Reading Archives (2023)
Gratefulness Happens Before Thinking
Brother David Steindl-Rast
My vision of the world? My hope for the future? This topic sounds a bit big. Allow me to start small — say, with crows. They are my special friends. Just as I am writing these lines, one of them...
There Are Many Voices Beside Ours
Ella Cara Deloria
We [Native Americans] know about silence. We are not afraid of it. In fact, for us, silence is more powerful than words. Our elders were trained in the ways of silence, and they handed over this knowl...
The Practice Before The Practice
Mark Nepo
From the moment we open our eyes, we are meaning-seeking creatures, looking for what matters though we carry what matters deep within us. And more than the hard-earned understandings we arrive at, mor...
The Vessel And The Filter
Rick Rubin
Each of us has a container within. It is constantly being filled with data. It holds the sum total of our thoughts, feelings, dreams, and experiences in the world. Let's call this the vessel. I...
An Ode To Imagination
Geneen Marie Haugen
What is unique about human beings? That was the question that followed me. Other philosophers have supposed that our form of consciousness is unique among the animals, or our symbol-making ability. Bu...
A Flame In A Dark Cave
Colin Walsh
It was just another day of that, when it happened. I don’t know why, but the teacher suddenly broke off what he was saying and considered us for a moment. A movement like a camera shutter happen...
What You Are Is Perfect Imperfection
Emannuel
Your less evolved areas have a right to be. They whisper of things past. They whisper of confusion, of unfulfillment and of the pain of the soul separated from its God and the longing for ...
Compulsion To Closure
Joan Tollifson
Somewhere recently, I heard or read the phrase, “compulsion to closure.” I can’t recall how it was used by whoever said it, but it feels like a great description of our human difficu...
Tale Of The Ringless Ring
Thomas Moore
Nasrudin was a spiritual leader and teacher in a small village. He was honored and respected as a mullah, although he was rather unusual and unpredictable. One day a man of great virtue in the vil...
Shadow Cannot Drive Out Shame
Bonnie Rose
I was taught to affirm, “I am whole, perfect, and complete.” I didn’t have good definitions of those words at the time. So my ego said, “Really? I am? Well thank you for notici...
Praying With The News
Rabbi Yael Levy
The 17th of the Hebrew month Tammuz initiates a three-week period of mourning that leads to Tisha b’Av, which is the day that marks the destruction of the Temples in Jerusalem in 586 BCE an...
Sound Of The Genuine
Howard Thurman
There is in every person something that waits and listens for the sound of the genuine ... There is in you something that waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in yourself. Nobody like y...
Pain Expands Our Capacity For Joy
Nikole Lim
Daily, my work requires me to delve into the hellish reality of unimaginable experiences of gross abuse. Neither words nor images can fully convey the emotional crises, psychological torment, and hear...
Beginner's Mind Vs. Expert Mind
Christina Feldman
We collect, store, and accumulate so much weight in this life. The thousands of thoughts, ideas, and plans we have are imprinted on our minds. We have engaged in countless conversations an...
Radical Optimism
Rev. Joan Halifax
Radical optimism is a big view of the moment that does not include outcome. Another way of saying this is that the radical optimist is not undertaking an investment plan. Rather he or she is involved ...
Forgiveness
Wayne Dyer
Forgiveness is the most powerful thing that you can do for your physiology and your spirituality, and it remains one of the least attractive things to us, largely because our egos rule so unequivocall...
The Simplest Meditation: Waiting
Peter Russell
For most of us waiting is not easy, often a bore. Waiting for a bus or train, we look for something to do to pass the time. Sitting in a doctor’s waiting room, we idle away the minutes thumbing ...
Irony Of Marriage
Neale Donald Walsch
Largely, marriage has been used by those societies, religions, and families as a mini-prison, as kind of a contractual arrangement that says: "Everything will be, now and forevermore, the wa...
Letting Someone Know They're Not Alone Is No Small Thing
Deborah Hawkins
Months ago, I decided to explore volunteering for a hospice organization. My initial curiosity came up when I contemplated wanting to use my talents for listening and putting things into words. I e...
Shape Of Silence
Kent Nerburn
The silence is profound this morning. It is not portentous; there seems to be nothing in the waiting. It is a gentle silence, liquid and pastel, a shimmer on still waters. It is good to listen to t...