Quotes, Poetry, Thoughts for Your Soul.
Ancient and New. 
What stirs you?

"How you approach something determines what you will see."  - Paula D'Arcy

“I do not want the peace which passeth understanding, I want the understanding which bringeth peace.” - Helen Keller 

“The privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are.” - C.G. Jung

"It is tragic how few people ever ‘possess their souls’ before they die… Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else’s opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation..." -Oscar Wilde

"Prayer is, in my view, nothing other than a talk with a friend. One to whom we gladly come alone to talk with, because we are sure that he loves us." - Teresa of Avila 

“Do not say that it is impossible to receive the Spirit of God. Do not say that it is possible to be made whole without Him. Do not say that one can possess Him without knowing it. Do not say that God does not manifest Himself to man. Do not say that men cannot perceive the divine light, or that it is impossible in this age! Never is it found to be impossible, my friends. On the contrary, it is entirely possible when one desires it” - St. Symeon the New Theologian

"The true mystic is always both humble and compassionate, for she knows that she does not know."  - Richard Rohr

"Listening creates a holy silence. When you listen generously to people they can hear the truth in themselves, often for the first time. And when you listen deeply, you can know yourself in everyone." - Dr. Rachel Naomi Remen

"There is no place in my soul, no corner of my character, where God is not." - Evelyn Underhill

"Oh, let me tell you how much God desires our presence. How much God longs to hear from us. How much God yearns to communicate with us. At the very heart of God is the passionate disposition to be in loving fellowship with you ... with me. From the human side of this equation it is meditative prayer that ushers us into this divine-human fellowship." - Richard Foster

"God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing." - C. S. Lewis

“Peace begins with a smile..”  - Mother Teresa

"Somebody was telling me this week that nobody can make a violin speak the last depths of human longing until that soul has been made tender by some great anguish. I do not say it is the only way to the heart of God, but I must witness that it has opened an inner shrine for me which I never entered before." - Frank Laubach

“You have peace," the old woman said, "when you make it with yourself.” - Mitch Albom, The Five People You Meet in Heaven

“The more I get to know Jesus, the more trouble he seems to get me into.” - Shane Claiborne

"Wholeness does not mean perfection; it means embracing brokenness as an intergral part of life. Knowing this gives me hope that human wholeness--mine, yours, ours--need not be a utopian dream, if we can use devastation as a seedbed for new life." - Parker Palmer

"The truly holy person welcomes all that is earthly." - Hildegard of Bingen

“If you cannot find peace within yourself, you will never find it anywhere else.” - Marvin Gaye

“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” - Mary Oliver

“When it's over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms. 
When it is over, I don't want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument. 
I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.” 
- Mary Oliver

“A genuine odyssey is not about piling up experiences. It is a deeply felt, risky, unpredictable tour of the soul.”  - Thomas Moore

“The only meaningful thing we can offer one another is love. Not advice, not questions about our choices, not suggestions for the future, just love.” - Glennon Doyle Melton

"What deadens us most to God's presence within, I think, is the inner dialogue that we are engaged in within ourselves, the endless chatter of human thought.  I suspect that there is nothing more crucial to true spiritual comfort than being able from time to time to stop the chatter, including the chatter of spoken prayer" - Frederick Buechner

"I always put the Lord in front of me; I will not stumble because he is on my right side. That’s why my heart celebrates and my mood is joyous; yes, my whole body will rest in safety." - The Psalmist, Psalm 16:8-9 CEB

“…We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness.  God is the friend of silence.  See how nature—trees, flowers, grass—grow in silence; see the stars, the moon and sun, how they move in silence. …The more we receive in silent prayer, the more we can give in our active life.  We need silence to touch souls.” - Mother Teresa

"If you attempt to act and do for others or for the world without deepening your own self-understanding, freedom, integrity and capacity to love, you will not have anything to give others." - Thomas Merton

“Be patient. Do the best with what you know. When you know more, adjust the trajectory.”  - Jen Hatmaker

"God hugs you. You are encircled by the arms of the mystery of God." - Hildegard of Bingen

"Times of extended retreat give us a chance to come home to ourselves in God's presence and to bring the realities of our life to God in utter privacy. This is important for us and for those we serve.... On retreat we rest in God and wait on him to do what is needed. Eventually we return to the battle with fresh energy and keener insight." - Ruth Haley Barton

"God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world." - C.S. Lewis

“We want to go to God for answers, but sometimes what we get is God’s presence.” - Nadia Bolz-Weber

"The place where God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet." - Frederick Buechner

"Sit and be still until in the time of no rain you hear beneath the dry wind's commotion in the trees the sound of flowing water among the rocks, a stream unheard before, and you are where breathing is prayer." - Wendell Berry

"The soul is in God and God in the soul, just as the fish is in the sea and the sea in the fish." - St. Catherine of Siena

"You, eternal Trinity, are a deep sea. The more I enter you, the more I discover, and the more I discover, the more I seek you." - St. Catherine of Siena

"It is only through shadows that one comes to know the light." - St. Catherine of Siena
Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
And Where there is sadness, joy.
O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
To be understood as to understand; To be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
- St. Francis of Assisi

"The way of love is not a subtle argument. The door there is devastation. Birds make great sky-circles of their freedom. How do they learn it? They fall, and falling, they are given wings." - Rumi

"I think the greatest victory of this period was something internal. The greatest victory of this period was that we armed ourselves with dignity and self—respect." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

“All shall be well, and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.” ― Julian of Norwich

"No on has ever become poor by giving."
- Anne Frank

“Humanity, take a good look at yourself. Inside, you’ve got heaven and earth, and all of creation. You’re a world—everything is hidden in you.” 
​-Hildegard of Bingen

"There is no normal life that is free of pain. It's the very wrestling with our problems that can be the impetus for our growth."
The World According to Mister Rogers