Quotes About Transformation

I wish," she continued, turning back to herself, "that there was a path of words I could walk down and they would lead me into a grotto pool where I could re-purify myself and return to the girl I was. But there isn't a path, or even a girl. She's gone, and I'm stuck trying to invent who I want to be, and I'm finding that figuring out who I want to be is so much harder than just being who I was when I was a little kid.

Since I was trying so hard to make books lead my life, I didn't want to read them and then just put them back on the shelf and say, "good book," as if I was patting a good dog. I wanted books to change me, and I wanted to write books that would change others.

However, if one reads the verses carefully, I believe that it tells of how Job's soul - the bitter, angry part which wanted to curse God - was wrenched from him and became a being of its own.

with the message 'I shall never henceforward

an individual action, multiplied by millions, creates global change.

This book was written with the hope that it will] save someone who wants to give up, for there is always a new life waiting.

The life he'd known now seemed capable of multiple, even infinite shatterings.

Being on a spiritual path does not prevent you from facing times of darkness. But it teaches you how to use the darkness as a tool to grow.

To open deeply, as genuine spiritual life requires, we need tremendous courage and strength, a kind of warrior spirit.

The art of living is neither careless drifting on the one hand or fearful clinging to the past on the other. It consist in being completely sensitive to each moment, in regarding it as utterly new and unique, in having the mind open and wholly receptive - Allan Watts

As we follow a genuine path of practice, our sufferings may seem to increase because we no longer hide from them or from ourselves. When we do not follow the old habits of fantasy and escape, we are left facing the actual problems and contradictions of our life.

It is not enough to know that love and forgiveness are possible. We have to find ways to bring them to life.

The poet Hafiz writes, Don't surrender your loneliness So quickly. Let it cut more deep. Let it ferment and season you As few human Or even divine ingredients can.

If we gain something, it was there from    the beginning. If we lose anything, it is hidden nearby.

The adult brain and nervous system grow and change throughout our lives. Until the very end, we are neurologically transformed by whatever we practice. We are not limited by the past.

True love and prayer are learned in the hour when love becomes impossible and the heart has turned to stone.

Acceptance is not passivity. It is a courageous step in the process of transformation.

Trying to hold onto "how it was" will only create suffering and disappointment, because life is a river and everything changes.

The truth is that things change whether we want them to or not. Becoming attached to things as they are or pushing things away that we do not like does not stop them from changing. It only leads to further suffering.

Accumulated knots in the fabric of our body, previously undetected, begin to reveal themselves as we open.

The place where we can most directly open to the mystery of life is in what we don't do well, in the places of our struggles and vulnerability. These places always require surrender and letting go: When we let ourselves become vulnerable, new things can be born in us. In risking the unknown we gain a sense of life itself. And most remarkably, that which we have sought is often just here, buried under the problem and the weakness itself.

No amount of meditation, yoga, diet, and reflection will make all of our problems go away, but we can transform our difficulties into our practice until little by little they guide us on our way.

consciously suffer the impact, to become the ground where the sorrows can be held and reworked. These things can be carried with grace. But it can't be faked. If you go to someone with 99 percent of goodwill and are still caught in 1 percent anger, all they feel is the anger, and it pushes them from reconciliation. The heart has to willingly hold the whole of suffering for it to be transformed.

As we follow a genuine path of practice, our sufferings may seem to increase because we no longer hide from them or from ourselves. When we do not follow the old habits of fantasy and escape, we are left facing the actual problems and contradictions of our life. A