“Gaining enlightenment is an accident. Spiritual practice simply makes us accident-prone.” ~ Zen Saying, via Solitude
“People say that what we are all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive.” ~ Joseph Campbell, via Solitude
“We have seriously confounded luxury with necessity in our culture, and can no longer differentiate between what we want in order to maintain a particular lifestyle (with its social relationships and sensual pleasures) and what we actually need for physical survival. We have confounded social identity with biological and spiritual being to the point of believing we will die if we lose our social standing, which is often based on the material wealth we have accumulated. This accelerating spiral of desires becoming necessities is driving our suicidal rush to destroy the Earth we depend on for our actual physical survival.” ~ Robert Kull, Solitude
“Not only is everything I experience part of who I am, Spirit-filled, and not to be rejected, but there is no need to go searching for something special anywhere else. Everything life has to offer is always right here wherever I am right now. There is no place more alive and sacred than this place. No time more alive and sacred than this time.” ~ Robert Kull, Solitude
“Our language has wisely sensed the two sides of being alone. It has created the word loneliness to express the pain of being alone. And it has created the word solitude to express the glory of being alone.” ~ Paul Tillich, via Solitude
“Joy comes from living fully in the here and now, no matter what the circumstance. To live like that I must give up wanting things to be different. The hardest is to give up wanting things to be different.” ~ Robert Kull, Solitude
“To be fully human we need to cultivate a relationship not only with other people but also with our deeper selves and with Spirit. Solitude can be a powerful context and catalyst for this process.” ~ Robert Kull, Solitude
“Even if our efforts of attention seem for years to be producing no result, one day a light that is in exact proportion to them will flood the soul.” ~ Simone Weil, via Solitude
“Life is a mystery to be lived, not a problem to be solved.” ~ Adrian Van Kaam, via Solitude
“Deep peace and harmony seem to arise when I surrender to the flow of the world, not when I’m analyzing it or staying busy to shut it out.” ~ Robert Kull, Solitude
“No wonder I’m a perfectionist – always hoping that if I do things well enough I’ll finally feel loved and accepted. So much of my activity is driven by pain: if I can just do it right, I won’t hurt anymore. The trap is that it works – temporarily. For a short time I do feel better, but then self-criticism sets in again and I need to accomplish something else – perfectly.” ~ Robert Kull, Solitude
“I feel I somehow own myself and have the right to control what I do and feel and what happens to me. From there it follows that the world is mine to do with as I wish. But I didn’t make me, nor do I own me or the world. I’m just part of the flow of existence.” ~ Robert Kull, Solitude
“Sometimes, I actually experience that there is no outside or inside, that the weather and my feelings are a continuum, that the world is not, cannot be, against me since there is not separation between us. I am the wind and rain. In those moments I feel peace and joy.” ~ Robert Kull, Solitude
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
~ Rumi, via Solitude
“It isn’t actually non-doing that generates anxiety, but rather fretting about doing or not doing. When I’m simply in the moment, without worrying about what I ought to be doing, my mind is at ease. It’s when I try to microplan everything that my imagination runs amok – because I can’t really know what will happen.” ~ Robert Kull, Solitude
