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Posts tagged ‘optimism’

Oct 25

Fight Them Daily

“All God wants of man is a peaceful heart.”― Meister Eckhart

“There were many terrible things in my life and most of them never happened.”― Michel de Montaigne

Eyes of the road in front and just ahead.
Not in the rearview mirror, not too far out.
Worry, opinion, assumptions, resentment, judgment, comparison suck the life out of life.
Time wasters, energy drainers.
Cynicism is like planting seeds in cement, nothing grows, nothing created.
Joy, beauty, peace, laughter, anticipation, gratitude, kindness, generosity, delight, wonder – balms for the soul, well-fillers, life-changers.
Cast light, change your world, change the world.

“We have to fight them daily, lake fleas, those many small worries about the morrow, for they sap our energies.”― Etty Hillesum

Oct 21

Chasing Sunset

“When I admire the wonder of a sunset or the beauty of the moon, my soul expands in worship of the Creator.” – Mahatma Gandhi

“Embrace the sacredness of existence.”― Lailah Gifty Akita

At the end of each day, may you find the wherewithal to chase sunset.
To see the depth and breadth of brilliant colors and hues.
Catch the light, absorbing it into your bones.
Returning to sacred space and place often.
Igniting and fanning the flames of wonder and awe.

“Your sacred space is where you can find yourself again and again.” – Joseph Campbell

Oct 20

What Moves Us Forward

“Awe, you see, is what moves us forward.”― Joseph Campbell, Thou Art That: Transforming Religious Metaphor

“Her pleasure in the walk must arise from the exercise and the day, from the view of the last smiles of the year upon the tawny leaves and withered hedges, and from repeating to herself some few of the thousand poetical descriptions extant of autumn – that season of peculiar and inexhaustible influence on the mind of taste and tenderness–that season which has drawn from every poet worthy of being read some attempt at description, or some lines of feeling.”― Jane Austen, Persuasion

Do not pass by beauty aloof, asleep.
Our imagination atrophies when we don’t use it.
Wonder, awe, delight is overflowing and abundant.
New day, fresh canvas, joy to be hold and be held.
Go on, move forward, dive in.

“Wonder. Go on and wonder.”― William Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury

Oct 17

A Bit Simpler

“I really must become a bit simpler. Let myself live a bit more. Not always insist on the results straight away. I know what the remedy is, though: just to crouch huddled up on the ground in a corner and listen to what is going on inside me. Thinking gets you nowhere. It may be a fine and noble aid in academic studies, but you can’t think your way out of emotional difficulties. That takes something altogether different. You have to make yourself passive then, and just listen. Reestablish contact with a slice of eternity.”― Etty Hillesum, An Interrupted Life: The Diaries, 1941-1943; and Letters from Westerbork

“A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” – Winston Churchill

Optimism does not deny reality nor ignore circumstances.
Not naïve or simplistic.
Resilience, strength, a daily practice, a decision.
Acknowledging what is present, choosing to put energy into persistence, hope and gratitude.
Create or criticize.
Choose well.

“I am an optimist. It does not seem too much use being anything else.” – Winston Churchill

Oct 14

Passing Through But Once

“Paying attention is a form of reciprocity with the living world, receiving the gifts with open eyes and open heart.”― Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants

Slow and pause.
Look longer.
Read between the lines.
Take a deeper dive.
To here and now.
To present.
In, out, all around.
Receive the overflowing gifts borne of attention, of wonder, of awe.
Open eyes. Open heart. Warm embrace.

“I shall pass through this world but once. Any good therefore that I can do or any kindness that I can show to any human being, let me do it now. Let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.”― Henry Drummond, The Supreme Gift

Oct 8

Night Sun

“Go slowly, my lovely moon, go slowly.”― Khaled Hosseini, The Kite Runner

“To try to understand the imperceptible
Power pervading the world;
To fly and find pure ethereal substances
That are not of matter
But of that invisible soul pervading reality.
To hear another soul and to whisper to another soul;
To be a lantern in the darkness
Or an umbrella in a stormy day;
To feel much more than know.
To be the eyes of an eagle, slope of a mountain;
To be a wave understanding the influence of the moon”― Dejan Stojanovic

May you feel the weight, gravity and expanse of the universe each day
Standing in awe
Arms up in praise
Kneeling in wonder
Like a child with a well of curiosity, enthusiasm, joy, innocence, love
Return within to where you began before the world took hold and said “no”
To the light within as bright as the night sun.

“We are going to the moon that is not very far. Man has so much farther to go within himself.”― Anaïs Nin

Oct 7

Autumn Awakened

“Winter is an etching, spring a watercolor, summer an oil painting, and autumn a mosaic of them all.” – Stanley Horowitz

“And the sun took a step back, the leaves lulled themselves to sleep and autumn was awakened.” – Raquel Franco

The brilliant color of autumn leaves doesn’t linger as long as the flowers of spring and summer.
Here but for a breath, a blink, a minute.
Ablaze with orange, gold, red at the same time.
A mosaic of all seasons.
Do not miss the show pining for summer behind, dreading winter ahead.
Seasons, cycles, circles have their place and purpose in our journey.
To prepare, to anticipate, to savor, to plant, to bloom, to die, to life, again and again.
Dance to tune of the season, anchored in beauty in each, held in delight.

“There is a harmony in autumn, and a luster in its sky, which through the summer is not heard or seen, as if it could not be, as if it had not been.” – Percy Bysshe Shelley

Sep 10

Looking

“The earth is full of thresholds where beauty awaits the wonder of our gaze.”― John O’Donohue, Divine Beauty: The Invisible Embrace

“Listen to your life. See it for the fathomless mystery it is. In the boredom and pain of it, no less than in the excitement and gladness: touch, taste, smell your way to the holy and hidden heart of it, because in the last analysis all moments are key moments, and life itself is grace.”― Frederick Buechner, Now and Then: A Memoir of Vocation

Spark to flame.
Reignite your senses.
Beauty the match.
Eyes, ears, imagination, heart.
Sharpen, hone, tune.
Compass of joy, wonder, hope, grace.
The quality of looking, of listening.
Senses reawakened to now.

“When our eyes are graced with wonder, the world reveals its wonders to us. There are people who see only dullness in the world and that is because their eyes have already been dulled. So much depends on how we look at things. The quality of our looking determines what we come to see.”― John O’Donohue, Beauty: The Invisible Embrace

Sep 8

The Why

“Love is the “why” of life,
why we are functioning at all.
I am convinced
it is the fundamental energy
of the human spirit.
the fuel on which we run,
the wellspring of our vitality.

And grace,
which is the flowing,
creative activity, of love itself,
is what makes all goodness possible.

Love should come first,
it should be the beginning of,
and the reason for everything.”

― Gerald May

We decide daily how we enter and engage with the world, others, self.
Choose love daily and act on it.
So goodness, joy, peace and light prevail within and throughout.

“Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity or registering wrongs.”― Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre

Aug 31

Ride the Air

“If you surrendered to the air, you could ride it.” – Toni Morrison

“The new life into which we are baptized is lived out in days, hours, and minutes. God is forming us into a new people. And the place of that formation is in the small moments of today.”― Tish Harrison Warren, Liturgy of the Ordinary: Sacred Practices in Everyday Life

Get a new perspective, a fresh view, a different angle
Loosen your grip, open your heart
Release thoughts of scarcity, comparison, someday when, not enough
In moments, in this day, and all it took to arrive
You are more than enough, complete and imperfect
Ride the air
Pockets of joy and delight
Sit here awhile for the work to be completed in you.

“What’s your best discovery?” asked the mole.

“That I’m enough as I am,” said the boy.”

― Charlie Mackesy, The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse

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