“One final piece of advice: Do not burn yourselves out. Be as I am–a reluctant enthusiast…a part-time crusader, a half hearted fanatic. Save the other half of yourselves and your lives for pleasure and adventure. It is not enough to fight for the land; it is even more important to enjoy it. While you can. While it’s still there. So get out there and hunt and fish and mess around with your friends, ramble out yonder and explore the forests, encounter the grizz, climb the mountains, bag the peaks, run the rivers, breathe deep of that yet sweet and lucid air, sit quietly for a while and contemplate the precious stillness, that lovely, mysterious and awesome space. Enjoy yourselves, keep your brain in your head and your head firmly attached to the body, the body active and alive, and I promise you this much: I promise you this one sweet victory over our enemies, over those deskbound people with their hearts in a safe deposit box and their eyes hypnotized by desk calculators. I promise you this: you will outlive the bastards.”
–Edward Abbey, at a 1987 Earth First! rally
gift
Morning Trip (218)
“When you are on your path, the universe will conspire to help you.”
–Brene Brown, and pulled from The Alchemist
Morning Trip (211)
“It is always with excitement that I wake up in the morning wondering what my intuition will toss up to me, like gifts from the sea. I work with it and rely on it. It’s my partner.”
–Jonas Salk
Morning Trip (210)
“The ability to be spontaneous is granted when we touch something deeply important: a moment of clarity in which we see an eternal truth. We give our truest reactions and utterances when we stand at the moment in question, all previously prepared words and actions suddenly voided in the face of the moment. A spontaneous response results, if only we can trust it. Spontaneity requires us to let go of fear and of continual self observation, to let pass the deeper truths that we have perceived or that have touched a cord in our soul.
Spontaneity is a great gift, and it grows stronger in us the more we attend to the present moment rather than living forever in the past or in the future: both memory and expectation can get in its way and expunge the up flowing revelation. Spontaneity occurs when all our senses are attuned to the present moment, when we see through the veil that usually separates us from the other-world and see its bridging connections coming through to our side of reality.
Spontaneity lifts the ordinary dull rote of existence into life of another order; it is a sparkling touch of revelation that responds to whatever is true, beautiful, and harmonious, giving energy to the living moment.
Meditate upon the dull and unyielding areas of your life. Now temporarily remove the rules, limits, and proscriptions that surround these areas. Allow truthful realizations about the connection between your controlling or limiting behavior and the flow of your life to spontaneously arise, even though these realizations might initially seem frivolous or irrelevant.”
–unknown
A Request Granted! (imagine pink, silver, and purple sparkles and fire flying forth)
Morning Trip (95)
“We gaze with perplexity at the highest part of the spiral of force that governs the Universe. And we call it God. We could give it any other name: Abyss, Mystery, Absolute Darkness, Total Light, Matter, Spirit, Supreme Hope, Supreme Despair, Silence. But we call it God, because only this name – for some mysterious reason – is capable of making our heart tremble with vigor. And let there be no doubt that this trembling is absolutely indispensable for us to be in contact with the basic emotions of the human being, emotions that are always beyond any explanation or logic.”
–the Greek author Nikos Kazantzakis
Lifesong: A Gift that I Offer Back in Gratitude and Joy
Morning Trip (65)
“All the Hemispheres
Leave the familiar for a while.
Let your senses and bodies stretch out
Like a welcomed season
Onto the meadows and shores and hills.
Open up to the Roof.
Make a new water-mark on your excitement
And love.
Like a blooming night flower,
Bestow your vital fragrance of happiness
And giving
Upon our intimate assembly.
Change rooms in your mind for a day.
All the hemispheres in existence
Lie beside an equator
In your heart.
Greet Yourself
In your thousand other forms
As you mount the hidden tide and travel
Back home.
All the hemispheres in heaven
Are sitting around a fire
Chatting
While stitching themselves together
Into the Great Circle inside of
You.”
– Hafiz
The Subject Tonight is Love
translated by Daniel Ladinsky
Elisa's Spot 