“Why is it that so many of us persist in thinking that autumn is a sad season? Nature has merely fallen asleep, and her dreams must be beautiful if we are to judge by her countenance.”

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772 – 1834), poet and one-time Unitarian minister, born on this day.

“To re-experience the integration of ourselves with nature, we have to take ourselves out of our four walls and set our life-story in the context of nature’s terms. This means becoming especially aware of one area of the natural world – an area that is our listening place, an area where we tune out the old broadcasts of our separateness and retune to the original station of the universal belonging…

In this communion, a further state of belonging may be experienced – initially just in brief glimpses, then sometimes for longer and longer periods – the temporary loss of our sense of identity, a softening of the hard boundaries that separate us from the tree and the animal, from the earth and the sunset. In this condition, we experience ourselves as no different from nature or anything within it. We come into true relationship with nature in such moments, which strip away our hubris, our control, and our feelings of separation and bring us once more under the mantle of the universe.”

Caitlin Matthews

“Sunlight made visible
the whole length of a sky,
movement of
leaf, flower, all six colours
on tree, bush and creeper:
all this
is the day’s worship.

The light of moon, star and fire,
lightnings and all things
that go by the name of light
are the night’s worship.

Night and day
in your worship
I forget myself
O lord white as jasmine.”

Mahadeviyakkha (12th Century South Indian poet)

“Three things differentiate living from the soul versus living from ego only.
They are:
the ability to sense and learn new ways;
the tenacity to ride a rough road;
and the patience to learn deep love over time.”

Clarissa Pinkola Estés

“Everything changes, everything passes,
Things appearing, things disappearing.
But when it is all over –
everything having appeared and having disappeared,
Being and extinction both transcended –
Still the basic emptiness and silence abides,
And that is blissful peace.”

Maha Prajna Paramita Hridaya (The Heart Sutra)

“Nonviolence requires of those who practise it, from whatever religious or cultural background they may come, an extraordinary commitment. It requires nothing less than the transformation of ourselves. We have to look deeply into our own anger, our aggressiveness and our fear. It’s no less arduous than training for the Olympics. And the results are no less rewarding. When you meet real peace-makers, they are radiant. They radiate an inner spaciousness, a joy and a power that is greater than any weapon.”

Scilla Elworthy, international peace campaigner, quoted in Fragments of Holiness for Daily Reflection

““Give thanks to God, who is good
whose mercy endures forever.”

We stand in awe of an infinity
which we cannot begin to comprehend
We set ourselves to live in tune with the universe—
that we may be glad with the gladness of people of faith.

Yes, time and time again we have gone astray,
We have despoiled this beautiful, wonderful world
dealt unjustly with our compadres
The law of love is a hard law.
In our prayer and then in our lives,
we return to the Way.”

Psalm 106: Returning by Christine Robinson

“Often when with deliberation
I set out to enjoy nature with a capital ‘N’,
my eagerness and expectation
lead to disappointment once again.
But if, without intent, I step outside
merely to hang washing on the line,
I am completely overwhelmed by the fine
October day:
the singing birds, the sparkling light,
the falling leaves put to flight
all introspection, I belong
to the simple life of the bird song
and sunlight and Autumn breeze,
And for a brief moment am at ease
in the world, disarmed into the peace
of the everyday.”

Anonymous Lay Buddhist, quoted in Fragments of Holiness for Daily Reflection

“The value of a human being
can be measured by what he or she
most deeply wants.
Be free of possessing things.
Sit at an empty table.
Be pleased with water,
the taste of being home.
People travel the world looking
for the Friend,
but that one is always at home!”

Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī (1207 – 1273)

“The circuits of the soul during sleep enter into a timelessness in which our past and future are inextricably mixed, in which we meet the dead, encounter the expected, and fly and dance and swim through elements that we normally do not move within. Whether or not the daytime consciousness has a spiritual framework of dedication, the night-wandering soul encounters spiritual allies and experiences inspirational truths. Within the compass of sleep and night, the soul explores the unseen universe with skilful knowledge, leaving the body as a secret retreat of the light that will emerge at dawning. But it is in the night that the light shines brightest and can be perceived.”

Caitlin Matthews