Reading Archives (Author)
Man's Most Important Mistake
One of man's most important mistakes, one which must be remembered, is his illusion in regard to his I. Man such as we know him,...
Tale of Two Sermons
I must tell you that in our brotherhood there are two very old brethren; one is called Brother Ahl and the other Brother Sez. These...
The Pleasure of Serving
All of nature is a yearning for service: The cloud serves, and the wind, and the furrow. Where there is a tree to plant, you be the...
The Fish on the Camel
As Hafiz says, "First, The fish needs to say, “Something ain’t right about this Camel ride – And I’m Feeling...
How Much Silence Is Too Much?
Ours is a noisy country. We’ve been rebellious, insolent shouters since the beginning. We invent freak shows and circuses and...
Gift of Dry Leaf
A few weeks prior to Independence Day of India in 1947, an emissary of Pandit Nehru and Sardar Patel was sent to Gandhi at Calcutta,...
Supreme Consideration Is Man
What I object to is the "craze" for machinery, not machinery as such. The craze is what they call labor-saving machinery. Men go on...
Uncommon Quotes
"Love is the only remedy for hate. It blossoms only in the heart of a fearless man." "Having flung aside the sword, there is nothing...
The Practice of Desire
Someone once shared with me this very simple yet profound discovery, "If I practice desire, I suffer." What could be simpler?...
What Do You Really Want?
Most of us do not have to worry about where we will get our next meal, or if we will have a place to sleep tonight. Most of us are not...
The Power of Stopping
The trance of conditioned thoughts can be deep and complex, but it has no defense against something as simple as...
Underneath All Victories and Defeats
In the midst of some activity, even the activity of reading this now, it is completely possible to allow your mind to open fully, and in...
To Know Without Needing To Understand
Usually, we search for understanding because we believe that it will lead to true...
To Be Simply, Radically, Absolutely Still
Sometimes, in a blessed life, there arises what we call the spiritual search, the search for God, the search for Truth. There is a...
Deep Inquiry: Not for the Faint of Heart
Authentic spiritual inquiry reveals the joy of fresh insights and revelation, just as artistic or scientific inquiry does, but if we...
Be Vigilance
Vigilance is often misunderstood. Usually what passes for vigilance is careful monitoring by the superego. I'm sure you're very...
Our Environment Is An Integrated Whole
We have a very special relationship with our environment. The sooner we realize it, the better it is for all of us. Life as we know it...
Reverence Protects Life
As you work toward becoming reverent, your tendencies toward harming others and other forms of life diminish. As you acquire a sense of...
Intentions And Effects
Have you ever wondered why things happen the way they do in your life? Have you ever considered that the creation of your experiences,...
Universal Humans In Training
We are in the midst of an unprecedented transformation in human consciousness. Unprecedented. Our perception is expanding beyond the...
Romance Vs. Love
Romantic love is like a drug. It produces euphoria, energy and vitality. You think you've found someone to complete your life — it's a...
Releasing Your Specifications
When you depend entirely upon the ability of your personality to determine what is best for you, you may stand in the way of a richness...
Awareness of Emotions
Without an awareness of our feelings we cannot experience compassion. How can we share the sufferings and the joys of others if we...
A Turtle's Silver Bead Of Quietude
The day is bright and warm for December, but the logs in the marsh pond are bare. Spring to summer into early fall they served, on sunny...
An Ode To Imagination
What is unique about human beings? That was the question that followed me. Other philosophers have supposed that our form of...
Art is a Life Raft
Art is a life raft. Many who become artists did so because they found refuge in art from some traumatic aspect of their early lives. I...
Mistaking The World We’ve Made For The Real World
The instant we wake the story begins: “Here I am. In my bed. Hard worker, good dad, decent husband, a guy who always tries his...
Kindness Includes Everything
What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness. Those moments when another human being was there, in front of me, suffering,...
Welcoming Fear As A Friend
The basic lesson is this: Fear is not an enemy but a friend. Fear is something good, something alive, alert, and wild in us. Fear may be...
Releasing Willpower From Movement
Initially, I used to move from willpower; I was concerned only with results. In retrospect, I realize that this created a sort of tunnel...
Your Thoughts And Mine
Your thought is a tree rooted deep in the soil of tradition and whose branches grow in the power of continuity. My thought is a cloud...
Work Is Love Made Visible
Work is love made visible. And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and...
Joy and Sorrow
"Your joy is your sorrow unmasked. And the self same well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears....
Self Knowledge
And a man said, "Speak to us of Self-Knowledge." And he answered, saying: Your hearts know in silence the secrets of the days and the...
Intentions Are Seeds
While our activities have consequences in both the external and internal world, happiness and freedom belong to the inner world of our...
Fearlessness can Coexist with Fear
In meditation and in mindfulness practice, we are learning to replace fear with trust, not as an ideal or abstraction, but as a sense of...
Bringing Attention to Intention
The greater our awareness of intentions, the greater our freedom to choose. People who do not see their choices do not believe they have...
Being a Naturalist
In mindfulness meditation we learn to be present for things as they are. In doing so, it can be useful to assume the attitude of a...
Natural Unfolding
I believe that spiritual practice unfolds most smoothly when we find how to accord ourselves with nature. A useful metaphor for this is...
Using Attention in a New Way
One of the things we are trying to do here, is learn to pay attention to seeing what complicates our attention -- where we get caught,...
Logical Conclusion of Meditation
The absence of craving and aversion does not imply an attitude of callous indifference, in which one enjoys one’s own liberation but...
The Hole-y Bucket
A student approaches the teacher with the question, “Could you help me with a question I've been struggling with -- what is the...
Lessons From An Accident
For the last forty years, I have been a somewhat compulsive caregiver. However, I found an appropriate niche in medical school, and have...
The Greatest Danger Before You
In the end -- and it will end -- your life will seem to have sped by like a fleeting dream. Much of your story will be the age-old but...
Grateful For Nothing
If you’re reading this, there’s a good chance your life is relatively safe -- so safe that safety isn’t on your mind....
Sincerely Enthusiastic
I wanted to laugh more, I wanted to show more loving-kindness, and I also wanted to be more enthusiastic. I knew that it wasn't nice...
No Wasted Time
The concept of wasted time doesn't exist for a serious meditator. Little dead spaces during your day can be turned into profit. Every...
So What is Happiness?
Happiness and peace. Those are really the prime issues in human existence. That is what all of us are seeking. This often is a bit...
Working With Soil, Attending To Soul
A garden tends to get inside us. If we go there to accomplish something or to get something, the garden soon becomes a burden. With...
Paradox of Noise
It is a paradox that we encounter so much internal noise when we first try to sit in silence. It is a paradox that experiencing pain...
Sacrifice Your Suffering
I have already said before that sacrifice is necessary. Without sacrifice, nothing can be attained. But if there is anything in the...
Bouquets And Brickbats
Guru Nanak, the first Guru of the Sikhs, shared a message that was radical for his day. He questioned empty rituals, exposed the...
My Dreams, My Works, Must Wait Till After Hell
I hold my honey and I store my bread In little jars and cabinets of my will. I label clearly, and each latch and lid I bid, Be...