Unless we are rooted in God, and rooted in the only sure way of listening to God -- namely, silence -- then we are doomed to spend our lives standing at the window of life and watching the world go by... It strikes me that most of the first part of our lives is spent filling our heads with information. The last part -- and the most important part -- is spent emptying our heads of all the trivia so that our hearts may be free to learn wisdom -- in silence.
~ from COMMON BUSHES AFIRE WITH GOD by Kieran M. Kay
In a talk about compassion, a former teacher of mine once said that practice prepares the mind, but suffering prepares the heart. Perhaps the final step in the healing of all wounds is the discovery of the capacity for compassion, an intuitive knowing that no one is singled out in their suffering, that all living beings are vulnerable to loss, attachment, and limitation. It is only in the presence of compassion that we can show our wounds without diminishing our wholeness. For those who have compassion, woundedness is not a place of judgment but a place of genuine meeting.
