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Share in the accounts and discoveries of the many individuals who, just like you, set out to find new, true answers that could stand up to the test of passing time with its ever-changing conditions. Welcome these inward and uplifting thoughts as if they were your own, for in one sense… they are.
Patience child, patience. Remember, life is a journey. If you got everything you wanted all at once there’d be no point to living. Enjoy the ride, and in the end you’ll see these “setbacks” as giant leaps forward, only you couldn’t see the bigger picture in the moment. Remain calm, all is within reach; all you have to do is show up every day, stay true to the path and you will surely find the treasure you seek.
Wisdom is needed to recognize a wise person, the sort of wisdom that illuminates the face of the inner person.
Only those who are willing to go too far will ever know how far they can go.
When we meet with the self thus purified… even while here below, we have attained the heights, and need no further guidance.
Let us not forget that man can never get away from himself.
But come what may, I do adore thee so
That danger shall seem sport, and I will go!
I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of a man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavour. It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of art.
When you sincerely enter into prayer, you will come forth with all your prayers answered. But a hundred prayers that lack sincerity will leave you still the bungler that you are, your work a failure. Prayers said from habit are like the dust that scatters in the wind. The prayers that reach God’s court are uttered by the soul.
Peace of mind! That is something essential to any enjoyment of the present moment, and unless its separate moments are enjoyed, there is an end to life’s happiness as a whole. We should always recollect that today comes only once, and never returns. We fancy that it will come again tomorrow, but tomorrow is another day, which, in its turn, comes only once.
Let us begin life anew.
What matters is what we love, for that is what determines the true and final course of our lives.
Faith is a conviction of the reality of the things which we do not see. Through faith we understand that the world came into being and still exists at the command of God, so that what is seen does not owe its existence to that which is visible.
Epistle to the Hebrews (11, 1-3), Attributed to Paul the Apostle
Doubt brings about lasting understanding; doubt is not an end in itself. What is true is revealed only through doubt, through questioning the many illusions, traditional values and ideals.
Culture, far from giving us freedom, only develops as it advances, new necessities; the fetters of the physical close more tightly around us, so that the fear of loss quenches even the ardent impulse towards improvement, and the maxims of passive obedience are held to be the highest wisdom of life.
If I have ever made any valuable discoveries, it has been owing more to patient attention, than to any other talent.
It is true that all knowledge is within ourselves, but this has to be called forth by another knowledge. Although the capacity to know is inside us, it must be called out.
No one is so accursed by fate, no one is so utterly desolate, but some heart, though unknown, responds unto his own.
If the way which, as I have shown, leads hither seems very difficult, it can nevertheless be found.
Many are avidly seeking, but they alone find who remain in silence. Those who delight in a multitude of words, even though they say admirable things, are empty within. If you love truth, be a lover of silence. Silence like the sunlight will illuminate you in God and will deliver you from the phantoms of ignorance. Silence will unite your soul to God.
Nothing is more practical than
finding God, than
falling in Love
in a quite absolute, final way.
What you are in love with,
what seizes your imagination, will affect everything.
It will decide
what will get you out of bed in the morning,
what you do with your evenings,
how you spend your weekends,
what you read, whom you know,
what breaks your heart,
and what amazes you with joy and gratitude.
Fall in Love, stay in love,
and it will decide everything.
Father Pedro Arrupe (1907 – 1991)
If you could see things as they are, not as they appear, you would no longer inflict injuries and pains on your own selves.
Seeking the way, you must exert yourselves and strive with diligence… free yourselves from the tangled net of sorrow. Walk in the path with steadfast aim. A sick man may be cured by the healing power of medicine and will be rid of all his ailments without beholding the physician.
If a foolish man is associated with a wise man, even all his life, the foolish man will understand truth as little as a spoon understands the taste of soup.
A stone beneath the surface of the ground is just as heavy as a visible one.
Great endeavors and hard struggles await those who are converted, but afterwards inexpressible joy. If you want to light a fire, you are troubled at first by smoke, and your eyes water. But in the end you achieve your aim. Now it is written: Our God is a consuming fire. So we must light the divine fire in us with tears and struggle.
