Zenshine Quotes

The greatest mistake you can make in life is to continually be afraid you will make one

2017-11-26T18:16:00.002-08:00

The greatest mistake you can make in life is to continually be afraid you will make one. ~Elbert Hubbard

You get your confidence and intuition back by trusting yourself, by being militantly on your own side... Trust them. Don't look at your feet to see if you are doing it right. Just dance.~Anne Lamott

It may be that when we no longer know what to do, we have come to our real work, and when we no longer know which way to go, we have begun our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed. The impeded stream is the one that sings. ~Wendell Berry

If you think you're enlightened, go spend a week with your family. ~Ram Dass

2017-11-23T14:57:00.001-08:00

If you think you're enlightened, go spend a week with your family. ~Ram Dass

Piglet noticed that even though he had a Very Small Heart, it could hold a rather large amount of Gratitude.~A.A. Milne

Acknowledging the good that you already have in your life is the foundation for all abundance. ~Eckhart Tolle

You don't have to, you get to. ~James Clear

I am grateful for what I am and have. My thanksgiving is perpetual. It is surprising how contented one can be with nothing definite -- only a sense of existence. ~Henry David Thoreau

I believe that you're great, that there's something magnificent about you. Regardless of what has happened to you in your life, regardless of how young or how old you think you might be, the moment you begin to think properly, there's something that is within you, there's power within you, that's greater than the world. It will begin to emerge. It will take over your life. It will feed you. It will clothe you. It will guide you, protect you, direct you, sustain your very existence, if you let it. Now, that is what I know for sure. ~Michael Beckwith

Every lesson is a widening and deepening of consciousness...

2017-11-12T18:23:00.001-08:00

What we plant in the soil of contemplation, we shall reap in the harvest of action. ~Meister Eckhart

In a world filled with noise, we need to quiet ourselves to hear God's voice. ~Paul Borthwick

Every lesson is a widening and deepening of consciousness. It is a stretching of the mind beyond its conceptual limits and a stretching of the heart beyond its emotional boundaries. It is a bringing of unconscious material into consciousness, a healing of past wounds, and a discovery of new faith and trust. ~Paul Ferrini

It's a bizarre but wonderful feeling, to arrive dead center of a target you didn't even know you were aiming for. ~Lois McMaster Bujold

There’s freedom in knowing you can carry joy and grief together....

2017-11-05T21:35:00.001-08:00

There’s freedom in knowing you can carry joy and grief together. There’s freedom in knowing you don’t need closure to heal. ~Nancy Berns

Our brokenness is also the source of our common humanity, the basis for our shared search for comfort, meaning, and healing. Our shared vulnerability and imperfection nurtures and sustains our capacity for compassion. ~Bryant Stevenson

Come to terms with death. Thereafter anything is possible. ~Albert Camus

If you think about disaster, you will get it. Brood about death and you hasten your demise. Think positively and masterfully, with confidence and faith, and life becomes more secure, more fraught with action, richer in achievement and experience. ~Swami Sivananda

Imagination... its limits are only those of the mind itself.

2017-10-29T17:06:00.003-07:00

Imagination... its limits are only those of the mind itself. ~Rod Serling

We're all ghosts. We all carry, inside us, people who came before us. ~Liam Callanan, The Cloud Atlas

Change the world by being yourself. ~Amy Poehler

The mind becomes a monster when it becomes your master. The mind is an angel when it is your servant. And it is all in your mind. ~Yogi Bhajan

Art is not what you see, but what you make others see. ~Edgar Degas

Something was withheld . . . We found it was ourselves. ~Robert Frost

2017-10-22T21:58:00.002-07:00

Something was withheld . . .
We found it was ourselves. ~Robert Frost

Come from the heart, the true heart, not the head. When in doubt, choose the heart. This does not mean to deny your own experiences and that which you have empirically learned through the years. It means to trust yourself to integrate intuition and experience. There is a balance, a harmony to be nurtured, between the head and the heart. When the intuition rings clear and true, loving impulses are favored. ~Brian Weiss

The temple bell stops but the sound keeps coming out of the flowers. ~Matsuo Basho

Your hand and your mouth agreed many years ago that, as far as chocolate is concerned, there is no need to involve your brain. ~Dave Barry

The best bridge between despair and hope is a good night's sleep...

2017-10-15T17:03:00.001-07:00

Like all explorers, we are drawn to discover what's out there without knowing yet if we have the courage to face it. ~Pema Chödrön

It may be that when we no longer know what to do, we have come to our real work and when we no longer know which way to go, we have begun our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed. The impeded stream is the one that sings. ~Wendell Berry

Relative to the level of awareness that is possible for us, our ordinary state of consciousness is as far from a direct experience of reality as sleep is from waking consciousness. ~Don Richard Riso & Russ Hudson

The best bridge between despair and hope is a good night's sleep. ~E. Joseph Cossman

Your pain is the breaking of the shell...

2017-10-08T20:58:00.000-07:00

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding. ~Khalil Gibran

To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be enlightened by the ten thousand things. ~Eihei Dogen

Peace is the result of retraining your mind to process life as it is, rather than as you think it should be. ~Wayne Dyer

Letting go gives us freedom, and freedom is the only condition for happiness. If, in our heart, we still cling to anything - anger, anxiety, or possessions - we cannot be free. ~Thich Nhat Hanh

Leave the door open for the unknown...

2017-10-01T21:43:00.001-07:00

Do understand that the mind has its limits. To go beyond, you must consent to silence. ~Nisargadatta Maharaj

Leave the door open for the unknown, the door into the dark. That’s where the most important things come from, where you yourself came from, and where you will go. ~Rebecca Solnit

You got to look at things with the eye in your heart, not with the eye in your head. ~Lame Deer, Medicine Man of the Oglala people

Work is not always required ... there is such a thing as sacred idleness, the cultivation of which is now fearfully neglected. ~George MacDonald

Give Peace A Chance

2017-09-17T20:34:00.001-07:00

People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use. ~Soren Kierkegaard

Let me listen to me and not to them. ~Gertrude Stein

As we live our truths, we will communicate across all barriers, speaking for the sources of peace. Peace that is not lack of war, but fierce and positive. ~Muriel Rukeyser

We don't always know what makes us happy. We know, instead, what we think SHOULD. We are baffled and confused when our attempts at happiness fail...We are mute when it comes to naming accurately our own preferences, delights, gifts, talents. The voice of our original self is often muffled, overwhelmed, even strangled, by the voices of other people's expectations. The tongue of the original self is the language of the heart. ~Julia Cameron

The next message you need is right where you are. ~Ram Dass

2017-09-04T21:37:00.001-07:00

Connection is the energy that is created between people when they feel seen, heard, and valued; when they can give and receive without judgment. ~Brene Brown

You are born alone. You die alone. The value of the space in between is trust and love. ~Louise Bourgeois

In a world filled with noise, we need to quiet ourselves to hear God's voice. ~Paul Borthwick

The next message you need is right where you are. ~Ram Dass

Grief and grieving...

2017-08-27T21:31:00.003-07:00

To love a person is to learn the song that is in their heart, and to sing it to them when they have forgotten. ~Thomas Chandler

When the heart grieves over what it has lost, the spirit rejoices over what it has left. ~Sufi epigram

You never know how strong you are, until being strong is your only choice. ~Bob Marley

Grief does not change you...it reveals you. ~John Green

You must never despair of human nature. ~Mahatma Gandhi

2017-08-20T23:11:00.000-07:00

Man's nature is not essentially evil. Brute nature has been known to yield to the influence of love. You must never despair of human nature. ~Mahatma Gandhi

It's not our job to toughen our children up to face a cruel and heartless world. It's our job to raise children who will make the world a little less cruel and heartless. ~L.R. Knost

Much violence is based on the illusion that life is a property to be defended and not to be shared. ~Henri Nouwen

In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert's mind there are few. Shunryu Suzuki

Nothing Conflicts with Oneness.

2017-08-13T18:35:00.001-07:00

Nothing conflicts with oneness. ~A Course in Miracles

Man's nature is not essentially evil. Brute nature has been known to yield to the influence of love. You must never despair of human nature. ~Mahatma Gandhi

Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love. ~Martin Luther King, Jr.

All differences in this world are of degree, and not of kind, because oneness is the secret of everything. ~Swami Vivekananda

The essence of nonviolence is love. Out of love and the willingness to act selflessly, strategies, tactics, and techniques for a nonviolent struggle arise naturally. Nonviolence is not a dogma; it is a process. ~Thich Nhat Hanh

Those who have reached their arms into emptiness...

2017-08-06T18:48:00.001-07:00

Those who have reached their arms into emptiness are no longer concerned with lies or truth, with mind or soul, or which side of the bed they rose from. ~Rumi

There can be no rebirth without a dark night of the soul, a total annihilation of all that you believed in and thought that you were. ~Hazrat Inayat Khan

Change is the constant, the signal for rebirth, the egg of the phoenix. ~Christina Baldwin

Meditation is fire — it burns your thoughts, your desires, your memories; it burns the past and the future. It burns your mind and the ego. It takes away all that you think that you are. It is a death and a rebirth, a crucifixion and a resurrection. You are born anew. You lose your own identity totally, and you attain to a new vision of life. ~Osho

Who Am I?

2017-07-30T21:04:00.003-07:00

What you are, the world is. And without your transformation, there can be no transformation of the world. ~J. Krishnamurti

Often people attempt to live their lives backwards: they try to have more things, or more money, in order to do more of what they want so they will be happier. The way it actually works is the reverse. You must first be who you really are, then do what you love to do, in order to have what you want. ~Margaret Young

A person's worth is contingent upon who he is, not upon what he does, or how much he has. The worth of a person, or a thing, or an idea, is in being, not in doing, not in having. ~Alice Mary Hilton

...What I focus on in life is what I get. And if I concentrate on how bad I am or how wrong I am or how inadequate I am, if I concentrate on what I can't do and how there's not enough time in which to do it, isn't that what I get every time? And when I think about how powerful I am, and when I think about what I have left to contribute, and when I think about the difference I can make on this planet, then that's what I get. You see, I recognize that it's not what happens to you; it's what you do about it. ~W. Mitchell

First, Do No Harm

2017-07-23T20:27:00.003-07:00

First, do no harm. ~Ahimsa, yoga sutra

They must find it difficult, those who have taken authority as truth, rather than truth as authority. ~Gerald Massey

Words are singularly the most powerful force available to humanity. We can choose to use this force constructively with words of encouragement, or destructively using words of despair. Words have energy and power with the ability to help, to heal, to hinder, to hurt, to harm, to humiliate and to humble. ~Yehuda Berg

We are each made for goodness, love and compassion. Our lives are transformed as much as the world is when we live with these truths. ~Desmond Tutu

If you are hurt by people you trusted, you do not heal by distrusting everyone. Nor will you heal by wishing them harm.To do so is to punish your own soul with their act of betrayal. ~Dodinsky

Embracing the Unknown

2017-07-09T19:25:00.002-07:00

How can you know what you are capable of if you don't embrace the unknown? ~Esmeralda Santiago

Sometimes in the winds of change we find our true direction. ~Unknown

Whatever inspiration is, it's born from a continuous 'I don't know.' ~Wislawa Szymborska

Don’t let someone dim your light simply because it’s shining in their eyes. ~Unknown

2017-06-25T16:24:00.004-07:00

Utilizing your conscious mind to direct the subconscious mind to enter into communication and harmony with the universal mind is the secret of personal power. ~Delfin Knowledge System

We can always choose to perceive things differently. You can focus on what's wrong in your life, or you can focus on what's right. ~Marianne Williamson

It is not by your actions that you will be saved, but by your being. ~Meister Eckhart

It's a bizarre but wonderful feeling, to arrive dead center of a target you didn't even know you were aiming for. ~Lois McMaster Bujold

Thank you, Dad

2017-06-18T19:53:00.001-07:00

Things my dad may have said if he could put his feelings into words:

You can't make everyone happy. You are not a pizza. ~Unknown

I can't think of any better representation of beauty than someone who is unafraid to be herself. ~Emma Stone

There is nothing more wonderful in life than seeing life as an adventure. We should all try things that we're afraid of. We should all look very clearly into the unknown and enjoy it. Because when you come in contact with things that you really don't know, that's when you're truly living. ~Unknown

It's a little embarrassing that after 45 years of research and study, the best advice I can give people is to be a little kinder to each other. ~Aldous Huxley

The love we give away is the only love we keep. ~Elbert Hubbard

Be courageous, care for others, a hero lives in you. ~Allison Crowther

Self Worth and Self Respect

2017-06-11T16:52:00.000-07:00

There’s a message in the way a person treats you. Just listen. . . ~R.H. Sin

Self respect, self worth and self love, all start with self. Stop looking outside of yourself for your value. ~Rob Liano

There are two kinds of pride, both good and bad. 'Good pride' represents our dignity and self-respect. 'Bad pride' is the deadly sin of superiority that reeks of conceit and arrogance. ~John C. Maxwell

Self respect, by definition, means being good to yourself for the sole reason that you revere your worth and demand your dignity. ~Barbara Stanny

We are exposing and discarding the unreal. When the unreal is discarded, you don’t have to go and search for the real. The real alone remains. ~Mooji

Gardening the Mind

2017-06-03T17:41:00.002-07:00

You're walking on a garden path called life, and it's filled with everything imaginable to you. Everyone you've ever met or even passed on the street is here in this garden, here just for you. All of the people in your life blend with all of the experiences you've ever had. Even though it could seem crowded, all of these people are part of the garden flowers, the trees, the grass, the stream, and the path itself; your life experience. Everywhere you step, your feet are met with love. Every face shines with the light of the heart's inner fire. Every thought you've ever thought and every word you've ever spoken are also here for you in this garden. Most of them are just seeds, lying in the nurturing soil of your endless experiences and relationships.

Many of your thoughts have been painful, and many are loving, light, gentle and breezy. It's your choice now to nurture the thoughts you want to grow. Here in your garden, on your path, your thoughts and your words are pure magic, sending wave after wave of love and light into the seedlings ready to burst through the earth. You carefully tend the seedlings, showering them in your song.

As your feet step on magical soil, your words change the path to shape around your journey. All of the people you encounter, no matter what they say or do, are reflecting back to you who you really are. No matter what you see, you stop judging. You decide to love yourself deeply for being able to create this magical experience in your life, and so you also must love everyone who is here for you. When you shift your vision to the beauty of those who have chosen to be a part of your life's path, it is easy to see yourself in them, and them in you. You are intertwined like the vines growing effortlessly around you.

You are willing to trust your constantly changing experience, which means you can relax and trust everyone, no matter what they appear to be doing, After all, your life is magic, and nothing is as it seems until you look with your heart and let that be the magic that flows through your mind, clearing the inner vision.

Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it we go nowhere. ~Carl Sagan

2017-06-03T17:06:00.002-07:00

Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it we go nowhere. ~Carl Sagan

The power of imagination created the illusion that my vision went much farther than the naked eye could actually see. ~Nelson Mandela

Imagination is the only weapon in the war against reality. ~Lewis Carroll

Reality is for people who can’t deal with imagination. ~Unknown

Peace is freedom

2017-05-29T09:30:00.000-07:00

True peace between nations will only happen when there is true peace within people's souls. ~Native American Proverb

As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn't leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I'd still be in prison. ~Nelson Mandela

If we could learn to like ourselves, even a little, maybe our cruelties and angers might melt away. ~John Steinbeck

Ultimately we know deeply that the other side of every fear is freedom. ~Marilyn Ferguson

Everything you are against weakens you. Everything you are for empowers you. ~Wayne Dyer

Loving the Tyrant. It's not who you think...

2017-05-21T16:18:00.000-07:00

Arrive and arise. There is no “someone else”. We are all one. Surprise.

Arrive and arise. There’s a dictator within us, just as avaricious and dull as some of those other leaders around us. The only reason why we would ever listen to such hypocrisy is that it’s within us already. It’s the inner voice, your personal tyrant, telling you that you are caught, dependent, helpless, held together by a mere trifle, some bling; the news of the day, whatever this tyrant within you allows. Whatever it is, it’s less than you.

Arrive and arise. Weren’t you the peaceful warrior determined to help others? I dare you to first accept yourself in all your beauty and ugliness, accept the terrible mystery of your being-ness. All voices within you are the voices outside you. Are you afraid that your ugliness will take over your beauty? Is your ugliness that powerful? Yes, it is. It’s powerful not because it exists within you, but because it has no light, no connection to your beauty and your love. Accept and connect. Be unafraid of any part of you.

Arrive and arise. There is a sweetness to owning your fears. Whatever you fear within you will take you over unless you own it. “I am fear as much as I am love. I am both beautiful and ugly. I will not shrink from the terrible mystery within me, and I will be powerful beyond imagination as I become once again whole, and all parts of my being feel the light.”

Arrive and arise. Take heart that you’re not alone. The peaceful warriors among us are many and growing, and oh so powerful. Tyrants and dictators will fall, not because we’ve conquered them, but because we’ve opened our hearts and they’ve melted into the light.

Does this mean that you love the tyrant so much that you accept poor treatment? Never. It means that you treat yourself with so much love and respect that no tyrant, inside our out, has a victim left to claim. And you are powerful, beautiful, terrible, mysterious and free.