Reading Archive (Tradition)
Why I Make Movies
Mickey Lemle
All movies are an illusion. We think we are seeing motion but in fact we are seeing twenty-four still pictures every second. Half the time the screen is actually black. Yet movies seem so real, and so...
Habits Of The Heart
Parker Palmer
“Habits of the heart” (a phrase coined by Alexis de Tocqueville) are deeply ingrained ways of seeing, being, and responding to life that involve our minds, our emotions, our self-images, o...
A Heart Wide Open
Joel and Michelle Levy
"Then it was as if I suddenly saw the secret beauty of their hearts, the depth of their hearts where neither sin nor knowledge could reach, the core of reality, the person that each one is in the...
Returning the Gift
Robin Wall Kimmerer
In the teachings of my Potawatomi ancestors, responsibilities and gifts are understood as two sides of the same coin. The possession of a gift is coupled with a duty to use it for the benefit of all. ...
The Gift Of Threshold Moments
Sam Keen
The thrush’s song belongs to a family of experiences that usher us into a threshold where sound trails off into silence, time disappears into timelessness, and the known world is engulfed by the...
In Eyes Of God, We're All Minorities
Barbara Brown Taylor
Krister Stendahl, former dean of Harvard Divinity school, told a reporter shortly before his death in 2008, "In the eyes of God, we are all minorities. That’s a rude awakening for many, who...
Nine Wisdom Steps From Spiritual Traditions
Sage Bennet
Each of the first eight [wisdom steps] introduces you to a different spiritual tradition -- Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Native American spirituality, Taoism, and New Thought -- a...
Untested Simplicity of the Villages
Ram Dass
Is the vision of simple living provided by this village in the East the answer? Is this an example of a primitive simplicity of the past or of an enlightened simplicity of the future? Gradual...
On Perfection and Priority
Thanissaro Bhikkhu
Determination seems to underlie all the perfections [of the mind]. There are four aspects to determination. You use your discernment to decide what you want to accomplish, to see how it best...
Giving Simply to Give
Kahlil Gibran
"There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward. And there are those who give with pain, and that pain is their baptism. And there are those who give and know not the pain i...
Zero-Sum Game of Violence
Michael Nagler
When we have a non-violent outlook, we no longer look on a dispute as what's called a 'zero-sum game.' Instead of thinking that for me to win, you have to lose, we now believe there must be a way tha...
On Generosity
Krishnamurti
"We are going to talk about something which needs a mind that can penetrate very profoundly. We must begin very near because we cannot go very far if we do not know how to begin very close,...
Your Thoughts And Mine
Gibran
Your thought is a tree rooted deep in the soil of tradition and whose branches grow in the power of continuity. My thought is a cloud moving in the space. It turns into drops which, as they fall, fo...
Putting Foundations Under Castles
Henry David Thoreau
I left the woods for as good a reason as I went there. Perhaps it seemed to me that I had several more lives to live, and could not spare any more time for that one. It is remarkable how easily and i...
Gifts
Author Unknown
Especially during the holiday season, we are often involved with the ritual of gift giving and taking. Many times it is fun to buy someone a gift and some times it even gets to be a drag, but never...