“When we do something nice for someone, a ‘thank you’ and a smile is nice to receive. And, in many parts of human culture, it’s a bit expected. But when something goes wrong, if we drop a plate or miss a turn or make someone late, it’s particularly delightful and memorable if we are greeted warmly instead of stomped on. The moments when it’s the most difficult to be kind are the moments where it matters the most.”
Seth Godin
Archives
“The lust for comfort murders the passion of the soul, and then walks grinning in the funeral.”
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet (Page 30)
“The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.”
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet (Page 27)
“Work is love made visible.
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet (Page 26)
And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy.
For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man’s hunger.
And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge distils a poison in the wine. And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man’s ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the night.”
“The wind speaks not more sweetly to the giant oaks than to the least of all the blades of grass;
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet (Page 26)
And he alone is great who turns the voice of the wind into a song made sweeter by his own loving.”
“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.
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet (Page 18)
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.”
“You give but little when you give of your possessions.
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet (Page 18)
It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.”
“Your children are not your children.
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet (Page 15)
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.”
“Love one another, but make not a bond of love:
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet (Page 13)
Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.
Fill each other’s cup but drink not from one cup.
Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same oaf. Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone,
Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.
Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping.
For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.”
“Love has no other desire but to fulfill itself.
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet (Page 10)
But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:
To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the night. To know the pain of too much tenderness
To be wounded by your own understanding of love;
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.
To wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving;
To rest at the noon hour and meditate love’s ecstacy;
To return home at eventide with gratitude;
And then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart and a song of praise upon your lips.”