"You are today where your thoughts have brought you; you will be tomorrow where your thoughts take you." ~ James Allen

Until Somebody Softens

"If you look back at history or you look at any place in the world where religious groups or ethnic groups or racial groups or political groups are killing each other, or families have been feuding for years and years, you can see — because you’re not particularly invested in that particular argument — that there will never be peace until somebody softens what is rigid in their heart."
~ Pema Chödrön

“The most satisfying thing in life is to have been able to give a large part of one's self to others.” ~ Teilhard de Chardin

Einstein: "... a kind of optical delusion of consciousness"

"A human being is part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. We experience ourselves, our thoughts and feelings as something separate from the rest. A kind of optical delusion of consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from the prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. The true value of a human being is determined by the measure and the sense in which they have obtained liberation from the self. We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if humanity is to survive." ~ Albert Einstein

"Be OK with what is, however you are feeling, whatever is going on, and you have taken the most important step towards freedom." ~ Simon, UK

Animals Teach Us Spirituality

In Loving Memory of Petty, Lani, Daphne, Jasmine, the German Shepard, the Dog I Took To the Pound, the Newborn Lost

"That animals touch us in a deep, central place is not a modern-day phenomenon, but one that pervades the history of the human-animal relationship. We sense that we can benefit spiritually in our relationship with animals, and we are right. They offer us something fundamental: a direct and immediate sense of both the joy and wonder of creation. We recognize that animals seem to feel more intensely and purely than we do. Perhaps we yearn to express ourselves with such abandon and integrity." ~ Mary Lou Randour, Ph.D.

Animals live in the Now!

Cat Soothing Crying Baby to Sleep

"Lao Pan, an unmarried man without much family, found close companionship with his loyal dog. And even though tragedy, their steadfast bond lives on. Pan lived in the Chinese village of Panjiatun, but died earlier this month at the age of 68. His furry friend was found by villagers at Pan's grave safeguarding the site according to BBC News. The loyal pup refused to leave even after going seven days without food.Sky News reports that since noticing the dog, villagers have been bringing food and water to the gravesite, and are even planning to build a kennel there for the dog to sleep in."

In a heroic story beyond reason, a yellow lab named Reagan made a discovery on an Iowa roadside that saved two precious lives.

Two kittens had been sealed into a bag of Meow Mix, left on a roadside and run over by traffic on a rural Iowa highway about three months ago,WHOTV.com reports.

It was Reagan the dog who dragged the bag home and whined until his owner opened it. Reagan's owner discovered two kittens barely hanging onto life, while the rest of the litter hadn't survived, prompting a call to the Raccoon Valley Animal Sanctuary.

"There was a litter of four or five of them and you couldn't tell if there were two or three [in the bag]...they had been run over by a vehicle. It was not a pretty sight," Linda Blakely of the animal shelter told WHOTV.com.

The Raccoon Valley Animal Sanctuary is now housing the two kittens -- Skipper and Tipper -- who weren't originally expected to live through the ordeal. The two were bottled-fed every two hours and are now back to their normal lively selves, the news outlet reports.

Thanks to Reagan, both kittens are now up for adoption through the Raccoon Valley Animal.

Luke and Tally - this is love...

Turtles High-Five Like People Do!

"Our job is to straighten out our lives." —Joseph Campbell

"I got half-a-dozen paintings from that shattered plate." ~ Georgia O'Keeffe

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It's not what life sends us, what is important is how we respond to what we receive ...

"The facts that free us to live richly are often shocking to our smug ego-armor. None is more disturbing to some people
than this one:

You must not live with a calculated motive of pleasing other people. Such motive is ego-centered; it expects some kind of
reward. When the reward fails to come, as it often does, the so-called pleasantness turns to secret resentment." ~ Vernon Howard

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"Real life isn't always going to be perfect or go our way, but the recurring acknowledgement of what is working in our lives can help us not only to survive but surmount our difficulties." ~ Sara Ban Breathnach

~ Doreen at Style Maniac

"Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less." ~ Madame Marie Curie

"Allow situations in your life to become your teacher." ~ Pema Chödrön

"What is true never fears investigation; what is false... fears everything." ~ Guy Finley

"Have a mind open to everything and attached to nothing" ~ Wayne Dyer

Ripples on The Surface of Being

" . . . the way I perceive the world is like ripples on the surface of being. Underneath the world of sense perceptions and the world of mind activity, there is the vastness of being. There's a vast spaciousness. There's a vast stillness and there's a little ripple activity on the surface, which isn't separate, just like the ripples are not separate from the ocean."

. . . Neither happiness nor unhappiness, however, go all that deep anymore. They are ripples on the surface of your Being. The background peace within you remains undisturbed regardless of the nature of the outside condition.

. . . The “yes” to what is reveals a dimension of depth within you that is dependent neither on external conditions nor on the internal conditions of constantly fluctuating thoughts and emotions." ~ Eckhart Tolle

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"When every situation which life can offer is turned to the profit of spiritual growth, no situation can really be a bad one." ~ Paul Brunton

"When you lose, don't lose the lesson" ~ Unknown

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“ What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared with what lies within us.” ~ Oliver Wendell Holmes