May 1997 (Vol X, No. 5)

Dear friends, do you know how to make God laugh?  Tell God your plans.

Anne S. Watson

If you could know that all the time the world would ever have is in the moment now in which you stand, that in your hand the future's bent and all the promise of the past's intent is held, would you not wait and listen and be still? Would you not let such mystery poured from unimagined source fill and fill and finally overflow the moment, until you, a living fragment of eternity, hear its measured beat and take its temp for your heart and hands and feet?

David Malouf An Imaginary Life
What else should our lives be but a continual series of beginnings, of painful settings out into the unknown, pushing off from the edges of consciousness into the mystery of what we have not yet become, except in dreams that blow in from out there bearing the fragrance of islands we have not yet sighted in our waking hours, as in voyaging sometimes the first blossoming branches of our next landfall come bumping against the keel, even in the dark, whole days before the real land rises to meet us.
Carolyn Myss

Do you know how to make God laugh?
Tell God your plans. The journey of life
is the journey of walking into your mystery,
and, not getting there before God does.

Paul Winter Missa Gaia
O Mystery, You are life. I feel you all around
You are the fire in my heart, You are the holy sound.
You are all of life. It is to You I sing.
Grant that I may feel You, always in every thing.
Alan McGlashan The Savage and Beautiful Country

Delight is a mystery. And the mystery is this: to plunge boldly into the brilliance and immediacy of living, at the same time as utterly surrendering to that which lies beyond space and time; to see life translucently ...

Nan Merrill Psalms for Praying
Enter into the Silence, into the
Heart of Truth;
For herein lies the Great Mystery
where life is ever unfolding;
Herein the Divine Plan is made known,
the Plan all are invited to serve.
Listen for the music of the Holy Word
in the resounding Silence of
the universe.
May balance and harmony be your aim
as you are drawn into the
Heart of Love.
Albert Einstein The World As I See It

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. A knowledge of the existence of something we cannot penetrate, of the manifestation of the profoundest reasons and the most radiant beauty, which are only accessible to our reason in their most elementary forms. It is this knowledge and this emotion that constitute the truly religious attitude; in this sense, I am a deeply religious man.

Joyce Diltz Presence

However I may be asked to be with a person, always I am tending to the birth of the sacred, to the mystery -- to the inbreaking of God in this time and space in this person's life. That experience is always new, always precious -- like any birth.

Larry Dossey Quest
The overwhelming experience of fly fishing is Mystery. It deals with the Unseen, with what lies in the invisible dimensions beneath the shimmering, rippling surface of an ever-changing mountain stream. It exercises every ounce of imagination and can bypass conscious awareness for extended periods. Fly fishing is an open doorway into the unconscious. After all, one is often standing waist-deep in water, which is a mighty symbol of the unconscious mind. There is no way to rush this process: One must STAND in the Mystery. ... In order to be a decent fly fisherman, on must BECOME the fish ... To enter Trout Mind means giving up the self. ... Landing a trout provides a great opportunity for nonattachment: thanking and blessing the fish, and releasing her.
Dag Hammarskjold Markings

The "mystical experience." Always HERE and NOW -- in that freedom which is one with distance, in that stillness which is born of silence. But this is a freedom in the midst of action, a stillness in the midst of other human beings. The mystery is a constant reality to those who, in this world, are free from self-concern, a reality that grows peaceful and mature before the receptive attention of assent. In our era, the road to holiness necessarily passes through the world of action.

Dan Millman The Laws of Spirit

For, there is a Mystery that many call God, manifesting as Universal Love, a set of Laws and a Great Process. That Process works through each and all of us, and that Process is perfect. As we discover this fundamental truth in the journey of our loves, we find that wherever we step, the path appears beneath our feet.

T.C. McLuhan Touch the Earth
We believe profoundly in silence -- the sign of a perfect equilibrium. Silence is the absolute poise or balance of body, mind and spirit. If you ask us: "What is silence?" we will answer: "It is the Great Mystery!" The holy silence is Great Spirit's voice!" If you ask: "What are the fruits of silence?" we will say: "They are self-control, true courage or endurance, patience, dignity, and reverence. Silence is the cornerstone of character.