We say we aren't listening to ourselves in the name of consideration for others. But this is a false premise because we can't really listen to others until we learn to listen, exquisitely listen, and TO ABIDE by our own heart.
What is this darkness? What is its name? Call it: an aptitude for sensitivity. Call it: a rich sensitivity which will make you whole. Call it: your potential for vulnerability.
It is the nature of a word to reveal what is hidden. The word that is hidden still sparkles in the darkness and whispers in the silence. It entices us to pursue it and to yearn and sigh after it. For it wishes to reveal to us something about God.
The outward work can never be small if the inward one is great, and the outward work can never be great if the inward is small or of little worth.
Nature's intent is neither food, nor drink, nor clothing, nor comfort, nor anything else in which God is left out. Whether you like it or not, whether you know it or not, secretly nature seeks, hunts, tries to ferret out the track on which God may be found. . .
For this joy is close to you,
it is in you!
None of you has a spirit so heavy
nor an intelligence so feeble,
none of you is so far from God
not to be able to find this joy
in God.
If the only prayer we say to God is "thank you,” that is enough.
In this life we are to become heaven
So that God might find a home here in us.