A Beautiful Place Inside

AA said: J’adore, je l’apprends par coeur

BB said: Ja! Und ich fühle mit mit allen, die innen keinen schönen Ort haben. Danke für diesen schönen Text!

CC said: Jag håller med dig. Det är nog en gåva om man kan gå in i sin inre värld, under förutsättning att man finner något gott där förstås.

DD said: Wow, couldn’t be told more beautifully. Exactly happiness comes from within 

A Beautiful Place Inside

The inside belongs to me. I have the right to live inside in a beautiful place. If the outside is not beautiful it doesn’t have to come in and disturb my inner world.       
                                 Michael Singer 

You might find the above quote sounds egoistic. Well, I do not agree. I find that each person is responsible for his or her own happiness. If you do your best to keep your inner place beautiful, harmonious and happy, that is what you will radiate outwards. If one person has a positive radiation, it will affect other people and that way the world becomes a more beautiful place. 

Singer’s quote is my credo: preserving my inner place is holy. I protect my sanctuary from harmful influence and keep it as fresh, sunny, happy, and beautiful as I can. Beauty heals the world.

Thank you, dear M., for your inspiration :-)

Infused with Love

Infused with Love

Any virtue, attribute, or aptitude of personality will come to its full power only when it is bound together with love. No talent in its own right and no quality of character will reach the apogee of its impact until we marry it in our hearts to the love that will alchemize it to its full potential.

Therefore, whatever your form of expression, whether it be language, music, color and design, or the movement of your body, be sure you fill it with love, so it can be received to the depths of its power.

                                 Daphne Rose Kingma: A Garland of Love

Fill your form or expression, creating, and living with all your love, and miracles will happen...

Stillness in Nature

AA said: à pratiquer encore et encore et encore 😀

BB said: Encore un message qui tombe bien: malgré nos échanges hier avec NN, il y a aussi eu des moments de silence et de partages avec la nature, la forêt magnifique des hauts de XX...

Stillness in Nature

To bring your attention to a stone, a tree, or an animal does not mean to think about it, but simply to perceive it, to hold it in your awareness. Something of its essence then transmits itself to you. You can sense how still it is, and in doing so the same stillness arises within you. You sense how deeply it rests in Being – completely at one with what is and where it is. In realizing this, you to come to a place of rest deep within yourself.

Nature can bring you to stillness. That is its gift to you. When you perceive and join with nature in the field of stillness, that field becomes permeated with your awareness. That is your gift to nature.

                                 Eckhart Tolle: Stillness Speaks

For me, nature is one of the greatest sources of energy and inspiration. “Walking Through Life” is my motto, but hiking is not mainly a sports activity, where I count my pulse, my steps or the minutes… What makes me come alive on a much deeper level is the communion with nature and the shared stillness. It is not about me, it is about us. 

Next time you go for a hike, take your time to walk attentively and let the thinking mind rest. Stop at flowers, rocks, torrents or trees and simply hold them in your awareness. Those are sacred moments and, just like Tolle puts it, you will sense that there is an exchange. Your awareness permeates nature, and the stillness of nature permeates you. We are made of the same fabric and we belong together.

Learn from the tree “how deeply it rests in Being – completely at one with what is and where it is”. Fully accept who you are, right here and right now, and enjoy sharing your vital energy with nature. 

Be Like Bread

AA said: Tack för detta Sabina!!  J

BB said: Oh this is cool. I loved it!

CC said: La pleine conscience du trop plein fut le levain qui me permît de faire un pain plus aéré pour nourrir ma vie de l’essentiel! Merci pour tes messages du lundi chère Sabina

Be Like Bread

Bread takes the effort of kneading but also requires sitting quietly while the dough rises with a power all of its own.

David Richo: How to Be an Adult in Relationships

The Corona crisis forced us to slow down, and for many of that was a truly positive side effect. The hurried pace of our society has a negative impact on many things; among others it leads to impatience – one main reason for human unhappiness.

Be like bread: do a good job, and then leave it at that. Be patient. Let the fermentation works its way.

During resting periods we grow and develop, often in surprising ways.

Sit Down and Let Go

AA said: Ça me parle tellement que je l’ai mise sur mon statut WhatsApp! 

Sit Down and Let Go

Can the heart of a meditative path be so simple – to sit down and let go? The lessons of simplicity teach us to love deeply and to let go; to savour each sound, taste, sight, and smell and to let go: to cherish each moment as a precious gift and to let go; to appreciate with profound sensitivity each connection with others, every thought and feeling, every birth and death, and to be a calm presence and conscious participant in their natural unfolding and passing. The path of simplicity is learning to live in harmony with the rhythms of life and each moment.              

                              Christina Feldman:  The Buddhist Path to Simplicity

Life would be so much easier if we learned to let go, instead of constantly reacting on everything that happens. So many inner and outer conflicts would be avoided! 

This is what I strive for: to “be a calm presence and conscious participant” in the natural unfolding and passing of the events in life. To let the flow of life pass through me, drop the story line, and move on. To put the smile back onto my face knowing that this, too, will pass. 

The habit of adding our own thoughts, experiences, prejudices etc. to everything is deeply rooted and it is the task of a lifetime to break it, but every single little victory makes the effort worthwhile. 

Opening and Closing Doors

AA said: Ska träna på detta.

BB said: merci! je vais essayer..

Opening and Closing Doors

Opening this door
I enter with mindfulness,
Fully open myself
To what is.

Closing this door
I exit with mindfulness
Fully open myself
To what is

                                 Buddhist gatha

Opening and closing doors is something we most often do completely without awareness. In fact, when we’re opening or closing a door our minds are already in that other room or out of the one we came from. We’re simply not in the Here and Now – entering or exiting a room.

In periods I have worked actively with the verses above, trying to remind myself to make little awareness pauses during the day and to be more present. It was especially helpful during work life, when I moved around in an office with lots of colleagues and different issues to deal with. However, even now, when spending much of my time alone at home it is a good reminder to pause, drop whatever my mind is busy with, and start afresh.

Someone said about the Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh: “As I saw him closing a door, I knew he was a real monk”. I think it’s worthwhile trying to gain a little of that calm composure, be it only while opening or closing doors… 

There Will Come Soft Rains

AA said: Lovely! And btw, meant to tell you I am planting seeds to grow flowers and thyme! Slow going though! But i loved this and the sowing seeds messages.

BB said: No apologies needed. It is beautiful, I love this one.

CC said: j’ai beaucoup apprécié la période poèmes 😊 Merci 

DD said: Tack Sabina!!


There Will Come Soft Rains

There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;

And frogs in the pools singing at night,
And wild plum trees in tremulous white,

Robins will wear their feathery fire
Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire;

And not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.

Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree
If mankind perished utterly;

And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn,
Would scarcely know that we were gone.

Sara Teasdale

I apologise for overwhelming you with poetry - and I promise this will be the last one for a while! - but my favourite Teasdale poem feels so relevant right now. Written during World War I, these beautiful verses fit into today’s situation, where many live in an anxious state of confinement.

Teasdale refers to spring’s awakening, which is what we’re experiencing here in the northern hemisphere at this moment and which makes the whole situation easier. Nature takes its course, despite the dealings of mankind. 

I find the poem comforting; it’s a call not to despair, but to live in the here and now and enjoy the spring unfolding outside. Everything changes all the time, and soon the confinement will be over.