Freedom

From this hour, Freeedom!
From this hour I ordain myself loos'd of limits and imaginary lines
Going where I list, my own master, total and absolute,
Listening to others, and considering well what they say
Pausing, searching, receiving, contemplating

Gently, but with undeniable will, divesting myself of the holds that would hold me.

I am larger, better than I thought;
I did not know I held so much goodness.

-Walt Whitman, Song of the Open Road

Do you believe there is someplace
That will make the soul less thirsty?
In that great absence you will find nothing.
Be strong then, and enter into your own body.
There you have a solid place for your feet.
Think about it carefully!
Don't go off somewhere else.
Kabir says this: Just throw away all thoughts of imaginary things
And stand firm in that which you are.

- Kabir

Imagination

"Imagination is more important that knowledge."  Albert Einstein

Perspective

 "The future becomes the present when you imagine that you are already what you will be when your assumption is fulfilled. Be still (least action) and know that you are that which you desire to be. The end of longing should be Being."                Neville Lancelot Goddard, who wrote The Power of Awareness in 1952: (p. 47)

Wild Geese

WILD GEESE

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
and mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean, blue air,
are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting--
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

God

"How long will grown men and women in this world keep drawing in their coloring books an image of God that makes them sad?"    Unknown

Image of God and Man

"The most profound way to stand or sit in the human presence and in the Divine presence is without any image whatsoever."  John O' Donahue

Image of God

"It has been so false to imagine that God could condemn us or make us suffer or eventually put us into eternal places of torment.  Any God or Divine Presence that could wait for millions of years to dream up your identity, your spirit and your soul could never nurture you and then prepare destruction for you.  The mercy and forgiveness and the lovely lyrical gentleness of the Divine Presence is around every person.   And you should never allow anyone to break your trust in the tenderness and gentleness of God because that is closer to you than the words of any other human or the stipulations or regulations of any institution."   John O' Donahue

Problem Solving

"It's typical of the soul's ways that a solution to a serious problem takes the form of a paradox.   The difficult truth to learn is that true change takes place in the imagination, and knowing this has everything to do with developing a good, intimate relationship to your own soul and to the soul of others."   Thomas Moore

Real Love

"The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves and not to twist them to fit our own image.   Otherwise we only love the reflection of ourselves we find in them."   Thomas Merton

Certainty

"I am certain of nothing but the holiness of the heart's affections and the truth of the imagination."  John Keats

William James says there are two types of people:  Once-born and Twice-born. 

Once-Born:

1. Do not stray from familiar territory of who they think they are and what they think is expected of them.
2. If pushed to the edge (of Dante's dark woods) where the straight way is lost.
3. Don't want to learn something new from life's darkest lessons.
4. Stay with what feels safe and what is expected/acceptable to their family and society
5. Stick to what they already know -even if they don't necessarily want it or like it.
6. May go their whole life and never know what lies beyond the woods.
7. May question later, "Is this all there is to life?"
8. Lives as if the soul was a figment of a flighty imagination.
9. Leads to confusion, numbness, sadness, depression, anger.
10. Avoid, deny or bitterly accept the unpredictable changes of real life.

Twice-Born:

1. Always pays attention to the soul poking it's head through a half-lived life.
2. Whether through choice or calamity- goes into the woods, loses the straight way, confronts that which needs to change within himself in order to live a more genuine and radiant life.
3. The journey into the woods of change and transformation is an inner one. 
4. The most ordinary-looking lives are often being lived by the most extraordinary spiritual warriors; people who have chosen the road less traveled, of self-reflection.
5. Uses adversity for awakening.
6. Trade the safety of the known for the power of the unknown
7. Something calls them into the woods (betrayal, illness, divorce, loss, death), where the straight path vanishes, and there is no turning back, only going through. 

Image

"The compulsion to be desired and desirable undermines self-direction, self-confidence, and self-determination in women of all ages, in all our roles, whether or not the affliction is conscious.  Wanting to be wanted is about finding our power in an image rather than in our own actions.   We try to appear attractive, nice, good, valid, legitimate, or worthy to someone else, instead of discovering what we actually feel and want for ourselves.   Other people are expected to provide our own feelings of power, worth or vitality, at the expense of our own authentic development.   In place of knowing the truth of who we are and what we want for our lives we become trapped in images."    Polly Young-Eisendrath

Heart

"I am sure of nothing but the holiness of the heart's affection and the truth of the imagination."  Keats