On Soulmates

“You might hate how overused the word ’soulmate’ is, but this is the way you make one.  A soulmate is the person who’s gotten the chance to see something real about you.  You risked; you bared ugliness; you forged a bond.  This friendship becomes something more lasting than a superficial thing.

“Soulmate means a friend who understands something about you and so lives flexibly in this relationship, in which you can both risk a little, and insult a little, and dare a little, and stray a little, while something solid connects you at the center.”

- Ilana Simons, author of  A Life of One’s Own

Beware of your own press

“…you need to be authentic with another living person.  Too strong a need for public polish can pervert you.”

- Ilana Simons

Listen

“Put your ear down close to your soul and listen hard.”

—Anne Sexton (1928-1974), poet, writer

Interests

“You embrace that which defines you.”

- Donna Cook, mother of comedian and actor Dane Cook 

Don’t be afraid of your inner light.

“We can easily forgive a child afraid of the dark.  The real tragedy is when an adult is afraid of the light.”

- Plato

Vision

“Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart.  Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.”

- Carl Jung

 

Find Your Groove

“Every human being has some handle by which he may be lifted, some groove in which he was meant to run; and the great work of life, as far as our relations with each other are concerned, is to lift each one by his own proper handle and run each one in his own proper groove.”

- Harriet Beecher Stowe

Leisure Activities

“It is in his pleasure that a man really lives; it is from his leisure that he constructs the true fabric of self.”

- Agnes Repplier

The Talent is The Call

“Each man has his own vocation.  The talent is the call.  There is one direction in which all space is open to him.  He has faculties silently inviting him thither to endless exertion.  He is like a ship in a river; he runs against obstructions on every side but one; on that side all obstruction is taken away, and he sweeps serenely over a deepening channel into an infinite sea.  By doing his own work, he unfolds himself.”

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Spiritual Laws

Barriers in Your Way

“Thinking back, I’ve realized that when barriers are put in front of you, it’s God or the universe asking you to remember who you are, and reminding you not to let yourself be defined by things outside of you.”

- Christine Ebersole, Actress and Tony Award winner

p. 77, O Magazine, June 2007