Max Ehrmann's 'Desiderata'

Marianne Williamson Quotation on Fear

The Hsin Hsin Ming

Excerpt from Kahlil Gibran's 'The Prophet' on Children

Don't Quit

Lao-Tzu's 'A Journey of a Thousand Miles'

Robert Frost's 'The Road Not Taken'

Ancient Sanskrit Poem

Oh Gentle Night

Autobiography in Five Chapters

Tackle the Thing

Kipling's 'If'

St Francis of Assisi Prayer

The Meaning of Success

From 'Man’s Search for Meaning' by Viktor Frankl

"For everything there is a season..." Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

Nelson Mandela's 'Long Road to Freedom...' Quotation

Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even the dull and ignorant; they too have their story. Avoid loud and aggressive persons - they are vexatious to the spirit. If you compare yourself to others you may become vain and bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time. Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals; and everywhere life is full of heroism. Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is as perennial as the grass. Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.

Nurture the strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether of not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be. And whatever your labours and aspirations, in the confusion of life keep peace with your soul. With all its sham and drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

Max Ehrmann (1872-1945)

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Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our Darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous? Actually, who are you NOT to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to manifest the glory of God that is within us. It is not in just some of us; it is in everyone. As we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

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If, one day, you suffer just to the very depths of yourself, beyond tears and desperation, just until you howl in horror, until you claw the black earth with your bare fingers, and even beyond that, just until you don't know if your own life is still possible in this nightmare, that day you will know that there is neither God nor human to get you out of this, and you will be drowned in the maelstrom of pain, crushed, flattened. Maybe you will survive, and maybe not. And that has no importance. Suffering is neither an atonement, nor a purification. Even less a redemption. But larger is the heart that has been broken, and stronger is love for having been wounded. And at the heart of the greatest suffering lies the greatest love.

We are not what we have experienced, nor what we believe to possess. Our richness could only be woven from threads of life in all the colors of its palette. And when we are all dressed in white, it's because we have integrated all the colors of the rainbow.

Throughout all our lives, we have discovered one at a time, or all at once, happiness and joy, sorrow and tears. Heedless butterfly, who only knows laughter and flowers. Gloomy caterpillar, who gets stuck in mud and tears. But the one, like the other, are only two aspects of the same being, the one would not exist without the other, who wouldn't know how to survive without engendering once more the first.

The day that you will be a caterpillar, even if you don't believe in butterflies anymore, know only how to remain conscious that you are in a cocoon. The metamorphosis will take care of itself. All your efforts won't do a thing. Only time will come, here or elsewhere, to dry your tears.

And it takes a lot of colours to paint the wings of a butterfly...

Sosan the 3rd Ch'an Patriarch

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And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said,
Speak to us of Children. And he said:
Your children are not your children.
They are the son's and daughter's of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are set forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with his might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For as even He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.

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A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.
The softest things in the world overcome the hardest things in the world.
Non-being penetrates that in which there is no space.
Through this I know the advantage of taking no action.
One may know the world without going out of doors.
One may see the way of Heaven without looking through the windows.
The further one goes, the less one knows.
Therefore the sage knows without going about,
Understands without seeing,
And accomplishes without any action.

Lao-Tzu

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When things go wrong as they sometimes will
When the road you're trudging seems all uphill
When the funds are low and the debts are high
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh.
When care is pressing you down a bit
Rest, if you must, but don't you quit.

Life is queer with its twists and turns
As every one of us sometimes learns
And many a failure turns about
When he might have won had he stuck it out;
Don't give up though the pace seems slow
You may succeed with another blow.

Success is failure turned inside out
The silver tints of the clouds of doubt
And you can never tell how close you are
It may be near when it seems so far.
So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit
It's when things seem worst that you must not quit.

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Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveller, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because, it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I -
I took the one less travelled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost

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Look well to this day
For it is life
The very best of life.
In its brief course lie all
The realities and truths of existence,
The joy of growth, the splendour of action,
The glory of power.
For yesterday is but a memory.
And tomorrow is only a vision.
But today well lived
Makes every yesterday a memory of happiness
And every tomorrow a vision of hope.
Look well, therefore to this day.

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Lay me down in kindness,
with compassion as my bed.
Weave me wondrous blankets
with multicolored thread.

Fill my peaceful pillow
with tufts of charity
and give me sheets of mercy
to cover and comfort me.

Guide me 'cross the nightscape
as I journey through my dreams.
Show me things I cannot see
by any earthly means.

Take me past the boundary
of my mere and mortal scope.
Let my soul take wing on winds
of infinite spiritual hope.

Wake me at the blush of dawn,
oh sweet and gentle night.
Kiss my eyes wide open,
with clear and loving sight.

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Chapter One
I walk down the street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I fall in. I am lost...I am hopeless. It isn't my fault. It takes forever to find a way out.

Chapter Two
I walk down the same street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I pretend I don't see it. I fall in again. I can't believe I'm in the same place. But it isn't my fault. It still takes a long time to get out.

Chapter Three
I walk down the same street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I see it is there. I still fall in...it's a habit. My eyes are open. I know where I am. It is my fault. I get out immediately.

Chapter Four
I walk down the same street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I walk around it.

Chapter Five
I walk down another street.

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Somebody said that it couldn't be done,
But he with a chuckle replied
That "maybe it couldn't," but he would be one
Who wouldn't say so till he tried.
So he buckled right in with a trace of a grin
On his face. If he worried he hid it.
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
That couldn't be done, and did it.

Somebody scoffed: Oh, you'll never do that;
At least no one has ever done it";
But he took off his coat and he took off his hat,
And the first thing we knew he'd begun it.
With a lift of his chin and a bit of a grin,
Without any doubting or quid it.
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
That couldn't be done, and did it.

There are thousands to tell you it cannot be done,
There are thousands to prophesy failure;
There are thousands to point out to you, one by one,
The dangers that wait to assail you.
But just buckle in with a bit of a grin,
Just take off your coat and go to it;
Just start to sing as you tackle the thing
That "cannot be done," and you'll do it.

Edgar A. Guest

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If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk to wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
.. And stoop, and build 'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
.. To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be grown up my child!

Rudyard Kipling (1865 to 1936)

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Lord, make me an instrument of Your Peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow Love;
Where there is injury, Pardon;
Where there is doubt, Faith;
Where there is despair, Hope;
Where there is darkness, Light and
Where there is sadness, Joy.

Oh Divine Master, grant that I may not so much
Seek to be consoled as to console;
To be understood as to understand;
To be loved as to love;
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

St. Francis of Assisi

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To laugh often and much;
To win the respect of intelligent people
And the affection of children;

To earn the appreciation of honest critics
And endure the betrayal of false friends;
To appreciate beauty

To find the best in others;
To leave the world a little better;
Whether by a healthy child,

A garden patch or a redeemed social condition;
To know even one life has breathed easier
Because you have lived

This is the meaning of success.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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"We must never forget that we may...find meaning in life even when confronted with a hopeless situation, when facing a fate that cannot be changed. For what then matters is to bear witness to the uniquely human potential at its best, which is to transform a personal tragedy into a triumph, to turn one’s predicament into a human achievement. When we are no longer able to change a situation ... we are challenged to change ourselves."

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For everything there is a season,
And a time for every matter under heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die;
A time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal;
A time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
A time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
A time to embrace, And a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to seek, and a time to lose;
A time to keep, and a time to throw away;
A time to tear, and a time to sew;
A time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate,
A time for war, and a time for peace.

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"I have walked that long road to freedom. I have tried not to falter; I have made missteps along the way. But I have discovered the secret that after climbing a great hill, one only finds that there are more hills to climb. I have taken a moment here to rest, to steal a view of the glorious vista that surrounds me, to look back on the distance I have come. But I can rest only for a moment, for with freedom come responsibilities, and I dare not linger, for my long walk is not yet ended."

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Wise Caterpillar Wisdom