Quotations

It is unusual a mailbox chokes you up, and because there are too many probable causes—not for the mailbox: for my being choked up—let me simply tell you it was the phrase affixed in those janky silver sticker letters, usually used for a name or address, a little crooked, the V and W peeling slightly, the phrase itself leaning back, lounging, or maybe almost indiscernibly ascending:
TRAVELERS WELCOME

The older I get, the more convinced I am that the space between people who are trying their best to understand each other is hallowed ground.

In surrender I clear a space in which something new can grow. I place my faith in something larger than me. I trust.

The answer was overwhelmingly consistent: beauty appears when something is completely and absolutely and openly itself.

Where there is separation,
there is pain.
And where there is pain,
there is story.

And where there is story,
there is understanding,
and misunderstanding,
listening
and not listening.

May we — separated peoples, estranged strangers,
unfriended families, divided communities —
turn toward each other,
and turn toward our stories,
with understanding
and listening,
with argument and acceptance,
with challenge, change
and consolation.

Because if God is to be found,
God will be found
in the space
between.

At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.

Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.

But...winter has an even greater gift to give. It comes when the sky is clear, the sun brilliant, the trees bare, and the first snow yet to come. It is the gift of utter clarity...Winter clears the landscape, however brutally, giving us a chance to see ourselves and each other more clearly, to see the very ground of our being.

I long to slip into cracks of silence
where breath is connected to spirit and
spirit to wind and a sense of oneness
resonates in my core.

Solitude is a state of hospitality, a welcoming of all that needs attention. Solitude offers a ground that is embracing and inclusive. Everything can be made welcome in the broad arms of solitude, even fear. For as long as humans have sought counsel with the sacred, much of it has happened in a space set apart from others. Here, in silence and nourishing aloneness, we can become receptive to the influence of soul...

This is a season of remembering the ancient rhythms of soul. It is a time to become immense....to recall how embedded we are in an animate world—a world that dreams and enchants, a world that excites our imaginations and conjures our affections through its stunning beauty. Everything we need is here...

We don't know what's around the uncharted bend in this wild river of change... Let us learn from our fellow Earth inhabitants, like mycelium networks who know about sharing resources, recycling toxins into nourishment, communicating underground. Let us find meaning in mystery rather than consumption. Let us turn our ears to the music rising out of the ground.

All throughout these months
as the shadows
have lengthened,
this blessing has been
gathering itself,
making ready,
preparing for
this night.

It has practiced
walking in the dark,
traveling with
its eyes closed,
feeling its way
by memory
by touch
by the pull of the moon
even as it wanes.

So believe me
when I tell you
this blessing will
reach you
even if you
have not light enough
to read it;
it will find you
even though you cannot
see it coming....

This blessing
does not mean
to take the night away
but it knows
its hidden roads,
knows the resting spots
along the path,
knows what it means
to travel
in the company
of a friend.

So when
this blessing comes,
take its hand.
Get up.
Set out on the road
you cannot see.

This is the night
when you can trust
that any direction
you go,
you will be walking
toward the dawn.

You do your absolute best to find and hone and wield your divine gifts against the dark. You do your best to reach out tenderly to touch and elevate as many people as you can reach. You bring your naked love and defiant courage and salty grace to bear as much as you can, with all the attentiveness and humor you can muster. This life is after all a miracle and we ought to pay fierce attention every moment, as much as possible.

Hope is a state of mind, not of the world. It is an orientation of the spirit and orientation of the heart; it transcends the world that is immediately experienced and is anchored somewhere beyond its horizons. Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as joy that things are going well, or willingness to invest in enterprises that are obviously heading for success, but rather an ability to work for something because it is good, not just because it stands a chance to succeed.

To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places—and there are so many—where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don't have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.

Sometimes, in this troubled world of ours, we forget that love is all around us. We imagine the worst of other people and withdraw into our own shells. But try this simple test: Stand still in any crowded place and watch the people around you. Within a very short time, you will begin to see love, and you will see it over and over and over. A young mother talking to her child, a couple laughing together as they walk by, an older man holding the door for a stranger — small signs of love are everywhere. The more you look, the more you will see. Love is literally everywhere. We are surrounded by love.

Our mission is to plant ourselves at the gates of Hope—
Not the prudent gates of Optimism,
Which are somewhat narrower.

Not the stalwart, boring gates of Common Sense;
Nor the strident gates of Self-Righteousness,
Which creak on shrill and angry hinges
(People cannot hear us there; they cannot pass through)
Nor the cheerful, flimsy garden gate of
"Everything is gonna' be all right."

But a different, sometimes lonely place,
The place of truth-telling,
About your own soul first of all and its condition.
The place of resistance and defiance,
The piece of ground from which you see the world
Both as it is and as it could be
As it will be;

The place from which you glimpse not only struggle,
But the joy of the struggle.
And we stand there, beckoning and calling,
Telling people what we are seeing
Asking people what they see.

Hope is a muscle, a practice, a choice that actually propels new realities into being. And it's a muscle we can strengthen. It is not the same as idealism or optimism. This kind of hope has nothing to do with wishful thinking. Hope as I've seen it lived is at once fierce and persistently joyful. I've come to understand this quality of hope as an essential foundation and power for the generative story, the generative landscape, that is emerging out of all of the rupture this moment in the life of the world has laid bare.

Gratitude, therefore, takes nothing for granted, is never unresponsive, is constantly awakening to the new wonder to praise the goodness of God. For the grateful person knows that God is good not by hearsay, but by experience. And that is what makes all the difference.

Every minute of every hour of every day you are making the world, just as you are making yourself, and you might as well do it with generosity and kindness and style.

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life.
It turns what we have into enough, and more.
It turns denial into acceptance,
chaos to order,
confusion to clarity.

We often remember to be grateful for big events, like graduating from university or getting married, but it can be more difficult to feel grateful for the small things we do every day. Reminding yourself that eating a meal, for example, is in itself special and can be very powerful. Your immediate awareness of the food in front of you, combining flavors while removing hunger, is a great way to enjoy gratitude as often as you eat! Another is feeling grateful in the morning for being able to comfortably sleep at night. We gain comfort, satisfaction and peace by practicing mindfulness and gratitude in this repeated fashion.

Awakening in a moment of peace
I give thanks
to the source of all peace
as I set forth
into the day
the birds sing
with new voices
And I listen
with new ears
and give thanks

nearby
the flower called Angel's Trumpet
blows
in the breeze
and I give thanks
my feet touch the grass
still wet with dew
and I give thanks

both to my mother earth
for sustaining my steps
and to the seas
cycling once again
to bring forth new life
sun-fire
the dewdrops
become jeweled
with the morning
sun's fire
and I give thanks

you can see forever
when the vision is clear
in this moment
each moment

I give thanks

Gratitude can transform common days into thanksgivings, turn routine jobs into joy, and change ordinary opportunities into blessings.

Love is my light and
my salvation,
whom shall I fear?...

One thing have I asked of Love,
that I shall ever seek:
That I might dwell in the
Heart of Love
All the days of my life,

To behold the Beauty of my Beloved...

Call upon the Beloved,
be strong and trust
in the heart's courage.
Trust in the power of Love;
the Beloved's unconditional and
everlasting love for you.