Ludmilla taught me that we can pray anywhere, during any kind of work that is being done attentively and well and to the best of our ability.In such work, God is present.We only have to know this and try to give it our heart.Many people wish to have spiritual development without obstacles or even effort, and so they will never understand God’s love or the poverty of our humanity.
A hidden river runs beneath the conscious layers of our lives.We become fatigued not from overwork, but from how much energy it takes to stage our lives in order to drown out the sounds of the river inside us.
No one is useless in this world who lightens the burden of it for anyone else.
Society functions at its very best when each member finds security in their place in the social structure.When all members can be gainfully employed, yet have individual initiative, when they can excel in their own craft and find satisfaction in their work contributing to the overall goals of society, then there exists harmony and a sense of community.When members have an interest in the continuity of their community, great deeds can be accomplished.This is because the many work for the One.
The mountains, rivers, earth
grasses, trees, and forests
are always emanating a subtle,
precious light,
day and night, always emanating
a subtle, precious sound,
demonstrating and expounding
to all people
the unsurpassed, ultimate truth.
To see all things at their origin, their beginning, puts us in kinship with all that lives: trees, birds, stars seem foreign to us only inasmuch as we perceive them outside of our common origin with them.To drink at the source of all that lives and breathes expands the heart and makes the blood sing, echoing the song of all the vital fluids in the world.To dwell near all beginnings is to draw infinitely near to that which creates both the unity and the diversity of all beings.
This earth is my sister: I love her daily grace, her silent daring, and how loved I am, how we admire this strength in each other, all that we have lost, all that we have suffered, all that we know: we are stunned by this beauty, and I do not forget: what she is to me, what I am to her.
"It doesn’t matter to most people that the wind sings in the trees or that a mountain shimmers in the sunlight.But you find life in all this, a life you can partake of."
I replied that no one understands nature: a tree bathed in sunlight, a weathered stone, an animal, a mountain, each has life, has a tale to tell, is a life, suffers, endures, experiences joy, dies -- but we
don’t understand it.
Be a gardener.
Dig a ditch,
toil and sweat
and turn the earth upside down
and seek the deepness
and water the plants in time.
Continue this labor
and make sweet floods to run
and noble and abundant fruits
to spring.
Take this food and drink
and carry it to God
as your true worship.
Blessed are the men and women
who are planted on Your earth in Your garden,
Who grow as Your trees and flowers grow,
who transform their darkness to light.
Their roots plunge into darkness;
their faces turn toward the light.
All those who love You are beautiful;
they overflow with Your presence
so that they can do nothing but good.
There is infinite space in Your garden;
all men, all women are welcome here;
all they need do is enter.