Paradoxically, the dark night of the soul is often a sign of significant spiritual progress for it is not really the soul (higher Self) but the ego that is in the dark. Some comfort can be obtained by recalling the spiritual dictum that one can only go as...
Mindfulness is a "coming to your senses" that moves closer and closer to the fore, quite spontaneously, when you regularly set aside the time to practice. It allows you to experience the world--calmly and nonjudgmentally--directly through your senses. It gives you a tremendous sense of perspective. You can sense what...
"How am I to start upon this process of true self-knowledge?"...
Make it a point in your life: Let there be no negative thought in the mind. If you really want peace of mind, don't ever harbor any negative thought even if it be true. It does not matter whether it is true or not, there is no place...
2 by Lao Tzu (604-531 BCE) Beauty and ugliness have one origin. Name beauty, and ugliness is. Recognizing virtue recognizes evil. Is and is not produce one another. The difficult is born in the easy, long is defined by short, the high by the low. Instrument and voice achieve one harmony. Before and after have places. That is why the sage can act without...
Never say any man is hopeless, because he only represents a character: a bundle of habits, which can be checked by new and better ones. Character is repeated habits, and repeated habits alone can reform character. Swami Vivekananda The ancient teachings of Vedanta say the goal of all yoga is to...
It is not quick or easy, we find, to allow the true self or to allow the true God. The task of life is the gradual unveiling of both… Resurrection takes care of itself. It comes naturally once the false self is abandoned. But what an abandoning! Every movement...
Self-worth is not created; it is discovered. Richard Rohr, What the Mystics Know Many of us seem to suffer from a sense of low self-worth. We look around and see all that we don’t have that others have. We look within and see thoughts and feelings that speak to us of how...
Every particle of the world is a mirror, In each atom lies the blazing light of a thousand suns. Cleave the heart of a rain-drop, a hundred pure oceans will flow forth. Look closely at a grain of sand, the seed of a thousand beings can be seen. Mahmoud Shabestari A recent study of memory in nursing home patients showed...
Love says, 'I am everything.' Wisdom says, 'I am nothing.' Between these two my life flows. Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj Who am I? Am I this body? These thoughts? This packet of desires? Am I the religion I practice? The money I make? The gender I am? The opinions I have about...