For an Addict by John O'Donohue

On its way through the innocent night
the moth is ambushed by the light,
becomes glued to a window
where a candle burns
its whole self, its dreams of flight
and all desire
trapped in one glazed gaze.

Now nothing else can satisfy
but the deadly beauty of the flame.
When you lose the feel
for all other belonging
and what is truly near
becomes distant and ghostly,
you are visited and claimed
by a simplicity
sinister in its singularity.

No longer yourself,
your mind will be owned
and steered from elsewhere now.
You will sacrifice anything
to dance once more
to the haunted music
with your fatal beloved
who owns the eyes to your heart.

These words of blessings cannot reach,
even as echos, to the shore of where you are.
Yet, may they walk without you
to soften some slight line,
through to the white cave
where your soul is captive.

May some glimmer of outside light
reach your eyes
to help you recognize how you have fallen
for a vampire.
May you crash hard and soon
onto real ground again
where this fundamentalist shell
might start to crack
for you to hear again
your own echo.

That your lost lonesome heart
might learn to cry out
for the true intimacy of love
that waits to take you home
to where you are known and seen
and where your life is treasured
beyond every frontier
of despair you have crossed.

~~ John O'Donohue

The Empowered Woman by Sonny Carroll

The Empowered Woman,

she moves through the world

with a sense of confidence and grace.

Her once reckless spirit now tempered by wisdom.

Quietly, yet firmly, she speaks her truth without doubt or hesitation

and the life she leads is of her own creation.

She now understands what it means to live and let live.

How much to ask for herself and how much to give.

She has a strong, yet generous heart

and the inner beauty she emanates truly sets her apart.

Like the mythical Phoenix,

she has risen from the ashes and soared to a new plane of existence,

unfettered by the things that once that posed such resistance.

Her senses now heightened, she sees everything so clearly.

She hears the wind rustling through the trees;

beckoning her to live the dreams she holds so dearly.

She feels the softness of her hands

and muses at the strength that they possess.

Her needs and desires she has learned to express.

She has tasted the bitter and savored the sweet fruits of life,

overcome adversity and pushed past heartache and strife.

And the one thing she never understood,

she now knows to be true,

it all begins and ends with you.

The Secret of Work by Swami Vivekananda

Whatever we do, we want a return. We are all traders. We are traders in life, we are traders in virtue, we are traders in religion. And alas! we are also traders in love.

If you come to trade, if it is a question of give-and-take, if it is a question of buy-and-sell, abide by the laws of buying and selling. There is a bad time and there is a good time; there is a rise and a fall in prices: always expect the blow to come. It is like looking at the mirror. Your face is reflected: you make a grimace — there is one in the mirror; if you laugh, the mirror laughs. This is buying and selling, giving and taking.

We get caught. How? Not by what we give, but by what we expect. We get misery in return for our love; not from the fact that we love, but from the fact that we want love in return. There is no misery where there is no want. Desire, want, is the father of all misery. Desires are bound by the laws of success and failure. Desires must bring misery.

The great secret of true success, of true happiness, then, is this: the man who asks for no return, the perfectly unselfish man, is the most successful. It seems to be a paradox. Do we not know that every man who is unselfish in life gets cheated, gets hurt? Apparently, yes. "Christ was unselfish, and yet he was crucified." True, but we know that his unselfishness is the reason, the cause of a great victory — the crowning of millions upon millions of lives with the blessings of true success.

Swami Vivekananda in "Work and Its Secret"

Êkla chôlo, êkla chôlo, êkla chôlo, êkla chôlo re- By Ravindra Nath Tagore

Bengali phonemic transcription

Jodi tor đak shune keu na ashe tôbe êkla chôlo re,
Êkla chôlo, êkla chôlo, êkla chôlo, êkla chôlo re.
Jodi keu kôtha na kôe, ore ore o ôbhaga,
Jodi shôbai thake mukh firaee shôbai kôre bhôe—
Tôbe pôran khule
O tui mukh fuţe tor moner kôtha êkla bôlo re.
Jodi shôbai fire jae, ore ore o ôbhaga,
Jodi gôhon pôthe jabar kale keu fire na chae—
Tôbe pôther kãţa
O tui rôktomakha chôrontôle êkla dôlo re.
Jodi alo na dhôre, ore ore o ôbhaga,
Jodi jhôŗ-badole ãdhar rate duar dêe ghôre—
Tôbe bojranôle
Apon buker pãjor jalie nie êkla jôlo re.

Translation into English

If they answer not to thy call walk alone,

If they are afraid and cower mutely facing the wall,

O thou unlucky one,

open thy mind and speak out alone.

If they turn away, and desert you when crossing the wilderness,

O thou unlucky one,

trample the thorns under thy tread,

and along the blood-lined track travel alone.

If they do not hold up the light when the night is troubled with storm,

O thou unlucky one,

with the thunder flame of pain ignite thy own heart

and let it burn alone.

Your love should never be offered…by Hafez

Love sometimes wants to do us a great favor: hold us upside down and shake all the nonsense out.

Your love
Should never be offered to the mouth of a stranger,
Only to someone who has the valor and daring
To cut pieces of their soul off with a knife
Then weave them into a blanket
To protect you.

Stay close to any sounds that make you glad you are alive.

Ever since happiness heard your name, it has been running through the streets trying to find you.
I wish I could show you when you are lonely or in the darkness, the astonishing light of your own being.

There are different wells within your heart.
Some fill with each good rain,
Others are far too deep for that

Fear is the cheapest room in the house. I would like to see you living in better conditions.

Even after all this time the sun never says to the Earth, “You owe me”

There is no pleasure without a tincture of bitterness.

Krishna is Christ consciousness

Krishna is poorna or complete. He manifests perfection, an ideal being, who knows how to live, love, fulfil his duties and fight, if need be. "I would like to walk the path that Krishna advocates in the Bhagavad Gita. His is a path of love; to give your 100% to everything that you do and surrender the result of your actions to Him," says Mansi, a PhD student in Mumbai. Mridula Bhatia and Poonam Jain make regular visits to the church to pray Neither is Christian, yet they are able to connect with Christ.

"I feel his presence sometimes in the Church," says Bhatia, a Delhi University student. "I may not follow Christ religiously, but i definitely want to cultivate qualities that are associated with him. He always talked of love and service." Both Krishna and Jesus embody Supreme Consciousness. A state of being aware, at all times, of all our actions Jesus said: "The Kingdom of Heaven is within you." That kingdom can be accessed not by idolising Jesus, but by attuning yourself with him; by being mindful of the Divinity that you and I are a part of, the Divinity personified by Jesus and Krishna.

"In the divine plan, Christ was responsible for the evolution of the West, and Krishna, for that of the East. It was intended that the West specialise in developing objectively, through logic and reason, and that the East specialise in inner, intuitive development. But in the cosmic plan, the time has come to combine these two lines into one East and West must unite," Paramhansa Yogananda wrote in Autobiography of A Yogi. Logic and rationale must be combined with inner intuitive wisdom to reach that perfected state of being.

Swami Kriyananda recalls, "Yogananda said it was Jesus himself who appeared to Babaji (Yogananda's guru) and asked him to send this teaching of Self-realisation to the West." He adds, "At that meeting, Yogananda told us, Jesus said, 'My followers have forgotten the art of divine inner communion. Outwardly they do good works, but they have lost sight of the most important of my teachings, to seek the Kingdom of God first.'" 

In the Gita, Krishna spoke of surrendering the mind to Him He said, "Still yourself in me, and without a doubt you shall be united with me, Lord of love, dwelling in your heart." 

Both Krishna and Jesus spoke of merging the self with God. The state of enlightenment is the highest state of intellectual development and emotional maturity. Masters who realise the Self have the emotional intelligence to lead others to it "Great masters have that level of consciousness For us, it is difficult even to visualise such a state. By attuning ourselves to them, we begin to sense what it is they have, and to develop that same consciousness in ourselves," says Swami Kriyananda referring to his guru Paramhansa Yogananda.

"You can know Jesus only through a man who has attained to Christ Consciousness. A Krishna can be known only through a man who has attained Krishna Consciousness. And they are the same thing: Krishna Consciousness. Christ Consciousness, Buddha Consciousness - the transcendental," says Osho In the end, it's all about becoming a better human being - doing everything with a smile and making life a happy experience for everyone journeying towards transcendence.

Giving Somebody Your Heart by Christopher Lowman

In every interaction you have with another human being—doesn’t matter who—you always have two main choices.

(The keyword is choice.)

One choice usually leads to logical (boring) interaction, politeness, formalities. And, more importantly, a lack of connectivity.

The other usually leads to interesting discussion, love (yes, love), aliveness, friendship, gift giving. And connectivity.

In every interaction you are either giving somebody else your mind—your intellect, your intelligent points, the who/what/where/when/why of your existence.

This is the easy thing to do. The safe thing to do. It doesn’t require much, if any, emotional strength or really expose who you are. In this way, you can hide from others (or from your self, depending on how you look at it) and not risk rejection by not even giving somebody the chance to reject you.

Or, you are giving somebody your heart—the real you, your presence, your true attention.

This is the hard thing to do. The risky thing to do. It involves an enormous amount of emotional strength (until it doesn’t). It entails entering the present moment. And it entails pushing through the challenging and stifling fear of doing so.

Instead of thinking about what to say or do, you let your inwardly felt experience inform your words and actions toward others.

Think about how often you self-censor and hit the mute button. Why? Why not just assume that what you have to say is valuable, even if it comes out not so smooth? Then maybe you say next, “oh, that was lame” and then laugh.

It’s this kind of moment-to-moment truthfulness that is required.

It’s so easy (but frightening) to practice because you always know what to say or do in any interaction with somebody else. The problem is having the courage to act on it.

Isn’t it time to feel less anxious and less alone and less unfulfilled?

--Christopher Lowman