Inflexible trees snap in the wind. The more we protect who we think we are in the face of major life changes, the more we’re at odds with the natural flow.

Character - the willingness to accept responsibility for one's own life -- is the source from which self-respect springs. 

- Joan Didion

“Possessions, outward success, publicity, luxury…to me these have always been contemptible. I believe that a simple and unassuming manner of life is best for everyone, best for both the body and the mind.” ~ Albert Einstein

Remember there's no such thing as a small act of kindness. Every act creates a ripple with no logical end. - Scott Adams

It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society. - Krishnamurti

 Energy – positive or negative – is a “boomerang.” When you send out good energy towards someone, that good energy is returned sooner or later. If you send out negative energy by unfairly being dishonest against someone, or by cheating, lying, harassing, discrediting or causing harm to someone, that kind of negative energy will inevitably return to you.

View your life with kindsight. Stop beating yourself up about things from your past. Instead of slapping your forehead and asking, ‘What was I thinking,’ breathe and ask yourself the kinder question, ‘What was I learning?'

- Karen Salmansohn

“The liar's punishment is, not in the least that he is not believed, but that he cannot believe anyone else.”  

- George Bernard Shaw

“What is hell? I maintain that it is the suffering of being unable to love.”  - Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Worth repeating...

"Be kind. Everyone you meet is fighting a great battle."
- Phyllos

"Fear isn’t going to kill you. It’s an energy that you can allow to move through you." - Panache Desai

"Your sadness doesn’t make you less of a human being. In fact, it makes you more. More expansive. More connected. Painfully beautiful. Raw. Open. Completely alive.”  Panache Desai

"Do not rely on the outer world as your measuring stick for your own spiritual growth, rely on your response to the outer world to determine how much you have grown."  - Bashar

"If you argue with reality, you'll lose every time." 

- Adyashanti

Dalai Lama once said:  "In the final analysis, the goal of every person is simply peace of mind."

Forgiveness

First, let us forgive others for ways that may have harmed us.

If anyone, through their confusion, has harmed me in any way—either knowingly or unknowingly—I forgive them.

And now, let us ask for forgiveness for ways in which we may have harmed others.

If, through my own confusion, I have harmed anyone in any way—either knowingly or unknowingly—I ask for forgiveness.

And now, let us offer forgiveness to ourselves.

For all the ways that my own confusion has led me to harm myself, or be unkind to myself, I forgive myself.

Finally, if there is someone, including myself, who I'm not yet ready to forgive, I forgive myself for that.

- From Peter Russell

Three Things

“I want my life to have a rhythm more than anything else on earth.”  ~Denton 

Leaving

RECOVERY

Choices

"Every day I get up and I say, 'You have to remember whose child this is.  Do not interfere.  Be there when you are welcome.  Be loving but not judgmental.' "

- President Bill Clinton on becoming a grandfather

Living With Emotional Painbody

"If you are present, the painbody cannot feed anymore on your thoughts, or on other people's reactions. You can simply observe it, and be the witness, be the space for it. Then gradually, its energy will decrease."

- Eckhart Tolle

“It came to me that every time I lose a dog, they take a piece of my heart with them, and every new dog who comes into my life gifts me with a piece of their heart. If I live long enough, all the components of my heart will be dog, and I will become as generous and loving as they are.”

"Everyone knows they're going to die but nobody believes it.  If we did, we would do things differently . . . Learn how to die and you learn how to live." 

- Morrie Schwartz

"A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it." 

- Max Planck

Broken crayons still color.