New Year's Eve 2019/2020

Cheer for endings -- whether goals have been met or not --
whether the ending is tidy or ragged.
Without endings, there would be neither the opportunity
nor the incentive to think new thoughts,
and to begin great new projects.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Cheers to a new year and another chance for us to get it right.
- Oprah Winfrey

Happiness is like a kiss.
You must share it to enjoy it.
- Bernard Meltzer

It's your life.
Live it with people who are alive.
It tends to be contagious.
- Peter McWilliams

Remember that happiness is as contagious as gloom.
It should be the first duty of those who are happy
to let others know of their gladness.
- Maurice Maeterlinck

At the end of a matter ask,
"What will I learn from this to make me better?"
- Mary Anne Radmacher

Further reading: Time to Move On

Create Completion

Endings and Beginnings

Finishing

What's Done is Done
           

Love is the Ultimate

You know that you have fully experienced love
when you turn into love -
that is the spiritual goal of life.
- Deepak Chopra

Love is the ultimate meaning of everything around us.
Love is not a mere sentiment.
Love is the ultimate truth at the heart of creation.
- Rabindranath Tagore

Love is an undulating energy that moves through you,
within you, and radiates out of you,
and changes everything.
- Bartholomew

Further reading: The Power of Unconditional Love

What Does Love Look Like?

Giving Love and Comfort
     

Consciously Create Peace, Inner And Outer

Peace doesn't just happen.
Peace must be "made,"
and it's hard work to make Peace.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Peace is not an absence of war,
it is a virtue, a state of mind,
a disposition for benevolence, confidence, justice.
- Baruch Spinoza

It is not enough to say we must not wage war.
It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

We can never obtain peace in the outer world
until we make peace with ourselves.
- Dalai Lama

The world has always been in an uproar, and it always will be.
Choose Peace. Choose to live with Peace.
Choose to interact peacefully with everyone -
especially those whose instinct is not to be peaceful.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Peacemakers

Love All, Judge None

Hatred vs. Love
     

Where Are You Going?

I am the owner of my choices.
I am the source for the perspectives I choose to hold...
regardless of how aware I am of why or how I come to possess
that particular perspective.
It takes courage to look into the mirror of our souls, absent excuses.
I will look into that mirror little bits at a time.
SEE and ACT. SEE what I can bear to see and ACT upon what I am able.
This is the heart of a gentle invitation to personal responsibility.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

Trust yourself. Only you can live your life.
Only you can taste your victories.
Only you can suffer the sting of your defeats.
Make your own choices, and accept your own consequences -
for better or worse.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

To raise new questions, new possibilities,
to regard old problems from a new angle,
requires creative imagination.
- Albert Einstein

Footprints in the sands of time...
Where have you been?
Where are you going?
Why are you going there?
Pay attention.
Don't let resentments or pessimism answer for you.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

There's no reality except the one contained within us.
That's why so many people live an unreal life.
They take images outside them for reality and never
allow the world within them to assert itself.
- Hermann Hesse

Further reading:  Seek the Truth

Maybe So, Maybe Not. - Ancient Taoist Proverb

Many Answers

Knowing Yourself
    

Dance, Move with the Winds

I will dance a little. I will move with the wind.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

Live to experience something new each day -
to learn something new, to meet a new friend,
to bring joy into someone's life,
to feel the wind newly on your skin,
to touch a new fear and a new anger,
and with focused intent and good fortune,
to find an ample measure of your own joy.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The journey between what you once were
and who you are now becoming
is where the dance of Life really takes place.
- Barbara De Angelis

Further reading: The Dance of Life

Choose to Dance

Life is Love - Enjoy It
      

Cherish Serenity

Do what you can, and do it well.
Accept the rest with equanimity, and trust in God.
No one can ever do more than that.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Boredom is the feeling that everything is a waste of time;
serenity, that nothing is.
- Thomas Szasz

Happiness is a butterfly, which, when pursued,
is always just beyond your grasp,
but which, if you will sit down quietly,
may alight upon you.
- Nathaniel Hawthorne

We have a good life when we manage to live with both
satisfied and unsatisfied needs,
when we are not obsessed by what is beyond our reach.
- Kjell Magne Bondevik

Live Well, Love Much, Laugh Often.
- Anonymous

Laugh at yourself and at life.
Not in the spirit of derision or whining self-pity,
but as a remedy, a miracle drug, that will ease your pain,
cure your depression, and help you to put in perspective
that seemingly terrible defeat and worry
with laughter at your predicaments,
thus freeing your mind to think clearly toward the solution
that is certain to come. Never take yourself too seriously.
- Og Mandino

Further reading: The Blessing Of Serenity

Pay Attention to the Natural World

Live in Peace
       

Christmas 2019

Christmas waves a magic wand over this world,
and behold, everything is softer and more beautiful.
- Norman Vincent Peale

Christmas is not a time nor a season, but a state of mind.
To cherish peace and goodwill, to be plenteous in mercy,
is to have the real spirit of Christmas.
- Calvin Coolidge

May you have the gladness of Christmas which is hope;
The spirit of Christmas which is peace;
The heart of Christmas which is love.
- Ada V. Hendricks

I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.
- Charles Dickens

Further reading: Happy Birthday Jesus

Brotherly Love 

With Love in My Heart

The Power of Unconditional Love
   

Christmas Eve 2019

Do you know someone who will not be with their family this holiday season?
Consider inviting them to your home and welcoming them into your family.

What is our family?
We touch our full hearts and see ourselves
reflected whole in each other's eyes.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

Love begins at home, and it is not how much we do...
but how much love we put in that action.
- Mother Teresa

Nothing can bring a real sense of security
into the home except true love.
- Billy Graham

Your greatest gift to your family and friends is yourself -
your relaxed, happy, and fully-present self.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

A happy family is but an earlier heaven.
- George Bernard Shaw

Further reading: Joy at Home

The World is My Family

What is a Home?

A Joyous Season of Renewal
     

Forgiving Others Is A Path To Your Own Peace

Forgiving Others Grants You Peace.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Forgiveness does not change the past,
but it does enlarge the future.
- Paul Boese

I rest in the light of forgiveness.
I forgive myself and others for that
which is done (and better left undone)
and also that which is not done (and better if done).
I give myself permission to enjoy this moment without guilt.
I freely release all uncertainty, regret, and fear.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

Forgiveness is the key to happiness.
- A Course In Miracles

Further reading: Burning Away Old Regrets and Resentments

Forgive All From Your Heart

Forgiving Sets You Free

Helping is what Life is About
     

Service With Compassion

Clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.
Bear with each other and forgive one another.
- Colossians 3:12

Let us touch the dying, the poor,
the lonely and the unwanted
according to the graces we have received
and let us not be ashamed
or slow to do the humble work.
- Mother Teresa

The only way you can serve God is by serving other people.
- Rick Warren

Religion is a blessing when, and only when,
it provides a focus for a compassionate community
to minister to its members and to the world at large.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: True Religion is about Helping Others

Do God's Work

Love One Another
    

Your Inner Peace Is Your Touchstone

Begin with your own inner peace.
Then use that inner peace
as a platform from which
to approach the outer world
with perspective, understanding, and patience.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

It is those who have a deep and real inner life
who are best able to deal with the irritating details of outer life.
- Evelyn Underhill

We're so engaged in doing things
to achieve purposes of outer value
that we forget the inner value,
the rapture that is associated
with being alive, is what it is all about.
- Joseph Campbell

The outer conditions of a person's life will always
be found to reflect their inner beliefs.
- James Lane Allen

Further reading: Master of My Emotions

What Really Matters

Your Attitude is Your Window

Renewal

Mastering Time

Life Really Is Good
      

Find A Way

Where there's a will, there's a way.
- old English proverb

Be resolute in your goals,
but flexible in your tactics.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Courage and perseverance have a magical talisman,
before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish into air.
- John Quincy Adams

Every problem has in it the seeds of its own solution.
If you don't have any problems, you don't get any seeds.
- Norman Vincent Peale

You must do the things you think you cannot do.
- Eleanor Roosevelt

In the midst of crisis, boldly seize opportunity.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

In their own way, problems can be blessings.
They can be the prod to get us out of our complacency and into action.

Problems create an opportunity for us to exercise our ingenuity,
to plan, to persevere, to interact with our social network,
and to feel a sense of accomplishment when we finally overcome the unexpected roadblock.

Further reading: Be Flexible

Rising Again

Problem-Solving Abilities

Another Door Opens
    

The Hurt Of Anger

Anger is often more hurtful than the injury that caused it.
- English Proverb

Speak when you are angry -- and you will make the best speech you'll ever regret.
- Laurence J. Peter

An angry man opens his mouth and shuts his eyes.
- Cato

We cannot learn from one another until we stop shouting at one another -
until we speak quietly enough so that our words can
be heard as well as our voices.
- Richard M. Nixon

When angry, count to ten before you speak.
If very angry, count to one hundred.
- Thomas Jefferson

Further reading: Stop Anger Before It Stops You

The Price of Anger

Burned by Your Own Anger

Anger is a Killing Thing
    

Why People Complain...

People generally complain about only two things:
when they have less than yesterday,
and when they have less than their neighbor.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Happiness in the present is only shattered by comparison with the past.
- Douglas Horton

Expectations Diminish Joy.
- Anonymous

Riches do not exhilarate us so much with their possession
as they torment us with their loss.
- Epicurus

Comparisons are odious.
- Old English Saying
Read more about this...

Further reading: Rejoice for What You Have

We have Already Arrived

Comparison - Cause of Unhappiness

Appreciating Our Lives
   

Study The Lessons Of History

Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.
- Winston Churchill

The importance of history is in its
educational value for our lives today,
not in regret, resentment, or revenge.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

History is a vast early warning system.
- Norman Cousins

Everyone who wants to know what will happen ought to examine what has happened.
Everything in this world in any epoch has their replicas in antiquity.
- Niccolò Machiavelli

History is the version of past events
that people have decided to agree upon.
- Napoleon Bonaparte

Study the past, if you would divine the future.
- Confucius
Further reading: Awareness

Vengeance

Fault

Anger
         

The Win-Win Approach To Disagreements

Compromise is the worst way to address human differences, except for all the others.
(modeled on Churchill's quote "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.")

The alternative to compromise is conflict.

Unless both sides win, no agreement can be permanent.
- Jimmy Carter

When we seek to discover the best in others,
we somehow bring out the best in ourselves.
- William Arthur Ward

Most of us think about succeeding in terms of someone else failing --
that is, if I win, you lose; or if you win, I lose.
Life becomes a zero-sum game.
... [In contrast,] Win-win sees life as a cooperative arena, not a competitive one.
Win-win is a frame of mind and heart that constantly seeks
mutual benefit in all human interactions.
Win-win means agreements or solutions are mutually beneficial and satisfying.
- Stephen R. Covey

Your mother really did know the secret to a better world:
"Play nicely together. Don't fight."

Today's affirmation:
I feel unity with Spirit and with all that is.
My life is richer for sharing my being with all those I meet.
Each experience, however it appears at the time,
highlights and strengthens the fabric of my life.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Our Shared Humanity

Helping Others

A Shared Dream

Caring for Others
      

Give a Little Hand

A Single Generosity Enlarges the World.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

You don't have to give all your savings to some charity
to make this world a humane and just place,
rather you just need to give a little hand
whenever and wherever you see someone in need.
- Abhijit Naskar

Spread love everywhere you go.
Let no one ever come to you without leaving happier.
- Mother Teresa

What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult for each other?
- George Eliot

Nothing is so hard for those who abound in riches
as to conceive how others can be in want.
- Jonathan Swift

Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.
- Pema Chodron

One thing I know: the only ones among you who will be really happy
are those who will have sought and found how to serve.
- Albert Schweitzer

Further reading: Brotherly Love (being of service)

Pay It Forward

Lighting the Way

Where There is Love, Nothing is Missing - a Parable
    

Grace

Grace has been defined as the outward expression
of the inward harmony of the soul.
- William Hazlitt

Grace defies reason and logic.
- Bono

Dear God, Please send to me the spirit of Your peace.
Then send, dear Lord, the spirit of peace from me to all the world.
Amen.
- Marianne Williamson

Hope is some extraordinary spiritual grace that God
gives us to control our fears,
not to oust them.
- Vincent McNabb

Grace isn't just a little prayer you say before receiving a meal.
It's a way to live.
- Jackie Windspear

Further reading: Everything is a Miracle

Serenity in Times of Crisis

Faith Plus Action

Be Not Unbending

The Darkest Night
     

Life Is Not About Perfection

None of us is perfect - and that's OK.
Life is not about perfection - or a quest for perfection.
Life is about enjoying what we have - for as long as we have it.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Don't let perfectionism become an excuse for never getting started.
- Marilu Henner

Perfectionism is not a quest for the best.
It is a pursuit of the worst in ourselves,
the part that tells us that nothing we do will ever be good enough.
- Julia Cameron

When you finally accept that it's OK not to have answers
and it's OK not to be perfect,
you realize that feeling confused
is a normal part of what it is to be a human being.
- Winona Ryder

Generally, your greatest service to someone
in their time of trouble, sorrow, or confusion, is your comfort.
Take the time to listen to their troubles and concerns
with patience, kindness, and empathy,
but without offering unsolicited advice or suggestions.
Your kindly hand on their shoulder, supportive hug, and patient listening
are often the greatest gifts you can offer.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Goodness of Humanity

Our Shared Humanity

Progress of the Human Mind
   

Balance Activity with Serenity

The ancient Chinese Yin-Yang symbol represents the balance of yin (peacefulness, serenity, acceptance, rest, rejuvenation, roots, tradition) with yang (activity, strength, striving, movement, change, wings, invention, progress). A meaningful and joyful life is to be found in balance.

Be aware of wonder.
Live a balanced life -
learn some and think some
and draw and paint
and sing and dance
and play and work every day some.
- Robert Fulghum

In the midst of movement and chaos,
keep stillness inside of you.
- Deepak Chopra

To go beyond is as wrong as to fall short.
- Confucius

Manage the remarkable balance between acting
from your heart and close to your gifts
with completing the obligations
that your labor and tasks require of you.
Leverage opportunity AND seize joy.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

Maintain a balance between skepticism and faith.
Maintain a beginner mind. Be open to possibility.
Don't give in to skepticism,
but don't give in to fantasy either.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Seek Balance in Life

Go With the Flow - Six Ways to Live a Happier Life

Balance Work and Play
     

Books Provoke Insight

A house without books is like a room without windows.
- Horace Mann

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

The best of a book is not the thought which it contains, but the thought which it suggests; just as the charm of music dwells not in the tones but in the echoes of our hearts.
- Oliver Wendell Holmes

When was the last time your whole family turned off the television and spent the evening in the company of insightful books?

Further reading: Five Questions to Ask Yourself When You Feel Sad for No Apparent Reason
     

Unique, Yet Bonded To All Humanity

Embrace your uniqueness.
Time is much too short to be
living someone else's life.
- Kobi Yamada

Share our similarities, celebrate our differences.
- M. Scott Peck

The first step in the evolution of ethics
is a sense of solidarity with other human beings.
- Albert Schweitzer

As we grow as unique persons, we learn to respect
the uniqueness of others.
- Robert H. Schuller

Fear of difference is fear of life itself.
- M. P. Follett

Every man and woman is born into the world
to do something unique and something distinctive;
and if he or she does not do it, it will never be done.
- Benjamin E. Mays

Once you respect yourself, there is no longer
any reason to disrespect anyone else.
Once you are confident of your own worthiness,
the worthiness of others ceases to be an issue.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Today's affirmation:
I celebrate both my uniqueness
and my connection with all that is.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Avoid Labeling Yourself

Accept Others

Recognize, Accept, and Celebrate Differences
      

One With The Earth

Nature is full of genius, full of the divinity;
so that not a snowflake escapes its fashioning hand.
- Henry David Thoreau

God is all there is - God includes everything,
all possibility and all action,
for Spirit is the invisible essence and substance of all form.
- Ernest Holmes

The fabric of existence weaves itself whole.
- Charles Ives

Nature uses only the longest threads to weave her patterns,
so that each small piece of her fabric reveals the
organization of the entire tapestry.
- Richard P. Feynman

Today's affirmation:
I am one with the Earth,
with the Water,
with the Fire,
with the Air that I breathe,
with all Living Things,
and we are one with Spirit.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Our Children's Earth

Natural World

All Life

Rejoice
  

Helping Hands

Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none,
and anyone who has food should do the same.
- Luke 3:11

The most eloquent prayer is the prayer through hands that heal and bless.
- Billy Graham

The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

What power there is in our service
when our actions line up with our mission, skills and joy.
– Mary Anne Radmacher

Further reading: We Belong to Each Other

Serve Others
    

Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day 2019

Today, fear again grips America - in public and in private. Remember FDR's words and focus with courage on the job at hand - the job of living joyfully regardless of external circumstances.

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.
- Franklin D. Roosevelt

This world of ours... must avoid becoming
a community of dreadful fear and hate,
and be, instead, a proud confederation of mutual trust and respect.
- Dwight D. Eisenhower

We shall draw from the heart of suffering itself
the means of inspiration and survival.
- Winston Churchill

Further reading: Serenity rather than Fear
       

Look a Little Deeper

Normally, we do not so much look at things as overlook them.
- Alan Watts

Trust not too much to appearances.
- Virgil

The work of science is to substitute facts for appearances,
and demonstrations for impressions.
- John Ruskin

Men in general judge more from
appearances than from reality.
All men have eyes, but few have
the gift of penetration.
- Niccolo Machiavelli

There are none so blind as those who will not see.
- John Heywood (also attributed to the later Matthew Henry, and others)
(based on Jeremiah 5:21)

The question is not what you look at, but what you see.
- Henry David Thoreau

Hope and Fear Cloud Our Vision.
We do not always see what is before our face -
sometimes we see what we hope to see,
or what we fear we will see.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Art of Seeing
           

Become Centered

At the center of your being you have the answer;
you know who you are and you know what you want.
- Lao Tzu

When you become centered, suddenly there is great freedom
because you know you are not the mind and you are not the body.
- Osho

A mind at peace, a mind centered and not focused on harming others,
is stronger than any physical force in the universe.
- Wayne Dyer

Breathe deeply and slowly. Let yourself become centered - shutting out distractions. Breathe in eternal peace, and let your body fill with unconditional love.

Further reading: Five 30-Second Emotional Releases to De-Stress at Work
     

Action, Not Anger, Not Violence

Raging is easy but is neither good for your sanity, nor the best way to effect change.
- Mariella Frostrup

Mariella Frostrup's words are the best advice, the only rational advice, whether the crisis is Misogyny, Racism, Climate Change, Political Corruption, or personal issues.

The limitation of riots, moral questions aside,
is that they cannot win and their participants know it.
Hence, rioting is not revolutionary but reactionary
because it invites defeat.
It involves an emotional catharsis,
but it must be followed by a sense of futility.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Change of any sort requires courage.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

Violence, even well intentioned,
always rebounds upon oneself.
- Lao Tzu

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful,
committed people can change the world.
Indeed it is the only thing that ever has.
- Margaret Mead

Non-violence means avoiding not only external physical violence
but also internal violence of spirit.
You not only refuse to shoot a man,
but you refuse to hate him.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Prepare for the unknown by studying how others in the past have coped
with the unforeseeable and the unpredictable.
- George S. Patton

Be resolute in your goals, but flexible in your tactics.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Until You Take Action, What You Want Holds No Power
            

Pray For People Who Have Wronged You

Love people who hate you. Pray for people who have wronged you.
It won’t just change their life, it will change yours.
- Mandy Hale

Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it.
Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it.
Hatred darkens life; love illumines it.
- Martin Luther King Jr.

If you want to make peace with your enemy,
you have to work with your enemy.
Then he becomes your partner.
- Nelson Mandela

Am I not destroying my enemies when I make friends of them?
- Abraham Lincoln

You have heard that it was said,
"Love your neighbor and hate your enemy."
But I tell you: Love your enemies
and pray for those who persecute you.
- Jesus (Matthew 5:43-44)

The practice of forgiveness is our most important
contribution to the healing of the world.
- Marianne Williamson

Further reading: Categorizing People

Life is a Reflection

Go and Do Likewise

Fear and Love

On the Unworkability of Vengeance

Fix the Environment

Consider this very deep Alexander Den Heijer quote in the context of children/families/schools, of our criminal justice system, of government employees, ...

When a flower doesn’t bloom, you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower.
- Alexander Den Heijer

Remember that children, marriages, and flower gardens
reflect the kind of care they get.
- H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

There can be no keener revelation of a society's soul
than the way in which it treats its children.
- Nelson Mandela

Education is the most powerful weapon
which you can use to change the world.
- Nelson Mandela

None of us got where we are solely by
pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps.
- Thurgood Marshall

Generally speaking, punishment makes men hard and cold;
it concentrates; it sharpens the feeling of alienation;
it strengthens the power of resistance
- Friedrich Nietzsche

Bars can't build better men, and misery can only break what goodness remains.
- Stuart Turton

It is said that no one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails.
A nation should not be judged by how it treats its highest citizens, but its lowest ones.
- Nelson Mandela

Gardening is all about optimism.
I put a seed in the ground.
I consistently tend it,
confident I will see the results, in time,
of the nurture I have provided.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

Further reading: Be Grateful, Pay It Forward
   

Not Fears, But Hopes and Dreams

Do not anticipate trouble,
or worry about what may never happen.
Keep in the sunlight.
- Benjamin Franklin

Life only appears to be rushing toward us.
Perhaps life is not as threatening as it appears.
Perhaps the greatest threat to our serenity
is our fear of the future - our fear of the unknown.
Perhaps, as Franklin D. Roosevelt said,
"The Only Thing We Have to Fear Is Fear Itself."
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Consult not your fears but your hopes and your dreams.
Think not about your frustrations, but about your unfulfilled potential.
Concern yourself not with what you tried and failed in,
but with what it is still possible for you to do.
- Pope John XXIII

There are no hopeless situations;
there are only men who have grown hopeless about them.
- Clare Boothe Luce

Sometimes good things fall apart
so better things can fall together.
- Marilyn Monroe

When you say a situation or a person is hopeless,
you are slamming the door in the face of God.
- Charles L. Allen

Further reading: Not Fair, But Joyful

Life: Mystery and Riddle

How to Stop Worrying

Welcome the Unknown

An Unknowable Future

The Edge of All We Know