There are times when we go on a long tramp with someone for whom we greatly care. There has been talk, but it has now faded, and we can stalk mile after mile together without a word but in perfect communication – each glad for the other's presence, each glad the other is alive, each grateful to be the other's friend, each feeling understood, each cherishing the other.
I draw prayer round me like a dark protective wall, withdraw inside it as one might into a convent cell and then step outside again, calmer and stronger and more collected again.
As life becomes harder and more threatening, it also becomes richer, because the fewer expectations we have, the more good things of life become unexpected gifts that we accept with gratitude.
Ultimately, we have just one moral duty: to reclaim large areas of peace in ourselves, more and more peace, and to reflect it toward others. And the more peace there is in us, the more peace there will be in our troubled world.
~ from AN INTERRUPTED LIFE by Etty Hillsum, thanks to Liz Stewart
