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One day you will wake up and there won’t be any more time to do the things you’ve always wanted to do. Do them now! —Paulo Coelho
One summer, many years ago, a banker was vacationing in a small village on the coast. He saw a fisherman in a small boat by the pier with a handful of fish that he had just caught. The businessman asked him how long it took him to catch the fish, and the man said he was out on the water for only a couple of hours. “So why didn’t you stay out there longer to catch more fish?” asked the businessman. The fisherman said he catches just
enough to feed his family every day, and then comes back.
“But it’s only 2 p.m.!” said the banker, “What do you do with the rest of your time?” The fisherman smiled and said, “Well, I sleep late every day, then fish a little, go home, play with my children, take a nap in the afternoon, then stroll into the village each evening with my wife, relax, play the guitar with our friends, laugh and sing late into the night. I have a full and wonderful life.” The banker scoffed at the young man, “Well, I’m a businessman from New York! Let me tell you what you should do instead of wasting your life like this! You should catch more fish to sell to others, and
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business, and make a ton of money!” “And then what?” asked the fisherman again, and the banker threw his hands in the air and said, “You’d be worth a million! You can then leave this small town, move to the city, and manage your enterprise from there!” “How long would all this take?” asked the fisherman. “Fifteen to twenty years!” replied the banker. “And then what?” The banker laughed and said, “That’s the best part. You can then sell your business, move to a small village, sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take naps in the afternoon, go for an evening stroll with your wife
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You never make the same mistake twice. The second time you make it, it’s no longer a mistake; it’s a choice. What we essentially are is a series of bad decisions.
most of your expectations are completely unreasonable and self-centered.
No one can make you feel inferior without your consent. —Eleanor Roosevelt
“There is a battle between two wolves inside all of us. One is Evil (it is anger, envy, greed, resentment, inferiority, lies and ego), and the other is Good (it is joy, peace, love, humility, kindness, empathy and truth).” When the boy asked, “Which wolf wins?” the old man quietly replied, “The one you feed.
It is better to have a mind opened by wonder than a mind closed by belief. —Gerry Spence
Here’s the trick: instead of focusing all of your energy on “letting go of anger,” focus on increasing your gratitude . . . and the anger will naturally subside.
I’d heard it said that if you feed your faith, then all your fears will starve to death, and now I know it’s powerfully true.
We have faith that our heart will keep beating, and that we’ll wake up tomorrow morning. We don’t KNOW this; we TRUST it.
It doesn’t mean your faith has to be wrapped up in religion.
We now know that energy flows where attention goes. So if you feed your fears they get bigger, but if you feed your faith, your fears have nothing to eat and eventually die. The problem is that fear has been drilled into us from a very young age, with its level of severity greatly varying depending on our upbringing, culture, family, etc.
So in your “battle against fear,” I say change direction: don’t focus on letting go of fear; focus on increasing your faith . . . and the fear will disappear on its own.
So just focus on feeding your faith and the fears will naturally go away. Try the breathing stuff . . . I’m serious. Close your mouth and breathe in and out through the nose really fast. It can get tricky UNLESS you just focus on the exhale and trust that the inhale will happen effortlessly.
We fear change and the unknown, so we cling to a past that’s already gone and attempt to avoid a future that is inevitable.
Accept that other people’s perspectives on reality are as valid as your own (even if they go against everything you believe in), and honor the fact that someone else’s truth is as real to them as yours is to you.
“Namaste,” which means the divinity within you not only acknowledges the divinity within others, but honors it as well. Compassion is the only thing that can break down political, dogmatic, ideological, and religious boundaries. May we all harmoniously live in peace.
You will not be punished for your anger; you will be punished by your anger. —The Buddha
The important lesson I learned from this experience is that you can’t want something more for someone than they want for themselves, and that some people simply don’t believe in the light.
It doesn’t matter if you shine light in their faces, because if they don’t believe in it, they won’t see it.
Breathing is a gift, a miracle, offered to us over and over again, yet much like our health, we often take it for granted right up until the moment we no longer have it.
we humans are comforted by routine, even if it’s dysfunctional).
I did my own research instead, at my own pace, on my own schedule, with no commercial interruption.
without TV I noticed a significantly more remarkable change: all of my thoughts were my own. I wasn’t being told what to think, what to buy, like, eat or watch; I was making my own decisions.
if we watch or listen to poisonous negativity, violence, gossip, and pretty much anything that is not conducive to our growth or maturity as adults, then it’s no different than eating only refined sugars, fried foods and saturated fats; we’re bound to get sick.
“We can make ourselves miserable, or we can make ourselves happy. The amount of work is the same.
So go ahead and choose to be happy by taking the first step of avoiding the very things that make you UNhappy.
Flowers only bloom when they are ready. People are the same way. You cannot rush or force them open just because you think it’s time. Be patient. —Timber Hawkeye
“sometimes subtle, sometimes clear. And the ones that go unnoticed, still leave their mark once disappeared.
Everything in your life will improve as soon as your determination to move forward is stronger than your reluctance to let go of the past. —Timber Hawkeye
nobody is in charge of your happiness (or unhappiness) except YOU!
When somebody loves you, they don’t have to say it. You can tell by the way they treat you. —Anonymous
Gratitude is an amazing antidote to almost any negative feeling.
If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging! —Will Rogers
celebrate the fact that we are far beyond survival and actually spoiled compared to so many others!
Seeking happiness outside ourselves is like waiting for sunlight in a cave facing north. —Tibetan saying
Be part of the solution by not being part of the pollution,
We can’t just THINK ABOUT compassion and kindness; we must BE compassionate and kind.
An ounce of practice is worth more than a ton of preaching. —Gandhi
Never judge anyone for the choices that they make, and always remember that the opposite of what you know is also true. Every other person’s perspective on reality is as valid as your own, so no matter how certain you are that what you’re doing is the “right thing,” you must humbly accept the possibility that even someone doing the exact opposite might be doing the “right thing” as well. Everything is subject to time, place, and circumstance. There are no “shoulds” in compassionate thinking!
Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as you can. —John Wesley
“the system,” after all, is made up of individuals. By raising the next generation to be peaceful and compassionate, we are building future systems to operate with altruistic intentions instead of hunger for power.
If you invite me to an anti-war rally, I won’t go. Invite me to a pro-peace rally, and I’ll be there! —Mother Teresa
Are we all looking for something permanent in an impermanent world?
The moment we accept, not fear, that everything is temporary, we can appreciate each breath as a gift. Whether it’s the love of a friend, our family, youth, or life itself, let’s celebrate and enjoy that we have it today. Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever. —Gandhi
The principle of compassion lies at the heart of all religious, ethical and spiritual traditions, calling us always to treat all others as we wish to be treated ourselves. Compassion impels us to work tirelessly to alleviate the suffering of our fellow creatures, to dethrone ourselves from the center of our world and put another there, and to honor the inviolable sanctity of every single human being, treating everybody, without exception, with absolute justice, equity and respect. It is also necessary (in both public and private life) to refrain consistently and empathically from inflicting
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Training our mind to be more positive, loving, accepting and kind may be “easier said than done,” but it’s certainly easier than living the rest of your life with greed, hatred and anger!
