Always looking elsewhere

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There is no greater mystery than this,

that we keep seeking reality

though in fact we are reality

Ramana Maharsi

photo epsos.de

Unique path

little birdEvery person born into this world represents something new, something that never existed before, something original and unique. It is the duty of every person…to know and consider…that there has never been anyone like him in the world, for if there had been someone like him, there would have been no need for him to be in the world. Every single person is a new thing in the world and is called upon to fulfill his particularity in this world. Every person’s foremost task is the actualization of his unique, unprecedented and never-recurring potentialities, and not the repetition of something that another, be it even the greatest, has already achieved.

Martin Buber

Travelling light

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There is an old story of a famous rabbi living in Europe who was visited one day by a man who had traveled by ship from New York to see him. The man came to the great rabbi’s dwelling, a large house on a street in a European city, and was directed to the rabbi’s room, which was in the attic. He entered to find the master living in a room with a bed, a chair, and a few books. The man had expected much more.  After greetings, he asked, “Rabbi, where are your things?” The rabbi asked in return, “Well, where are yours?” His visitor replied, “But, Rabbi, I’m only passing through,” and the master answered, “So am I, So am I.”

This is not a lesson to be put off. One great teacher explained it this way: “The trouble with you is that you think you have time.” We don’t know how much time we have. What would it be like to live with the knowledge that this may be our last year, our last week, our last day? In light of this question, we can choose a path with heart.

Jack Kornfield,  A Path With Heart

photo dirk ingo franke

Trust

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What shape waits in the seed of you

to grow and spread its branches

against a future sky?

David Whyte

Ambiguity

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The magnitude of our personal journeys,

require that we learn to tolerate ambiguity,

in service to a larger life.

James Hollis, What Matters Most

photo of 13th century Killelan Abbey (Knights of St John of Jerusalem),  Moone, Co. Kildare

Travelling at night

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E.L. Doctorow said once said that ‘Writing a novel is like driving a car at night. You can see only as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.’ You don’t have to see where you’re going, you don’t have to see your destination or everything you will pass along the way. You just have to see two or three feet ahead of you. This is right up there with the best advice on writing, or life, I have ever heard.

Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird: Instructions on Writing and Life

photo triddle