The world of suffering changes into a place that brings forth goodness when we can consciously relate to it, rather than identify with the circumstances we are thrown into.
We don’t have to drink the water we’re swimming through.
Ajahn Sucitto, Turning the Wheel of Truth
There are thresholds which thought alone, left to itself, can never permit us to cross.
An experience is required – an experience of poverty, of sickness.
Gabriel Marcel, quoted in Gelin, Les Pauvres de Yahvé
The other morning a friend shared that when he was a little boy, he loved to watch his grandfather prune trees, and his memory of it has become a helpful metaphor during the COVID-19 crisis.
He explained that after the pruning, once the trees were down to their bare essence, they entered a period of botanical seclusion and apparent dormancy. But in time, the trees stood tall again – more lush and beautiful in the morning light.
We are in a time of tremendous pruning and seclusion, said my friend.
Let’s hope and trust that when this period ends, we, too, will emerge from our global seclusion more vibrant and beautiful than before.
Kelly Barron, Finding Opportunities for Insight and Growth During Isolation
The word blessing evokes a sense of warmth and protection; it suggests that no life is alone or unreachable.
Each life is clothed in raiment of spirit that secretly links it to everything else.
Though suffering and chaos befall us, they can never quench that inner light of providence.
John O’Donohue
One of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world is to stand up and show your soul. Soul on deck shines like gold in dark times. The light of the soul throws sparks, can send up flares, builds signal fires, causes proper matters to catch fire. To display the lantern of soul in shadowy times like these – to be fierce and to show mercy toward others, both, are acts of immense bravery and greatest necessity. Struggling souls catch light from other souls who are fully lit and willing to show it. If you would help to calm the tumult, this is one of the strongest things you can do.
Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Letter to a Young Activist During Troubled Times: Do not Lose Heart, We were made for these Times
Even if our movement is restricted, there are countless opportunities to have an impact on another persons mood
I think sometimes about this phrase, “made my day” — that we have the power, with our words and with all kinds of small gestures like that. Even somebody being really nice in a checkout line, or you being nice to somebody in a checkout line, after the last two people were really rude to them. And you watch a transformation take place that you made — that their day was getting broken, and you made. What an incredible power we have, to walk through the world, making somebody’s day.
Krista Tippett, On Being Blog, in conversation with Ross Gay
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