martha hickman

"we were surprised and disappointed that people we thought were good friends became distant, uneasy, and seemed unable to help us.  others who were casual acquaintances became suddenly close, sustainers of life for us.  grief changes the rules, and sometimes rearranges the combinations."

steinbeck

“It's so much darker when a light goes out than it would have been if it had never shone.” 

Winterson

“You’ll get over it…” It’s the clichés that cause the trouble. To lose someone you love is to alter your life for ever. You don’t get over it because ‘it” is the person you loved. The pain stops, there are new people, but the gap never closes. How could it? The particularness of someone who mattered enough to grieve over is not made anodyne by death. This hole in my heart is in the shape of you and no-one else can fit it. Why would I want them to?” 

Louis de Pointe du Lac

"But all my passion went with her golden hair."

a hole in the world

“Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night."
~St Vincent Millay~

Irving

“There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition, and of unspeakable love.”

monsoon

"If there was a love strong enough to make you stay...
You'd be here.

But you're not here, 
and with all my tears...
It feels like monsoon every day."

Strand

"Nothing could stop you.
Not the best day.  Not the quiet.  Not the ocean rocking.
You went on with your dying."

Joan Didion

"Nothing I read about grief seemed to exactly express the craziness of it; which was the interesting aspect of it to me - how really tenuous our sanity is."

gone

"It is hard to forget, when there is such an empty space when you have gone."

Garden

"Grief can be the garden of compassion. 
If you keep your heart open through everything, 
your pain can become your greatest ally 
in your life's search for love and wisdom."

river runs through it...

"Each one of us here today will, at one time in our lives, look upon a loved one in need and ask the same question: We are willing Lord, but what, if anything, is needed? For it is true that we can seldom help those closest to us. Either we don’t know what part of ourselves to give, or more often than not, that part we have to give... is not wanted. And so it is those we live with and should know who elude us... But we can still love them... We can love—completely—even without complete understanding..."

Grief

"Life's not a song. 

Life isn't bliss. 

Life is just this: it's living. 

You'll get along. The pain that you feel, it only can heal by living. 

You have to keep on living, so one of us is living."

Thomas Browne

"We carry with us the wonders, we seek without us: There is all Africa, and her prodigies in us; we are that bold and adventurous piece of nature, which he that studies, wisely learns in a compendium, what others labour at in a divided piece and endless volume."

As the Buddha says...

"So watch the thought and its ways with care,
And let it spring from love,
Born out of concern for all beings…
As the shadow follows the body,
As we think, so we become"

kevin griffin

"While many people tend to think of spirituality as looking up, toward the heights of perfection or saintliness, the Steps remind us that we must first look down, into the darkness of our souls, and see and accept our shadow before we attain an honest and authentic spiritual life."

more rumi...

"Do not stray into the neighborhood of despair; for there are hopes: they are real, they exist!
Do not go in the direction of darkness; I tell you: suns exist!"

Six Years

"To those devoid of imagination a blank place on the map is a useless waste; to others, the most valuable part."
~ Aldo Leopold ~

Bruce Lee

"Don't pray for an easy life.  Pray for the strength to endure a difficult one."

William Gass

"The true alchemists do not change lead into gold.  They change the world into words."

Paulo Coelho

"When you say 'Yes' to others, make sure you are not saying 'No' to yourself."

rumi

"Doing as others told me, I was blind.
Coming when others called me, I was lost.
Then I left everyone, myself as well.
Then I found everyone, myself as well."

One Altar

"I go into the Muslim mosque and the Jewish synagogue and the Christian church and I see one altar."
~Rumi~

Rumi

"When you're walking through the graveyard at night 

and you see a boogeyman, run AT it,

and it will go away."

"Let the beauty we love be what we do."

"Be patient.

Respond to every call

that excites your spirit."

"Don't regret what's happened.  If it's in the past,

let it go."

"This world is a mountain.  What we do

is a shout.  The echo comes back to you."

"Some human beings are safe havens.

Be companions with them.

Others may seem to be friends,

but they're really consuming your essence"

Appreciating Ourselves

"We are the greatest thing that will ever happen to us. Believe it. It makes life much easier.

It is time to stop this nonsense of running around picking on ourselves.

We may have walked through much of our life apologizing for ourselves either directly or indirectly—feeling less valuable than others, believing that they know better than we do, and believing that somehow others are meant to be here and we are not.

We have a right to be here.

We have a right to be ourselves.

We are here. There is a purpose, a reason, and an intention for our life. We do not have to apologize for being here or being who we are.

We are good enough, and deserving.

Others do not have our magic. We have our magic. It is in us.

It doesn’t matter what we’ve done in our past. We all have a past, woven with mistakes, successes, and learning experiences. We have a right to our past. It is ours. It has worked to shape and form us. As we progress on this journey, we shall see how each of our experiences will be turned around and used for good.

We have already spent too much time being ashamed, being apologetic, and doubting the beauty of ourselves. Be done with it. Let it go. It is an unnecessary burden. Others have rights, but so do we. We are neither less than nor more than. We are equal. We are who we are. That is who we were created and intended to be.

That, my friend, is a wonderful gift.

God, help me own my power to love and appreciate myself. Help me give myself validity instead of looking to others to do that."

~Melody Beattie~

Anne Lamott

"You can safely assume that you've created God in your own image if it turns out that your God hates the same people you do."

Cobain

"I would rather be hated for who I am than loved for who I am not."

Timber Hawkeye

"No one can drive you crazy, unless you give them the keys."

Bob Dylan

"Just when you think you lost everything, you find out that you can always lose a little more."

Gesshin Greenwood

"From the ultimate perspective, True practice is all the same practice. There's zazen in the morning, work, zazen and then sleep. Throughout zazen and work and sleep there's always your mind, your thoughts and opinions and emotions drifting by like clouds. There's your attitude and attention, which is the only thing you can really control: how you relate to people, how you chop vegetables, the quality of your interaction with the world around you. There are doubts and fears and then letting go of those doubts, and continuing with practice. The water is clear right down to the bottom, and fish swim like fish."