Quotes from Anodea Judith

Many spiritual disciplines, especially those oriented toward ascendance, advise us to give up the self, to surrender all to a master, guru, or a particular concept of God. While it is important to give up attachments to the lower egos, what is really called for is to become one with the divine. There is no we without an I. To become one with the divine is not to abandon the Self (as archetype of wholeness) but to realize that divine consciousness of who that Self really is.

Give up being safe and your power chakra will awaken more quickly.

Limitation has success . . . . Unlimited possibilities are not suited to man; if they existed, his life would only dissolve in the boundless. To become strong a man's life needs the limitations ordained by duty and voluntarily accepted.

how can we know all the possibilities in an infinite universe?

The more we allow one kind of energy, the more the other can come through. Once a commitment is made, it is easier to allow a partner their solitude or freedom. Once we know our freedom is respected, we can more easily make a commitment. Conversely, the more a partner insists on one aspect, the more his lover will yearn for its opposite. Dynamic balance is a dance between attachment and freedom.

All life is rhythmic. From the rise and fall of the sun to the rise and fall of our breath, from the beating of our heart to the infinite vibrations of atomic particles within our cells, we are a mass of vibrations that miraculously resonate together as a single system. In fact, our ability to function as a unified whole depends upon the coherent resonance of the many subtle vibrations within us. The task of the fifth chakra is to enhance this resonance.

Soul is the individual expression of spirit, and spirit is the universal expression of soul.

As we interact with others, our etheric fields become engaged. The most rewarding connections occur when there is resonance between vibrational fields. Just as people who speak the same language resonate with spoken symbols, the subtle resonance between our etheric field and those of others deepens our feeling of connection. The greater our internal resonance, the more deeply we can resonate with those around us.

Shame-bound people honor their thoughts more than their instincts, especially the internal voices that constantly tell them how worthless and inferior they are. Spontaneity is limited by internal scrutiny, which binds and disempowers the will.

Sound awareness is especially important, for although we easily close our mouth and eyes to what we don't want to take in, we can't really close our ears. Nature did not give us earlids. Our ears remain open and working even when we sleep. STEVEN HALPERN

Issues of power, control, energy fuels, and political strength have become key themes in our current events. We have come a long way from iron spearheads to nuclear warheads, yet the disease of power used for control and domination has remained.

The traumas and abuses we suffer as children, the lack of consciousness with which we operate, the blind spots of our culture -all these serve to shut us down and twist our path off its basic course.

Though we have talked about the chakras individually, remember that we are a complete, indivisible system. What affects one part affects the whole. As we change ourselves, so do we change the world.

The shadow side of this exposure is that, at least in the West, any cultural meme that gets seized by the collective consciousness runs the risk of trivialization, thus diluting its power.

We either get success or lessons. If we learn our lessons successfully, we get both.

World peace is the most essential outer realization of our time.

To love ourselves is to act respectfully toward ourselves, to enjoy our own company when in solitude, to honor our limits and speak our truths.

Love is a state of being in harmony with oneself.

The cultural transformation from the love of power to the power of love is the drama of our time.