The Dark Side

“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.”
– Yoda

Peace

"Peace requires us to surrender our illusions of control.  We can love and care for others but we cannot possess our children, lovers, family, or friends.  We can assist them, pray for them, and wish them well, yet in the end their happiness and suffering depend on their thoughts and actions, not on our wishes."

~Jack Kornfield~

Indifference

"Indifference pretends to create peace, but it is based on not caring, a silent resignation.  It is a movement away, a separation fed by a subtle fear of the heart.  We pull back, believing that what happens to others is not our concern.  Our courage leaves us.  Indifference is a misguided way of defending ourselves."
~Jack Kornfield~

John Gato

"Think of the things that are killing us as a nation: drugs, brainless competition, recreational sex, the pornography of violence, gambling, alcohol, and the worst pornography of all - lives devoted to buying things, accumulation as a religion."

Health & Healing

"To keep the body in good health is a duty... otherwise we shall not be able to keep our mind strong and clear." ~Buddha~

"The wish for healing has always been half of health." ~Lucius Annaeus Seneca~

"Every time you eat or drink you are either fighting disease or feeding it." ~Heather Morgan~

Pablo Picasso

"I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn how to do it."

J. Krishnamurti

"If you look into your mind, you will see it's like thousands of butterflies whirling about!  You can hardly trace a single idea in this complexity.  A way to bring clarity to the mind is to write down your immediate thoughts and feelings in response to the events of the day, and then ponder them.  If you emphasize one particular problem in this writing, it will gradually lead to all others."

Stevenson

"Quiet minds cannot be perplexed or frightened but go on in fortune or misfortune at their own private pace, like a clock during a thunderstorm."

I'm Waiting For The Sweet One

"One day Mullah Nasrudin was sitting in the market in front of a big basket of red hot chili peppers.  With tears streaming down his cheeks, eyes bloodshot, face red, and nose running, he kept eating one after another.  Every now and then he let out a big howl they were so hot! One of his students approached him and asked, 'Mullah! What on earth are you doing? Why do you keep eating them?'

'I'm waiting for the sweet one,' he replied."

~Idries Shaw~

Jane Dobisz

"It occurs to me in this vulnerable state that regardless of the practice, the teachings, or what I attain or don't attain, I can't control this body.  It will get sick, grow old, and die whether I like it or not, whether I am enlightened or not, and, most especially, whether I am ready or not."

Seung Sahn

The Human Route

"Coming empty-handed, going empty-handed — that is human.
When you are born, where do you come from?
When you die, where do you go?
Life is like a floating cloud which appears.
Death is like a floating cloud which disappears.
The floating cloud itself originally does not exist.
Life and death, coming and going, are also like that.
But there is one thing which always remains clear.
It is pure and clear, not depending on life and death.

Then what is the one pure and clear thing?"

Dhammapada

"Hostilities are not stilled
     Through hostility, regardless.
Hostilities are stilled
     Through Non-hostility:
This, an unending Truth."

Dr King

"The means by which we live have outdistanced the ends for which we live.  Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power.  We have guided missiles and misguided men."

Chinul

"Strengthen your will; reprimand yourself; reprove your own laziness.  Know your faults and turn toward what is good.  Reform and repent your bad conduct; train and control your mind.  Cultivate earnestly and the power of contemplation will grow; train continuously and your practice will become increasing pure."

Geri Larkin

"I've discovered a secret about this nowness.  In this place we can clean up our karma, the muck we've created in our lives that needs scrubbing.  When we see clearly we don't need to whine about anyone else, to blame them, or to run away.  We just need to see.  And then start scrubbing."

Yoda

"Size matters not.  Look at me.  Judge me by my size, do you? Hmmmm? Hmmmm.  And well you should not.  For my ally is the Force, and a powerful ally it is.  Life creates it, makes it grow.  Its energy surrounds us and binds us.  Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter.  You must feel the force around you; here, between you, me, the tree, the rock, everywhere, yes.  Even between the land and the ship."

Bernie Glassman

"We cook, eat, and appreciate the meal, whereas if we just sit around bitching about all the things we don't have and not eating anything, we'd starve.  And that goes for life, too.  Look at the ingredients you have, make the best meal possible, and offer it.  Don't forget to offer it.  If you make the meal just for yourself, you don't get the same pleasure."

Jeanette Winterson

"I understand that trouble is just something that has been filed in the wrong place.  That is what Jung was explaining of course - as the chaos of our unconscious contents drive to find their rightful place in the index of consciousness."

"I was going to be away, free, or so it seemed, but you always take it with you.  It takes much longer to leave the psychic place than the physical place."

Buddha Smiles

I have no idea.
     Truth.
          Complexities.
Seven Chakras.
Twelve Steps.

Questions.
     Discoveries.
          Acceptance.

If I listen to you,
     Can you hear me?

Enlightened!
     Enlightened to What?
          Enlighten Me.

Reality Is Enlightenment.

Accepting Self.
Accepting Others.

So simple.
No mystery.

Nothing to learn.
Nothing to teach.

Matter is neither created nor destroyed.

I matter.
You matter.
All matter.

What is here now
     has always been.

Big Bang!
Let There Be Light!

All is created from the same.

God.
     You.
         Me.

The Earth, Sun and Moon.
The Dirt, Trees and Water.

When I die
I become
What I once was.
     What I still am.
          What I will always be.

I am you
and
You are me.

God.  Light.  Love.  All.

You cannot create me.
I cannot destroy you.

Linked. Bound. Tied. All.

DO YOU KNOW HOW GOOD YOU SMELL?

Movement in the mind
Conscious shift
Conscious split.

Split from the lies,
Dust removed from the eyes.

Unblocked: From the Lies we tell ourselves.

The lie of separation.  Differentiation.

Words.  Thoughts. Actions. Voice.

The throat is unblocked by the Truth.
The light moves up and through and out.
into...

Reality is Heaven.
Heaven is Bliss.
Bliss is Real.
Real is now.

There is no pie in the sky.

Suffering is the human condition.

Can you suffer
     and accept?

Buddha Smiling.

Knowing how precious
this moment is.

This moment is reality
and we will never exist again.

The me that started does not finish.

My two year old Me,
does not exist.
That person does not exist.

The Me of yesterday does not exist.

Only me, now, this moment.
Only you, now, this moment.

Enlightenment is not an opening
of the seventh chakra to the cosmos.

It is not floating on the ninth cloud.

You cannot be Saved,
from yourself.

Exist. Now.  In This Moment. Only Once. Forever Gone.  Forever More.

Accepting
Smiling

Alice Walker

"The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don't have any."

Think Less... Do More

"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition." ~Steve Jobs~ 

"There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so." ~William Shakespeare~

 "When you begin to worry, go find something to do. Get busy being a blessing to someone; do something fruitful. Talking about your problem or sitting alone, thinking about it, does no good; it serves only to make you miserable. Above all else, remember that worrying is totally useless. Worrying will not solve your problem." ~Joyce Meyer~

Cherokee Legend - Two Wolves

"An old Cherokee is teaching her grandson about life... "A fight is going on inside me," she said to the boy. "It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. "One is evil - it is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, self-doubt, and ego. "The other is good - it is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, gratitude, trust, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. "This same fight is going on inside you - and inside every other person, too." The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandmother, "Which wolf will win?" The old Cherokee smiled and said, "The one you feed."

Decisions

Every decision is the wrong decision and the right decision at the same time depending on who is looking at it.

Acceptance

"Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend."
~Melody Beattie~

"Acceptance is not love. You love a person because he or she has lovable traits, but you accept everybody just because they're alive and human."
~Albert Ellis~

"Life becomes easier when you learn to accept an apology that you never got."
~Robert Brault~

"I'm not ok - And you're not ok - And that is ok."
~William Sloane Coffin

Dada Vaswani

"Happiness, true happiness, is an inner quality. It is a state of mind. If your mind is at peace, you are happy. If your mind is at peace, but you have nothing else, you can be happy. If you have everything the world can give - pleasure, possessions, power - but lack peace of mind, you can never be happy."

Jampolsky

“Peace of mind comes from not wanting to change others.”

Tao

“The best fighter is never angry.” ― Lao Tzu

love

"The people who love you for who you are and not for what you can do for them are the best kind of people."

Brigitte Nicole

wake up

"Waking up to who you are requires letting go of who you imagine yourself to be."

~Alan Watts~

freedom

“Our ultimate freedom is the right and power to decide how anybody or anything outside ourselves will affect us.” ~Stephen Covey