In our quest for happiness and the avoidance of suffering, we are all fundamentally the same, and therefore equal. Despite the characteristics that differentiate us—race, language, religion, gender, wealth and many others—we are all equal in terms of our basic humanity.
~ Dalai Lama
Sun Over the Ocean – photo by Lynne Williamson, bigstockphoto.com
We all have encounters with the sacred, we just have to cultivate the eye that can perceive them. We have to see what’s already here, interwoven with what we claim is human and mundane. We have to take inventory of the magic that conspires to love us in and through our ordinary lives.
~ Meggan Watterson
Deep Tropical Jungle, Southeast Asia – photo by Quickshooting, bigstockphoto.com
May the energy emanating
from every step I take
re-sanctify the Earth.
May the energy emanating
from every breath I take
re-sanctify the Earth.
May the energy emanating
from every action I take
re-sanctify the Earth.
May the energy emanating
from every thought, action,
word and deed of all humanity
re-sanctify the Earth.
And so, by this exchange
of blessings may grow,
in symbiosis,
the consciousness of Oneness.
~ Ann Palmer
Earth – photo from NASA PIA18033~orig.jpg
You may consider yourself an individual but, as a cell biologist, I can tell you that you are in truth a cooperative community of approximately fifty trillion single-celled citizens.
~ Bruce Lipton
White Cosmos Flowers – photo by Kowit Sitthi, bigstockphoto.com
Whatever we give our attention to flourishes.
~ Rupert Spira
Moonrise Inside Delicate Arch, Arches National Park, UT – photo by HS Digital, bigstockphoto.com
We don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of nows, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.
~ Howard Zinn
Sunrise, Mesa Red Rock, Monument Valley, AZ – photo by wisanuboonrawd, bigstockphoto.com
The deeper we look into nature, the more we recognize that it is full of life, and the more profoundly we know that all life is sacred and that we are united with all life that is in nature.
~ Albert Schweitzer
Plitvice Lakes National Park, Croatia – photo by Tallem, bigstockphoto.com
I regard consciousness as fundamental. I regard matter as derivative from consciousness. We cannot get behind consciousness. Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.
~ Max Planck
Pholiota in the Woods – photo by Dmitry Maslov, bigstockphoto.com
The most straightforward advice on awakening enlightened mind is this: practice not causing harm to anyone – yourself or others – and every day, do what you can to be helpful.
~ Pema Chödrön
Sunset in Central Park – photo by johnanderson, bigstockphoto.com
The eyes of the future are looking back at us and they are praying for us to see beyond our own time. They are kneeling with hands clasped that we might act with restraint, that we might leave room for the life that is destined to come. To protect what is wild is to protect what is gentle. Perhaps the wilderness we fear is the pause between our own heartbeats, the silent space that says we live only by grace. Wilderness lives by this same grace. Wild mercy is in our hands.
~ Terry Tempest Williams
Oxbow Bend, Grand Teton National Park, WY – photo by Steve Byland, bigstockphoto.com
Becoming a person of the plants is not a learning process, it is a remembering process. Somewhere in our ancestral line, there was someone that lived deeply connected to the Earth, the Elements, the Sun, Moon and Stars. That ancestor lives inside our DNA, dormant, unexpressed, waiting to be remembered and brought back to life to show us the true nature of our indigenous soul.
~ Sajah Popham
Oak Creek, Cathedral Rock, Sedona, AZ – photo by diomedes66, bigstockphoto.com
You have been chosen to be who you are. Not as an accident. Not as an existence without purpose. But as a self-aware soul brought to life by a Spirit who knows your name. You have a mission to carry out, a message to send, a blessing to bestow. You are the only one who can live your life. You are entrusted with a corner of the universe. You are a stakeholder in creation, selected for a task only you can complete.
~ Steven Charleston
Tropical Sunrise, Phuket, Thailand – photo by Panya Kuanun, bigstockphoto.com
Personal Transformation is the greatest offering we can make to the world, for each awakening ignites humanity’s collective consciousness. Because consciousness is one, change yourself and you change the world.
~ John C. Robinson
Waterfall, Costa Rican Rainforest – photo by Achrushko Galyna, bigstockphoto.com
Somewhere out there, in the darkness, in the distance, someone is playing music. I can just hear it. The sound slips through the noise of the world, the tumult of the world, to find me listening. It is the music of grateful hearts, of lives restored to wholeness, of hope fulfilled and justice, at last, realized. Listen. Even in the turmoil, listen. It is the music of our redemption, the first sound of creation.
~ Steven Charleston
Adriatic Sea Pine Forest, Croatia – photo by AnnaElizabeth photography, bigstockphoto.com
When a bird sings its sacred songs, it casts medicine all around the earth to the hard to reach places. When we drum and sing our songs, the same thing happens. The power of the heart is the most powerful medicine we have. When you think about it, it’s the only thing that can save everything: Because it is everything.
~ Isaac Murdoch
Male Flame Tanager, Costa Rica – photo by Mark Caunt Photography, bigstockphoto.com
