Elizabeth Lesser Quotes
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I love this life, because I am a human being and it sure would be nice, I think, to preserve it. But I don't even know if that's true, because God's mind is huge, and I don't really know what he's thinking.I can only do what I do with a spirit of humor, and faith and give the controls over to something else.
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Over and over, we are broken on the shore of life. Our stubborn egos are knocked around, and our frightened hearts are broken open—not once, and not in predictable patterns, but in surprising ways and for as long as we live.
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I was just a kid when I started doing this,yoga, meditation, natural foods, acupuncture - things like were seen as practically voodoo. And today you can go into any hospital and they'll have massage, and Chinese medicine, and therapy, and a prayer room.
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Сertainly there are people for whom anti-depression medication has allowed them to use difficulty to wake up, and I don't deny that at all, but as usual with us human beings, we've overdone it. We are self-medicating ourselves away from the great awakening moments, and losing our coping skills and losing wake-up calls.
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We don't need anymore empowered people who are all about the ego.
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My years as a mystic have made me question almost all my assumptions. They've made me a proud I-don't-know-it-all.
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I heard the term "mamisma" when describing Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, how she was speaking from that place which is kind of like a strong mother. Like when your mom says like, "put that down!" you know that is coming from a place of both love and strength. And at this critical stage in human history we need both action and caring.
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If family and society tell you its unfeminine, not really womanly, to be aggressive, to speak up, to have strong opinions, to take up space, then women won't trust their own voice, because to be heard and to be influential, you've got to have a way to sing out with passion and love and self-trust - to sing out your song for everyone to hear.
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I think the main problem people have getting older, whether they know it or not, is that you're closer to dying. And we may fixate on not wanting to look a certain way, but it really is just the clock ticking, that it means, "Oh, I am not immortal!".
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If we want liberation, we must rewrite the Sleeping Beauty myth. No one is coming and no one else is to blame.
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But grief is also a tonic. It is a healing elixir, made of tears that lubricate the heart.
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It's rare that you have a conflict and two people or two groups who are equally mature in their desire or capacity to get there. That doesn't mean it can't happen. What it means is that one person has to take the lead, has to be bigger. I call that kind of person the new first responder.
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If men and women were equal, everybody would have the same values.Because at this point in time, many women feel compelled to care for the children, feel empathetically into another person's reality, more so than many men who often are on more of a straight-shooting path towards achievement come what may.
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I do not wish upon anyone a descent into hell. But if your life has to be turned inside out in order for you to know yourself--if the shadow of a shaman crosses your path and you turn and follow it down--I pray that you use its force wisely. I hope that you take the ultimate responsibility for your actions and that you consecrate any destruction to the rebuilding of your higher self and a more radiant life.
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It's like you trade the virility of the body for the agility of the spirirt.
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When we descend all the way down to the bottom of loss, and dwell patiently, with an open heart, in the darkness and pain, we can bring back up with us the sweetness of life and the exhilaration of inner growth. When there is nothing left to lose, we find the true self - the self that is whole, the self that is enough, the self that no longer looks to others for definition, or completion, or anything but companionship on the journey.
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Recognition of the harm that patriarchy has caused to people and the planet does not mean that men are wrong and women are right; rather it is a call for new organizational forms and for relishing gender differences within a context of equality.
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We don't need any more teachers. We don't. We need friends.
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Life's always changing. We always are being called to adapt.
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Life actually is this mystery and gift. And every moment of it can be full of real radical joy and wakefulness. And for some reason in our most difficult times, we have the best chance to wake up. Many people will tell you that their divorce or illness or loss of job was the wake up call.
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If you have fathered a child, if you have given birth, if sex is a source of healthy pleasure, thank your pelvis and your reproductive organs for allowing you to feel the creative rhythms of life.
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Agree to these ground rules: Be curious, conversational and real. Don't persuade or interrupt. Listen, listen, listen.
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I think the gender story will become less fraught with hard edges - and not that we'll have androgyny, but that men and women will move more fluidly into each other's domains.
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When women hear each other's stories, told from the heart, it gives us inspiration to keep on going.