“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.” Melody Beattie

Love Thyself

(From “A Book of Meditations and Affirmations for Women,” Mandarava Gifts for the Spirit). 

Who will speak words of love to you, 

if you do not speak them to yourself? 

Arise every morning and give thanks to the Power 

for your life, 

your awareness, 

your creativity, 

and all that you hold dear. 

Then speak words of love to yourself. 

As you love yourself more and more, 

the fountain within will flow more readily and persistently, 

until it overflows the bricks and mortar of your heart-well 

and brings forth life in all the corners of your garden. 

You are beautiful. 

You are unique. 

You are my wonderful creation. 

Love yourself each day before the pink dawn 

has lost its blush. 

Love yourself as the noonday sun 

purifies the heavens. 

Love yourself in the velvet shawl of twilight. 

Repeat these words to yourself: 

"I love you more than anyone in the world. 

You are an infinite, immortal being. 

You know only abundance. 

You are the most wondrous creature 

in the world to me. 

You are divinely beautiful. 

You are wonderful and magical 

and you have the gift of Love." 

Then will the sparrows and swans drink from your hand, 

praising your kindness. 

The forest will be cooled by your generous waters. 

Your name will be a blessing on the lips of all who thirst. 

“To meet at all, one must open ones eyes to another; and there is no true conversation no matter how many words are spoken, unless the eye, unveiled and listening, opens itself to the other.” —Jessamyn West

I was neurotic for years. I was anxious and depressed and selfish. Everyone kept telling me to change. I resented them and I agreed with them, and I wanted to change, but simply couldn't, no matter how hard I tried. Then one day someone said to me, "Don't change. I love you just as you are." Those words were music to my ears: "Don't Change, Don't change. Don't change... I love you as you are." I relaxed. I came alive. And suddenly I changed!

In Place of a Curse

by John Ciardi

At the next vacancy for God, if I am elected,
I shall forgive last the delicately wounded
who, having been slugged no harder than anyone else,
never got up again, neither to fight back,
not to finger their jaws in painful admiration.

They who are wholly broken, and they in whom
mercy is understanding, I shall embrace at once
and lead to pillows in heaven. But they who are
the meek by trade, baiting the best of their betters
with extortions of a mock-helplessness

I shall take last to love, and never wholly.
Let them all into heaven – I abolish Hell -
but let it be read over them as they enter:
“Beware the calculations of the meek, who gambled
nothing, gave nothing, and could never receive enough.”

Collection

"A rose in the rain doesn't bloom." -TSMHR

"In order for the spirit to grow the body needs to function correctly, and the mind needs to be positive and lead the body." TSMHR