Another gem unearthed from Michael Ventura’s excavations.

It takes fierceness to grow old well. It takes a fierce devotion to the word good-bye — learning how to say it in many ways — fiercely, yes, but also gently, with laughter, with tears, but, no matter how, to say it every time so that there’s no doubt you mean it.

–Michael Ventura, “Across the Great Divide”; Psychotherapy Networker, Jan/Feb 2005

“My heart is afraid it will have to suffer,” the boy told the alchemist one night as they looked up at the moonless sky.

“Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And that no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dreams, because every second of the search is a second’s encounter with God and with eternity.”

–Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist

Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.

–James A. Baldwin

A great gift of getting older, of becoming old, is to realize that I, too, am a precious vessel — quite apart from any idea of self-worth I might have, quite apart from anything I may have accomplished. I’m a precious vessel because of all that I’ve seen, all the stories I know, all the images and memories that will die with me. In this way, we’re all precious vessels. And it isn’t that we must get frantic about preserving all we’ve seen and all we know. Preserving all the stories isn’t a human possibility, for all will be forgotten one day. But to know that I’m such a vessel, as you are, makes me more attentive, makes me more available to anyone who asks for what I know, makes me speak more carefully, with less of the judgmental and more attention to nuance — makes me try to speak more slowly and reflectively, and to be like… an older man, the kind of older man I once admired: tolerant, receptive, at ease in his age, not trying to be anything he isn’t, not trying to be younger.

–Michael Ventura, “Across the Great Divide”; Psychotherapy Networker, Jan/Feb 2005

I love this guy; I’m grateful he pours out his words for the rest of us to soak up.

Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach.

–Clarissa Pinkola Estes

Let us accept the invitation, ever-open, from the Stillness, taste its exquisite sweetness, and heed its silent instruction.

–Paul Brunton, Perspectives

In an article from the UK publication, The Guardian, a report:

The New Yorker reported this week that the Pentagon has already sent special operations teams into Iran to locate possible nuclear weapons sites. The report by Seymour Hersh, a veteran investigative journalist, was played down by the White House and the Pentagon, with comments that stopped short of an outright denial.

However, there are denials coming from the Pentagon, as reported in Express India:

Pentagon’s spokesman Lawrence Dirita said in a statement that the article “is so riddled with errors of fundamental fact that the credibility of his (Hersh) entire piece is destroyed”. …However, the spokesman did not confirm or deny Hersh’s claim that the administration had authorised covert operations against the countries, located in West Asia and South Asia.

Considering all this, I have a question.

Don’t weep for the dead; weep for the brightness in the eyes which is dimmed, for the feeling of love which has withered before its time and for the weeds of hate and revenge which have inherited their place. Can a plant grow on salty soil? Can a nation grow on the soil of fire and sulphur, hate and revenge?

—Natan Hofshi

Remember:

There is no surprise more magical than the surprise of being loved.

–Charles Morgan

When you look into a child’s eyes, think of this. And when you look into an adult’s eyes, imagine the child within. Now go to a mirror and look at yourself. That quote applies to you, too. Who loves you? Take a moment to ponder this. Somebody loves you and cares about your well-being and success. Somebody finds you endearing, notices your talents, accepts your quirks. Even if that somebody has died, the love they carried and gave lives yet. When you feel impoverished of love, try to remember this. Then turn around and remember this of all the people you meet — somebody loves them too. Look for the reasons why this might be. You’d be amazed at what you find, and how this affects your perspective of the human race.

Writers would have it that heroes and good characters are less interesting than villains and pests because virtue is boring. I’ll agree that that’s often true in stories, or if you’re Dickens, and it may be that this chapter is doomed to fall short of rousing your passionate interest. But in real life, I have to say, I have found authentic goodness magnificent, muscular, tonic, as rare and grand as Yosemite’s El Capitan, a mountain whose magnitude stuns you further when you realize that it is a monolith, one whole, seamless rock. I find absolutely nothing boring about true goodness.

–June Sprigg, Simple Gifts: Lessons in Living from a Shaker Village

We are called to play the good Samaritan on life’s roadside. But one day we must come to see that the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life’s highway. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it is not haphazard and superficial. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring.

–Martin Luther King Jr.