Character
To forgive and forget is to reflect love. Situations pass, they cease to exist, but they continue to be alive in the mind. Open your heart and be generous, free yourself from that sorrow, forgive and forget and you will live every moment in peace.

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, 1837-1921

Only a powerful soul can offer love. Only a powerful soul can afford to be humble. If we are weak, then we become selfish. If we are empty, we take; but if we are filled, we automatically give to all. That is our nature.

Dadi Prakashmani, 1922-2007
Indian Peace Activist and Spiritual Leader

"We can live without religion and meditation, but we cannot survive without human affection."

~Dalai Lama

Remember the clear light, the pure clear white light from which everything in the universe comes, to which everything in the universe returns; the original nature of your own mind. The natural state of the universe unmanifest. Let go into the clear light, trust it, merge with it. It is your own true nature, it is home.

- Tibetan Book of the Dead

Life's easy to live for someone unscrupulous, cunning as a crow, corrupt, back-biting, forward, & brash; But for someone who's constantly scrupulous, cautious, observant, sincere, pure in his livelihood, clean in his pursuits, it's hard.

- Dhammapada, 18, translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu.

And I saw the river
over which every soul
must pass
to reach the kingdom
of heaven
and the name of that river
was suffering:
and I saw a boat
which carries souls
across the river
and the name of that boat
was love.

Saint John of the Cross, 1542-1591
Spanish Mystic, Priest and Poet

Only one thing has to change for us to know happiness in our lives: where we focus our attention.

- Greg Anderson

Tough times never last, tough people do.

- Robert Schuller

The most valuable learning is not about memorizing facts and figures. It is not about higher grade point averages and accumulating degrees. It is about life itself, and its impact is on the heart.

- Rodney Smith

Thus shall ye think of this fleeting world:
A star at dawn, a bubble in a stream;
A flash of lightning in a summer cloud;
A flickering lamp, a phantom, and a dream.


-Diamond Sutra

"Man's greatest actions are performed in minor struggles. Life, misfortune, isolation, abandonment and poverty are battlefields which have their heroes - obscure heroes who are at times greater than illustrious heroes." -- Victor Hugo

Whatever living beings there may be--feeble or strong, small or large, seen or unseen, those who live far or those near, those who are born and those who are yet to be born--may all beings, without exception, experience a happy mind.

Let one not deceive another nor despise any person whatever in any place. In anger or ill will let one not wish any harm to another.

Let one's thoughts of boundless love pervade the whole world without any obstruction, without any hatred, without any enmity.

-Samyutta Nikaya

AFTER AWHILE YOU LEARN

After a while you learn the subtle difference between holding a hand
and chaining a soul.
And you learn that love doesn't mean leaning
and company doesn't mean security.
And you begin to learn that kisses aren't contracts
and presents aren't promises.
And you begin to accept your defeats with your head up
and your eyes ahead with the grace of a woman or a man,
not the grief of a child, and learn to build all your roads on today
because tomorrow's ground is too uncertain for plans
and futures have a way of falling down in mid-flight.
After a while you learn that even sunshine burns if you ask too much.
So you plant your own garden and decorate your own soul,
instead of waiting for someone to bring you flowers.
And you learn that you really can endure that you really are strong
and you really do have worth.
And you learn, you learn.. with every goodbye
you learn.........

Just as sharp-bladed grass,
if wrongly held,
wounds the very hand that holds it--
the contemplative life, if wrongly grasped,
drags you down to hell.

-Dhammapada, 22

“How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in your life you will have been all of these. ”

- George Washington Carver -

Anything in life that we don't accept will simply make trouble for us until we make peace with it.
Shakti Gawain

"You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your eternity in each moment." -- Henry David Thoreau

"I have made a ceaseless effort not to ridicule, not to bewail, not to scorn human actions, but to understand."
-- Baruch Spinoza

Move through life with lightness, touching the hearts of others without leaving a mark.