“God created man, and finding him not sufficiently alone, gave him a female companion so that he might feel his solitude more acutely.”
Paul Valéry, via Sunbeams (Page 99)
Quotes from Sunbeams
“Life is short and it hurts. Love is the only drug that works.”
John Coit, via Sunbeams (Page 98)
“Ideologies separate us. Dreams and anguish bring us together.”
Eugene Ionesco, via Sunbeams (Page 98)
“If you tell the truth, you have infinite power supporting you; but if not, you have infinite power against you.”
Charles Gordon, via Sunbeams (Page 97)
“The pain of love is the pain of being alive. It’s a perpetual wound.”
Maureen Duffy, via Sunbeams (Page 97)
“If we could read the secret history of those we would like to punish, we would find in each life enough grief and suffering to make us stop wishing anything more on them.”
Unknown, via Sunbeams (Page 96)
“Gossip isn’t scandal and it isn’t malicious. It’s chatter about the human race by lovers of the same.”
Phyllis McGinley, via Sunbeams (Page 96)
“True light that makes true vision possible is not the light the body’s eyes behold. It is a state of mind that has been so unified that darkness cannot be perceived.”
A Course In Miracles, via Sunbeams (Page 96)
“The difficulty is to learn to perceive with your whole body, not with just your eyes and reason. The world becomes a stream of tremendously rapid, unique events. So you must trim your body to make it a good receptor. The body is an awareness; and it must be treated impeccably.”
Carlos Castaneda, via Sunbeams (Page 95)
“I shall tell you a great secret, my friend. Do not wait for the last judgement. It takes place every day.”
Albert Camus, The Fall, via Sunbeams (Page 95)
“There is not one big cosmic meaning for all, there is only the meaning we each give to our life… To seek a total unity is wrong. To give as much meaning to one’s life as possible is right to me.”
Anaïs Nin, via Sunbeams (Page 95)
“Respect for the vulnerability of human beings is a necessary part of telling the truth, because no truth will be wrested from a callous vision or callous handling.”
Anaïs Nin, via Sunbeams (Page 94)
“Gandhi said your power becomes invincible when you have reduced yourself to zero—which means, when you don’t want anything, when you have no more fear looking in the eyes of death, when you’re right here. Then your statement has the power of the universe behind it. It’s coming from a root place of truth, because there’s nothing in it for you. You don’t want anything. To me, that is the power of a Christ, or just one clear person who isn’t vulnerable. I don’t underestimate the power of the human heart. When I look at the human heart, that link, that doorway, I see an institution that makes the Pentagon look like a kids’ toys.”
Ram Dass, via Sunbeams (Page 93)
“If I am transparent enough to myself, then I can become less afraid of those hidden selves that my transparency may reveal to others. If I reveal myself without worrying about how others will respond, then some will care, though others may not. But who can love me, if no one knows me? I must risk it, or live alone. It is enough that I must die alone. I am determined to let down, whatever the risks, if it means that I may have whatever is there for me.”
Sheldon Kopp, If You Meet The Buddha On The Road, Kill Him, via Sunbeams (Page 93)
“Though no two centuries are very much like each other, some hours perhaps are; moments are; critical moments nearly always are. Emotions are the same. We are the same. The man, not the day, is the lasting phenomenon.”
Eudora Welty, via Sunbeams (Page 93)
“What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime. It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset.”
Crowfoot, via Sunbeams (Page 93)
“We are the living links in a life force that moves and plays through and around us, binding the deepest soils with the farthest stars.”
Alan Chadwick, via Sunbeams (Page 93)
“The purpose of discipline is to promote freedom. But freedom leads to infinity and infinity is terrifying.”
Henry Miller, via Sunbeams (Page 93)
“A wise man is never less alone than when he is alone.”
Jonathan Swift, via Sunbeams (Page 93)
“Art is the lie that reveals the truth.”
Pablo Picasso, via Sunbeams (Page 93)