β
What you're supposed to do when you don't like a thing is change it. If you can't change it, change the way you think about it. Don't complain.
β
β
Maya Angelou (Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now)
β
Life is about accepting the challenges along the way, choosing to keep moving forward, and savoring the journey.
β
β
Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
β
Do not let the memories of your past limit the potential of your future. There are no limits to what you can achieve on your journey through life, except in your mind.
β
β
Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
β
Life before Death.
Strength before Weakness.
Journey before Destination.
β
β
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
β
We travel, some of us forever, to seek other states, other lives, other souls.
β
β
AnaΓ―s Nin (The Diary of AnaΓ―s Nin, Vol. 7: 1966-1974)
β
How would your life be different ifβ¦You stopped making negative judgmental assumptions about people you encounter? Let today be the dayβ¦You look for the good in everyone you meet and respect their journey.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
Everyone you meet is a part of your journey, but not all of them are meant to stay in your life. Some people are just passing through to bring you gifts; either they're blessings or lessons.
β
β
Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
β
... "You may not see the ocean, but right now we are in the middle of the ocean, and we have to keep swimming.
β
β
Tracy Kidder (Strength in What Remains: A Journey of Remembrance and Forgiveness)
β
Dare to love yourself
as if you were a rainbow
with gold at both ends.
β
β
Aberjhani (Journey through the Power of the Rainbow: Quotations from a Life Made Out of Poetry)
β
Though the road's been rocky it sure feels good to me.
β
β
Bob Marley
β
We don't receive wisdom; we must discover it for ourselves after a journey that no one can take for us or spare us.
β
β
Marcel Proust
β
Some things cannot be taught; they must be experienced. You never learn the most valuable lessons in life until you go through your own journey.
β
β
Roy T. Bennett
β
If my mind can conceive it, and my heart can believe it - then I can achieve it.
β
β
Muhammad Ali (The Soul of a Butterfly: Reflections on Life's Journey)
β
The beautiful journey of today can only begin when we learn to let go of yesterday.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
β
We should not judge people by their peak of excellence; but by the distance they have traveled from the point where they started.
β
β
Henry Ward Beecher
β
How would your life be different ifβ¦You stopped allowing other people to dilute or poison your day with their words or opinions? Let today be the dayβ¦You stand strong in the truth of your beauty and journey through your day without attachment to the validation of others.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
...there ain't no journey what don't change you some.
β
β
David Mitchell (Cloud Atlas)
β
Each person deserves a day away in which no problems are confronted, no solutions searched for.
β
β
Maya Angelou (Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now)
β
Sometimes, reaching out and taking someone's hand is the beginning of a journey.
At other times, it is allowing another to take yours.
β
β
Vera Nazarian (The Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration)
β
Dream your own dreams, achieve your own goals. Your journey is your own and unique.
β
β
Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
β
Love is what we are born with. Fear is what we learn. The spiritual journey is the unlearning of fear and prejudices and the acceptance of love back in our hearts. Love is the essential reality and our purpose on earth. To be consciously aware of it, to experience love in ourselves and others, is the meaning of life. Meaning does not lie in things. Meaning lies in us.
β
β
Marianne Williamson
β
A bridge of silver wings stretches from the dead ashes of an unforgiving nightmare
to the jeweled vision of a life started anew.
β
β
Aberjhani (Journey through the Power of the Rainbow: Quotations from a Life Made Out of Poetry)
β
Living well is an art that can be developed: a love of life and ability to take great pleasure from small offerings and assurance that the world owes you nothing and that every gift is exactly that, a gift.
β
β
Maya Angelou (Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now)
β
It's funny how, in this journey of life, even though we may begin at different times and places, our paths cross with others so that we may share our love, compassion, observations, and hope. This is a design of God that I appreciate and cherish.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
β
You cannot change your journey if you are unwilling to move at all.
β
β
Ally Condie (Reached (Matched, #3))
β
Jamie: You know what I figured out today?
Landon: What?
Jamie: Maybe God has a bigger plan for me than I had for myself. Like this journey never ends. Like you were sent to me because I'm sick. To help me through all this. You're my angel.
β
β
Nicholas Sparks (A Walk to Remember)
β
Each star is a mirror reflecting the truth inside you.
β
β
Aberjhani (Journey through the Power of the Rainbow: Quotations from a Life Made Out of Poetry)
β
Everything you need to know you have learned through your journey.
β
β
Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist)
β
May I share with you a formula that in my judgment will help you and help me to journey well through mortality... First, fill your mind with truth; second, fill your life with service; and third, fill your heart with love.
β
β
Thomas S. Monson
β
But one of the big lessons I have learned from my journey is you canβt please everyone, so donβt try.
β
β
Chris Colfer
β
There is strange comfort in knowing that no matter what happens today, the Sun will rise again tomorrow.
β
β
Aaron Lauritsen (100 Days Drive: The Great North American Road Trip)
β
Who we are in the present includes who we were in the past.
β
β
Fred Rogers (Life's Journeys According to Mister Rogers: Things to Remember Along the Way)
β
Only you can take inner freedom away from yourself, or give it to yourself. Nobody else can.
β
β
Michael A. Singer (The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself)
β
You enter the forest
at the darkest point,
where there is no path.
Where there is a way or path,
it is someone else's path.
You are not on your own path.
If you follow someone else's way,
you are not going to realize
your potential.
β
β
Joseph Campbell (The Hero's Journey: Joseph Campbell on His Life & Work (Works))
β
She remembered who she was
and the game changed.
β
β
Lalah Delia
β
The struggles we endure today will be the βgood old daysβ we laugh about tomorrow.
β
β
Aaron Lauritsen (100 Days Drive: The Great North American Road Trip)
β
If you fuel your journey on the opinions of others, you are going to run out of gas.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
β
When you reach for the stars, you are reaching for the farthest thing out there. When you reach deep into yourself, it is the same thing, but in the opposite direction. If you reach in both directions, you will have spanned the universe.
β
β
Vera Nazarian (The Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration)
β
Would you like to know your future?
If your answer is yes, think again. Not knowing is the greatest life motivator.
So enjoy, endure, survive each moment as it comes to you in its proper sequence -- a surprise.
β
β
Vera Nazarian (The Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration)
β
When God takes out the trash, don't go digging back through it. Trust Him.
β
β
Amaka Imani Nkosazana (Heart Crush)
β
I've come to believe that there exists in the universe something I call "The Physics of The Quest" β a force of nature governed by laws as real as the laws of gravity or momentum. And the rule of Quest Physics maybe goes like this: "If you are brave enough to leave behind everything familiar and comforting (which can be anything from your house to your bitter old resentments) and set out on a truth-seeking journey (either externally or internally), and if you are truly willing to regard everything that happens to you on that journey as a clue, and if you accept everyone you meet along the way as a teacher, and if you are prepared β most of all β to face (and forgive) some very difficult realities about yourself... then truth will not be withheld from you." Or so I've come to believe.
β
β
Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love)
β
Try to remember it always," he said once Gogol had reached him, leading him slowly back across the breakwater, to where his mother and Sonia stood waiting. "Remember that you and I made this journey together to a place where there was nowhere left to go.
β
β
Jhumpa Lahiri (The Namesake)
β
APPLY WITHIN
You once told me
You wanted to find
Yourself in the world -
And I told you to
First apply within,
To discover the world
within you.
You once told me
You wanted to save
The world from all its wars -
And I told you to
First save yourself
From the world,
And all the wars
You put yourself
Through.
APPLY WITHIN by Suzy Kassem
β
β
Suzy Kassem
β
There are, it seems, two muses: the Muse of Inspiration, who gives us inarticulate visions and desires, and the Muse of Realization, who returns again and again to say "It is yet more difficult than you thought." This is the muse of form. It may be then that form serves us best when it works as an obstruction, to baffle us and deflect our intended course. It may be that when we no longer know what to do, we have come to our real work and when we no longer know which way to go, we have begun our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed. The impeded stream is the one that sings.
β
β
Wendell Berry
β
There is no evidence that we've been placed on this planet to be especially happy or especially normal. And in fact our unhappiness and our strangeness, our anxieties and compulsions, those least fashionable aspects of our personalities, are quite often what lead us to do rather interesting things.
β
β
Jon Ronson (The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry)
β
The best traveler is one without a camera.
β
β
Kamand Kojouri
β
At every given moment we are absolutely perfect for what is required for our journey.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
We are constantly trying to hold it all together. If you really want to see why you do things, then don't do them and see what happens.
β
β
Michael A. Singer (The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself)
β
I want my life to be the greatest story.
My very existence will be the greatest poem.
Watch me burn.
Love always, Charlotte
β
β
Charlotte Eriksson (Empty Roads & Broken Bottles: in search for The Great Perhaps)
β
Every day is a journey, and the journey itself is home.
β
β
Matsuo BashΕ
β
Each of us has the right and the responsibility to assess the roads which lie ahead, and those over which we have traveled, and if the future road looms ominous or unpromising, and the roads back uninviting, then we need to gather our resolve and, carrying only the necessary baggage, step off that road into another direction. If the new choice is also unpalatable, without embarrassment, we must be ready to change that as well.
β
β
Maya Angelou (Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now)
β
Our culture made a virtue of living only as extroverts. We discouraged the inner journey, the quest for a center. So we lost our center and have to find it again.
β
β
AnaΓ―s Nin
β
For everything in this journey of life we are on, there is a right wing and a left wing: for the wing of love there is anger; for the wing of destiny there is fear; for the wing of pain there is healing; for the wing of hurt there is forgiveness; for the wing of pride there is humility; for the wing of giving there is taking; for the wing of tears there is joy; for the wing of rejection there is acceptance; for the wing of judgment there is grace; for the wing of honor there is shame; for the wing of letting go there is the wing of keeping. We can only fly with two wings and two wings can only stay in the air if there is a balance. Two beautiful wings is perfection. There is a generation of people who idealize perfection as the existence of only one of these wings every time. But I see that a bird with one wing is imperfect. An angel with one wing is imperfect. A butterfly with one wing is dead. So this generation of people strive to always cut off the other wing in the hopes of embodying their ideal of perfection, and in doing so, have created a crippled race.
β
β
C. JoyBell C.
β
Sunlight shines beauty aglow, by the banks of the river that quietly flow. Misty rain yields comfort to a muggy night. Wind of a gentle breeze, calming the skies destine of rendering light.
β
β
Sherman Kennon (Whisk Of Dust: Too Unseen Distance)
β
Women waste so much time wearing no perfume. As for me, in every step that I have taken in life, I have been accompanied by an exquisite perfume!
β
β
C. JoyBell C.
β
Sesungguhnya, terlalu perhatiannya orangtua kita adalah gangguan terindah yang pernah bisa kita terima
β
β
Raditya Dika (The Journeys)
β
She'd decided long ago that life was a long journey. She would be strong and she would be weak, and both would be okay.
β
β
Tahereh Mafi (Furthermore (Furthermore, #1))
β
It's in those quiet little towns, at the edge of the world, that you will find the salt of the earth people who make you feel right at home.
β
β
Aaron Lauritsen (100 Days Drive: The Great North American Road Trip)
β
The most adventurous journey to embark on; is the journey to yourself, the most exciting thing to discover; is who you really are, the most treasured pieces that you can find; are all the pieces of you, the most special portrait you can recognize; is the portrait of your soul.
β
β
C. JoyBell C.
β
In his suicide note, Kurt Cobain wrote, "It's better to burn out than to fade away." He was quoting a Neil Young song about Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols. When I was twenty-four, I interviewed John Lennon. I asked him about this sentiment, one that pervades rock and roll. He took strong, outraged exception to it. "It's better to fade away like an old soldier than to burn out, " he said. "I worship people who survive. I'll take the living and the healthy.
β
β
David Sheff (Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Addiction)
β
The most important words a man can say are, βI will do better.β These are not the most important words any man can say. I am a man, and they are what I needed to say.
The ancient code of the Knights Radiant says βjourney before destination.β Some may call it a simple platitude, but it is far more. A journey will have pain and failure. It is not only the steps forward that we must accept. It is the stumbles. The trials. The knowledge that we will fail. That we will hurt those around us.
But if we stop, if we accept the person we are when we fall, the journey ends. That failure becomes our destination. To love the journey is to accept no such end. I have found, through painful experience, that the most important step a person can take is always the next one.
Iβm certain some will feel threatened by this record. Some few may feel liberated. Most will simply feel that it should not exist. I needed to write it anyway.
β
β
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
β
How to win in life:
1 work hard
2 complain less
3 listen more
4 try, learn, grow
5 don't let people tell you it cant be done
6 make no excuses
β
β
Germany Kent
β
Life's trials will test you, and shape you, but donβt let them change who you are.β
~ Aaron Lauritsen, β100 Days Drive
β
β
Aaron Lauritsen (100 Days Drive: The Great North American Road Trip)
β
But paradise is locked and bolted....
We must make a journey around the world to see if a back door has perhaps been left open.
β
β
Heinrich von Kleist (On a Theatre of Marionettes)
β
We may run, walk, stumble. drive, or fly, but let us never lose sight of the reason for the journey, or miss a chance to see a rainbow on the way.
β
β
Gloria Gaither
β
If you find yourself drawn to an event against all logic, go. The universe is telling you something.
β
β
Gloria Steinem (My Life on the Road)
β
Books. They are lined up on shelves or stacked on a table. There they are wrapped up in their jackets, lines of neat print on nicely bound pages. They look like such orderly, static things. Then you, the reader come along. You open the book jacket, and it can be like opening the gates to an unknown city, or opening the lid of a treasure chest. You read the first word and you're off on a journey of exploration and discovery.
β
β
David Almond
β
The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Watch your step.
β
β
Lao Tzu
β
In every journey comes a moment... one like no other. And in that moment, you must decide between who you are... and who you want to be.
β
β
J.C. Marino (Dante's Journey)
β
It amazed me how quickly a lie loses its power in the face of truth.
β
β
Yeonmi Park (In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom)
β
Jamie saved my life. She taught me everything. About life, hope and the long journey ahead. I'll always miss her. But our love is like the wind. I can't see it, but I can feel it.
β
β
Nicholas Sparks (A Walk to Remember)
β
Blessed are those with cracks in their broken heart because that is how the light gets in.
β
β
Shannon L. Alder
β
Life is a journey, not a destination; there are no mistakes, just chances we've taken.
β
β
India.Arie
β
True friends don't come with conditions.
β
β
Aaron Lauritsen (100 Days Drive: The Great North American Road Trip)
β
Without struggle, success has no value.
β
β
Aaron Lauritsen (100 Days Drive: The Great North American Road Trip)
β
Just as anyone who listens to the muse will hear, you can write out of your own intention or out of inspiration. There is such a thing. It comes up and talks. And those who have heard deeply the rhythms and hymns of the gods, can recite those hymns in such a way that the gods will be attracted.
β
β
Joseph Campbell (The Hero's Journey: Joseph Campbell on His Life & Work (Works))
β
The question is not whether you will love, hurt, dream, and die. It is what you will love, why you will hurt, when you will dream, and how you will die. This is your choice. You cannot pick the destination, only the path.
β
β
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
β
Writing, painting, singing- it cannot stop everything. Cannot halt death in its tracks. But perhaps it can make the pause between deathβs footsteps sound and look and feel beautiful, can make the space of waiting a place where you can linger without as much fear. For we are all walking each other to our deaths, and the journey there between footsteps makes up our lives.
β
β
Ally Condie (Reached (Matched, #3))
β
All paths are the same: they lead nowhere. ... Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn't, it is of no use. Both paths lead nowhere; but one has a heart, the other doesn't. One makes for a joyful journey; as long as you follow it, you are one with it. The other will make you curse your life. One makes you strong; the other weakens you.
β
β
Carlos Castaneda (The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge)
β
Dreams are reality that has not become true. However, in the hearts of some people, they have already come true. People whose dreams are already achieved in their hearts, and who can see that as they boldly throw themselves into it, have true courage.
β
β
Ilchi Lee (The Call of Sedona: Journey of the Heart)
β
In the years ahead of me, I learned that the world is actually filled with people ready to tell you how likely something is, and what it means to be realistic. But what I have also learned is that no one, no one truly knows what is possible until they go and do it.
β
β
Liz Murray (Breaking Night: A Memoir of Forgiveness, Survival, and My Journey from Homeless to Harvard)
β
Instead, what I was beginning to understand was that however things unfolded from here on, whatever the next chapter was, my life could never be the sum of one circumstance. It would be determined, as it had always been, by my willingness to put one foot in front of the other, moving forward, come what may.
β
β
Liz Murray (Breaking Night: A Memoir of Forgiveness, Survival, and My Journey from Homeless to Harvard)
β
It was being a runner that mattered, not how fast or how far I could run. The joy was in the act of running and in the journey, not in the destination. We have a better chance of seeing where we are when we stop trying to get somewhere else. We can enjoy every moment of movement, as long as where we are is as good as where we'd like to be. That's not to say that you need to be satisfied forever with where you are today. But you need to honor what you've accomplished, rather than thinking of what's left to be done (p. 159).
β
β
John Bingham (No Need for Speed: A Beginner's Guide to the Joy of Running)
β
Emotion is βrecognitionβ. When treasured moments are identified in the jungle of our personal history during a visual or aural encounter, we capture magic sparks from our past, arousing flashes of insight and revealing an inner flare. These instants of recognition may kindle enthralling emotion and fulfilling inspiration. (βThose journeys of loveβ)
β
β
Erik Pevernagie
β
Life isn't about having, it's about being. You could surround yourself with all that money can buy, and you'd still be as miserable as a human can be. I know people with perfect bodies who don't have half the happiness I've found. On my journeys I've seen more joy in the slums of Mumbai and the orphanages of Africa than in wealthy gated communities and on sprawling estates worth millions. Why is that? You'll find contentment when your talents and passion are completely engaged, in full force. Recognise instant self-gratification for what it is. Resist the temptation to grab for material objects like the perfect house, the coolest clothes or the hottest car. The if I just had X, I would be happy syndrome is a mass delusion. When you look for happiness in mere objects, they are never enough. Look around. Look within.
β
β
Nick Vujicic
β
Perfectly Imperfect
We have all heard that no two snowflakes are alike. Each snowflake takes the perfect form for the maximum efficiency and effectiveness for its journey. And while the universal force of gravity gives them a shared destination, the expansive space in the air gives each snowflake the opportunity to take their own path. They are on the same journey, but each takes a different path.
Along this gravity-driven journey, some snowflakes collide and damage each other, some collide and join together, some are influenced by wind... there are so many transitions and changes that take place along the journey of the snowflake. But, no matter what the transition, the snowflake always finds itself perfectly shaped for its journey.
I find parallels in nature to be a beautiful reflection of grand orchestration. One of these parallels is of snowflakes and us. We, too, are all headed in the same direction. We are being driven by a universal force to the same destination. We are all individuals taking different journeys and along our journey, we sometimes bump into each other, we cross paths, we become altered... we take different physical forms. But at all times we too are 100% perfectly imperfect. At every given moment we are absolutely perfect for what is required for our journey. Iβm not perfect for your journey and youβre not perfect for my journey, but Iβm perfect for my journey and youβre perfect for your journey. Weβre heading to the same place, weβre taking different routes, but weβre both exactly perfect the way we are.
Think of what understanding this great orchestration could mean for relationships. Imagine interacting with others knowing that they too each share this parallel with the snowflake. Like you, they are headed to the same place and no matter what they may appear like to you, they have taken the perfect form for their journey. How strong our relationships would be if we could see and respect that we are all perfectly imperfect for our journey.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
When we fully understand the brevity of life, its fleeting joys and unavoidable pains; when we accept the facts that all men and women are approaching an inevitable doom: the consciousness of it should make us more kindly and considerate of each other. This feeling should make men and women use their best efforts to help their fellow travelers on the road, to make the path brighter and easier as we journey on. It should bring a closer kinship, a better understanding, and a deeper sympathy for the wayfarers who must live a common life and die a common death.
β
β
Clarence Darrow (The Essential Words and Writings of Clarence Darrow (Modern Library Classics))
β
...But...to sing,
to dream, to smile, to walk, to be alone, be free,
with a voice that stirs and an eye that still can see!
To cock your hat to one side, when you please
at a yes, a no, to fight, or- make poetry!
To work without a thought of fame or fortune,
on that journey, that you dream of, to the moon!
Never to write a line that's not your own...
β
β
Edmond Rostand (Cyrano de Bergerac)
β
Together let us hold the intention that all aspects of this living planet come together in love, acceptance, and celebration of both our diversities and commonalities. Let us possess the common purpose that we heal from our hearts into compassion and forgiveness for ourselves. Together let us own the belief that we will no longer unite with blame and judgement, but come to accept that we all carry the same wounds. In acknowledging this, the hope is for the whole planet in its jubilant diversity to be healed from any and all woundings so that we come together on equal footing, living in peace and joy and setting the tone for a future of harmony within and on this planet.
Peace to all and healing to all.
β
β
Wendy E. Slater (Of the Flame, Poems - Volume 15)
β
As Kevin climbed the three flights of stairs to his apartment, his brain formulated a vague plan of action. He could not have explained it to anyone or even to himself in coherent sentences. But the outline was there in Kevinβs subconscious. It would not only change his life, but many others, as well.
A Call to Action had been born.
β
β
Traci Medford-Rosow (Unblinded: One Manβs Courageous Journey Through Darkness to Sight)
β
The home we seek is in eternity;
The Truth we seek is like a shoreless sea,
Of which your paradise is but a drop.
This ocean can be yours; why should you stop
Beguiled by dreams of evanescent dew?
The secrets of the sun are yours, but you
Content yourself with motes trapped in its beams.
Turn to what truly lives, reject what seems --
Which matters more, the body or the soul?
Be whole: desire and journey to the Whole.
β
β
Attar of Nishapur
β
While we may judge things as good or bad, karma doesn't. It's a simple case of like gets like, the ultimate balancing act, nothing more, nothing less. And if you're deteremined to fix every situation you deem as bad, or difficult, or somehow unsavory, then you rob the person of their own chance to fix it, learn from it, or even grow from it. Some things, no matter how painful, happen for a reason. A reason you or I may not be able to grasp at first sight, not without knowing a person's entire life storyβtheir cumulative past. And to just barge in and interfere, no matter how well-intentioned, would be akin to robbing them of their journey. Something that's better not done.
β
β
Alyson Noel (Shadowland (The Immortals, #3))
β
Last Night the Rain Spoke to Me"
Last night
the rain
spoke to me
slowly, saying,
what joy
to come falling
out of the brisk cloud,
to be happy again
in a new way
on the earth!
Thatβs what it said
as it dropped,
smelling of iron,
and vanished
like a dream of the ocean
into the branches
and the grass below.
Then it was over.
The sky cleared.
I was standing
under a tree.
The tree was a tree
with happy leaves,
and I was myself,
and there were stars in the sky
that were also themselves
at the moment,
at which moment
my right hand
was holding my left hand
which was holding the tree
which was filled with stars
and the soft rainβ
imagine! imagine!
the wild and wondrous journeys
still to be ours.
β
β
Mary Oliver (What Do We Know)
β
Our life is like a land journey, too even and easy and dull over long distances across the plains, too hard and painful up the steep grades; but, on the summits of the mountain, you have a magnificent view--and feel exalted--and your eyes are full of happy tears--and you want to sing--and wish you had wings! And then--you can't stay there, but must continue your journey--you begin climbing down the other side, so busy with your footholds that your summit experience is forgotten.
β
β
Lloyd C. Douglas (The Robe)
β
Warriors of light always have a certain gleam in their eyes.
They are of this world, they are part of the lives of others, and they set out on their journey with no saddlebags and no sandals. They are often cowardly. They do not always make the right decisions.
They suffer over the most trivial things, they have mean thoughts, and sometimes believe that they are incapable of growing. They frequently deem themselves unworthy of any blessing or miracle.
They are not always quite sure what they are doing here. They spend many sleepless nights, believing that their lives have no meaning.
That is why they are warriors of light. Because they make mistakes. Because they ask themselves questions. Because they are looking for a reason - and are sure to find it.
β
β
Paulo Coelho
β
The downfall of the attempts of governments and leaders to unite mankind is found in this- in the wrong message that we should see everyone as the same. This is the root of the failure of harmony. Because the truth is, we should not all see everyone as the same! We are not the same! We are made of different colours and we have different cultures. We are all different! But the key to this door is to look at these differences, respect these differences, learn from and about these differences, and grow in and with these differences. We are all different. We are not the same. But that's beautiful. And that's okay.In the quest for unity and peace, we cannot blind ourselves and expect to be all the same. Because in this, we all have an underlying belief that everyone should be the same as us at some point. We are not on a journey to become the same or to be the same. But we are on a journey to see that in all of our differences, that is what makes us beautiful as a human race, and if we are ever to grow, we ought to learn and always learn some more.
β
β
C. JoyBell C.
β
If we constantly focus only on the stones in our mortal path, we will
almost surely miss the beautiful flower or cool stream provided by the
loving Father who outlined our journey. Each day can bring more joy
than sorrow when our mortal and spiritual eyes are open to God's
goodness. Joy in the gospel is not something that begins only in the
next life. It is our privilege now, this very day. We must never allow
our burdens to obscure our blessings. There will always be more
blessings than burdens--even if some days it doesn't seem so. Jesus
said, "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it
more abundantly." Enjoy those blessings right now. They are yours and
always will be.
β
β
Jeffrey R. Holland
β
The symbol of Goddess gives us permission. She teaches us to embrace the holiness of every natural, ordinary, sensual dying moment. Patriarchy may try to negate body and flee earth with its constant heartbeat of death, but Goddess forces us back to embrace them, to take our human life in our arms and clasp it for the divine life it is - the nice, sanitary, harmonious moment as well as the painful, dark, splintered ones.
If such a consciousness truly is set loose in the world, nothing will be the same. It will free us to be in a sacred body, on a sacred planet, in sacred communion with all of it. It will infect the universe with holiness. We will discover the Divine deep within the earth and the cells of our bodies, and we will lover her there with all our hearts and all our souls and all our minds.
β
β
Sue Monk Kidd (The Dance of the Dissident Daughter: A Woman's Journey from Christian Tradition to the Sacred Feminine)
β
It was a very ordinary day, the day I realised that my becoming is my life and my home and that I don't have to do anything but trust the process, trust my story and enjoy the journey. It doesn't really matter who I've become by the finish line, the important things are the changes from this morning to when I fall asleep again, and how they happened, and who they happened with. An hour watching the stars, a coffee in the morning with someone beautiful, intelligent conversations at 5am while sharing the last cigarette. Taking trains to nowhere, walking hand in hand through foreign cities with someone you love. Oceans and poetry.
It was all very ordinary until my identity appeared, until my body and mind became one being. The day I saw the flowers and learned how to turn my daily struggles into the most extraordinary moments. Moments worth writing about. For so long I let my life slip through my fingers, like water.
I'm holding on to it now,
and I'm not letting go.
β
β
Charlotte Eriksson (Empty Roads & Broken Bottles: in search for The Great Perhaps)
β
The night before brain surgery, I thought about death. I searched out my larger values, and I asked myself, if I was going to die, did I want to do it fighting and clawing or in peaceful surrender? What sort of character did I hope to show? Was I content with myself and what I had done with my life so far? I decided that I was essentially a good person, although I could have been better--but at the same time I understood that the cancer didn't care.
I asked myself what I believed. I had never prayed a lot. I hoped hard, I wished hard, but I didn't pray. I had developed a certain distrust of organized religion growing up, but I felt I had the capacity to be a spiritual person, and to hold some fervent beliefs. Quite simply, I believed I had a responsibility to be a good person, and that meant fair, honest, hardworking, and honorable. If I did that, if I was good to my family, true to my friends, if I gave back to my community or to some cause, if I wasn't a liar, a cheat, or a thief, then I believed that should be enough. At the end of the day, if there was indeed some Body or presence standing there to judge me, I hoped I would be judged on whether I had lived a true life, not on whether I believed in a certain book, or whether I'd been baptized. If there was indeed a God at the end of my days, I hoped he didn't say, 'But you were never a Christian, so you're going the other way from heaven.' If so, I was going to reply, 'You know what? You're right. Fine.'
I believed, too, in the doctors and the medicine and the surgeries--I believed in that. I believed in them. A person like Dr. Einhorn [his oncologist], that's someone to believe in, I thought, a person with the mind to develop an experimental treatment 20 years ago that now could save my life. I believed in the hard currency of his intelligence and his research.
Beyond that, I had no idea where to draw the line between spiritual belief and science. But I knew this much: I believed in belief, for its own shining sake. To believe in the face of utter hopelessness, every article of evidence to the contrary, to ignore apparent catastrophe--what other choice was there? We do it every day, I realized. We are so much stronger than we imagine, and belief is one of the most valiant and long-lived human characteristics. To believe, when all along we humans know that nothing can cure the briefness of this life, that there is no remedy for our basic mortality, that is a form of bravery.
To continue believing in yourself, believing in the doctors, believing in the treatment, believing in whatever I chose to believe in, that was the most important thing, I decided. It had to be.
Without belief, we would be left with nothing but an overwhelming doom, every single day. And it will beat you. I didn't fully see, until the cancer, how we fight every day against the creeping negatives of the world, how we struggle daily against the slow lapping of cynicism. Dispiritedness and disappointment, these were the real perils of life, not some sudden illness or cataclysmic millennium doomsday. I knew now why people fear cancer: because it is a slow and inevitable death, it is the very definition of cynicism and loss of spirit.
So, I believed.
β
β
Lance Armstrong (It's Not About the Bike: My Journey Back to Life)