Love It the Way It Is

In order to love it the way it is,
we must first learn to see it the way it is.

Thaddeus Golas

Necessary Pain

Every person who understands
the necessity for enduring pain and effort
makes a difference in our human reality.

Thaddeus Golas

Delicious Solitude

I live in that solitude which is painful in youth
but delicious in the years of maturity.

Albert Einstein

You Must Understand

You must understand that the object of the dance
of enlightenment is not to lose the incarnation,
it's not to realize God and forget humanity,
for the formless and the form are two different
faces of God and if you deny your incarnation
in order to go to God, you don't know God fully.

Ram Dass

Less and Less Obvious

Everything you've learned in school as "obvious"
becomes less and less obvious as you begin to
study the universe. For example, there are no solids
in the universe. There's not even a suggestion of
a solid. There are no absolute continuums.
There are no surfaces. There are no straight lines.

R. Buckminster Fuller

The Way Out

Enlightenment is not a benign form of therapy,
nor is it the acquisition of status.
It is merely the way out of this reality.

Thaddeus Golas

Gradual Abdication

And it is an open question how conscious we want to become and still continue our normal lives as human beings. Those of us who do choose to make sustained consciousness a priority should anticipate a gradual abdication from the busyness of energetic life. And when we do aim to leave human affairs, we should also be indifferent to any human value judgments about being "spiritual." It is folly to expect to enjoy the best of both worlds at the same time. The energy-minded do not need this sort of advice. They will always be busy with what they can perceive and manipulate.

Thaddeus Golas

Learning to Trust Oneself

Healing, more than anything, becomes
an exercise in learning to trust oneself.

Monica Cassani

Love Never Goes Out of Style

Kindness is timeless.
Love is so easy to give.
It just takes a moment to
show somebody that you care.

From the song, "Timeless"
by Sergio Mendes

What It Is

It is nonsense
says reason.

It is what it is
says love.

It is calamity
says calculation.

It is nothing but pain
says fear.

It is hopeless
says insight.

It is what it is
says love.

It is ludicrous
says pride.

It is foolish
says caution.

It is impossible
says experience.

It is what it is
says love.

Erich Fried

Happiness is This

Maybe happiness is this:
not feeling like you should be
elsewhere, doing something else,
being someone else.

Isaac Asimov

When Setting Out

When setting out on a journey,
never take advice from someone
who never left home.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

Good Clear Footprints

Never for a moment think that you
are the only traveler on your path.
Leave good, clear footprints.

Thaddeus Golas

What We Don't Need

What we don't need
in the midst of struggle
is shame for being human.

Brene Brown

Nothing to Criticize

Fault is in the one who blames.
Spirit sees nothing to criticize.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

Unlearn Something Daily

A scholar tries to learn something every day;
a student of Buddhism tries to unlearn something daily.

Alan Watts

It Makes You Human

You don't have to be positive all the time.
It's perfectly okay to feel sad, angry, annoyed,
frustrated, scared, or anxious. Having feelings
doesn't make you a "negative person."
It makes you human.

Lori Deschene

To Know Your Own Soul

The desire to know your own soul
will end all other desires.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

I Am Your Mirror

I am not here for your understanding of who I am.
I am here for your understanding of who you are.
I am your mirror. How you feel about me,
what you see in me, the thoughts that arise
from your encounter of me, the judgments
you hold about me are all reflections of you.
They have nothing to do with me.

Emily Maroutian

The Teaching of My Soul

I have been a seeker and still am,
but I stopped asking books and the stars.
I started listening to the teaching of my soul.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

The Mouse Will Not Appreciate Your Neutrality

If you are neutral in situations of injustice,
you have chosen the side of the oppressor.
If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse,
and you say that you are neutral,
the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.

Desmond Tutu

Prelude to The Dance

What if it truly doesn't matter what you do
but how you do whatever you do?
How would this change what you
choose to do with your life?

What if you could be more present
and openhearted with each person
you met if you were working as
a cashier in a corner store or as
a parking lot attendant than you could
if you were doing a job you think
is more important?
How would this change how you
spend your precious time on earth?

What if you contribution to the world
and the fulfillment of your own happiness
is not dependent upon discovering
a better method of prayer or
technique of meditation, not dependent
upon reading the right book or
attending the right seminar,
but upon really seeing and deeply
appreciating yourself and the world
as they are right now?
How would this affect your search
for spiritual development?

What if there is no need to change,
no need to try to transform yourself
into someone who is more compassionate,
more present, more loving or wise?
How would this affect all the places
in your life where you are endlessly
trying to be better?

What if the task is simply to unfold,
to become who you already are
in your essential nature - gentle,
compassionate, and capable of living
fully and passionately present?
How would this affect how you feel
when you wake up in the morning?

What if who you essentially are right now
is all that you are ever going to be?
How would this affect how you
feel about your future?

What if the essence of who you are
and always have been is enough?
What if the question is no why am I so
infrequently the person I really want to be,
but why do I so infrequently want to be
the person I really am?
How would this change what you think
you have to learn?

What if becoming who and what we truly are
happens not through striving and trying
but by recognizing and receiving
the people and places and practices
that offer the warmth of encouragement
we need to unfold?
How would this shape the choices
you make about how to spend today?

What if you knew that the impulse to move
in a way that creates beauty in the world
will arise from deep within and guide you
every time you simply pay attention and wait?
How would this shape your stillness, your
movement, your willingness to follow
this impulse, to just let go and dance?

Oriah Mountain Dreamer

The Only Thing

The only thing shame cannot
possibly survive is empathy.

Lauren Golombek

You Know

Yeah, well, you know that's
just like your opinion, man.

The Big Grabowski

Love Feels Free

You must love in such a way that
the person you love feels free.

Thich Nhat Hanh

Yes, I Am Happy

"Young man," he said, "are you happy?
The young man named Jack looked startled
at this question, and he glanced in both directions
before answering, and then he spoke.
"Yes, I am happy. Things are as they are,
and I am part of them."

George R. Stewart, "Earth Abides"

The Call

I have heard it all my life,
A voice calling a name I recognized as my own.

Sometimes it comes as a soft-bellied whisper.
Sometimes it holds an edge of urgency.

But always it says: Wake up my love.
You are walking asleep. There's no safety in that!

Remember what you are and let this knowing
take you home to the Beloved with every breath.

Hold tenderly who you are and let a deeper knowing
color the shape of your humanness.

There is no where to go. What
you are looking for is right here.
Open the fist clenched in wanting
and see what you already hold in your hand.

There is no waiting for something to happen,
no point in the future to get to.
All you have ever longer for is here in this moment,
right now.

You are wearing yourself out with all this searching.
Come home and rest.

How much longer can you life like this?
You hungry spirit is gaunt, your heart stumbles,
All this trying. Give it up!

Let yourself be one of the God-mad,
faithful only to the beauty you are.

Let the Lover pull you to your feet and hold you close,
dancing even when fear urges you to sit this one out.

Remember - there is one word you are here
to say with your whole being.
When it finds you, give your life to it.
Don't be tight-lipped and stingy.

Spend yourself completely on the saying.
Be one in this great love poem we are writing together.

Oriah Mountain Dreamer

Tragic Expression

Every unskillful act,
or hurtful word,
is a tragic expression
of an unmet need.

Marshal Rosenberg

I'm Not One of Them

There are lovers content with longing.
I'm not one of them.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

Love Says There Are

Lovers find secret places
inside this violent world
where they make transactions
with beauty.
Reason says, Nonsense!
I have walked and measured the walls here.
There are no places like that.
Love says, There are.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

Tall Order

Unconditional is a tall order.

Unknown

Green Bough

If I keep a green bough in my heart,
the singing bird will come.

Chinese Proverb

Constantly Greater Beings

Winning does not tempt that man
For this is how he grows:
By being defeated, decisively,
By constantly greater beings.

Rainer Maria Rilke

The Invitation

It doesn't interest me
what you do for a living.
I want to know
what you ache for
and if you dare to dream
of meeting your heart's longing.

I doesn't interest me
how old you are.
I want to know
if you will risk
looking like a fool
for love
for your dream
for the adventure of being alive.

I doesn't interest me
what planets are
squaring your moon.
I want to know
if you have touched
the center of your own sorrow
if you have been opened
by life's betrayals
or have become shriveled and closed
from fear of further pain.

I want to know
if you can sit with pain
mine or your own
without moving to hide it
or fade it
or fix it.

I want to know
if you can be with joy
mine or your own
if you can dance with wildness
and let the ecstasy fill you
to the tips of your fingers and toes
without cautioning us
to be careful
to be realistic
to remember the limitations
of being human.

It doesn't interest me
if the story you are telling me
is true.
I want to know if you can
disappoint another
to be true to your self.
If you can bear
the accusation of betrayal
and not betray your own soul.
If you can be faithless
and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty
even when it is not pretty
every day.
And if you can source your own life
from its presence.

I want to know
if you can live with failure
yours and mine
and still stand at the edge of the lake
and shout to the silver of the full moon,
"Yes."

It doesn't interest me
to know where you live
or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up
after the night of grief and despair
weary and bruised to the bone
and do what needs to be done
to feed the children.

I doesn't interest me
who you know
or how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand
in the center of the fire
with me
and not shrink back.

It doesn't interest me
where or what or with whom
you have studied.
I want to know
what sustains you
from the inside
when all else falls away.

I want to know
if you can be alone
with yourself
and if you truly like
the company you keep
in the empty moments.

Oriah Mountain Dreamer

No Authentic Self

we are all frauds.
there is no "real me."
one sense of self feels better than another,
and we call that better-liked feeling
the "authentic me."
but neither is what we are.
there is no authentic self.

Judy Cohen

What You Can Offer

After a while you come to appreciate that
what you can offer another human being
is to work on yourself to be a statement of
what it is you have found in the way to live
your life. One of the things you will find is
the ability to appreciate what is, as it is, in
equanimity and compassion, and love that
isn't conditional. You don't love the person
more because they are happier the way
you think they should be.

Ram Dass