Where is Heaven?

"Then where is Heaven?", asked the puzzled child

The Wise One took her tiny hand and smiled

Then swept an arm across the earth and sky,
"It is right here, never far and not too high

Look with your Heart, my little one, and See

For all who find their peace within are free;

So search for beauty always in all things

For ever from the Soul true Heaven springs"

Echoes

Two Stars

Across a sky of indigo blue

On a cold and lonely night

Two twinkling stars hung silently

Just out of each other's sight

Each star looking wistfully

At a moon that turned to blue

Wishing on another star

To find a love so true

Then came a comet across the sky

A sparkling flashing light

Causing the stars to spin about

On that cold and lonely night

The twinkling stars looked across the sky

They stared in star struck wonder

As if drawn by some greater force

They moved toward one another

Suspended in the heavens

The stars began to dance

Spinning ever gracefully

In a heavenly romance

Two twinkling stars in the heavens

Now shine as one sparkling light

Across a sky of indigo blue

Suspended in the night

-- Allison Chambers Coxsey

Definition of Success

To laugh often and love much;
to win respect of intelligent persons
and the affections of children;
to earn the approbation of honest critics
and endure the betrayal of false friends;
to appreciate beauty;
to find the best in others;
to give one's self;
to leave the world a little better,
whether by a healthy child, a garden patch,
or a redeemed social condition.;
to have played and laughed with enthusiasm,
and sung with exultation;
to know even one life has breathed easier
because you have lived --
this is to have succeeded.

[a variation of 'Success' by Bessie A Stanley (1904)
often erroneously attributed to R W Emerson]

Broken Wings

The most beautiful word on the lips of mankind is the word “Mother,” and the most beautiful call is the call of “My mother.” it is a word full of hope and love, a sweet and kind word coming from the depths of the heart. The mother is every thing – she is our consolation in sorrow, our hope in misery, and our strength in weakness. She is the source of love, mercy, sympathy, and forgiveness. He who loses his mother loses a pure soul who blesses and guards him constantly.

Every thing in nature bespeaks the mother. The sun is the mother of earth and gives it its nourishment of hear; it never leaves the universe at night until it has put the earth to sleep to the song of the sea and the hymn of birds and brooks. And this earth is the mother of trees and flowers. It produces them, nurses them, and weans them. The trees and flowers become kind mothers of their great fruits and seeds. And the mother, the prototype of all existence, is the eternal spirit, full of beauty and love.

--- Kahlil Gibran

Way Back Into Love

The Friend

There are lots and lots of people who are always asking things,
Like Dates and Pounds-and-ounces and names of funny Kings,
And the answer's always Sixpence or a Hundred Inches Long.
And I know they'll think me silly if I get the answer wrong.
So Pooh and I go whispering, and Pooh looks very bright,
And says, "Well, I say sixpence, but I don't suppose I'm right."
And then it doesn't matter what the answer ought to be,
'Cos if he's right, I'm Right, and if he's wrong, it isn't Me.

Thoughts

Thought for the Moment

Buddha Quote

"There are only two mistakes one can make
along the road to Truth;

not going all the way,
and not starting."

The Lotus

First blooming in the Western Paradise,

The lotus has delighted us for ages.

Its white petals are covered with dew,

its jade green leaves spread out over the pond,

And its pure fragrance perfumes the wind.

Cool and majestic,

it raises from the murky water.

The sun sets behind the mountains.

But I remain in the darkness,

too captivated to leave.

RYOKAN

The Winner Stands Alone

A seagull was flying over a beach, when it saw a mouse. It flew down and asked the mouse:
‘Where are your wings?’

Each animal speaks its own language, and so the mouse didn’t understand the question, but stared at the two strange, large things attached to the other creatures body.
‘It must have some illness,’ thought the mouse.

The seagull noticed the mouse staring at its wings and thought:
‘Poor thing. It must have been attacked by monsters that left it deaf and took away its wings.’

Feeling sorry for the mouse, the seagull picked it up in its beak and took it for a ride in the skies. ‘Its probably homesick,’ the seagull thought while they were flying. Then, very carefully, it deposited the mouse once more on the ground.

For some months afterwards, the mouse was sunk in gloom; it had known the heights and seen a vast and beautiful world. However, in time, it grew accustomed to being just a mouse again and came to believe that the miracle that had occurred in its life was nothing but a dream.

The Prophet on Giving

Then said a rich man, "Speak to us of Giving."
And he answered:

You give but little when you give of your possessions.
It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.
For what are your possessions but things you keep and guard for fear you may need them tomorrow?
And tomorrow, what shall tomorrow bring to the overprudent dog burying bones in the trackless sand as he follows the pilgrims to the holy city?
And what is fear of need but need itself?
Is not dread of thirst when your well is full, thirst that is unquenchable?

There are those who give little of the much which they have - and they give it for recognition and their hidden desire makes their gifts unwholesome.
And there are those who have little and give it all.
These are the believers in life and the bounty of life, and their coffer is never empty.

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 pain in giving, nor do they seek joy, nor give with mindfulness of virtue;
They give as in yonder valley the myrtle breathes its fragrance into space.
Though the hands of such as these God speaks, and from behind their eyes He smiles upon the earth.

It is well to give when asked, but it is better to give unasked, through understanding;
And to the open-handed the search for one who shall receive is joy greater than giving
And is there aught you would withhold?

All you have shall some day be given;
Therefore give now, that the season of giving may be yours and not your inheritors'.

You often say, "I would give, but only to the deserving."
The trees in your orchard say not so, nor the flocks in your pasture.
They give that they may live, for to withhold is to perish.
Surely he who is worthy to receive his days and his nights is worthy of all else from you.
And he who has deserved to drink from the ocean of life deserves to fill his cup from your little stream.
And what desert greater shall there be than that which lies in the courage and the confidence, nay the charity, of receiving?
And who are you that men should rend their bosom and unveil their pride, that you may see their worth naked and their pride unabashed?

See first that you yourself deserve to be a giver, and an instrument of giving.
For in truth it is life that gives unto life - while you, who deem yourself a giver, are but a witness.

And you receivers - and you are all receivers - assume no weight of gratitude, lest you lay a yoke upon yourself and upon him who gives.

Rather rise together with the giver on his gifts as on wings;
For to be overmindful of your debt, is to doubt his generosity who has the free-hearted earth for mother, and God for father. --- Kahlil Gibran

A Hymn to Shiva by Swami Vivekananda

Salutation to Shiva! whose glory

Is immeasurable, who resembles sky

In clearness, to whom are attributed

The phenomena of all creation,

The preservation and dissolution

Of the universe! May the devotion,

The burning devotion of this my life

Attach itself to Him, to Shiva, who,

While being Lord of all, transcends Himself.

In whom Lordship is ever established,

Who causes annihilation of delusion,

Whose most surpassing love, made manifest,

Has crowned Him with a name above all names,

The name of “Mahadeva”, the Great God!

Whose warm embrace, of Love personified,

Displays, within the heart, that all power

Is but a semblance and a passing show.

In which the tempest of the whole past blows,

Past Samskaras, stirring the energies

With violence, like water lashed to waves;

In which the dual consciousness of “I” and “Thou”

Plays on: I salute that mind unstable,

Centered in Shiva, the abode of calm!

Where the ideas of parent and produced,

Purified thoughts and endless varied forms,

Merge in the Real one; where the existence ends

Of such conceptions as “within”, “without”–

The wind of modification being stilled–

That Hara I worship, the suppression

Of movements of the mind. Shiva I hail!

From whom all gloom and darkness have dispersed;

That radiant Light, white, beautiful

As bloom of lotus white is beautiful;

Whose laughter loud sheds knowledge luminous;

Who, by undivided meditation,

Is realized in the self-controlled heart:

May that Lordly Swan of the limpid lake

Of my mind, guard me, prostrate before Him!

Him, the Master-remover of evil,

Who wipes the dark stain of this Iron Age;

Whom Daksha’s Daughter gave Her coveted hand;

Who, like the charming water-lily white,

Is beautiful; who is ready ever

To part with life for others’ good, whose gaze

Is on the humble fixed; whose neck is blue

With the poison swallowed:

Him, we salute!

This is a translation of Swami Vivekananda’s Sanskrit Hymn to Shiva, reproduced from his

Complete Works 4: 501-04.

When I Have Learnt

When I have learnt to love God better than my earthly dearest, I shall love my earthly dearest better than I do now. In so far as I learn to love my earthly dearest at the expense of God and instead of God, I shall be moving towards the state in which I shall not love my earthly dearest at all. When first things are put first, second things are not suppressed but increased. --- C.S. Lewis