I thought about the perfection of the morning, tried to name what it is about the morning that is different from the rest of the day. Is it the stillness? And, I thought, often on Sundays there is an all-day silence, or on rainy days or during off seasons; whatever this perfection might be, it's more than the absence of noises made by humans and their machines... In the purity of the morning, I understand how much more there is to the world than meets the eye...
~ from THE PERFECTION OF THE MORNING: AN APPRENTICESHIP IN NATURE by Sharon Butala
We must suppose that we go deep within ourselves, deeper and deeper into our most hidden self. There in our innermost being, in the very core of ourselves, we will find a place where there is peace, stillness, and above all, love.
After having found the place, we must imagine that we are seated there, immersed into, surrounded by the Love of God. We are in deepest peace . . . All of us is there, physical body and all; nothing is outside, not even a fingertip, not even the tiniest hair. Our whole being is connected with the Love of God.
Into my life You came like a storm of monsoon banging down from the eastern sky. And You scattered me, like the wind disperses dry grass and the petals of flowers. Out of myself You scattered me into Nothingness, Beyond the Nowhere, beyond the Beyond.
I experienced in myself a curious phenomenon: I was listening with the heart. And if I just listened, through the heart, just listened, and no thinking was involved in it, then the heart sang with the violins, it was the trumpet call, it was the woodwinds, and I was the music.
It is the task of the teacher to set the heart aflame with an unquenchable fire of longing ... and, to keep it burning until it is reduced to ashes. For only a heart which has burned itself empty is capable of love.
