The real way circulates everywhere;
How could it require
Practice or enlightenment?
The essential teaching is fully available;
How could effort be necessary?
Furthermore, the entire mirror is
Free of dust; why take steps to polish it?
Nothing is separate from this
Very place; why journey away?
- Dogen (1200-1253)
5255 days in a row
THE LANGUAGE OF THE HEART, p. 37
Who am I to judge anyone? When I first entered the Fellowship I found that I liked everyone. After all, A.A. was going to help me to a better way of life without alcohol. The reality was that I couldn't possibly like everyone, nor they me. As I've grown in the Fellowship, I've learned to love everyone just from listening to what they had to say. That person over there, or the one right here, may be the one God has chosen to give me the message I need for today. I must always remember to place principles above personalities.
- Joined
- 06 May 15
- Moves
- 27445
Some things are in our control and others not.
Things in our control are opinion, pursuit, desire, aversion, and, in a word, whatever are our own actions.
Things not in our control are body, property, reputation, command, and, in one word, whatever are not our own actions.
— Opening lines of The Enchiridion by Epictetus
The opposite of the religious fanatic is not the fanatical atheist but the gentle cynic who cares not whether there is a god or not.
~ Eric Hoffer (1902 - 1983)
When we are unable to find tranquility within ourselves, it is useless to seek it elsewhere.
~ Francois de La Rochefoucauld
French author & moralist (1613 - 1680)
@sonship saidThis is one of the best and most enlightening threads going, and the only one in Spirituality to which I return frequently and always with pleasure. This thread is like a breath of fresh air, compared to most of the rest of the SF which stinks of the Spanish Inquisition with the usual suspects slagging each other off as apostates.
Rookie54, has Ghost of a Duke EVER complained on this thread that this was not your private pulpit, like he has on my threads?
Consider yourself to have been overlooked by his critical and skeptical annoyance.
In contradistinction to your threads, rookie does not preach, admonish, correct anyone who has the wrong interpretation, or argue. Now take a long hard look at your own threads, and the responses to them. See the difference? You presume to know something you think no one else here does, and that gives to your posts a certain infelicitous tint. Or should I say taint.
To you, I say, “Let he who is without sin cast the first complaint.”
- Joined
- 06 May 15
- Moves
- 27445
@sonship saidRookie just has the one thread though, in which he almost always or perhaps only posts quotations from poets and mystics, without commentary (as far as I have observed).
Rookie54, has Ghost of a Duke EVER complained on this thread that this was not your private pulpit, like he has on my threads?
Consider yourself to have been overlooked by his critical and skeptical annoyance.
Would Christ complain about such perceptions?
If there's a toad on the porch, should it be concerned?
Should we listen for the geese before they are flying?
Why not just leave these things in God's hands?
@kevin-eleven removed their quoted postMaybe they're just recovering from Christmas. I'm sure they'll all be back soon.