“The spirit of a time is an incredibly subtle, yet hugely powerful force. And it is comprised of the mentality and spirit of all individuals together. Therefore, the way you look at things is not simply a private matter. Your outlook actually and concretely affects what goes on. When you give in to helplessness, you collude with despair and add to it. When you take back your power and choose to see the possibilities for healing and transformation, your creativity awakens and flows to become an active force of renewal and encouragement in the world. In this way, even in your own hidden life, you can become a powerful agent of transformation in a broken, darkened world. There is a huge force field that opens when intention focuses and directs itself toward transformation.”-John O’Donohue
Become Whole Again
“Trees in particular were mysterious and seemed to me direct embodiments of the incomprehensible meaning of life. For that reason the woods were the place where I felt closest to its deepest meaning and to its awe-inspiring workings…The tree brings back all that has been lost through Christ’s extreme spiritualization, namely the elements of nature. Through its branches and leaves the tree gathers the powers of light and air, and through its roots those of the earth and the water… You must go in quest of yourself, and you will find yourself again only in the simple and forgotten things. Why not go into the forest for a time, literally? Sometimes a tree tells you more than can be read in books… ”
-Carl Jung
“Only when I walked into the forest did the world become whole again.”
-Lars Muhl
Sunflowers are Angels Sometimes
“I don’t know
if the sunflowers
are angels always,
but surely sometimes.
Who, even in heaven,
wouldn’t want to wear,
for awhile,
such a seed-face
and brave spine,
a coat of leaves
with so many pockets—
and who wouldn’t want
to stand, for a summer day,
in the hot fields,
in the lonely country
of the wild-haired corn?
This much I know,
when I see the bright
stars of their faces,
when I’m strolling nearby,
I grow soft in my speech,
and soft in my thoughts,
and I remember how everything will be everything else,
by and by.”-Mary Oliver, from “By the Wild-Haired Corn”, Long Life : Essays and Other Writings
A Friend, A Soul
“When I look into the eyes of an animal, I do not see an animal. I see a living being. I see a friend. I feel a soul.”
-Anthony Douglas Williams
The Winter of Listening
THE WINTER OF LISTENING (by David Whyte)
“No one but me by the fire,
my hands burning
red in the palms while
the night wind carries
everything away outside.All this petty worry
while the great cloak
of the sky grows dark
and intense
round every living thing.What is precious
inside us does not
care to be known
by the mind
in ways that diminish
its presence.What we strive for
in perfection
is not what turns us
into the lit angel
we desire.What disturbs
and then nourishes
has everything
we need.What we hate
in ourselves
is what we cannot know
in ourselves but
what is true to the pattern
does not need
to be explained.Inside everyone
is a great shout of joy
waiting to be born…And
here
in the tumult
of the night
I hear the walnut
above the child’s swing
swaying
its dark limbs
in the wind
and the snow now
come to
beat against my window
and somewhere
in this cold night
of wind and stars
the first whispered
opening of
those hidden
and invisible springs
that uncoil
in the still summer air
each yet
to be imagined
rose.”-David Whyte
Strong, clear and powerful moon on snow at home.
Never Lost
“I am never lost in the mountains, it is where I find myself”
-Lee Hiller
Love is All There Is
“Eventually you will come to understand that love heals everything, and love is all there is”
– Gary Zukav
Center of Our Being
“May we not neglect the silenceprinted in the center of our being.It will not fail us.”-Thomas Merton
Being Pulled by the Stars Again
“I’m restless. Things are calling me away. My hair is being pulled by the stars again.”
-Anais Nin
“We do not grow absolutely, chronologically. We grow sometimes in one dimension, and not in another; unevenly. We grow partially. We are relative. We are mature in one realm, childish in another. The past, present, and future mingle and pull us backward, forward, or fix us in the present. We are made up of layers, cells, constellations.”
-Anais Nin
Hidden Presence
“May you know that absence is alive with hidden presence, that nothing is ever lost or forgotten.May the absences in your life grow full of eternal echo.May you sense around you the secret Elsewhere where the presences that have left you dwell.”-John O’Donohue