Contemplative life does not have to be seen as a special vocation reserved for some special souls only; it is open to all, and all are invited to enjoy it. You do not have to be in special circumstances to practice it, because it consists not so much in what you do as in the attitude and the perspective in which your ordinary actions are performed. It is a life of wonder. The contemplative is one who look around at the world and marvels at reality. We are living as contemplatives when we are thoroughly alive ourselves and when we are alert and sensitive to the reality of other beings and disposed to appreciate them.
~ from "The Contemplative Life" in "The Roll" by Beatrice Bruteau -- June 1995
"It is the time you waste on our flowers that makes your flowers unique," the Little Prince said when he realized that the world was full of flowers that looked just like his own. It is love that transforms the vast unknowable, the anonymous universe with all its chaotic eruptions of pain and joy, its life and death, with a world that we can live in and make sense of in some way.
