Homeless

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Probably no word better summarizes the suffering of our times than the word “homeless.” It reveals one of our deepest and most painful conditions, the condition of not having a sense of belonging, of not having a place where we can feel safe, cared for, protected, and loved.

Henri J. M. Nouwen

Anthropology

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The key revelation of anthropology is the idea that distinct cultures represent unique visions of life itself, morally inspired and inherently right. ... To dismiss indigenous peoples as trivial, to view their societies as marginal, is to ignore and deny the central revelation of anthropology.

Wade Davis, Light at the Edge of the World

Heaven on Earth

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Sing like no one's listening, love like you've never been hurt, dance like nobody's watching, and live like its heaven on earth.

Mark Twain

Emptiness

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Emptiness is the footprint on which the centred person moves.

Tibetan sage

The World

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The world is not like a picture painted by an artist centuries ago which now hangs untouchable in a museum. It is more like a work of art in constant process of creation, still in a studio.

Ernesto Cardenal

Miracles

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But that is the thing about miracles: it is perception that determines them as such, not facts.

Camilla Gibb, sweetness in the belly

Story

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Everyone has a story. That’s what the circle teaches us. We become better people, a better species, when we take the time to hear them. That’s how you change the world, really. One story, one voice at a time.

Richard Wagamese, One Native Life

Door

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The traveler has to knock at every alien door to come to his own.

Rabindranath Tagore

Resurgam

     Exiled afar from youth and happy love,

     If death should ravish my fond spirit hence

     I have no doubt but, like a homing dove,

     It would return to its dear residence,

     And through a thousand stars find out the road

     Back into earthly flesh that was its loved abode.

       Alan Seeger

Dreamer

The subject of the dream is the dreamer.

Tony Morrison

Exceptional

Eventually it comes to you: the thing that makes you exceptional is also what makes you lonely.

Lorraine Hansberry

Gift

It is not because we have value that we are loved, but because we are loved that we have value.  Our value is a gift, not an achievement.

William Sloane Coffin

Quality of Life

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The quality of life is initially and inevitably predicated by love. ... And what is at stake is always the quality of life, which people know cannot be bettered, unless love is factored in.


Pier Giorgio Di Cicco, Municipal Mind: Manifestos for the Creative City

Miracle

A miracle is not defined by an event.  A miracle is defined by gratitude.

Kate Braestrup, Here If You Need Me: A True Story

Forgiveness

   
    God's forgiveness is more than a blessing;
    it's a challenge.

        William Sloane Coffin

Democracy

We can have a democracy or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of the few.  We cannot have both.

Justice Louis Brandeis

Character

Ultimately my character is defined by the quality of my sensitivity to other people.  I exist in equilibrium.  I am here to the degree I am there.

Hugh Prather, Love and Courage

Reading & Writing

Reading and writing are in themselves subversive acts.  What they subvert is the notion that things have to be the way they are, that you are alone, that no one has ever felt the way you have.

Mark Vonnegut on his Dad Kurt Vonnegut's writing

A poem in progress

Isn't a city a poem in progress?  ...  The citizen must self-identify as an artist,
with the same moral commitment to ideals, before we can have any credible allegiance to our environment.  This is the key to sustainability.

Pier Giorgio Di Cicco, Municipal Mind: Manifestos for the Creative City

Possibilities

Writers know that when we write, we feel the world move; it is flexible, crammed wih possibilities.

David Grossman

Where God Begins

When you come to an end, that's where God begins.

Reb Albert Lewis, Mitch Albom' s have a little faith: a true story

Whole Heart

The only whole heart is a broken heart.

Mitch Albom, have a little faith: a true story

Life 5

A man's life is nothing but an extended trek through the detours of art to recapture those one or two moments when his heart first opened.

Albert Camus

Artist

Everyone is an artist.  Each person brings sound out of silence and coaxes the invisible to become visible.

John O'Donohue, Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom

Being Whole

     I believe the only way we can be whole, healthy, 
     happy persons is to learn to forgive.

        Desmond Tutu, No Future Without Forgiveness

Rememberance

Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.

George Santayana

Joy

He who binds to himself a joy
Does the winged life destroy;
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in Eternity's sun rise.

William Blake

Failure

Failure is not having the courage to try, nothing more and nothing less.

Robin Sharma

Searching

How will you go about finding that thing the nature of which is totally unknown to you?

Plato, Meno

Being Woman

Any woman who wants to be equal to a man has no ambition.

a car bumper sticker seen by Archbishop Tutu, No Future Without Forgiveness

Still Voice

The only tyrant I accept in this world is the still voice within.

Mohandas Gandhi

Celtic Prayer

I arise today
through the strength of heaven, light of sun,
Radiance of moon,
Splendor of fire,
Speed of lightening,
Swiftness of wind,
Depth of sea,
Stability of earth,
Firmness of rock.

"St Patrick's Breastplate/The Deer's Cry," translated by Kuno Meyer in Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom by John O'Donouhe

Christianity

We are not going to win the masses to Christianity until we live it.

Dorothy Day, December 1961

Imperative of Humanity

To make pain real is the task of the writer.  To pursue the end of pain is the imperative of humanity.

Alice Sebold

Discovery

To myself I am only a child playing on the beach, while vast ocean of truth lie undiscovered before me.

Isaac Newton

A Blessing of Solitude

May you recognize in your life the presence, power, and light of your soul.
May you realize that you are never alone,
that your soul in its brightness and belonging connects you intimately with the rhythm of the universe.  ...
May you learn to see yourself with the same delight, pride, and expectation with which God sees you in every moment.

John O'Donohue, A Blessing of Solitude, Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom

Peace

Divine Peace-Bringer,
take what is jagged in my relationships,
and transform it with your grace.
I will do my best to bid farewell
to whatever keeps me from inner peace.
Help me bring your enduring harmony
into every part of my existence.
I open the door of my heart to you.
I open the door.


Joyce Rupp, The Open Door

Leadership

The true leader must at some point or other convince her or his followers that she or he is in this whole business not for self-aggrandizement but for the sake of others.

Desmond Tutu, No Futuer Without Forgiveness

Be the Change

Be the change that you wish to see in the world.


Mahatma Ghandi

Imagination

The imagination is the great friend of the unknown.  Endlessly, it invokes and releases the power of possibility.

John O'Donohue, Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom

Passage of Time

The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time.

Richie Havens

Will to Live

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Dylan Thomas, Do not go gentle into that good night

Colours

Colours are the wounds of light.

William Blake

Wounds of the Spirit

Die Wunden des Geistes Heilen, ohne dass Narben bleiben.

The wounds of the spirit heal and leave no scars.

Hegel

Choice

Every choice we make can be a celebration of the world we want.

Frances Moore Lappé and Anna Lappé

Miracles

And as to me, I know of nothing else but miracles.

Walt Whitman

Solitude

When you cease to fear your solitude, a new creativity awakens in you.  ...  You come home to yourself and learn to rest within.

John O'Donohue, Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom

Eternity

I think that maybe
I will be a little surer
of being a little nearer.
That's all.  Eternity
is in the understanding
that little is more than enough.

R. S. Thomas

Labour Pains

There is only one truth.
I shall give birth to a child,
truth driving outward from my inwardness.
Neither good nor bad; no sham about it.

Yosako Akiko, Labour Pains

Beannacht ("Blessing")

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
may the clarity of light be yours,
may the fluency of the ocean be yours,
may the protection of the ancestors be yours.

And so may a slow
wind work these words
of love around you,
an invisible cloak
to mind your life.

John O'Donohue, Beannacht ("Blessing")