Belief

"If your too convicted in your opinions and beliefs, perhaps you are a convict, imprisoned within the confines of your own understandings."  Jon Kabat-Zinn

Lovingkindness

"My aspiration is to water the seed of loving-kindness in order to create understanding so that I can bring joy and happiness to my beloved and all beings."

 -Thich Nhat Hanh

Listening from the Heart

From the one heart...

Hear from the heart wordless mysteries!
Understand what cannot be understood...
In our stone-dark hearts there burns a fire
That burns all veils to their root and foundation,
When the veils are burned away,
the heart will understand completely...
Ancient Love will unfold ever-fresh forms
In the heart of the Spirit, in the core of the heart.

- Rumi

Two Puddles Chatting

It rained during the night
And two puddles formed in the dark
And began chatting.
One said,

"It is so nice to at last be upon the earth
And to met you as well,

But what will happen when
The brilliant Sun comes
And turns us back into spirit again?"

Dear ones,
Enjoy the night as much as you can.

Why ever trouble your heart with flight, when you have just arrived
And your body is so full of warm desires.
And look:

So many meadows of soft hair are
Planted upon you.

Why ever trouble yourself with God
When He is so unjudging
And kind

Hafiz

Talking

Man's word is Spirit in man. Spoken words are sounds occasioned by the vibrations of thoughts, thoughts are vibrations sent forth by the ego or by the soul. Every word you utter should be potent with soul vibration. A mans words are lifeless if he fails to impregnate them with spiritual force. Talkativeness, exaggeration, or falsehood makes your words as ineffective as paper bullets shot from a toy gun. The speech and prayer of garrulous or inaccurate persons are unlikely to produce beneficial changes in the order of things. Mans words should represent not only truth but also his definite understanding and realization. Speech without soul force is like husks without corn...    Paramahansa Yogananda

Your Pain

"Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.  Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that it's heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain.  And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life, your pain would not be less wondrous than your joy; And you would accept the seasons of your heart, even as you have always accepted the seasons that pass over your fields.  And you would watch with serenity through the winters of your grief."  Kahlil Gibran

Secret of Death

"The great secret of death, and perhaps its deepest connection with us, is this: that, in taking from us a being we have loved and venerated, death does not wound us without, at the same time, lifting us toward a more perfect understanding of this being and of ourselves."  Rilke

Forgiveness

"To understand everything is to forgive everything."    Buddha

Understanding

You must understand the whole of life, not just one little part of it. That is why you must read, that is why you must look at the skies, that is why you must sing and dance, and write poems, and suffer, and understand, for all that is life. –J. Krishnamurti

The Noble Edge

 The Noble Edge

Upon the Noble Edge we meet
And never are apart
Upon the razor's edge we dance
To experience the heart.
The heart of understanding
The heart of letting go
The heart of being all we are in the ever changing flow.

FREE at last if I-dentity
We serve, love and allow
Living Holy Spirit
Sharing forever NOW.

So gaze at every rainbow
And wipe away the fear
Always dancing in I AM
Upon the Noble Edge
That mirrors.

There is no separation
I love the me I see
I AM the me I see
I love the all we be
I AM the all we be

I AM

There is no limitiation
I love the mirror I see
I am the mirror I see
I love the all we be

I AM

Holy Spirit
Conscious I AM
Always NOW
We transcend
The separation of duality
To shroud no more
Our unity

Same in you
Same in me
We are I AM

You are with me wherever I go
I am with you always
ONE breath
ONE life
One co-creator
Thy will is one
Thy will be done.  

Love

"Love is the fruit of spiritual labor; it is not a technique you try or a dogma you adopt.  Love is the secret you unmask yourself to find; the destination where all roads of the journey lead.  But it does no one any good to rush the process, nor enforce loving behavior.  You cannot legislate forgiveness; you cannot make hate illegal.  Just as you cannot pull a shoot out of the ground and demand that it flower then and there, love cannot be forced.  Spiritual work prepares the ground.  Love will blossom when our egos and our wounds and our fears have been worked with, tilled into the soil of our understanding."  Elizabeth Lesser

Listening

“Only that in you which is me can hear what I'm saying.” Ram Dass

Courage

"I remember all the times that I have resented the climb, the amount of living needed to gain the precious understanding to know how to live well.   And how important it is in the struggle for freedom from the old ways not to be limited by self-expectation or to worry about what others may think.   To be willing to do the really important things any way you can, even three steps at a time."  Rachel Naomi Remen

Unconditional Love

"It is rare to find someone who loves us as we are as it is to find someone who loves themselves whole."  Rachel Naomi Remen

Unanswered Questions

"An unanswered question is a fine traveling companion.  It sharpens your eye for the road.   In some fairy tales there is a magic word which has the power to undo the spell that has imprisoned someone and free them.   When I was small I would wait anxiously until the prince or princess stumbled on the formula and said the healing words  that would release them into life.   Usually the words are some sort of nonsense like 'shazam'.   My magic words are 'I don't know'.   Rachel Naomi Remen

Soul

"The soul finds it's home in the ordinary details of everyday life and does not in itself have an urgent need for understanding or achievement."   CG Jung

4 Qualities for Real Magic in Relationships

1. Relinquish your need to be right:  If you want to see miracles begin to take place in your life simply let go of the need to make someone else wrong for a few days and watch how differently things go.
2. Allow space:  Let there be space in your togetherness.  Treat that space as sacred, not a threat.  The irony is, the more space you allow and encourage within the relationship, the more the relationship will flourish.
3. Eliminate the idea of ownership: Seek time to enjoy each other, not to possess each other.  You do not have the right to tell people what they out to be doing while they are here on earth.   You do not have a loving relationship if either partner feels owned or like a possession.
4. Know that you do not have to understand: You do not have to understand why someone would want to do and think the way they do.   Things to say to yourself are, for example:  "I do not understand and that is fine." Or for children, "This is their journey.  They have come through me, not for me."  "I don't think that way, but they do.   I love them not because they are like me, but because they provide me with what I am not.   I honor that part of them that is incomprehensible to me."  

Understanding

"Go into each negative thing and you will find the positive, the third, the ultimate happens- the transcendental.   That is the meaning of understanding.  Osho