Balance

• I live a balanced life of growth and renewal
• I fill my life with exciting variety
• I let go in the midst of excitement
• I live up and out in this moment

Balance

• Active / Still
• Grow / Renew
• Create / Analyse
• Break-through / Consolidate
• Assert / Affirm
• Plan / Do

Let go of the mind

• When you allow your mind to take a break, it comes back stronger, sharper, more focused and creative. Richard Carlson
• Think and concentrate in short, relaxed, blocks of time. Don't allow the mind to over steam. It is harmful and painful. The mind is a muscle. Renew your mind.
• A key to balance is to let go in the throes of excitement. Then it grows and creates joy. Grasping exhausts and stifles. Learn to let go and pause.

Replenish

• Fill the well. Nurture yourself. Consciously replenish your resources. As the Zen saying goes, "The bow kept forever tight will break. Learn to stimulate the "muse within." Fun and diversity are great stimulators.
• I found I could add nearly two hours to my working day by going to bed for an hour after luncheon. Winston Churchill
• Sharpen your Saw (Stephen Covey)
• The most important balance comes from (developing / renewing) and doing. The production / production capability balance. (P/PC) Stephen Covey
• When your schedule is out of hand, it's a signal that it's time to slow down and re- evaluate what's important rather than power through everything on the list. When you're feeling out of control, rather than roll up your sleeves and "get to it," a better strategy is to relax, take a few deep breaths and go for a short walk. Richard Carlson

Quotes

• You're like a great, big hairy moth bashing yourself to pieces over a silly flame while all the while out there in the cool night there's food and love... Maggie, Thornbirds
• The more time we spend on work to attain more, more, more, the less time we have to enjoy, enjoy, enjoy…. Schedule time for pleasure, then use your will to keep this important schedule. No cancelling allowed. Susan Jeffers
• Learn to pause or nothing worthwhile will catch up with you. Doug King
• Balance is a True North Principal. Nature is living proof. Stephen Covey
• Get your priorities straight. No one on their deathbed ever said, "If only I'd spent more time at the office." Life's Little Instruction Book
• Variety invigorates while routine saps strength. Do different things. Meet different people. Go to different places. Learn different things. Read different books.

The beauty and wonder of Music

The effects of music

• Music washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.  Red Auerbach
• Music melts all the separate parts of our bodies together. Anais Nin
• Music was my refuge. I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness.  Maya Angelou
• Music is well said to be the speech of angels; in fact, nothing among the utterances allowed to man is felt to be so divine. It brings us near to the infinite.  Thomas Carlyle

Music and nature

• Look at the stars sometimes. They are only notes They are music. Pat Conroy
• Without music, life is a journey through a desert. Pat Conroy
• All the sounds of the earth are like music. Oscar Hammerstein
• There is pleasure in the pathless woods, there is rapture in the lonely shore, there is society where none intrudes, by the deep sea, and music in its roar; I love not Man the less, but Nature more. George Gordon Byron
• Mozart has the classic purity of light and the blue ocean; Beethoven the romantic grandeur which belongs to the storms of air and sea, and while the soul of Mozart seems to dwell on the ethereal peaks of Olympus, that of Beethoven climbs shuddering the storm-beaten sides of a Sinai. Blessed be they both! Each represents a moment of the ideal life, each does us good. Our love is due to both.  Henri Frederic Amiel

Expression through music

• Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and that which cannot remain silent. Victor Hugo
• Where words fail, music speaks. Hans Christian Andersen
• The truest expression of a people is in its dance and music.  Agnes de Mile
• Music is the vernacular of the human soul. Geoffrey Latham
• Music isn't just learning notes and playing them, You learn notes to play to the music of your soul. Katie Greenwood
• I think music in itself is healing. It's an explosive expression of humanity. It's something we are all touched by. No matter what culture we're from, everyone loves music.  Billy Joel

Other

• Great art is as irrational as great music. It is mad with its own loveliness. George Jean Nathan
• In music one must think with the heart and feel with the brain.  George Szell
• Mozart is sweet sunshine.  Antonin Dvorak
• Remember, information is not knowledge; knowledge is not wisdom; wisdom is not truth; truth is not beauty; beauty is not love; love is not music; music is the best.  Frank Zappa

Calmness

• Effortless in mind and body, I nurture an inmost calm in all I do
  I flow with the journey, letting it unfold with time
  I act where I choose, then allow all to flow
  I am relaxed and centred, letting nothing phase me
  Rush not, I take my time. Strive not, I let it happen. Grasp not, I let go.
  I live a relaxed stroll drinking in all the beauty and fun around me.
  Supported below, each movement is a chance to release.
• Wherever I go in the midst of movement and activity, I carry my stillness with me. Deepak Chopra
• Practice being the eye of the storm. Commit to being the one person in the room who is an example of peace and calm. All it takes is intention and practice. Richard Carlson
• You have a choice how you respond to life. Turn your melodrama into a mellow drama. Richard Carlson
• Be happy where you are. There is no way to happiness. Happiness is the way. Richard Carlson
• During crisis or stress, remember that 100 years from now we will all be gone from this planet. Richard Carlson
• Life just is. You have to flow with it. Give yourself to the moment. Let it happen. Governor Gerry Brown
• No matter how dire the situation, keep your cool. Life's Little Instruction Book
• To have it all, Let it all go
• Time deals gently only with those who take it gently. Anatole France
• Count to ten. When you feel yourself getting angry or stressed, take a deep inhalation and relax your body. Count from one to ten, breathing and relaxing each time. Richard Carlson

Feel the fear and do it anyway

• You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing which you think you cannot do. Eleanor Roosevelt
• Do the things you fear and the death of fear is certain. Ralph Waldo Emerson
• It was high counsel that I once heard given to a young person,"Always do what you are afraid to do." Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Strengthen your risk muscle. Keep it in shape by doing new things. If you don't, it atrophies and you're no longer able to take chances. Make it a point to take at least one risk per week. Try a new recipe. Tackle a problem outside your field of expertise. Invest in a new idea. Roger von Oech
• Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear - not absence of fear. Mark Twain

The rewards

• Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage. Anais Nin
• We cannot find peace if we are afraid of the windstorms of life. Elizabeth Kubler- Ross
• One doesn't discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time. Andre Gide
• Watch the turtle. He only moves forward by sticking his head out. Jr Gerstner
• And only when we are no longer afraid do we begin to live in every experience, painful or joyous; to live in gratitude for every moment, to live abundantly. Dorothy Thompson)
• Don't be afraid that your life will end, be afraid that it will never begin. Grace Hansen
• It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live. Marcus Aelius Aurelius
• In my view he who goes ahead is always the one who wins. Catherine The Great

Courage

• It's better to be a lion for a day than a sheep all your life. Elizabeth Henry
• An army of deer led by a lion is more to be feared than an army of lions led by a deer. Chabrais, Athenian general, 357 B.C.
• My centre is giving way, my right is retreating. Situation excellent. I shall attack. Ferdinand Foch
• For the first time in the history of this campaign we are surrounded on the East, West, North and South. We can now attack the enemy in all directions. General Abrams
• "Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things 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

Letting Go

Letting go of worries

• When we stop fighting the inevitable, we release energy which allows us to create a richer life. Elsie MacCormick
• I act where I choose, then allow all to flow.
• There is only one way to happiness and that is to cease worrying about things which are beyond the power of our will. Epictetus
• Two step formula for handling stress. 1. Don't sweat the small stuff. 2. Remember that it's all small stuff. Anthony Robbins
• I let go and trust that all is happening perfectly. Susan Jeffers
• I won't worry about anything today. I'll worry about it tomorrow. Susan Jeffers
• Worry, is in effect, saying to God I don't trust you. John Loftness
• Relax. This is the yesterday that will not matter tomorrow. Brilliant Ashleigh
• I have suffered many things in this life, most of which have never happened. G. W Gates
• Worry pulls tomorrow's cloud over today's sunshine.
• Worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow; it empties today of its strength. Corrie Ten Boom
• I close my eyes, then cut an imagery cord that is attaching me to whatever I am worrying about. I then say to myself "OK God, I am doing my best. I'll let you take over now. Take over God, I trust it is all happening perfectly." I take a deep breath and feel myself letting go." Susan Jeffers

Letting go of Thoughts

• The power of calm: In matters of the mind, the more mental effort you apply to any given situation, the less will be the result.
• When you allow your mind to take a break, it comes back stronger, sharper, more focused and creative. Richard Carlson
• Go slow. Stop thinking. Look around. You'll see something beautiful if you open yourself. Sermon of Van Gogh
• That which is left when there is no more grasping is the Self. Panchadasi
• The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience. Emily Elizabeth Dickinson
• The truth emerges when you get stuck

Letting go of the need for order and perfection

• Chaos often breeds life, when order breeds habit. Henry B. Adams
• For thought is a bird of space, that in a cage of words may indeed unfold its wings but cannot fly. Kahlil Gibran
• Have faith in the Great Mystery to guide me. Important ideas will return. Prove your faith by letting them slip away! This is the secret to an effortless mind.

Letting go of the need to solve it right now

• Use your back burner. Gently hold the problem in your mind without actively analysing it. This simple technique will help you solve many problems and will greatly reduce the stress and effort in your life. Richard Carlson
• The next time you are feeling bad, rather than fight it, try to relax. Richard Carlson
• Don’t allow yourself to be fooled by your low moods. People do not realise that their moods are always on the run. They think instead that their lives have suddenly become worse in the past day, or even the last hour. A low mood is not the time to analyse your life. In low moods we lose our perspective and everything seems urgent. Life is almost never as bad as it seems when you're in a low mood. The trick is to be grateful for our good moods and graceful in our low moods - not taking them to seriously. Richard Carlson
• Practice ignoring your negative thoughts. You can analyse your thoughts, ponder, think through, study, think some more - or you can learn to ignore them - dismiss, pay less attention to, not take too seriously. Richard Carlson
• Negative thoughts do not need to be studied and analysed. Simply recognise that the reason you are feeling sad, angry, stressed or whatever is that you are sweating the small stuff. Instead of rolling up your sleeves and fighting back, back off, take a few deep breaths and relax. Richard Carlson

.
Letting go of expectations

• When you let go of your expectations, when you accept life as it is, you're free.  To hold on is to be serious and uptight.  To let go is to lighten up.  Richard Carlson
• When things don't seem to go my way, I let go of my attachment to how I think they should be, trusting that I am not seeing the big picture.  If I knew the big picture, I would understand that there is a reason for things unfolding the way they are, and that the cosmos has a plan for me much grander than anything I have conceived.   Deepak Chopra
• I let go of expectation.  I visualise cutting the cord to my expectations.  I imagine them drifting into the air until they are gone.   Susan Jeffers
• I relax my consciousness.  I unset my heart.  I wear the world as a loose garment.  I learn to dance with grace on the constantly shifting carpet.  I go with the flow.  Susan Jeffers
• Is it so small a thing to have enjoyed the sun, to have lived light in the spring, to have loved, to have thought, to have done? Matthew Arnold

Letting go of possessions

• Would that you could meet the sun and the wind with more of your skin and less of your raiment.  For the breath of life is in the sunlight and the hand of life is in the wind. Kahlil Gibran
• It is the preoccupation with possession, more than anything else, that prevents men from living freely and nobly.  Betrand Russell
• Let me not be tied down to property or praise and I shall be free. Free from the nagging ache of envy. Free from the hurts of resentment. Free to love all and forgive all. Free to do and say what is right, regardless of the unpopularity. Free to wander everywhere as inspiration guides me. Saint Francis of Assisi
• The things you own end up owning you.  It's only after you lose everything that you're free to do anything.   Chuck Palahniuk 1996, Fight Club
• Barn's burned down - now I can see the rising moon.  Zen Master Masahide
• Appreciate the abundance of what's good in your life, rather than measure and amass things that do not actually lead to happiness.  Cherie Carter-Scott

Letting go of the need for certainty

• The search for certainty and security is an attachment to the known.  The known is the past. There is no evolution in that.  Uncertainty on the other hand is the fertile ground of pure creativity and freedom.  I relinquish my attachment to the known and step into the field of all possibilities.   Deepak Chopra
• I am unattached to outcome.  I am comfortable in the realm of uncertainty.  I do not anticipate or resist, I allow.   Deepak Chopra

Letting go of striving

• Learn to pause or nothing worthwhile will catch up with you. Doug King
• Happiness is as a butterfly, which, when pursued, is always just beyond our grasp, but which, if you sit down quietly, may alight upon you. N. Hawthorne
• As long as there is drivenness, then we cannot experience our true nature. Our true nature is effortless. It is the nature of nature itself - an effortless spontaneous flow. Whether we realize it or not, all of us, from infancy on, start to acquire drivenness, compulsiveness, grabbiness, and that covers over our true nature. As long as that is covered over…life is going to be suffering. On the other hand, we could just as well say that Buddhism teaches that life is heaven on earth if we see what is really there. Shinzen Young
• He who bends to himself a joy doth the winged life destroy. But he who kisses a joy as it flies lives in Eternity's sunrise. William Blake
• The earth belongs to anyone who stops for a moment, gazes, and goes on his way. Colette
• Untroubling and untroubled where I lie, the grass below, above, the vaulted sky. John Clare
• Act without doing; work without effort. Tao Te Ching
• Let your skills evolve with time, without forcing or grasping, especially meditation. Bursts of progress, followed by consolidation and sometimes even apparent relapse. Read your dairy for confirmation. Ebbs and flows - this is the way of the world.
• Sometimes the most urgent and vital thing you can possibly do is to take a complete rest. Ashleigh Brilliant
• If you want to be happy, be. Leo Tolstoy
• What is this life if, full of care, we have no time to stop and stare. William Henry Davies

Letting go of end goaling

• It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end. Ursula K. Le Guin
• Happiness is not a state to arrive at, but a manner of travelling. Margaret Lee Runbeck
• Nothing comes into being all at once; not even the grape or the fig. If you say to me now, I want a fig, I shall answer, that requires time. Let the tree blossom first, then put forth its fruit, and finally let the fruit ripen. Epictetus

Letting go of physical tension

• Every movement I make is a chance to release
• I let my neck release, to let my neck go forward and up, to let my back lengthen and widen. Each movement is a chance to release and lengthen with my head leading. Each part of me releases and lengthens out of the nearest joint. I am supported from below. I think upwards for downward movements. My head floats on a water fountain. Alexander Technique

Letting go of judging others

• Become an anthropologist. Be interested, without judgement, how others choose to live and behave. This is a way of replacing judgements with loving kindness. "I see, that must be the way she sees things in her world. Very interesting." Richard Carlson
• Resist the urge to criticize. Criticism, like swearing, is actually nothing more than a bad habit. When we criticise, it is a statement to the world and to ourselves "I have a need to be critical." Richard Carlson
• I will practice non- judgement. Today I shall judge nothing that occurs. Deepak Chopra
• Non judgement creates silence in your mind. Judgement is the constant evaluation of things as right or wrong, good or bad. When you are constantly evaluating, classifying, labelling, analyzing, you create a lot of turbulence in your internal dialogue. This turbulence constricts the flow of energy between you and the field of pure potentiality. Deepak Chopra
• Observing is witnessing. Judging is concluding. I do not draw conclusions about Who You Are because in your creation of yourself you are never concluded. N. D. Walsch
• When you learn not to judge, you are basically saying, "I am willing to let anything in without deciding first whether it is good or bad. In the practice of openness, you will be inviting your soul to be intimate with you. Deepak Chopra
• One of the cardinal rules of joyful loving is that judging others takes a great deal of energy and without exception, pulls you away from where you want to be. Richard Carlson
• Imagine this person as a tiny infant. See their tiny little features and their innocent eyes. See the same person as a very old person who is about to die. Look at their worn out eyes and their soft smile, which suggests a bit of wisdom and the admission of mistakes made. Richard Carlson
• See the innocence. Learn to be less bothered by the actions of people. Look beyond it so that we can see the innocence in where the behaviour is coming from. Underneath even the most annoying behaviour is a frustrated person who is crying out for compassion. Richard Carlson

Letting go of worrying what others think

• Praise and blame are all the same. You'll never be able to please all the people all the time. Even in a landslide victory in which a candidate secures 55% of the vote, he or she is left with 45% of the population that wishes someone else were the winner. Everyone has their own set of ideas with which to evaluate life and our ideas don't always match those of other people. The sooner we accept the inevitable dilemma of not being able to win the approval of everyone we meet, the easier our lives will become. Richard Carlson
• Practice humility. The less compelled you are to try to prove yourself to others, the easier it is to feel peaceful inside. The less you care about seeking approval, the more approval you seem to get. Richard Carlson
• As for worrying about what other people think, forget it. They aren't concerned about you. They're too busy worrying about what you and other people think of them. Michael le Boouf
• Be more concerned about your character than about your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think of you. Richard Carlson

Letting go of the need to be right

• The next time you find yourself in an argument, rather than defend yourself, see if you can see the other point of view first. Richard Carlson
• I let go of my need to convince others of my point of view. When I remain open to all points of view, my dreams and desires will flow with nature's desires. Deepak Chopra
• Seek first to understand, then to be understood. Stephen Covey, 5th Habit
• I am not controlled by any unfortunate need to be right. Maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong. Only time and circumstances will show for sure… maybe. Susan Jeffers
• Most of our energy goes into maintaining our own importance. If we were capable of losing some of that importance, two extraordinary things would happen to us. One, we would free ourselves from trying to maintain the illusory idea of our grandeur; and two, we would provide ourselves with enough energy to catch a glimpse of the actual grandeur of the universe. Deepak Chopra
• Being right is highly overrated. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day. Richard Carlson
• A wonderful, heartfelt strategy for becoming more peaceful and loving is to practice allowing others the joy of being right - give them the glory. You don't have to sacrifice your deepest philosophical truths or most hearfelt opinions, but starting today, let others be "right" most of the time! Richard Carlson
• Choose being kind over being right. The reason we are tempted to put others down is that our ego mistakenly believes that if we point out how someone else is wrong, we must be right and therefore we feel better. Richard Carlson

Connecting to the Great Mystery though nature

• "How do you know," a Bedouin asked, "that there is a God?" "In the same way," his friend replied. "that I know, on looking at the sand, when a man or beast has crossed the desert-- by his footprints in the world around me." Henry Parry Liddon
• The closer we are to Nature, the closer we are to God. Johann Goethe
• I believe that a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars, and the Pismire ant is equally perfect, and a grain of sand, and the egg of the wren. Walt Whitman
• Twilight has always seemed like God's indrawn breath, a pause in the progression of time. Emilie Richards
• The first act of awe, when man was struck with the beauty or wonder of Nature, was the first spiritual experience. Henryk Skolimowski
• I, the fiery life of divine essence, am aflame beyond the beauty of the meadows, I gleam in the waters, and I burn in the sun, moon, and stars....I awaken everything to life. Ildergard of Bingen
• The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature and God. Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be and that God wishes to see people happy, amidst the simple beauty of nature. Anne Frank
• To see a world in a grain of sand, And a heaven in a wild flower, Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, An eternity in an hour. William Blake
• What else is nature but God? Seneca the Younger
• Every natural object is a conductor of divinity. John Muir
• So nature is my god. To me, nature is sacred; trees are my temples and forests are my cathedrals. Mikhail Gorbachev
• Nature is full of genius, full of divinity; so that not a snowflake escapes its fashioning hand. Henry David Thoreau
• The deeper we look into nature, the more we recognize that it is full of life, and the more profoundly we know that all life is a secret and that we are united with all life that is in nature. Man can no longer live his life for himself alone. We realize that all life is valuable and that we are united to all this life. From this knowledge comes our spiritual relationship with the universe. Albert Schweitzer
• Try and penetrate with our limited means the secrets of nature and you will find that, behind all the discernible concatenations, there remains something subtle, intangible and inexplicable. Veneration for this force beyond anything that we can comprehend is my religion. Albert Einstein
• We are learning finally that the forests and mountains and desert canyons are holier than our churches. Edward Abbey
• "How do you know," a Bedouin asked, "that there is a God?" "In the same way," his friend replied. "that I know, on looking at the sand, when a man or beast has crossed the desert - by his footprints in the world around me." Henry Parry Liddon
• In the mountain, stillness surges up to explore its own height; In the lake, movement stands still to contemplate its own depth. Sir Rabindranath Tagore
• We are surrounded by a rich and fertile mystery. Henry David Thoreau
• Untroubling and untroubled where I lie, the grass below, above, the vaulted sky. Clare John
• If you watched a rock your entire life it would never look different. But if you were God and could observe the rock over fifteen billion years as though only a second had passed, the rock would be frantic with activity. It would be shrinking and growing and trading matter with its environment. Its molecules would travel the universe and become a partner to amazing things that we could never imagine. Scott Adams, God's Debris
• At the deepest level of ecological awareness you are talking about spiritual awareness. Spiritual awareness is an understanding of being imbedded in a larger whole, a cosmic whole, of belonging to the universe. Fritjof Capra
• The forest is not merely an expression or representation of sacredness, nor a place to invoke the sacred; the forest is sacredness itself. Nature is not merely created by God, nature is God. Whoever moves within the forest can partake directly of sacredness, experience sacredness with his entire body, breath sacredness and contain it within himself, drink the sacred water as a living communion, bury his feet in sacredness, open his eyes and witness the burning beauty of sacredness. Richard Nelson
• I believe in God, only I spell it Nature. Frank Lloyd Wright
• Earth’s crammed with heaven, and every common bush afire with God. Elizabeth Barrett Browning
• Nature is too thin a screen; the glory of the omnipresent God bursts through everywhere. Ralph Waldo Emerson
• The arch of sky and mightiness of storms, Have moved the spirit within me, Till I am carried away, Trembling with joy. Uvavnuk, Inuit shaman
• Even in a single leaf of a tree, or a tender blade of grass, the awe- inspiring Deity manifests Itself. Shinto. Urabe-no- Kanekuni
• Conceive of God in terms of universal Nature--a nature God in whom we really live and move and have our being, with who our relation is as intimate and constant as that of the babe in its mother’s womb, or the apple upon the bough. This is the God that science and reason reveal to us--the God we touch with our hands, see with our eyes, hear with our ears, and from whom there is no escape, who is, indeed, from everlasting to everlasting. John Burroughs

The effects of time in nature

• To find the universal elements enough; to find the air and the water exhilarating; to be refreshed by a morning walk or an evening saunter ... to be thrilled by the stars at night; to be elated over a bird's nest or a wildflower in spring—these are some of the rewards of the simple life. John Burroughs
• In the woods, we return to reason and faith. Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves. John Muir
• Study nature, love nature, stay close to nature. It will never fail you. Frank Lloyd Wright
• There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore. Lord Byron
• Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you... while cares will drop off like autumn leaves. John Muir
• Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth will find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. Rachel Carson
• Standing alone on a mountain top, it is easy to realize that whatever special nests we make-- leaves and moss like the marmots and birds, or tents of piled stone-- we all dwell in a house of one room..." John Muir

Celebrating nature

• Nature shows us only surfaces, but she is a million fathoms deep. Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Sunshine is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces us up, snow is exhilarating, there is really no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather. John Ruskin
• The most precious things of life are near at hand, without money and without price. Each of you has the whole wealth of the universe at your very door. John Burroughs
• What is life? it is the flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime. It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset. Crowfoot Blackfoot (Native American)
• To me a lush carpet of pine needles or spongy grass is more welcome than the most luxurious Persian rug. Helen Keller
• Through primrose tufts, in that sweet bower, The periwinkle trail'd its wreaths; And 'tis my faith that every flower Enjoys the air it breathes. William Wordsworth
• While with an eye made quiet by the power of harmony, and the deep power of joy, we see into the life of things. William Wordsworth
• In all things of nature there is something of the marvelous. Aristotle
• Green is the prime colour of the world, and that from which its loveliness arises. Pedro Calderon De La Barca
• All my life through, the new sights of Nature made me rejoice like a child. Marie Curie
• The birds and animals, trees and grasses, rocks, water and wind are our allies. They waken our senses, rouse our passions, renew our spirits and fill us with vision, courage, and joy... David Gaines
• The day I see a leaf is a marvel of a day. Kenneth Patton
• God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform; He plants his footsteps in the sea, And rides upon the storm. William Cowper

Deep thoughts

• If you will think of ourselves as coming out of the earth, rather than having been thrown in here from somewhere else, you see that we are the earth, we are the consciousness of the earth. These are the eyes of the Earth. And this is the voice of the earth. Joseph Campbell
• Nature is a unity in diversity...a harmony, blending together all created things...one great whole animated by the breath of life. Alexander von Humboldt
• Let children walk with Nature, let them see the beautiful blendings and communions of death and life, their joyous inseparable unity, as taught in woods and meadows, plains and mountains and streams of our blessed star, and they will learn that death is stingless indeed, and as beautiful as life. John Muir

Fun and Laugter

• Laughter is the sunshine of my soul
• I search out fun and share it with others
• I splash in puddles
• I do what I love. I discover joy

The Power of Laughter

• Laughter is the closest thing to the grace of God. Karl Barth
• Laughter is the shortest distance between two people. Victor Borge
• He who laughs, lasts. (Mary Pettibone Poole)
• He dares to be a fool, and that is just the first step in the direction of wisdom. James Gibbons Huneker
• Progress is nothing but the victory of laughter over dogma. Benjamin De Cassere
• The Laughing Buddha represents the inner intelligence that lives within all of us. He represents the part of us that is in tune with the Grand Design. He doesn't try to control the chaos. Instead he listens and moves comfortably within the chaos as the world unfolds around him. He stays open to a constant flow of "joyous survival" versus "turbulent survival". He makes us realise that we can't get rid of the chaos, but we can get very creative with the turmoil. Susan Jeffers
• Laughter is the brush that sweeps away the cobwebs of the heart.

Advice

• As soon as you have made a thought, laugh at it. (Lao Tzu)
• Be spontaneous - do it on the spur of the moment, just because you enjoy it. Do it for the joy of doing it, not to win, excel or even do your best. Dr Wayne W. Dyer
• If you are too busy to laugh, you are too busy.
• It has been wisely said that we cannot really love anyone at whom we never laugh. (Agnes Repplier)
• Just below the surface of consciousness, there lurks...a subterranean giggle. Nurture it, give it its space, and it will be fruitful and multiply and cheer your days and warm your nights. Cynthia Heimel
• Let us start a new religion with one commandment, "Enjoy thyself." (Israel Zangwill)

Thoughtful

• Every normal function of life holds some delight. Will Durant
• The one serious conviction that a man should have is that nothing should be taken seriously. (Samuel Butler)
• The most wasted day of all is that on which we have not laughed. Sebastien Chamfort
• We don't stop having fun when we're old; we're old when we stop having fun.
• If you wish to glimpse inside a human soul and get to know a man, don't bother analyzing his ways of being silent, of talking, of weeping, of seeing how much he is moved by noble ideas; you will get better results if you just watch him laugh. If he laughs well, he's a good man. Feodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky

Fun sayings

• Blessed are those who can laugh at themselves, for they shall always be amused.
• Given a choice between two theories, take the one which is funnier. Blore's Razor
• God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh. Voltaire
• Good behaviour is the last refuge of mediocrity. (Henry S.Haskins)
• All the fun's in how you say a thing. Robert Frost
• Its not easy to stay sane in a world that offers such a wonderful choice of madness. Ashleigh Brilliant
• I've explored and rejected every other possibility. Life after all must be for having fun. Ashleigh Brilliant
• One loses many laughs by not laughing at oneself. Sarn Jeannette Duncan
• One should always aim at being interesting rather than exact. (Voltaire)
• The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not 'Eureka!' (I've found it!), but 'That's funny...' - Isaac Asimov.

Coming home to myself and to life

• I am enough. I go easy on myself. I nurture myself.
• I am enough, there is enough and this moment is perfect
• I catch myself doing things right. I capture things I am proud of.
• I feel and acknowledge my feelings. I feel free to express them openly if I choose.
• I do not take life too seriously. It is a wondrous and fun adventure to be enjoyed.
• I love my imperfections and foibles as I love my strengths.
• I choose to grow, not to improve or better myself, but to increase my capacity for happiness.
• I make plenty of time for what I love.
• I nurture my body through healthy diet, fun exercise and plenty of rest.
• I am calmly assertive, knowing I am worthy of respect. I am not afraid to say "no."
• I am my own best friend. I give myself a hug.
• I am not afraid to ask.
• I free myself of "musts" and "shoulds" I do because I choose to.
• I do to enjoy, not because "I have to win" or "be the best"
• I surrender to the inevitable ebbs and flows of life.
• I act where I can and choose to, then allow all to flow.
• I welcome mistakes and failures as I welcome successes for they are portals of discovery and signs I am truly alive.
• I listen to my own truth far more than the praise, criticism and insistences of others.
• I feel free to be myself, make my own rules and develop my own original style.
• I allow things to develop with time knowing that great things can be achieved through consistent, small steps in the right direction.
• I let go of perfectionism for it clogs freedom and creative energy.

Coming home

• I pull up a chair and get acquainted with the me that exists right now. I am enough! I am beautiful as I am. This is a wonderful and courageous step. I can relax and enjoy myself. I become more tolerant of myself and others. I am able to delight in uniqueness. John Kehoe
• I come home to life as well. Things are what they are. I let go and allow life to just happen, instead of trying to orchestrate it. I appreciate everything just for what it is. I've tried to make believe life is something it is not - some utopia where every dream is fulfilled. Life is happy and sad. Life is joy and grief. Life is health and sickness. Life is excitement and boredom. Life is having friends and being lonely. Life is achieving your goals and failing at your goals. Life is being confused and being sure. Life is what it is and if I look at it beyond my illusion of what I think it should be, I find within its diversity, tremendous beauty and goodness. Friendship, a brilliant blue sky, making love, sunsets, acts of kindness, the beach, trees, a good movie, delicious food, a hot bath, beautiful music. Maybe there's no caviar but there's always a hot bowl of soup and it will nourish me. I let go of any bitterness, disappointment, anxiety or frustration and let the sun warm my bones. Wake up! Life is spilling out abundantly. Come home and enjoy it. John Kehoe

I nourish my centre

• Learn to pat yourself on the back for your past and present victories, not matter how small. Search for things to acknowledge. Write down every strong point you can come up with in your life, past and present. John Kehoe
• Redefine a "meaningful accomplishment." If being peaceful and loving are amongst your primary goals, then why not redefine your most meaningful accomplishments as being those that support and measure qualities such as kindness and happiness. Richard Carlson
• I catch myself doing things right
• I am my own best friend
• Give yourself a hug. Dr Irene C. Kassorla
• Once we believe in ourselves, we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight, or any experience that reveals the human spirit. E.E. Cummings

I nourish my body

• I nourish my body through exercise, rest, good posture and healthy food
• Vibrant health is based on natural principles. It grows over time out of regular exercise, proper nutrition, adequate rest, a healthy mind-set, avoiding substances that are harmful to the body. Stephen Covey

The power of gratitude

• I search out treasure in this moment
• I thank the Great Mystery
• I draw positive people close
• I see opportunities

Thanking the Great Mystery

• A single grateful thought raised to heaven is the most perfect prayer. Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
• “If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, “thank you,” that would suffice.” Meister Eckhart
• The more I thank and praise, the more beauty I perceive. As if praise washes and cleanses my eyes, so more is revealed. This prayer is a door into the path of beauty.
• You say grace before meals. All right. But I say grace before the concert and the opera, and grace before the play and pantomime, and grace before I open a book, and grace before sketching, painting, and swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing, and grace before I dip the pen in ink. G. K. Chesterton
• Waking up this morning, I see the blue sky. I join my hands in thanks for the many wonders of life; for having twenty-four brand- new hours before me. Thich Nhat Hanh
• Savor it. Say mmmmmmm! Say "WOW!" Susan Jeffers
• Wealth is not his who has it but his who enjoys it.
• Give Thanks. What excites me? What do I relish doing? What is going well for me right now? Who is special to me? What are my blessings? What am I unhappy about? What are the positives in this?

Focusing on Treasure

• It's not about having what you want. It's about wanting what you have and what you are, right at this moment. Zen saying
• Actively search out the beautiful and positive that life has to offer. Dr Irene Kassorla
• I am the prism by which all is perceived. I need not change, make myself better or more beautiful - I have merely to behold myself as beautiful and it will be so. Wondrous, it is so. All exists within. So it has been and will be forever more. And so I choose to behold myself and my life through the vision the Great Mystery has shown me. I will behold my life as glorious in sickness as well as health. In despair and in hope. In sadness and happiness. This will be my gift. This is my sacred song. To behold the wonder and glory - and to proclaim it loud and clear for all to hear. There is no greater honour than to honour myself. My life. All I can see and touch. Every person I meet. Each day becomes my miracle, simply because I live within the Great Mystery. The Great Mystery is there in all I do and experience. Each day becomes a tribute and a prayer and worship. Always together. Always one. Holy art thou, Mysterious One. John Kehoe
• Celebrate what you want to see more of. (Tom Peters)
• Try the "I have had this" exercise. When looking onto a magnificent view, say "I have had this." These experiences accumulate into a feeling of a life well led. Susan Jeffers
• We can only focus on a couple of things at a time. Ensure they are positive, constructive and uplifting. Anthony Robbins
• There are two ways you can be rich. One is to have all you want, the other is to be satisfied with what you have.
• We are building up or tearing down in everything we do. Do you belong to the construction gang or the wrecking crew?
• I know that life is short. I appreciate every moment I have. Susan Jeffers
• If you look at what you have in life, you'll always have more. If you look at what you don't have in life, you'll never have enough. Oprah Winfrey
• My experience of life reflects what you pay attention to. If I'm paying attention mostly to the BAD, BLEAK AND BLAH, my experience of life reflects a life that doesn't seem worth living. If I'm paying attention to mostly the GOOD, GREAT AND GRAND, it reflects a wonderful life. And make no mistake, what I pay attention to is really up to me. Susan Jeffers
• Be an Alchemist. The real alchemist is one who learns the secret of turning everyday situations into gold. There are no such things as problems, only opportunities.
• Count your blessings instead of your crosses, Count you gains instead of your losses, Count your joys instead of your woes,Count your friends instead of your foes. Count your courage instead of your fears, Count your laughs instead of your tears. Count your full years instead of your lean,Count your kind deeds instead of your mean. Count your health instead of your wealth, Count on God instead of yourself. (Irish Blessing)
• Look for the extraordinary in the ordinary. We see in life what we look for. Richard Carlson
• For everything you have missed, you have gained something else. Ralph Waldo Emerson

Mistakes

• I celebrate mistakes too.
• A man's errors are his portals of discovery. James Joyce
• Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavour. (Truman Captoe)
• You cannot experience that Which You Are in the absence of that which you are not. Therefore, know that when you experience that which you are not, it is not a failure to experience but a way to experience That Which You Are. N. D. Walsch

.
When the going gets tough

• What treasure can I see in this? No matter how hard the loss, defeat might serve as well as victory to shape the soul and let the glory out. Susan Jeffers
• We are confronted with insurmountable opportunities. (Pogo)
• When it is dark enough you can see the stars. Ralph Waldo Emerson
• So much that is good can come from so much that is bad. Susan Jeffers
• Each circumstance is a gift, and in each experience is hidden a treasure. N. D. Walsch
• Barn's burned down - now I can see the moon. Zen Master Masahide
• Most people go through life stepping on flowers while pointing out the weeds.
• My house burned down. Now I can better see the rising moon Basho (12th century Japanese wanderer)
• Every exit is an entry somewhere else. (Tom Stoppard)
• Don't cry because it is over. Smile because it happened.
• Become a possibilitarian. No matter how dark things seem to be or actually are, raise your sights and see possibilities - always see them, for they're always there. (Norman Vicent Peale)
• Every style that is not boring is a good one. (Voltaire)
• Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it. Confucius
• I had the blues because I had no shoes, until upon the street, I met a man who had no feet. Dale Carnegie
• Sometimes things don't go the way we feel they should. Maybe it's because something we never dreamed about is going to happen. (Flavia Weedn)

Awakening beauty

• It is my sacred duty to awaken beauty in my life. To let it fill my heart and mind. In this way, I help to purify the consciousness of my race. The first step is when I accept life totally and unconditionally. I allow life to be what it is. Life becomes my lover, spouse, companion. Everything in life is transitory. I feel the tenderness and fragility of it all. This makes it all the more precious. For every moment is unique. It can be appreciated only once and only now. Let us kiss our lover each moment. Let us accept it totally. Everything is perfect in being what it is. When I fully accept this, I walk the path of beauty. When I cease my judging, criticizing, comparing, I see that all things have their place. In the grand scheme of the universe unfolding, all things are as they should be. Not so much as a hair is out of place in the universe. All things are unfolding in their special way. I have much to celebrate. The present moment is always alive with infinite treasures. Life is spilling out at us in abundance. Children playing. Birds singing. Colours. Flowers blooming. Wind in the branches. Ants crawling. Night and day. Poetry. Music. Making love. Friendship. Travelling. Eating. The universe is celebrating. Let us celebrate with it. A child sees everything as wondrous. Walking the path of beauty means living moment to glorious moment, letting everything be new and exciting again. Let us also see the beauty in one another's hearts. As I see beauty, I praise it. Give thanks for it. Fill my mind with it. With practice, I too will see God in a blade of grass and eternity in a grain of sand. John Kehoe

Creating yourself as you choose to be

• Life is not about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself. George Bernard Shore
• It is the purpose of your soul to announce and declare, to be and to express, to experience and to fulfil Who You Really Are. And who is that? Whoever you say you are! Your life lived is your declaration. Your choices define you. Every act is an act of self definition. N. D. Walsch
• The deepest secret is that life is not a process of discovery, but a process of creation. You are not discovering yourself but creating yourself anew. Seek therefore not to find out Who You Are but determine Who You Want to Be. N. D. Walsch
• Life is about choosing what I want to experience of my Self N. D. Walsch
• Life is a constant process of limitless creation. It is about recreating Who You are, by remembering all you have always known, and choosing what you want to experience of your Self. Go therefore into this magnificent world of your creation and make your lifetime an extraordinary statement of and a breathtaking experience of the greatest idea that you have ever had of yourself. N. D. Walsch
• Man's main task in life is to give birth to himself. (Erich Fromm)
• It is not God's function to create or uncreate the circumstances of my life. God created me in the likeness of God. I have created the rest, through the power God has given me. God has given me the free choice to create with life as I will. N. D. Walsch
• We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are. (Anais Nin)
• What we see depends mainly on what we look for. John Lubbock
• We are the cutting edge of becoming. Terence McKenna
• You can't have a light without a dark to stick it in. Arlo Guthrie
• Your focus becomes your reality.
• Your purpose is to create and recreate yourself anew in each golden moment of Now in the next grandest version of the greatest vision you have ever held about Who You Really Are. To announce and become, express and fulfil, experience and know your true Self. N. D. Walsch
• I am not my past. I am not my yesterdays. I am not what I did yesterday, what I said yesterday, what I thought yesterday. I am the grandest version of the greatest vision I've ever had about who I am. Creating myself anew in the golden moment of now. N. D. Walsch
• I remember I am simply using illusions to create a localised contextual field within which I can experience, and not merely conceptualise, any one of the myriad aspects of Who I Am. I use this contextual field like an artist using a paint brush, producing wonderful pictures and creating powerful and extraordinary moments - moments of grace - in which I may know myself experientially. N. D. Walsch
• "Be the change you wish to see in the world" Gandhi

Creating powerful habits

• It is infinitely better to practice a few minutes every day than to do it for an hour once a week.
• I use personal leverages and create powerful habits.
• Remember that you become what you practice most. Repeated practice is the most basic principle of most spiritual and meditative paths. Where is your attention? How do you spend your time? Are you cultivating habits that are helpful to your goals? Richard Carlson
• Men's natures are alike; it is their habits that carry them far apart. Confucius
• Sow an act...reap a habit; Sow a habit...reap a character; Sow a character...reap a destiny. George Dana Boardman
• The essence of a belief is the establishment of a habit. Charles S. Pearce
• Watch your thoughts, they become words. Watch your words, they become actions. Watch your actions, they become habits. Watch your habits, they become character. Watch your character, it becomes your destiny. Frank Outlaw
• We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit. Aristotle
• We first make our habits, and then our habits make us. John Dryden
• Deep continuous investment over time brings real, sustaining change. Cramming or quick fix solutions do nothing. Stephen Covey

Creating powerful beliefs

Believing our Own Truth

• All we have to know is our own truth, not someone else's. When we understand this, we understand everything. We understand that what others are saying doesn't have to be The Truth; it only has to lead us to our own. All things lead us to our inner most truth. That is their purpose. When it comes to knowing the Truth, the highest authority lies within you. N. D. Walsch
• The highest authority lies within me. I believe only what resonates deep within. I let the truth reveal itself. I do not grasp. Does it ring true? Does it inspire me? Is this an expression of Who I Am? If it is, it will ring true - for I will have been reunited with my innermost wisdom. N. D. Walsch
• Seek always for the answer within. Be not influenced by those around you, by their thoughts or their words. Eileen Caddy
• Say not this is true. Say this is true for me. Say not mine is a better way. Say mine is merely another way. N. D. Walsch
• Say not I have found the truth, but rather I have found a truth. Kahlil Gibran
• Be a light unto yourself. Buddha
• All things based on illusion rather than principle have no sustaining power because they don't tap into that deep burning yes. Stephen Covey
• Find your truth. Stand in your truth. Speak from your truth.

The power of believing

• "What is real?” asks the voice of Truth to the spirits of all who have lived. Like the sound of a raging river, I hear the voices of millions, each proclaiming their truth - all different with many contradictions. Silence fills the air and there is great expectation. Then The Book of Law falls open. Its pages are empty. And the voice of Truth answers: "As thou hast believed, so it is true. Whatever you believe within, that you will see without. All power belongs to those who believe."
• Whatever I believe within, that will I see without. All power belongs to those who believe. I re-examine every belief I possess. Does it empower me? Awaken within me my sacred song? All the beliefs that fail are halved and quartered by the Warrior. I choose my beliefs from within. Daily, like eating and bathing, I focus and meditate upon the things I wish to believe. Imagine them to be true. Use simple affirmations. To imprint these onto my consciousness in much the same way as the times table. I know that any thought or concept, which is fed and nourished through repetition, will take hold within me. John Kehoe
• Man is what he believes. Anton Chekhov
• There are fundamental laws of life (Truths) that operate with unerring consistency - and I am better off to the degree to which I learn to live according to them. Stephen Covey
• I live my life by True North principles - the Laws of Life. I connect with the wisdom of the ages and the wisdom of the heart. My security does not come from the way people treat me or by comparing myself to others. It comes from my basic integrity. Stephen Covey
• Beliefs are the key. Affirming beliefs spur us to action towards our dreams. Associate pleasure with affirming beliefs. Look for legs to support them and build them up. Cast doubt on beliefs that hold you back. Anthony Robbins
• I recreate my beliefs. Thus, I have the power to recreate my reality. For what I believe, I experience. This is original power. I change beliefs that don't belong. Like beliefs of need, separateness, scarcity, failure, judgement, conditionality of love, condemnation and superiority. N. D. Walsch
• Whether you believe you can do a thing or believe you cannot, you are right. Henry Ford
• Once your subconscious has accepted a belief or idea, wether true or not, it will continually feed you thoughts to support that belief. John Kehoe

There are many ways home

• God's greatest truth is that there is not one way only but many ways Home. There are a thousand paths to God and every one will get you there. Indeed all paths lead to God. This is because there is no other place to go. N. D. Walsch
• The spiritual path is not about religions or dogma. It is not about finding the one true way. It is simply the wonder of our own beauty being revealed to ourselves. Of discovering inner sources of power and guidance, and following the path our hearts show us. It is about opening ourselves up to the amazing possibilities that life affords us. For there is more here than we can possibly imagine and all will be greatly rewarded who venture within. John Kehoe
• The Great way has no gate; there are a thousand paths to it. Wu-Men

Creating by Believing

• What I believe, I will see in reality. I have the free will to believe or not believe what I choose. A master's beliefs are not based on his experience, his experience is based on his beliefs. I use thoughts creatively to create beliefs - then I let go of thoughts and move to experience. N. D. Walsch
• The correct prayer is never a prayer of supplication but a prayer of gratitude. Thankfulness is a powerful statement to God; an affirmation that even before you ask, God has answered. Therefore never supplicate. Appreciate. Every prayer - every thought, every statement, every feeling - is creative. To the degree that it is fervently held as truth, to that degree will it be made manifest in your experience. N. D. Walsch
• The will to disbelieve is the strongest deterrent to wider horizons. (Hans Holzer)

Creating beliefs

• Create new, more supportive beliefs.  Remind yourself that you can voluntarily plant in your subconscious mind any thought or belief you desire, and your mind will accept it provided it is introduced with enough feeling and reinforced through repetition.  John Kehoe
• True imprinting requires one to three months before its effects are firmly fixed in the mind.  John Kehoe
• The essence of a belief is the establishment of a habit. Charles S. Pearce
• A complete restructuring of my belief system is required.  I am called to build a temple with new, more powerful spiritual beliefs.  My old, limiting beliefs must be changed.  Every belief I possess about myself and my world must be re-examined in this new light.  Will it strengthen the temple?  Empower me?  Awaken within me my sacred song?  Assist me on my path?  All the beliefs that fail must be halved and quartered by the Warrior.  I am prepared to deny my reality.  Turn heaven and earth upside down.  I need not accept what others have previously accepted.  My temple will be a strong vessel, able to withstand the most vigorous journeys, for I intend to explore vigorously through unknown waters both within and without.  John Kehoe
• In building my temple, I draw from many sources.  I drink deeply from the well of my ancestors.  I choose the finest beliefs I can find.  Beliefs that speak to my heart.  I feel no restraint in borrowing, adding or deleting from one system to the next. Do I believe it?  It doesn't matter!  Do I choose to believe it!  My beliefs are chosen from within, not imposed from without. Daily, like eating and bathing, I focus and meditate upon the things I wish to believe.  Imagine them to be true.  And use simple affirmations.  To imprint these onto my consciousness in much the same way as the times table.  I know that any thought or concept which is fed and nourished through repetition will take hold within me.  "Think not of results, just do."  Until my beliefs become a living, flaming reality.  Remember, this is not a path for the sluggard.  Much is required before anything is gained.  But I persist because there is no way for the temple to built but for one stone upon another.  John Kehoe

Creating vibrant intentions

Practical exercises

• Visualise your goal as if it is actually happening to you right now at least once a day, each and every day. Physically sense the feeling of accomplishment you are after too. John Kehoe
• I make a list of all my desires. I will carry this wherever I go. I will look at this list before I go into stillness and sleep. And when I wake. I release this list of my desires and surrender it to the womb of creation, trusting that when things don't seem to go my way, there is a reason, that the cosmic plan has designs for me grander than even those that I have conceived. Deepak Chopra
• The secret of unleashing your true power is setting goals that are exciting enough that they inspire your creativity and ignite your passion. Anthony Robbins
• You get your life to "take off" by first becoming very, very clear in your thinking. Think about what you want to be, do and have. Think about it often until you are very clear about this. Then when you are very clear, think about nothing else. Imagine no other possibilities. Throw all negative thoughts out. Release all your doubts. Reject all fears. Discipline your mind to hold fast to the original creative thought. When your thoughts are clear and steadfast, begin to speak them as truths. Say them out loud. Use the great command that calls forth creative power: I am. "I am" is the strongest creative statement in the universe. Whatever you think, whatever you say, after the words "I am" sets in motion those experiences, calls them forth, brings them to you. N. D. Walsch

Intention with detachment

• Have intentions but don't have expectations, and certainly don't have requirements. Do not become addicted to a particular result. Do not even prefer one. Elevate your Addictions to Preferences, and your Preferences to Acceptances. N. D. Walsch
• Intention combined with detachment leads to life centred, present-moment awareness. My intent is for the future, but my attention is in the present. I accept the present and intend the future. I let go of my attachment to outcome. I enjoy every moment in the journey of life. Deepak Chopra

Develop the right consciousness

• When I have a strong intention, I set energy in motion. Energy in motion touches other energy in motion and remarkable things can happen. Susan Jeffers
• You can have, be and do whatever you imagine. Thought is pure energy. Every thought is creative. N. D. Walsch
• Want to change your circumstances? Develop the necessary consciousness. A successful person has a success consciousness. A wealthy person has developed a prosperity consciousness, and his thoughts are on abundance, success and prosperity. John Kehoe
• Your powerful, inner collaborator (subconscious) will bring to you the people and circumstances you require to fulfil your goals. "A thousand unseen hands", as Joseph Campbell describes them, will come to your aid. John Kehoe
• When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it. Paulo Coelho
• So think as if your every thought were etched in fire upon the sky for all and everything to see, for so, in truth, it is. Book of Mirdad
• Consciousness is but energy in its finest and most dynamic form. This helps explain why events are effected by what we imagine, visualise, desire, want or fear, and why and how an image held in the mind can be made real. John Kehoe
• Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations. I may not reach them, but I can look up and see their beauty, believe in them, and try to follow where they lead. Louisa May Alcott

Focus

• Weak and scattered thoughts are weak and scattered forces. Strong and concentrated thoughts are strong and concentrated forces.
• Through repetition, a thought can become concentrated and directed, and its force can be magnified many times. John Kehoe
• Focus! True direction is being woken up at 3 am and knowing exactly what your one goal is. Anthony Robbins
• Focus on what you want, not on what you fear or don't want. Focus on what you fear and that's exactly where you'll end up. (Anthony Robbins)
• The secret of success is constancy to purpose. (Benjamin Disraeli)

Dreaming. Visioning. Imagining

• Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine and at last you create what you will. George Bernard Shaw
• Nothing happens unless first a dream. (Carl Sandburg)
• The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams. Eleanor Roosevelt
• If the vision is there, the means will follow. Faith Popcorn
• Without leaps of imagination, or dreaming, we lose the excitement of possibilities. Dreaming, after all, is a form of planning. Gloria Steinem
• Turn on your dream machine. Create mental pictures of what you want. Peter. J. Daniels

The power of intentions

• The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn. Ralph Waldo Emerson
• The shortest distance between two points is an intention. Richard Carlson
• Whatever things ye pray for and ask for believing that ye have received, ye shall receive them. Jesus
• When an object or purpose is clearly held in thought, its precipitation, in tangible and visible form, is merely a question of time. The vision always precedes the realisation. Lillian Whiting
• If you can dream it, you can do it Walt Disney
• A person expands or contracts the world to the dimension of his own vision. That which the mind can conceive and believe can be achieved. The best way to predict the future is to create it. Visualise!
• Having lost sight of our objectives, we redoubled our efforts.
• He who determines the end, provides the means. (Benedetto Varchi)
• I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavour. If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavours to live the life he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. (Thoreau)
• Nothing magnifies your creative powers more than a clear sense of mission. He who puts in four hours of want to will almost always outperform the person who puts in eight hours of have to. How can you convert your have to's to can't wait to's?
• One must not lose desires. They are mighty stimulants to creativeness, to love, and to long life. (Alexander A.Bogomoletz)
• Realise the power of a single choice acted upon immediately and with total conviction. Anthony Robbins
• The ability to progress and achieve extraordinary results even in the midst of chaos is to take just one step at a time in the right direction. Anthony Robbins
• The best way to predict the future is to invent it. (Alan Kay)
• Three people were at work on a construction site. All were doing the same job, but when each was asked what his job was, the answers varied. 'Breaking rocks,' the first replied. 'Earning my living,' said the second. 'Helping to build a cathedral,' said the third. (Peter Schultz)
• We are more in need of a destination and less in need of a road map. Stephen Covey
• What we vividly imagine, ardently desire, enthusiastically act upon, must inevitably come to pass. Colin P. Sisson
• What you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Goethe
• Your life proceeds out of your intentions for it. N. D. Walsch
• He who has a why to live can bear almost any how. Freidrich Nietzhe

The Flip Side

• If you don't know where you are going, any path will take you there. (Sioux Proverb)
• Nothing is more terrible than activity without insight. Thomas Carlyle
• Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off the goal. (Henry Ford)
• Perfection of means and confusion of ends seems to characterise our age. (Albert Einstein)
• There is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all. Peter Drucker
• Things that matter most must never be at the mercy of things that matter least. (Goethe)
• When you're up to your knees in alligators, it's hard to remember that your original goal was to drain the swamp.
• What is the use of running when we are on the wrong road? Bavarian proverb

Creating with love and passion

Creating according to my purpose

• I make a list of my unique talents. Then I list all the things I love to do while expressing my unique talents. When I express my unique talents and use them in the service of humanity, I lose track of time and create abundance in my life as well as the life of others. Deepak Chopra
• What makes life dreary is the want of motive. (George Eliot)

Doing what I love

• Find something you love to do, and you'll never have to work another day in your life. Harvey Mackay
• The supreme accomplishment is to blur the line between work and play. - Arnold Toynbee
• Do what you love. Do what makes your heart sing. And never do it for the money. Don't go to work to make money, go to work to spread joy. Marianne Williamson
• Work is love made visible. Kahlil Gibran
• '…we put the thought of all that we love into all that we make" - J.R.R. Tolkien, Fellowship of the Ring.
• Go ahead and do what you love to do. Do nothing else! You have so little time. How can you think of wasting a single moment doing something for a living you don't like to do. That is not a living, that is dying! N. D. Walsch
• I don't care what you do for a living. If you love it, you re a success. George Burns
• To be successful, the first thing to do is to fall in love with your work. Sister Mary Lauretta
• No man is a failure who is enjoying life. William Feather
• What's money? A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and goes to bed at night and in between does what he wants to do. (Bob Dylan)
• The best career advice to give to the young is, "Find out what you like doing best and get someone to pay you for doing it." (Katharine Whitehorn)

Enthusiasm and passion

• Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm. R.W. Emerson
• Throw your heart out in front of you and run ahead to catch it. (Arab proverb)

Cherishing Others

The sacred nature of relationships

• When we lose sight of each other as sacred souls on a sacred journey, then we cannot see the purpose behind all relationships. The purpose of a relationship is to decide what part of ourselves we would like to experience and express - not what part of another we can capture and hold. Not to have someone to complete us but to have another with whom to share our completeness. N. D. Walsch

• When I see others in need, I allow myself to use the illusion to express the part of myself that I choose to experience. But be clear that I never do anything for another. Everything I do I do for myself. That is because the self is all there is . In this way, there is no resentment. N. D. Walsch

• I love you, not only for what you are, but for what I am when I am with you. Roy Croft
  Quality relationships are built on principles - especially the principle of trust. And trust grows out of trustworthiness, out of the character to make and keep commitments, to share resources, to be caring and responsible, to belong, to love unconditionally. Stephen Covey

• Perhaps God is in the space between people as they try to connect. Before Sunrise
  Love is but the discovery of ourselves in others, and the delight in the recognition. Alexander Smith

• Young lovers seek perfection. Old lovers learn the art of sewing shreds together and of seeing beauty in a multiplicity of patches. American Quilt

• We come to love, not by finding the perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.

The gift of friendship

• From quiet homes and first beginnings, Out to the undiscovered ends, There's nothing worth the wear of winning, But laughter and the love of friends. Hilaire Belloc

• It's the friends you can call up at 4 am that matter. Marlene Dietrich

• Love is blind; friendship closes its eyes.

• What is a friend? A single soul dwelling in two bodies. Aristotle

• And what is as important as knowledge, asked the mind. Caring and seeing with the heart, said the soul. Flavia Weedn

• A sorrow shared is half a trouble, but joy that's shared is joy made double. English proverb

• Let there be spaces in your togetherness. Kahlil Gibran

• It is better to have one person working with you than three people working for you.

Finding and cherishing the beauty in others

• Every person is special, unique and deserves respect. Learn to see beyond what people see in themselves. Everyone has the seeds of greatness in them and you empower people by seeing beyond their imperfections and problems to their potential, their depth, their inner beauty and their possibilities. John Kehoe

• Is the tulip superior to the rose? Are the mountains more majestic than the sea? Which snowflake is the most magnificent? Is it possible that they are all magnificent - and that, celebrating their magnificence together, they create an awesome display. See the beauty and the wonder of all whose lives you touch. For you are each wondrous indeed, yet no- one more wondrous than another. And you will oneday melt into Oneness, and know then that you form together a single stream N. D. Walsch

• A man is like a bit of labrador spar, which has no lustre as you turn it in your hand, until you come to a particular angle, then it shows deep and beautiful colours. Emerson

• When you see others who appear separate from you, look at them deeply. Look into them. Do this for a long moment and you will capture their essence. And you'll meet you, waiting there. N. D. Walsch
  

Affirming others

• Affirm each person you meet. Feed positive energy to your friends and family. The waitress after a meal. The taxi driver. The letter carrier. John Kehoe

• See God in everyone and help everyone to see God in themselves. N. D. Walsch
  The greatest good you can do for another is not just to share your riches, but to reveal to him his own. Benjamin Disraeli

• Flatter me, and I may not believe you. Criticize me, and I may not like you. Ignore me, and I may not forgive you. Encourage me, and I may not forget you. Sir William Arthur

• Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them to become what they are capable of being. Johann W. von Goethe

• The deepest principle in human nature is the craving to be appreciated. William James
  A candle loses nothing by lighting another candle.

• A person's greatest emotional need is to feel appreciated. Life's Little Instruction Book
  Wise sayings often fall on barren ground; but a kind word is never thrown away. Sir Arthur Helps

• A woman wants to be cherished - to be loved and accepted for who she is. Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus.
  

Accepting others

• Love is the ability and willingness to allow those that you care for to be what they choose for themselves, without any insistence that they satisfy you. Dr Wayne W Dyer

• True love requires nothing. N. D. Walsch

• Truly loving another means letting go of all expectations. It means full acceptance, even celebration of another's personhood. Karen Casey

• I allow myself and those around me the freedom to be as they are. I do not rigidly apply my idea of how things should be. I do not force solutions on problems. Deepak Chopra

• You will not see in yourself that which is Divine until you forgive that which you believe is not. And you will be unable to behold the divinity in another unless and until you do the same. Forgiveness is the expander of perception. N. D. Walsch

Listening

• Nurture a genuine interest in others. You can make more friends in two months by becoming really interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you. Dale Carnegie

• Breathe before you speak. Pause - breath - after the person to whom you are speaking is finished. Richard Carlson

• A good listener is not only popular everywhere, but after a while he gets to know something. Wilson Mizner

• There is only one rule for being a good talker: learn to listen. Christopher Morley

• Listening is a magnetic and strange thing, a creative force. The friends who listen to us are the ones we move toward. When we are listened to, it creates us, makes us unfold and expand. Dr. Karl Augustus Menninger

• Become a better listener and a more peaceful person by slowing down your responses. Don't fire back your response. Wait for the person you are listening to finish. You'll notice that the pressure you feel is off. Richard Carlson

• Seek first to understand. Be more interested in understanding others and less in having other people understand you. Stephen Covey
  

Giving

• Wherever I go, and whoever I encounter, I will bring them a gift. The gift may be a compliment, a flower, or a prayer. Today I will gratefully receive all the gifts that life has to offer me. The gifts of nature, sunlight and the sounds of birds singing. Deepak Chopra

• Each day, I make a difference to someone's life.

• Spend a moment everyday thinking of someone to love. Who shall I send love to today? Gear your mind towards love. Even if it just to wish them a day filled with love. Richard Carlson

• My heart expands to embrace others. And so I help because I want to. To lend a hand, an ear, give some time, concern, money - whatever seems appropriate. As I lose myself momentarily in service to others, I am nourished & find a nurturing inner peace. I let my heart breathe & beat for more than just myself. I become the vehicle through which the Great Mystery showers gifts upon others, because so many gifts have been showered upon me. Every act of kindness becomes a prayer. John Kehoe

• Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared. Buddha

• Make service an integral pat of your life. Ask yourself at the start of the day "How can I be of service?" The best way of being of service is often very simple - it's those little, quiet, often unnoticed acts of kindness that I can choose on a daily basis - being supportive.

• Every day, tell at least one person something you like, admire or appreciate about them. Richard Carlson

• Practice random acts of kindness and senseless acts of beauty. Pay for the person behind you at toll booths.

• No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another. Charles Dickens

• Each of us has a gift, a talent to give back to the world. It may be small or large, it does not matter. The sacred song is our unique gift, our purpose, & each of us was born to discover & share it with the world.

• Meaning is in contribution, in living for something higher than self. Stephen Covey

• One turning point amid life’s lessons comes when we receive an acknowledgement of gratitude from someone who may or may not know us. Something clicks inside of us and we realise we are contributing something. Suddenly we realise that our life really matters and we have found a life path that will feed more than just the brain and ego; it will feed our heart and our soul. An influx of energy bursts through us, and we enjoy a sense of satisfaction, spiritual accomplishment and self- esteem. These feelings gather together to create a kind of magical synchronicity. We begin going with that flow rather than paddling up stream. We begin to flow with an unseen force ‘Dancing the Dream’ Jamie Sams

What you give, you become (receiving through giving)

• Be the source. If you want joy, give joy to others. If you want love, learn to give love. The easiest way to get what you want is to help others get what they want. Deepak Chopra

• From the soul's perspective, both helpee and helper are just hanging out together - complementary roles in a dance. Without helpees, what would the helpers have to do? Susan Jeffers

• It is in sharing the most, not gathering the most, that the most is received. N. D. Walsch
  The more you give, the more you receive because you keep the abundance of the universe circulating in your life. Deepak Chopra

• However little of anything you have, you can always find someone who has less. Find that someone and give to them from the abundance that is yours. Seek not to be the recipient of anything but to the the source. That which you wish to have , cause another to have. That which you hope to experience, cause anther to experience. For what you give you become. And in so doing, you will realise that you have had these things in your possession all along. N. D. Walsch

• Be what you are looking for and what you are looking for will find you. What you seek from another, give to another. That which you wish to experience from another, cause another to experience. N. D. Walsch

• There is a wonderful, mystical law of nature that the three things we crave most in life - happiness, freedom and peace of mind - are always attained by giving them to someone else.

We are sacred spirits on a sacred journey

• Life is a cosmic game of hide and seek in which we lose ourselves to find ourselves.  Deepak Chopra

• In reality, we are divinity in disguise, and the gods and goddesses in embyro that are contained within us seek to be fully materialised.  True success is therefore the experience of the miraculous.  It is the unfolding of the divinity within us.  It is the perception of divinity wherever we go, in whatever we perceive. Deepak Chopra

• We are not human beings trying to be spiritual.  We are spiritual beings trying to be human.

• The parable of the soul and the sun:  There was once a soul who knew itself to be the light.  This was a new soul, and so, anxious for experience.  "I am the light," it said.  "I am the light."  Yet all the knowing of it and the all the saying of it could not substitute for the experience of it.  For in the realm from which the this little soul emerged, there was nothing BUT the light.  Every soul was magnificent, and shone with the brilliance of My awesome light.  And so the little soul in question was as a candle in the sun.  In the midst of the grandest light, of which it was a part, it could not see itself, nor experience itself as Who It Really Is.  Now it came to pass that this soul yearned and yearned to know itself.  And so great was its yearning that I one day said "Do you know, Little One, what you must do to satisfy this yearning of yours? You must separate yourself from the rest of us and then you must call upon yourself the darkness."  "What is the darkness, oh Holy One?" the little soul asked.  "That which you are not." I replied and the little soul understood.  And so this the soul did, removing itself from all Yea, and going even unto another realm.  And in this realm, the soul had the power to call into its experience all sorts of darkness.  And this it did.  And yet in the midst of all the darkness did it cry out, "Father, father, why have you forsaken me?"  But I have never forsaken you, but stand by you always, ready to remind you of Who You Really Are, ready, always ready to call you home.   N. D. Walsch

• In creating "something else" - namely the realm of the relative - we have produced an environment in which we may choose to be God, rather than simply be told that we are God, in which we may experience our Godness as an act of creation, rather than conceptualisation, in which the little candle in the sun - the littlest soul - can know itself as the light. N. D. Walsch

• You can't have a light without a dark to stick it in. Arlo Guthrie

• My purpose in creating you, My spiritual offspring, was for Me to know myself as God.  I have no way to do that save through you.  Thus it can be said that My purpose for you is that You should know yourself as Me.   N. D. Walsch

• We are all God, Godding - experiencing Our Self through the experiencing of Our parts.  We are God expressing Our Self.  N. D. Walsch

• We are all the Light.  Light is all we are.  But we have been placed in a relative realm (light and dark) so we can experience who we are and who we are not.

If it isn't about love, it isn't about God

• God is love. God accepts me as I am. God expects nothing of me.  God does not judge. Nothing makes God unhappy. God would never condemn anyone. I do not need to change anything or "get better" to be seen as perfect and beautiful in God's eyes.  N. D. Walsch

• The Great Mystery never judges me.  The Great Mystery supports, nourishes, loves and accepts me totally. And encourages me to do the same.  "Love thyself as I love you." And it is not just me that the Great Mystery loves. It comforts everyone, even the most wicked. Such is its love. None will be punished except those who punish themselves. All is forgiven when you forgive yourself. One thing only is asked of us: that we love and accept ourselves as the universe has loved and accepted us. That is all. John Kehoe

• God needs nothing. God cannot fail, and neither can I. Nothing is separate from anything. There is enough. There is nothing I have to do. I will never be judged. Love knows no condition. A thing cannot be superior to itself. I already know all of this.  N. D. Walsch

• If it isn't about love, it isn't about God  Susan Jeffers

• When you love you should not say, "God is in my heart", but rather, "I am in the heart of God". Kahlil Gibran

• Earthly things must be known to be loved;  Divine things must be loved to be known. Blaise Pascal

• As swimmers dare
  to lie face to the sky
  and water bears them,
  as hawks rest upon air
  and air sustains them,
  so I would learn to attain
  free fall and float
  into Creator Spirit's deep embrace,
  knowing no effort earns
  that all surrounding grace. Denise Levertov

The Great Mystery

• In music, in the sea, in a flower, in a leaf, in an act of kindness...  I see what people call God in all these things.  Pablo Casals

• "How do you know," a Bedouin asked, "that there is a God?" "In the same way," his friend replied. "that I know, on looking at the sand, when a man or beast has crossed the desert - by his footprints in the world around me."  Henry Parry Liddon

Footprints   (inspired by the quotes above)

   Through the loving ways that people connect;
   laughter between friends, a couple holding hands,
   the generosity of a stranger, the smile of a child
   Through the gift of knowing I am enough, no matter what
   Through my highest thoughts, my truest words, my kindests deeds
   Through the wonders of sunsets and mountains, ocean waves, dolphins and daffodils
   Through the uplifting beauty of music, art and poetry
   Through the infiniteness of time and space and the intricacies of atoms and less
   Through the mighty power of silence and the peace that stillness brings
   Through these things,
   I see the footprints of a benevolent Mystery unfolding
   and I look out into the vast night sky
   and I smile at the stars and the moon
   content in the knowledge
   that the universe smiles back

Wonder

Celebrating wonder

• Life is measured not by the number of breaths we take but the number of moments that take our breath away.
• We are all connected through this world of wonders that's more plainly referred to as life. Charlie O'Shields
• When it's over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement. I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms. Mary Oliver
• From wonder into wonder existence opens. Lao-tzu
• Rich in the simple worship of the day. John Keats
• Wonder is the basis of worship. Thomas Carlyle
• The highest human purpose is always to reinvent and celebrate the sacred. N. Scott Momaday
• People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don't even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the curious eyes of a child - our own two eyes. All is a miracle. Thich Nhat Hanh
• Wonder rather than doubt is the root of knowledge. Abraham Joshua Herschel
• Wonder is the beginning of wisdom Greek proverb quotes
• Wherever life takes us, there are always moments of wonder. Jimmy Carter
• I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C- beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die. Blade Runner
• It is a wholesome and necessary thing for us to turn again to the earth and in the contemplation of her beauties to know of wonder and humility. Rachel Carson
• Be aware of wonder. Live a balanced life - learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some. Robert Fulghum
• If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder, he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy, excitement and mystery of the world we live in. Rachel Carson

Wonder in the every day

• If we could see the miracle of a single flower clearly, our whole life would change. Buddha
• The invariable mark of wisdom is to see the miraculous in the common. Ralph Waldo Emerson
• The child lives in the neighbourhood of wonder where innocence keeps mystery playful. Each new event and encounter is all absorbing. John O'Donohue

Knowledge and wonder

• The larger the island of knowledge, the longer the shoreline of wonder. Ralph W. Sockman
• As knowledge increases, wonder deepens. Charles Morgan
• The possession of knowledge does not kill the sense of wonder and mystery. There is always more mystery. Anais Nin

The power of stillness

I will Find You in the Stillness

• You need not leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. You need not even listen, simply wait. You need not even wait, just learn to be quiet, and still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked. It has no choice; it will roll in ecstasy at your feet. Deepak Chopra
• Searching with my mind is like swimming on the surface - swim the whole ocean and I will find nothing. I sink to the place of stillness within. From here the inner presence nourishes me with living waters. From here my prayers carry much power. From here the voice speaks to me sweetly. Helps me in my day-to- day affairs. Tells me truths long forgotten by my race. John Kehoe
• In the stillness, you will find your true being. In the silence, you will hear the breathing of your soul - and of God. You will find God in the Stillness. N. D. Walsch
• To the mind that is still, The whole universe surrenders. Chuang Tzu
• I lovingly nurture the god in embryo that lies deep within my soul. I awaken myself to the deep stillness that lies deep within my heart. Deepak Chopra
• All power comes from the Great Mystery. I can draw directly from the great cosmic reservoirs. The Path of Power involves becoming less, not more. Less of me, the ego. More of the Great Mystery. When I quieten my mind and remain in stillness and feel this power, I feel renewed and empowered. To do this is to drink from the living waters. Here is the source of all power. And here too, is my centre - not only mine but the centre of all centres. As my consciousness expands, my whole being changes and I vibrate at a higher frequency. Inner truths are perceived. Veils are lifted. I see with new eyes. John Kehoe
• Nothing worth knowing can be understood with the mind. Woody Allen
• The cosmic psyche whispers to us softly in the gap between our thoughts. We can learn more about the universe "between our thoughts" than actually "from our thoughts". Deepak Chopra
• Silence is the language of God; It is also the language of the heart. Dag Hammerskjold
• Much silence has a mighty noise. Swamile

The Journey Inwards

• The longest journey of any person is the journey inward. Dag Hjalmar Agné
• I soon realized that no journey carries one far unless, as it extends into the world around us, it goes an equal distance into the world within. Lillian Smith
• I think that I travelled not outwards but within… Imtiaz Dharker

Stillness in Nature

• In the mountain, stillness surges up to explore its own height; In the lake, movement stands still to contemplate its own depth. Sir Rabindranath Tagore
• Untroubling and untroubled where I lie, the grass below, above, the vaulted sky. Clare John
• Twilight has always seemed like God's indrawn breath, a pause in the progression of time. Emilie Richards

The Pure Witness

• When the mind is quiet, we come to know ourselves as the pure witness. Deepak Chopra
• To see your drama clearly is to be liberated from it. Ken Keyes Jr

Being Still

• Simply be quiet. Be with your Self in the stillness. Do this daily. Just stop. Stop all your doing ness. Stop all your thinking. Just "be" for a while. Take an hour every day at dawn and give it to your Self. Meet your Self there in the holy moment. Then go about your day. You will be a different person. N. D. Walsch
• Wherever I go in the midst of movement and activity, I carry my stillness with me. Deepak Chopra
• I get in touch with the power of pure potentiality by taking time each day to be silent, to just be. I take time each day to commune with nature. I will practice non- judgement. Today I shall judge nothing that occurs. Deepak Chopra
• Enter into the stillness inside your busy life. Become familiar with her ways. Grow to love her, feel with all your heart and you will come to hear her silent music and become one with Love’s silent song, the song of Songs. Noel Davis
• Stillness within finds stillness without as the framework through which all activity occurs. Breathe deep and full. Relax always. Grace unfolds from within to dance about in joyous recognition. Rob Campbell
• He who does not go within, goes without, N. D. Walsch
• There is a place in you where there is perfect peace. There is a place in you where nothing is impossible. There is a place in you where the strength of God abides. A Course in Miracles
• To meet everything and everyone through stillness instead of mental noise is the greatest gift you can offer to the universe. Eckhart Tolle
• Trying to find the Truth through words and speech is like putting your head in a bowl of glue. Yuan Wu
• The Chinese word for “busy” is composed of two characters: “heart” and “killing.” When we make ourselves so busy that we are always rushing around trying to get this or that “done” or “over with,” we kill something vital in ourselves, and we smother the quiet wisdom in our heart. When we invest our work with judgment and impatience, always striving for speed and efficiency, we lose the capacity to appreciate the six million quiet moments that may bring us peace, beauty, or joy. As we seek salvation through our frantic productivity and accomplishments, we squander the teachings that may be present in this very moment, in the richness of this particular breath. Brother Steindhl-Rast