False Nobility

Growth, Relationships 0

I have met many women and a few men in what are clearly difficult, sometimes abusive, or extremely negative relationships who think that they are doing something spiritually wonderful by staying in a situation that is clearly eroding their soul. This is an example of the tribal belief Spiritual growth is hard, and you have to change yourself so you can be happy in any situation with any person at all times. Personally, I don’t believe this at all. It is responsible for more people staying in bad situations than any other tribal belief about spirituality.

— Christel Nani, Sacred Choices, p. 284

A Single Purpose

Growth, Life, Love 1

We are all here for a single purpose: to grow in wisdom and to learn to love better. We can do this through losing as well as through winning, by having and by not having, by succeeding or by failing. All we need to do is to show up openhearted for class.

— Rachel Naomi Remen, MD, Kitchen Table Wisdom, p. 80

Changed by Reading

Books, Growth, Inspiration, Joy 0

A book on virtually any subject, when written well and falling into the right hands, can produce a transcendent emotional response. And one such experience can lead to another and another, in a delightfully unpredictable way that is different for each person.

It is said that no love is sincerer than the love of food. Perhaps no love is vaster in its particulars than the love of books.

As adults, we can use the power of book love not only to entertain us, but also to inspire us to do new things, and to make significant changes in our lives. We can even use our love of books to help others, and maybe save a bit of the world.

That’s what reading is all about — the pure pleasure of it, how it changes you, how you live your life differently because of what you read.

— Steve Leveen, The Little Guide to Your Well-Read Life, p. 8

More My True Self

God, Growth, Peace, Trust 0

God, in his faithfulness is changing me…. Instead of making me into someone else, he is making me more me. And that is one of the beautiful things about him. That the more his we become, the more ourselves we become; more our true selves…. To have a gentle and quiet spirit is to have a heart of faith, a heart that trusts in God, a spirit that has been quieted by his love and filled with his peace. Not a heart that is striving and restless.

— Stasi Eldredge & John Eldredge, Captivating, p. 134

Making Mistakes

Compassion, Forgiveness, Growth, Letting Go, Life 0

Trying to be what I am not, and cannot be, is not only arrogant, it is stupid. . . . If I make myself a martyr to appease my false guilt, then I am falling into the age-old trap of pride. I fall into it often. . . . If I am not free to accept guilt when I am wrong, then I am not free at all. If all my mistakes are excused, if there’s an alibi, a rationalization for every blunder, then I am not free at all. I am subhuman. . . . I do all kinds of things which aren’t right, which aren’t sensitive or understanding. I neglect all kinds of things which I ought to do. . . . One reason I don’t feel guilty is that I no longer feel I have to be perfect. I am not in charge of the universe, whereas a humanist has to be. . . this inability presents her with a picture of herself which is not the all-competent, in-control-of-everything person she wants to see.

— Madeleine L’Engle, Summer of the Great-Grandmother

For Love of Him

God, Growth, Letting Go 0

In every giving up, whether it be of those who are daily our delight, or of our own desires, for love of Him who died for us; in every little private resolve of the heart to do the thing that pleaseth Him, whatever the cost, and to do it not with a grudging spirit but with glad abandon; in every such experience, however small, we may have fellowship with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ.

— Amy Carmichael, Thou Givest . . . They Gather