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Tag Archives: Dalai Lama
Rabindranath Tagore, Mevlana Rumi, Dalai Lama, Vonnegut, Nhat Hahn, Lao Tzu, Yoko Ono, Mahatma Gandhi, Buddha <3
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☮Peace is every step.
- Thich Nhat Hahn
The Inner Sun
Love is longing and longing, the pain of being parted;
No illness is rich enough for the distress of the heart,
A lover’s lament surpasses all other cries of pain.
Love is the royal threshold to God’s mystery.
The carnival of small affections and polite attachments
Which litter and consume our passing time
Is no match to Love which pulses behind this play.
It’s easy to talk endlessly about Love,
To live Love is to be seized by joy and bewilderment;
Love is not clear-minded, busy with images and argument.
Language is too precocious, too impudent, too sane
To stop the molten lava of Love which churns the blood,
This practicing energy burns the tongue to silence;
The knowing pen is disabled, servile paper
Shrivels in the fire of Love. Bald reason too is an ass
Explaining Love, deceived by spoilt lucidity.
Love is dangerous offering no consolation,
Only those who are ravaged by Love know Love,
The sun alone unveils the sun to those who have
The sense to receive the senseless and not turn away.
Cavernous shadows need the light to play but light
And light alone can lead you to the light alone.
Material shadows weigh down your vision with dross,
But the rising sun splits the ashen moon in empty half.
The outer sun is our daily miracle in timely
Birth and death, the inner sun
Dazzles the inner eye in a timeless space.
Our daily sun is but a working star in a galaxy of stars,
Our inner sun is One, the dancing nuance of eternal light.
You must be set alight by the inner sun,
You have to live your Love or else
You’ll only end in words.
~ Mevlana Rumi
Translated by Raficq Abdulla
Knowing ignorance is strength; ignoring knowledge is sickness.
- Lao Tzu
I tell you one thing – if you want peace of mind, do not find fault with others. Rather learn to see your own faults. Learn to make the whole world your own. No one is a stranger, my child; this whole world is your own.
– SRI SARADA DEVI
Our world is in profound danger. Mankind must establish a set of positive values with which to secure its own survival.
This quest for enlightenment must begin now.
It is essential that all men and women become aware of what they are, why they are here on Earth and what they must do to preserve civilization before it is too late. ~ Richard Matheson (born 20 February 1926)
I will, in the name of humanity which is outraged, in the name of liberty which is fettered, in the name of the constitution and the Bible, which are disregarded and trampled upon, dare to call in question and to denounce, with all the emphasis I can command, everything that serves to perpetuate slavery — the great sin and shame of America! “I will not equivocate; I will not excuse;” I will use the severest language I can command; and yet not one word shall escape me that any man, whose judgement is not blinded by prejudice, or who is not at heart a slaveholder, shall not confess to be right and just.
~ Frederick Douglass ~
There can be no Friendship where there is no Freedom. Friendship loves a free Air, and will not be penned up in streight and narrow Enclosures. It will speak freely, and act so too; and take nothing ill where no ill is meant; nay, where it is, ’twill easily forgive, and forget too, upon small Acknowledgments. ~ William Penn
All in all is all we are. ~ Kurt Cobain (born 20 February 1967)
We picked up everything we could get our hands on. Not that we needed all that for the trip, but once you get locked into a serious drug-collection, the tendency is to push it as far as you can.
The only thing that really worried me was the ether. There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge. And I knew we’d get into that rotten stuff pretty soon. ~ Hunter S. Thompson (died 20 February 2005)
If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one; or it may be a physical one; or it may be both moral and physical; but it must be a struggle. ~ Frederick Douglass
Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what a people will submit to, and you have found out the exact amount of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them; and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress. Men may not get all they pay for in this world; but they must pay for all they get. ~ Frederick Douglass (died February 20, 1895; born February 1817/1818, birthdate unknown)
No man can put a chain about the ankle of his fellow man without at last finding the other end fastened about his own neck. ~ Frederick Douglass
If you cannot find the truth right where you are, where else do you expect to find it?
- Dogen Zenji
Words of wisdom
came to me at last
“the beloved you’ve lost
the one you’ve been seeking outside
can only be found inside”
- Rumi
All great truths begin as blasphemies.
- George Bernard Shaw
”…meditation is the only way to make you absolutely sane.”
~ Osho
The rose has come from beyond; it is from the other world. That’s why this world cannot encompass the rose. The rose is so graceful, so elegant that the world of dreams is too narrow to dream of the rose. What is meant by the rose, a messenger from the garden of the intellect, from the grove of spirit? What is the rose? A document that describes the beauty and the highness of the rose of truth that neither turns brown nor withers.
~ Rumi
Come come the roses are in bloom!
The Beloved has arrived!
Now it is time to unite the soul and the world.
~ Rumi
Without trying, the world is heading for perfect awareness – and you are part of it.
- Yoko Ono
We cannot be loving and compassionate unless at the same time we curb our own harmful impulses and desires.
Large human movements spring from individual human initiatives.
- Dalai Lama
☮Peace is the only battle worth waging.
- Albert Camus (1913-1960)
☮All it takes for evil to rule a land is for good men to remain silent.
- Daniel Webster (1782-1852)
Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, What are you doing for others. ♥ Martin Luther King, Jr.
Make the most of yourself, for that is all there is of you.
♥ Ralph Waldo Emerson
”Responding to adverse situations or conditions with patience and tolerance rather than reacting with anger and hatred involves active restraint, which arises from a strong, self-disciplined mind. We should not see patience as a sign of weakness or giving in, but rather as a sign of strength.”
- Dalai Lama
Seek out the source
which shines forever.
- Mevlana Rumi
“In the midst of death life persists.
In the midst of untruth truth persists.
In the midst of darkness light persists.”
- Mahatma Gandhi
We are all dependent on one another, every soul of us on earth.
– George Bernard Shaw
I am not so enamored of my own opinions that I disregard what others may think of them. I am aware that a philosopher’s ideas are not subject to the judgement of ordinary persons, because it is his endeavor to seek the truth in all things, to the extent permitted to human reason by God. Yet I hold that completely erroneous views should be shunned. ~ Nicolaus Copernicus (born 19 February 1473)
External success has to do with people who may see me as a model, or an example, or a representative. As much as I may dislike or want to reject that responsibility, this is something that comes with public success. It’s important to give others a sense of hope that it is possible and you can come from really different places in the world and find your own place in the world that’s unique for yourself. ~ Amy Tan (born 19 February 1952)
Hello darkness, my old friend
I’ve come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence.
~ Paul Simon ~
(Lyrics to “The Sound of Silence” — written on this day in 1964)
Now that your rose is in bloom,
A light hits the gloom on the grave,
I’ve been kissed by a rose on the grave.
~ Seal ~
And the sign flashed out its warning
In the words that it was forming
And the sign said “The words of the prophets
Are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls
And whispered in the sound of silence.”
~ Paul Simon ~ (song written on this day in 1964)
People have such terrible assumptions about ghosts — you know, phantoms that haunt you, that make you scared, that turn the house upside down. Yin people are not in our living presence but are around, and kind of guide you to insights. Like in Las Vegas when the bells go off, telling you you’ve hit the jackpot. Yin people ring the bells, saying, “Pay attention.” And you say, “Oh, I see now.” Yet I’m a fairly skeptical person. I’m educated, I’m reasonably sane, and I know that this subject is fodder for ridicule. … To write the book, I had to put that aside. As with any book. I go through the anxiety, “What will people think of me for writing something like this?” But ultimately, I have to write what I have to write about, including the question of life continuing beyond our ordinary senses. ~ Amy Tan
Baby, I compare you to a kiss from a rose on the grave.
Ooh, the more I get of you,
Stranger it feels, yeah.
And now that your rose is in bloom,
A light hits the gloom on the grave.
~ Seal ~
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Wikiquote:Quote_of_the_day/February#19
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I’m sure you’ve noticed that more and more people are getting aware.
- Yoko Ono
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“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”
— Martin Luther King Jr.
“You’ve gotta dance like there’s nobody watching,
Love like you’ll never be hurt,
Sing like there’s nobody listening,
And live like it’s heaven on earth.”
— William W. Purkey
“You know you’re in love when you can’t fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.”
— Dr. Seuss
“I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells.”
— Dr. Seuss
“Be the change that you wish to see in the world.”
— Mahatma Gandhi
“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.”
— Maya Angelou
“A room without books is like a body without a soul.”
— Marcus Tullius Cicero
“No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”
— Eleanor Roosevelt
“Don’t walk behind me; I may not lead. Don’t walk in front of me; I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend.”
— Albert Camus
“If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything.”
— Mark Twain
“Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.”
— Oscar Wilde
“It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.”
— Abraham Lincoln
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”
— Mark Twain
“So many books, so little time.”
— Frank Zappa
“Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: “What! You too? I thought I was the only one.”
— C.S. Lewis
“In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: it goes on.”
— Robert Frost
“Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.”
— Mahatma Gandhi
“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
— Maya Angelou
“Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”
— John Lennon
“If you don’t stand for something you will fall for anything.”
— Malcolm X
“Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That’s why we call it ‘The Present’.”
— Eleanor Roosevelt
“Without music, life would be a mistake.”
— Friedrich Nietzsche
“A fool thinks himself to be wise, but a wise man knows himself to be a fool.”
— William Shakespeare (As You Like It)
“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.”
— Albert Einstein
“Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.”
— Mark Twain
“I believe that everything happens for a reason. People change so that you can learn to let go, things go wrong so that you appreciate them when they’re right, you believe lies so you eventually learn to trust no one but yourself, and sometimes good things fall apart so better things can fall together.”
— Marilyn Monroe
“The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it’s indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it’s indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it’s indifference.”
— Elie Wiesel
“Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog it’s too dark to read.”
— Groucho Marx (The Essential Groucho)
“All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost;
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by the frost.
From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
A light from the shadows shall spring;
Renewed shall be blade that was broken,
The crownless again shall be king.”
— J.R.R. Tolkien (The Fellowship of the Ring)
“The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who can’t read them.”
— Mark Twain
“That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”
— Friedrich Nietzsche
“A day without sunshine is like, you know, night.”
— Steve Martin
“I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.”
— Albert Einstein
“We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.”
— Oscar Wilde (Lady Windermere’s Fan)
“If you want to know what a man’s like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals.”
— J.K. Rowling (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire)
“The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.”
— Jane Austen (Northanger Abbey)
“Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and it may be necessary from time to time to give a stupid or misinformed beholder a black eye.”
— Jim Henson
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The Great Spirit does not toil within the bounds of human time, place, or casualty.
The Great Spirit is superior to these human questionings. It teems with many rich and wandering drives which to our shallow minds seem contradictory; but in the essence of divinity they fraternize and struggle together, faithful comrades-in-arms.
The primordial Spirit branches out, overflows, struggles, fails, succeeds, trains itself. It is the Rose of the Winds.
~ Nikos Kazantzakis ~
What a man believes may be ascertained, not from his creed, but from the assumptions on which he habitually acts. ~ George Bernard Shaw
Teachers are those who use themselves as bridges, over which they invite their students to cross; then having facilitated their crossing, joyfully collapse, encouraging them to create bridges of their own. ~ Nikos Kazantzakis (born 18 February 1883)
At some point in life the world’s beauty becomes enough. You don’t need to photograph, paint or even remember it. It is enough. No record of it needs to be kept and you don’t need someone to share it with or tell it to. When that happens — that letting go — you let go because you can. ~Toni Morrison (born 18 February 1931)
The doors of heaven and hell are adjacent and identical. ~ Nikos Kazantzakis
My prayer is not the whimpering of a beggar nor a confession of love. Nor is it the petty reckoning of a small tradesman: Give me and I shall give you. My prayer is the report of a soldier to his general: This is what I did today, this is how I fought to save the entire battle in my own sector, these are the obstacles I encountered, this is how I plan to fight tomorrow. ~ Nikos Kazantzakis
The heart unites whatever the mind separates, pushes on beyond the arena of necessity and transmutes the struggle into love. ~ Nikos Kazantzakis
Where are we going? Do not ask! Ascend, descend. There is no beginning and no end. Only this present moment exists, full of bitterness, full of sweetness, and I rejoice in it all. ~ Nikos Kazantzakis
I am a mariner of Odysseus with heart of fire but with mind ruthless and clear.
My entire soul is a cry, and all my work the commentary on that cry.
I said to the almond tree: “Speak to me of God”
and the almond tree blossomed.
~ Nikos Kazantzakis
Do not let your peace depend on the hearts of others; whatever they say about you, good or bad, you are not because of it another, for as you are, you are.
– THOMAS A KEMPIS
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”I am in the right place, at the right time, doing the right thing.”
— Louise L. Hay
”Love yourself as much as you can and all of life will mirror this love back to you.”
- Louise L. Hay
“Life is now. There was never a time when your life was not now, nor will there ever be.”
- Eckhart Tolle
The law of nature is that one can never unknow what one knows. So all of us are getting wiser and wiser. There’s no stopping it!
Change is inevitable. And it’s up to us to make it a good change.
- Yoko Ono
☮Peace will be victorious. — Yitzhak Rabin (1922-1995)
”Ambition is bondage.”
–Ibn Gabirol
Better than a thousand hollow words is one word that brings peace.
♥ Buddha
A friend is a person with whom I may be sincere. Before him, I may think aloud.
♥ Ralph Waldo Emerson
Your work is to discover your work and then with all your heart to give yourself to it.
♥ Buddha
The BIG question is whether you are going to be able to say a hearty YES to your adventure!
♥ Joseph Campbell
You cannot travel on the path until you become the path itself.
♥ Buddha
“The seemingly impossible is possible. We can have a good world.”
~ Hans Rosling
Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents which, in prosperous circumstances, would have lain dormant.
♥ Horace
“It’s not worth doing something unless someone, somewhere, would much rather you weren’t doing it.”
— Terry Pratchett
“How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.”
— Henry David Thoreau
“The world is indeed full of peril and in it there are many dark places.
But still there is much that is fair. And though in all lands, love is now
mingled with grief, it still grows, perhaps, the greater.”
— J.R.R. Tolkien (The Lord of the Rings)
“However many holy words you read, however many you speak, what good will they do you if you do not act on upon them?”
— Siddhārtha Gautama
“Try not to become a man of success. Rather become a man of value.”
— Albert Einstein
“Love doesn’t just sit there like a stone; it has to be made, like bread, remade all the time, made new.”
— Ursula K. Le Guin (The Lathe of Heaven)
(I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.)”
— Pablo Neruda
“The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious – the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science.”
— Albert Einstein
“If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:
THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED
FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD
WAS MUSIC”
— Kurt Vonnegut
“By virtue of being human, each of us has the capacity to choose, to change, to grow.”
EKNATH EASWARAN
(1910–1999)
“This is the central principle of meditation: we become what we meditate on.”
EKNATH EASWARAN
(1910–1999)
I claim to be an average man of less than average ability. . . . I have not the shadow of a doubt that any man or woman can achieve what I have, if he or she would make the same effort and cultivate the same hope and faith.
– MAHATMA GANDHI
Our body needs peace of mind and is not suited to agitation. This shows that an appreciation for peace of mind is in our blood.
- Dalai Lama
I understand Being in all and over all, as there is nothing without participation in Being, and there is no being without Essence. Thus nothing can be free of the Divine Presence.
~ Giordano Bruno ~
Treat a person as he is, and he will remain as he is. Treat him as he could be, and he will become what he should be. ~ Anonymous
There is one simple Divinity found in all things, everything has Divinity latent within itself. For she enfolds and imparts herself even unto the smallest beings. Without her presence nothing would have being, because she is the essence of the existence of the first unto the last being. ~ Giordano Bruno (died 17 February 1600)
Even to have come forth is something, since I see that being able to conquer is placed in the hands of fate. However, there was in me, whatever I was able to do, that which no future century will deny to be mine, that which a victor could have for his own: Not to have feared to die, not to have yielded to any equal in firmness of nature, and to have preferred a courageous death to a noncombatant life. ~ Giordano Bruno (executed 17 February 1600)
A voiceless song in an ageless light
Sings at the coming dawn
Birds in flight are calling there
Where the heart moves the stones
It’s there that my heart is calling
All for the love of you.
~ Loreena McKennitt ~
All things are in the Universe, and the universe is in all things: we in it, and it in us; in this way everything concurs in a perfect unity. ~ Giordano Bruno
The Divine Light is always in man, presenting itself to the senses and to the comprehension, but man rejects it. ~ Giordano Bruno
Writing…is an art; and artists…are human beings. As a human being stands, so a human being is…
Poetry and every other art was and is and forever will be strictly and distinctly a question of individuality….poetry is being, not doing….if poetry is your goal, you’ve got to forget all about punishments and all about rewards and all about selfstyled obligations and duties and responsibilities . . .
Almost anybody can learn to think or believe or know, but not a single human being can be taught to feel …
the moment you feel, you’re nobody-but-yourself.
To be nobody-but-yourself — in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else — means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.
nothing is quite as easy as using words like somebody else. We all of us do exactly this nearly all of the time —and whenever we do it, we are not poets.
I’d rather learn from one bird how to sing than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance. ~ e. e. cummings
A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops. ~ Henry Adams (born 16 February 1838)
The counsels of impatience and hatred can always be supported by the crudest and cheapest symbols; for the counsels of moderation, the reasons are often intricate, rather than emotional, and difficult to explain. And so the chauvinists of all times and places go their appointed way: plucking the easy fruits, reaping the little triumphs of the day at the expense of someone else tomorrow, deluging in noise and filth anyone who gets in their way, dancing their reckless dance on the prospects for human progress, drawing the shadow of a great doubt over the validity of democratic institutions. And until people learn to spot the fanning of mass emotions and the sowing of bitterness, suspicion, and intolerance as crimes in themselves — as perhaps the greatest disservice that can be done to the cause of popular government — this sort of thing will continue to occur. ~George F. Kennan
Public opinion, or what passes for public opinion, is not invariably a moderating force in the jungle of politics. It may be true, and I suspect it is, that the mass of people everywhere are normally peace-loving and would accept many restraints and sacrifices in preference to the monstrous calamities of war. But I also suspect that what purports to be public opinion in most countries that consider themselves to have popular government is often not really the consensus of the feelings of the mass of the people at all, but rather the expression of the interests of special highly vocal minorities — politicians, commentators, and publicity-seekers of all sorts: people who live by their ability to draw attention to themselves and die, like fish out of water, if they are compelled to remain silent. ~ George F. Kennan
All experience is an arch, to build upon. ~ Henry Brooks Adams
What one knows is, in youth, of little moment; they know enough who know how to learn. ~ Henry Adams
Knowledge of human nature is the beginning and end of political education. ~ Henry Adams
To be happy is to be able to become aware of oneself without fright.
–Walter Benjamin
I’m sick of following my dreams. I’m just going to ask them where they’re going and hook up with them later.
- Mitch Hedberg
When two men in business always agree, one of them is unnecessary.
- William Wrigley Jr.
People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don’t believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can’t find them, make them.
- George Bernard Shaw
”The greatest good you can do for another is not just to share your riches but to reveal to him his own.”
- Benjamin Disraeli
“The secret of health for both mind and body is not to mourn for the past, nor to worry about the future, but to live the present moment wisely and earnestly.”
—
Siddhārtha Gautama
All the powers in the universe are already ours. It is we who have put our hands before our eyes and cry that it is dark.
- Swami Vivekananda
Love is invisible except here, in us.
Sometimes I praise love,
sometimes love praises me.
Love, a little shell somewhere
on the ocean floor,
open its mouth.
You and I and we, those imaginary beings,
enter that shell as a single sip of seawater.
- Rumi
“Be Yourself. Everyone else is already taken.”
- Oscar Wilde
“The actions of men are the best interpreters of thoughts.”
–Zig Ziglar
Your imagination is your preview of life’s coming attractions.
♥ Albert Einstein
☮Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without.
- Hindu Prince Gautama Siddharta, the founder of Buddhism, 563-483 B.C.
Friends and enemies do not exist as such; friendship and enmity depend on many factors, of which the primary one is our own mental attitude.
Whoever wants to tell a variety of stories ought to have a variety of beginnings.
–Marie de France
“We all need joy, and we can all receive joy in only one way, by adding to the joy of others.”EKNATH EASWARAN(1910–1999)
As Plato sometimes speaks of the divine love, it arises not out of indigency, as created love does, but out of fullness and redundancy.
– JOHN SMITH THE PLATONIST
“The widest possibilities for spiritual growth lie in the give-and-take of everyday relationships.”
EKNATH EASWARAN
(1910–1999)
“This is the central principle of meditation: we become what we meditate on.”
EKNATH EASWARAN
(1910–1999)
“The capacity to be patient, to bear with others through thick and thin, is within the reach of anyone”
EKNATH EASWARAN
(1910–1999)
Justice and power must be brought together, so that whatever is just may be powerful, and whatever is powerful may be just. ~ Blaise Pascal
via nasa.gov
via nasa.gov
via nasa.gov
via nasa.gov
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“The spiritual journey is individual, highly personal. It can’t be organized or regulated. It isn’t true that everyone should follow one path. Listen to your own truth.”
—
Ram Dass
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
– WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
“By virtue of being human, each of us has the capacity to choose, to change, to grow.”
EKNATH EASWARAN
(1910–1999)
If God gave the soul his whole creation she would not be filled thereby but only with himself.
– MEISTER ECKHART
“Nothing can be more important than being able to choose the way we think.”
EKNATH EASWARAN
(1910–1999)
”Your progress depends upon your degree of sustained intensity in a given direction.”
- Roger McDonald
”This is what we call love. When you are loved, you can do anything in creation. When you are loved, there’s no need at all to understand what’s happening, because everything happens within you.”
— Paulo Coelho
look at water and fire
earth and wind
enemies and friends all at once
- Rumi
“We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, and engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.”
—
John Keating (Dead Poets Society)
The house of my heart is empty,
devoid of desire, like paradise.
Within it is no work but the LOVE OF GOD,
no inhabitant but the image of union with Him.
I have swept the house clear of good and bad -
my house is full of love for the One…
- Rumi
The dismaying thing about the classic totalitarian mind is that any given gear, though mutilated, will have at its circumference unbroken sequences of teeth that are immaculately maintained, that are exquisitely machined.
Hence the cuckoo clock in Hell – keeping perfect time for eight minutes and twenty-three seconds, jumping ahead fourteen minutes, keeping perfect time for six seconds, jumping ahead two seconds, keeping perfect time for two hours and one second, then jumping a year.
The missing teeth, of course, are simple, obvious truths, truths available and comprehensible even to ten-year-olds, in most cases.
The wilful filing off of gear teeth, the wilful doing without certain obvious pieces of information.
Mother Night, Kurt Vonnegut
“Fuck every cause that ends in murder and children crying.”
– Iain M. Banks
Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.
♥ Martin Luther King Jr.
Fear breeds fear. Hate breeds hate. And Love breeds love.
- Yoko Ono
A given situation can be viewed as either unbearable or beneficial: it depends how we look at it. We must make certain that things don’t begin to seem unbearable. If we look too closely at problems we will see nothing else and they will appear all out of proportion with reality; that is when they become intolerable. If we can stand back from them, we will be better able to judge them and they will seem less serious.
- Dalai Lama
God made everything out of nothing, but the nothingness shows through.
- Paul Valery
Politics is not a bad profession. If you succeed there are many rewards, if you disgrace yourself you can always write a book.
- Ronald Reagan
Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
Special-interest publications should realize that if they are attracting enough advertising and readers to make a profit, the interest is not so special.
- Fran Lebowitz
Now I know what a statesman is; he’s a dead politician. We need more statesmen.
- Bob Edwards
Writing is not necessarily something to be ashamed of, but do it in private and wash your hands afterwards.
- Robert Heinlein
God wasn’t too bad a novelist except he was a Realist.
- John Barth
Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us ~ Bill Watterson
Never give in and never give up.
- Hubert H. Humphrey
“It is not a lack of love, but a lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages.”
— Friedrich Nietzsche
“Where does one go from a world of insanity? Somewhere on the other side of despair.”
- T.S. Eliot
“Grow old along with me! The best is yet to be, The last of life, for which the first was made.”
- Robert Browning
We are inclined to believe those whom we do not know because they have never deceived us.
- Samuel Johnson
You’ve achieved success in your field when you don’t know whether what you’re doing is work or play.
- Warren Beatty
The whole dream of democracy is to raise the proletarian to the level of stupidity attained by the bourgeois.
- Gustave Flaubert
The only things in my life that compatibly exist with this grand universe are the creative works of the human spirit.
No matter how sophisticated you may be, a large granite mountain cannot be denied — it speaks in silence to the very core of your being.
- Ansel Adams (Born February 20, 1902)
“I’d rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not.”
- Kurt Kobain (Born February 20, 1967)
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The truth comes as conqueror only because we have lost the art of receiving it as guest.
Depth of friendship does not depend on length of acquaintance.
Let this be my last word, that I trust in thy love.
God, the Great Giver, can open the whole universe to our gaze in the narrow space of a single land.
My debts are large, my failures great, my shame secret and heavy; yet I come to ask for my good, I quake in fear lest my prayer be granted.
In this playhouse of infinite forms I have had my play, and here have I caught sight of him that is formless.
Love is the ultimate meaning of everything around us. It is not a mere sentiment; it is truth; it is the joy that is at the root of all creation.
When we define a man by the market value of the service we can expect of him, we know him imperfectly.
Civilisation must be judged and prized, not by the amount of power it has developed, but by how much it has evolved and given expression to, by its laws and institutions, the love of humanity.
The human soul is on its journey from the law to love, from discipline to liberation, from the moral plane to the spiritual.
Joy is the realisation of the truth of oneness, the oneness of our soul with the world and of the world-soul with the supreme lover.
The infinite being has assumed unto himself the mystery of finitude. And in him who is love the finite and the infinite are made one.
Your idol is shattered in the dust to prove that God’s dust is greater than your idol.
The wise man warns me that life is but a dewdrop on the lotus leaf.
In the world’s audience hall, the simple blade of grass sits on the same carpet with the sunbeams, and the stars of midnight.
Wishing to hearten a timid lamp
great night lights all her stars.
God seeks comrades and claims love,
the Devil seeks slaves and claims obedience.
Life’s errors cry for the merciful beauty
that can modulate their isolation
into a harmony with the whole.
Color may, by combination with lines, create great pictures, so long as it does not smother and destroy their value.
- Rabindranath Tagore
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Rabindranath_Tagore
See this Amp at http://bit.ly/gPn87l
Hubble’s Sharpest View Of The Orion Nebula – Patti Smith, Novalis, Dalai Lama, Morihei Ueshiba, & Mahatma Gandhi
When you don’t know how you will make the whole journey, just take the next step. Courage is in the now. Let the universe take care of the future how.
- Cory Booker
I love you when you bow in your mosque, kneel in your temple, pray in your church. For you and I are sons of one religion, and it is the spirit
~ Kahlil Gibran
We do not inherit the earth from our fathers. We borrow it from our children.
- Peace Quotes
http://twitter.com/peacequotes
There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats.
– Albert Schweitzer
The best way to succeed in this world is to act on the advice we give to other people.
- Proverb
When it’s obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don’t adjust the goals, adjust the action steps.
- Confucius
Compassion is not luxury, it is essential for our own peace, mental stability and for human survival.
- Dalai Lama
I believe that we, that this planet, hasn’t seen its Golden Age. Everybody says its finished … art’s finished, rock and roll is dead, God is dead. Fuck that! This is my chance in the world. I didn’t live back there in Mesopotamia, I wasn’t there in the Garden of Eden, I wasn’t there with Emperor Han, I’m right here right now and I want now to be the Golden Age …if only each generation would realise that the time for greatness is right now when they’re alive … the time to flower is now.
…heroine: the artist, the premier mistress writhering in a garden graced w/highly polished blades of grass… release (ethiopium) is the drug…an animal howl says it all…notes pour into the caste of freedom…the freedom to be intense…to defy social order and break the slow kill monotony of censorship. to break from the long bonds of servitude-ruthless adoration of the celestial shepherd. let us celebrate our own flesh-to embrace not ones race mais the marathon-to never let go of the fiery sadness called desire.
For life is the best thing we have in this existence. And if we should desire to believe in something, it should be a beacon within. This beacon being the sun, sea, and sky, our children, our work, our companions and, most simply put, the embodiment of love.
— Patti Smith
http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/196092.Patti_Smith
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Patti_Smith
I don’t consider writing a quiet, closet act.
I consider it a real physical act.
When I’m home writing on the typewriter, I go crazy.
I move like a monkey.
I’ve wet myself, I’ve come in my pants writing.
- Patti Smith
FEMINISM NOT EXIST IN VACUUM. HULK SMASH FOR ALL FORMS OF SOCIAL JUSTICE! HULK NO LET HEGEMONY SNEAK IN THE BACK DOOR.
- Feminist Hulk
Happiness is anyone and anything that’s loved by you.
~ Charlie Brown
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We are near waking when we dream that we dream.
There are ideal series of events which run parallel with the real ones. They rarely coincide.
I was still blind, but twinkling stars did dance
Throughout my being’s limitless expanse,
Nothing had yet drawn close, only at distant stages
I found myself, a mere suggestion sensed in past and future ages.
True anarchy is the generative element of religion. Out of the annihilation of all existing institutions she raises her glorious head, as the new foundress of the world.
Friends, the soil is poor, we must sow seeds in plenty for us to garner even modest harvests…
We do not know the depths of our own spirit. — The mysterious path leads within…
We are on a mission: we are called to the cultivation of the earth.
Before abstraction everything is one, but one like chaos; after abstraction everything is united again, but this union is a free binding of autonomous, self-determined beings.
Where children are, there is a golden age.
Love works magic. It is the final purpose of the world story, the Amen of the universe.
The seat of the soul is where the inner world and the outer world meet. Where they overlap, it is in every point of the overlap.
Men travel in manifold paths: whoso traces and compares these, will find strange Figures come to light; Figures which seem as if they belonged to that great Cipher-writing which one meets with everywhere…
Whoso speaks truly is full of eternal life, and wonderfully related to genuine mysteries does his Writing appear to us, for it is a Concord from the Symphony of the Universe.
He watches in our eyes whether the star has yet risen upon us, which is to make the Figure visible and intelligible.
No one, of a surety, wanders farther from the mark than he who fancies to himself that he already understands this marvellous Kingdom, and can, in few words, fathom its constitution, and everywhere find the right path.
Long, unwearied intercourse, free and wise Contemplation, attention to faint tokens and indications; an inward poet-life, practised senses, a simple and devout spirit: these are the essential requisites of a true Friend of Nature.
Moral Action is that great and only Experiment, in which all riddles of the most manifold appearances explain themselves.
Metaphysical ideas stand related to one another, like thoughts without words.
We had to abide by metaphysical Logic, and logical Metaphysic, but neither of them was as it should be.
There is but one temple in the Universe and that is the Body of Man.
All Fabulous Tales are merely dreams of that home world, which is everywhere and nowhere.
Man consists in Truth. If he exposes Truth, he exposes himself. If he betrays Truth, he betrays himself.
The Art of a well-developed genius is far different from the Artfulness of the Understanding, of the merely reasoning mind … They are emblematic, have many meanings, are simple and inexhaustible, like products of Nature; and nothing more unsuitable could be said of them than that they are works of Art, in that narrow mechanical acceptation of the word.
- Novalis
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Novalis
Novalis is known as the originator of the central symbol of the German Romanticism, The Blue Flower; he shared in the movement’s deification of Nature, the demand for the Absolute, the idea of spiritual rebirth.
~ Graham Brown
The ardent and holy Novalis…
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
For Novalis the poetic in the world was the only genuine reality, even as the poetic spirit in man was the proof of man’s divine origin. All of his poetry is concerned ultimately with revealing and celebrating the poetic spirit.
- Bruce Haywood
Never was he seen languid or exhausted, never out of spirits or out of humor.
- Ludwig Tieck
1
Before all the wondrous shows of the widespread space around him, what living, sentient thing loves not the all-joyous light — with its colors, its rays and undulations, its gentle omnipresence in the form of the wakening Day? The giant-world of the unresting constellations inhales it as the innermost soul of life, and floats dancing in its blue flood — the sparkling, ever-tranquil stone, the thoughtful, imbibing plant, and the wild, burning multiform beast inhales it — but more than all, the lordly stranger with the sense-filled eyes, the swaying walk, and the sweetly closed, melodious lips. Like a king over earthly nature, it rouses every force to countless transformations, binds and unbinds innumerable alliances, hangs its heavenly form around every earthly substance. — Its presence alone reveals the marvelous splendor of the kingdoms of the world.
Aside I turn to the holy, unspeakable, mysterious Night. Afar lies the world — sunk in a deep grave — waste and lonely is its place. In the chords of the bosom blows a deep sadness. I am ready to sink away in drops of dew, and mingle with the ashes. — The distances of memory, the wishes of youth, the dreams of childhood, the brief joys and vain hopes of a whole long life, arise in gray garments, like an evening vapor after the sunset. In other regions the light has pitched its joyous tents. What if it should never return to its children, who wait for it with the faith of innocence?
What springs up all at once so sweetly boding in my heart, and stills the soft air of sadness? Dost thou also take a pleasure in us, dark Night? What holdest thou under thy mantle, that with hidden power affects my soul? Precious balm drips from thy hand out of its bundle of poppies. Thou upliftest the heavy-laden wings of the soul. Darkly and inexpressibly are we moved — joy-startled, I see a grave face that, tender and worshipful, inclines toward me, and, amid manifold entangled locks, reveals the youthful loveliness of the Mother. How poor and childish a thing seems to me now the Light — how joyous and welcome the departure of the day — because the Night turns away from thee thy servants, you now strew in the gulfs of space those flashing globes, to proclaim thy omnipotence — thy return — in seasons of thy absence. More heavenly than those glittering stars we hold the eternal eyes which the Night hath opened within us. Farther they see than the palest of those countless hosts — needing no aid from the light, they penetrate the depths of a loving soul — that fills a loftier region with bliss ineffable. Glory to the queen of the world, to the great prophet of the holier worlds, to the guardian of blissful love — she sends thee to me — thou tenderly beloved — the gracious sun of the Night, — now am I awake — for now am I thine and mine — thou hast made me know the Night — made of me a man — consume with spirit-fire my body, that I, turned to finer air, may mingle more closely with thee, and then our bridal night endure forever.
2
Must the morning always return? Will the despotism of the earthly never cease? Unholy activity consumes the angel-visit of the Night. Will the time never come when Love’s hidden sacrifice shall burn eternally? To the Light a season was set; but everlasting and boundless is the dominion of the Night. — Endless is the duration of sleep. Holy Sleep — gladden not too seldom in this earthly day-labor, the devoted servant of the Night. Fools alone mistake thee, knowing nought of sleep but the shadow which, in the twilight of the real Night, thou pitifully castest over us. They feel thee not in the golden flood of the grapes — in the magic oil of the almond tree — and the brown juice of the poppy. They know not that it is thou who hauntest the bosom of the tender maiden, and makest a heaven of her lap — never suspect it is thou, opening the doors to Heaven, that steppest to meet them out of ancient stories, bearing the key to the dwellings of the blessed, silent messenger of secrets infinite.
3
Once when I was shedding bitter tears, when, dissolved in pain, my hope was melting away, and I stood alone by the barren mound which in its narrow dark bosom hid the vanished form of my life — lonely as never yet was lonely man, driven by anxiety unspeakable — powerless, and no longer anything but a conscious misery. — As there I looked about me for help, unable to go on or to turn back, and clung to the fleeting, extinguished life with an endless longing: — then, out of the blue distances — from the hills of my ancient bliss, came a shiver of twilight — and at once snapt the bond of birth — the chains of the Light. Away fled the glory of the world, and with it my mourning — the sadness flowed together into a new, unfathomable world — Thou, Night-inspiration, heavenly Slumber, didst come upon me — the region gently upheaved itself; over it hovered my unbound, newborn spirit. The mound became a cloud of dust — and through the cloud I saw the glorified face of my beloved. In her eyes eternity reposed — I laid hold of her hands, and the tears became a sparkling bond that could not be broken. Into the distance swept by, like a tempest, thousands of years. On her neck I welcomed the new life with ecstatic tears. It was the first, the only dream — and just since then I have held fast an eternal, unchangeable faith in the heaven of the Night, and its Light, the Beloved.
4
Now I know when will come the last morning — when the Light no more scares away Night and Love — when sleep shall be without waking, and but one continuous dream. I feel in me a celestial exhaustion. Long and weariful was my pilgrimage to the holy grave, and crushing was the cross. The crystal wave, which, imperceptible to the ordinary sense, springs in the dark bosom of the mound against whose foot breaks the flood of the world, he who has tasted it, he who has stood on the mountain frontier of the world, and looked across into the new land, into the abode of the Night — truly he turns not again into the tumult of the world, into the land where dwells the Light in ceaseless unrest.
On those heights he builds for himself tabernacles — tabernacles of peace, there longs and loves and gazes across, until the welcomest of all hours draws him down into the waters of the spring — afloat above remains what is earthly, and is swept back in storms, but what became holy by the touch of love, runs free through hidden ways to the region beyond, where, like fragrances, it mingles with love asleep.
Still wakest thou, cheerful Light, that weary man to his labor — and into me pourest joyous life — but thou wilest me not away from Memory’s moss-grown monument. Gladly will I stir busy hands, everywhere behold where thou hast need of me — praise the lustre of thy splendor — pursue unwearied the lovely harmonies of thy skilled handicraft — gladly contemplate the clever pace of thy mighty, luminous clock — explore the balance of the forces and the laws of the wondrous play of countless worlds and their seasons. But true to the Night remains my secret heart, and to creative Love, her daughter. Canst thou show me a heart eternally true? has thy sun friendly eyes that know me? do thy stars lay hold of my longing hand? and return me the tender pressure and the caressing word? was it thou did adorn them with colors and a flickering outline — or was it she who gave to thy jewels a higher, a dearer weight? What delight, what pleasure offers thy life, to outweigh the transports of Death? Wears not everything that inspires us the color of the Night? She sustains thee mother-like, and to her thou owest all thy glory. Thou wouldst vanish into thyself — in boundless space thou wouldst dissolve, if she did not hold thee fast, if she swaddled thee not, so that thou grewest warm, and flaming, begot the universe. Truly I was, before thou wast — the mother sent me with my brothers and sisters to inhabit thy world, to hallow it with love that it might be an ever-present memorial — to plant it with flowers unfading. As yet they have not ripened, these thoughts divine — as yet is there small trace of our coming revelation — One day thy clock will point to the end of time, and then thou shalt be as one of us, and shalt, full of ardent longing, be extinguished and die. I feel in me the close of thy activity — heavenly freedom, and blessed return. With wild pangs I recognize thy distance from our home, thy resistance against the ancient, glorious heaven. Thy rage and thy raving are in vain. Unscorchable stands the cross — victory-banner of our breed.
Over I journey
And for each pain
A pleasant sting only
Shall one day remain.
Yet in a few moments
Then free am I,
And intoxicated
In Love’s lap lie.
Life everlasting
Lifts, wave-like, at me,
I gaze from its summit
Down after thee.
Your lustre must vanish
Yon mound underneath –
A shadow will bring thee
Thy cooling wreath.
Oh draw at my heart, love,
Draw till I’m gone,
That, fallen asleep, I
Still may love on.
I feel the flow of
Death’s youth-giving flood
To balsam and ether
Transform my blood –
I live all the daytime
In faith and in might
And in holy fire
I die every night.
5
In ancient times, over the widespread families of men an iron Fate ruled with dumb force. A gloomy oppression swathed their heavy souls — the earth was boundless — the abode of the gods and their home. From eternal ages stood its mysterious structure. Beyond the red hills of the morning, in the sacred bosom of the sea, dwelt the sun, the all-enkindling, living Light. An aged giant upbore the blissful world. Fast beneath mountains lay the first-born sons of mother Earth. Helpless in their destroying fury against the new, glorious race of gods, and their kindred, glad-hearted men. The ocean’s dark green abyss was the lap of a goddess. In crystal grottos revelled a luxuriant folk. Rivers, trees, flowers, and beasts had human wits. Sweeter tasted the wine — poured out by Youth-abundance — a god in the grape-clusters — a loving, motherly goddess upgrew in the full golden sheaves — love’s sacred inebriation was a sweet worship of the fairest of the god-ladies — Life rustled through the centuries like one spring-time, an ever-variegated festival of heaven-children and earth-dwellers. All races childlike adored the ethereal, thousand-fold flame as the one sublimest thing in the world. There was but one notion, a horrible dream-shape –
That fearsome to the merry tables strode,
A wrapt the spirit there in wild fright.
The gods themselves no counsel knew nor showed
To fill the anxious hearts with comfort light.
Mysterious was the monster’s pathless road,
Whose rage no prayer nor tribute could requite;
‘Twas Death who broke the banquet up with fears,
With anguish, dire pain, and bitter tears.
Eternally from all things here disparted
That sway the heart with pleasure’s joyous flow,
Divided from the loved ones who’ve departed,
Tossed by longing vain, unceasing woe –
In a dull dream to struggle, faint and thwarted,
Seemed all was granted to the dead below.
Broke lay the merry wave of human bliss
On Death’s inevitable, rocky cliff.
With daring spirit and a passion deep,
Did man ameliorate the horrid blight,
A gentle youth puts out his torch, to sleep –
The end, just like a harp’s sigh, comes light.
Cool shadow-floods o’er melting memory creep,
So sang the song, into its sorry need.
Still undeciphered lay the endless Night –
The solemn symbol of a far-off might.
The old world began to decline. The pleasure-garden of the young race withered away — up into more open, desolate regions, forsaking his childhood, struggled the growing man. The gods vanished with their retinue — Nature stood alone and lifeless. Dry Number and rigid Measure bound it with iron chains. Into dust and air the priceless blossoms of life fell away in words obscure. Gone was wonder-working Faith, and its all-transforming, all-uniting angel-comrade, the Imagination. A cold north wind blew unkindly over the rigid plain, and the rigid wonderland first froze, then evaporated into ether. The far depths of heaven filled with glowing worlds. Into the deeper sanctuary, into the more exalted region of feeling, the soul of the world retired with all its earthly powers, there to rule until the dawn should break of universal Glory. No longer was the Light the abode of the gods, and the heavenly token of their presence — they drew over themselves the veil of the Night. The Night became the mighty womb of revelations — into it the gods went back — and fell asleep, to go abroad in new and more glorious shapes over the transfigured world. Among the people who too early were become of all the most scornful and insolently estranged from the blessed innocence of youth, appeared the New World with a face never seen before — in the poverty of a poetic shelter — a son of the first virgin and mother — the eternal fruit of mysterious embrace. The foreboding, rich-blossoming wisdom of the East at once recognized the beginning of the new age — A star showed the way to the humble cradle of the king. In the name of the distant future, they did him homage with lustre and fragrance, the highest wonders of Nature. In solitude the heavenly heart unfolded to a flower-chalice of almighty love — upturned toward the supreme face of the father, and resting on the bliss-foreboding bosom of the sweetly solemn mother. With deifying fervor the prophetic eye of the blooming child beheld the years to come, foresaw, untroubled over the earthly lot of his own days, the beloved offspring of his divine stem. Ere long the most childlike souls, by true love marvellously possessed, gathered about him. Like flowers sprang up a strange new life in his presence. Words inexhaustible and the most joyful tidings fell like sparks of a divine spirit from his friendly lips. From a far shore, born under the clear sky of Hellas, came a singer to Palestine, and gave up his whole heart to the wonder-child:
The youth thou art who ages long hast stood
Upon our graves, so deeply lost in thought;
A sign of comfort in the dusky gloom
For high humanity, a joyful start.
What dropped us all into abyssmal woe,
Pulls us forward with sweet yearning now.
In everlasting life death found its goal,
For thou art Death who at last makes us whole.
Filled with joy, the singer went on to Hindustan — his heart intoxicated with the sweetest love; and poured it out in fiery songs under the balmy sky, so that a thousand hearts bowed to him, and the good news sprang up with a thousand branches. Soon after the singer’s departure, his precious life was made a sacrifice for the deep fall of man — He died in his youth, torn away from his beloved world, from his weeping mother, and his trembling friends. His lovely mouth emptied the dark cup of unspeakable woes — in ghastly fear the birth of the new world drew near. Hard he wrestled with the terrors of old Death — Heavy lay the weight of the old world upon him. Yet once more he looked fondly at his mother — then came the releasing hand of eternal love, and he fell asleep. Only a few days hung a deep veil over the roaring sea, over the quaking land — countless tears wept his loved ones — the mystery was unsealed — heavenly spirits heaved the ancient stone from the gloomy grave. Angels sat by the Sleeper — delicately shaped from his dreams — awoken in new Godlike glory; he clomb the limits of the new-born world — buried with his own hand the old corpse in the abandoned hollow, and with a hand almighty laid upon it a stone which no power shall ever again upheave.
Yet weep thy loved ones tears of joy, tears of feeling and endless thanksgiving over your grave — joyously startled, they see thee rise again, and themselves with thee — behold thee weep with sweet fervor on the blessed bosom of thy mother, solemnly walking with thy friends, uttering words plucked as from the Tree of Life; see thee hasten, full of longing, into thy father’s arms, bearing with thee youthful humanity, and the inexhaustible cup of the golden future. Soon the mother hastened after thee — in heavenly triumph — she was the first with thee in the new home. Since then, long ages have flowed past, and in ever-increasing splendor have stirred your new creation — and thousands have, away from pangs and tortures, followed thee, filled with faith and longing and fidelity — walking about with thee and the heavenly virgin in the kingdom of love, serving in the temple of heavenly Death, and forever thine.
Uplifted is the stone –
And all mankind is risen –
We all remain thine own.
And vanished is our prison.
All troubles flee away
Thy golden bowl before,
For Earth and Life give way
At the last and final supper.
To the marriage Death doth call –
The virgins standeth back –
The lamps burn lustrous all –
Of oil there is no lack –
If the distance would only fill
With the sound of you walking alone
And that the stars would call
Us all with human tongues and tone.
Unto thee, O Mary
A thousand hearts aspire.
In this life of shadows
Thee only they desire.
In thee they hope for delivery
With visionary expectation –
If only thou, O holy being
Could clasp them to thy breast.
With bitter torment burning,
So many who are consumed
At last from this world turning
To thee have looked and fled,
Helpful thou hast appeared
To so many in pain.
Now to them we come,
To never go out again.
At no grave can weep
Any who love and pray.
The gift of Love they keep,
From none can it be taken away.
To soothe and quiet his longing,
Night comes and inspires –
Heaven’s children round him thronging
Watch and guard his heart.
Have courage, for life is striding
To endless life along;
Stretched by inner fire,
Our sense becomes transfigured.
One day the stars above
Shall flow in golden wine,
We will enjoy it all,
And as stars we will shine.
The love is given freely,
And Separation is no more.
The whole life heaves and surges
Like a sea without a shore.
Just one night of bliss –
One everlasting poem –
And the sun we all share
Is the face of God.
6
Longing for Death
Into the bosom of the earth,
Out of the Light’s dominion,
Death’s pains are but a bursting forth,
Sign of glad departure.
Swift in the narrow little boat,
Swift to the heavenly shore we float.
Blessed be the everlasting Night,
And blessed the endless slumber.
We are heated by the day too bright,
And withered up with care.
We’re weary of a life abroad,
And we now want our Father’s home.
What in this world should we all
Do with love and with faith?
That which is old is set aside,
And the new may perish also.
Alone he stands and sore downcast
Who loves with pious warmth the Past.
The Past where the light of the senses
In lofty flames did rise;
Where the Father’s face and hand
All men did recognize;
And, with high sense, in simplicity
Many still fit the original pattern.
The Past wherein, still rich in bloom,
Man’s strain did burgeon glorious,
And children, for the world to come,
Sought pain and death victorious,
And, through both life and pleasure spake,
Yet many a heart for love did break.
The Past, where to the flow of youth
God still showed himself,
And truly to an early death
Did commit his sweet life.
Fear and torture patiently he bore
So that he would be loved forever.
With anxious yearning now we see
That Past in darkness drenched,
With this world’s water never we
Shall find our hot thirst quenched.
To our old home we have to go
That blessed time again to know.
What yet doth hinder our return
To loved ones long reposed?
Their grave limits our lives.
We are all sad and afraid.
We can search for nothing more –
The heart is full, the world is void.
Infinite and mysterious,
Thrills through us a sweet trembling –
As if from far there echoed thus
A sigh, our grief resembling.
Our loved ones yearn as well as we,
And sent to us this longing breeze.
Down to the sweet bride, and away
To the beloved Jesus.
Have courage, evening shades grow gray
To those who love and grieve.
A dream will dash our chains apart,
And lay us in the Father’s lap.
- Novalis, Hymns to the Night
http://www.logopoeia.com/novalis/hymns.html
Poetry heals the wounds inflicted by reason.
Life must not be a novel that is given to us, but one that is made by us.
Where are we really going? Always home.
- Novalis
http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/187510.Novalis
It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.
- Antoine de Saint-Exupery
The meaning of life is to find your gift, the purpose of life is to give it away.
~ Joy J. Golliver
Compassion is not religious business, it is human business … it is essential for human survival.
- Dalai Lama
There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.
- Albert Einstein
Someday, after mastering the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, we shall harness for God the energies of love, and then, for a second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire.
~ Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
Loving kindness is greater than laws; and the charities of life are more than all ceremonies.
~ The Talmud
If we use favorable circumstances such as good health or wealth to help others, they can be contributory factors to achieving a happier life.
I don’t think human affection and compassion are just religious concerns; they’re indispensable factors in our day-to-day lives.
A spiritual practice is a constant battle within, replacing previous negative conditioning or habituation with new positive conditioning.
At one level, all major religious traditions have the same aim – to transform the individual into a positive being.
- Dalai Lama
Become aware. Be honest with yourself. Express what you are. Love others just as they are, whether or not they love you back. It is the love that comes from you rather than the love that comes to you that makes you happy.
~ Don Miguel Ruiz
via en.wikiquote.org
The Art of Peace is not easy. It is a fight to the finish, the slaying of evil desires and all falsehood within. On occasion the Voice of Peace resounds like thunder, jolting human beings out of their stupor.
Instructors can impart only a fraction of the teaching. It is through your own devoted practice that the mysteries of the Art of Peace are brought to life.
True Budo is to accept the spirit of the universe, keep the peace of the world, correctly produce, protect and cultivate all beings in nature.
I felt the universe suddenly quake, and that a golden spirit sprang up from the ground, veiled my body, and changed my body into a golden one. At the same time my body became light. I was able to understand the whispering of the birds, and was clearly aware of the mind of God, the creator of the universe.
At that moment I was enlightened: the source of Budo is God’s love — the spirit of loving protection for all beings… Budo is not the felling of an opponent by force; nor is it a tool to lead the world to destruction with arms. True Budo is to accept the spirit of the universe, keep the peace of the world, correctly produce, protect and cultivate all beings in nature.
I am the Universe.
~ Morihei Ueshiba (born 14 December 1883)
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Morihei_Ueshiba
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Wikiquote:Quote_of_the_day/December#14
I wonder if the artist ever lives his life — he is so busy recreating it.
-Anne Sexton
Peace is rarely denied to the peaceful.
- Johann von Schiller
Your true radiance is always shining. It is only you that stands in the way.
~ Amoda Maa Jeevan
To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.
- Anatole France
If you’ve never been thrilled to the very edges of your soul by a flower in spring bloom, maybe your soul has never been in bloom.
- Terri Guillemets
Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks inside, awakes.
~ Carl Jung
One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain
- Bob Marley
No experience has been too unimportant, and the smallest event unfolds like a fate, and fate itself is like a wonderful, wide fabric in which every thread is guided by an infinitely tender hand and laid alongside another thread and is held and supported by a hundred others.
~ Rainer Maria Rilke
I don’t have any desire to live on a planet that has no heroes, and no angels, and no saints, and no art.
Without having a real cosmic discussion about it, let’s just say I have an optimistic feeling about the future.
I know art got us because if art gets you, you never can be normal. You can never enjoy. You cant go anywhere without trying to transform it.
One doesn’t have to be very learned to speak against the build-up of WMDs or nuclear weapons. All of human society should abolish them.
Oh, God, give me something: a reason to live. I don’t want no handout; no, not sympathy. Come on. Come and love me. Come on. Set me free.
- Patti Smith
A painting is never finished – it simply stops in interesting places.
- Paul Gardner
via en.wikiquote.org
via en.wikiquote.org
The Universe is made of stories, not of atoms.
~ Muriel Rukeyser ~
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Main_Page
It appears that mind, as manifested by the capacity to make choices, is to some extent inherent in every atom. The universe as a whole is also weird, with laws of nature that make it hospitable to the growth of mind. I do not make any clear distinction between mind and God. God is what mind becomes when it has passed beyond the scale of our comprehension.
Both as a scientist and as a religious person, I am accustomed to living with uncertainty. Science is exciting because it is full of unsolved mysteries, and religion is exciting for the same reason. The greatest unsolved mysteries are the mysteries of our existence as conscious beings in a small corner of a vast universe.
We stand, in a manner of speaking, midway between the unpredictability of atoms and the unpredictability of God.
I do not make any clear distinction between mind and God. God is what mind becomes when it has passed beyond the scale of our comprehension.
To talk about the end of science is just as foolish as to talk about the end of religion. Science and religion are both still close to their beginnings, with no ends in sight.
Trouble arises when either science or religion claims universal jurisdiction, when either religious dogma or scientific dogma claims to be infallible. Religious creationists and scientific materialists are equally dogmatic and insensitive. By their arrogance they bring both science and religion into disrepute
~ Freeman Dyson (born 15 December 1923)
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Freeman_Dyson
It is not the right angle that attracts me,
Nor the hard, inflexible straight line, man-made.
What attracts me are free and sensual curves.
The curves in my country’s mountains,
In the sinuous flow of its rivers,
In the beloved woman’s body.
~ Oscar Niemeyer (his 100th Birthday — born 15 December 1907)
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Wikiquote:Quote_of_the_day/December#15
via en.wikiquote.org
Be bold and mighty forces will come to your aid.
Who is the happiest of men? He who values the merits of others, and in their pleasure takes joy, even as though ’twere his own.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Intuition is the clear conception of the whole at once.
- Unknown
I’m still learning.
- Michelangelo
Progress always involves risks. You can’t steal second base and keep your foot on first.
- Frederick Wilcox
Sacred trees hold a message in silence. It is a stream of consciousness that can be tapped. It is not unlike the quietness of the painter and the stillness inside the notes of the composer. It is a sympathy with something grand outside of the human fold, a voice that transcends time and is heard down into the marrow of bones.
- Diana Beresford-Kroeger
Zen says that if you drop knowledge – and within knowledge everything is included; your name, your identity, everything, because this has been given to you by others – if you drop all that has been given by others, you will have a totally different quality to your being: innocence. This will be a crucifixion of the persona, the personality, and there will be a resurrection of your innocence. You will become a child again, reborn.
— Osho
The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.
- Mahatma Gandhi
Hatred, jealousy and excessive attachment cause suffering and agitation. I feel compassion can help us overcome these disturbances and let us return to a calm state of mind. Compassion is not just being kind to your friend. That involves attachment because it is based on expectation. Compassion is when you do something good without any expectations – based on realizing that “the other person is also just like me”.
- Dalai Lama
Just go out there and do what you’ve got to do.
- Martina Navratilova
If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.
- Mother Teresa
The future is like heaven – everyone exalts it, but no one wants to go there now.
- James Arthur Baldwin
If you want to make peace, you don’t talk to your friends. You talk to your enemies.
- Moshe Dayan
… and if you think that one person can’t make a difference, you’re wrong, particularly young people.
- Jimmy Carter
Abstract Art: A product of the untalented, sold by the unprincipled to the utterly bewildered.
- Albert Camus
If we’re growing, we’re always going to be out of our comfort zone.
- John Maxwell
There is no time left for anything but to make peacework a dimension of our every waking activity.
- Elise Boulding
Healing does not happen in a vacuum but through interactions with other people. By giving, you are focusing on what you have to offer others, inviting more abundance into your life. Giving of any kind is taking a positive action that begins the process of change. It will shift your energy for life.
- Mbali Creazzo
Amplify’d from www.spacetelescope.org
Hubble’s sharpest view of the Orion Nebula
This dramatic image offers a peek inside a cavern of roiling dust and gas where thousands of stars are forming. The image, taken by the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) aboard NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, represents the sharpest view ever taken of this region, called the Orion Nebula. More than 3,000 stars of various sizes appear in this image. Some of them have never been seen in visible light. These stars reside in a dramatic dust-and-gas landscape of plateaus, mountains, and valleys that are reminiscent of the Grand Canyon.
The Orion Nebula is a picture book of star formation, from the massive, young stars that are shaping the nebula to the pillars of dense gas that may be the homes of budding stars. The bright central region is the home of the four heftiest stars in the nebula. The stars are called the Trapezium because they are arranged in a trapezoid pattern. Ultraviolet light unleashed by these stars is carving a cavity in the nebula and disrupting the growth of hundreds of smaller stars. Located near the Trapezium stars are stars still young enough to have disks of material encircling them. These disks are called protoplanetary disks or “proplyds” and are too small to see clearly in this image. The disks are the building blocks of solar systems.
The bright glow at upper left is from M43, a small region being shaped by a massive, young star’s ultraviolet light. Astronomers call the region a miniature Orion Nebula because only one star is sculpting the landscape. The Orion Nebula has four such stars. Next to M43 are dense, dark pillars of dust and gas that point toward the Trapezium. These pillars are resisting erosion from the Trapezium’s intense ultraviolet light. The glowing region on the right reveals arcs and bubbles formed when stellar winds – streams of charged particles ejected from the Trapezium stars – collide with material.
The faint red stars near the bottom are the myriad brown dwarfs that Hubble spied for the first time in the nebula in visible light. Sometimes called “failed stars,” brown dwarfs are cool objects that are too small to be ordinary stars because they cannot sustain nuclear fusion in their cores the way our Sun does. The dark red column, below, left, shows an illuminated edge of the cavity wall.
The Orion Nebula is 1,500 light-years away, the nearest star-forming region to Earth. Astronomers used 520 Hubble images, taken in five colours, to make this picture. They also added ground-based photos to fill out the nebula. The ACS mosaic covers approximately the apparent angular size of the full moon.
Credit:
NASA, ESA, M. Robberto ( Space Telescope Science Institute/ESA) and the Hubble Space Telescope Orion Treasury Project Team
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A Dazzling Planetary Nebula – Hafiz, Sagan, Van Gogh, George Polya, Laozi, Thich Nhat Hanh, & William Shakespeare
Human Beings, indeed all sentient beings, have the right to pursue happiness and live in peace and freedom.
- The XIVth Dalai Lama
http://twitter.com/peacequotes
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better.
- Samuel Beckett
I have learned that every heart will get what it prays for most.
- Hafiz
What you think, you create. What you feel, you attract. What you imagine, you become.
- Adele Basheer
Promise me you’ll always remember: you’re braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, & smarter than you think.
- Christopher to Pooh
Nothing happens unless first we dream.
- Carl Sandburg
My understanding of the fundamental laws of the universe did not come out of my rational mind.
- Albert Einstein
Self-respect is often mistaken for arrogance when in reality it is the opposite. When we can recognize all our good qualities as well as or faults with neutrality, we can start to appreciate ourselves as we would a dear friend and experience the comfortable inner glow of respect. To embrace the journey towards our full potential we need to become our own loving teacher and coach. Spurring ourselves on to become better human beings we develop true regard for ourselves and our life will become sacred.
- Osho
The world is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.
- Bertrand Russel
There is no time left for anything but to make peacework a dimension of our every waking activity.
- Elise Boulding
Peace is the one condition of survival in this nuclear age.
- Adlai E. Stevenson
There is no model; there is only color.
- Paul Cezanne
Unfold your own myth, without complicated explanation, so everyone will understand the passage.
Only from the heart can you touch the sky.
- Mevlana Rumi
What we are is God’s Gift to us; What we become is our Gift to God.
- Eleanor Powell
Everybody wants to eat at the government’s table, but nobody wants to do the dishes.
- Werner Finck
All the things that truly matter – beauty, love, creativity, joy, inner peace – arise from beyond the mind.
- Eckhart Tolle
People love chopping wood. In this activity one immediately sees results. – Albert Einstein
Let him that would move the world first move himself.
- Socrates
Nothing is more important than reconnecting with your bliss. Nothing is as rich. Nothing is more real.
- Deepak Chopra
There are no rules of architecture for a castle in the clouds.
- Gilbert K. Chesterton
Treasure each empty moment of the experience. Something sacred is about to be born!
- Osho
Nothing happens unless first we dream.
- Carl Sandburg
There is another old poet whose name I do not now remember who said, “Truth is the daughter of Time.”
- Abraham Lincoln
Be kind to unkind people – they need it the most.
- Ashleigh Brilliant
When you blame others, you give up your power to change.
- Douglas Noel Adams
Where there is great love, there are always miracles.
- Willa Cather
What you seek is seeking you!
- Mevlana Rumi
Never lose an opportunity of seeing anything beautiful, for beauty is God’s handwriting.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
I could not, at any age, be content to take my place by the fireside and simply look on. Life was meant to be lived.
- Eleanor Roosevelt
The owners of this country know the truth: It’s called the American dream because you have to be asleep to believe it.
- George Carlin
There are three truths: my truth, your truth and the truth.
- Chinese Proverb
Love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love is done well.
- Vincent Van Gogh
Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.
- Albert Einstein
How lovely to think that no one need wait a moment, we can start now, start slowly changing the world! How lovely that everyone, great and small, can make their contribution toward introducing justice straightaway… And you can always, always give something, even if it is only kindness!
- Anne Frank
We may have different religions, different languages, different colored skin, but we all belong to one human race.
- Kofi Annan (Elected Secretary General of the United Nations on December 13, 1996)
Where they burn books, they will also burn people.
Mark this well, you proud men of action: You are nothing but the unwitting agents of the men of thought who often, in quiet self-effacement, mark out most exactly all your doings in advance.
- Heinrich Heine (Born December 13, 1797)
Pedantry and mastery are opposite attitudes toward rules. To apply a rule to the letter, rigidly, unquestioningly, in cases where it fits and in cases where it does not fit, is pedantry… To apply a rule with natural ease, with judgment, noticing the cases where it fits, and without ever letting the words of the rule obscure the purpose of the action or the opportunities of the situation, is mastery.
The best of ideas is hurt by uncritical acceptance and thrives on critical examination.
- George Pólya (Born December 3, 1187)
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Wikiquote:Quote_of_the_day/December#13
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The Tao that can be expressed is not the eternal Tao; The name that can be defined is not the unchanging name.
The Tao is called the Great Mother: empty yet inexhaustible, it gives birth to infinite worlds.
The Tao is like a well:
used but never used up.
It is like the eternal void:
filled with infinite possibilities.
A leader is best when people barely know that he exists…
Since before time and space were, the Tao is. It is beyond is and is not.
How do I know this is true?
I look inside myself and see.
A good traveler has no fixed plans
and is not intent upon arriving.
A good artist lets his intuition
lead him wherever it wants.
Without the laughter, there would be no Tao.
A journey of a thousand li starts with a single step.
The mark of a moderate man is freedom from his own ideas. Tolerant like the sky, all-pervading like sunlight, firm like a mountain, supple like a tree in the wind, he has no destination in view and makes use of anything life happens to bring his way.
The Master has no possessions.
The more he does for others, the happier he is.
The more he gives to others, the wealthier he is.
The Tao nourishes by not forcing.
By not dominating, the Master leads.
- Laozi, Tao Te Ching
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Laozi
Hope isn’t obvious or easy. It takes a stubborn resolve & an indomitable will. With hope, no matter how dark the day, there is always light.
- Cory Booker
From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of particular interest. But for us, it’s different. Consider again that dot. That’s here, that’s home, that’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there — on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.
Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.
The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.
It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.
- Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot
via en.wikiquote.org
The miracle is not to walk on water. The miracle is to walk on the green earth in the present moment, to appreciate the peace and beauty that are available now.
Peace is every step.
- Thich Nhat Hanh
How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a weary world.
- William Shakespeare
I am a passenger on Spaceship Earth.
- Buckminster Fuller
via apod.nasa.gov
“Explanation: Have you contemplated your sky recently? Tonight will be a good one for midnight meditators at many northerly locations as meteors from the Geminids meteor shower will frequently streak through. The Geminds meteor shower has slowly been building to a crescendo and should peak tonight. Pictured above ten days ago, a group of celestial sightseers in the Maranjab Desert in Iran, were treated to a dark and wondrous pre-dawn sky that contained the planet Venus and a crescent Moon. Tonight Mars and Mercury should be visible just above the southwestern horizon at sunset, while the first quarter Moon will set around midnight.”
Amplify’d from www.spacetelescope.org
A Dazzling Planetary Nebula
The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has turned its eagle eye to the planetary nebula NGC 6572, a very bright example of these strange but beautiful objects. Planetary nebulae are created during the late stages of the evolution of certain stars that eject gas into space and emit intense ultraviolet radiation that makes the material glow. This picture of NGC 6572 shows the intricate shapes that can develop as stars exhale their last breaths. Hubble has even imaged the central white dwarf star, the origin of the dazzling nebula, but now a faint, but hot, vestige of its former glory.
NGC 6572 only began to shed its gases a few thousand years ago, so it is a fairly young planetary nebula. As a result the material is still quite concentrated, which explains why it is abnormally bright. The envelope of gas is currently racing out into space at a speed of around 15 kilometres every second and as it becomes more diffuse, it will dim.
NGC 6572 was discovered in 1825 by the German astronomer Friedrich Georg Wilhelm von Struve, who came from a family of distinguished stargazers. The name planetary nebula is left over from the time when the telescopes of early astronomers were not good enough to reveal the true nature of these objects. To many, the discs looked like the outer planets Uranus and Neptune. The application of spectral analysis, later in the 19th century, first revealed that they were glowing gas clouds.
NGC 6572 is magnitude 8.1, easily bright enough to make it an appealing target for amateur astronomers with telescopes. It is located within the large constellation of Ophiuchus (the Serpent Bearer) and at low magnification it will appear to be just a coloured star, but higher magnification will reveal its shape. Some observers report that NGC 6572 looks blue, while others state that it is green. Colour as seen through the eyepiece is often a matter of interpretation, so you may make your own decision!
This picture was created from images taken with Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 2. Images through a blue filter that isolates the glow from hydrogen gas (Hβ, F487N, coloured dark blue), a green filter that isolates emission from ionised oxygen (F502N, coloured blue), a yellow broadband filter (F555W, coloured green) and a red filter that passes emission from hydrogen (Hα, F656N) have been combined. The exposure times were 360 s, 240 s, 100 s and 180 s, respectively and the field of view is just 29 arcseconds across.
Credit:
ESA/Hubble & NASA
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Reflecting Merope – Erich Fromm, Erica Jong, Roy Croft, Sophocles, Aldous Huxley, Herodotus, Dalai Lama, Dr. West
via nasa.gov
You were created from ecstasy; you were created out of LOVE & LIGHT. It is your birthright.
- Bashar
Those who bring sunshine to the lives of others cannot keep it from themselves.
- James Matthew Barrie
Each one has to find his peace from within. And peace to be real must be unaffected by outside circumstances.
- Mahatma Gandhi
You’ll never find rainbows if you’re looking down!
- Charlie Chaplin
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.
- William Shakespeare
The purpose of our lives is to give birth to the best which is within us.
- Marianne Williamson
Keep alert, stand firm in your faith; be courageous, be strong, let all that you do be done in LOVE.
- Corinthians
Confusion now hath made his masterpiece!
- William Shakespeare
People love chopping wood. In this activity one immediately sees results.
- Albert Einstein
Never injure a friend, even in jest.
- Cicero
To truly give charity, you must be free of selfishness!
- Mother Teresa
You were born from a ray of God’s majesty and have ALL the blessings of a good star.
- Rumi
Everybody wants to eat at the government’s table, but nobody wants to do the dishes.
- Werner Finck
Beauty of style and harmony and grace and good rhythm depends on simplicity.
- Plato
A ship has a soul.
- John Rhodes
Follow your HEART
- ♡
Don’t grieve. Anything you lose comes round in another form.
- Rumi
If you would know strength and patience, welcome the company of trees.
- Hal Borland
Come, come again, whoever you are, come!
Heathen, fire worshipper or idolatrous, come!
Come even if you broke your penitence a hundred times,
Ours is the portal of hope, come as you are.
- Rumi
It takes awareness to remember that life is a gift, don’t feel overwhelmed by other thoughts. Feel joy as spirit reflects back onto you.
- Deepak Chopra
The minute I heard my first love story I started
looking for you, not knowing how blind that was. Lovers don’t finally
meet somewhere. They’re in each other all along.
- Mevlana Celaleddin Rumi
Looking at American prisons in our day, we see primarily poor people, disproportionately but not exclusively black & brown.
- Cornel West
How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.
- Anne Frank
via en.wikiquote.org
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via en.wikiquote.org
The Great Vehicle path requires the vast motivation of a Bodhisattva, who, not seeking just his or her welfare, takes on the burden of bringing about the welfare of all sentient beings.
All living beings are believed to possess the nature of the Primordial Buddha Samantabhadra, the potential or seed of enlightenment, within them.
For as long as space endures, and for as long as living beings remain, until then may I, too, abide to dispel the misery of the world.
As time passes I have firmed my conviction that all religions can work together despite fundamental differences in philosophy. Every religion aims at serving humanity. Therefore, it is possible for the various religions to work together to serve humanity and contribute to world peace.
When we reach beyond the confines of narrow self-interest, our hearts become filled with strength.
Only the inner protection of patience can keep us from experiencing the turmoil of negative thoughts and emotions.
Always embrace the common humanity that lies at the heart of us all.
By developing a sense of concern for others’ well-being, then no matter what others’ attitudes are, you can keep inner peace.
No matter what activity or practice we are pursuing, there isn’t anything that isn’t made easier through constant familiarity and training.
If you make your best effort to be kinder, nurture compassion, make the world a better place, then you can say ‘At least I’ve done my best’.
Certain desires are positive: a desire for happiness; for peace; for a more harmonious and friendlier world.
- Dalai Lama
via en.wikiquote.org
In awarding the Peace Prize to H.H. the Dalai Lama we affirm our unstinting support for his work for peace, and for the unarmed masses on the march in many lands for liberty, peace and human dignity.
- Egil Aarvik, Chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee
There is no meaning to life except the meaning man gives his life by the unfolding of his powers.
- Erich Fromm
Peace is more precious than a piece of land.
- Anwar Sadat
No one is fool enough to choose war instead of peace – in peace sons bury fathers, but in war fathers bury sons.
- Herodotus
All that happens means something; nothing you do is ever insignificant.
- Aldous Huxley
My sun sets to rise again.
- Robert Browning
Grace was in all her steps, Heav’n in her Eye, In every gesture dignity and love.
- John Milton (Born December 9, 1608)
Without labor nothing prospers.
- Sophocles
I love you,
Not only for what you are,
But for what I am
When I am with you.
I love you,
Not only for what
You have made of yourself,
But for what
You are making of me.
I love you
For the part of me
That you bring out;
I love you
For putting your hand
Into my heaped-up heart
And passing over
All the foolish, weak things
That you can’t help
Dimly seeing there,
And for drawing out
Into the light
All the beautiful belongings
That no one else had looked
Quite far enough to find.
I love you because you
Are helping me to make
Of the lumber of my life
Not a tavern
But a temple;
Out of the works
Of my every day
Not a reproach
But a song.
I love you
Because you have done
More than any creed
Could have done
To make me good
And more than any fate
Could have done
To make me happy.
You have done it
Without a touch,
Without a word,
Without a sign.
You have done it
By being yourself.
Perhaps that is what
Being a friend means,
After all.
- Roy Croft
Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it’s cracked up to be. That’s why people are so cynical about it. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don’t risk anything, you risk even more.
- Erica Jong
Immature love says: ‘I love you because I need you.’
Mature love says: ‘I need you because I love you.’
- Erich Fromm
The Search for Truth is a Search for Identity, that in finding Truth, we find Ourselves.
- Neil Sutton
Friendship improves happiness and abates misery, by the doubling of our joy and the dividing of our grief.
- Marcus Tullius Cicero
Amplify’d from www.nasa.gov
Reflecting Merope
In the well known Pleiades star cluster, starlight is slowly destroying this wandering cloud of gas and dust. The star Merope lies just off the upper left edge of this picture from the Hubble Space Telescope. In the past 100,000 years, part of the cloud has by chance moved so close to this star–only 3,500 times the Earth-Sun distance–that the starlight itself is having a very dramatic effect. Pressure of the star’s light significantly repels the dust in the reflection nebula, and smaller dust particles are repelled more strongly. As a result, parts of the dust cloud have become stratified, pointing toward Merope. The closest particles are the most massive and the least affected by the radiation pressure. A longer-term result will be the general destruction of the dust by the energetic starlight.
Image Credit: NASA
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M81 & Arp’s Loop – John Milton, Peter Kropotkin, Grace Hopper, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Robert Louis Stevenson
via apod.nasa.gov
via en.wikiquote.org
via en.wikiquote.org
A poet soaring in the high reason of his fancies, with his garland and singing robes about him.
The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.
As good almost kill a man as kill a good book. Who kills a man kills a reasonable creature, God’s image; but he who destroys a good book, kills reason itself, kills the image of God, as it were in the eye.
Freely we serve,
Because we freely love, as in our will
To love or not; in this we stand or fall.
Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to my conscience, above all liberties.
- John Milton (Born December 9, 1608)
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Milton
via en.wikiquote.org
One single war — we all know — may be productive of more evil, immediate and subsequent, than hundreds of years of the unchecked action of the mutual-aid principle may be productive of good.
All belongs to all. All things are for all men … All is for all!
A different conception of society, very different from that which now prevails, is in process of formation. … Acknowledging, as a fact, the equal rights of all its members to the treasures accumulated in the past … it seeks to establish a certain harmonious compatibility in its midst — not by subjecting all its members to an authority that is fictitiously supposed to represent society, not by trying to establish uniformity, but by urging all men to develop free initiative, free action, free association.
Man is appealed to to be guided in his acts, not merely by love, which is always personal, or at the best tribal, but by the perception of his oneness with each human being. In the practice of mutual aid, which we can retrace to the earliest beginnings of evolution, we thus find the positive and undoubted origin of our ethical conceptions; and we can affirm that in the ethical progress of man, mutual support not mutual struggle — has had the leading part.
We take men for what they are worth — and that is why we hate the government of man by man, and that we work with all our might — perhaps not strong enough — to put an end to it.
- Peter Kropotkin (Born December 9, 1842)
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Peter_Kropotkin
A ship in port is safe; but that is not what ships are built for. Sail out to sea and do new things.
- Grace Hopper
Love alone is capable of uniting living beings in such a way as to complete and fulfill them, for it alone takes them and joins them by what is deepest in themselves.
- Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
If your morals make you dreary, depend upon it, they are wrong. I do not say give them up, for they may be all you have, but conceal them like a vice lest they spoil the lives of better and simpler people.
- Robert Louis Stevenson
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Wikiquote:Quote_of_the_day/December#9
Change is inevitable, growth optional. Choose Wisel
- Cory Booker
Grant that we may not so much seek to be understood as to understand.
- Saint Francis of Assisi
The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are.
- Joseph Campbell
The life of inner peace, being harmonious and without stress, is the easiest type of existence
- Norman Vincent Peale
Love helps break down barriers.
- Cornel West
Peace is liberty in tranquility.
- Cicero
The most compassionate form of giving is done with no thought or expectation of reward, and grounded in genuine concern for others.
I look at people from a positive angle, seeking positive aspects. This immediately creates a feeling of affinity, a kind of connectedness.
When we ignore the question of the impact our actions have on others’ well-being, inevitably we end up hurting them.
By studying others’ viewpoints, it is possible for us to discover new and refreshing perspectives on the world – including our own life.
I think that ethical behavior is another feature of the kind of inner discipline that leads to a happier existence.
- Dalai Lama
Amplify’d from apod.nasa.gov
Image Credit &
Copyright:
R Jay GaBany -
Collaboration:
A. Sollima
(IAC),
A. Gil de Paz
(U. Complutense Madrid)
D. Martínez-Delgado (IAC,
MPIA),
J.J. Gallego-Laborda
(Fosca
Nit Obs.),
T. Hallas
(Hallas Obs.)
Explanation:
One of the brightest galaxies in planet Earth’s sky and similar in size
to the Milky
Way, big, beautiful spiral M81
lies 11.8 million light-years away in the northern constellation
Ursa Major.
This
deep image of the region reveals
details in the bright yellow core, but at the
same time follows fainter features along the galaxy’s gorgeous blue
spiral arms and sweeping dust lanes.
It also follows the expansive, arcing feature, known
as Arp’s loop, that seems to rise from the galaxy’s disk at the right.
Studied in the 1960s, Arp’s loop has been thought to be a
tidal tail,
material pulled out of M81 by gravitational interaction with its large
neighboring galaxy M82.
But a recent investigation
demonstrates that much of Arp’s loop likely lies within our own galaxy.
The loop’s colors in visible and
infrared light
match the colors of pervasive
clouds of dust, relatively
unexplored
galactic cirrus
only a few hundred light-years above the plane of the Milky Way.
Along with the Milky Way’s stars, the dust clouds lie in
the foreground of this remarkable view.
M81′s dwarf companion galaxy,
Holmberg IX,
can be seen just above and left of the large spiral.
On the sky, this image spans about 0.5 degrees,
about the size of the Full Moon.
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Mono Lake: Home To The Strange Microbe GFAJ-1 – Max Muller (Born Dec. 6, 1823), Kierkegaard, Gandhi, & Dalai Lama
via apod.nasa.gov
Work as if you live in the early days of a better nation.
- Alasdair Gray
The pen is the tongue of the mind.
- Horace
I think it’s wrong that only one company makes the game Monopoly.
- Steven Wright (Born December 6, 1955)
No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
- Eleanor Roosevelt
http://www.goodreads.com/quotes
Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.
- Oscar Wilde
Whatever you are, be a good one.
- Abraham Lincoln
What we cannot speak of we must pass over in silence.
- Ludwig Wittgenstein
Every man’s work, whether it be literature or music or pictures or architecture or anything else, is always a portrait of himself.
- Samuel Butler
Love is made out of ecstasy and wonder;
Love is a poignant and accustomed pain.
It is a burst of Heaven-shaking thunder;
It is a linnet’s fluting after rain.
It is stern work, it is perilous work, to thrust your hand in the sun and pull out a spark of immortal flame to warm the hearts of men: but Prometheus, torn by the claws and beaks whose task is never done, would be tortured another eternity to go stealing fire again.
Is Freedom only a Will-o’-the-wisp
To cheat a poet’s eye?
Be it phantom or fact, it’s a noble cause
In which to sing and to die!
- Joyce Kilmer (Born December 6, 1886)
Never think that you’re not good enough. A man should never think that. People will take you very much at your own reckoning.
- Anthony Trollope (Died December 6, 1882)
The Science of Language has taught us that there is order and wisdom in all languages, and even the most degraded jargons contain the ruins of former greatness and beauty. The Science of Religion, I hope, will produce a similar change in our views of barbarous forms of faith and worship.
Whenever we can trace back a religion to its first beginnings, we find it free from many of the blemishes that offend us in its later phases. The founders of the ancient religions of the world, as far as we can judge, were minds of a high stamp, full of noble aspirations, yearning for truth, devoted to the welfare of their neighbors, examples of purity and unselfishness. What they desired to found upon earth was but seldom realized, and their sayings, if preserved in their original form, offer often a strange contrast to the practice of those who profess to be their disciples.
If I were asked under what sky the human mind has most fully developed some of its choicest gifts, has most deeply pondered over the greatest problems of life… I should point to India.
He must be a man of little faith, who would fear to subject his own religion to the same critical tests to which the historian subjects all other religions. We need not surely crave a tender or merciful treatment for that faith which we hold to be the only true one.
The Science of Language has taught us that there is order and wisdom in all languages, and even the most degraded jargons contain the ruins of former greatness and beauty.
The great problems touching the relation of the Finite to the Infinite, of the human mind as the recipient, and of the Divine Spirit as the source of truth, are old problems indeed…
The founders of the ancient religions of the world, as far as we can judge, were minds of a high stamp, full of noble aspirations, yearning for truth, devoted to the welfare of their neighbors, examples of purity and unselfishness.
It is necessary that we too should see the beam in our own eyes, and learn to distinguish between the Christianity of the nineteenth century and the religion of Christ.
Hidden in this rubbish there are precious stones.
Then first came love upon it, the new spring
Of mind — yea, poets in their hearts discerned,
Pondering, this bond between created things
And uncreated…
Who knows from whence this great creation sprang?
He from whom all this great creation came,
Whether his will created or was mute,
The Most High Seer that is in highest heaven,
He knows it — or perchance even He knows not.
- Max Müller (Born December 6, 1823)
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Max_M%C3%BCller
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Wikiquote:Quote_of_the_day/December#6
Painting completed my life.
- Frida Kahlo
There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.
- Soren Kierkegaard
Nonviolence is the supreme law of life.
- Indian Proverb
Peace is its own reward.
My life is my message.
- Mahatma Gandhi
Happiness is not something ready made. It comes from your own actions.
By developing a sense of concern for others’ well-being, then no matter what others’ attitudes are, you can keep inner peace.
A calm mind helps our human intelligence to assess the situation realistically.
I believe that whether a person follows any religion or not is unimportant, he or she must have a good heart, a warm heart.
All the major religious traditions carry the message of love, compassion and forgiveness.
Peace of mind is the basis of a healthy body and a healthy mind; so peace of mind, a calm mind, is very, very important.
By studying others’ viewpoints, it is possible for us to discover new and refreshing perspectives on the world – including our own life.
I think that ethical behavior is another feature of the kind of inner discipline that leads to a happier existence.
- Dalai Lama
via en.wikiquote.org
via en.wikiquote.org
via en.wikiquote.org
via en.wikiquote.org
via en.wikiquote.org
via en.wikiquote.org
via en.wikiquote.org
via en.wikiquote.org
via en.wikiquote.org
Amplify’d from apod.nasa.gov
Explanation:
How strange could alien life be?
An
indication that the fundamental elements that compose most terrestrial life forms
might differ out in the universe was found in unusual
Mono Lake in
California,
USA.
Bacteria in Mono’s lakebed gives
indications
that it not only can tolerate a large abundance of normally toxic
arsenic,
but possibly use arsenic as a replacement for
phosphorous,
an element needed by every other known Earth-based life form.
The result is surprising — and perhaps controversial — partly because arsenic-incorporating
organic molecules were thought to be much more fragile than phosphorous-incorporating organic molecules.
Pictured above is 7.5-km wide Mono Lake as seen from nearby Mount Dana.
The inset picture shows GFAJ-1, the unusual bacteria that might be able to
survive on
another world.
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Dalai Lama – 11th World Summit Of Nobel Peace Laureates – Opening Statement – A World Without Nuclear Weapons #p2
“Opening statement by His Holiness the Dalai Lama during the opening session of the three day “11th World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates – The Legacy of Hiroshima: A World without Nuclear Weapons” held in Hiroshima, Japan, from November 12th to 14th, 2010.”
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Peace Justice Disarmament Poetry Inspiration Quotes Beauty Wisdom Future World Vision
“I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.
In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.
Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.
I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality.
Darkness cannot put out darkness. Only light can do that.
The time is always right to do what is right.
Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality.”
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
Obama follows the advice of Kissinger, Nunn, Schultz, Reagan, Matlock, Gorbachev, Kennedy, et al ad infinitum and reduces the role of nuclear weapons in foreign policy, with the goal and vision of complete abolition and disarmament. This is a very very very positive step in the right direction, and will help future efforts to negotiate in the common interest of all countries and all people to put the nuclear genie back in the bottle and achieve total elimination of nuclear weapons, “the scourge of humanity” as described by Jack Matlock, former Reagan ambassador to the Soviet Union. I really don’t understand arguments against nuclear abolition and disarmament. By changing the Nuclear policy of the United States, along with signing the new START treaty with Russia, the upcoming Nuclear Security Summit next week as well as the Nuclear Nonproliferation Review Conference in May are strengthened and it will be easier to work toward the shared goal and vision of a world free from the danger and threat of nuclear weapons, that President Obama articulated last year in Prague.
Facts from the White House: The New Start Treaty and Protocol
“Finally, this day demonstrates the determination of the United States and Russia — the two nations that hold over 90 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons — to pursue responsible global leadership. Together, we are keeping our commitments under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which must be the foundation for global non-proliferation.
While the New START treaty is an important first step forward, it is just one step on a longer journey. As I said last year in Prague, this treaty will set the stage for further cuts. And going forward, we hope to pursue discussions with Russia on reducing both our strategic and tactical weapons, including non-deployed weapons.
President Medvedev and I have also agreed to expand our discussions on missile defense. This will include regular exchanges of information about our threat assessments, as well as the completion of a joint assessment of emerging ballistic missiles. And as these assessments are completed, I look forward to launching a serious dialogue about Russian-American cooperation on missile defense.
But nuclear weapons are not simply an issue for the United States and Russia — they threaten the common security of all nations. A nuclear weapon in the hands of a terrorist is a danger to people everywhere — from Moscow to New York; from the cities of Europe to South Asia. So next week, 47 nations will come together in Washington to discuss concrete steps that can be taken to secure all vulnerable nuclear materials around the world in four years.
And the spread of nuclear weapons to more states is also an unacceptable risk to global security — raising the specter of arms races from the Middle East to East Asia. Earlier this week, the United States formally changed our policy to make it clear that those [non]-nuclear weapons states that are in compliance with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and their non-proliferation obligations will not be threatened by America’s nuclear arsenal. This demonstrates, once more, America’s commitment to the NPT as a cornerstone of our security strategy. Those nations that follow the rules will find greater security and opportunity. Those nations that refuse to meet their obligations will be isolated, and denied the opportunity that comes with international recognition.
That includes accountability for those that break the rules — otherwise the NPT is just words on a page. That’s why the United States and Russia are part of a coalition of nations insisting that the Islamic Republic of Iran face consequences, because they have continually failed to meet their obligations. We are working together at the United Nations Security Council to pass strong sanctions on Iran. And we will not tolerate actions that flout the NPT, risk an arms race in a vital region, and threaten the credibility of the international community and our collective security.
While these issues are a top priority, they are only one part of the U.S.-Russia relationship. Today, I again expressed my deepest condolences for the terrible loss of Russian life in recent terrorist attacks, and we will remain steadfast partners in combating violent extremism. We also discussed the potential to expand our cooperation on behalf of economic growth, trade and investment, as well as technological innovation, and I look forward to discussing these issues further when President Medvedev visits the United States later this year, because there is much we can do on behalf of our security and prosperity if we continue to work together.
When one surveys the many challenges that we face around the world, it’s easy to grow complacent, or to abandon the notion that progress can be shared. But I want to repeat what I said last year in Prague: When nations and peoples allow themselves to be defined by their differences, the gulf between them widens. When we fail to pursue peace, then it stays forever beyond our grasp.”
President Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev signed the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty in Prague. The treaty commits the U.S. and Russia to reduce the number of strategic nuclear warheads by one-third and decrease the number of missiles, bombers, and submarines carrying them by more than one-half. Following the signing, the two leaders took questions from reporters. President Obama in his comments said, “It sends a signal around the world that the United States and Russia are prepared to once again take leadership.”
The White House Blog: Key Facts about the New START Treaty
Verification and Transparency: The Treaty has a verification regime that combines the appropriate elements of the 1991 START Treaty with new elements tailored to the limitations of the Treaty. Measures under the Treaty include on-site inspections and exhibitions, data exchanges and notifications related to strategic offensive arms and facilities covered by the Treaty, and provisions to facilitate the use of national technical means for treaty monitoring. To increase confidence and transparency, the Treaty also provides for the exchange of telemetry.
Soon the treaty will go to the Senate, where it must receive support from two-thirds of the chamber before it can take effect.
Saying that “the pursuit of peace and calm and cooperation among nations is the work of both leaders and peoples in the 21st century” and that “we must be as persistent and passionate in our pursuit of progress as any who would stand in our way,” President Barack Obama just joined Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in signing a new arms control deal that cuts both their nations’ nuclear arsenals by about one-third.
“I fully support Obama’s proposal to cut nuclear weapons. This needs to be done because it reduces the risk of nuclear war,” Arkady Brish, 92, said when asked if he backed Obama’s call for a world free of atomic weapons.
“We hope humanity will reach the moment when there is no need for nuclear weapons, when there is peace and calm in the world,” he told reporters at a Moscow atomic research institute in a rare public appearance.
Foreign journalists were given an opportunity to speak with Brish during a Kremlin-organized tour of two nuclear-related sites ahead of the signing Thursday of a new US-Russia nuclear disarmament treaty.
Obama dismisses Palin’s uninformed criticism
Jon Stewart: That’s Fox. They always would have been so unfair . . . to Reagan.”
The point is to have a phased and verifiable reducing of arms by all nuclear powers as part of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty with the ultimate goal of complete global nuclear abolition and disarmament, which makes us much much much safer in the context of rogue states such as Iran and North Korea.
Global Zero leaders reacted to the President Obama’s signing of the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) in Prague earlier in the day and responded to reporter’s questions. The group supports the elimination of nuclear weapons. They also discussed President Obama’s upcoming April 12-13, 2010, Nuclear Security Summit. Film producer Lawrence Bender showed a clip of his new documentary film on nuclear danger, Countdown to Zero.
Avaaz: The World In Action’s Partnership with Global Zero
Avaaz / Global Zero Petition Digg
Global Zero Declaration Direct Link
It is interesting that a broad range of foreign policy experts and former ambassadors, politicians, and public figures including Colin Powell, George Schultz, Sam Nunn, Henry Kissinger (!), Nuclear Threat Initiative, Jack Matlock (former Reagan ambassador to Soviet Union), and many many many others, including about eighty percent of Americans and thousands of mayors across the world and even Reagan himself supported the goal and vision of complete global nuclear abolition and disarmament. So, for all the people that are against the promise and possibility of nuclear disarmament, I ask you, “why?” Why oppose the majority of people of the world? Why oppose Reagan, the patron saint of conservatives?
According to Matlock, Putin offered to help the United States deal with terrorism before 9/11 happened, but Bush essentially ignored the offer of support from the Russians. The Russians are our friends, not our adversaries.
As Reagan himself quoted many times from the Russian proverb, “Trust, but verify . . . .”
The treaty contains verification framework, much more advanced and detailed than the first START treaty negotiated by Reagan and Gorbachev.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates almost breaks into tears when describing his own personal experience with the transition from arms control during the Cold War to disarmament in the world today, and uses his memory and personal story to illustrate how much the world has changed now that Russia and the United States are friends and no longer enemies. Last year I was hesitant to support Gates remaining as Defense Secretary in President Obama’s administration, but now Gates truly does seem to have a good heart and a right mind for his job, and is committed to the principle, goal, and vision of complete global nuclear disarmament and abolition.
“We live in a troubled world, and the United States and China, as two great nations, share a special responsibility to help reduce the risks of war. We both agree that there can be only one sane policy to preserve our precious civilization in this modern age: A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought. And no matter how great the obstacles may seem, we must never stop our efforts to reduce the weapons of war. We must never stop at all until we see the day when nuclear arms have been banished from the face of this Earth.” Ronald Reagan, 1984, China
With 23,000 nuclear weapons worldwide, experts are clear: we either eliminate all nuclear weapons or accept living in a world where virtually any country or terrorist group can get one.
Last year, over 115,000 of us helped secure a historic commitment by Russia and the US to reduce their nuclear arsenals by a third–a commitment affirmed in the new US-Russia treaty.
But only a massive surge of people power can persuade world leaders to take bolder steps to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons. We cannot miss this historic opportunity! Sign the declaration below, then spread the word — the petition numbers will be announced at the summit in 4 days!:
“WE believe that to protect our children, our grandchildren and our civilization from the threat of nuclear catastrophe, we must eliminate all nuclear weapons globally. We therefore commit to working for a legally binding, verifiable agreement, including all nations, to eliminate nuclear weapons by a date certain.”
MR. GIBBS: Good afternoon. Let’s start with a few quick announcements. As you all know, the President will host, on April 12-13, the Nuclear Security Summit at the Washington Convention Center here in D.C. I wanted to list for you all a couple of different things — first, the 47 countries including the United States that will participate in the summit.
They include Algeria, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, the Czech Republic, Egypt, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, India, Indonesia, Israel, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Mexico, Morocco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Philippines, Poland, the Republic of Korea, the Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Switzerland, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Thailand, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, Ukraine, and Vietnam. The United Nations, the IAEA, and the European Union will also be represented.
As part of the Nuclear Security Summit, the President is currently planning to host a number of bilateral meetings. Those include President Sargsian of Armenia; President Hu Jintao of China; Chancellor Merkel of Germany; Prime Minister Singh of India; King Abdullah II of Jordan; Prime Minister Najib of Malaysia; Prime Minister Gilani of Pakistan; President Zuma of South Africa; and President Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan.
Thanks Proposition One In 2010 Campaign!
Nuclear Security Summit May Bring U.S., China Closer
“The two leaders [Presidents Obama and Hu] reached a new and important consensus on U.S.-China relations and other matters of common concern. They agreed to respect each other’s core interests, appropriately handle disputes and sensitive issues and increase dialogue and cooperation in all areas.” – China’s Vice Foreign Minister Cui Tiankai
Largest Peace Group: Signing New START Treaty is Good; More Needed to Finish
“The New START treaty is a modest, but good step toward reducing the threat from nuclear weapons. The Senate should quickly and deliberately advise and consent to its ratification. Fewer nuclear weapons makes Americans safer and sends the right message to the rest of the world. President Obama should continue his push for a nuclear weapons-free world not by beginning another round of negotiations for a further incremental cut to 1,000 nuclear weapons on each side, as has been reported, but by taking executive actions to reduce the U.S. nuclear stockpile.”
The road to ratification in the Senate is complicated by conservatives such as Sen. John Kyl (R-AZ), yet even he has not ruled outright the possibility of voting for the treaty, provided his pet projects are taken care of . . . Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) does a good job of supporting the new START treaty as well as making clear that no new nuclear weapons will be built, even to win over waffling Republican senators.
And, so, to change that adversarial relationship, to build the trust and build the confidence, and also, over time, seek to reduce what are huge, huge still, and very large nuclear weapons, I think, is a significant step forward.
Yet John Kyl does not argue for making new weapons, at the very least, yet he wants funding to “modernize.”
Al Franken also did a good job of countering arguments against the new START treaty last month:
Sen. AL. FRANKEN. Madam President, I rise today to speak about arms control and the President’s negotiations with Russia over a replacement to the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or START. This new treaty will be an important enhancement to American national security, and I look forward to considering it on the Senate floor once it has been signed.
As you may recall, the original START treaty was ratified by the Senate in 1992 by a bipartisan vote of 93 to 6. It went into force in late 1994, with a predetermined life of 15 years, causing it to expire this past December.
Soon after taking office, the Obama administration began careful and diligent work to negotiate a successor treaty with Russia. As START was expiring in early December,
President Obama and President Medvedev of Russia issued a joint statement making clear that our two countries would effectively abide by the expiring treaty until the new one comes into force.
I think we can all agree that the original START was a landmark achievement. It brought about historic reductions in nuclear weapons. Its verification measures and the communication between the United States and Russia that they fostered served to build confidence between the two countries at an uncertain moment. It helped our nations to move toward a post-Cold-War mentality, providing strategic stability between the world’s two greatest nuclear powers.
I am confident the successor to START will be equally historic. The world has changed, and this will be a new treaty for a new world with a new set of nuclear challenges. But the bottom line for the new treaty remains the same as it was for the original START: The treaty must–and it will–advance our national security interests.
When the new treaty is signed and presented to the Senate, there will be plenty of opportunity to discuss and debate in detail the specific numerical limitations on strategic offensive arms. President Obama and President Medvedev determined these would be in the range of 500 to 1,100 for strategic delivery vehicles, and in the range of 1,500 to 1,675 for their associated warheads. Likewise, we will carefully examine the counting rules for those limitations, the monitoring and verification measures for implementing the agreement, and all its other provisions.
I look forward to discussing all these specific matters when the Senate fulfills our responsibility to offer our advice and, as appropriate, our consent. But the core reasons this treaty will make us safer are already clear.
The verifiable reduction of nuclear weapons by the United States and Russia will provide us with strategic stability and mutual confidence. In other words, it ensures transparency and predictability between the two countries that possess 95 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons.
The new treaty will do this while streamlining the elaborate and, in some cases, outdated and unnecessarily burdensome verification measures from the original treaty. The new treaty will also reduce the risk of nuclear theft or loss from our countries, and we know just how important this last point is in a world where terrorist groups would give anything to obtain a nuclear weapon.
This new treaty will also allow us to lead by example in arms reduction, and this will in turn greatly aid our vital nonproliferation efforts. Indeed, while the arms reductions in the treaty will be relatively modest, entering into the treaty will be a significant step in the renewal of our arms control and nonproliferation agenda for the 21st century. It will put us on firmer ground as we confront the dangers of nuclear weapons in this new world.
I want to dwell briefly on this last point. The centerpiece of the global nonproliferation framework is aptly named the Non-Proliferation Treaty. This treaty requires that states without nuclear weapons pledge not to acquire them. But it also imposes a responsibility on nuclear states which must pursue reductions in weapons.
When we fulfill that responsibility, it strengthens the global nonproliferation framework that centers on the Non-Proliferation Treaty. It strengthens our hand in dealing with nonnuclear states, whether they are allies pursuing civilian nuclear power or adversaries with unclear nuclear intentions.
The point is not that untrustworthy adversaries will suddenly be transparent about their intentions or fulfill their obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Rather, we can negotiate with and pressure adversaries more effectively when we are meeting our own responsibilities. Likewise, we can work more effectively with our friends–and rely on them for multilateral support–when we ourselves lead by example. In other words, arms control agreements like the new START follow-on treaty are themselves powerful tools in our nonproliferation efforts.
The START follow-on treaty is only one element of President Obama’s ambitious nonproliferation and arms control agenda to reduce and ultimately eliminate the threat from nuclear weapons. But until we are able to realize this end goal, it remains important to maintain an effective deterrent. This treaty will in no way–in no way–take away that deterrent.
Likewise, it is critical for us to support the administration’s increased budget request for ensuring the safety and reliability of the nuclear stockpile and the complex and experts who maintain it. Such a commitment to a safe and reliable nuclear arsenal goes hand in hand with minimizing the danger from nuclear weapons through arms control and nonproliferation. We must pursue the limitation of nuclear weapons while maintaining an effective deterrent. And that is just what the START follow-on treaty will do. It will make us safer without jeopardizing our effective deterrent.
I look forward to a robust discussion and ultimately, I hope, to bipartisan consent to the resolution of ratification.
We shall see if Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell were and will be able to come to an agreement to ensure speedy ratification of the treaty.
Check out Nuclear Age Peace Foundation and Abolition Caucus for further updates:
Abolition 2000, a global network calling for a treaty to eliminate nuclear weapons, is supported by concerned individuals, citizen action groups, religious leaders, political and civic leaders, retired military leaders, nobel laureates, municipalities, and colleges and universities. The Abolition Global Caucus promotes international dialogue on key nuclear issues and provides a forum for individuals and organizations to contribute action alerts, news bulletins and ideas that will lead to a more secure and peaceful world, free from the threat of nuclear weapons.
as well as Global Zero, Ploughshares Fund, and Avaaz / Avaaz / Global Zero Partnership.
“Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.”
“You know my friends, there comes a time when people get tired of being trampled by the iron feet of oppression … If we are wrong, the Supreme Court of this nation is wrong. If we are wrong, the Constitution of the United States is wrong. And if we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong. If we are wrong, Jesus of Nazareth was merely a utopian dreamer that never came down to Earth. If we are wrong, justice is a lie, love has no meaning. And we are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until justice runs down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
- Martin Luther King, Jr. – Address to the first Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) Mass Meeting, at Holt Street Baptist Church (5 December 1955)
Inspirational Educational Martin Luther King, Jr. Quotes for Liberals, Progressives, Creative Radicals, Positive Extremists, Leftist Anarchists, etc., etc., etc.:
“We may have all come on different ships, but we’re in the same boat now.
When you are right you cannot be too radical; when you are wrong, you cannot be too conservative.
We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.
We must build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear.
Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.
We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.
Almost always, the creative dedicated minority has made the world better.
The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists who are dedicated to justice, peace and brotherhood.
The question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be… The nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into friend.
At the center of nonviolence stands the principle of love.
Have we not come to such an impasse in the modern world that we must love our enemies – or else? The chain reaction of evil – hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars – must be broken, or else we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.
The hottest place in Hell is reserved for those who remain neutral in times of great moral conflict.
Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will.
Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking. There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think.
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.
Peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but a means by which we arrive at that goal.
Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‘What are you doing for others?’
The first question which the priest and the Levite asked was: “If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?” But… the good Samaritan reversed the question: “If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?”
Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.
Nonviolence is a powerful and just weapon. which cuts without wounding and ennobles the man who wields it. It is a sword that heals.
Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him.
Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness.
History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people.
Human salvation lies in the hands of the creatively maladjusted.
I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.
If we are to go forward, we must go back and rediscover those precious values – that all reality hinges on moral foundations and that all reality has spiritual control.
In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality.
Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.
It is not enough to say we must not wage war. It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it.
Never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was legal.
Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.
The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character – that is the goal of true education.
That old law about ‘an eye for an eye’ leaves everybody blind. The time is always right to do the right thing.
This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy.
He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it.
We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love. There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When we discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies.
No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.
I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.
As you press on for justice, be sure to move with dignity and discipline, using only the weapon of love. Let no man pull you so low as to hate him. Always avoid violence. If you succumb to the temptation of using violence in your struggle, unborn generations will be the recipients of a long and desolate night of bitterness, and your chief legacy to the future will be an endless reign of meaningless chaos.
Men often hate each other because they fear each other; they fear each other because they don’t know each other; they don’t know each other because they cannot communicate; they cannot communicate because they are separated.
The moral arc of the universe bends at the elbow of justice.
It is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence in this world; it’s nonviolence or nonexistence.”
-Martin Luther King, Jr.
Toward Peace, Disarmament, Justice, Freedom, Poetry, Magic, Beauty, Positive Future, World Vision
Tell global leaders: It’s time to work toward zero!:
Hopes for the next week’s Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, DC are high. With the U.S. and Russia leading the way, 2010 could mark the beginning of the end of nuclear weapons. But public support at this crucial moment is critical to build the foundation of a binding and verifiable global zero agreement. If the world fails to come together now, when the biggest nuclear powers are taking unprecedented steps, we might lose our best chance yet to do away with one of the greatest threats to our civilization. Achieving global zero will take years and require tremendous amounts of political will. Leaders at the summit need to hear that we, their constituents, care about this issue.
Today we have a chance to tell them when it matters most.
We invite you to join our partner Global Zero, an international movement of activists, experts, political and religious leaders, in calling for immediate steps the leaders at the summit can take now. Global Zero activists will hold a rally outside the Summit and deliver the petition and action plan.
Click to sign the petition!The Global Zero petition and action plan are backed by hundreds of former heads of state, foreign ministers, national security advisers and military commanders, supported by grassroots activists from around the world.
“The leaders at the Nuclear Security Summit have the power to take immediate steps to begin eliminating all remaining nuclear weapons,” say Global Zero organizers. “But they need to hear from us first. Please sign the petition and forward it to all your friends and family — we need to have as many signatures as possible when we deliver it April 12.”
“Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense. Hatred does not cease by hatred, but only by love. This is the eternal rule.” – Gautama Buddha
“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” – Rumi
“As I love nature, as I love singing birds, and gleaming stubble, and flowing rivers, and morning and evening, and summer and winter, I love thee, my Friend.” – Henry David Thoreau
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.
Mavis Staples “Eyes On The Prize”
We have come a long way, yet we have a long way to go to realize Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s vision and dream . . . .
“Hate is too great a burden to bear. It injures the hater more than it injures the hated.” – Coretta Scott King
Daily Kos: Martin Luther King, Jr.: It’s Always The Right Time, To Do What Is Right
All I’m saying is simply this: that all mankind is tied together; all life is interrelated, and we are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. For some strange reason I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. And you can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be – this is the interrelated structure of reality. John Donne caught it years ago and placed it in graphic terms: No man is an Island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main… And then he goes on toward the end to say: any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. And by believing this, by living out this fact, we will be able to remain awake through a great revolution.
I would like to mention, secondly, that we are challenged to work passionately and unrelentingly to get rid of racial injustice in all its dimensions. Anyone who feels that our nation can survive half segregated and half integrated is sleeping through a revolution. The challenge before us today is to develop a coalition of conscience and get rid of this problem that has been one of the nagging and agonizing ills of our nation over the years. Racial injustice is still the Negro’s burden and America’s shame. We’ve made strides, to be sure. We have come a long, long way since the Negro was first brought to this nation as a slave in 1619. In the last decade we have seen significant developments – the Supreme Court’s decision outlawing segregation in the public schools, a comprehensive Civil Rights Bill in 1964, and, in a few weeks, a new voting bill to guarantee the right to vote. All of these are significant developments, but I would be dishonest with you this morning if I gave you the impression that we have come to the point where the problem is almost solved.
We must face the honest fact that we still have a long, long way to go before the problem of racial injustice is solved. For while we are quite successful in breaking down the legal barriers to segregation, the Negro is now confronting social and economic barriers which are very real. The Negro is still at the bottom of the economic ladder. He finds himself perishing on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. Millions of Negroes are still housed in unendurable slums; millions of Negroes are still forced to attend totally inadequate and substandard schools. And we still see, in certain sections of our country, violence and man’s inhumanity to man in the most tragic way. All of these things remind us that we have a long, long way to go. For in Alabama and Mississippi, violence and murder where civil rights workers are concerned, are popular and favorite pastimes.
Let nobody give you the impression that the problem of racial injustice will work itself out. Let nobody give you the impression that only time will solve the problem. That is a myth, and it is a myth because time is neutral. It can be used either constructively or destructively. And I’m absolutely convinced that the people of ill will in our nation – the extreme rightists – the forces committed to negative ends – have used time much more effectively than the people of good will. It may well be that we will have to repent in this generation, not merely for the vitriolic works and violent actions of the bad people who bomb a church in Birmingham, Alabama, or shoot down a civil rights worker in Selma, but for the appalling silence and indifference of the good people who sit around and say, “Wait on time.” Somewhere we must come to see that human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability. It comes through the tireless efforts and the persistent work of dedicated individuals. Without this hard work, time becomes an ally of the primitive forces of social stagnation. So we must help time and realize that the time is always right to do right.
There is another reason why we must get rid of racial injustice. Not merely because it is sociologically untenable or because it is politically unsound, not merely to meet the communist challenge or to create a good image in the world or to appeal to African and Asian peoples, as important as that happens to be. In the final analysis racial injustice must be uprooted from American society because it is morally wrong. Segregation is morally wrong, to use the words of the great Jewish philosopher, Martin Buber, because it substitutes an I-it relationship for the I-thou relationship. Or to use the thinking of Saint Thomas Aquinas, segregation is wrong because it is based on human laws that are out of harmony with the eternal natural and moral laws of the universe. The great Protestant theologian, Paul Tillich, said that sin is separation. And what is segregation but an existential expression of man’s tragic estrangement – his awful segregation, his terrible sinfulness? And so in order to rise to our full moral maturity as a nation, we must get rid of segregation whether it is in housing, whether it is a de facto segregation in the public schools, whether it is segregation in public accommodations, or whether it is segregation in the church. We must see that it is morally wrong. We must see that it is a national problem. And no section of our country can boast of clean hands in the area of brotherhood. We strengthen our nation, above all we strengthen our moral commitment; as we work to get rid of this problem.
Now there is another problem facing us that we must deal with if we are to remain awake through a social revolution. We must get rid of violence, hatred, and war. Anyone who feels that the problems of mankind can be solved through violence is sleeping through a revolution. I’ve said this over and over again, and I believe it more than ever today. We know about violence. It’s been the inseparable twin of Western materialism, the hallmark of its grandeur. I am convinced that violence ends up creating many more social problems than it solves. This is why I say to my people that if we succumb to the temptation of using violence in our struggle, unborn generations will be the recipients of a long and desolate night of bitterness. There is another way – a way as old as the insights of Jesus of Nazareth and as modern as the techniques of Mohandas K. Gandhi. For it is possible to stand up against an unjust system with all of your might, with all of your body, with all of your soul, and yet not stoop to hatred and violence. Something about this approach disarms the opponent. It exposes his moral defenses, weakens his morale, and at the same time, works on his conscience. He doesn’t know how to handle it. So it is my great hope that, as we struggle for racial justice, we will follow that philosophy and method of non-violent resistance, realizing that this is the approach that can bring about that better day of racial justice for everyone.
In international relations, we must come to see this. We must find some alternative to war and bloodshed. In a day when man-made vehicles are dashing through outer space, and guided ballistic missiles are carving highways of death in the stratosphere, no nation can win a world war. It is no longer a choice between violence and non-violence; it is either non-violence or non-existence. The alternative may well be a civilization plunged into the abyss of annihilation, our earthly habitat transformed into a tragic inferno that even Dante could not imagine. So this is our challenge: to see that war is obsolete, cast into limbo.
I do not wish to minimize the complexity of the problems to be faced in achieving disarmament and peace. But we shall not have the courage, the insight, to deal with such matters unless we are prepared to undergo a mental and spiritual change. It is not enough to say we must not wage war. We must love peace and sacrifice for it. We must fix our visions not merely on the negative expulsion of war, but upon the positive affirmation of peace. We must see that peace represents a sweeter music, far superior to the discords of war. Somehow we must transform the dynamics of the world power struggle from the negative nuclear arms race which no one can win to a positive contest to harness man’s creative genius for the purpose of making peace and prosperity a reality for all of the nations of the world. In short, we must shift the arms race into a peace race.
All that I’ve said is that we must work for peace, for racial justice, for economic justice, and for brotherhood the world over. We have inherited a big house, a great world house in which we have to live together – black and white, Easterners and Westerners, Gentiles and Jews, Protestants and Catholics, Moslem and Hindu. If we all learn to do this we, in a real sense, will remain awake through a great revolution.
I would recommend watching at least the last ten minutes or so of this wonderful talk / discussion with Rep. John Lewis, William Cohen, and Janet Cohen about race and reconciliation:
In summer 2008, the Cohens conducted a forum on race relations in America with a long list of participants. That forum is encapsulated in their book, which they discuss with Congressman, civil rights activist and forum participant John Lewis of Georgia.
There is a definite connection between the inhumanity of racism and the inhumanity of war / murder / elimination of whole peoples. Janet Cohen wrote a play that is a theoretical conversation between Anne Frank and Emmett Till, both young victims of their respective societies that could not protect them from evil / darkness.
Beyond that, Martin Luther King’s message and vision is really a continuation of Gandhi and Thoreau‘s message and vision, and many many many people before that. Among other things, it takes good people standing up to darkness in order to not only make a change toward good, but also ensure that war / murder / oppression does not happen in the future, also by remembering the lessons of history. As George Santayana so famously said, “those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it.” It is a fact that we cannot have another world war or the earth and humanity as we know it would cease to exist, as well as the rest of life on earth. So, in order to ensure the future survival and health of the human race as well as the earth, we must learn to control the dark side of our own natures, and live in peace, as Martin Luther King Jr. says in the speech at Oberlin college.
“Dreams are the touchstones of our characters.” – Henry David Thoreau
“Truth alone will endure, all the rest will be swept away before the tide of time. I must continue to bear testimony to truth even if I am forsaken by all. Mine may today be a voice in the wilderness, but it will be heard when all other voices are silenced, if it is the voice of Truth.” – Mahatma Gandhi
“When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”" – Martin Luther King, Jr.
O, let America be America again–
The land that never has been yet–
And yet must be–the land where every man is free.
The land that’s mine–the poor man’s, Indian’s, Negro’s, ME–
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.
Sure, call me any ugly name you choose–
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people’s lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!
O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath–
America will be!”
- Langston Hughes, “Let America Be America Again”
“Knowing is not enough, we must apply. Willing is not enough, we must do.” – Bruce Lee
“The first principle of nonviolent action is that of noncooperation with everything humiliating.” – Cesar Chavez
“Come, come, come
My endless desires
Come, come, come
Come my beloved
Come my sweetheart
Come, come, come
Don’t talk about the journey
Say no more of the path
The path one must take
You are my path
You are my journey
Come, come, come
You stole from this earth
A bouquet of roses
I am hidden in that bouquet
Come, come, come
As long as I am sober
And keep talking about good and bad
I am missing the most important event
Seeing your face
Come come come
I must be a moron
Missing this life
If I don’t cast my mind
In the fire of love
Come, come, come”
- Mawlana Rumi
Translated by Nader Khalili
Rumi, Fountain of Fire
“An affectionate disposition not only makes the mind more peaceful and calm, but it affects our body in a positive way too. On the other hand, hatred, jealousy and fear upset our peace of mind, make us agitated and affect our body adversely. Even our body needs peace of mind and is not suited to agitation. This shows that an appreciation for peace of mind is in our blood.” – Dalai Lama
“The greatest oak was once a little nut who held it’s ground.” – Buddhist Proverb
“When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace.” – Jimi Hendrix
“Nothing is impossible, the word itself says: I`m possible.” – Audrey Hepburn
“Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense. Hatred does not cease by hatred, but only by love. This is the eternal rule.” – Gautama Buddha
“Great wisdom is generous; petty wisdom is contentious. Great speech is impassioned, small speech cantankerous.” – Zhuang Zi
“The greatest friend of Truth is time, her greatest enemy is Prejudice, and her constant companion Humility.”
- Charles Caleb Colton
“You may encounter many defeats,
but you must not be Defeated.
In fact, the Encountering may be
the very Experience which Creates the
Vitality and the Power to Endure.”
- Maya Angelou
“Keep going until your efforts start to make things better in your hometown.”
- Yoko Ono
“We make out of the quarrel with others, rhetoric, but of the quarrel with ourselves, poetry.” – William Butler Yeats
“There is a tendency for things to right themselves”. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
“You can spend your time agonizing or organizing.” – Dorothy Day
“The Jesus of your spirit is inside you now.
Ask that one for help, but don’t ask for body-things…
Don’t ask Moses for provisions
that you can get from Pharaoh.
Don’t worry so much about livelihood.
Your livelihood will turn out as it should.
Be constantly occupied instead
with listening to God.”
- Maulana Rumi
Mathnawi II:450-454
“Please stop waiting for a better and more appropriate time to become happy and focus on the moment you live in. Happiness is not an arrival, it is the journey itself. Many people seek for happiness above the height of human beings, some below. Yet, happiness is exactly at the exact height of human beings.” – Confucius
“We are taught that the most important gift of our natures is the reaching out to another” – Master Po
“A more altruistic attitude is very relevant in today’s world. If we look at the situation from various angles, such as the complexity and inter-connectedness of the nature of modern existence, then we will gradually notice a change in our outlook, so that when we say ‘others’ and when we think of others, we will no longer dismiss them as something that is irrelevant to us. We will no longer feel indifferent.” – Dalai Lama
“The earth is too small a star and we too brief a visitor upon it for anything to matter more than the struggle for peace.” – Colman McCarthy
“Nothing from outside can stop you from enjoying lasting peace and joy in life – it is the essential nature of your own soul.” – Maharishi
#1
Song of Joy for Paradise
Born in the Ocean of Worlds, Galaxies, Universes
Thousands of rose petals drift
In the sweet sunlit air and sky
Brought down from the mountains
On the wind change from across
The oceanic tides and the stories
Of sailors who wandered far
So that everything brings me to tears
And the thought and fear that I will never
Leave my birth country for distant lands
In search of the promise of treasure
For I am tied to my friends and family
Yet there are many winds to tempt
The imagination of a poor man’s son
And I am the same as any other inside
With just the same chances to succeed
My family’s advice is permanent isolation
From myself as well as the rest of the world
But I will search for exquisite solitude instead
Go to the secret places in my mind
Where loneliness cannot corrupt me
Nor sorrow, fear, darkness, evil, hate
My heart is tied to the earth, love, poetry
The source of all that is, was, and shall be
Where my ancestors came from
To found a better life than the one
They had known across the ocean
From far away the wind brings its tales
Sailors who have wandered far from home
Myself among them, lost in the ether
The land of my birth only a memory
And all lost for the promise of treasure
My heart remains tied to my father’s country
But I have chosen to cross the ocean
In the desert temptations of flesh are many
The imagination of a poor farmer’s son is great
Yet I cannot deny the destiny of my soul
Everlasting Starflower: Diamond Soul Fractal Mandala Spirit
happy music peace love light life health justice environment
Mike Oldfield – A New Beginning In The Beginning
Good luck and Peace, Love, Light, Life, Good Health, & Happiness to Everyone! 
<3
With and For Dreams and Hopes of Peace, Freedom, Justice, Sustainability, Compassion, Interbeing, Understanding, Music, & Love <3
