Moving on

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The swallows are gathering in the evenings now, and look as if they are getting ready to depart. Their natural freedom lies within us,  not something outside that we need to attain or become. It is often our fears that prevent us from accessing it, and we choose to stay safe rather than risk the journey:

Look at the birds.

Even flying
is born
out of nothing.

The first sky
is inside you, my friend, open
at either end of day.

The work of wings
was always freedom, fastening
one heart to every falling thing.

Li Young Lee, One Heart

photo Takashi Hososhima

Sunday Quote: Wake up

tree light

Awake, my dear.

Be kind to your sleeping heart.

Take it out into the vast fields of light and let it breathe.

Hafiz

photo Mullaghrellan Woods Kilkea

Choosing

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We can let the circumstances of our lives harden us so that we become increasingly resentful and afraid,

or we can let them soften us and make us kinder and more open to what scares us.

We always have this choice.

Pema Chodron

Not listening to our fears

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The imagination is far better at inventing tortures than life because the imagination is a demon within us and it knows where to strike, where it hurts. It knows the vulnerable spot, and life does not, our friends and lovers do not, because seldom do they have the imagination equal to the task.

Anais Nin

Sunday Quote: Begin again

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If the angel deigns to reappear

It is because you have persuaded him

not with tears but with your humble decision always to begin again

Rainer Maria Rilke

photo mark voorendt

Trust

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When we get our spiritual house in order, we’ll be dead. This goes on.

You arrive at enough certainty to be able to make your way, but it is making it in darkness.

Don’t expect faith to clear things up for you.

It is trust, not certainty.

Flannery O’Connor, American Author, 1925 – 1964, A Prayer Journal.

photo chi king