Trust that everything will be okay, but that doesn’t mean that everything will be restored. Start making yourself at home in your life as it is. Look around and look ahead.
KEEP MOVING.
— Maggie Smith, Keep Moving, p. 37
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, March 13, 2021
We need the grace of Trust more than we realize. We want everything to happen now — right now — in our lives. And we want to recognize the sound of every footstep we hear. We have to stop wanting, wanting, wanting life to be what it will never, ever be — familiar, controllable, and wrapped around our personal needs. That impossible craving is what leads to attacks of stress, panic, and inner madness. Instead we must contact the grace of Trust. We must learn to rest easy in the mobius of prayer and trust, guidance and action. Rather than imagining greatness or humiliation, power or powerlessness. Your imagination is an engine of creation, a vessel through which your inside coordinates the outside of your life. Imagining greatness for yourself is rooted in the fear of humiliation. The end product is an ego full of hubris. Driven by fear, you will end up in the fog of panic and uncertainty. The discipline — and it is a discipline — is to apply the grace of Trust. Trust brings detachment. You do not have to interfere with heaven’s work. If you knew what was best for you, you would not need heaven’s help. Just Trust.
— Caroline Myss, Intimate Conversations with the Divine, p. 120
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, March 14, 2020
I saw such sorrow on a friend’s face today, Lord. Something did not work out the way she had hoped. There was once a time when I would have prayed for her to get the position she was aiming for. When I think of that now, how I used to pray, I wince in my soul. It took me years — and maybe lifetimes — to understand my folly. Thinking that I know what is best for someone, and that You require my guidance — my intervention — to direct another person’s life! I often replay the dream I had years ago, at the time I felt the doors had suddenly closed on the career I had chosen. I had been lamenting not getting my way. I was feeling sorry for myself, rejected by something I wanted, and abandoned by heaven, so to speak. I was not in good shape. But in a dream visitation I was informed that “earthly rejection is holy protection.” I woke up calm. Tranquil, as if I had slept under a blanket of grace. I have never doubted again — not once. When I released my unmet expectations to You, You led me down a path I did not see coming. One I could not have imagined because I never knew it existed.
— Caroline Myss, Intimate Conversations with the Divine, p. 118
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, February 27, 2021
Focus on who you are and what you’ve built, not who you’d planned on being and what you’d expected to have. Trust that the present moment — however difficult, however different from what you’d imagined — has something to teach you.
KEEP MOVING.
— Maggie Smith, Keep Moving, p. 9
Photo: Bremen, Germany, November 28, 2003
Often, our pride stands in the way of our asking for help. In true love there is no place for pride. To love each other means to trust each other. If you don’t tell the person you love of your suffering, it means you don’t love this person enough to trust her. You have to realize that this person is the best person to help you. We need to be able to get help from the person we love.
— Thich Nhat Hanh, How to Love, p. 54
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, February 20, 2017
If we think it unreasonable to expect ourselves to rejoice in suffering, try looking at the other side: Isn’t it unreasonable not to rejoice? Taking into account God’s great love and faithfulness, and the promise of our eternal reward in heaven, isn’t a joyless attitude like a small child’s tantrum? Feeling powerless, we either shut down or throw a fit as the only means of retaliating against the one who does hold power.
Unhappiness is a form of pouting. It’s a way of saying, “I shouldn’t suffer like this; it’s scandalous; I don’t deserve it and I won’t accept it.” Fine. Your unhappiness will continue until you do accept it. You’d rather be right than happy.
— Mike Mason, Champagne for the Soul, p. 112
Photo: San Pedro, California, January 2, 2004
Joy instinctively sides with God in everything, against human circumstances, against transient feelings, against common sense. Common sense does not yield joy; joy is supernatural sense. To attain the supernatural I must adopt God’s point of view. Therefore I resolve to let God be right about everything. Instead of being sorry for myself, I let God be right for allowing my sickness or my difficulties to continue. Instead of worrying, I let God be right for not immediately intervening.
Joy comes from thinking God’s thoughts, doing His will, looking at everything through His eyes by the power of the indwelling Spirit. To embrace entirely God’s point of view, however briefly, is to be joyful. This is true even when God’s point of view involves sorrow over suffering. Joy is not proud, detached, or affected. It mixes well with suffering; it comprehends and effectively ministers to loss. Even in the midst of compassion for affliction, everyone who sides with God remains joyful.
— Mike Mason, Champagne for the Soul, p. 109-110
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, November 22, 2018
Teilhard de Chardin wrote that we must “trust in the slow work of God.”
Ours is a God who waits. Who are we not to? It takes what it takes for the great turnaround. Wait for it.
— Gregory Boyle, Tattoos on the Heart, p. 113
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, November 4, 2018
I scanned this picture from September 28, 1997 and the Eagle Show, Volerie des Aigles, at Chateau du Kitzheim in Alsace, France – and I couldn’t resist making this:
