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Inspirational Quotes

I love a good quote. Something that’s inspiring. Something that makes me think. Something that reminds of something which should never be forgotten. Something that makes me laugh, smile or remember to appreciate the beauty of life. I have more quotes framed on my walls than I do artwork. Here are a few of favorites. Feel free to add to the list.

• “Getting rid of a delusion makes us wiser than getting hold of a truth.” - Ludwig Borne

• "I never think about the future, it always comes soon enough.” -Albert Einstein

• “Pray hard as if everything depends on God, and work hard as if everything depends on you.” -Edgar Cayce

• God is always there, just as is the sun, and all one needs is to step out into the sunshine. Nothing is asked by the sun but the stepping out, and nothing is asked by God but the same thing – the need of Him.” -Yogi Ramacharaka

• “Fear is where the information is.” -Sally Field

• "The greatest gift that you could ever give another is the expectation of their success." –‘Abraham Teachers’

• If you want to be of greatest value to others, see them as you know they want to be. That is the influence that you want to offer. –‘Abraham Teachers’

• “Every moment wasted looking back, keeps us from moving forward.” -Hillary Clinton

• “You are looking for God with His eyes.” –Adyashanti

• “You are today where your thoughts have brought you; you will be tomorrow where your thoughts take you.” - James Allen

• "Why is everyone here so happy except me?" "Because they have learned to see goodness and beauty everywhere," said the Master. "Why don't I see goodness and beauty everywhere?" "Because you cannot see outside of you what you fail to see inside." -Anthony de Mello

• “When you judge another, you do not define them, you define yourself.” -Wayne Dyer

• “Do everything with a mind that lets go. Don’t accept praise or gain or anything else. If you let go a little you a will have a little peace; if you let go a lot you will have a lot of peace; if you let go completely you will have complete peace.” –Ajahn Chah

• “There are some people who live in a dream world, and there are some who face reality; and then there are those who turn one into the other.” -Douglas Everett

• “Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.” -Andre Gide

• “He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else.” -Benjamin Franklin

• “There is nothing like a dream to create the future.” -Victor Hugo

• “We would accomplish many more things if we did not think of them as impossible.” –Vince Lombard

• “What we have once enjoyed we can never lose. All that we love deeply becomes a part of us.” -Helen Keller

Letting Go of Attachments

In that interim between having a dream and waking up from a dream, have you ever experienced a moment where you’ve forgotten yourself? Such forgetful moments are actually common occurrences in these in-between states, between sleep and wakefulness. It was during one of these experiences that realize I something pivotal.

Up until this particular occurrence it was easier for me to associate the idea of “attachments” with physical things - people, places and objects. Sometimes we obsessively cling to familiar tangibles for fear of losing what they have come to represent to us. When we convince ourselves that such objects are the source of our comfort and confidence in life they become our attachments. Our money, our cars, our houses, our designer whatever, our latest techno gizmos, the town we grew up in or maybe the one we grew up to move to, our lovers… Each of us has our own special inventory of physical somethings which we would rather fight the world trying before we willingly let go of them. We identify ourselves with the physical possessions we impart the most value to. This understanding was not new to me. But attachments don’t always have to have a physical form. I knew this too (but I knew it merely in the academic sense of the concept of knowing). It wasn’t until this incident that I was able to associate an actual experience to this academic understanding.

It started when the alarm clock jolted me awake mid dream. The shock of the abrupt change in my environment brought on a temporary confusion and for a moment everything was gone. I had no memory of what I had been dreaming, nor any tie to the world I awoke to. For just a split second I was aware of myself as being conscious and that was pretty much all. The absence of having any thought to readily identify myself with was an experience I wasn’t used to. The differentness of the feeling was disorienting and I was quick to panic. I craved an explanation for where I was and what I was supposed to be doing. I craved a sense of purpose, something I could hold onto so I wouldn’t feel so overwhelmed by the sheer openness of the mental space I was in. It was too much to take in all at once. It made me feel exposed and vulnerable. I reacted defensively as I instantly set about trying to re-call all the thoughts and perceptions which I knew to be familiar to me. I was desperate to get a grip on my reality. In the state of limbo I was in all my usual thoughts and perceptions were for some reason removed from me, I had to actively go about re-collecting them. I realize then how much of a sense of comfort I get from holding onto certain views and conceptions. These views and conceptions are the things that form the fabric of the character I play in life. I was used to the emotions these recurring thoughts inspired. They were what made me feel like me. Being so acutely aware of the cause and effect relationship in this experience is what really brought home for me that while I could (for the most part) care less about material things and material labels, I was indeed very attached to mental things and the mental labels I liked to attribute to myself. I am assured. I am respectful. I live up to what I promise I’m going to do… Despite all the baggage that comes along with my definitions of what these mental labels mean to me, I have been adamant in my determination to hold onto them. I could now plainly see, however, how much false comfort I was deriving from clinging to familiar ideas. Yeah I’ve been growing, but now I have a better appreciation for how far I still have to go.

The lesson here is this:
Your thoughts are not indigenous to you. You have to deliberately claim your perceptions. Every moment of your life you are intentionally creating the person you choose to be, the role you choose to play in life. Everything about you and your life experience is by your design. The choice is always yours. Even more insidious than our desperate artificial need to hold onto tangible things, is our desperate artificial need to hold onto a habited way of thinking. My experience in this particular in-between state from sleep to wakefulness made me realize how addicted I am to the role I have chosen to play in life.

I was never so keenly aware of the power I have to either hold or let go of my thoughts and beliefs as I was in this particular dreamy moment. It wasn’t until this moment that I became wholly mindful of my actively reaching to pull back familiar thoughts. And never before had I been so conscious of the emotions inspired by these thoughts once I’d reclaimed them. Though I felt a sense of security from the familiarity of bathing in old ideas, not all of what I called back was pleasant. But the fact that I have the power to hold also means that I have the power to release. I can let it all go, if I so choose, any time I want. I can start fresh; remake myself as many times as I want. And the same power of transformation applies to you too.

Two Kinds of Change: When Change Come From Within

There are two kinds of change. There is the change of appearance, which is of a superficial nature. And there is the change of heart which occurs when one chooses to see an idea or situation in a different light. This latter type of change is of a more substantive nature. It’s change from the inside out (which is the only Real change possible). Change that occurs from the outside in has to do with presentation and has nothing whatsoever to do with essentials. This brand of change does not reflect genuine transformation; it is merely a reflection of how a single state or condition has the potential to present itself in multiple ways. For example, you can be inwardly unhappy and bitter because you believe the world is out to get you in a situation where outwardly you appear to have little financial resources. And you can also be inwardly unhappy and bitter because you believe the world is out to get you in a situation where outwardly you appear to have abundant financial resources. So even if you start out materially poor and this outward condition changes to appear more favorable, such success does not necessarily mean that your bitterness and unhappiness will disappear. Yes, the package may be different but the contents will be just the same if the transformation does not arise from the within. Change, in order to be substantive, must be rooted in mental transmutation. The changes we see are just the outward show of things. The changes we feel are what actually indicate either true spiritual development or relative stagnation.

A Brief Reflection (6) The Opportunity of Fear

Know that if you’re afraid to fail, you will never succeed. In the pursuit of happiness, fear should not be looked upon as that thing that turns you around and keeps you boxed in. Fear should be valued as the doorway to a fantastic adventure. Why? Because the only way to realize that you have no limitations is to step outside of your comfort zone and experience how open life truly is to you.

Where is God in All This Suffering?

Not to long ago I noticed something about myself which, after I relented and submitted to honoring it, I actually found kind of amusing. It occurred to me that whenever I start to feel stressed about anything in my life, in those moments, in the midst of my anxiety (always when I’m not looking), something remarkably comforting never fails to come over me. An emotional hug of sorts, like somebody, somewhere, suddenly turns on the lights and makes the darkness I’d been wandering aimlessly in disappear. It’s a peaceful feeling that saturates my entire being and for a moment I am at ease with not only the understanding, but also an absolute knowing that despite whatever plight may appear before me, everything is going to be (and indeed truly already is) alright.

Of course after a second or two of allowing myself the pleasurable experience of this “unfounded” assurance, I would immediately set out to then discredit the incident as nothing more than fanciful thinking. After all, all the information within the bounds of my awareness says that I’m really in some stuff here and that this stuff is only going to get thicker. And who am I to argue with the facts of the actual tangible evidence which lies before me? So after enjoying my moment of groundless serenity for a brief instant, I tell myself that it’s now time to come back to reality. I tell myself that every moment spent in the comfort of baseless feelings (baseless because they aren’t based on anything materially evident) is a moment spent in denial; and that I cannot get to work on solving the problem before me if I insist on walking around with my head in the clouds. It’s an argument that never fails to send me crashing back into the chaos of my troubled circumstance where I once again return to a state of feeling riddle with anxiety and grow so mentally scattered that it becomes difficult for me to tell where any one thing connects to any other. And this is the environment in which I have chosen to devise a rational response to whatever has sent my world into a tailspin. You’re beginning to pick up on the funny too now, aren’t you?

I have elected to be “sensible,” and in so doing not only have I traded paradise for the slums, the greater tragedy is that I’ve also robbed myself of the big picture experience (I had been having) which not only contained within it the storm of this moment, but also possessed the moment of clarity which is to follow. In choosing to dismiss the comfort of my unfounded assurance, the blissfulness of the grand picture of my life soon becomes lost in the minutia of its gritty details. It’s a pitiful trade I’ve made and a sorry prize I’ve won, all in the name of being realistic. Yet time and time again I allowed myself to be duped into believing that this time, this trade, this choice is going to be a winning strategy. Of course it never turns out this way and in retrospect I always come to realize that I’ve put myself through more pain than I actually need have in moving through a trying time.

Every single time, during every trying experience in my life, I have experienced this opening. And every single time I have been the one who has been responsible for the closing of this opening – it has never been yanked away from me. I have always been the one to voluntarily shut it because for a very long time my traditional response to suddenly finding myself in this alien space of absolute comfort and assurance was, I can’t stay here. I need to get back to reality. Little did I realize then that it actually was this space of absolute comfort and assurance that is Reality! And that the place I was insisting on getting back to was a place of chaos which I wouldn’t be fit to go back to unless and until I fully drank in the experience that everything is okay.

Such blissful experiences are not unique to me. I’m convinced that they happen to us all; however, not all of us are given to paying attention to them. We sometimes like to play the victim in life and are prone to ask ourselves, where is God in all this suffering? For me, I have realized that the answer to this question is that God is right here, within me, all the time. He makes me most aware of His presence in those inexplicable moments of consolation that I have so often chosen to push away in favor of dealing with the dirty “facts” of life.

I am reminded of that poem, first written by Mary Stevenson in 1936 (revised by Carolyn Carty in 1963, and later on by Margaret Fishback Powers in 1964) entitled Footprints in the Sand.

One night I dreamed I was walking along the beach with the Lord. Many scenes from my life flashed across the sky.

In each scene I noticed footprints in the sand. Sometimes there were two sets of footprints, other times there was one only.

This bothered me because I noticed that during the low periods of my life, when I was suffering from anguish, sorrow or defeat, I could see only one set of footprints, so I said to the Lord,

“You promised me Lord,that if I followed you, you would walk with me always. But I have noticed that during the most trying periods of my life there has only been one set of footprints in the sand. Why, when I needed you most, have you not been there for me?”

The Lord replied, “The years when you have seen only one set of footprints, my child, is when I carried you.”

The message:
Never doubt that a Higher Power walks with you. And never doubt that it’s when you need Him most that He most strikingly reveals His presence. Don’t be so quick to dismiss that inner voice you hear that tries to assure you that you’re okay, life’s is good and everything is truly alright.

We’re All in Different Places, And That’s Okay

Sometimes it can be difficult to resist the impulse not to put people in a box. For most of us, sizing people up and then applying the labels we feel best characterizes them is such an ingrain habit that parting from this tendency requires an extraordinary amount of diligence and attention from us. For my efforts, along this line, I try to stay mindful of the truth that not only do people have the capacity to change, that people actually do change and are in fact constantly changing all the time. Nothing in the universe stays the same from one moment to the next. Everything is in perpetual motion. All souls are in growth. Still I find it wise not to expect more from another person than what past experience has shown me to be typical for them. My reason for this, however, is not cynicism. My reasoning is I’d rather set myself up to be pleasantly surprised when and if expectations are exceeded, than set myself up to be grossly disappointed, annoyed, aggravated or whatever have you, if expectations fall short. Because while I recognize that it is indeed true that all souls are in growth, I can also appreciate that the rate at which that growth is developing may, perhaps, be exceedingly slow.

We’re all in different places. And over time I have come to realize that it is not my job to try to make others conform to the life outlook I would have for them. It is a modern truism that people are going to do, what people are going to do; and I, in my experience, have had to come to terms with the fact that I have absolutely no control over another person. I have come to realize that the only person I do in fact have control over, and this control is absolute, is me. So while I may and most certainly do influence other people, I’ve learned from experience that it is best not to use this influence in an effort to intentionally manipulate another. The job of changing other people is not my place. People must be inspired to change out of the lessons learned from their own experience. Everybody has their own lesson plan in life. And God, that All imbuing, All wise, All loving, indelible presence within each of us is both the beginning and the end realization of all these plans. Everything emerges from a single Source. And in the end, All things resolve back to this Source. Nothing, truly, goes off course. Nothing is ever really lost to love and goodness. Even those things which, from our limited point of view, seem to have gone astray, are actually exactly where they need to be in the Grand scheme of things.

God, being infinite, demonstrates His limitlessness through the diversity we see playing out in the universe. So even though goodness, and love, and wisdom, etc. is the ultimate Truth, demonstrations of every degree of even ultimate qualities must be played out in life. If this were not so, infiniteness would in fact be limited. In other words, not only must goodness have expression in life, but evil (which is merely a lesser degree of goodness) must be expressed as well. The same is true of love and hate, wisdom and ignorance, power and impotence, and on and on. It is part and parcel of the principle of polarity. Everything has its opposite. And all opposites are identical in nature, varying only in degree. Like and unlike are essentially the same. And even though all qualities are not absolute, all qualities are valid expressions of The One (infinite God).

So my advice to myself has been: be supportive of those who reach out for a hand from you, but recognize that it is not part of your life’s work to go on a crusade to change those who choose to follow a path which is not in agreement with yours. Live and let be. Know that it will all come to good in the end. We are all in different places in life, and that’s exactly as it should be because we, in our infinite diversity, reflect the infiniteness of The One (God).