The fool, with all his other faults, has this one also,
he is always getting ready to live.
Seneca
Time to start living
Tag: Mindfulness
Sunday Quote: When
The beginning is always today
Mary Wollstonecraft, 1759 – 1797 English writer, philosopher and advocate for women’s rights
A juicy creative life
It’s time to get serious about joy and fulfillment, work on our books, songs, dances, gardens. But perfectionism is always lurking nearby, like the demonic prowling lion in the Old Testament, waiting to pounce.
Oh my God, what if you wake up some day, and you’re 65, or 75, and you never got your memoir or novel written, or you didn’t go swimming in those warm pools and oceans all those years because your thighs were jiggly and you had a nice big comfortable tummy; or you were just so strung out on perfectionism and people-pleasing that you forgot to have a big juicy creative life, of imagination and radical silliness and staring off into space like when you were a kid? It’s going to break your heart.
Don’t let this happen.
Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird, Instructions on Writing and lIfe
Even though
Piglet noticed that even
though he had a very small heart,
it could hold a rather
large amount of gratitude.
A.A. Milne
Honest prayers
There is Thomas Merton’s famous prayer, the beginning of which reads, ‘My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me.’ You can look up the rest.
There is a beautiful prayer a friend’s Jewish mother wrote and taught me, which I swear by: Help for the sick and hungry, home for the homeless folk, peace in the world forever. This is my prayer, O lord. Amen.
I wrote one that will do in a pinch:
Hi, God. I am just a mess.
It is all hopeless. What else is new?
I would be sick of me, if I were You,
but miraculously You are not.
I know I have no control over other people’s
lives, and I hate this. Yet I believe that if I
accept this and surrender, You will meet me
wherever I am. Wow. Can this be true? If so, how is this
afternoon – say, two-ish?
Thank You in advance for Your company and blessings.
You have never once let me down.
Amen.
Anne Lamott, Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers
Cycles
Instead of seeing time as a straight line,
if we see life as a series of cycles of growth, maturation, and death followed by rebirth,
we can better understand why endings are necessary for new beginnings.
Jeremy Hunter, mindfulness teacher, founder Executive Mind Leadership Institute
Mindfulbalance 