Reading Archive (Courage)
How Is Your Heart Doing?
Omid Safi
In many Muslim cultures, when you want to ask them how they’re doing, you ask: in Arabic, Kayf haal-ik? or, in Persian, Haal-e shomaa chetoreh? How is yourhaal? What is this haal that you inq...
Taking a Stand
Lynne Twist
Over two thousand years ago, the mathematician Archimedes said, “Give me a place to stand and I’ll move the world.” Taking a stand is a way of living and being that draws on a place ...
Seven Stages Of The Ego
Rumi, as told by Elif Shafak
The first stage is the Depraved Ego (Nafs), the most primitive and common state of being, when the soul is entrapped in worldly pursuits. Most human beings are stuck there, struggling and suffering in...
Sincerely Enthusiastic
Gretchen Rubin
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 to criticize but it was fun. Why was it so deliciously satisfyi...
Habits Of The Heart
Parker Palmer
“Habits of the heart” (a phrase coined by Alexis de Tocqueville) are deeply ingrained ways of seeing, being, and responding to life that involve our minds, our emotions, our self-images, o...
Exhausting Quest For Perfection
Brene Brown
The quest for perfection is exhausting and unrelenting, but as hard as we try, we can't turn off the tapes that fill our heads with messages like "Never good enough" and "What will ...
Communication As Mutual Entrainment
Ursula LeGuin
Every act of communication is an act of tremendous courage in which we give ourselves over to two parallel possibilities: the possibility of planting into another mind a seed sprouted in ours and watc...
The Work Of Love Is To Love
Mark Nepo
My own time on earth has led me to believe in two powerful instruments that turn experience into love: holding and listening. For every time I have held or been held, every time I have listened or bee...
Creative Living
Elizabeth Gilbert
This, I believe, is the central question upon which all creative living hinges: Do you have the courage to bring forth the treasures that are hidden within you? Look, I don't know what's hi...
Big Enough to Take It All In
Margaret Wheatley
To want to see clearly is a true act of fearlessness. To open our heart and mind, to be open to what life is offering us in this moment, requires tremendous courage and steadfastness. In the openne...
Choosing Suffering over Safety
Bonnie Rose
“Can you walk, sweetheart?” I say these words to our dog Stella who is dying. It’s time for breakfast and if she walks from our bed to the kitchen, maybe that will be a sign. Maybe s...
When My Life Is In Danger
Christina Feldman
A few years ago, an elderly monk arrived in India after fleeing from prison in Tibet. Meeting with the Dalai Lama, he recounted the years he had been imprisoned, the hardship and beatings he had endur...
My Word Of The Year
Nancy Gibbs
My word of the year is listen. It’s one of those words whose meaning is in its music. Listen is a quiet word, that half swallowed L and diffident I and softly hissing S. It defies the clamoro...
How Observation Changes Relationships
Vimala Thakar
When we sit in silence what do we do? We sit and observe the voluntary and involuntary activities of the body and mind. Slowly the voluntary activities come to an end, but the involuntary activities...
Giving Up is Different From Letting Someone Down
Brother David Steindl-Rast
This inner gesture of letting go from moment to moment is what is so terribly difficult for us; and it can be applied to almost any area of experience. We mentioned time, for instance: there is the wh...