What makes a fire burn
is space between the logs,
a breathing space.
Too much of a good thing,
too many logs
packed in too tight
can douse the flame
almost as surely
as a pail of water would.
So building fires
requires attention
to the spaces in between.
A fire grows
simply because the space is there,
with openings in which the flame,
that knows just how it wants to burn,
can find its way.
~Judy Brown
(Writer, speaker, poet, leadership educator)
I love your silence.
It is so wise.
It listens.
It invites warmth.
I love your loneliness.
It is brave.
It makes the universe want to protect you.
You have the loneliness
that all true heroes have,
a loneliness that is a deep sea,
within which the fishes of mystery dwell.
I love your quest.
It is noble.
It has greatness in it.
Only one who is born under a blessed star
would set sail across the billowing waves
and the wild squalls,
because of a dream.
I love your dream.
It is magical.
Ben Okri
(1959 to pres., Nigerian poet and novelist)
We have a responsibility
to hold to the power of love
that we know to be true,
and to not allow the world around us
to deaden that in ourselves.
~Lucas Johnson
(Civil Rights activist,
General Secretary of the International Fellowship of Reconciliation)
Forgive yourself for not being at peace.
The moment you completely
accept your non-peace
it is translated into peace.
Anything you accept fully
will get you there,
will take you into peace.
This is the miracle of surrender.
~Eckhart Tolle
(1948 to pres., German Philosopher and Mystic)
You cannot get through a single day
without having an impact
on the world around you.
What you do makes a difference,
and you have to decide
what kind of difference
you want to make.
~Jane Goodall
(1934 to pres, British Primatologist,
ethologist, anthropologist and UN Messenger of Peace)
God is in me, and God is in you,
As life is hidden in every seed.
So toss away your pride, my friend,
And look for God within you.
When I sit in the heart of God’s world
A million suns blaze with light,
A burning blue sea spreads across the sky,
Life’s turmoil falls quiet,
All the stains of suffering wash away.
Listen to the unstruck bells and drums!
Love is here; plunge into its rapture!
Rains pour down without water;
Rivers are streams of light.
How could I ever express
How blessed I feel
To revel in such vast ecstasy
Inside my own body?
This is the music
Of soul and soul meeting.
Of the forgetting of all grief.
This is the music
That transcends all coming and going.
~Kabir
(1440-1518, Sufi Master Saint,
Weaver, and Mystic Poet)
Praying.
It doesn’t have to be the blue iris,
it could be weeds in a vacant lot,
or a few small stones;
just pay attention,
then patch a few words together
and don’t try to make them elaborate,
this isn’t a contest
but the doorway into thanks,
and a silence
in which another voice may speak.
~Mary Oliver
(1935 to 2019 American Poet)
When we have love for all,
we are in tune with God.
When we have anger, animosity, hatred, and prejudice
against any person or group of people,
the mind will use that to keep us from God.
It will occupy our thoughts with more and more reasons
for hating someone else or a group of people.
It will lead us into thoughts, words, and deeds
that keep us from having stillness of mind.
When we do not love someone or a group of people,
whether because they have a different nationality,
religion, skin color, or economic status,
it means that the mind has won over the soul.
The mind will keep us engaged in constant distraction
due to our negative and unloving
thoughts, words and deeds to others.
We can overcome this tendency by realizing
that we are all children of one Creator.
If we realize the same Light of God that is in us
is also in every living creature,
then our mind will be stilled.
We will live each day in the spirt of love and harmony.
The state of love is the state of allowing God
to flow through us.
The more time we spend in a state of loving all,
the more easily we can meditate with a still mind
and peaceful heart and we can then
contact God within us.
~Sant Rajinder Singh Ji Maharaj
(1946 to pres., Author, Scientist, Mystic,
Leader of Science of Spirituality and
International Movements for World Peace)
Between God and spirit,
there is no other obstacle
but that of a veil of the mind.
If this veil were to stop fluttering
in the breeze of desires,
as it does at present,
the spirit can take in directly
the Cosmic Energy
from its very source.
~Param Sant Satguru Kirpal Singh Ji Maharaj
(February 6, 1894 to August 21, 1974
Spiritual Teacher, Mystic Adept,
President of the World Fellowship of Religions,
Satguru of Science of Spirituality)
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 curious eyes of a child —
our own two eyes.
All is a miracle.
~Thich Nhat Hanh
(1926 to pres., Vietnamese Zen Buddhist Monk)
