Even such a small creature as I finds intimate shelter in their embrace
Heaven is my Father and Earth is my Mother, and even such a small creature as I finds intimate shelter in their embrace. Therefore, that which fills the universe I regard as my own body, and that which directs the universe I consider as my own nature. All people are my brothers and sisters, […]
The pattern of life is not woven ahead of time, like cloth to be worn later as a tunic. Rather, life is woven at the very instant you live it.
“The pattern of life is not woven ahead of time, like cloth to be worn later as a tunic. Rather, life is woven at the very instant you live it.” – Brian Bates, The Way of Wyrd In the foreword to his historical novel, The Way of Wyrd, psychologist and shamanic consciousness researcher Brian Bates […]
There is available to us a form of transformation
“There is available to us, a form of transformation which, each time it is applied, extends and enhances the wholeness of the land, and the act of using this process of transforming puts us in touch with ourselves. This means that it makes the land of the Earth become more and more deeply connected to […]
On Wholeness & Inwardness: The universe is not a thoughtlessly static and inert whole—the cosmos is not lazy, but energetically dynamic and even creative.
Wholeness & Inwardness Wholeness and inwardness are two key notions put forward by Jan Smuts in his book Holism and Evolution, published in 1926. Smuts’ ideas around Holism sit somewhere between science and philosophy but go deeper yet. They were described by Albert Einstein as two of the most important concepts to shape the future […]
The qualities of the world that come to your attention are determined by the qualities of the attention you bring to it.
“The qualities of the world that come to your attention are determined by the qualities of the attention you bring to it.” – Iain Mc Gilchrist Source: McGilchrist, Iain (2019) The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World. Yale University Press. Photo Credits: Rebel Wisdom, CC BY 3.0, […]
Call the world if you Please ‘The Vale of Soul-making’
Call the world if you Please ‘The Vale of Soul-making’ by John Keats (1891), Letter to his brother Call the world if you Please ‘The Vale of Soul-making.’ Then you will find out the use of the world… I say ‘Soul making’ Soul as distinguished from an Intelligence – There may be intelligences or sparks […]
It is a path within ourselves where the feet first falter in shadow and darkness but which is later made gay by heavenly light
It is a path within ourselves where the feet first falter in shadow and darkness but which is later made gay by heavenly light George William Russell, or AE as he preferred to be called, Meditation in Candle of Vision (1918): THERE is no personal virtue in me other than this that I followed a […]
After the Storm
After the Storm by Boris Pasternak The air is full of after-thunder freshness, And everything rejoices and revives. With the whole outburst of its purple clusters. The lilac drinks the air of paradise. The gutters overflow; the change of weather Makes all you see appear alive and new. Meanwhile the shades of sky are growing […]
What Was Told, That
What Was Told, That by Jalal al-Din Rumi 1207-1273 What was said to the rose that made it open was said to me here in my chest. What was told the cypress that made it strong and straight, what was whispered the jasmine so it is what it is, whatever made sugarcane sweet, whatever was […]
The rose celebrates by falling apart.
Rumi says just being in a body and sentient is rapture. Just being here is a cause for celebration. And a cause for grief too. Though grief is also a form of joy. The rose celebrates by falling apart. Foil by foil falling to the ground. And the cloud celebrates by weeping.
Suffering is unnecessary. But one has to suffer before he is able to realise that this is so.
“Once I thought that I had been wounded as no man ever had. Because I felt thus I vowed to write this book. But long before I began the book the wound had healed. Since I had sworn to fulfil my task I reopened the horrible wound. Let me put it another way . . […]
What is wrong with peace that its inspiration does not endure and that it is almost untellable?
“The world seems to be sinking into dusk but I recount, as in the beginning, in my sing-song voice which sustains me saved by my tale from present confusion and troubles and protected for the future. Finished with the sweeping over the centuries with going and back forth, as in the past. Now I can […]
Walking makes the path, and on glancing back one sees the path that will never be trod again.
Wanderer, your footprints are the path, and nothing else; wanderer, there is no path, the path is made by walking. Walking makes the path, and on glancing back one sees the path that will never be trod again. Wanderer, there is no path— Just your wake in the sea. taken from: “Proverbios y cantares XXIX” […]
One’s real life is so often the life that one does not lead
In some such way as this we could gather up these strewn and scattered petals of song into one perfect rose of life, and yet, perhaps, in so doing, we might be missing the true quality of the poems; one’s real life is so often the life that one does not lead; and beautiful poems, […]
The life of every man is a way to himself, an attempt at a way, the suggestion of a path.
But every man is not only himself; he is also the unique, particular, always significant and remarkable point where the phenomena of the world intersect once and for all and never again. That is why every man’s story is important, eternal, sacred; and why every man while he lives and fulfils the will of nature […]
But man’s task is the exact opposite: to become conscious of the contents that press upward from the unconscious.
It is not I who create myself, rather I happen to myself. ~Carl Jung, CW 11, Para 391 People will do anything, no matter how absurd, in order to avoid facing their own souls. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious. ~Carl Jung, Psychology and Alchemy, […]
The craft or art of writing is the clumsy attempt to find symbols for the wordlessness
I am choosing to write this book to my sons. They are little boys now and they will never know what they came from through me, unless I tell them. It is not written for them to read now but when they are grown and the pains and joys have tousled them a little. And […]
You meet your destiny on the road you take to avoid it.
You meet your destiny on the road you take to avoid it. Jean de La Fontaine, Book VIII, Fable 16
A Narcissist’s Prayer
That didn’t happen.And if it did, it wasn’t that bad.And if it was, that’s not a big deal.And if it is, that’s not my fault.And if it was, I didn’t mean it.And if I did… You deserved it. anonymous, found at https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbynarcissists/comments/4nymz1/a_narcissists_prayer/, accessed 23.03.2020
The Fool is not a philosophy, but a quality of consciousness of life
But there always exist in society some men and women whom the Fool touches, who respond to the Fool. For the Fool awakens the Fool in others, but in many the Fool is stifled, or sleeps. There are human beings living in isolation and loneliness in the society of men who realise suddenly that they […]
The Tao is simply an expression of first principles. For those who do not perceive its rationality, even universal consent could not prove it.
“A hard heart is no infallible protection against a soft head.” The Abolition of Man was first given as a series of lectures in 1943. The lectures dealt largely with the dangers of moral relativism – a subject that increasingly was to occupy Lewis’ mind as he noted the destructive trends emerging in the modern […]
Until at last he chooses nothing, but does only and wholly what he must do…
“You thought, as a boy, that a mage is one who can do anything. So I thought, once. So did we all. And the truth is that as a man’s real power grows and his knowledge widens, ever the way he can follow grows narrower; until at last he chooses nothing, but does only and […]
Who is more responsible than a gull who finds and follows a meaning, a higher purpose for life?
Seagulls, as you know, never falter, never stall. To stall in the air is for them disgrace and it is dishonour. But Jonathan Livingston Seagull, unashamed, stretching his wings again in that trembling hard curve – slowing, slowing, and stalling once more – was no ordinary bird. […] “…one day, Jonathan Livingston Seagull, you shall […]
The impeded stream is the one that sings
“It may be that when we no longer know what to do, we have come to our real work and when we no longer know which way to go, we have begun our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed. The impeded stream is the one that sings.” ~ Wendell Berry
The Word grants a stay of execution
“…to God’s least creature is given voice for speech, or for song – a sign that it has found a way; to bind together, and stretch life’s limits, whether an hour or a day.” by Joseph Brodsky
Three Rules on Work
1- Out of clutter find simplicity; 2- From discord find harmony; 3- In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity. by Albert Einstein