps every living thing.

Viruses have enriched the evolutionary options of cellular creatures over the past several billion years by depositing new genetic material in their genomes. - David Quammen

I will now practice joy . . .I remember (and thereby relive) a recent joyful time. Quite often it’s the last time I was enveloped in my beloved’s embrace.For me, joy manifests here and now thru my free-will choice to practice love, gratefulness, kindness, mudita and appreciation. I'm doing my part, I'm fulfilling my responsibility (or purpose) to beautify this part of space-time, if I'm practicing joy. Some Muslims repeat: yaa-WAA-jid (64), the source of ecstasy, or Al-BAA-sit (21), expansion, ecstasy, joy.

Gratitude begins in our hearts and then dovetails into behavior. It almost always makes you willing to be of service, which is where the joy resides.- Anne Lamott

I will now practice mudita.I don't limit my joy to times when good or pleasurable things are happening in my life or experience. A sufficient reason to practice joy is the fact that other sentient beings (other divine, dynamic, living systems in our family, which are not as separate from me as they seem) are experiencing happiness or pleasure. Mudita is the skill/virtue of practicing this sort of empathetic (or sympathetic) joy. It’s fair and wise, and its not cheating in the Game of Life. I choose to practice joy now because: thousands of couples are embracing, or looking forward to their marriage today . . . a thousand fathers are quite happy because their baby was born in the last 2 minutes . . . thousands of grandpas are experiencing the happiness of holding their first grandchild for the first time . . . and hundreds of thousands are singing, dancing or getting massages, etc.

One of the sanest, surest, and most generous joys of life comes from being happy over the good fortune of others. - Archibald Rutledge.

I will practice kindness. . . now and in the future. . . I will care about and care for the happiness of others, with my thoughts, feelings, words and gestures. Kindness is one of the top 3 or 4 skills to choose to practice often if one is to love well (along with appreciation and acceptance).

Kindness is in our power, even when fondness is not. - Samuel Johnson

I will appreciate the strengths of myself- I define a strength as an attribute, virtue or skill of a living thing that puts them in the top 20% of the distribution curve compared to others like themselves. (e.g. other 66 year old men in Lorain County). Others set a higher bar, which is valid, but decreases the number of strengths we have. We all have many strengths that we should appreciate, so as to love ourselves well.
I will appreciate the strengths of others- Loving well involves often choosing to appreciate the many strengths of the beloved; joy ensues.
May I appreciate the Divine in all beings- It works for me to see the evolving Universe as one, miraculous, ineffable, Divine process . . . to equate the Universe with God happening. This pantheism (or religious monism) works better for me than monotheism (with one creator being, called God, who is often thought to have a human-like abilities & virtues, who exists (or is happening) and is different from the created beings and things in the Universe. And pantheism works better for me than humanism or materialism (with a Universe full of inanimate, physical, material things, composed of elementary particles which interact via knowable physical forces). There are no beings (e.g. me, plants, bacteria) or souls, or processes that are separate from God. The tree, the worm, my sensations, perceptions, thoughts and feelings are beautiful manifestations of God happening in their respective space-times. This attitude of love and respect for the Divine in all beings (regardless of their species, gender, ethnicity, beliefs, etc.) is expressed by Hindus as Namaste. God, for me, is ever-present, all-pervading (immanent), beyond space and time (transcendent) and the only being or process (Al-A-had, 66, the One Unity. Al-WAA-see, 45, the all-pervading, "yet another magnificent face of Divine Life Energy."). Perhaps the most common zikr is "La 'illaha 'illa allah" -- there are no other Gods (?or beings) than God.

Each being is a verse in the sacred manuscript of nature. - Hazrat Inayat Khan.

Seek Him in all souls, good or bad, wise and foolish, attractive and unattractive; in the depths of each there is God. - Hazrat Inayat Khan.

The one who knows himself truly knows God.- Hazrat Ali.

My religion is nature. That’s what arouses those feelings of wonder and mysticism and gratitude in me.- Oliver Sacks

May I appreciate the Divine in all places- God is happening/manifesting in beautiful, divine nonliving ways as well, for example in: atoms, molecules (e.g. oxygen, ATP, hemoglobin, chlorophyll), the space between the nucleus and electrons in an atom, rocks, clouds, sunsets, and stars. (btw, divine stars of various sizes, 5-9 eons ago, evolved into planetary nebulae, supernova and kilonova, to create all of the atoms in our solar system). A glass that is half full of water is non-living, but it is divine. Some would bemoan that it is half empty. Others would appreciate that it is half full of divine water. What works for me is to choose to see the glass as always 100% full-- with trillions of divine water molecules and trillions of divine molecules of nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide and trillions of other molecules that were created eons ago. God is manifesting in all places and all times. There is no edge to God in space or time. Muslims venerate ya-WAA-hid (65)-- the oneness that underlies all differentiated, unique forms. Or yaa-ma-JEEED (48).

"Everything is a mirror for God's face"

“May I See the face of the Divine everywhere I turn.”

"Love is the Religion. The Universe is the Book." ~Rumi.

"All the particles of the world are in love and looking for lovers." ~Rumi.

“Appreciation can turn our planet into a sacred home and our communities into extended family. - KRISTI NELSON.

I will practice humility- My thoughts, actions and life are significant, but small in the big picture. I should always try to recognize and avoid surety, self-righteousness, and self-importance.
I will remember my body is small- relative to the Earth (10 to the 21st times bigger than me--a billion trillion times) . . . and our Solar System . . . and our Galaxy . . . and our Universe.
I will remember that my lifetime is short- relative to the 250 thousand years since our grandparents walked out of Africa, or the 3.5 billion years since the first life on Earth (single-celled oceanic plants of unknown origin). But, of course, I could be infinite in space-time, depending on one's concept of the ineffable "I".

If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite. - William Blake

I will remember that my disappointments are minor - Others have much worse life situations and sufferings than I. Things don't always happen as I think they should, but in the big picture, things are probably evolving as they should, and I’m quite fortunate.
I will remember that my knowledge is limited- I habitually see through thick filters. The big picture is ineffable to my small mind/heart/brain. There are many, many reasons why the Universe (God) is evolving as it is . . .and other beings are thinking and acting the way they are. Many of those reasons, or forces, are ineffable to the limited thinking of people (mysterianism). God is not just immanent in things we see (and think we understand), but is also transcendent, beyond space and time (and perhaps happening in other ineffable dimensions?)

I will remember that my models are incomplete- Our models are maps of reality. They are codified and limited by our language, and work quite well to help us to survive, adapt, and be agents to change our environment. Scientific models are great, and are evolving well, but they often are reductionistic (not holistic) and miss the big picture (especially metaphysical things, like love, intentionality, Dark Energy and Dark Matter). The Whole System is much more significant and incomprehensible than its subsystems (aka holons).
I will doubt my beliefs - Most suffering comes from false or dysfunctional beliefs about things that are happening which we don't accept or appreciate. Believing that things or others should be different, or that events that are happening should be different, is quite natural and inevitable, but it causes our suffering. "Don't always believe what you think" is a good maxim. Only the closed mind is certain.- anon
May I become more aware of my imperfections . I define an imperfection as an attribute, virtue or skill of a living thing that puts them in the middle 60% of the distribution curve compared to others like themselves (others have different, valid definitions, which have significantly different implications). We all have many imperfections, and that's natural, normal and OK. Usually I see through thick filters that disable clear views of my imperfections and my contributions to discord. Only if I'm aware of my imperfections can I develop the strong intentions needed to minimize them. Acceptance is one of the top 3 or 4 skills to choose to practice if one is to love oneself, another, or God well (along with kindness and appreciation). It is the key for maintaining inner peace and practicing equanimity (mental/emotional resilience). Adventurers on the many valid spiritual paths are challenged to foster inner and outer peace. For the inner peace which comes from acceptance, Muslims invoke As-sa-LAAM (5); their most common greeting is As-sa LAMM ah LAY kum. Jews often use the salutation Shalom (peace).

"Each moment is a chance for us to make peace with the world."-Thich Nhat Hanh.

I will accept the imperfections of others. Other beings and processes are happening the way they are for thousands of reasons. Who am I to be judgemental or self-righteous? Practicing those ideas are dysfunctional and diminish inner peace, outer peace and great loving.
I will tolerate weaknesses. . . in myself and others. It's usually much more skillful to accept imperfections rather than tolerate them. Tolerance might best reserved for weaknesses (?bottom 20% of the Bell curve), or things like pain, sickness and death. And, to help humankind evolve well, it's probably skillful to even be intolerant of some choices that our culture declares are clearly bad (e.g. rape, murder). But often, "When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves." -VIKTOR FRANKL.
I will practice compassion. . . now and in the future . . .for the suffering of others, and say and do what I can to minimize it. Two people die every second, so many families have appropriate sadness.
May I practice equanimity. . . when I experience pains, sadness or disappointment (which, by my nature I will) may I soon come back to a peaceful balance. May the keel of my ship prevent it from being capsized. Shit happens; pain happens; potholes in the path happen. But choosing to often practice acceptance (or at least tolerance) minimizes our suffering and is the key to equanimity. (Equanimity, along with compassion, loving-kindness and mudita, are the four noble virtues to be practiced in Buddhism.)

May I choose to have realistic expectations. . . so as to minimize disturbances of my inner peace. High expectations lead to disappointment. But sometimesit’s wise to have high expectations, which foster high achievements. A healthy balance is wise.
May my body be resilient - Resilience (a close synonym for health) is the ability or skill of a system to return to a balance point through homeostatic mechanisms after experiencing a stressor which takes it away from a balance point. May I recover well from illnesses and injuries. Some Muslims venerate Ya-'ADL (29)-- balance, resilience, or, Ya jab-BAAR (9)- healing.
May I resonate with Divine sustaining forces- . . . (now I reactivate the muscles needed to cause a smile, and keep them activated thru the rest of my morning prayers.). . . may I be aware of, respectful of, open to, venerate, appreciate, synchronize with . . . and thereby be fertile ground for all the ineffable metaphysical forces that keep the Universe and its subsystems running well. May I honor and praise (and thereby be welcoming to) Vishnu, the Hindu name for the aspect of God that sustains and preserves. Christians and Jews call these ineffable metaphysical forces Divine Grace. Muslims call it Al MuQEET (39)- the sustainer, nourisher, maintainer. Now in my practice is when I do zikr for Al-MuQEET. (see addendum 2). . . Others praise/love Al ma-JEED (48)- divine life energy. Pluralism seems wise; there are many valid ways to appreciate metaphysical forces.
May I resonate with Divine protective forces- May I be aware of, respectful of, open to, venerate, appreciate, synchronize with, praise, and be welcoming to the Divine, miraculous, ineffable forces which (perhaps) keep living systems safe. Monotheists (and sometimes myself) find it useful to name these protective forces “angels”, as if they are separate beings. I often find it useful and effective to imagine that the talisman I rub, or the buckeye in my pocket, or the 4 leaf clover in my wallet act as magnets to attract angelic beings or protective metaphysical forces.In a significant way, our thoughts create our reality.

Positive illusions make us more resilient and more likely to succeed. - Bruce Hood

Now I mentally repeat, 11 times, the 38^th name of God, Al-Ha-FEEZ (38)- guardian, protector, preserver. May I honor and welcome Al-Ha-FEEZ into my life, here and now. Muslims also praise Al-Mu-HAI-min (7), or Al-MU-min (6)- granter of security, safety.

May I harmonize in the Divine Cosmic Symphony- May I be aware of, respectful of, and play along with all the many vibrating living systems . . . and molecules, and atoms. Above absolute zero, everything vibrates; nothing is steady. Sounds are oscillations in the density of air which cause my eardrums to vibrate at the same frequency (20-20,000 Hz. The lowest note I can sing is D2, 73 Hz, which also happens to be the base frequency of my 32” gong). Microwaves which are tuned to vibrate, “rock”, and rotate water molecules oscillate at 2.45 gigahertz.To play well in an orchestra we need to listen well, be in tune with others, keep the shared rhythm, respect the other instruments, and not play too loud. Each participant in a symphony plays an instrument which plays with different pitches and timbres. Egocentric, conceited or power-hungry people who aren’t skillful at respecting the other voices in the symphony detract from the beauty of the Symphony. They create discord instead of harmony. They don’t have the skill of an artistic or skillful Spiritual Musician in the Divine Cosmic Symphony (aka, God evolving, the Universe happening). May I practice and thereby develop the skills to play on many different instruments. May I harmonize well with God in all His/Her/Its manifestations. May I Harmonize well with Saraswati, the Hindu incarnation/aspect of God (music, sound, vibration).

May I will dance well with God- . . . in the Divine Cosmic Dance. . . in the here and now. (aka, in this space-time) . . . and in the future. It seems true that nothing is stable; everything (all space-time) is moving and evolving; God is always moving. So my goal in life, as the choreographer of this space-time, should be to move my body/mind/heart/soul well, by often choosing skillful and graceful thoughts, feelings, words and gestures.

"When before the beauty of a sunset or a mountain, you pause and exclaim, "Ah," you are participating in divinity." – Ancient Hindu text . . . i.e. you are dancing well with God. i.e. Loving God well. When the Divine is seen as triune in Hinduism, it is Shiva (as his incarnation Nataraja) that is the dancer and drummer in the circle of flames-- the aspect of God that is responsible for the incessant change of the Universe, which is, of course, needed for evolution. It's skillful practice to honor Shiva by welcoming change, by looking forward to new chapters in the book of life, by surfing the waves of change, by dancing well with God (aka the Universe). The skillful Spiritual Dancer in the Divine Cosmic Dance is sensitive to their many partners, and gracefully moves with them to augment joy in the Universe (or other wholesome goals that are sought after or that seem appropriate for the situation (e.g. sadness, compassion, peace, holistic wellness, harmony, loving relations, etc.)

The Holy Spirit dances across space and time.- Rev. Erica Saunders.

Dance from here to the other world—and don't stop. ~Rumi

May I love God well.In these skillful and loving ways, in my choice of thoughts, words and gestures, may I optimize the holistic health and wellness of all aspects of the divine living system that we call Mother Earth.

May I often realize the oneness of all . . . now, and in the future. May I often dis-identify with my self so as to better identify with other aspects and manifestations of God. In a deep, profound way I am one with: the new grandpa in India now holding his first grandchild for the first time, the chickadee at my feeder, the nucleic acid in the virus in my nose, the nitrogen atom in the fiber of this blanket, the propane molecule now burning in our furnace, the copper atom in my gong, the supernovas and kilonovas on the far side of the Milky Way that are now creating new copper and gold atoms.

The work of the spiritual man is to forget his false self and so to realize the true self which is God, and this true self not only in him, but in his neighbor also.- Hazrat Inayat Khan

The Hindu & Buddhist chant of OM can help us resonate with the Universe. I take a deep breath, then . . . Oooooooooooooooommmmmm.

After this practice, I often do a shortened version of these practices for at least one loved one. But I don't know what their mental/emotional/spiritual/physical goals currently are, so I start with, “May (their name) skillfully practice the thoughts, feelings and actions that work to increase their joy, peace and progress towards his/her other wholesome goals." I suggest that you make up your own mantram phrases, to repeat in a trance, as a prayer that actually works to achieve your current goals. In addendum 3 are a few others to consider. Namaste.

* * *

Addendum 2: There are many valid, helpful styles of repeating a name of Allah/God. What works for me these days is to: flex my neck, then, on the inhale, I extend my neck back and circle it counter clockwise to the 9 o’clock position, where I exhale and mentally say the first syllable. At the 6 o’clock position I say the 2^nd syllable. At the 3 o’clock position I say the final syllable and continue it to 12 o’clock, then flex down to 6 o’clock. I repeat this with each breath/incantation 11 times. My way to keep count, that minimizes distraction from my focus, is to briefly focus on my left little finger by activating the muscles which would cause it to flex. With the 2^nd repetition I briefly focus on my left 4^th finger, etc, around to 10. And then I do one more. Instead of just mentally saying/invoking the name of God, reverentially, I sometimes vocalize the name of Allah. Zikr done in a group is also, evidently, quite effective and nourishing.

May (I) Struggle well in the Greater Jihad. In Islam, the Greater Jihad is the struggle in a Spiritual Warrior to overcome the barriers in himself to loving God (and all His many manifestations) better. Our main enemies are the dysfunctional, habitual tendencies within us, not beings or things outside of us or separate from us. God's "will" is for us to struggle well in this Jihad by skillfully choosing virtuous thoughts, feelings and actions for the good of all (i.e. selflessly, humbly, lovingly, piously). The Spiritual Warrior has many different weapons, or types of arrows in his quiver, to puncture holes in the curtain of our main delusion-- that we are separate beings in space and time, apart from the other divine manifestations of God (aka other beings and things and phenomena). We are called to "fight" this Jihad well, and not let counsel (inner voices) of metaphysical "Devils" take us off course. Jews, Christians and Muslims believe we will be judged by God on our efforts, and may be rewarded with eternal life in Heaven. Many Hindus and Buddhist believe in karma, that our thoughts and actions determine the quality of our rebirth in future lives. I'm pleased that this belief works for them, but it doesn't seem to work for me. I'm less inclined to worship a personified God who has characteristics of human beings, e.g. who is judgemental, or 'who' has a will, or can hear or see us, or who is omniscent, or was/is a creator of things and beings which are then separate from "Him/Her". Pantheism works better for me than monotheism.

May (I) Embrace the flow that is the Universe

May ( I ) Be safe

Here are some metta phrases that work for Melvin Escobar, a Buddhist in Oakland :

May (I/you/all beings) be safe and protected, free from inner and outer harm.

May (I/you/all) be happy.

May (my/your/everyone’s) body support the practice of loving awareness.

May (I/you/all) be free from ill-will, affliction, and anxiety.

May (I/you/everyone) love (myself/yourself/themselves) as (I am/you are/they are).

May (I/you/all) be happy and free from suffering.

May (I/you/all) find peace in an uncertain world.

May (I/you/all) find ease on the middle path between attachment and apathy.

Jan 29, 2021 9:04:25 AM

10/19/2020

Drumming for Holistic Wellness- a sermon I gave at OUUF on May 3, 2020

Drumming with others is quite good for our social wellness, psychological wellness and spiritual wellness. It’s salutogenic and salubrious in many ways that we’ll explore this morning. It’s one of many great strategies to use in the Game of Life to achieve our goals.

Drumming was probably the first form of music, which is one of the activities, like laughter, grammar and revenge, that distinguishes humans from other life forms. Making sounds by pounding on something . . . sets that thing into a vibration that then sends out an oscillation in the density of the air, which travels about 770 miles per hour, which then causes our bodies and eardrums to resonate at the same frequency. If it’s between 20 and 20,000 oscillations per second we can experience the sensation of the sound -- we are aware of it’s pitch and rhythm. The 2^nd lowest D on the piano is called D2; the piano causes the string to vibrate 73 times per second. (pianist plays d2) An octave up, D3 is double that, 143 hz. (piana plays d3) So when you play them together, they resonate together. (pianist plays d2 & d3) Harmony is when something creates a frequency that seems to fit well, or harmoniously, with the base pitch. For instance F# and A fit with D. Here’s a D chord . Here’s 2 adjacent notes that are not harmonious. (d2 and d#2). Clearly humans prefer harmony instead of discord.

About 99% of humans over 4 years old have the unique ability to move their bodies in synchrony or in resonance with the rhythms they hear, whereas younger toddlers and animals don’t have this ability. We can drum along with, or clap our hands to, or dance to the rhythms we hear. We can resonate and harmonize with others and connect with them in a profound way, thereby improving our social wellness, and gaining crucial social capital.

In a drum circle everyone should try to act as one. The ME becomes the WE.

Social wellness

In Africa, drumming was always a part of everyday life. Groups of drummers played (while dancers danced) at harvest rituals, solstice gatherings, fertility rituals, marriage ceremonies, and all manner of celebrations.

In the 60s Arthur Hull was the most famous proponent of informal drum circles,where 2 - 30 random hippies would creatively improvise around a common steady beat that each player was aware of and tried to keep in synchrony with, or resonate with; otherwise it degenerates into chaotic noise. A drum circle experience is an end in itself rather than preparation for a performance.They tend to happen in parks or churches or during retreats and festivals.they are improvised and co-created by the participants, not prearranged or composed.

Tanice G. Foltz writes that: Drumming levels out differences, engenders altered states of consciousness, and brings people together in abandoned play, where participants feels as though they are part of a single entity engaged in a unique creative experience that can never be repeated. Thus drumming is a form of spirituality wherein participants can heal the self, create community, and even transform society through their re-enchantment of the secular world. -

Keeping in time through any rhythmic group activity contributes to social cohesion through what is called ‘muscular bonding’: the euphoric fellow feeling that prolonged and rhythmic muscular movement arouses among nearly all participants in such exercises’. This type of bonding increases solidarity among people, a solidarity that historically has been channelled into religious or healing ceremonies and war.

Rhythms are played with a sense of group. Each person plays a piece to make the whole. Everyone in the community can join in and not only make music but commune with one another without inhibition and with their own self expression. That is the spirit of the drum circle.

Resonating at the same frequency with another helps to soften our ego boundaries and self-centeredness and nourishes an other-centeredness that is an essential ingredient in a love relationship. We can resonate with another with drumming, but another exercise that works to nourish a love relationship is to synchronize our breathing, in resonance with one’s lover, perhaps while lying close together in bed.

drummer Mickey Hart stated:

The drum circle offers equality because there is no head or tail. It includes people of all ages. The main objective is to share rhythm and get in tune with each other and themselves. To form a group consciousness. To entrain and resonate. By entrainment, I mean that a new voice, a collective voice, emerges from the group as they drum together.

Drum circles tend to have a facilitator or moderator who helps to shape the experience through discrete actions, such as helping to maintain a steady beat, helping those who need it,passing out extra instruments and generally managing the environment to see that everyone is able to participate fully. Participants use their listening and playing skills to make musical connections and express themselves in any and all ways that feel right. Participation is voluntary and often includes singing, chanting, dancing, playing or a flute, or just listening. drum circles often attract both regular and drop-in participants of all ages.

In drum circles, unlike in many more formal types of music there an emphasis an acceptance and respect of all, regardless of their musical abilities. All are welcomed into the circle. Quite often dancers or chanters join in and improvise to the rhythms. Others just listen or meditate.

Individual wellness- Drumming is often used by music therapists to help people free themselves from dysfunctional habitual thoughts. Little ‘mind vacations’ away from our usual mode of consciousness (with its discursive, verbal thinking) are quite good for us. Ideally, while listening and playing with others our thinking stops for awhile. We are intensively living in the here and now. We are practicing a form of mindfulness. Forgetting about our current worries about the future and ruminations about the past can be good medicine for us. It can relieve our stress and generate feel-good hormones called endorphins.

Noell Oxenhandler writes that : Realizing one is simply part of the machinery, or the music, of the universe, with its resonating structure of wave patterns: this one giving rise to this one, giving rise to this one … to hear this music, piercing as it is, restores a measure of order in the havoc of pain.

Drumming can energize us and be revitalizing. One can experience happiness, and occasionally even delicious moments of ecstasy.

Finally, group drumming can improve our Spiritual Wellness- Some consider spirituality to be our relationship with everything outside of our own selves.

There are countless examples of drums playing a part in sacred ritual. Shamans in many cultures have used the drum as the "canoe" to transport the healer to an altered state of consciousness in preparation for healing, or to help listeners experience dreamlike journeys.

During the Sufi Zikr, small groups of drummers play a simple rhythm over and over to accompany the whirling dervishes,or Sufis in a circle, helping them achieve an ego-less, trance-like state . For Sufis,their main spiritual goal tends to be to love God well and feel a unity with God.

Group drumming can sometimes quiet my ego mind, and my egocentric perspective, and help me feel a mystical oneness with others and the Universe. For the last 50 years, the theology that has worked well for me (which is certainly not the only valid theology), is called Pantheism. Instead of Monotheism, the belief that there is an all-powerful, all-knowing, everpresent, loving, compassionate, merciful, opinionated creator God out there that is different than the Universe he or she created. . . and instead of Polytheism, the belief that there are many divine, supernatural Gods with different superpowers . . . and instead of materialism or humanism which believe that there are no supernatural Divine things or powers running the Universe, just natural forces like electromagnetism, gravity and evolution . . . Pantheism is the belief that God is the Universe, the Universe is God. Everything in the Universe that is happening, is God happening. God is not a separate being that created the Universe, God is all there is, and everything happening is Divine. God is everpresent, or omnipresent and immanent everywhere, and God is everlasting in all time. We tend to think of the Universe as consisting of many separate things, such as subatomic particles, atoms, molecules, cells and organisms like ourselves that are each happening in space and time. Pantheists tend to be mystics who strive to realize and experience the oneness of all. Jane Hirshfield wrote: We feel like separate water droplets but we are also ocean.-

Sometimes when my discursive mental train of thought stops for awhile during a good drum circle, or especially when playing my large gong, my delusion of being a separate being dissolves and I taste the delicious state of being one with all. I am not a thing hearing music; rather I am the drum and I am the music.

Singers and musicians are skillful at harmonizing with all the other beings and processes playing in the Divine Cosmic Symphony . . May you harmonize well in the Divine Cosmic Symphony.

Also, nothing seems to be stable, rather everything seems to be moving in space. Dancers are skillful at dancing well with God; may you dance well with God (or, if you’re one of the many who is uncomfortable with the G word, May you dance well in the Cosmic Dance).

Or, since everything on a microscopic scale seems to be oscillating or vibrating, I would encourage you to often practice resonating well with God (or, if you will, with Divine Grace, by which I mean all of the metaphysical forces that are, perhaps, always around us in ways that organize and sustain all the things and processes happening in the Universe).

Probably it’s helpful to choose some mottos for living well that suit you. Or, if you practice affirmations in your prayers, meditations, or spiritual practice, perhaps you’ll consider silently repeating: May I harmonize well with God, and .. . may I dance well with God. And now, perhaps, after hearing some ideas about drumming, you might try, “may I drum well with God.” Namaste.

Oct 19, 2020 5:20:40 PM

06/09/2017

a metta prayer I have been practicing for myself and my loved ones

May ( I )	practice gratefulness
May ( I )	practice joy
May ( I )	Practice kindness
May ( I )	Practice mudita
May ( I )	Practice humility
May ( I )	Doubt (my) beliefs
May ( my )	Body be resilient
May ( I )	Be safe
May ( I )	Be protected by divine forces
May ( I )	Practice acceptance of myself
May ( I )	Practice acceptance of others
May ( I )	Practice acceptance of events
May ( I )	accept suboptimal outcomes of (my) wholesome desires
May ( I )	Dance well with God

Jun 9, 2017 11:12:23 AM

11/29/2015

some thoughts about boundaries, things, existence

Humans have invented the very useful concept that there are separate things in the universe, many of which have edges (or boundaries) that separate them from other things. But it’s probably wise to often remember that words like edge, boundary and thing are just maps . . . they are not the territory. They are models that work well for adult homo sapiens these days, but they are not the real thing, and probably not the way the universe is seen by a tree, a worm, a dog or a newborn baby. My guess is that these other things don’t have internal verbal monologues or “egos”, so they don’t see themselves as things that have a separate identity apart from their environment (or the evolving universe, or the Cosmic Dance, or God, or whatever you want to call All-That-Is-Happening).

So today I’ve been playing with the idea that, on a deep, philosophical level, nothing has a clear-cut, definite, discrete edge, or boundary, that separates it from other things in three dimensional space or in the time dimension. What we perceive as edges are mushy, imaginary, fictional. and useful . . . but misrepresent the way things actually are . . . or, since I am unsure what the abstract, fictional, imaginary concept of “existence” means, the way the universe is actually happening. This is a holistic, or monistic, or pantheistic model of reality.

Fundamental “physical” particles such as an electron or an up-quark act as if they have a three dimensional size, because when you watch streams of them passing each other sometimes it appears as if there is a collision. So they seem to have a “collision cross section” or diameter. So we tend to think of an electron as a “thing” like a billiard ball with a finite size, with an inside to it and an outside to it, and with the boundary between the two being an imaginary sphere with infinitesimal thickness. The electron is the stuff inside the sphere, and it exists within an environment, or space, that is not the electron (i.e. the complementary set to that particular electron).

But some scientists, including me, believe that fundamental particles are actually points of infinitesimal dimension, which have a finite probability of being (or happening) in many places at once (at many different discrete, quantized energy levels) according to a probability function, surrounded by gravitational and electromagnetic fields that extend out to ‘touch’ or fill the entire universe (albeit with rapidly decreasing strength). If particles are infinitesimal, it seems true to me these days that there is no physical “stuff” inside an electron or anywhere in the evolving universe. I’m proposing that there are no things that take up, or fill up, a 3 dimensional space. There are no “material” things . . . or immaterial things. There is no stuff that exists, there are no discrete or independent things happening, there is just The Divine Cosmic Dance happening.

Moving up a few levels, I would say that there is no discrete boundary between a neutron (which is usually thought to consist of 3 tiny quarks traveling around in a spherical space) and the rest of an atom. And there is no discrete edge to any atom . . . they extend out to fill the universe. And there is no real edge to a water molecule, the Atlantic Ocean, a hemoglobin molecule, my mind, my heart, “myself”, a cloud, the atmosphere, a star, or a galaxy. Most cosmologists would claim that even our universe is finite in size and expanding but does not have a boundary or edge.

What am I? Where do I stop and the universe begin? Do I have a discrete existence in space or in time? At what point in time did I start to exist? When I was just a thought in my grandfather’s mind? When one of my dad’s sperm penetrated one of my mom’s eggs? When the doctor cut my umbilical cord? Or when I developed a sense of a separate self between the ages of 6 and 14 months? Am I the same person I was when I was 3 years old? I think not. Legally Edward D. Miller is all that is happening that is centered in this space and in this time, and I will stop existing 3 minutes after my heart stops beating. And I am the husband of my wife and the father of my sons. On a more scientific level, I am an unique, continually evolving, open living system that is currently metabolizing nutrients so as to be self-organizing and self-sustaining . . . so as to maintain my integrity. I am a unique subsystem happening amidst The Big System—the evolving measurable and unmeasurable (physical and metaphysical) energy fields that we call the unfolding of the Universe. I don’t have a discrete edge in time or space, but I am certainly centered in this space and in this time, not in Paris or in 1880. I am not my body, my mind, my heart or my soul, but they are useful words to describe imaginary, fictional aspects of me. I have a sense that I am that which, when I am conscious, has a privileged awareness of “my” sensations and thoughts (which seem to happen in a fictional thing called my mind) and feelings (which happen in another fictional thing called my heart). To the extent that I love something or somebody, my separateness from them (and my happiness and well-being vs. theirs) diminishes. Mystics often try to love God, which, in a way, is realizing their oneness or lack of separateness from God (the Divine Cosmic Dance).

These days I’m an idealist and not a Platonist, so I believe that edges and boundaries are imaginary, fictional concepts that we have invented (and not discovered), just like points, lines, perfect circles, and the numbers pi and infinity. (Btw, the definition of boundary, also called frontier in mathematics, is the collection of all points of a given set having the property that every neighborhood of each point contains points in the set and in the complement of the set (i.e. points not in the set). If you ponder this definition awhile, it certainly makes sense as a useful, abstract math concept that depends upon the ‘existence’ of points, which themselves come into existence in so far as they are, indeed, defined to exist in the language or paradigm of math. Perhaps just by imagining points, or boundaries, or circles in a Euclidian space, in a way they do thereby have an ‘existence.’ But just because we can imagine that things exist (e.g. circles, hearts, souls, the Devil, justice, truth, good luck and Leprechans), or are true, doesn’t mean they actually exist or are actually true in an objective sense. I guess things exist in different ways, to different degrees.

Things are certainly more complicated than they seem. Our models are good, but not great. Many things are ineffable, unknowable . . . but it’s a fascinating game to ponder the nature of reality! We certainly shouldn’t believe everything we think; doing so leads to many of our problems. Too often we think we are right, and our models are right. But we’re not as sharp as we think, and our models will need to continually evolve as we seek ways of thinking that are more skillful and true. And, the zen master would wisely point out, perhaps models, concepts and words need to be dispensed with altogether for us to really ‘get it,’ or be enlightened. Goooonnnnggggg . . . .

Nov 29, 2015 12:35:40 PM

09/04/2015

some thoughts about pantheism, ontology, what I am

One of the many valid spiritual perspectives and the one that seems to work best for me these days is pantheism, the belief that God is the Universe, the Universe (or Nature, or Divine Cosmic Dance) is God, and that all of the “things” in the universe are manifestations of God, and are not really separate things. God is the only thing that is happening, and God is more of a verb than a noun. God is not separate from “creation” and there is no “creator” of what appear to us to be “things”. So, these days, I am not a “theist,” a “monotheist” or a “polytheist” as I don’t think of God as separate from the Universe, separate from all of the things (or processes or ‘open living systems’) happening around us and concurrently with us. All things are interrelated, interconnected, open processes that are happening together somehow, in ways that we can describe and understand a bit with our scientific “laws”. . . but also in metaphysical ways that are ineffable, unknowable. I call these miraculous, ineffable forces Divine Grace, and this is the “thing” that, I believe, is most worthy of our respect, appreciation and gratefulness (which I consider to be the highest spiritual virtue). Because I believe that God is happening, I do not believe in atheism or agnosticism. An electromagnetic field, an electron, a quark, a water molecule, a bacterium, a tree, a worm, a sensation, a perception, a thought, a person are all interconnected aspects of God happening. Does God have ears that can hear us or our prayers? In a way “he” or “she” does, but I’m thinking they are our ears that “he” has and not his ears. Does God love us? Yes, in a way, since we love one another. Should we love God? Yes, definitely. So, as you can see, I ‘worship’ a God that is not personified, that isn’t created in our image, that doesn’t have his own thoughts and feelings, but who thinks, feels and lives through us . . . and, through Divine Grace, animates the entire Cosmic Dance.

People are somehow blessed with the miraculous ability to verbally think with words and languages-- abstract concepts ordered by grammar. But just because there is a word for something doesn’t mean that it exists. The map is not the territory. I’m not sure that existence exists, or that any “thing” exists (e.g. minds, hearts, souls, egos, angels, leprechauns, the devil, unicorns, gravity, justice). What I’m aware of is a string of sensations, perceptions and thoughts that are happening. But that doesn’t mean a “mind” exists in which they happen, or a heart exists in which feelings happen. Existence implies a certain amount of stability, but it seems to me that everything is always changing and evolving. You can’t really put your finger on a moment in time, an electron, a mind, or a sensation. So it makes more sense to me to say that interconnected processes are happening (the present progressive tense) than to say that a thing exists.

These beliefs may also be called existence monism. From Wikipedia: Existence monism posits that, strictly speaking, there exists only a single thing (e.g. the universe), which can only be artificially and arbitrarily divided into many things. . . . The term "monism" was introduced in the 18th century by Christian von Wolff^[6] in his work Logic (1728),^[7] to designate types of philosophical thought in which the attempt was made to eliminate the dichotomy of body and mind^[8] and explain all phenomena by one unifying principle, or as manifestations of a single substance.

Mathmaticians tend to be “Platonists”, because they believe that numbers and perfect geometric concepts like perfect circles actually exist, and people ‘discovered’ them. But others, like me, (“idealists”) prefer to think of them as abstract concepts that don’t really exist, but that people have invented, because they are extremely useful for people. I doubt if there are any perfect circles that exist in the Universe, and I doubt if the number 17 “exists” on Neptune, or existed 5 million years ago. I would call them fictional, imaginary things in people’s minds, like infinity, good luck or leprechans. My view is that the irrational number pi doesn’t really exist. Pi is the unapproachable limit that the circumference of a circle divided by the diameter of the circle approaches as the circle gets more and more perfect. But all the circles in the universe, to me, seem a bit squiggly and imperfect, so C/D is always greater than pi (perhaps 3.15). Two dimensional planes are extremely useful concepts, but I’m not aware of any that actually exist, except in a mathmatician’s mentation. (But, I guess, in a way, ideas are real, so can I create my own reality and give things existence by thinking about them? If I think there are angels, does that mean they exist? Well, in a way, they do, as abstract concepts. . . just like words can be said to exist.)

So now to the next big, difficult, probably unknowable spiritual question, “what am I?” . . . Legally, Edward D. Miller is all of the things that are happening here and now, centered in this space and this time, happening from the moment of my birth to the time 3 minutes after my heart stops beating. And, commonly, I am defined by my relationships (I am my mother’s son, and have been, and always will be, even after my death) or my activities (I am an obstetrician and a tennis player) or my attributes (I am a short, gray-haired man) or my current preferences (I am a heterosexual or a Democrat). But on a deep, spiritual level, because I don’t think of my “self” or my identity as being a separate, stable thing, I believe that I am God happening (or a manifestation of God happening), just like you, a tree and a ray of light. Another valid way to describe me, or another animal is: a unique, open, living system that takes in nutrients from my environment, metabolizes them, and excretes wastes back to the environment , and that is autopoetic (an adjective that applies to a system capable of reproducing and maintaining itself.)

These perspectives are all valid, but, on a deeper level, my self is ineffable, something that I will never be able to understand well, something I can’t put my finger on or fully grok. My sense of my “self” is ‘that which is privvy to my own brain/mind/heart activity.’ I believe that I am that which is aware of my sensations, perceptions and thoughts . . . and that is the crux of how I am different than you or a tree. More than that, I believe that I am that which seemingly has free will and an ability to choose my thoughts. I am that which can choose to think about a dolphin or a worm. If I didn’t have the ability to be aware of sensations or thoughts, and I didn’t have the ability to choose my thoughts and actions (as I won’t after my brain dies), then I would say that I wouldn’t exist anymore. My sense of self would be gone, as it temporarily is in a coma.

In a way, I am my body too, but my body changes every second, and I would still feel like my same old self even if I had amputations and/or heart, lung and kidney transplants. But I don’t think I would be the same person if they were able to give me a brain transplant.

In a way, “I” will live on after my death as occasional thoughts ‘in the minds of’ family and friends. And certainly it’s plausible that some part of my essence will live on in future living things who will acquire (borrow from the cosmic library?) some of the atoms that have been intimately associated with my body. I’m an agnostic about whether some non-material aspect of me (e.g. my soul) will live on in other living things, but that seems like a nifty possibility. But it seems certain to me that God, the Divine Cosmic Dance, will continue to vibrate in awesome, complicated, beautiful ways, into the indefinite future.

What is our purpose in life and why are we here? Well, purpose is just a word for another abstract human concept, and clearly there are many valid answers to this big question. Here are a few that I like these days:

to harmonize well (or vibrate well) with the Universe/God

to love well . . . to optimize my relationship wellness with all the other aspects of God around us, by often choosing to practice other-centeredness, kindness, mudita, compassion, empathy, acceptance, equanimity and gratefulness

to dance well in the Cosmic Dance

to optimize the "holistic wellness" of ourselves and those around us

to optimize the wellness of the Universe . . . by frequently choosing to practice virtuous, skillful thoughts, feelings, words and gestures in the next few moments, because that may be all that I can control, and the biggest challenge of our short/long lives.

to play the game of life well (skillfully) . . . which sometimes means light-heartedly ('surf the waves of change', be with the flow), or heavy-heartedly when that is called for, with creativity and a good variety and balance of plays in our playbook--e.g. gratefulness for Divine Grace, acceptance of the way the Universe is evolving, right brain modes and left brain modes, divine masculine modes and divine feminine modes. Hopefully as we age we are more skillful at choosing to practice the 'plays' that work for us, and choosing to minimize practice of plays that don't work so well for us.

... fun stuff to ponder with discursive thinking. but I wish I could bang my gong now . . . to help me disidentify with my self and enjoy a mystical experience of being with God in a more profound way.

P.S. according to William James, “in mystic states we both become one with the Absolute and we become aware of our oneness. This is the everlasting and triumphant mystical tradition, hardly altered by differences of clime or creed. In Hinduism, in Neoplatonism, in Sufism, in Christian mysticism, in Whitmanism, we find the same recurring note.”

Sep 4, 2015 12:13:46 PM

10/01/2014

quotations- from Khalil Gibran

1. Be thankful for the difficult times. They have showed you how strong you can be.

“Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars.”

2. Kindness is a quality of the strong.

“Tenderness and kindness are not signs of weakness and despair, but manifestations of strength and resolution.”

3. There’s no such thing as absolute truth.

“Say not, ‘I have found the truth,’ but rather, ‘I have found a truth.’

“I AM IGNORANT of absolute truth. But I am humble before my ignorance and therein lies my honor and my reward.”

4. It’s the small people who try to belittle and humiliate others.

“To belittle, you have to be little.”

5. The harm others do to you is easier to forget than the harm you do to others.

“If the other person injures you, you may forget the injury; but if you injure him you will always remember.”

6. You might forget those who made you laugh, but you will never forget those who were by your side in your darkest hours.

“You may forget with whom you laughed, but you will never forget with whom you wept.”

“Hearts united in pain and sorrow will not be separated by joy and happiness. Bonds that are woven in sadness are stronger than the ties of joy and pleasure. Love that is washed by tears will remain eternally pure and faithful.”

7. It’s the simple things in life that are the most extraordinary.

“In the sweetness of friendship; let there be laughter and the sharing of pleasures. For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.”

8. Love is life. And life is love.

“When you love you should not say, “God is in my heart,” but rather, “I am in the heart of God.”

“Life without love is like a tree without blossoms or fruit.”

9. Put love into your work.

“Work is love made visible. And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy. For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man’s hunger. And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge distills a poison in the wine. And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man’s ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the night.”

“They deem me mad because I will not sell my days for gold; and I deem them mad because they think my days have a price.”

10. To understand the heart and mind of a person, look at what he aspires to be.

“To understand the heart and mind of a person, look not at what he has already achieved, but at what he aspires to.”

“Trust in dreams, for in them is the hidden gate to eternity.”

11. True love can’t be possessed.

“Love possesses not nor would it be possessed; For love is sufficient unto love. And think not you can direct the course of love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course. Love has no other desire but to fulfill itself.”

12. Seek to put up with bad manners pleasantly.

“The real test of good manners is to be able to put up with bad manners pleasantly.”

13. Love binds everything together in perfect harmony.

“They say: ‘If a man knew himself, he would know all mankind.’ I say: ‘If a man loved mankind, he would know something of himself.”

14. Always look on the bright side of life.

“The optimist sees the rose and not its thorns; the pessimist stares at the thorns, oblivious to the rose.”

15. We don’t see things as they are. We see things as we are.

“The appearance of things changes according to the emotions; and thus we see magic and beauty in them, while the magic and beauty are really in ourselves.”

16. True love is the offspring of spiritual affinity.

“It is wrong to think that love comes from long companionship and persevering courtship. Love is the offspring of spiritual affinity and unless that affinity is created in a moment, it will not be created for years or even generations.”

17. Let there be space in your relationship.

“Let there be spaces in your togetherness, And let the winds of the heavens dance between you. Love one another but make not a bond of love: Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls. Fill each other’s cup but drink not from one cup. Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf. Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone, Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music. Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping. For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts. And stand together, yet not too near together: For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.”

18. If you pray when it rains, make sure you also pray when the sun shines.

“You pray in your distress and in your need; would that you might pray also in the fullness of your joy and in your days of abundance.”

19. When you give of yourself, that’s when you truly give.

“You give but little when you give of your possessions. It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.”

20. Real beauty comes from within.

“Beauty is not in the face; beauty is a light in the heart.”

21. Your children are not your children. They are sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.

“Your children are not your children. They are sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself. They come through you but not from you. And though they are with you yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts, for they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, for their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.”

22. Every relationship should be free from bondage.

“No human relation gives one possession in another—every two souls are absolutely different. In friendship or in love, the two side by side raise hands together to find what one cannot reach alone.”

“If you love somebody, let them go, for if they return, they were always yours. And if they don’t, they never were.”

23. Be thankful for both the good and the bad in your life. It’s all meant to teach you something.

“I have learned silence from the talkative, toleration from the intolerant, and kindness from the unkind; yet, strange, I am ungrateful to those teachers.”

“When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy. When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.”

24. Your attitude towards life will determine life’s attitude towards you.

“Your living is determined not so much by what life brings to you as by the attitude you bring to life; not so much by what happens to you as by the way your mind looks at what happens.”

25. A friend who is far away is sometimes much nearer than one who is at hand.

“A friend who is far away is sometimes much nearer than one who is at hand. Is not the mountain far more awe-inspiring and more clearly visible to one passing through the valley than to those who inhabit the mountain?”

Oct 1, 2014 8:49:45 AM | quotations

06/04/2014

some purposes & goals of the Game of Life- 6/4/14

a spiritual athlete often strives:

to skillfully, wisely and lovingly control their thoughts, feelings and actions in the next few moments (the only thing that one can control)

to resonate well with the vibrations in other living and nonliving things (listen well, tune in well, connect well)

to harmonize well with the Cosmic Symphony (to add creative, interesting and salutogenic vibrations, pitches and rhythms . . . and minimize discordency)

to dance well with the Cosmic Dance (with grace, balance, strength, gentleness, wisdom, and creative choreography)

to frequently choose to practice gratefulness, joy, kindness, acceptance and peace . . . in the midst of a complicated, ineffable, unknowable, ever-evolving Universe where many things are happening (for trillions of reasons) that, at first glance, seem unfortunate, unjust, disappointing and wrong.

to make a difference

to beautify the Cosmic Dance

strategies, plays and tips for the spiritual athlete to do this well:

associate closely with teammates who are also often striving to do 'things' well (including thoughts, feelings and actions, such as love, acceptance, kindness and gratefulness)

love a partner well (care about and care for them well) by frequently choosing to speak their love languages and frequently choosing to practice acceptance, kindness, affection for them.

love many things well, which is another way of saying optimize relationship wellness with many other people, animals, plants & living systems

choose to practice techniques to quiet muddled, frenetic, monkey-mind thinking which tends to cloud my vision, filter my hearing, separate me from others, and make me self-centered & ego-centric (e.g. mindfulness (of thoughts, sensations, breathing), yoga, tai chi (and frequently practicing mindfulness of my body's balance, grace and softness). playing music, playing my gong, hugs & walks with Linda, massage of Freddie and Ampy, practicing moments of silence between paragraphs in the book of life (or putting punctuation marks between sentences in the frenetic, run-on sentence that dominates my verbal thinking), etc.

choose to practice gratefulness for Divine Grace--the ineffable, unknowable, miraculous forces which propel and coordinate the unfolding Universe

frequently appreciate, and practice awe for, the natural beauty and the creative artistry of 'Mother Nature and God'

frequently practice humility

frequently laugh, or at least chuckle (especially about the foibles, shortcomings, weaknesses of myself and others)

frequently choose to relax tension and to lighten up, and thereby beautify this place in the Universe that I am responsible for (the space here and the time now which is currently me)

Jun 4, 2014 8:14:51 AM

01/14/2014

some good trends, by Ed, Jan 14, 2014

1/1/14- some good trends:

There are clearly some very bad, worsening problems (e.g. global warming, species extinctions, worsening separation between super-rich and middle class people, our national debt, obesity), but there are also dozens of significant, very good trends, that make me think this has been, and is, a very good and exciting time to be alive:

Teen birthrate- down 45% since 91

teens responsibly using contraception- up

Teen abortions- down

Birthrate in USA- continues down from peak in 1956

Total fertility rate in world- hugely decreased number of kids per woman

Contraceptive availability to all couples- improved

Unintended pregnancies – down 18% in last 20 y

Rape in USA- down 75% in last 40 y

Domestic violence- down 50% in last 20y

Torture- huge declines

Chance of dying a violent death- decreasing for thousands of years

War-related death rates- decreased 90% over last 2000 years

Murder rate in USA- down 20% in 8y

Bank robberies- down 50% in last 15 y

Deaths from car accidents (per mile driven)- down 80% in last 50 y

Infant mortality in world- decreased from 46-35 per 1000 in last 8 y

Divorce in US- declining since ’08, lowest since ‘70

Unwanted dogs & cats killed- down from 17 to 5 million per year in last 15 years

Extreme poverty in world- halved. # in world living on less than $1.25/d (inflation adjusted) decreased from 52% in 1981 to 40% in ’90 to 22% in 2008, to 20% in ‘14

Microloans- keep going up

Hunger in world- decreased

USA citizens’ after-tax income- up 10% in last 4 y

Age adjusted cancer incidence rates- decreased for most cancers

Cancer death rates in USA- decreased 25% in last 30 y, 1.8% per year over last 20 y for men (true for lung, colon, prostate, leukemia, kidney, non H lymphoma, myeloma, and especially for stomach)

Maternal mortality rates- decreased 100 fold over last 100 years in all developed countries

Deaths of kids- decreased by 2.5 million / y because of vaccinations

Smallpox deaths- decreased from 2 million /y to zero from ’67 – ‘80

Life expectancy- improved almost everywhere

Age-adjusted death rates from heart disease- down 50% in last 60y

Age-adjusted death rates from stroke- down 66% in last 60 y in US

Smoking rates & tobacco addiction- down

Age-adjusted rates of dementia- decreasing

Occupational safety- improved

Many fewer Americans without health insurance- starting in 2014

Use of solar energy-

Use of wind energy

Use of heat pumps

Use of energy saving techniques in buildings, lighting

Imported oil- down 30% in last 4 y

Gas mileage- improved

Miles driven per person in USA- down

Airfares- down 50% since ‘85

Bald eagles in lower 48- doubling every 10 y since 1963 (10,000 in ’06, 487 in ’63)

Urban farming- big increases

Farmers’ markets- big increases

Trans-fat intake- big declines

Reforestation in the US- up for last 120 years

Subsidies to make alcohol from corn- down

Alternatives to gasoline powered cars- up (electrics, hybrids, biofuels)

Internet connectivity- improving, allowing quick, free access to huge amounts of information to most people

USA citizens with college degree- up to 33%

USA high school graduation rate- up 8% in last 10 y to 78%

Pollution- decreases over last 30 y, especially in lead (ave level 13 in 1978 to 1.1 in 2010), chloroflourocarbons (removed from aerosol cans), water pollution

Womens’ rights- improved, Athletic options for girls- improved ten times in last 50 y; higher education for women- improved all over world

Mens’ liberation

Gay rights- improving fast, Homophobia- down

Racism- decreasing in prevalence

Piracy on high seas- down by 35% in last 5 y

Yoga & meditation- huge growth

Options for dying well- improving

Hospice- improved usage, up to 37% now

Marijuana- more legalization (Washington, Colorado, Uruguay) and decriminalization

Many more governments with elected representatives that speak up for lower and middle classes. And a new Pope Francis who is also a populist.

More and more disdain by Americans for military interventions overseas

Jan 14, 2014 9:09:41 AM

01/08/2014

Why and How We Breathe- by Ed, July, 2013

How marvelous it is that from birth thru death we breathe so well! Our autonomic nerves flawlessly activate and relax our diaphragms in tune with our brain’s assessment of how much CO2 waste has built up in our blood. Even if we hold our breath or exercise, blood oxygenation stays plentiful, so it never plays a role in our drive to breathe. Upon cessation of exercise, we have absolutely no need to inhale extra oxygen. We hyperventilate solely to rid our blood of the CO2, which has built up and caused a slight acidification of our blood.

In the relaxed state, our left and right diaphragms are domed. Think of cutting off a third of a round cantaloupe, and placing it next to another third of a cantaloupe; our diaphragms are like their rinds. All the muscle fibers radiate outwards and downwards from the fibrous tissue at their peaks. When these muscles activate and shorten, our diaphragms flatten and push downwards (‘south’, if you will); the chest cavity enlarges and air naturally rushes in to fill the extra space. To make room for more air, the diaphragms have pushed the stomach, liver, and intestines down and out; the relaxed belly wall allows itself to be passively pouched out.

When all the radial muscle fibers in our 2 diaphragms then relax, the shape of the diaphragms again become domed, our belly circumference shrinks, and the stale air in our lungs, beefed-up in CO2, is naturally, passively and effortlessly exhaled. During sleep or relaxed breathing, exhalation tends to be 50% to 100% longer than inhalation. Lately, an effective way for me to relax and be in the now is to mentally count to 4 on inhalations, and gradually increase the length of my exhalations from 4 counts to 8 counts. . . while I also try to focus on the position of my diaphragms.

Occasionally (e.g. with a sigh) we use the muscles outside of our chest to lift our ribs outward and upwards. This is the 2^nd, but relatively unimportant way to increase the potential space that air can fill in our lungs.

Occasionally (e.g. when blowing up a balloon) we forcefully contract our chest wall muscles to expel air. And rarely, if we choose, we can forcefully contract our abdominal wall muscles to push the liver, stomach ‘north’ into the chest, so that the diaphragms are forced back into their fully-domed shape.

But the lion’s share of our breathing is due to gentle contraction and relaxation of the tireless radial fibers in our 2 diaphragms in response to the CO2 buildup in our blood. How often are we grateful for our behind-the-scenes diaphragm muscles? Can we sense their changing shape? It’s quite difficult, but like most things in life, we can get better with lots of practice.

Jan 8, 2014 7:29:46 PM

01/02/2013

Stones are awesome

I have always been fond of gemstones and stones that have been weathered smooth in lakes and streams. They have prodigious physical beauty and show the fabulous creativity of Mother Nature. Stones are made of trillions of marvelously dancing atoms, forever spinning and frolicking in the Cosmic Dance. Their often-crystalline molecular arrangements and vibrations have a comforting, more regular, more stable order than biologic phenomena. They transform trillions of times slower than living things. They are rich in silicon, the lovely, heavier, sibling of carbon in the p2 family.

For intrigue sometimes, I have attempted to imbue them with extra powers . . . by lovingly massaging them, by sharing my warmth with them, by sleeping with them, by vibrating with them, by inviting them to steep in my metaphysical and physical vibrations, Thus, by making them into “talismans”, they have become much more special for me. They are no longer just ‘off the shelf’ stones; they have become mine. I have befriended them. And when I give them to someone dear to me, perhaps they carry some of me with them. I don’t know this for sure, but perhaps they can then serve as antennae to help my friend better tune into my energies, and help me and them connect in loving ways. Perhaps because I believe this, it becomes true for me. Perhaps it’s one of those magical ways I can create my own reality. When I tune into stones, I feel much more connected with my deceased sister Linda, who often bonded with stones through the universal glue of appreciation. Perhaps it’s ‘just’ due to the placebo effect, but that doesn’t diminish its reality.

I continue to be nourished by the relationship wellness (love) I have with the stones I have befriended.

Perhaps this seems crazy, but it works for me.

Jan 2, 2013 10:14:32 PM

12/22/2012

quotations- from John Welwood (e.g. Love and Awakening)

The things we most enjoy-- lovemaking, natural beauty, creative challenges, sports or strenuous exercise-- are those things that bring us alive and fully here.

Only between one person and another can the renewal of our world begin.

Love becomes a path of awakening-- rousing us from the sleep of old, unconscious patterns into the freshness and immediacy of living more fully in the present, in accord with who we really are.

All significant achievements come about through vision and intention.

Instead of seeing our partner as our jailer, we need to see that we have constructed our own cage, one we have been carrying around a long time, and that we alone keep ourselves confined there.

Love’s most fundamental and insistent dividend--you must change your life. ... you must awaken from your trance . . . free yourself from the conditioned personality.

To let love enter all the way into us, we have to give up who we think we are . . . it requires letting go of old identities that have served as a protective shell.

To love and be loved, the false self has to die.

Love inspires us to relax into the blessed flow of our being.

When we focus on another as the cause of our difficulties, or the solution to them, we contract and tense up; but when we acknowledge the cause or solution inside us, and relate to that, we start to open, expand, and settle down

A soul connection is a resonance between two people who respond to the essential beauty of each other's individual natures, behind their facades, and who connect on this deeper level. This kind of mutual recognition provides the catalyst for a potent alchemy. It is a sacred alliance whose purpose is to help both partners discover and realize their deepest potentials. While a heart connection lets us appreciate those we love just as they are, a soul connection opens up a further dimension -- seeing and loving them for who they could be, and for who we could become under their influence. This means recognizing that we both have an important part to play in helping each other become more fully who we are....A soul connection not only inspires us to expand, but also forces us to confront whatever stands in the way of that expansion."

We already have so much abundance. We truly do. We need not search too far. It is within. The reason we fail to recognize this is because we haven't quite mastered the art of being. For abundance to prevail, we must have LOVE, gratitude, acceptance and compassion.

While our absolute nature, as pure being or open presence, is timeless and changeless....our soul evolves and deepens through cultivating and embodying the seed potentials -- for courage, strength, generosity, humor, tenderness, wisdom -- contained in this larger nature. The essence of spiritual work is to realize and continually reorient ourselves toward our being, our absolute nature; and this is what leads to ultimate freedom. Yet spiritual realizations often remain compartmentalized, apart from everyday life, or become used as a rationale for living in an impersonal or soulless way. That is why, if we are to live our realizations and bring them into this world, we also need to work on the vessel of spirit -- our embodied humanity. Soulwork is the forging of this vessel......If spiritual work brings freedom, soulwork brings integration. Both are necessary for a complete human life.

The light of unconditional love awakens the dormant seed potentials of the soul, helping them ripen, blossom, and bear fruit, allowing us to bring forth the unique gifts that are ours to offer in this life.

There is a secret about human love that is commonly overlooked: Receiving it is much more scary and threatening than giving it. How many times in your life have you been unable to let in someone's love or even pushed it away? Much as we proclaim the wish to be truly loved, we are often afraid of that, and so find it difficult to open to love or let it all the way in.

I would define love very simply: as a potent blend of openness and warmth, which allows us to make real contact, to take delight in and appreciate, and to be at one with----our selves, others, and life itself. Openness----the heart's pure, unconditional yes----is love's essence. And warmth is love's basic expression, arising as a natural extension of this yes----the desire to reach out and touch, connect with, and nourish what we love.

The problems in relationships begin when we imagine that the warmth ignited in our heart isn't really ours, that it's transferred into us by the other person. Then we become obsessed with the other as the provider of love, when in truth the warmth we feel comes from the sunlight of great love entering our heart....

No one else can ever provide the connection that finally puts the soul at ease. We find that connection when the window of the heart opens, allowing us to bask in the warmth and openness that is our deepest nature. When we look to others for this ground, we wind up trying to control and manipulate them into being there for us in a way that allows us to settle into ourselves. yet this very focus on trying to get something from them prevents us from resting in our own ground, leaving us outwardly dependent and inwardly disconnected.

Dec 22, 2012 7:42:21 PM | quotations

quotations- from Twain's Puddn'head Wilson's calendar

I wish I owned half of that dog. “Why?” Because I would kill my half.

"Adam was but human - this explains all-he did not want the apple for the apple's sake, he wanted it only because it was forbidden. The mistake was in not forbidding the serpent: then he would have eaten the serpent." -Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is, knows how deep a dept of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first great benefactor of our race. He brought death into the world."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Adam and Eve had many advantages, but the principal one was that they escaped teething."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Training is everything. The peach was once a bitter almond; cauliflower is nothing but cabbage with a college education."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Remark of Dr. Baldwin's concerning upstarts: 'We don't care to eat toadstools that think they are truffles.'"
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Let us endeavor so to live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Habit is habit, and not to be flung out the window by any man, but coaxed down-stairs a step at a time." -Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"One of the most striking differences between a cat and a lie is that a cat has only nine lives."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"There is no character, howsoever good and fine, but it can be destroyed by ridicule, howsoever poor and witless. Observe the ass, for instance: his character is about perfect, he is the choicest spirit among all the humbler animals, yet see what ridicule has brought him to. Instead of feeling complimented when we are called an ass, we are left in doubt."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"The holy passion of Friendship is of so sweet and steady and loyal and enduring a nature that it will last through a whole lifetime, if not asked to lend money."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Consider well the proportions of things. It is better to be a young June-bug than an old bird-of-paradise."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Why is it that we rejoice at a birth and grieve at a funeral? Is it because we are not the person involved?"
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"It is easy to find fault if one has that disposition. There was once a man who, not being able to find any other fault with his coal, complained that there were too many prehistoric toads in it."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"All say, 'How hard it is that we have to die'-a strange complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"When angry, count to four; when very angry, swear."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"As to the adjective: when in doubt, strike it out."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"When I reflect upon the number of disagreeable people who I know have gone to a better world, I am moved to lead a different life."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"October. This is one of the particularly dangerous months to speculate in stocks in. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August and February."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Nothing so needs reforming as other people's opinion."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Behold, the fool saith, 'Put not all thine eggs in one basket'-which is but a manner of saying, 'Scatter your money and your attention;' but the wise man saith,'Put all your eggs in the one basket and WATCH THAT BASKET."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and a man."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Even popularity can be overdone. In Rome, along at first, you are full of regrets that Michelangelo died; but by and by you only regret that you didn't see him do it."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"July 4. Statistics show that we lose more fools on this day than in all the other days of the year put together. This proves, by the number left in stock, that one Fourth of July per year is now inadequate, the country's grown so."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Gratitude and treachery are merely the two extremities of the same procession. You have seen all of it that is worth staying for when the band and the gaudy officials have gone by."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Thanksgiving Day. Let all give humble, hearty, and sincere thanks, now, but the turkeys. In the island of Fiji, they do not use turkeys; they use plumbers. It does not become you and me to sneer at Fiji."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"It were not best that we should all think alike; it is difference of opinion that makes horse-races."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"Even the clearest and most perfect circumstantial evidence is likely to be at fault, after all, and therefore ought to be received with great caution. Take the case of any pencil, sharpened by any woman: if you have witnesses, you will find she did it with a knife; but if you take simply the aspect of the pencil, you will say she did it with her teeth."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"He is useless on top of the ground; he ought to be under it, inspiring the cabbages."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"APRIL 1. This is the day upon which we are reminded of what we are on the other three hundred and sixty-four."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"It is often the case that the man who can't tell a lie thinks he is the best judge of one."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

"October 12, The Discovery. It was wonderful to find America, but it would have been more wonderful to miss it."
-Pudd'nhead Wilson-

Dec 22, 2012 7:33:56 PM | quotations

quotations- from Cervantes (most from Don Quixote)

God exalts the man who humbles himself. -Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Look carefully, I tell you, look carefully at what you do, in case the devil is deceiving you. –Sancho Panza, Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

I know who I am and who I may be, if I choose. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

He who sings scares away his woes. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Alas! all music jars when the soul's out of tune. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Never stand begging for that which you have the power to earn. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Those who will play with cats must expect to be scratched. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Make it thy business to know thyself, which is the most difficult lesson in the world. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

There are two kinds of beauty, one being of the soul and the other of the body,

That of the soul is revealed through intelligence, modesty, right conduct,
Generosity and good breeding, all of which qualities may exist in an ugly man;
And when one's gaze is fixed upon beauty of this sort and not upon that of the body,
Love is usually born suddenly and violently. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

The truth may be stretched thin, but it never breaks, and it always surfaces above lies, as oil floats on water. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Too much sanity may be madness. And maddest of all, to see life as it is and not as it should be. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

In order to attain the impossible, one must attempt the absurd. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Abundance, even of good things, prevents them from being valued. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Diligence is the mother of good fortune. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Everyone is as God has made him, and oftentimes a great deal worse. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Honesty's the best policy. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Take my advice and live for a long, long time. Because the maddest thing a man can do in this life is to let himself die. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

A Man Without Honor is Worse than Dead. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

When life itself seems lunatic, who knows where madness lies? Perhaps to be too practical may be madness. To surrender dreams, this may be madness ...Maddest of all is to see life as it is and not as it should be. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

The journey is better than the inn. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

There is no greater folly in the world than for a man to despair. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

One who loses wealth loses much. One who loses a friend loses more. But one who loses courage loses all. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Tell me what company thou keepst, and I'll tell thee what thou art. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

There's no taking trout with dry breeches.― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Fair and softly goes far. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Until death it is all life. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

The brave man carves out his fortune, and every man is the son of his own works. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

To be prepared is half the victory. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

He preaches well that lives well. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

No man is more than another unless he does more than another. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Captivity is the greatest of all evils that can befall one. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

True valor lies between cowardice and rashness. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

That which costs little is less valued. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

The knowledge of yourself will preserve you from vanity. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Diligence is the mother of good fortune, and idleness, its opposite, never brought a man to the goal of any of his best wishes. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Good actions ennoble us, and we are the sons of our own deeds. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Never stand begging for that which you have the power to earn. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Take away the cause, and the effect ceases. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

To withdraw is not to run away, and to stay is no wise action, when there's more reason to fear than to hope. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Be slow of tongue and quick of eye. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

I have always heard, Sancho, that doing good to base fellows is like throwing water into the sea. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Liberty is one of the most precious gifts which heaven has bestowed on man; with it we cannot compare the treasures which the earth contains or the sea conceals; for liberty, as for honor, we can and ought to risk our lives; and, on for the other hand, captivity is the greatest evil that can befall man. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

It seldom happens that any felicity comes so pure as not to be tempered and allayed by some mixture of sorrow. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Make it thy business to know thyself, which is the most difficult lesson in the world. Yet from this lesson thou will learn to avoid the frog's foolish ambition of swelling to rival the bigness of the ox. -Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

When thou art at Rome, do as they do at Rome. -Miguel de Cervantes

The eyes, those silent tongues of love. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Our greatest foes, and whom we must chiefly combat, are within. ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Forewarned, forearmed; to be prepared is half the victory. -Miguel de Cervantes

That's the nature of women, not to love when we love them, and to love when we love them not.

-Miguel de Cervantes

What man can pretend to know the riddle of a woman's mind? ― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Dec 22, 2012 7:30:37 PM | quotations

quotations- from Don Miguel Ruiz (most from The Four Agreements)

If you are generous with your love, everyone is going to love you. –Don Miguel Ruiz

Once you decide to become a couple, you are there to serve the one you love. . . you are there to serve your love to your lover, to be each other’s servant. . . . Love is always kind. –Don Miguel Ruiz

If you see your partnership, your romantic relationship, as a team, everything will start to improve. –Don Miguel Ruiz

To become masters of love, we have to practice love. The art of relationship is also a whole mastery, and the only way to reach mastery is with practice. To master a relationship is therefore about action. It is not about concepts or attaining knowledge. It is about action. Of course, to have action, we need to have some knowledge, or at least a little more awareness of the ways humans operate. –Don Miguel Ruiz

No one else can make you happy; happiness is the result of love coming out of you. –Don Miguel Ruiz

You cannot change other people. –Don Miguel Ruiz

We have to learn not to put our nose where no one wants it. –Don Miguel Ruiz

You are not in the relationship to clean your partner’s garbage; she is going to clean her own. –Don Miguel Ruiz

[In a good relationship] sex becomes a communion; sex becomes a complete surrendering, a dance, an art, a supreme expression of beauty. –Don Miguel Ruiz

On one level or another, all of us are masters. We are masters because we have the power to create and to rule our own lives. . . . You create yourself, whatever you believe you are. You are the way you are because that is what you believe about yourself. Your whole reality, everything you believe, is your creation. –Don Miguel Ruiz

The human mind is sick with a disease called fear. . . . the emotional body is full of wounds, and these wounds are infected with emotional poison. . . . the result of the disease is all the emotions that make us suffer. . . . Humans live in continuous fear of being hurt. . . . The human mind is sick because it has a Parasite that steals its vital energy and robs it of joy. The Parasite is all those beliefs that make you suffer . –Don Miguel Ruiz

Happiness never comes from outside of us. We are happy because of the love coming out of ourselves. –Don Miguel Ruiz

Everything we think, everything we do, has a consequence. –Don Miguel Ruiz

Love is based on respect. . . . Love respects. I love you; I know you can make it. I know you are strong enough, intelligent enough, good enough that you can make your own choices. If you fall I can give you my hand, I can help you to stand up. I can say, “you can do it, go ahead.” That is compassion. –Don Miguel Ruiz

Selfishness, control and fear will break almost any relationship. Generosity, freedom and love will create the most beautiful relationship: an ongoing romance. –Don Miguel Ruiz

The right woman for you is the woman you love just the way she is, the woman you don’t have the need to change at all. –Don Miguel Ruiz

Nothing that your partner does is personal. Your partner is dealing with her own garbage. If you don’t take it personally, it will be so easy for you to have a wonderful relationship with your partner. –Don Miguel Ruiz

The truth is like a scalpel because it is painful to open our wounds and uncover all the lies. The wounds in our emotional body are covered by the denial system, the system of lies we have created to protect those wounds. When we look at our wounds with eyes of truth, we can finally heal them. . . . The only way to heal your wounds is through forgiveness. . . . Forgive others by knowing that whatever anyone did to you had nothing to do with you. The words and actions that hurt you are merely a reaction to the demons in that person’s own mind. … Nothing anyone does is because of you. You also must forgive yourself for all those wounds and all the poison you created for yourself in your own dream. … Once we have cleaned the wounds, we are going to us the powerful medicine of Love to accelerate the process of healing. –Don Miguel Ruiz

You are the force that plays with your mind and uses your body as its favorite toy to play and have fun with. –Don Miguel Ruiz

If you take responsibility for your own life, for your own actions, then your future is in your hands, and you can live in heaven while the body is alive. –Don Miguel Ruiz

Whatever we believe rules our existence, rules our life. –Don Miguel Ruiz

Don’t believe everything you think. –my favorite one-liner?

Life is nothing but a dream, and if you create your life with Love, your dream becomes a masterpiece of art. –Don Miguel Ruiz

Dec 22, 2012 7:27:14 PM | quotations

quotations- about change, growth, resiliency

You can't start the new chapter in your life if you keep re-reading the last one.

* * *

The important thing is this: To be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become. -Charles Dubois

* * *

I am not what happened to me. I am what I choose to become. ~ Carl Jung

* * *

It is never too late to become what you might have been. -George Eliot

* * *

It's not who you are that holds you back, it who you think you're not.

* * *

As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world -- that is the myth of the "atomic age" -- as in being able to remake ourselves. -Mahatma Gandhi

* * *

People wish to be settled; only as far as they are unsettled is there any hope for them. - Ralph W. Emerson

* * *

Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations. I may not reach them, but I can look up and see their beauty, believe in them, and try to follow where they lead. -Louisa May Alcott

* * *

The best way to predict the future is to invent it. -Alan Key

* * *

Blessed are the hearts that can bend; they shall never be broken. - Albert Camus

*   *   *

Human relationships are primary in all of living. When the gusty winds blow and shake our lives, if we know that people care about us, we may bend with the wind, but we won't break. -Fred Rogers
* * *

*   *   *

A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs -- jolted by every pebble in the road. - Henry Ward Beecher

* * *

-David Steindl-Rast

* * *

A few fly bites cannot stop a spirited horse. -Mark Twain

* * *

The moment you can visualize being free from the things that hold you back, you have indeed begun to set yourself free. -Unknown

* * *

If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything; it is open to everything. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind there are few. -SUZUKI-ROSHI

* * *

Every exit is an entry somewhere else. -Tom Stoppard

* * *

By benevolent powers wondrously sheltered, we, confident, await what may come.

-Dietrich Bonhoeffer

* * *

If you have a strong mind and plant in it a firm resolve, you can change your destiny. -Paramahansa Yogananda

* * *

The art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on. -Havelock Ellis

* * *

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. -Margaret Mead

* * *

All the flowers of all the tomorrows are in the seeds of today. -Indian Proverb

* * *

Stasis is the most dangerous of those things which are not natural. –Paul Atredies

* * *

Without change, something sleeps inside us, and seldom awakens. The sleeper must awaken. - Frank Herbert

I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. -Frank Herbert

* * *

Loss makes artists of us all . . . as we weave new patterns in the fabric of our lives.

–Greta Crosby

* * *

If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant; if we did not

sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome. - Anne Bradstreet

* * *

The world is perfect, including our efforts to change it. -Ram Dass

* * *

Success depends upon how high you bounce when you hit bottom.

* * *

Fundamentally, what everyone needs is mental strength and confidence, to manage the mind, just as we manage the outside world. - Amma

* * *

If you have a strong mind and plant in it a firm resolve, you can change

your destiny.- Paramahansa Yogananda

*   *   *

The future is not some place we are going, but one we are creating.The paths are not to be found, but made. And the activity of making them changes both the maker and their destination. - John Schaar

* * *

I’m not afraid of storms, for I’m learning how to sail my ship. -Louisa May Alcott

* * *

I cannot say whether things will get better if we change; what I can say is they must change if they are to get better. – Georg C Lichtenberg

* * *

Those who expect moments of change to be comfortable and free of conflict have not learned their history. ~Joan Wallach Scott

* * *

What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly. – Richard Bach

* * *

Don't think about what you've left behind.-Paulo Coelho

* * *

It is said that the darkest hour of the night comes just before the dawn.-Paulo Coelho

* * *

Resiliency is the key to love. -Ronald Rolheiser

* * *

Time spent thinking about past and future is time taken away from living. -Barry Bub, MD

* * *

A so-called fault is a weak place where character can change. -Robert Aitkin Roshi

* * *

Example is the school of mankind; indeed they will learn at no other.

* * *

The voyage of discovery lies not in seeking new vistas,

but in having new eyes. -Proust

* * *

If you do not change your direction, you are likely to end up where you are headed.

~Ancient Chinese Proverb

* * *

The Man who lives a life of self awareness

is his own driver and skillfully finds his way. -Plotinus

* * *

To be without some of the things you want

is an indispensable part of happiness. – Bertrand Russell

* * *

You have got to let go of the life you have planned to live the life that is waiting for you. -Joseph Campbell

The important thing is to be able at any moment to sacrifice what you are for what you can become. -Charles Dubois

And the day came when the risk to remain closed in a bud became more painful than the risk it took to blossom. -Anais Nin

If we don't change our direction, we are likely to end up where we are headed. -Chinese proverb

* * *

The main benefit of optimism is resilience in the face of setbacks. - Nobel Prize-winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman

* * *

Dec 22, 2012 7:23:32 PM | quotations

10/22/2011

quotations- favorites from Rumi

Embark on the journey of Love.

 It takes you from yourself to Yourself.

~Rumi

Every part of the cosmos draws toward its mate.

~Rumi

LOVE is our steady guide on this road full of hardships.

~Rumi

When the heart has seen the sweetheart,

how can it remain bitter?

When a nightingale has seen the rose,

how can it keep from singing?

~Rumi

When you lose all sense of self

the bonds of a thousand chains will vanish.

Lose yourself completely.

Return to the root of the root

of your own soul.

~Rumi

When you seek Love

with all your Heart,

you shall find its echoes in the universe.

~Rumi

LOVE is the One who masters all things;

I am mastered by LOVE.

~Rumi

No more thought of "you" and "I."

Just the bliss of union –

Joyous, alive, free of care, you and I.

~Rumi

The Language of companionship

is a unique one.

To reach someone through the Heart

is other than reaching through words.

Besides words, allusions and arguments

the heart knows a Hundred thousands ways to speak.

~Rumi

A lifetime without Love is of no account.

~ Rumi

Only the soul knows what love is.

~ Rumi

it is by failures that lovers

stay aware of how they’re loved.

~Rumi

The illuminated life can happen now

in the moments left,

Die to your ego,

and become a true Human Being.

~Rumi

Embark on the Journey of Love

It takes you from yourself to your self.

~Rumi

A heart filled with love

is like a phoenix

that no cage can imprison.

~Rumi

Keep Silent.  Be Mute.

If you have not yet become

the Tongue of God, be an Ear.

~Rumi

You're a song, a wished-for song.

~Rumi

Because of Your LOVE I have lost my sobriety.

 I am intoxicated by the madness of LOVE.

~Rumi

I am filled with you,

skin, blood, bone, brain, and soul.

~Rumi

In order to enter into your Rose Garden,

the soul makes peace with the Thorns.

~Rumi

When you lose all sense of self

the bonds of a thousand chains will vanish.

Lose yourself completely.

Return to the root of the root

of your own soul.

~Rumi

Veil upon veil, thought upon thought –

Let go of them all,

For they only hide the truth.

~Rumi

God turns you from one feeling to another

and teaches by means of opposites,

so that you will have two wings to fly,

not one.

~Rumi

I believe in love

I swear by love

believe me my love.

~Rumi

A lifetime without Love is of no account

Love is the Water of Life

Drink it down with HEART and SOUL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

~Rumi

Do not feel Lonely

The entire universe is inside you.

~Rumi

stop this useless

argument and disharmony

show your sweetness and accord.

~Rumi

O heart, for whatever you are looking,

Look inside of yourself.

~ Rumi

The kindness of your face

has changed so many thorns

into so many Rose Gardens.

~Rumi

If you want to be more alive,

 LOVE is the truest health.

~ Rumi

Come inside

Of the HEART's house.

There is peace and solace there.

~ Rumi

An eye is meant to see things.

The soul is here for its own Joy.

 ~Rumi

Oh GOD!!!!

I have discovered LOVE!!!!!

How marvelous!!!!!!!

How good!!!!!!

How beautful it is!!!!!!!

 My body is warm from the heat of this Love.

How secret!!!!!!

How deep!!!!!!!

How obvious it is!!!

~Rumi

Every moment is made glorious by the light of LOVE.

~Rumi

Grow from the past,

But grab hold of now.

Now is always evolving.

~Rumi

Birds fly with wings.

I fly without.

~ Rumi

If you knew the secrets of life

you would too choose no other

companion but LOVE!!!!

~ Rumi

Don't Pray to be Healed and look for ''some other world''

You are the soul and medicine for what wounds the soul.

~Rumi

When you feel a peaceful joy,

you’re near the truth.

~ Rumi

Your fragrant breath like the morning breeze

has come to the stillness of the garden.

You have breathed new life into ME.

~ Rumi

O Heart, you're not telling

What has happened to you.

You've fallen in love,

Which adds life to your life.

~ Rumi

Every moment someone is blessed

a tree sprouts an angel flies,

even a monster leaps with delight.

When your body feels together,

when your soul wants to unite

you are chosen for a blissful LOVE.

~ Rumi

Your body is away from me

But there is a window open

from my heart to yours.

From this window, like the moon

I keep sending news secretly.

~Rumi

Without love, all worship is a burden,

 all dancing is a chore,

 all music is mere Noise.

~Rumi

LOVE, the life-giving garden of this world.

~ Rumi

Don't go in the direction of darkness:

suns exist.

~ Rumi

Do not Grieve,

Anything you lose comes round in another Form.

~Rumi

Dance from here to the other world—and don't stop.

~Rumi

Do not see yourself as a body of clay,

 See yourself as a mirror reflecting the divine beauty.

~Rumi

Love is the water of life.

Drink it down with heart and soul.

~Rumi

Everything in the universe is within you.

 Ask all from yourself.

~Rumi

The art of knowing is knowing what to ignore.

~Rumi

I have become a rose petal

and you are like the wind for me.

Take me for a ride.

~Rumi

The leaf of every tree brings a message from the unseen world.

Look, every falling leaf is a blessing.

~Rumi

Let yourself be drawn

by the stronger pull of

what you truly love.

~Rumi

All doubt, despair, and fear become insignificant once the intention of life becomes LOVE.

~Rumi

Both light and shadow are the dance of Love.

~Rumi

You are that freshness,

And I am with you now.

I can't explain the goings,

Or the comings.

You enter suddenly,

And I am nowhere again.

Inside the majesty.

~Rumi

When the Lover breathes

flames spread through the universe.

One breath shatters this illusionary world into particles.

The world becomes an ocean from beginning to end

and the ocean disappears in its majesty.

 ~Rumi

Angelic music is endlessly pouring down from heaven.

 Are you in a state to hear it?

~Rumi

Forget safety. Live where you fear to live.

~Rumi

I believe in LOVE

I swear by LOVE

believe me my LOVE!!

~ Rumi

The mind constricts and love unbinds. The mind says, 'Don't let go or overflow.'

Love says, 'Be free without formality'.

~ Rumi

God has given you feathers of endeavor.

 As long as you have life, shouldn't you learn to fly.?

~ Rumi

Be open to LOVE, let it lead you where it will.

 Follow the Light within your heart,

Your heart will lead the way, lead me my HEART.

~ Rumi

The way toward Heaven is inward. Lift the wings of LOVE!!!!!!!!!

Once the wings of

love are strong, no need for a ladder remains.

~Rumi

I have become a Rose Petal and

you are like the wind for me,

Take me for a ride !!!!

~Rumi

Dance, when you're broken open. Dance in the middle of the fighting. Dance in your blood.

Dance when you're perfectly free.

~Rumi

In compassion and grace be like sun.

~Rumi

From LOVE

thorns become flowers!!!!!

From LOVE

vinegar becomes wine!!!!

From LOVE

fury turns to mercy!!!!

~ Rumi

Patience is the key to success.
~ Rumi

Walk patiently through this troubled world and you'll find a great treasure.

~Rumi

Wherever you are, whatever you do, be in love.

~Rumi

How could you reach the pearl by only looking at the sea? If you seek the pearl, be a diver.

~Rumi

I will soothe you and heal you. I will bring you roses. I too have been covered with thorns.
~Rumi

Whoever sees clearly what's diseased in himself
begins to gallop on the Way.

~Rumi

Hold on to the reins of Love and don’t be afraid.
Hold on to the real behind the false and don’t be afraid.

~Rumi

Dance from here to the other world—and don't stop.
~Rumi

Not to be anything is the necessary condition to Be."
~Rumi

I want Your sun to reach my raindrops so Your heat can raise my soul upward like a cloud."
~Rumi

whether one moves slowly or with speed,
the one who is a seeker will be a finder.

~Rumi

You know what love is?

It is all kindness and generosity.

Disharmony prevails when you confuse lust with love, while the distance between the two is endless."
~Rumi

You are the light of my heart and the comfort of my soul.
~Rumi

Let the waters settle and you will see stars & moon mirrored in your being.

~Rumi

Behind every atom of this world hides an infinite universe.

~Rumi

Because of your love
i'll be dancing and floating
in this air as a speck of dust
to finally settle in your house.

~Rumi

A woman is a mystery to guide a wise and open man.
~Rumi

Your grief for what you've lost lifts a mirror to where you are so bravely working.
~Rumi

We rarely hear the inward music, but we're all dancing to it nevertheless.
~Rumi

I am already under and living in the ocean of Your love.
~Rumi

To Love is to be God.

~Rumi

I am Yours.
Don’t give myself
back to me !!!!!!!!!!!
~ Rumi

Be kind and honest
and harmful poisons will turn sweet inside you.

~Rumi

The rule that covers everything is:
How you are with others, expect that back.

~Rumi

Let the lover be disgraceful, crazy, absent-minded. Someone sober will worry about events going badly.
"Let the lover be."
~Rumi

Remember, the entrance door to the sanctuary is inside you.
~Rumi

Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.
~Rumi

Love is our steady guide on this road full of hardships.
~Rumi

All the particles of the world
are in love and looking for lovers.

~Rumi

Love is the Religion.

Universe is the Book.

~Rumi

The one who truly loves you will set you free.
~Rumi

The wound is the place where the Light enters you.
~Rumi

The intelligent want self-control; children want candy.
~Rumi

Because of your Love
I have lost my sobriety.
I am intoxicated
by the madness of Love.

~Rumi

Let go of your worries and be completely clear-hearted, like the face of a mirror that contains no images.

~Rumi

Everything in the universe is within you.
Ask all from yourself.
~Rumi

Live, as though heaven is on earth.

~Rumi

Love will bring the wine that changes
Darkness into vision, cruelty into compassion
and dust into precious incense.

~RUMI

The elixer is hidden in the poison. –Rumi

When I am silent,
I fall into that place
where everything is music.
-Rumi

Be a lamp or a lifeboat or a ladder. Help someone’s soul heal. Walk out of your house like a shepherd. – RUMI

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you. Don’t go back to sleep. - From a quatrain by Jalaluddin Rumi, the 13th-century Persian poet and Sufi mystic, translated by Coleman Barks.

We are stars wrapped in skin; the light we are seeking has always been within. - Rumi

I searched for God and found only myself. I searched for myself and found only God. - Rumi

Oct 22, 2011 9:40:33 PM | quotations

10/05/2011

Choosing ACCEPTANCE, rather than tolerance, is key

If you eat less calories than you burn you will experience hunger, burn fat stores and lose weight. If you can't tolerate hunger, and go ahead and eat what your body needs (or more) you will never lose weight. If you can TOLERATE hunger, you can lose weight but it's very, very difficult. If, instead, you choose to practice ACCEPTANCE of hunger (keep your equanimity and choose to see it as OK, appropriate, not a threat to you, no big deal, just a signal or sensation coming from your body), it's very easy to lose weight. Choosing to fast for a day (perhaps with 3 tiny cups of juice or pieces of candy) has been a great way for me to practice transforming tolerance into acceptance, not just in the weight-loss arena, but in other realms as well. (see similar ideas below in my homily, "I can't dance well if I have a stick up my butt.")

If you can't tolerate some traits of your spouse you will never stay married. (intolerance is deadly.) If you can tolerate their quirks/weaknesses/rough points (e.g. need for power & control, tendency to criticize or whine, cynicism, pessimism, totally unrealistic optimism, exaggerations, lies, lethargy, stuckness, fear of growth, worry-mind, defensiveness, self-centeredness, tendency to interrupt, sexual imperfections, prejudices, emotional baggage, profligate spending, messiness, burps, farts in inopportune places, beer belly, vanity, laziness, irresponsibility, rudeness, etc.) you can stay married, but it's very, very difficult. If, instead, you choose to practice ACCEPTANCE of their difficult, suboptimal traits, it's very easy to stay married. . . . and enjoy the positive thoughts and feelings that accompany relationship wellness (“love”, if you will). If you catch yourself TOLERATING your mate's weaknesses (i.e. being grumpy about them and wishing they weren't there) and then choose to ACCEPT them (because they are there for thousands of reasons from their past, because they have come to them honestly, because all people are imperfect, because then they are more likely to accept your weaknesses) you have taken control of your monkey mind and transformed your reaction to reality (the way things currently are), so that you then don't suffer the uncomfortable thoughts and feelings of tolerance. Instead of getting bent out of shape, you have chosen to maintain your equanimity. Ideally, you then choose to practice POSITIVE thoughts and feelings about your lover (appreciation, respect, gratitude, kindness, generosity, affection).

Your lover is imperfect but lovable. If you don't practice loving thoughts and feelings about them, it's due to problems you have controlling what thoughts and feelings happen in your mind and heart. Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder . . . and love is in the mind and heart of the beholder. Perhaps our main task in life is to accept responsibility for and control what thoughts and feelings we have in the next 2 seconds . . . perhaps the only things we can control. Almost always we’re our own worst enemies.

Probably it’s wise to accept most things about reality (e.g. the weather, our aging bodies, your lover’s imperfections, other people’s valid opinions that differ from your own, a baby’s crying), and tolerate many things . . . but not ALL things. There are a few things a wise person should not tolerate. And a wise person doesn’t just accept all of their own weaknesses, just like a wise gardener doesn’t accept all the weeds in their garden. A wise person very often looks for ways to have more virtuous, loving thoughts, feelings, and habits; they have ongoing self-improvement projects (just like a wise gardener is always vigilant and looking for ways to have a more optimal garden). Friends and lovers should help us, when asked, with our plans for healthy growth. Unfortunately, all too often, they criticize us & try to whip us into shape in ways that THEY think we should grow, and that can be counterproductive . . . or even fatal to relationships.

Oct 5, 2011 9:24:42 AM

07/08/2011

mindful breathing as you walk

A peaceful and fruitful way to be in the now is a walking meditation game that I just
invented; I call it "mindful breathing as you walk": as you keep your breathing cycle
slow, deep and steady, start by doing one step with each breathing cycle (start an
inhalation with each footplant and an exhalation whenever a foot leaves the ground). Then
double your walking speed by doing 2 footplants with each breathing cycle (inhale when
your left foot touches the ground, exhale whenever your right foot touches).  Then do 3
steps with each breathing cycle. . . then 4, then 5, then 6 (which seems to be the most
natural walking pace), then 7, then 8.  Then you can slow down your walking by gradually
decreasing the number of steps per breath, down to zero steps per breath (mountain pose).
Repeat often (or do tai chi walks) if you want more equanimity.

Jul 8, 2011 2:48:38 PM

03/25/2011

thoughts on 3/25/11- is time like a river?

I would have thought that the one-way motion of a river would clearly correspond with the seemingly one-way motion of time. But here are some valid perspectives I have been pondering which support 2 or 3 intriguing, seemingly incompatible or opposite views:

the upstream part of a river corresponds with the future:

If I’m standing or walking in a band of a river and looking upstream, the water and things in the water are coming at me, like events and things in the future will come at me. I am something “in” the stream of time. I can courageously say, “bring it on!” about stuff in the river, or stuff in life. Some of what’s coming at me I can see, and plan for, but other things are around the bend upstream, and I will have to deal with as it comes closer to me. I can struggle to be strong, stiff and rigid and not let things coming at me knock me over, or I can be more fluid and twist and turn to deftly deal with the endless stuff and water coming at me, so that they don’t knock me over or stress me out too much.

The past is receding behind me, downstream, and isn’t all that important to me now. Recent stuff is closer behind me and distant stuff has already receded around the bend in the river. The past isn’t so important, because it’s gone; what’s important is how I navigate and attend to the now, using the lessons of my past experiences. If I’m able to meditate well, I can sit or stand peacefully and allow things happening in the universe to flow right past me, leaving me undisturbed, as if I am in a timeless moment and an unshifting space. If I’m sitting on shore, I can look at the recent past, what has just passed by, and see it clearly . . . or I can look farther into the past by turning my head to look way downstream, in which case I can’t see with as much clarity and resolution. Or I can turn my head and look upstream into the future, at things which I anticipate will be happening to me sooner or later. But the water that’s coming towards me is chaotic, and not easily predictable. My job is to manage myself well in the now, with whatever comes at me. . . to swim well, or dance well in the now.

Other people are there in the river with me, encountering the future as it comes at us; sometimes we choose to hold hands as teammates to better meet the challenges of the future.

2. Downstream corresponds with the future:

If I’m floating or swimming with the water, I’m moving with time, towards the unknown future, which I will deal with sooner or later. I can see just so far downstream, ahead, so I can see some dangers. But I can’t see all of the ‘rocks’ around the bend that will eventually be obstacles for me to deal with. When obstacles appear in the future, downstream, I can move laterally or slow down or speed up a bit, because I have arms to swim with, or oars to skillfully steer my boat. If I’m fluid and able to ‘go with the flow’ then I don’t fight the current, and I playfully frolic with the other things in the river, as we travel downstream, towards the future. I am a process not just happening “in” the stream of time, but also “with” the stream of time. The water and things upstream, behind me, push me, just as my past experiences and ways of dealing with the world give me a karma that pushes me to think, feel & behave in certain ways. My karma, the water behind me, upstream, is VERY important. It’s tiring and almost impossible to fight (for too long) the current that’s pushing me on, but if I meditate well (or when I sleep), I can zone-out and just float along, without cares for the other things happening in the universe, which are also floating along in time, with the water. But if I’m asleep too much, or have foggy vision too often, I will surely bump roughly into obstacles; this will hopefully awaken me, and teach me to be a more aware ‘pilot’ of my ship.

Other people are similarly floating along in time with me, and I can choose to hold hands with them to travel with them for awhile, since sometimes two together are better/stronger than one alone, in going with the flow, in travelling with time.

3. The whole river is both ever-changing & ever-present, just like the true nature of me . . . and the universe.

Upstream stuff is happening and downstream stuff is happening. All parts of the ever-changing river are happening, now, and always. The past and the future are both happening. My past is happening, and my future is happening, and my usual dualistic way of conceiving of the past, the future, and the time dimension is the problem. Is there just one view of history, what really happened, or do we each have valid viewpoints on what happened in the past? Will only one thing/process happen in the future, or will each person’s different viewpoint somehow create different realities for themselves.

What is the now? Is it a very small segment of time, lasting only about a quarter of a second? It seems to be the all-important time when I experience something, when a thought, sensation or perception is happening in my awareness. By “now” I tend to mean the quick segment of time it takes for a sensation or thought to happen, the time it takes a boxcar in my ‘train’ of thought to pass by. . . and, typically, my train of thought passes by with a speed of about 3 to 5 boxcars per second. Sometimes my train of thought speeds up a bit (e.g. after my morning coffee). Sometimes it slows down quite a bit (e.g. with meditation). And sometimes it stops altogether and I’m not aware of having conscious experiences, (e.g. when I’m unconscious from sleep or anesthetics or I’m in a coma).

This 3^rd view supports the fact that we can have accurate memories of the past (perhaps even of previous incarnations before we were born) and we can (perhaps, occaisionally) have precognition or premonitions about stuff that is “in” the future . . . all of which is really happening ‘now’. We can look both upstream and downstream at what is happening all along the time dimension (although our vision of the past and future is less accurate the further we try to look from the ‘now’).

With this view, I am a more timeless process. I don’t just exist in the now, in a tiny segment of the time dimension. Here’s an analogy: my existence in the north/south, east/west and up/down spatial dimensions seems to be limited to the segment of space inside my skin, since that’s the space I mainly occupy, but actually the electromagnetic and gravitational fields of my body extend to infinity in all 3 spatial dimensions (albeit to a decreasing extent, falling off as the square of the distance from where “I” am). Similarly, my existence in the time dimension seems to be limited to the segment of time we call “now” (or perhaps from my conception to the death of my body) . . . . but perhaps the unique process that is me actually extends to infinity (?) into the past and future on the time dimension. With this view: I am a twinkle in my father’s eye, I am a baby, I am a searching teen, I am a pensive middle-aged man experiencing a lot of joy, and I am the great-grandfather of great-grandchildren. All of these things are really happening, just like the upstream and downstream aspects of the river are happening. I am not limited to this time, just like I am not geographically compact and discrete.

This view tempers the seeming finality of the death of my body. Just like the river, you can’t put your finger on the real me. The river and I are ever-changing and ever-present. My soul, or the real me, is not separate from everything else. In a deep sense, behind my usual illusion that I am a separate object or process in time and space, I am the Cosmic Dance, the only ‘thing’ that is. Or, if you will, God is the only thing happening, and what we tend to see as separate things/processes happening are just manifestations of God. I am not separate from the only ‘process’ happening in 4-dimensional space-time. (btw, I bet there are many other “metaphysical” dimensions that we can’t really understand or relate to easily.) It’s all a miraculous and incomprehensible big mish-mash; there are no clear-cut boundaries between things that have happened, are happening, or will happen in the only dance there is. Everything that happens is intimately related and interconnected to everything else that has happened and is happening. But alas, because I am only human (and am therefore intimately tied to a unique mind/heart/brain that mainly occupies this particular space and time in the here and now), usually I think I am a separate thing or process, happening here and now, but not happening over there, or in the distant past or the distant future.

Although it’s fascinating to try, probably the tool of words (abstract concepts) in a person’s mind/heart/brain are inherently inadequate to understand deep, unanswerable questions such as these. Zen Buddhism and mystics encourage us to quiet the mind/heart/brain and just ‘grok’ (ala Robert Heinlein) the nature of reality. Sitting beside a mesmerizing river often helps me do this. Gooonnnnngggg.

Mar 25, 2011 6:34:38 PM

03/24/2011

quotations- rivers, water

Who looks upon a river in a meditative hour, and is not reminded of the flux of all things? Throw a stone into the stream, and the circles that propagate themselves are the beautiful type of all influence. —Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature

If you're not beside a real river, close your eyes, and sit down beside an imaginary one, a river where you feel comfortable and safe. Know that the water has wisdom, in its motion through the world, as much wisdom as any of us have. Picture yourself as the water. We are liquid; we innately share water's wisdom. —Eric Alan, "Meditation Draws Its Power From the Water," The Oregonian (September 11, 2005)

Sit by a river. Find peace and meaning in the rhythm of the lifeblood of the Earth. —anon

The river delights to lift us free, if only we dare to let go. Our true work is this voyage, this adventure. —Richard Bach, Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah

Any river is really the summation of the whole valley. To think of it as nothing but water is to ignore the greater part. — Hal Borland, This Hill, This Valley

What makes a river so restful to people is that it doesn't have any doubt—it is sure to get where it is going, and it doesn't want to go anywhere else. —Hal Boyle

In rivers, the water that you touch is the last of what has passed and the first of that which comes; so with present time. —Leonardo da Vinci

The river has taught me to listen; you will learn from it, too. The river knows everything; one can learn everything from it. —Herman Hesse, Siddhartha

Rivers have what man most respects and longs for in his own life—a capacity for renewal and replenishment, continual energy, creativity, cleansing. —John Kauffman, A Look At Our North Atlantic Rivers

A river sings a holy song conveying the mysterious truth that we are a river, and if we are ignorant of this natural law, we are lost. —Thomas Moore, The Re-Enchantment of Everyday Life

Wonderful how completely everything in wild nature fits into us, as if truly part and parent of us. The sun shines not on us but in us. The rivers flow not past, but through us, thrilling, tingling, vibrating every fiber and cell of the substance of our bodies, making them glide and sing. The trees wave and the flowers bloom in our bodies as well as our souls, and every bird song, wind song, and; tremendous storm song of the rocks in the heart of the mountains is our song, our very own, and sings our love. — John Muir, Mountain Thoughts

Rivers are magnets for the imagination, for conscious pondering and subconscious dreams, thrills, fears. People stare into the moving water, captivated, as they are when gazing into a fire. What is it that draws and holds us? The rivers' reflections of our lives and experiences are endless. — Tim Palmer, Lifelines

Streams represent constant rebirth. The water flows in, forever new, yet forever the same; they complete a journey from beginning to end, and then they embark on the journey again. — Tim Palmer, Lifelines

Rivers are the primal highways of life. From the crack of time, they had borne men's dreams, and in their lovely rush to elsewhere, fed our wanderlust, mimicked our arteries, and charmed our imaginations in a way the static pond or vast and savage ocean never could. — Tom Robbins, Fierce Invalids from Hot Climates

River, take me along

In your sunshine,

Sing me your song
Ever moving and winding and free
You rolling old river,
You changing old river,
Let's you and me river
Run down to the sea.
-Bill Staines, River (Song)

There is no music like a little river's . . . It takes the mind out-of-doors . . . and . . . it quiets a man down like saying his prayers. — Robert Louis Stevenson

Who hears the rippling of rivers will not utterly despair of anything. — Henry David Thoreau

I was born upon thy bank, river,

My blood flows in thy stream,

And thou meanderest forever,
At the bottom of my dream.
-Henry David Thoreau, Journals 1906, 1842 entry

A river is the most human and companionable of all inanimate things. It has a life, a character, a voice of its own, and is as full of good fellowship as a sugar-maple is of sap. It can talk in various tones, loud or low, and of many subjects grave and gay . . . For real company and friendship, there is nothing outside of the animal kingdom that is comparable to a river. — Henry van Dyke, Little Rivers

Hi yih, yippity-yap, merrily I flow, O I may be an old foul river but I have plenty of go. -Stevie Smith (1902-1971), British poet, novelist. The River God (l. 9-10)

What makes a river so restful to people is that it doesn’t have any doubt – it is sure to get where it is going, and it doesn’t want to go anywhere else. -Hal Boyle

Smooth runs the water where the brook is deep. -William Shakespeare, Henry VI, II, III, 1

The river delights to lift us free, if only we dare to let go. Our true work is this voyage, this adventure. -Richard Bach

Expect poison from the standing water. -William Blake

No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man. -Heraclitus of Ephesus

Ideas can no more flow backward than can the river. -Victor Hugo

It is not best to swap horses while crossing the river. -Abraham Lincoln. Reply to National Union League, June 9, 1864.

A river, though, has so many things to say that it is hard to know what it says to each of us.

Norman Maclean, A River Runs Through It

A river sings a holy song conveying the mysterious truth that we are a river, and if we are ignorant of this natural law, we are lost. -Thomas Moore -from The Re-Enchantment of Everyday Life

For real company and friendship, there is nothing outside of the animal kingdom that is comparable to a river. -Henry Van Dyke

In the world there is nothing more submissive and weak than water. Yet for attacking that which is hard and strong nothing can surpass it. —Lao-Tzu,Another Interpretation

Water flows humbly to the lowest level. Nothing is weaker than water, yet for overcoming what is hard and strong, nothing surpasses it. — Lao-Tzu

A man of wisdom delights in water. — Confucius

By means of water, we give life to everything. -Koran, Chapter 21, verse 30

Water is H2O, hydrogen two parts, oxygen one, but there is also a third
thing that makes water and nobody knows what that is.
D. H. Lawrence (1885-1930), Pansies, 1929

In every glass of water we drink, some of the water has already passed through fishes, trees, bacteria, worms in the soil, and many other organisms, including people...Living systems cleanse water and make it fit, among other things, for human consumption.
Elliot A. Norse in R.J. Hoage, ed., Animal Extinctions, 1985

Only in quiet waters do things mirror themselves undistorted. Only in a quiet mind is adequate perception of the world. -Hans Margolius

Irrigation of the land with seawater desalinated by fusion power is ancient. It's called rain. -Michael McClary.

When oxygen and hydrogen find one another, their joining produces fiery passion. Out of this fire, water is born. Quaint Victorian chemistry gives us an image of one oxygen and two hydrogen atoms in a fixed molecule that bounces around from place to place. The reality of water is not so orderly. The hydrogen atoms are not owned by any particular oxygen atom. Water is a substance very much in love with itself, and the atoms connect in webs and clusters where oxygen shares around the hydrogen atoms freely, a fluid situation indeed. -Ian D. Anderson, Ian Lurking Bear

Earth and sky, woods and fields, lakes and rivers, the mountains and the sea, are excellent schoolmasters, and teach some of us more than we can ever learn from books. —John Lubbock

Mar 24, 2011 11:40:01 AM | quotations

03/03/2011

3/3/11- what is a tree?

That’s an intriguing question. Perhaps a tree is:

An idea in the mind of people. An abstract concept.

A tall, large plant with thick, woody branches anchored in dirt by extensive roots.

A long-lived perennial, which means it usually rides on the Earth more than one 320 million mile trip around the Sun. (btw, one particular tree is the longest living thing on Earth)

A non-complaining, peaceful, resilient, healthy system that goes through active periods of time in summers and quiescent periods of time in winters

A process which functions to connect the processes of our Earth and our Sun

A living system which teams up with genetically unrelated chloroplasts to serve the function of taking in carbon dioxide, water and sunlight and synthesizing them into carbohydrates, which can then be used to maintain the tree’s structure and to produce fruits and nuts so that more trees can happen and so that animals can be nourished.

A process to create leaves, which are key ingredients (along with bacteria) in the production of dirt.

A light-obstructing object in the sensorium of animals.

A home and a meal for bugs.

A place for the attachment of fungi.

A stage in the production of fire by people. (Fire- the light & heat radiation that accompanies the oxidation of carbon-carbon bonds)

The reason why we have axes, loppers and chainsaws.

The main ingredient in paper production.

The usual receptive antenna through which lightening rebalances electrical charges between clouds and the Earth

An object of wonder for people. An object for artists to depict. An object of adoration and value for people.

A place for people to climb, perch and play.

A fellow dancer in the Cosmic Dance, a fellow actor and ever-evolving sub plot and in the Cosmic Play.

A cousin of mine, since we both share the same grandparents (mother nature and God).

A structure to facilitate the lives of birds and squirrels, upon which they can perch and build nests.

A process which provides cooling shade for other plants and animals during hot summers.

An obstruction for wind and sunlight.

One of myriad ways rainwater recycles back into carbohydrates.

A way that our biome stabilizes dirt from excessive erosion, so that other species of plants and animals have a nice home.

A producer of beautiful and functional wood, which people can use in construction of homes, crafts and implements.

The main producer of cellulose (chains and sheets of several hundred to over 10,000 D-glucose molecules linked by indigestible beta one-four bonds).

A unique, important process happening in at least 4 dimensions, centered in this 3-dimensional space and in this moment in time (but extending infinitely in those 4 dimensions).

A beautiful, dynamic, ever-changing collection of quarks, atoms, molecules and fields (gravitational and electromagnetic), organized by the miraculous, unknowable, metaphysical forces which constitute Divine Grace.

And finally, a playful, intriguing conjecture for what a tree is: a tree is an ANTENNA that I can use to transmit metaphysical energies to each of you and receive energies from each of you, and thereby connect with you better. (today in the hottub I felt a strengthened connection with Linda and Cindi through the assistance of ‘my’ trees. A question to ponder-- if I have a strong faith in the scientifically unprovable belief that a tree that I am in or near helps me to connect with others, is that belief true? If it’s true in my reality, if it seems to often work for me, do I thus create my own reality? (btw, one of the many lessons I learned from Joanie is that it’s often wise to practice ‘not knowing.’)

So a tree isn’t one thing! Sometimes it’s a gorgeous material to craft into a bowl for Dad, a source of wool dye (or a friend) for Mom, a jungle gym to climb for many of us, something to keep healthy for O Ryan, something to swing from for Becky, and an antenna, sometimes, for me.

Similarly, we are all many things!

PS. Whenever I nourish myself with a fig, I take in a dose of Bill. Does that really happen? It seems to in my reality.

PPS. my favorite charity for the last afew decades has been: Trees For the Future (plant-trees.org) I have helped them plant over 60,000 seedlings, to help our brothers & sisters overseas.

Mar 3, 2011 8:59:14 AM

03/02/2011

quotations- on meditation

(NB. Most of the quotations below are from Sogyal Rinpoche, via his free, daily email list.)

To meditate is to make a complete break with how we “normally” operate, for it is a state free of all cares and concerns, in which there is no competition, no desire to possess or grasp at anything, no intense and anxious struggle, and no hunger to achieve: an ambitionless state where there is neither acceptance nor rejection, neither hope nor fear, a state in which we slowly begin to release all those emotions and concepts that have imprisoned us into the space of natural simplicity.

***

If your mind is able to settle naturally of its own accord, and if you find you are inspired simply to rest in its pure awareness, then you do not need any method of meditation. However, the vast majority of us find it difficult to arrive at that state straight away. We simply do not know how to awaken it, and our minds are so wild and so distracted that we need a skillful means or method to evoke it.

By “skillful” I mean that you bring together your understanding of the essential nature of your mind, your knowledge of your various, shifting moods, and the insight you have developed through your practice into how to work with yourself, from moment to moment. By bringing these together, you learn the art of applying whatever method is appropriate to any particular situation or problem, to transform that environment of your mind.

***

Remember: A method is only a means, not the meditation itself. It is through practicing the method skillfully that you reach the perfection of that pure state of total presence, which is the real meditation.

There is a revealing Tibetan saying: “Gompa ma yin, kompa yin,” which means literally: “ Meditation is not; getting used to is.”

It means that meditation is nothing other than getting used to the practice of meditation. As it is said: “Meditation is not striving, but naturally becoming assimilated into it.” As you continue to practice the method, then meditation slowly arises. Meditation is not something that you can “do”; it is something that has to happen spontaneously, only when you have perfected the practice.

***

When you are practicing meditation, it’s important not to get involved in mental commentary, analysis, or internal gossip. Do not mistake the running commentary in your mind (“Now I’m breathing in, now I’m breathing out”) for mindfulness; what is important is pure presence.

Don’t concentrate too much on the breath; give it about 25 percent of your attention, with the other 75 percent quietly and spaciously relaxed. As you become more mindful of your breathing, you will find that you become more and more present, gather all your scattered aspects back into yourself, and become whole.

***

You will find that this very simple process of mindfulness filters your thoughts and emotions. Then, as if you were shedding an old skin, something is peeled off and freed.

***

If you really wish to achieve this, what you need to do is practice not just as occasional medicine or therapy but as if it were your daily sustenance or food.

***

Quietly sitting, body still, speech silent, mind at peace, let thoughts and emotions, whatever rises, come and go, without clinging to anything.

In meditation, as in all arts, there has to be a delicate balance between relaxation and alertness. Once a monk called Shrona was studying meditation with one of Buddha’s closest disciples. He had difficulty finding the right frame of mind. He tried very hard to concentrate, and gave himself a headache. Then he relaxed his mind, but so much that he fell asleep. Finally he appealed to Buddha for help.

Knowing that Shrona had been a famous musician before he became a monk, Buddha asked him: “Weren’t you a vina player when you were a layperson?”

Shrona nodded.

“How did you get the best sound out of your vina? Was it when the strings were very tight or when they were very loose?”

“Neither. When they had just the right tension, neither too taut nor too slack.”

“Well, it’s exactly the same with your mind.”

The masters stress that to stabilize the View in meditation, it is essential, first of all, to accomplish this practice in a special environment of retreat, where all the favorable conditions are present; amid the distractions and busyness of the world, however much you meditate, true experience will not be born in your mind.

Second, though there is no difference in Dzogchen between meditation and everyday life, until you have found true stability through doing the practice in proper sessions, you will not be able to integrate the wisdom of meditation into your experience of daily life.

Third, even when you practice, you might be able to abide by the continual flow of Rigpa with the confidence of the View, but if you are unable to continue that flow at all times and in all situations, mixing your practice with everyday life, it will not serve as a remedy when unfavorable circumstances arise, and you will be led astray into delusion by thoughts and emotions.

Learning to meditate is the greatest gift you can give yourself in this life. For it is only through meditation that you can undertake the journey to discover your true nature, and so find the stability and confidence you will need to live, and die, well.

Meditation is the road to enlightenment.

* * *

Just as a writer learns the spontaneous freedom of expression only after years of often grueling study, and just as the simple grace of a dancer is achieved only with enormous, patient effort, so when you begin to understand where meditation will lead you, you will approach it as the greatest endeavor of your life, one that demands of you the deepest perseverance, enthusiasm, intelligence, and discipline.

* * *

Whatever thoughts and emotions arise in meditation, allow them to rise and settle, like the waves in the ocean. Whatever you find yourself thinking, let that thought rise and settle, without any constraint. Don’t grasp at it, feed it, or indulge it, don’t cling to it, and don’t try to solidify it. Neither follow thoughts nor invite them; be like the ocean looking at its own waves, or the sky gazing down on the clouds that pass across it.

You will soon find that thoughts are like the wind; they come and go. The secret is not to “think” about the thoughts but to allow them to flow through your mind, while keeping your mind free of afterthoughts.

* * *

Meditation, then, is bringing the mind home.

* * *

For meditation to happen, calm and auspicious conditions have to be created. Before we have mastery over our minds, we need first to calm their environment.

At the moment, our minds are like a candle flame: unstable, flickering, constantly changing, fanned by the violent winds of our thoughts and emotions. The flame will burn steadily only when we can calm the air around it; so we can only begin to glimpse and rest in the nature of mind when we have stilled the turbulence of our thoughts and emotions. On the other hand, once we have found a stability in our meditation, noises and disturbances of every kind will have far less impact.

* * *

You will find that this very simple process of mindfulness filters your thoughts and emotions. Then, as if you were shedding an old skin, something is peeled off and freed.

* * *

When I teach meditation, I often begin by saying: “Bring your mind home. And release. And relax.”

To bring your mind home means to bring the mind into the state of Calm Abiding through the practice of mindfulness. In its deepest sense, to bring your mind home is to turn your mind inward and rest in the nature of mind. This itself is the highest meditation.

To release means to release the mind from its prison of grasping, since you recognize that all pain and fear and distress arise from the craving of the grasping mind. On a deeper level, the realization and confidence that arise from your growing understanding of the nature of mind inspire the profound and natural generosity that enables you to release all grasping from your heart, letting it free itself to melt away in the inspiration of meditation.

To relax means to be spacious and to relax the mind of its tensions. More deeply, you relax into the true nature of your mind, the state of Rigpa. It is like pouring a handful of sand onto a hot surface, and each grain settles of its own accord. This is how you relax into your true nature, letting all thoughts and emotions naturally subside and dissolve into the state of the nature of mind.

* * *

Meditation is the road to enlightenment.

* * *

If you are sitting, and your mind is not wholly in tune with your body—if you are, for instance, anxious or preoccupied with something—your body will experience physical discomfort, and difficulties will arise more easily. Whereas if your mind is in a calm, inspired state, it will influence your whole posture, and you can sit much more naturally and effortlessly. So it is very important to unite the posture of your body and the confidence that arises from your realization of the nature of your mind.

* * *

If you really wish to achieve this, what you need to do is practice not just as occasional medicine or therapy but as if it were your daily sustenance or food.

* * *

In the Dzogchen teachings it is said that your View and your posture should be like a mountain.

Your View is the summation of your whole understanding and insight into the nature of mind, which you bring to your meditation. So your View translates into and inspires your posture, expressing the core of your being in the way you sit.

Sit, then, as if you were a mountain, with all its unshakable, steadfast majesty. A mountain is completely relaxed and at ease with itself, however strong the winds that batter it, however thick the dark clouds that swirl around its peak.

Sitting like a mountain, let your mind rise and fly and soar.

* * *

Mar 2, 2011 5:31:20 PM | quotations

3/2/11 Pura vida!

Pura Vida! -- this is the ubiquitous Costa Rican phrase which translates as, “ Life is good, I’m feeling a lot of gratefulness right now and have been feeling a lot of joy lately.”

Here’s my ‘day off’ routine that has been nourishing me extremely well:

Strong coffee & pondering on the couch for 30m,

Vipassana mediation for 30m,

Mindfulness yoga for 20 m,

My daily breakfast of a rich brownie,

Motorcycling on country roads for 45m,

Strolling thru a park and woods for 45m,

Meditation with the birds beside a fast, playful, undulating river for 20m,

A quesadilla at “Miller’s Country Diner,”

A “Joy” ride home for my daily hot tub bath,

Tai Chi for 20 min,

then a nice nap.

Perhaps this type of day is better called a ‘day on’. Pura vida!

Mar 2, 2011 5:08:48 PM

02/12/2011

Am I a noun or a verb?

More and more I think that no thing exists. Rather, things happen. We tend to overuse the verb “to be” and underuse the verbs “to do” and “to have”; this leads us to be deluded about the nature of things. If you want to explore how our incessant use of the verb “to be” is frought with danger, try googling “E-prime”, which is the English language with the proviso that all conjugations of the verb “to be” are disallowed. One can actually think, write and speak without most uses of this extremely prevalent passive, non-action verb. Instead of saying “I am a Democrat,” as if it’s part of my identity, we would say “I usually have ideas which most people would associate with the Democratic Party.” Instead of saying “I am a father,” one would say “I care for my children.”

A plant is not so much a thing as a dynamic process that connects the Sun and the Earth . . . a recycling process that functions to keep carbon, hydrogen and oxygen atoms moving in and out of the atmosphere and other living processes.

Analogously, more and more I also tend to see myself as a verb . . . as a dance instead of a dancer. I am a process that connects my parents and my children. I function as a father, as a friend, as a physician. I am a recycling process to keep atoms recirculating in the Cosmic Dance. I am an ever-evolving song (sometimes harmonious and sometimes discordant) happening in this part of three dimensional space and centered in this moment of the time dimension. Like other living processes I take in nutrients and catabolize them to derive energy . . . that I can then use to create other biomolecules . . . which are then used in the construction of my self-organizing and ever-evolving body, so as to ward off stressors and the forces of entropy . . . and thereby keep my integrity. But unlike nonliving processes (like rocks), plants and most creatures, I have the incredible ability to have self-awareness (conciousness) and to think with abstract concepts (words)! Go figure. How awesome is that!

I wouldn't trade it for the world, but having an incessant verbal train of thought in my monkey mind can, however, be tiresome. Sometimes I wish I could be (or be-have like?) an oak tree for a day.

Feb 12, 2011 11:29:03 AM

Divine Molecular Recycling

Some perspectives I considered this morning while meditating (and pondering) with my candle, my hottub and an apple:

The candle, the cloud, the apple and I are all brothers & sisters in the Divine Family (with God & Mother Nature as our parents.) We are all fellow actors in the Cosmic Play. We are all fellow dancers in the Cosmic Dance. We are all unique and diverse instruments in the Cosmic Orchestra. We are all important teammates in the Game of Life. Each of these perspectives deserves it’s own essay. . . but today’s reflections are about how we are all Divine Recycling Engines for the Big Three molecules of life: carbon, oxygen and hydrogen.

Why does the candle flame continue? Because there’s a wonderful, relentless natural tendency for change . . . and a wonderful, divine, natural tendency for carbon, oxygen and hydrogen to bind to each other in various combinations. For awhile. They closely associate with each other (get married?), then disassociate for awhile, and then re-associate with other atoms in our Earthly home. Like a courageous (?brash) young man at a dance, the oxygen in the air has a tendency to butt in to the slow dance that has been going on for 300 million years between the carbon and hydrogen atoms in the paraffin (which has been buried underground in the form of oil). When the oxygen taps the shoulder of the hydrocarbon molecule in the candle, the molecule ‘goes along with’ the polite request for a recombination, and the oxygen atoms leave the party arm-in-arm with either a carbon atom (as carbon dioxide) or hydrogen atoms (as water). These happy new triads spread throughout the warm blanket of our atmosphere. For awhile.

Clouds, through their unique and crucial ability to create rain and snow, are wonderful divine processes to recycle these gaseous water molecules back into our fellow living creatures in our biome.

Plants (with the help of the genetically unrelated chloroplasts in their cells) then function as unique, miraculous, self-organizing living processes (or recycling engines) which take in carbon dioxide, water and the yang energy of our Sun and create gorgeous new carbohydrate molecules—mainly glucose (C6-H12-O6). The glucose molecules then arrange themselves in long indigestible chains and sheets (cellulose). Or they stay single and abide in nutritious, digestible grains, nuts or fruits. For awhile.

Animals like us (with the help of the genetically unrelated mitochondria in our cells) then function as unique, miraculous, self-orgainizing living processes which take in glucose and burn it as fuel. That burning, like that in the candle, then releases the carbon atoms (as carbon dioxide in our exhalations) and the water molecules (as urine and sweat) back into the atmosphere and biome.

That burning also allows us to create many other types of gorgeous, functional biomolecules that we temporarily use in the dynamic, everchanging processes which are our bodies. So we borrow atoms from the Cosmic Library, use them for awhile, then return them (recycle them) back to our Earthly environment. When we die, especially if we are cremated, all of ‘our’ atoms (which are really not ours) are returned to the Cosmic Library so that they can be checked out by other living and nonliving citizens of the Earth.

It’s both mind-boggling and comforting for me to realize that all of the beautiful atoms currently happening in me were once happening in stars, and in the plants that were living 300 million years ago, and/or were once happening in the hydrocarbons of candles (or oil), and/or were once happening in clouds or rivers, and/or were once happening in the structure or fruits of plants, and/or were once happening in animals who breathed them in and out, and/or in people (especially loved ones) who have been cremated.

How and why does this miraculous, complex, harmonious, industrious Cosmic Recycling Process continue? A gong should ring now, to remind me that I’ll never know, because my thinking is limited by the use of words . . . but it’s convenient for me to credit it to the inherently unknowable metaphysical forces of Divine Grace . . . which, to me, is the same as crediting it to the harmonious yin/yang dance between Mother Nature and God.

Feb 12, 2011 11:19:23 AM

12/13/2010

12/13/10- Freedom vs. Entanglement

Some middle-aged people who divorce after many years of marriage very much look forward to much more freedom—escaping from painful, constricting, stifling, suffocating, entangling relationship bonds. Marriage was a cage, holding them in. Their ring was a heavy burden keeping them back from flying. Acquiring a motorcycle during their divorce would, for them, be symbolic of a yearning for freedom—I’ll ride by myself, without passengers, wherever I want to go. I can accept that; it’s OK that many find marriage too entangling for their tastes, and they want to just ‘play around’ and ‘stretch their wings’ a bit. These people will do best, if they do remarry after many years, to have a spouse who also wants looser ‘bonds’.

Others, like me, tend to thrive at the other end of the spectrum. Since reading The Art of Loving, by Erik Fromm, in 1971, I have always romanticized a loving marriage as the clearly-best path for me—my path with heart. Now I have been bucked off the horse . . . but I’m already ready to get back up again. I very much want to have lots of loving thoughts and feelings for another woman, and care for her often and well. I see strong, healthy entanglement (love & loving, with ‘bonds’ of kindness, appreciation, affection, respect, acceptance, compassion, etc.) as the path to my holistic wellness. I am not an independent entity that exists. I am not a closed, self-sufficient system like a rock in interstellar space. Living systems like me are, by definition, OPEN—they very much depend on matter/energy inputs and outputs. They are inextricably enmeshed in relationships and in bigger systems. And they are, themselves, composed of many smaller systems (our cells). So we are “holons” ala Ken Wilbur. I am a verb. I am what I do. I am what happens in the relationships that I have. By free will I choreograph my own solo dance in the Cosmic Dance, but two lives thrive (and the Universe really jives) when I’m choosing to harmonize with a wise and playful dancing partner.

So I’ll soon be ‘on the hunt’ for a friend who, more than anything else, also wants a very healthy marriage with strong ‘bonds.’ It’s OK if she doesn’t even like dancing (although that would be a fun plus). What’s key is that my next partner will be committed to usually following the Golden Rule for Couples: “Do unto others as they would have you do unto them.” Loving, in this sense, means treating another well, in the ways that work for them. This sort of marriage is much more than being ‘business partners’ living in the same household. It means freely choosing to often speak phrases in your partner’s ‘love languages,’ frequently showing them outward signs of your inner loving thoughts and feelings. Such freely chosen bonds constitute a good sort of ‘entanglement.’

Finding a healthy yin/yang balance is the key to wisely doing most things. It’s very rare that black or white is the right answer. So spouses very much need to respect each other’s dynamic need for space and freedom. I thoroughly enjoy and am nourished by doing tai chi, yoga and meditation alone. I thoroughly enjoy solo rides on my jetski or my new motorcycle. They are joyful . . . hence, I have named my new motorcycle “Joy.” But when I come home, what would nourish me, what I have always yearned for, is a wife who I can hug and be hugged by. One I can talk with, and snuggle up with, and become very ‘entangled’ with . . . physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually, till death do us part.

I’m not a totally naïve & starry-eyed romantic; I certainly know from experience that real-world marriages are inevitably very painful sometimes. So resiliency, commitment, and mutual generosity are important keys to nourishing, joyful, life-long love relationships.

Dec 13, 2010 10:28:07 PM

12/06/2010

why do I lovingly hold babies?

To help them and nourish them, to help teach them the most important thing they could ever
learn-- that they are not alone, it is not them against the world, that they are blessed
to be part of a loving, interconnected, divine web of life, that we're all in this
miraculous Cosmic Dance together, that others will always support them and nourish them.

To the extent people learn this, they have holistic wellness (because they have the
ability to feel loved, to have loving thoughts and feelings and to love well); to the
extent that they don't, they suffer from: despair, loneliness, self-centeredness,
selfishness, conceit, ego-centrism, fear, worry, sadness, the inability to feel kindness,
compassion and gratefulness, the inability to feel joy about the happiness of others, and
the inability to act as a helpful team-player in the game of life.

Dec 6, 2010 8:11:56 AM

11/25/2010

Life is a game

There are many valid ways to approach life and many analogies to describe them.

For many (and sometimes for me), life is a war with many battles to be fought against many internal and a few external enemies. For them, a spiritual warrior needs many different weapons to fight the crucial battles within.

Sometimes for me, life is a never-ending project . . . so, as a spiritual workman I need many tools in my tool chest to do my inner and outer chores well, to repair and optimize myself.

Sometimes for me, life is a garden . . . so, as a good, responsible spiritual gardener I should often pull the weeds, fertilize the soil, and nurture the batch of seeds and young plants that I would like to thrive.

Sometimes for me, life is one big cosmic dance. As a spiritual choreographer I do better and have more joy if I have many different moves to jive with and harmonize with the music and other dancers. . . and if I lighten up . . . and if I choose to practice gratefulness and a mystical mind set quite often.

Usually for me, life is a fascinating, complicated game we are all privileged to play, with the goal achieving optimal holistic wellness for myself and those around me. To be a good spiritual athlete I need many plays in my playbook. I score better if I creatively choose different tactics when the one I have been trying isn't currently working well enough. Other keys are teamwork (I'll care for you well, in the ways that work for you and hopefully you'll often reciprocate and treat me well) and quieting verbal thinking so I can move more gracefully. Some great plays in my playbook: dancing, drumming, mantram (with positive phrases, especially about gratefulness), optimism, acceptance, tolerance, equanimity, kindness, mudita, compassion, mindfulness (especially in the hot tub), tai chi, yoga, sports, climbing trees, patience, laughter, listening to music, enjoying a beer, walks in the woods, & appreciating and having reverence for the beauty and miracles in nature, and for the divine grace which allows the whole game to continue. To play the game of life well, I always try to heed the main rule, karma, that whatever I think and do has consequences. Of the MANY guidelines on how to play well, I believe the most important for me is: "do unto others as they would have you do unto them." Unfortunately, the game of life is not always fair.

Various attitudes about living all support my main task in life-- to wisely and lovingly manage the thoughts, feelings and actions that I will have in the next few seconds . . . which is perhaps about the only thing I can control.

Nov 25, 2010 11:47:19 AM

10/16/2010

Laughter, gratefulness

It’s very common, natural, and foolish for me to allow my ego-mind to so often pine for things (e.g. signs of warmth, kindness and appreciation from others) that I think I do not have ‘enough’ of and think I need. Often I have thoughts of victimhood. Sometimes my consciousness dwells on and worries about which black numbers are on white pieces of paper. Often I forget that things happen in the world and in my mind/heart (and that of others) for billions of valid reasons (karma). Often I think that the way the Cosmic Dance is happening is unsatisfactory. Thus I am often my own worst enemy and thereby start losing the crucial ‘battle within.’

Fortunately, sometimes the wise spiritual warrior within me chooses to use the delightful tool of laughter to qwell this foolishness. Then it’s much easier to choose to practice gratefulness for the wonderful privilege of being a part of (or at one with) this miraculous Cosmic Dance . . . that is infused with and fueled by Divine Grace. I then practice much more: happiness, joy, appreciation, acceptance, tolerance, equanimity, kindness, compassion and mudita (joy for the happiness and good fortune of others). I thereby start winning the crucial ‘battle within.’

I would do myself (and others) a favor to lighten up more often and more often choose to practice the tool of laughter at my foolishness (and that of others). Today I will often choose to remember this wisdom . . . and strive on in this wonderful/terrible ‘battle within!’

(Other days I will choose to wield other effective weapons in the ‘battle within’: dance, tai chi and mindfulness yoga.)

Oct 16, 2010 3:35:29 PM

08/26/2010

88 stress management suggestions-- try a few by Ed Miller

1. Go to sleep early enough that you can awaken without an alarm clock. Sufficient sleep is KEY to health, wellness and managing stress well! It’s the best medicine to boost your resiliency.

2. Remember that stress is a normal condition that YOU are responsible for managing well

3. 6 or 8 times daily use a deep breath (or two) to put a semicolon (or period) in the outrageous, chaotic, run-on sentence that is your stream of consciousness. This is especially helpful before meals and before meeting someone.

4. Stand up and stretch frequently through the day

5. Prepare for the next day before you get into bed (e.g. make your lists)

6. Get to work earlier than you need too, so you’ll start the day relaxed

7. Exercise or play sports most days

8. Quit trying to fix other people; they are the way they are for millions of reasons. They’re good enough.

9. Plant this seed for thought: do you suffer from 'emotional obesity'? Do you need to 'lighten up'? Is there some emotional baggage or habit it's time to discard?

10. Be responsible for your own thoughts and feelings; the ONLY thing we can control is what goes on in our minds and hearts in the next few moments. Don’t blame others so often.

11. Imagine being in your favorite place, with all your senses

12. When taking your daily vitamin and fish oil capsule, give your ego daily doses of humility and acceptance. . . to calm down it's pernicious propensity to be inflated with self-importance and judgmental of others.

13. Set appointments for things you want to do that nourish you

14. Think of something you’ve been wanting to do, and do it today or tomorrow

15. Don't rely on your memory ... write things down

16. Say "no" more often to things that don’t nourish you. Cut out unnecessary things (e.g. TV)

17. Care for your mind as well as your inbox; unclutter it by trashing 'brain spam' daily

18. Make a list of priorities in your life, so that important things don’t get crowded out

19. If you can't find the time for all the activities that are important to you, maybe you are trying to do too much. Make a list of what you do during the day and how much each activity takes. Then cut back.

20. Avoid negative people, or decide to practice tolerance with them

21. Anticipate your needs and share them with your partner

22. Ask for help with the jobs you dislike

23. Break large tasks into bite size portions

24. Look at problems as challenges, and opportunities for growth; Look for a silver lining in difficult situations. Look at challenges differently. They’re fascinating, complicated, and an opportunity to be creative.

25. Choose to unclutter your life; a lot of stuff isn’t as important as you think

26. Pet a dog or cat with kindness in your heart

27. Be humble and laugh about the foolish idea that you should know all the answers

28. Say something kind to someone, especially your partner

29. Plant this seed for thought: we magnify our troubles and dissatisfactions by focusing on them so much. In the big picture, they're much smaller than we make them. Are you your own worst enemy?

30. Walk in the rain and pay attention to the sounds

31. Schedule play time into every day

32. Take a bubble bath or hot tub bath

33. Believe in yourself ; you have a lot of strengths

34. Stop saying negative things to yourself ; everyone has weaknesses, but you are good enough

35. Develop your sense of humor and watch comedians and funny movies more often

36. Stop thinking tomorrow will be a better today; the only time to live is now, so live well now

37. Once a day nourish and exercise your humility by reflecting on how small we are. Attempt to comprehend that behind a grain of sand, held at arms length, there are about 3000 distant galaxies, up to 13 billion light years away.

38. set goals for yourself that are reasonable

39. Look up at the stars and be grateful for the mysterious grace that keeps it all going

40. Play an instrument or a drum

41. Sing a song

42. Listen to a symphony

43. Listen to soft music with mindfulness (i.e. by being in the now with the sensations, without thinking about it much)

44. Dance –by yourself or with a partner

45. Watch a dance performance

46. Read a good book

47. Play a video or computer game . . . and laugh at yourself if your score isn’t so hot

48. Decide to stop doing a bad habit

49. Buy yourself, or someone else, a flower

50. Get a massage, or give one . . . with a quiet mind attending only to sensations, not thoughts

51. Make love more often

52. Learn to meet your own needs more often (e.g. going for a walk, massaging your feet, or masturbation)

53. Take time to smell and appreciate the flowers; enjoy the journey of life

54. Appreciate and acknowledge the support of others

55. Sometimes decide to try on cheerfulness and optimism

56. Don’t pay too much attention to your appearance or that of others.

57. Competing with others, whether in accomplishments, appearance, or possessions, is an avoidable source of stress. While it may seem easy to say you should be satisfied with what you have, it's the truth. Stress from jealousy is self-inflicted.

58. Strive for Excellence NOT perfection. But remember, most things are “good enough” as they are

59. Look at a work of art, or make one

60. Eat slowly and only while seated . . .and enjoy the sensations in your mouth, so you won’t overeat

61. Plant a tree, bush or flower

62. Feed the birds, or watch them and marvel at their beauty

63. Decide to practice grace under pressure. Don’t freak out; keep relaxed, cool and confident

64. Try to have a plan "B" in case plan “A” doesn’t work; remember, you always have options

philosophical thoughts, and many blogs consisting of collected quotations from an author or about a subject

08/18/2024

07/09/2023

The tongue like a sharp knife, kills without drawing blood. -Chinese proverb

Lasting change is not a dream; it can be achieved employing strategies that can be learned and are repeatable. Once you break the habit of being yourself and truly change your mind, your life will never be the same! - Dr. Joe Dispenza, M.D.

Help me to travel light, in every area of my life. Especially help me to unclutter my mind, so that I may hear you and see more clearly your mighty hand on my life. Amen.

· Help me to travel light, in every area of my life. Especially help me to unclutter my mind, so that I may hear you and see more clearly your mighty hand on my life. Amen.

For fast-acting relief, try slowing down. - Jane Wagner

01/29/2021

10/19/2020

06/09/2017

11/29/2015

09/04/2015

10/01/2014

2. Kindness is a quality of the strong.

3. There’s no such thing as absolute truth.

4. It’s the small people who try to belittle and humiliate others.

5. The harm others do to you is easier to forget than the harm you do to others.

6. You might forget those who made you laugh, but you will never forget those who were by your side in your darkest hours.

7. It’s the simple things in life that are the most extraordinary.

8. Love is life. And life is love.

9. Put love into your work.

10. To understand the heart and mind of a person, look at what he aspires to be.

11. True love can’t be possessed.

12. Seek to put up with bad manners pleasantly.

13. Love binds everything together in perfect harmony.

14. Always look on the bright side of life.

15. We don’t see things as they are. We see things as we are.

16. True love is the offspring of spiritual affinity.

17. Let there be space in your relationship.

18. If you pray when it rains, make sure you also pray when the sun shines.

19. When you give of yourself, that’s when you truly give.

20. Real beauty comes from within.

21. Your children are not your children. They are sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.

22. Every relationship should be free from bondage.

23. Be thankful for both the good and the bad in your life. It’s all meant to teach you something.

24. Your attitude towards life will determine life’s attitude towards you.

25. A friend who is far away is sometimes much nearer than one who is at hand.

06/04/2014

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10/16/2010

08/26/2010