Our capacity to notice

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As civilization advances, the sense of wonder declines. Such decline is an alarming symptom of our state of mind. Mankind will not perish for want of information; but only for want of appreciation. The beginning of our happiness lies in the understanding that life without wonder is not worth living. What we lack is not a will to believe but a will to wonder.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel

Whatever comes up

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Patience is the ability to watch something until it changes.

Ajahn Sucitto

photo Benson kua

Sunday Quote: Self-care

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You have to learn to get up from the table

when love is no longer being served.

Nina Simone

photo mrfinch

Really Looking

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I look;

Morning to night I am never done with looking.

Looking, I mean not just standing around,

but standing around
as though with your arms open.

Mary Oliver, Where does the Temple Begin, Where does it End?

Where the heart is…

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Here is one simple exercise to help us discover what we love. Looks to see where we give our time and attention. Attention is the physical manifestation of love. If I keep pushing my children away when they want me to play with them, they do not feel loved. I may have love in my heart; I may feel joy when I see them, and want only the best for them. But they will feel my love only when I turn around and give them my undivided attention. Through my attention, they experience my love. Attention is a tangible measure of love. Whatever receives our time and attention becomes the center of gravity, the focus of our life. This is what we do with what we love: We allow it to become our center.

Wayne Muller, How then Shall We live: Four Simple Questions that Reveal the Beauty and Meaning of Our Lives

photo joao pimentel ferreira

How to be at peace

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How to be at peace now? By making peace with the present moment. The present moment is the field on which the game of life happens. It cannot happen anywhere else. Once you have made peace with the present moment, see what happens, what you can do or choose to do, or rather what life does through you. There are three words that convey the secret of the art of living, the secret of all success and happiness: One With Life. Being one with life is being one with Now. You then realize that you don’t live your life, but life lives you. Life is the dancer, and you are the dance.

Eckhart Tolle, A new Earth: Awakening to your Life’s Purpose

photo tony hisgett