Published in 1925, The Game of Life and How to Play It was a trailblazing tome of self-help literature couched in positive thinking and affirmative actions.
Tag: love
Galway Kinnell – Saint Francis and the Sow
though sometimes it is necessaryto reteach a thing its loveliness,to put a hand on its browof the flowerand retell it in words and in touchit is lovely - Galway Kinnell In a 2001 interview with The Christian Science Monitor, poet Galway Kinnell talked about seeing beyond the usual clichés of things: "'Pig' is a pejorative… Continue reading Galway Kinnell – Saint Francis and the Sow
Margaret Atwood – Habitation
Using the stark language of cold glaciers and barren deserts, Margaret Atwood paints a picture of marriage as something that survives on the very peripheries of primitive forces and natural epics. Not a house or even a tent, it's a place where we are 'learning to make fire', as though we are still in the very first and most primal stages of the endeavor.
Mother Teresa – Compassion in Action
This essay by Mother Teresa crystallizes her vision of compassion in action, of how the fundamental love and benevolence between humans can override all social, racial and doctrinal divides.
Being With Dying – Kerry Egan
In her years working as a hospice chaplain, spiritual caregiver and author Kerry Egan has rarely found that dying patients want to discuss God or religion. Instead, chaplaincy work for her leans on the quality of the presence she can offer her patients and the compassion and empathy with which she can hold space for them and their stories.
Running After Loves – Ray Bradbury on Fostering Hunger in Writing
'How long has it been since you wrote a story where your real love or your real hatred somehow got onto the paper?' Finding the truth of our authentic passions is the key to forming the foundations of a writing practice, according to science fiction author Ray Bradbury.
Edna St. Vincent Millay – “When You, That at This Moment Are to Me”
This sonnet by American poet and playwright Edna St. Vincent Millay is addressed to a lover and to the latent sense of impermanence and loss built in to all moments when one becomes conscious of great love or great happiness.
Simone Weil – The Infinite in an Instant
Simone Weil lauds 'unmixed attention', which she likens to prayer, and reflects on the quality of attention, expressed as 'patience, effort and method' to 'understand with our whole self the truths which are evident.'
The One Motive Power in the Universe
In this extract from an essay about bhakti and devotional love written in the late 19th century, Swami Vivekananda - the 19th century spiritual reformist and teacher of Vedanta who was instrumental in popularizing Hinduism and yoga in the west - makes the difference between empty religious ritual and the burning desire for union with God, which is as real as any hunger or thirst.
Solace, Courage and Asking the Beautiful Question
According to David Whyte, solace is the art of asking the beautiful and often difficult question of ourselves, something that also requires courage.