Tag: Gentleness

Sunday Quote

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Try it today:

One kind word can warm three winter months

Japanese Proverb

When fear approaches

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When your mind is reeling in confusion, breathe deeply into the centre of your chest.

Connecting to ther core of your being this way extends loving kindness to yourself , even when there is none in sight.

Ezra Bayda

The map is deep inside, in your heart

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[Some] people feel that their real identity is working on themselves, and some work on themselves with such harshness. Like a demented gardener who won’t let the soil settle for anything to grow, they keep raking, tearing away the nurturing clay from their own heart, then they’re surprised that they feel so empty and vacant. Self-compassion is paramount. When you are compassionate with yourself, you trust in your soul, which you let guide your life.

Your soul knows the geography of your destiny. Your soul alone has the map of your future, therefore you can trust this indirect, oblique side of yourself.

If you do, it will take you where you need to go, but more important it will teach you
a kindness of rhythm in your journey.

John O’Donoghue

Gratitude for life as it is

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Every morning I vow to be grateful for the precious gift of my human birth. It’s a big gift, and it includes a lot of stuff I never particularly wanted for my birthday. Some of the things in the package I wish I could exchange for a different size or color. But I want to find out what it means to be a human being — my curiosity remains intense even as I get older — so I say thanks for the whole thing. It’s all of a piece.

In thirteenth-century Japan, Zen Master Dogen wrote, ‘The Way is basically perfect and all-pervading.’  I’m already in it. We are all in it; we are made of it.

Susan Moon

Endings and beginnings

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Seeing beginnings and endings is a vital step in developing the understanding that nothing exists apart from interdependent, cause-and-effect relationships. To see the beginnings and endings is also, in my experience, a great support in difficult times. Early on, as I began to trust in the fiber of my being that nothing lasts, I became less afraid of pain. The fact that everything has an end comforted me. “One way or another,” I would say to myself, “this too will pass.” I was glad I saw that…the end of the day is the beginning of the night, and that the dead rose becomes compost for new growth.

Sad and wistful and lonesome are what human beings feel when they are parted from what they love. They are difficult emotions, but they aren’t problems. They become suffering when we resent them, or resist them, or pretend that they aren’t there. I know that when I struggle with the pain of any loss, the struggle preoccupies my mind and leaves no room for hope. When I recognize the pain I feel as the legitimate result of loss, I am respectful of its presence and kind to myself. My mind always relaxes when it is kind, and around the edges of the truth of whatever has ended, I see displays of what might be beginning.

Sylvia Boorstein

Knowing us better than we ourselves do

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There is a twilight zone in our hearts that we ourselves cannot see. Even when we know quite a lot about ourselves – our gifts and weaknesses, our ambitions and aspirations, our motives and our drives – large parts of ourselves remain in the shadow of consciousness. This is a very good thing. We will always remain partially hidden to ourselves. Other people, especially those who love us, can often see our twilight zones better than we ourselves can. The way we are seen and understood by others is different from the way we see and understand ourselves. We will never fully know the significance of our presence in the lives of our friends. That’s a grace, a grace that calls us not only to humility, but to a deep trust in those who love us. It is the twilight zones of our hearts where true friendships are born.

Henri Nouwen