“My dear, Find what you love and let it kill you. Let it drain you of your all. Let it cling onto your back and weigh you down into eventual nothingness. Let it kill you and let it devour your remains. For all things will kill you, both slowly and fastly, but it’s much better to be killed by a lover. ~ Falsely yours”
“Thus Gotama [Buddha] walked toward the town to gather alms, and the two samanas recognized him solely by the perfection of his repose, by the calmness of his figure, in which there was no trace of seeking, desiring, imitating, or striving, only light and peace.” ― Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha
Sometimes I think we don't need our eyes -- after all, you close them anyhow when the most important things are going on, and when you're feeling really good. A painter needs his eyes because that's the way he earns his living, but I've learnt to live without them. I sense my world now, and words mean more to me than they do to you sighted people.
Excerpt from page 172, Zinky Boys: Soviet Voices from a Forgotten War, by Svetlana Alexievich
I have the whole Table of Elements in my body. I'm still wracked by malaria. Not long ago I had a few teeth pulled, one after the other, and in my pain and shock I began to talk. The dentist, a woman, looked at me almost in disgust: "A mouth full of blood, and he wants to talk ..." At that moment I realized I would never be able to talk honestly about anything again. Everyone thinks of us like that: mouths full of blood, and we want to talk.
-- "Zinky Boys: Soviet Voices from a Forgotten War" by Svetlana Alexievich, page 10
But try. For our sake and yours forget your name in the street; tell us what the world has been to you in the dark places and in the light. Don't tell us what to believe, what to fear. Show us belief s wide skirt and the stitch that unravels fear's caul. You, old woman, blessed with blindness, can speak the language that tells us what only language can: how to see without pictures. Language alone protects us from the scariness of things with no names. Language alone is meditation.
Let me change the mood with a few sweet words that will, I hope, serve as well as that music. As you know, the question we writers are asked most often, the favourite question, is; why do you write? I write because I have an innate need to write! I write because I can't do normal work like other people. I write because I want to read books like the ones I write. I write because I am angry at all of you, angry at everyone. I write because I love sitting in a room all day writing. I write because I can only partake in real life by changing it. I write because I want others, all of us, the whole world, to know what sort of life we lived, and continue to live, in Istanbul, in Turkey. I write because I love the smell of paper, pen, and ink. I write because I believe in literature, in the art of the novel, more than I believe in anything else. I write because it is a habit, a passion. I write because I am afraid of being forgotten. I write because I like the glory and interest that writing brings. I write to be alone. Perhaps I write because I hope to understand why I am so very, very angry at all of you, so very, very angry at everyone. I write because I like to be read. I write because once I have begun a novel, an essay, a page, I want to finish it. I write because everyone expects me to write. I write because I have a childish belief in the immortality of libraries, and in the way my books sit on the shelf. I write because it is exciting to turn all of life's beauties and riches into words. I write not to tell a story, but to compose a story. I write because I wish to escape from the foreboding that there is a place I must go but – just as in a dream – I can't quite get there. I write because I have never managed to be happy. I write to be happy.
“Everyone in this room is going to be gone pretty quickly — and we will have either made something or not made something. The artists that inspire me are the ones that I look at and go, ‘Oh my god — you didn’t have to go there. It would’v been safer not to — but, for whatever reason, you did.’ And every time death happens, I’m reminded that it’s stupid to be safe… Usually, whatever that is — wherever you don’t want to go, whatever that risk is, wherever the unsafe place is — that really is the gift that you have to give.”
“To paint peasant life one has to be master of such an enormous number of things. But on the other hand — I know of nothing that one works on with such peace, in the sense of peace of mind, even when one has a great struggle in material things.”
Although the road is never ending, take a step and keep walking, do not look fearfully into the distance. On this path let the heart be your guide for your body is hesitant and full of fear.
~ Rumi
Oh Lord, I've never lived where churches grow. I love creation better as it stood, That day You finished it so long ago And looked upon Your work and called it good.
I know that others find you in the light That's sifted down through tinted window panes, And yet I seem to feel You near tonight In this dim, quiet starlight on the plains.
I thank You, Lord, that I am placed so well, That You have made my freedom so complete; That I'm no slave of whistle, clock, or bell Nor weak-eyed prisoner of wall and street.
Just let me live my life as I've begun And give me work that's open to the sky; Make me a pardner of the wind and sun, And I won't ask a life that's soft or high.
Let me be easy on the man that's down; Let me be square and generous with all. I'm careless sometimes, Lord, when I'm in town, But never let 'em say I'm mean or small!
Make me as big and open as the plains, As honest as the hoss between my knees, Clean as the wind that blows behind the rains, Free as the hawk that circles down the breeze!
Forgive me, Lord, if sometimes I forget. You know about the reasons that are hid. You understand the things that gall and fret; You know me better than my mother did.
Just keep an eye on all that's done and said And right me, sometimes when I turn aside, And guide me on the long, dim trail ahead That stretches upward toward The Great Divide.
Of the two thieves who were crucified with Christ one said, 'It is just that we should be thus condemned to death for we receive the payment of our transgressions, but this Man has done nothing evil'. These words tell us that there is no one except Christ who is not obliged to carry his cross with a certain justice and on account of a certain culpability. If our neighbours suspect our thoughts and intentions, it is almost always true that our thoughts towards them, or towards others, have not been filled with perfect love. If they criticize us it is because we have not always helped them in their own difficult circumstances. It is almost always certain that we have not given them all the help that we could have done, and have not opened our heart to them. If they forget the help which we have given them it is because we ourselves do not fully rejoice in the good things which have come to them because of the help which we have been able to give. If a tension or coldness exists between me and another person, it is almost certain that I am at least in part the cause of this tension or coldness, or at least that I have not done all that I could to get rid of it. Bad relationships between myself and other people nearly always have their roots in me as well as in the others. I ought to support the hostility of other people not only as a cross which I bear for myself but as a cross which I bear for them as well, since I carry this cross because, on account of the kind of person I am, they are not able to be in the relationship with me which they would wish to be. Every cross which has saving power is a cross which I carry not only on account of my own sins, but also on account of the sins of others. I should bend and bow in carrying my neighbor with his cross, and in bowing and bending I spiritually form the horizontal line, the humbling line of the cross, in order that the one whom I carry may form the vertical line as I carry him on my shoulders. Our moral weakness and powerlessness, our insufficient responsibility towards God and our neighbors, these form our cross.
- Father Dumitru Staniloae (Oxford: Fairacres Publications, 1970) from "The Victory of the Cross"
Most high, all powerful, all good Lord! All praise is Yours, all glory, all honor, and all blessing.
To You, alone, Most High, do they belong. No mortal lips are worthy to pronounce Your name.
Be praised, my Lord, through all Your creatures, especially through my lord Brother Sun, who brings the day; and You give light through him. And he is beautiful and radiant in all his splendor! Of You, Most High, he bears the likeness.
Be praised, my Lord, through Sister Moon and the stars; in the heavens You have made them bright, precious and beautiful.
Be praised, my Lord, through Brothers Wind and Air, and clouds and storms, and all the weather, through which You give Your creatures sustenance.
Be praised, my Lord, through Sister Water; she is very useful, and humble, and precious, and pure.
Be praised, my Lord, through Brother Fire, through whom You brighten the night. He is beautiful and cheerful, and powerful and strong.
Be praised, my Lord, through our sister Mother Earth, who feeds us and rules us, and produces various fruits with colored flowers and herbs.
Be praised, my Lord, through those who forgive for love of You; through those who endure sickness and trial.
Happy those who endure in peace, for by You, Most High, they will be crowned.
Be praised, my Lord, through our sister Bodily Death, from whose embrace no living person can escape. Woe to those who die in mortal sin! Happy those she finds doing Your most holy will. The second death can do no harm to them.
Praise and bless my Lord, and give thanks, and serve Him with great humility.
Does practicing Christianity in modern society imply setting oneself up for defeat? What is a true Christian?
I think complementary to the questions above is Bertrand Russell's simple and heartening definition of the good life.
The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge.
Knowledge and love are both indefinitely extensible; therefore, however good a life may be, a better life can be imagined. Neither love without knowledge, nor knowledge without love can produce a good life.
Oh, how mesmerizing, this authentic human spirit expressed in music. To experience beautiful work that can literally move you to tears -- what pure joy!
Life gets filled with more and more unfinished stories and only some finished. It's the ones finished which truly form the pillars of our lives. What about the unfinished? ... They are the windows that let in the sun, rain, moonshine, and dust. And if we look carefully through them, they also show us views to broad horizons.
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