Week of January 21, 2000

Love is like friendship caught on fire.

Bruce Lee

Week of January 14, 2000

"The important thing is to be able to at any moment to sacrifice what you are for what you could become." Charles Dubois

The Dark Side of the Light Chasers, page 137
by Debbie Ford

Week of January 7, 2000

When you don't know where you're going, every road will take you there.

Yiddish Proverb

Week of December 31, 2000

For one human being to love another; that is perhaps the most difficult
of all our tasks, the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which
all other work is but preparation.

Rainer Maria Rilke

Week of December 24, 2000

How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.

Anne Frank

Week of December 17, 2000

Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.

Leo Tolstoy

Week of December 10, 2000

If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.

George Bernard Shaw

Week of December 3, 2000

It is easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.

Alfred Adler

Week of November 26, 2000

This treasure from Sarah Ban Breathnach's Simple Abundance:

To be happy at home is the ultimate result of all ambition.
Samuel Johnson

Week of November 19, 2000

Golden Buddha

The Dark Side of the Light Chasers, page 55-56
by Debbie Ford

Consider the story of the Golden Buddha. In 1957, a monastery in Thailand was being relocated and a group of monks was put in charge of moving a giant clay Buddha. In the midst of the move one of the monks noticed a crack in the Buddha. Concerned about damaging the idol, the monks decided to wait for a day before continuing with their task. When night came, one of the monks came to check on the giant statue. He shined his flashlight over the entire Buddha. When he reached the crack he saw something reflected back at him. The monk, his cursiosity aroused, got a hammer and a chisel and began chipping away at the clay Buddha. As he knocked off piece a fter piece of clay, the Buddha got brighter and brighter. After hours of work, the monk looked up in amazement to see standing before him a huge solid-gold Buddha.

Many historians believe the Buddha had been covered with clay by Thai monks several hundred years earlier before an attack by the Burmese army. They covered the Buddha to keep it from being stolen. In the attack all the monks were killed, so it wasn't until 1957, when the monks were moving the giant statue, that the great treasure was discovered. Like the Buddha, our outer shell protects us from the word: our real treaure is hidden within. We human beings unconsciously hide our inner gold under a layer of clay. All we need to do to uncover our gold is to have the courage to chip away at our aouter shell, piece by piece.

Week of November 12, 2000

Excerpt from The Dead
by Rupert Brooke

They grow not old, as we that are left grow old;
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun, and in the morning
We will remember them.

Week of November 5, 2000

World Without, World Within by
Debbie Ford

The Dark Side of the Light Chasers, page 4

The holographic model of the universe provides us with a revolutionary view of the connection between the inner and the outer world. According to this theory, every piece of the universe, no matter how we slice it, contains the intelligence of the whole. We, as individual beings, are not isolated and random. Each of us is a microcosm that reflects and contains the macrocosm.

Week of October 29, 2000

Earth laughs in flowers.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Week of October 22, 2000

The thought manifests as the word;
The word manifests as the deed;
The deed develops into habit;
And habit hardens into character.

So watch the thought and its ways with care,
And let it spring from love;
Born out of concern for all beings.

Buddha

Week of October 15, 2000

Do not resent growing old. Many are denied the privilege.

Unknown

Week of October 8, 2000

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them.

Henry David Thoreau

>Week of October 1, 2000

... Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds,
or bends with the remover to remove. Oh no!
It is an ever-fixed mark, which looks upon tempests and is not shaken ...

William Shakespeare

Week of September 24, 2000

Teach only love, for that is what you are.

A Course in Mircles, page 71 of text

Week of September 17, 2000

If there is light in the soul,
There will be beauty in the person.
If there is beauty in the person,
There will be harmony in the house.
If there is harmony in the house,
There will be order in the nation.
If there is order in the nation,
There will be peace in the world.

Chinese Proverb

Week of September 10, 2000

Nothing outside yourself can save you; nothing outside yourself can give you peace.

A Course in Mircles, Lesson 70

Week of September 3, 2000

If you can't explain something to a six-year-old, you really don't understand it yourself.

Albert Einstein

Week of August 27, 2000

Lost, yesterday, somewhere between sunrise and sunset, two golden hours, each set with sixt diamond minutes. No reward is offered, for they are gone forever.

Horace Mann

Week of August 20, 2000

Become willing to see the hand of God and accept is as
a friend's offer to help you with what you are doing.

Julia Cameron

Week of August 13, 2000

Love Sonnet CXVI - The Marriage of True Minds

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come:
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

William Shakepeare

Week of August 6, 2000

Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be,
The last of life, for which the first was made;
Our times are in his hand who saith,
"A whole I planned,
Youth shows but half; trust God: See all, nor be afraid!

Robert Browning

Week of July 30, 2000

Grant, Lord, that we might overcome our enemies by transforming them into friends.
Make them and make us conscious of those deep inward reaches whereby every heart
is rooted in our world's deep common life.

Jewish Prayer

Week of July 23, 2000

May there always be work for your hands to do,
May your purse always hold a coin or two.
May the sun always shine warm on your windowpane,
May a rainbow be certain to follow each rain.
May the hand of a friend always be near you,
And may God fill your heart with gladness to cheer you.

Irish Blessing

Week of July 16, 2000

A Course in Miracles, page 200 of text

Every loving thought is true.
Everything else is an appeal for healing and help,
regardless of the form it takes.

Week of July 9, 2000

A Course in Miracles, page 308 of text

The meaning of love is lost in any relationship that looks to weakness, and hopes to find love there. The power of love, which is its meaning, lies in the strength of God that hovers over it and blesses it silently by enveloping it in healing wings.

Week of July 2, 2000

Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?

William Shakespeare: As You Like it, Act III, sc 5

Week of June 25, 2000

Appetites, page 145

Geneen Roth

A man and his neighbor both owned chickens. One day the neighbor was given a beautiful cow, which he grew to love and care for. The cow provided milk and butter and cheese, which he shared with his friend. But the man was envious that his neighbor had a cow and he didn't. One day he found a bottle, rubbed it, and the proverbial genie appeared.

The genie said, "I will grant you one wish, but only one. Think carefully, consider your life, and then ask me for anything you can imagine."

The man said, "Kill the cow."

And it was done.

He could have asked for a herd of cows. Or a farm wir=th a garden and horses and sheep and cows. He could have asked for happiness or joy or sexual exctasy forever, but all he wanted was to diminish the size of his neighbor's life rather than increase the size of his own.

Week of June 18, 2000

Our planet is designed to meet everyone's need, but not everyone's greed. As we arise each day and go into our world, we can leave behind our belief in scarcity. We can take with us the promise that "there is enough" to share wtih all.

From World Ark Summer 2000, page 28

by Jerry Aaker
Director of training for Heifer Project International
Spiritual director in Kenyon, Minnesota

Week of June 11, 2000

The Invitation, page 85

Oriah Mountain Dreamer

When we cannot live with failure, we limit the intimacy in our lives. People do not tell stories of failure to those who have room in their hearts only for perfection. Tell me story of failure in your life, a time when you made a mistake. Tell it with compassion for the child or man or woman you were. Tell it with ruthless honesty and gentle acceptance. We do not avoid shame by hiding mistakes. The shame just becomes buried within us.

Week of June 4, 2000

What the caterpillar calls the end, the rest of the world calls a butterfly.

Lao Tsu

Week of May 28, 2000

Irish Blessing

May the road rise to meet you,
May the wind be always at your back,
May the sun shine warm upon your face,
The rains fall soft upon your fields and,
Until we meet again,
May God hold you in the palm of His hand

Week of May 21, 2000

My Heart Will Go On
Love theme from Titanic

Every night in my dreams
I see you, I feel you
That is how I know you go on.

Far across the distance
and spaces between us
You have come to show you go on.

Near, far, wherever you are
I believe that the heart does go on
Once more, you opened the door
And you're here in my heart,
and my heart will go on and on.

Love can touch us one time
and last for a lifetime
And never let go till we're gone.

Love was when I loved you,
one true time I'd hold to
In my life we'll always go on.

Near, far, wherever you are
I believe that the heart does go on
Once more, you opened the door
And you're here in my heart,
and my heart will go on and on.

You're here, there's nothing I fear
And I know that my heart will go on.
We'll stay, forever this way
You are safe in my heart
and my heart will go on and on.

Week of May 14, 2000

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 you cannot do.

Eleanor Roosevelt

Week of May 7, 2000

Simple Abundance, May 16

Sarah Ban Breathnach

There is an ancient metaphysical law that says if we desire more abundance in our lives we must create a vacuum to allow ourselves to receive the good we seek. How can more good come into our lives if there is no room for it? The way we create the vacuum is by giving away what we no longer need or desire but what can serve others.

Week of April 30, 2000

Living Juicy, meditation for April 9

Sark

Expressing Your Creativity

Ex-pression is the opposite of de-pression. Whenever we de-press, we usually need to ex-press. Tune your channel to creativity and let the goodness flow out of you.

Week of April 23, 2000

A Course in Miracles, page 274 of text

It is impossible to remember God in secret and alone. For remembering Him means you are not alone, and are willing to remember it

Amen

Week of April 16, 2000

Seat of the Soul, page 142

Gary Zukav

... the Universe backs the part of you that is of clearest intention.

Week of April 09, 2000

A Course in Miracles, page 216 of text

When you have accepted your mission to extend peace you will find peace,
for by making it manifest you will see it.

Amen

Week of April 2, 2000

A Course in Miracles, page 215 of text

When you want only love you will see nothing else.

Week of March 26, 2000

Enchanted Love, page 60

Marianne Williamson

Your eyes are like street lamps to me. They tell me I am home, this is where I live, I am safe here, I have made it. There is someone waiting here to talk to me and hold me ... I want to know everything, and I am rushing now across the grass, to throw open the door, to say "I'm home!", to see your eyes, to know that this is the right address, the right address at last, thank God.

Week of March 19, 2000

Enchanted Love, page 37

Marianne Williamson

Dear God,

I pray for the loves of my past,
those who chose me and those who did not.
I pray for their happiness,
their growth and their good.
May their hearts be filled with light
and their desires finally filled.
May they find what they are seeking,
although it could not be me.

Amen

Week of March 12, 2000

The Invitation, page 80

Oriah Mountain Dreamer

On my fortieth birthday I made a vow. I promised myself that in the second half of my life I would only make real mistakes. Real mistakes are the genuine errors in judgment, choices that can be seen, with the knowledge of hindsight, not to have been the best. It's not that I hadn't made lots of mistakes in my first forty years. But I was frustrated less with those honest failures born of inexperience or lack of information, than the mistakes I'd made because I'd second-guessed my initial judgments.

Excerpted with permission from THE INVITATION by Oriah Mountain Dreamer (published May 1999). Copyright (c) 1999 by Mountain Dreaming Productions. All rights reserved. May not be reproduced in whole or in part without the permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 10 E. 53 St., New York NY 10022.

Week of March 5, 2000

The Invitation, page 58

Oriah Mountain Dreamer

I suddenly realized that the people in my life who are the most trustworthy - those who tell the truth, even when the truth is hard - are not those who always keep their agreements with me. Those who can be faithless - who can bear the responsibility of breaking an agreement with someone when the alternative is to betray themselves - are trustworthy.

As the original version of "The Invitation" was copied and shared by people all over the world, the most frequent change made to it was to substitute the world faithful for the word faithless. People didn't like it. It made them uncomfortable.

Week of February 27, 2000

Work like you don't need the money.
Love like you've never been hurt.
Dance like nobody is watching.

Author Unknown

Week of February 20, 2000

Death ends a life, not a relationship.

page 174 of Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom

Week of February 13, 2000

So when you are offering your gift at the alter, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the alter and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift

Mathew 5:23

Week of February 6, 2000

I did not lose myself all at once. I rubbed my face over the years washing away my pain, the same way carvings on stone are worn down by water.

Amy Tan

Week of January 30, 2000

Accepting the Invitation
Oriah Mountain Dreamer

The Invitation, page 12

When I imagine myself as an old woman at the end of my life and ask myself how I will evaluate my time here, there is only one question that concerns me: Did I love well? There are a thousand ways to love people and the world - with our touch, our words, our silences, our work, our presence. I want to love well. This is my hunger. I want to make love to the world by the way I live in it, by the way I am with myself and others every day. So I seek to increase my ability to be with the truth in each moment, to be with what I know, the sweet and the bitter. I want to stay aware of the vastness of what I do not know. This is what brings me to the journey. I do not want to live any other way.

Week of January 23, 2000

Anybody can observe the Sabbath but making it holy surely takes the rest of the week.

Alice Walker

Week of January 16, 2000

When Sleeping Beauty wakes up, she is almost fifty years old.

Maxine Kumin

Week of January 9, 2000

After a certain number of years, our faces become our biographies.

Cynthia Ozick

Week of January 2, 2000

Gravitation can not be held responsible for two people falling in love.

Albert Einstein

Week of December 26, 1999

He Wishes For The Cloths of Heaven

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

W.B. Yeats

Week of December 19, 1999

A woman without freckles is like a night without stars

author unknown

Week of December 12, 1999

Little Drummer Boy

Come they told me
Pa rum pum pum pum
A new born King to see
Pa rum pum pum pum
Our finest gifts we bring
Pa rum pum pum pum
To lay before the King
Pa rum pum pum pum
Rum pum pum pum, Rum pum pum pum
So to honor Him
Pa rum pum pum pum
When we come

Baby Jesus
Pa rum pum pum pum
I am a poor boy too
Pa rum pum pum pum
I have no gift to bring
Pa rum pum pum pum
That's fit to give a King
Pa rum pum pum pum
Rum pum pum pum, Rum pum pum pum
Shall I play for you
Pa rum pum pum pum
On my drum

Mary nodded
Pa rum pum pum pum
The ox and lamb kept time
Pa rum pum pum pum
I played my drum for Him
Pa rum pum pum pum
I played my best for Him
Pa rum pum pum pum
Rum pum pum pum, Rum pum pum pum
Then he smiled at me
Pa rum pum pum pum
Me and my drum

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The drum is the Great Spirit's favorite instrument, that is why He gave us each a Heart beat.

American Indian saying

Week of December 5, 1999

Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage.

Anais Nin

Week of November 28, 1999

Come wander with me, she said,
Into regions yet untrod;
And read what is still unread
In the manuscripts of God.

Longfellow

Week of November 21, 1999

F.E.A.R. = False Evidence Appearing Real

Anthony Robbins

Week of November 14, 1999

A Native American elder once described his own inner struggles in this manner:

"Inside of me there are two dogs. One of the dogs is mean and evil. The other dog is good. The mean dog fights the good dog all the time."

When asked which dog wins, he reflected for a moment and replied,

"The one I feed the most."

Week of November 7, 1999

All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost;
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by the frost.
From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
A light from the shadows shall spring;
Renewed shall be the blade that was broken,
The crownless again shall be king.

J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

Week of October 24, 1999

I Will Remember You
Sarah McLachlan

Chorus:
I will remember you
Will you remember me?
Don't let your life pass you by
Weep not for the memories

Remember the good times that we had?
I let them slip away from us when things got bad
How clearly I first saw you smilin' in the sun
Wanna feel your warmth upon me, I wanna be the one

Chorus

I'm so tired, but I can't sleep
Standin' on the edge of something much too deep
It's funny how we feel so much but we cannot say a word
We are screaming inside, but we can't be heard

Chorus

I'm so afraid to love you, but more afraid to loose
Clinging to a past that doesn't let me choose
Once there was a darkness, deep and endless night
You gave me everything you had, oh you gave me light

Chorus

And I will remember you
Will you remember me?
Don't let your life pass you by
Weep not for the memories
Weep not for the memories

Week of October 17, 1999

Circle
Harry Chapin

Chorus:
All my life's a circle,
Sunrise and sundown
Moon rolls through the nighttime,
Till daybreak comes around
All my life's a circle,
Still I wonder why
Seasons spinning 'round again,
Years keep rolling by

Seems like I've been here before,
Can't remember when
I got this funny feeling,
We'll all be together again
No straight lines make up my life,
All my roads have bends
No clear cut beginnings, So far no dead ends

Chorus

I've met you a thousand times,
I guess you've done the same
Then we lose each other,
It's like a children's game
But now I find you here again,
The thought comes to my mind
Our love is like a circle,
Let's go 'round one more time

Chorus

Week of October 10, 1999

What greater thing is there for two human souls than to feel that they are joined together to strengthen each other in all labour, to minister to each other in all sorrow, to share with each other in all gladness, to be one with each other in the silent unspoken memories.

George Elliot

Week of October 3, 1999

And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud
was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.

Anais Nin

Week of September 26, 1999

Problems cannot be solved at the same level of awareness that created them

Albert Einstein

Week of September 19, 1999

It's not so much that we're afraid of change or so in love with the old ways,
but it's that place in between that we fear . . . . It's like being between trapezes.
It's Linus when his blanket is in the dryer. There's nothing to hold on to.

Marilyn Ferguson

Week of September 12, 1999

Laughter is the shortest distance between two people.

Victor Borge

Week of September 5, 1999

When you want only love you will see nothing else.

A Course in Miracles, page 214

Week of August 29, 1999

Charlotte's Web
by
E. B. White

You have been my friend. That in itself is a tremendous thing. I wove my webs for you because I liked you. After all, what's a life, anyway? We're born, we live a little while, we die. A spider's life can't help being something of a mess, with all this trapping and eating flies. By helping you, perhaps I was trying to lift up my life a trifle. Heaven knows anyone's life can stand a little of that.

Charlotte, from Charlotte's Web

Week of August 22, 1999

Some Me of Beauty
by
Carolyn Rogers

I took a good long look at myself in a full length mirror
Sometimes it's good to look in a full length mirror
And what I saw was not some soul sister poetess of the moment
But I saw just a woman
Just a woman feeling
Just a woman human
And what I felt was
What I felt was a spiritual revelation
And what I felt was a root revival of some love coming on
Coming on strong
And I knew then looking in a full length mirror
That many things were over
And some me of beauty was about to begin

Week of August 15, 1999

Pain is a wrong perspective. When it is experienced in any form, it is a proof of self-deception. It is not a fact at all. There is no form it takes that will not disappear if seen aright.

From Lesson 190 of A Course in Miracles

Week of August 8, 1999

There is nothing in a caterpillar that tells you it's going to be a butterfly.

Buckminster Fuller

Week of August 1, 1999

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

Buddha

Week of July 25, 1999

Inner Contentment
Dalai Lama

From The Art of Happiness, page 39,
by The Dalai Lama and and Howard C. Cutter M.D.

One interesting thing about greed is that although the underlying motive is to seek satisfaction, the irony is that even after obtaining the object of your desire, you are still not satisfied. The true antidote of greed is contentment. If you have a strong sense of contentment, it doesn't matter if you obtain the object or not, either way, you are still content.

Week of July 18, 1999

When you choose to respond to life's difficulties
with compassion and love instead of fear and doubt,
you create a "heaven on earth" - you bring the
aspects of a more balanced and harmonious
level of reality into physical being.

Gary Zukav, Seat of the Soul, page 127

Week of July 11, 1999

Translated excerpt from Dante's The New Life

In that book which is my memory,
on the first page
of the chapter that is the day
when I first met you,
appear the words
"here begins a new life."

Week of July 4, 1999

If I Had My Life to Live Over
a letter written by Nadine Stair at age 85

If I had my life to live over, I'd dare to make more mistakes next time. I'd relax; I'd limber up. I would be sillier than I have been this trip. I would take fewer things seriously. I would take more chances. I would climb more mountains and swim more rivers. I would eat more ice cream and less beans. I would perhaps have more actual troubles, but I'd have fewer imaginary ones.

You see, I'm one of those people who lived sensibly and sanely hour after hour, day after day. Oh, I had my moments, and if I had to do it over again, I'd have more of them. In fact, I'd try to have nothing else. Just moments, one after the other, instead of living so many years ahead of each day. I've been one of those persons who never goes anywhere without a thermometer, a hot water bottle, a raincoat, and a parachute. If I had it to do over again, I would travel lighter than I have.

If I had my life to live over again, I would start barefoot earlier in the spring and stay that way later in the fall. I would go to more dance; I would ride more merry-go-rounds. I would pick more daisies.

Week of June 27, 1999

LOVE
by
Roy Croft

I love you,
Not only for what you are,
But for what I am
When I am with you.

I love you,
Not only for what
You have made of yourself,
But for what
You are making of me.

I love you
For the part of me
That you bring out;
I love you
For putting your hand
Into my heaped-up heart
And passing over
All the foolish, weak things
That you can't help
Dimly seeing there,
And for drawing out
Into the light
All the beautiful belongings
That no one else had looked
Quite far enough to find.

I love you because you
Are helping me to make
Of the lumber of my life
Not a tavern
But a temple;
Out of the works
Of my every day
Not a reproach
But a song.

I love you
Because you have done
More than any creed
Could have done
To make me good
And more than any fate
Could have done
To make me happy.

You have done it
Without a touch,
Without a word,
Without a sign.
You have done it
By being yourself.
Perhaps that is what
Being a friend means,
After all.

Week of June 20, 1999

Some birds aren't meant to be caged,
their feathers are just too bright.
And when they fly away,
the part of you that knows
it was a sin to lock them up,
does rejoice.
I guess I just miss my friend.

Spoken by Morgan Freidman's character in The Shawshank Redemption

In any union with a brother in which you seek to lay your guilt upon him,
or share it with him or perceive his own, you will feel guilty.

A Course in Miracles, text page 245

Week of June 13, 1999

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
by
Robert Frost, 1923

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Week of June 6, 1999

Excerpt from the Bible

Ecclesiastes 3, 1 - 8
To every thing there is a season,
and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn and a time to dance;
a time to cast away stones, and
a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and
a time to refrain from embracing;
a time to get, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
a time to rend, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time of war, and a time of peace.

Week of May 30, 1999

A human being is a part of the whole, called by us Universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest -- a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole nature in its beauty.

Albert Einstein

God is very quiet, for there is no conflict in Him.

A Course in Miracles, text page 184

Week of May 23, 1999

To laugh often and much;
To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children;
To earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends;
To appreciate beauty, to find the best in others;
To leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition;
To know that even one life has breathed easier because you have lived.
This is to have succeeded.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Journey to God is merely the reawakening of the knowledge of where you are always and what you are forever.

A Course in Miracles, text page 150

Week of May 16, 1999

Love

To love another person is to see the face of God.
-- Lyric from Les Miserables

Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind; And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.
-- William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act i. Sc. 1.

Love is only the game that is not called on account of darkness.
-- M. Hirschfield

When a child loves you for a long, long time . . .
REALLY loves you,
then you become Real.
Generally, by the time you are real,
most of your hair has been loved off,
and your eyes drop out
and you get loose in the joints
and very shabby,
But these things don't matter at all,
because once you are real,
you can't be ugly,
except to people who don't understand.
-- Velveteen Rabbit

Love is like pi - natural, irrational, and very important.
-- Lisa Hoffman

Piglet sidled up behind Pooh.
"Pooh," he whispered.
"Yes, Piglet?"
"Nothing," said Piglet, taking Pooh's paw.
"I just wanted to be sure of you."
-- A. A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh

Week of May 9, 1999

Introduction to A Course In Miracles

This is a course in miracles. It is a required course. Only the time you take it is voluntary. Free will does not mean that you can establish the curriculum. It means only that you can elect what you want to take at a given time. The course does not aim at teaching the meaning of love, for that is beyond what can be taught. It does aim, however, at removing the blocks to the awareness of love's presence, which is your natural inheritance. The opposite of love is fear, but what is all-encompassing can have no opposite.

This course can therefore be summed up very simply in this way:

Nothing real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.

Herein lies the peace of God.

Week of May 2, 1999

The distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.

Albert Einstein

Week of April 25, 1999

The Hundredth Monkey
by
Ken Keyes

The Japanese monkey, Macaca Fuscata, has been observed in the wild for over 40 years. In 1952, on the island of Koshina, scientists started feeding the monkeys by dropping sweet potatoes in the sand. While the monkeys liked the taste of the potatoes, they didn't like the sand.

An 18-month-old female named Imo found she could solve the problem by washing the potatoes in a nearby stream. She taught this trick to her mother and to her playmates, who also taught their mothers. Over a period of several years, all the young monkeys on the island learned to wash the sandy sweet potatoes to make them more palatable. But only the adults who imitated the children learned this trick. Other adults kept eating the sandy sweet potatoes.

Then something startling took place. In the autumn of 1958, a certain number of Koshima monkeys were washing their sweet potatoes - nobody knows how many. For the sake of the story, let's suppose that when the sun rose one morning there were 99 monkeys on Koshima Island who had learned to wash their sweet potatoes. Let's further suppose that later that morning, a hundredth monkey learned to wash the potatoes.

That's when it happened. The additional energy of this hundredth monkey seemed to create an ideological breakthrough for the entire species. By that evening, nearly every monkey in the tribe was washing their sweet potatoes before eating them.

But that's not all. The most surprising thing observed by the scientists was that the habit of washing sweet potatoes somehow jumped overseas. Soon colonies of monkeys on other islands, and the mainland troop of monkeys at Takasakiyama were also washing their sweet potatoes!

Although the exact number may vary, the "Hundredth Monkey Phenomenon" means that when a limited group has a certain realization, it remains the conscious property of that few. But, at a certain point of "critical mass," when just one more mind tunes-in to the new idea, the field is exponentially strengthened, and the awareness is picked up by almost everyone!

Just think what this bit of science can mean for mankind. Every time we adopt a new habit or belief that helps our community, we increase the collective wisdom of humanity and get one person closer to changing the world!

Week of April 18, 1999

Phenomenal Woman
by
Maya Angelou

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies
I'm not cute or built to suit a model's fashion size
But when I start to tell them
They think I'm telling lies.
I say
It's in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips
The stride of my steps
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman Phenomenally
Phenomenal woman
That's me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please
and to a man
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees
Then they swarm around me
A hive of honey bees
I say
It's the fire in my eyes
And the flash of my teeth
The swing of my waist
And the joy in my feet.
Phenomenally
Phenomenal woman
That's me.

Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me
They try so much
But they can't touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them
They say they still can't see.
I say
It's in the arch of my back
The sun of my smile
The ride of my breasts
The grace of my style.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally
Phenomenal woman
That's me.

Now you understand
Just why my head's not bowed
I don't shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say
It's in the click of my heels
The bend of my hair
The palm of my hand
The need for my care.
'Cause I'm a woman
Phenomenal woman
That's me.

Week of April 11, 1999

Faith
by
Marianne Williamson

A Return to Love, chapter 4

There is no problem in any situation that faith will not solve.

What if we truly believed there is a God - a beneficent order to things, a force that's holding things together without our conscious control? What if we could see, in our daily lives, the working of that force? What if we believed it loved us somehow, and cared for us, and protected us? What if we believed we could afford to relax?

The physical body is at work every moment, an array of mechanisms with a brilliance of design and efficiency our human efforts have never begun to match. Our hearts beat, our lungs breathe, our ears hear, our hair grows. And we don't have to make them work-they just do. Planets revolve around the sun, seeds become flowers, embryos become babies, and with no help from us. Their movement is built into a natural system. You and I are integral parts of that system, too. We can let our lives be directed by the same force that makes flowers grow-or we can do it ourselves.

To trust in the force that moves the universe is faith. Faith isn't blind, it's visionary. Faith is believing that the universe is on our side, and that the universe knows what it's doing. Faith is a psychological awareness of an unfolding force for good, constantly at work in all dimensions. Our attempts to direct this force only interferes with it. Our willingness to relax into it allows it to work on our behalf. Without faith, we're frantically trying to control what is not our business to control, and fix what it is not in our power to fix. What we're trying to control is much better off without us, and what we're trying to fix can't be fixed by us anyway. Without faith, we're wasting time.

There are objective, discernible laws of physical phenomena. Take gravity, for instance, or the law of thermodynamics. You don't exactly have faith in the law of gravity, so much as you just know that it is.

There are objective, discernible laws of non-physical phenomena, as well. These two sets of laws - those which rule both the external and internal worlds - are parallel.

Externally, the universe supports our physical survival. Photosynthesis in plants and plankton in the ocean produce the oxygen that we need in order to breathe. It is important to respect the laws that rule the physical universe because violation of these laws threatens our survival. When we pollute the oceans or destroy plant life, we are destroying our support system and so are destroying ourselves.

Internally, the universe supports as well-emotionally and psychologically. The internal equivalent to oxygen, what we need in order to survive, is love. Human relationships exist to produce love. When we pollute our relationships with unloving thoughts, or destroy or abort them with unloving attitudes, we are threatening our emotional survival.

So the laws of the universe merely describe the way things are. These laws aren't invented; they're discovered. They are not dependent on our faith. Faith in them merely shows we understand what they are. Violation of these laws doesn't bespeak a lack of goodness; just a lack of intelligence. We respect the laws of nature in order to survive. And what is the highest internal law? That we love one another. Because if we don't, we will all die. As surely as a lack of oxygen will kill us, so will a lack of love.

Week of April 4, 1999

Going Easy
by
Melody Beattie

The Language of Letting Go

Go easy. You may have to push forward, but you don't have to push too hard. Go in gentleness, go in peace.

Do not be in so much of a hurry. At no day, no hour, no time are you required to do more than you can do in peace.

Frantic behaviors and urgency are not the foundation for ... life.

Do not be in too much of a hurry to begin. Begin, but do not force the beginning if it is not time. Beginnings will arrive soon enough.

Enjoy and relish middles, the heart of the matter.

Do not be in too much of a hurry to finish. You may be almost done, but enjoy the final moments. Give yourself fully to those moments so that you may give and get all there is.

Let the pace flow naturally. Move forward. Start. Keep moving forward. Do it gently, though. Do it in peach. Cherish each moment.

Today, God, help me focus on a peaceful pace rather than a harried one. I will keep moving forward gently, not frantically. Help me let go of my need to be anxious and upset. Help me replace it with a need to be at peace and in harmony.

Week of March 28, 1999

Excerpt from The Tao of Pooh
by
Benjamin Hoff

We were discussing the definition of wisdom late one night, and we were just about to fall asleep from it all when Pooh remarked that his understanding of Taoist principles had been passed down to him from certain Ancient Ancestors.

"Like who?" I asked
"Like Pooh Tao-tse, the famous Chinese painter," said Pooh.
"That's Wu Tao-tse."
"Or how about Li Pooh, the famous Taoist poet?" Pooh asked cautiously.
"You mean li po," I said.
"Oh," said Pooh, looking down at his feet.
Then I thought of something. "That doesn't really matter, anyway," I said, "because one of the most important principles of Taoism was named after you."
"Really?" Pooh asked, looking more hopeful.
"Of course - P'u, the Uncarved Block."
"I'd forgotten," said Pooh.

So here we are, about to try to explain P'u, the Uncarved Block. In the classic Taoist Manner, we won't try too hard or explain too much, because that ouwld only Confuse things, and because it would leave the impression that it was all only an intellectual idea that could be left on the intellectual level and ignore. Then you would say, "Well this idea is al very nice, but what does it amount to?" So instead, we will try to show what it amounts to, in various ways.

P'u, by the way, is pronounced sort of like Pooh, but without so much oo - like the sound you make when blowing a bug off your arm on a hot summer day.

Before we bring our Resident Expert in for a few illuminatiing remarks, let's explain something.

The essence of the principle of the Uncarved Block is that things in their original simplicity contain their own natural power, power that is easily spoiled and lost when that simplicity is changed. For the written character PP'u, the typical Chinese dictionary will give a definition of "natural, simple, plain, honest." P'u is composed of two separate characters combined: the first, the "radical" or root-meaning one, is that for tree or wood; the second, the "phonetic" or sound-giving one, is the character for dense growth or thicket. So from "tree in a thicket" or "wood not cut" comes the meaning of "things in their natural state" - what is generally represented in English versions of Taoist writing as the "uncarved block."

This basic Taoist principle applies not only to things in their natural bearuty and function, but to people as well. Or Bears. Which brings us to Pooh, the very Epitome of the Uncarved Block. As an illustration of the principle, he may appear a bit too simple at times ...

"I think it's more to the right," said Piglet nervously, "What do you think, Pooh?"
Pooh looked at his two paws. He knew that one of them was right, and he knew that when you had decided which one of them was the right, then the other one was the left, but he never could remember how to begin.

"Well," he said slowly ----

... but no matter how he may seem to others, especially to those fooled by appearances, Pooh, the Uncarved Block, is able to accomplish what he does because he is simpleminded. As any old Taoist walking out fo the woods can tell you, simpleminded does not necessarily mean stupid. It's rather significant that the Taoist ideal is that of the still, calm, reflecting "mirror-mind" of the Uncarved Block, and it's rather significant that Pooh, rather than the thinkers Rabbit, Owl or Eeyore, is the true hero of Winnie-the-Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner.

Week of March 21, 1999

Excerpt from A Course in Miracles

The Forgotten Song (Chap 21)

Listen, - perhaps you catch a hint of an ancient state not quite forgotten; dim, perhaps, and yet not altogether unfamiliar, like a song whose name is long forgotten, and the circumstances in which you heard completely unremembered. Not the whole song has stayed with you, but just a little wisp of melody, attached not to a person or a place or anything particular. But you remember, from just this little part, how lovely was the song, how wonderful the setting where you heard it, and how you loved those who were there and listened with you.

The notes are nothing. Yet you have kept them with you, not for themselves, but as a soft reminder of what would make you weep if you remembered how dear it was to you. You could remember, yet you are afraid, believing you would lose the world you learned since then. And yet you know that nothing in the world you learned is half so dear as this. Listen, and see if you remember an ancient song you knew so long ago and held more dear than any melody you taught yourself to cherish since.

Week of March 14, 1999

It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who stives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again because there is no effort without error and shortcomings, who knows the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who best knows in the end the high achievement of triumph and who at worst, if he fails while daring greatly, knows his place shall never be with those timid and cold souls who know neither victory or defeat.

Theodore Roosevelt

Week of March 7, 1999

Excerpt from the Bible

I Corinthians
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude.

Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right.

Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never ends; as for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.

For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect; but when the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood.

So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Week of February 28, 1999

Procrastinating

January 1st from Living Juicy: Daily Morsels For Your Creative Soul by Sark

I noitce how we inundate ourselves with huge goals and then berate ourselves when they don't occur. Remember that procrastination is rooted in over-functioning and low self esteem. What a doomed combination! Procrastinators are also tremendous perfectionists and relentless rehearsers. They rehearse over and over in their mind how they're going to do it perfectly - then when they do nothing - it doesn't disturb their perfect vision.

... you can learn how to be tender to yourself ...

Week of February 21, 1999

The Invitation

Oriah Mountain Dreamer

It doesn't interest me what you do for a living.

I want to know what you ache for, and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart's longing.

It doesn't interest me how old you are.

I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dreams, for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring your moon.

I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life's betrayals or have been shriveled and closed from fear of further pain! I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own; if you can dance with wildness and let ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, be realistic, or to remember the limitations of being a human.

It doesn't matter to me if the story you are telling me is true.

I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself; if you can bear the accusations of betrayal and not betray your own soul. I want to know if you can be faithful, and therefore be trustworthy. I want to know if you can see beauty even if it's not pretty every day and if you can source your life from God's presence. I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, and still stand on the edge of a lake and shout to the sliver of the full moon "Yes!"

It doesn't interest me to know where you live or how much money you have.

I want to know if you can get up after the night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone, and do what needs to be done for the children.

It doesn't interest me who you are, how you came to be here.

I want to know of you will stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back.

It doesn't interest me where or what or with whom you have studied.

I want to know what sustains you from the inside when all else falls away.

I want to know if you can be alone with yourself, and if you truly like the company you keep in empty moments.

Week of February 14, 1999

The holiest of all the spots on earth is where an ancient hatred has become a present love.

A Course in Miracles, page 521

Week of February 7, 1999

Desiderata

Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even the dull and ignorant; they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself. Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.

Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time. Exercise caution on your business affairs; for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals; and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth. Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.

You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be, and whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be careful. Strive to be happy.

Week of January 31, 1999

The Oversoul
by
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Excerpt from his essay: The Oversoul

We live in succession, in division, in parts, in particles. Meantime within man is the soul of the whole; the wise silence; the universal beauty, to which every part and particle is equally related; the eternal ONE. And this deep power in which we exist, and whose beatitude is all accessible to us, is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour, but the act of seeing and the thing seeen, the seer and spectacle, the subject and the object, are one.

Week of January 24, 1999

I shall pass through this world but once.
Any good that I can do or any kindness that I can show to any human being,
let me do it now. Let me not defer or neglect it,
for I shall not pass this way again.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Week of January 17, 1999

The Road Not Taken
by
Robert Frost

Two Roads Diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I --
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Week of January 10, 1999

Please Hear What I'm Not Saying
by
Charles C. Finn

Excerpt from Healing the Child Within by Charles L Whitfield, MD (pages 13-15)

Don't be fooled by me.
Don't be fooled by the face I wear.
For I wear a mask, a thousand masks,
masks that I'm afraid to take off,
and none of them is me.
Pretending is an art that's second nature to me,
but don't be fooled.
For God's sake don't be fooled.
I give you the impression that I'm secure,
that all is sunny and unruffled with me, within as well as without,
that confidence is my name and coolness my game,
that the water's calm and I'm in command,
and that I need no one.
But don't believe me.
My surface may seem smooth but my surface is my mask,
ever-varying and ever-concealing.
Beneath lies no complacence.
Beneath lies confusion and fear and aloneness.
But I hide this. I don't want anybody to know it.

I panic at the thought of my weakness and fear being exposed,
That's why I frantically create a mask to hide behind,
a nonchalant sophisticated facade,
to help me pretend,
to shield me from the glance that knows.
But such a glance is precisely my salvation.
My only hope and I know it.
That is, if it's followed by acceptance,
if it's followed by love,
It's the only thing that can liberate me from myself,
from my own self-built prison walls,
from the barriers I so painstakingly erect.
It is the only thing that will assure me of what I can't assure myself,
that I'm really worth something.

But I don't tell you this. I don't dare. I'm afraid to.
I'm afraid your glance will not be followed by acceptance,
will not be followed by love.
I'm afraid you'll think less of me, that you'll laugh,
and your laugh would kill me.
I'm afraid that deep-down I'm nothing, that I'm just no good,
and that you will see this and reject me.

So I play my game, my desperate pretending game,
with a facade of assurance without
and a trembling child within.
So begins the glittering but empty parade of masks,
and my life becomes a front.
I idly chatter to you in the suave tones of surface talk.
I tell you everything that's really nothing,
and nothing of what's everything,
of what's crying within me.
So when I'm going through my routine,
do not be fooled by what I am saying.
Please listen carefully and try to hear what I'm not saying,
what I'd like to be able to say,
but what I can't say.

I don't like to hide.
I don't like to play superficial phony games.
I want to stop playing them.
I want to be genuine and spontaneous and me,
but you've got to help me.
You've got to hold out your hand
even when that's the last thing I seem to want.
Only you can wipe away from my eyes the blank stare of the breathing dead.
Only you can call me into aliveness.
Each time you are kind and gentle and encouraging,
each time you try to understand because you really care,
my heart begins to grow wings,
very small wings,
very feeble wings,
but wings!
With your power to touch me into feeling
you can breathe life into me.
I want you to know that.

I want you to know how important you are to me,
how you can be a creator -- a honest-to-God creator --
of the person that is me
if you choose to.
You alone can break down the wall behind which I tremble,
you alone can remove my mask,
you alone can release me from my shadow-world of panic
and uncertainty, from my lonely prison,
if you choose to.
Please choose to. Do not pass me by.
It will not be easy for you.

A long conviction of worthlessness builds strong walls. The nearer you approach to me
the blinder I may strike back,
It's irrational, but despite what the books say about man,
often I am irrational.
I fight against the very thing that I cry out for.
But I am told that love is stronger than strong walls,
and in this lies my hope.
Please try to beat down those walls
with firms hands
but with gentle hands
for a child is very sensitive.

Who am I, you may wonder?
I am someone you know very well.
For I am ever man you meet
and I am every woman you meet.

Week of January 3, 1999

You've Got to Know When to Let Go
by
Iyanla Vanzant

In the Meantime, Iyanla Vanzant, pages 197-199

All relationships have the same basic components: people, needs, and expectations, Try as we may to keep the needs and the expectations stuff in order, we usually get so caught up in them that the pure essence of the relationship is lost to what we think we should be doing and what we expect should be done. Sometimes the needs are very real. Other times they are not. Sometimes the expectations are based in solid reality. In most cases, they are not. Sometimes the expectations of having needs met are placed upon us. At other times we place them upon ourselves. What we fail to realize before it is much too late is that when love is the foundation of the relationships, all needs and expectations are met without any effort on our part.

No matter how horrible you have been told you are, don't believe it! No matter how bad you think you are, have courage. No matter what is going on around you, stand your ground. No matter what happens in your relationships, take hold of yourself. No matter what you get in return for the love you give, know that you are protected. divinely protected. As long as you stand for love, with love, refusing to allow your "self" to be lost in the search for love, you will be just fine. You cannot lose in love. Nothing you do can make someone who loves you, really loves you, stop loving you. They may get angry with you. They may be disappointed with or in you. That's about their needs and expectations. It is not about love. The more love you give, the more love you will receive. It may not always look like that, but that is the absolute truth. You may not get it from those whom you give it--just know that you will, no, you must get it. Love is always returned to those who give it freely and courageously, without strings or expectations.

Guilt, shame, fear, anger and resentment are not the outgrowths of a loving relationship. They are a function of the conditions we place on ourselves and the people we love. When you find yourself in either of these places as a result of your love experiences, you are being provided with the opportunity to make the shift from conditional to unconditional love. Your level of mental, emotional and spiritual development in response to your love relationships can serve as a springboard to even greater development and the unfolding of a grander, greater, more noble you. Making the shift enables you to realize that you don't have to be guilty or hurt, you don't have to be ashamed or angry, you don't have to be resentful or alone, all you have to do is love you and all others the best you know how. You do not have to prove your love, nor should you ask other to prove theirs. When you do, you are asking to relive the same experiences, learn the same lessons, walk through the same terrain you have already traveled. Until we grasp the concept that love asks for nothing, we will do the same thing over and over. This is not a very spiritually enlightening thing to do!

Surrender and detachment are two spiritual household cleansers that bring us closer to the experience of love. Surrender, the act of consciously admitting what we can and cannot do, keeps us from assuming false responsibilities and from doing those things which are detrimental to our own well being. So often in relationships, we want to be all, do all, give all, when we know full well it is impossible. We are trying to prove our love. We are making a desperate attempt to prove we are worthy to be loved. The key here is to surrender every thought, every belief, every idea that leads you to the conclusion that you are unlovable. If you can get to the point where you no longer believe that you are unlovable, you will instantly become lovable! When you are lovable, you are required to do NOTHING. Just be. The path to this realization is detachment. Detach from all the conditions you have placed on yourself. There is nothing you must do. There is nothing you must have. There is nothing you must be. You are ALL right now. Anything you think you must be, do, or have to make yourself more deserving of love is like a ring in the bathtub -- it must be removed.

Week of December 27, 1998

Sachi
by
Dan Millman

Chicken Soup for the Soul, compiled by Canfield & Hansen, page 290

Soon after her brother was born, little Sachi began to ask her parents to leave her alone with the new baby. They worried that like most four-year-olds, she might feel jealous and want to hit or shake him, so they said no. But she showed no signs of jealousy. She treated the baby with kindness and her pleas to be left alone with him became more urgent. They decided to allow it.

Elated, she went into the baby's room and shut the door, but it opened a crack - enough for her curious parents to peek in and listen. They saw little Sachi walk quietly up to her baby brother, put her face close to his and say quietly, "Baby, tell me what God feels like. I'm starting to forget."

Week of December 20, 1998

Excerpt from UH-OH
by
Robert Fulghum

UH-OH: Some Observations from Both Sides of the Refrigerator Door, page 201

Just above the light switch by the door to the studio where I work, I often place a photograph - pinning it to the wall with a red pushpin. When in a magazine or newspaper, I find a particularly arresting picture - a visual image that provokes my mind - I tear it out and put it by the light switch so that I see it and consider it as I come and go. Something to inspire me or confront me. For most of the month of March 1990, three photographs were pinned there by the light switch together.

A small one, in color, showed a middle-aged man doing some carpentry. Wearing aged leather high-top work shoes, blue jeans, flannel shirt, sweat-stained red baseball cap, and around his waist, a well-used nail apron. He is working about eight feet off the ground, straddling a wall header while he nails it to the corner post. He's framing a house, and by the look on his face and the way he holds the hammer, it is clear that he not only knows what he is doing, but is intent on doing it right and well. You see carpenters every day doing this common task - nailing wood to wood with hammer and nail and muscle and blood and sinew and brain. Men who say, when asked, "Well, I'm in construction work." I like looking at this picture - bright blue sky, new wood, an ancient trade - something very honest and positive going on.

The second picture by the light switch was a grainy black-and-white news photo from the morning paper earlier in the month. Showing a middle-aged man, in a short sleeved, sweat-stained khakki shirt. The man is smiling a great smile. And the other people in the picture are also smiling. The occasion is the conclusion of an election - an honest election - held in powder-keg conditions in a Central American country. Nobody was killed during the elections, and the losers accepted the results, leading to a major change in governent. The man in the shirtsleeves was there risking his credibility and brains and skills - even his life - to help bring about the impossible. he was there on his own, representing only himself and his concerns, without compensation other than the wages of conscience.

The third picture by the light switch shows a man in white shirt and tie. He is not smiling. the look on his face is a combination of vexation and determination. He has come once again to meetings in the Middle East to get enemies to talk to one another face-to-face. Not on behalf of his government or any government - not on behalf of any organization. On behalf of peace and justice. An agent of progress in human affairs.

It's the same man in each of these pictures by the light switch. And he is truly in the construction business. Giving of his time and his life to build houses for poor people, to build an atmosphere wherein free elections can take place, to build structures of peace in one of the oldest and harshest arenas of conflict in human history.

The man's name is Carter. Used to raise peanuts in Georgia. Had a government job once. Carpenter now. And teacher. And when the historians settle up accounts on the twentieth century someday, his name will shine. He man not be in the list of great presidents - it is too soon to say. But is is not too soon to say that he is the finest ex-president in our century, and maybe ever.

Each night as I finished my work and paused at the switch, I looked at the three pictures. Gallant is the word that comes to mind - high-spirited, courageous. He knows how to lose - for he has lost big. Forces beyond his control may have made him the wrong man for the wrong job at the wrong time. Still, he lost as few men have.

He might have tucked his tail between his legs and spent the rest of his life sortinghis papers and fishing and playing golf. Others who have had his goverment job have done as little. But to lose and to be a loser are very different matters. Besides, he still had work to do. Tasks he accepts because of who he is and not because of any office he may or may not hold. He is proof that there is no limit to the amount of good a man can do if he does not worry about who gets the credit.

He is not of of those who gained the world and lost his own soul.

His example is not lost on me.

Thanks to that man.

To him, the nobel prize.

Week of December 13, 1998

Fear Not
by
Iyanla Vanzant

One Day My Soul Just Opened Up, page 315

There is no greater disservice we commit in this life than living within the grips of fear. My friend and mentor Helen Hannon reminded me of this when she said, "You can't lose!" No matter what happens, you cannot lose. If you let go of something or someone that has been divinely ordained for you, it will come back when you are ready to receive it. If you let go of something or someone that has not been divinely ordained for you, you are making room for the Divine to take its place in your life.

There is never a good reason to fear that you are wrong or that you are losing. God in you will not deny itself. It will be fulfilled. It will be acknowledged. Fear only delays fulfillment. It cannot or does not destroy it. Fear is the insidious activity of the belief that there is something that God cannot do or does not know. It is a covert admission that God cannot be trusted and that God's love is not enough to sustain you.

Fear is how we act out loyalty to family patterns that can eventually become the noose around our necks, that "hang us up" in life. Fear not! Realize that no matter what it is, no matter how you show up, no matter what you are experienceing, you cannot lose because help is on the way.