Inspirational messages

solas

will admit,there's a great sense of freedom being away from it all, feel like myself again. Truley, it is the greatest sense of liberation so in a way I suppose my time is now. Guess I'm back to living in the present again.

joseph dawton

Lots of rumours about this being ancient but was written by Max Ehrmann in 1927.


Desiderata

Go placidly amid the noise and haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible without surrender
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons,
they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain and bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.

Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs;
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals;
and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself.
Especially, do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love;
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment
it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.

You are a child of the universe,
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.

http://www.electricpublications.com

Nevyn

Don't Dream it, Be it.

Asiaprod

I have a choice (original)

cue

I like
Place your heart at the lotus feet of the lord
And plunge into the heat of battle

Yechidah

"Struggle is nature's way of strengthening us"

LLLSHJ,
Yechidah.

kshiel

The earth hold the branches of life
Let Water give the earth life
Let Fire burn with passion
Let the Wind spread the seed to life
Be part of it, we hold it everyday within our hands

solas

for what its worth...

Lord, make me a channel of thy peace;
that where there is hatred, I may bring love;
that where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness;
that where there is discord, I may bring harmony;
that where there is error, I may bring truth;
that where there is doubt, I may bring faith;
that where there is despair, I may bring hope;
that where there are shadows, I may bring light;
that where there is sadness, I may bring joy.

Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted;
to understand, than to be understood;
to love, than to be loved.
For it is by self-forgetting that one finds.
It is by forgiving that one is forgiven.
It is by dying that one awakens to eternal life.
Amen.

Jackie laughlin

"The mass of men lead lives of quiet desparation"


"Is a dream a lie if it don't come true
Or is it smoethin' worse?"

siochain

solas wrote:

for what its worth...

Lord, make me a channel of thy peace;
that where there is hatred, I may bring love;
that where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness;
that where there is discord, I may bring harmony;
that where there is error, I may bring truth;
that where there is doubt, I may bring faith;
that where there is despair, I may bring hope;
that where there are shadows, I may bring light;
that where there is sadness, I may bring joy.

Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted;
to understand, than to be understood;
to love, than to be loved.
For it is by self-forgetting that one finds.
It is by forgiving that one is forgiven.
It is by dying that one awakens to eternal life.
Amen.

prayer of st francis, love it

siochain

You were born with potential.
You were born with goodness and trust.
You were born with ideas and dreams.
You were born with greatness.
You were born with wings.
You are not meant for crawling, so don’t.
You have wings.
Learn to use them and fly.

~ Rumi

MeditationMom

This day allow me to be useful to you,
I can give you kindness, take it in abundance so there will be more,
I can give you patience, take it in abundance so there will be more,
I can give you joy, take it in abundance so there will be more,
Take all of me, take all I have, so I may disappear to be with you.

(Anonymous)

maitri

“The minute I heard my first love story I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was. Lovers don't finally meet somewhere. They're in each other all along.”

“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.”

“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I will meet you there.”

“Don't grieve. Anything you lose comes round in another form.”

(Jalal ad-Din Rumi)

maitri

“The only thing that makes sense is kindness”

"Love and compassion are like the weak spots in the walls of ego. If we connect with even one moment of the good heart of bodhicitta (awakened mind/heart) and cherish it, our ability to open will gradually expand.
…
On this journey we're moving toward that which is not so certain, that which cannot be tied down, that which is not habitual and fixed. We're moving toward a whole new way of thinking and feeling, a flexible and open way of perceiving reality that is not based on certainty and security. This new way of perceiving is based on connecting with the living energetic quality of ourselves and everything else. Bodhicitta is our means of tapping into this awakened energy and we can start by tapping into our emotions. We can start by connecting very directly with what we already have.”*

“To begin with, just give up any expectations of yourself. That's a simple good instruction for how to meditate. Liberate yourself from any sort of idea of how you're supposed to be, and just sit.”

“To be without a reference point is the ultimate loneliness. It is also called enlightenment.”

(Pema Chodron)

*(From: Everybody Loves Something)

MeditationMom

Wonderful post, Maitri. One correction I think is important.

“To be without a reference point is the ultimate loneliness. It is also called enlightenment.”

(Pema Chodron)

I am sure Pema Chodron would instantly agree with my saying that here "ultimate loneliness" needs to be replaced by "aloneness". "Loneliness" is our emotional state of feeling alone, while "aloneness" is our spiritual truth, the state of enlightenment. Our All-One-ness. Just words, I am sure she meant it as such, but words are important. Otherwise if becomes a harmful misunderstanding leading to severe depression - and I have seen it many times - precisely because it is so close to the truth, but not the truth.

It is this emotional loneliness that we try to avoid all our lives, that we have to face either because of events of loss, or when we first start meditating, or go into retreat etc. Once the emotional mountain of loneliness is let go of, we notice and realize our divine and infinite, eternal, blissful Aloneness, and we know that it is everyone's, even if they are still suffering from loneliness.

Also, to be without a reference point is the ultimate, sad loneliness. In enlightenment there is a new reference point. I'll never manage to be able to explain it, but essentially enlightenment, aloneness, God, true self itself becomes the new reference point, but not referenced by the mind or the heart even, but the third thing which is no thing. Well, there's your moment of zen for today -

Thank you for the post, Maitri.

CathyMoran

"Be ambitious for the higher gifts. And I am going to show you a way that is better than any of them.
If I have all the eloquence of men or of angels, but speak without love, I am simply a gong booming or a cymbal clashing. If I have the gift of prophecy, understanding all the mysteries there~ are, and knowing everything, and if I have faith in all its fullness, to move mountains, but without love, then I am nothing at all. If I give away all that I possess, piece by piece, and if I even let them take my body to burn it, but am without love, it will do me no good whatever.
Love is always patient and kind; it is never jealous;
love is never boastful or conceited; it is never rude or selfish; it does not take offence, and is not resentful.
Love takes no pleasure in other people's sins but delights in the truth; it is always ready to excuse, to trust, to hope, and to endure whatever comes.
Love does not come to an end"

A reading from the first letter of St Paul to the Corinthians 12:31- 13:8
Had this as the reading at my wedding but have tried to memorise some of it - expresses love in it's purest form and has been known to bring me to tears.

maitri

Hi MeditationMom!
Thanks a lot for your post!

Yeah, I also thought that another way of putting it could be that “enlightenment is the ultimate non-loneliness”. (Though I must admit, I probably don’t know very much about enlightenment…:D ).

MeditationMom wrote:

Wonderful post, Maitri. One correction I think is important.

“To be without a reference point is the ultimate loneliness. It is also called enlightenment.”

(Pema Chodron)

...

I am sure Pema Chodron would instantly agree with my saying that here "ultimate loneliness" needs to be replaced by "aloneness".

Yes, perhaps she would indeed.

MeditationMom wrote:

Otherwise if becomes a harmful misunderstanding leading to severe depression - and I have seen it many times - precisely because it is so close to the truth, but not the truth.

Yes - though I think the possibility for misunderstandings here is probably mostly due to me taking the quote out of context...:o That is always a dangerous thing to do. Still, partly because of this discussion I cannot really be sorry about having done it… but here is the whole article in context to avoid further misunderstandings (of course I don’t know if you agree with everything here):

Shambhala Sun - Six Kinds of Loneliness

MeditationMom wrote:

Also, to be without a reference point is the ultimate, sad loneliness. In enlightenment there is a new reference point.

For me the thought of "no reference point" is not a source of depression or sadness – and I don’t get the association to” ultimate sad loneliness” from it – but it's rather a way of thinking (an attitude) that I feel is helpful for me and that gives a sense of... freedom/relief.
– though I must say... I don’t treat it as “absolute literal truth” in any way.

For other people it might be harmful way of thinking, though, as you say, and therefore I am happy for your helpful corrections. Thank you!

MeditationMom wrote:

I'll never manage to be able to explain it, but essentially enlightenment, aloneness, God, true self itself becomes the new reference point, but not referenced by the mind or the heart even, but the third thing which is no thing. Well, there's your moment of zen for today –

I am sure that’s another good way of seeing it.:)

MeditationMom wrote:

Thank you for the post, Maitri.

You are very welcome!

PS CathyMoran: Corinthians 12:31- 13:8 is also my mother's favourite.

MeditationMom

Thank you for the link, Maitri - it was helpful to see the whole context. I must say I respect her a lot. Her teaching is good. I was trying to put my finger on what is missing, though, for the last few days, and by chance , no such thing, right? - came across this zen saying this morning:

"To get rid of your passions is not nirvana, to look upon them as no matter of yours, that is nirvana."

In her words, that would probably be like saying - and then when you come full circle you again have a reference point, or many, but they are of no concern to you. This is what makes every Buddhist laugh - the divine paradox, the simultaneous yes and no of all things, the tenth card. I am not sure she is there. In this link, though, to be fair, I think she is only talking about the difficulties of getting started on this path and how to analyze why it is so and how to work your way through it. She is right on, too. I like her and maybe you have seen much more of her in conversations where she laughs and twinkles with wisdom. I am looking for the Buddha belly chuckle thing It just doesn't come through in her writing for me.

The equivalent to the above quote in Christianity would be "you shall have no other God". No matter all of our engagements here on earth, deep, loving, meaningful ones, in our hearts, God/Enlightenment has to be the priority. Similar to the vow you take as a Buddhist nun. I saw a movie several years ago where a father buries his nine-month old child - heart-wrenching to say the least - and to my surprise he kneels down at the grave and with great sincerity begs God for forgiveness for having loved his child so much, more than God. This commandment that to me, even as a child, was always the most obvious one, and the easiest one - just kind of thrown in there with the rest - that is when I understood it for the first time. For the human being, this is simply the most difficult commandment there is. Almost impossible. That is why there is so much fighting, killing, greed, mischief. Only when that gets to be too hard and we understand where our suffering and unease comes from, can we try the even harder. And in the end the hardest turns out to be the easiest.

by Maitri- (Though I must admit, I probably don’t know very much about enlightenment… ).

There isn't much to know !

(Going back up to re-read Cathy's Love post. It is most wonderful, whether we apply it to our earthly relationships or our relationship to God, or as Buddhists to Buddhahood, or Muslims to Allah and so on and so on. Such universal, soothing truth expressed in that paragraph)

maitri

MeditationMom wrote:

"To get rid of your passions is not nirvana, to look upon them as no matter of yours, that is nirvana."

An interesting one!:)

Have a very nice week end everybody!


M.

kshiel

AS THE LAKE WHISPERS

Beneath the watery surface lies the world beneath,
Its breath you cannot take,
Your nourishment it cannot supplement,
Only wonder lies beneath the temperate surface,
No less wonderful or magical than on the park bench.

Yet we seek what lies beneath for we are always searching for those we cannot reach,
But ponder a while and take that breath above the watery air.
You will soon discover it's the wonder that lies up here,
Don't seek what lies beneath but what lies above and all around,
For my breath, my touch is what you seek and it never lay just beneath.

Auron

May You Always Feel Loved

May you find serenity and tranquility in a world you may not always understand. May the pain you have known, and the conflict you have experienced give you the strength to walk through life facing each new situation with optimism and courage. Always know that there are those whose love and understanding will always be there even when you feel most alone.

May you discover enough goodness in others to believe in a world of peace. May a kind word, a reassuring touch, a warm smile, be yours every day of your life, and may you give these gifts as well as receive them. Remember the sunshine when the storm seems unending. Teach love to those who know hate, and let that love embrace you as you go into the world.

May the teaching of those you admire become part of you, so that you may call upon them. Remember, those whose lives you have touched and who have touched yours are always a part of you, even if the encounters were less than you would have wished.

May you not become too concerned with material matters, but instead place immeasurable value on the goodness in your heart. Find time in each day to see the beauty and love in the world around you. Realize that each person has limitless abilities, but each of us is different in our own way. What you may feel you lack in one regard may be more than compensated for in another. What you feel you lack in the present may become one of your strengths in the future.

May you see your future as one filled with promise and possibility. Learn to view everything as a worthwhile experience. May you find enough inner strength to determine your own worth by yourself, and not be dependent on another's judgments of your accomplishments.

And...... May you always feel loved.

mctechie

Hi All,

Just thought I should share a video I found that really struck a chord with me.

http://www.inspiringcinema.com/2008/09/love-vs-fear/

__
Martin

mysterious

I am presence;)

Past, I painted a picture. Is it enough
Future I want to paint a better picture, will it be good enough

Present, I'm immortal, I can...