Jackson Community Church

Summit, Spirit, Sky: connect to community and creation!

doubting Thomas

Reflections on parable of the sower: themes of weeds, seeds, and many types of soil

By jacksonnhccPosted on Posted in Home, Weekly MeditationsTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Weeds are flowers too, once you get to know them. — A. A. Milne

Every problem has in it the seeds of its own solution. If you don’t have any problems, you don’t get any seeds. —Norman Vincent Peale

When people try to bury you, remind yourself you are a seed. ― Matshona Dhliwayo 

If you can look into the seeds of time, and say which grain will grow and which will not, speak then unto me. — William Shakespeare

SONGS about SEEDS & GARDENS

SEED SONGS (Kid Music): 

Earth, Teach Me — Native American Prayer, unattributed

Earth teach me quiet ~ as the grasses are still with new light.
Earth teach me suffering ~ as old stones suffer with memory.
Earth teach me humility ~ as blossoms are humble with beginning.
Earth teach me caring ~ as mothers nurture their young.
Earth teach me courage ~ as the tree that stands alone.
Earth teach me limitation ~ as the ant that crawls on the ground.
Earth teach me freedom ~ as the eagle that soars in the sky.
Earth teach me acceptance ~ as the leaves that die each fall.
Earth teach me renewal ~ as the seed that rises in the spring.
Earth teach me to forget myself ~ as melted snow forgets its life.
Earth teach me to remember kindness ~ as dry fields weep with rain.

Blessing That Holds
a Nest in Its Branches
— Jan Richardson

The emptiness
that you have been holding
for such a long season now;

that ache in your chest
that goes with you
night and day
in your sleeping,
your rising—

think of this
not as a mere hollow,
the void left from
the life that has leached out
of you.

Think of it like this:
as the space being prepared
for the seed.

Think of it
as your earth that dreams
of the branches
the seed contains.

Think of it
as your heart making ready
to welcome the nest
its branches will hold.

What would the world be,
once bereft
Of wet and wildness?
Let them be left,
O let them be left,
wildness and wet,
Long live the weeds
and the wildness yet.
— Gerard Manley Hopkins (excerpt from poem)

I the grain and the furrow,
The plough-cloven clod
And the ploughshare drawn thorough,
The germ and the sod,
The deed and the doer, the seed and the sower,
the dust which is God.
— Algernon Charles Swinburne, Hertha (excerpt)

ON WEEDS

The strongest and most mysterious weeds often have things to teach us. ― F.T. McKinstry

But what attracted me to weeds was not their beauty, but their resilience. I mean, despite being so widely despised, so unloved, killed with every chance we get, they are so pervasive, so seemingly invincible. ― Carol Vorvain

Some plants become weeds simply by virtue of their success rather than any other factor. You merely want less of them. — Monty Don

Prejudices, it is well known, are most difficult to eradicate from the heart whose soil has never been loosened or fertilized by education; they grow firm there, firm as weeds among stones. — Charlotte Bronte

The weeds keep multiplying in our garden, which is our mind ruled by fear. Rip them out and call them by name. — Sylvia Browne

A man of words and not of deeds, Is like a garden full of weeds. ― Benjamin Franklin

COMMENTARY on SOWING SEEDS on DIFFERENT SOIL

Maybe the point of this parable isn’t judgement at all, maybe it’s joy. Since again and again in the midst of this thorny and rocky and good world, God still is sowing a life-giving Word. Just wantonly and indiscriminately scattering it everywhere like God doesn’t understand our rules.
Which would also mean that the thing we call the Word is not something relegated to religious institutions and ordained clergy and the piety police. The thing we call the Word isn’t locked up in some spiritual ivory tower. I am persuaded that the Word of the Lord is anything that brings good news to the poor, and comfort to those who mourn. Whatever heals the brokenhearted. Whatever opens prisons.
The Word is whatever brings freedom to slaves. Whatever brings freedom to former slaves. Whatever brings freedom to the descendants of former slaves. The Word is whatever liberates a nation from the spiritual bondage of human bondage.
And God’s Word is scattered all around us… joyfully scrawled on protest signs and heard in newborns’ cries, and seen in city streets and county fairs and shopping malls.  The Word of the Lord is written on the broken tablets of our hearts, it is falling like rain in the tears of the forgiven, it is harnessed in the laughter of our children. —Nadia Bolz-Weber, full reflection: https://thecorners.substack.com/p/gods-wastefulness

If we want to return our hardened paths to their natural condition so grass and flowers and trees can grow, they have to be plowed up, the soil aerated, new seeds planted and the rain and the sun allowed to do their work without force or interference. That’s what listening to the word of God does for hearts trampled down by the back-and-forth of busyness and that are hardened by the heat of over-exposure. — Kenrt from cslewisfoundation, full reflection: https://www.cslewis.org/blog/january-13-2014/

ON SEEDS

Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit. — Napoleon Hill

Your heart is full of fertile seeds, waiting to sprout. — Morihei Ueshiba

The seed is in the ground. Now may we rest in hope, while darkness does its work. ~ Wendell Berry

From seeds of his body blossomed the flower that liberated a people and touched the soul of a nation. — Jesse Jackson

We are a seed patiently waiting in the earth: waiting to come up a flower in the Gardener’s good time, up into the real world, the real waking. I suppose that our whole present life, looked back on from there, will seem only a drowsy half-waking. We are here in the land of dreams. But cock-crow is coming. — CS Lewis

I hope that upon this scorched earth we have planted the seeds of ideas that will bear the fruit of more diverse and inclusive stories ….  — Wilson Cruz

By cultivating the beautiful we scatter the seeds of heavenly flowers, as by doing good we cultivate those that belong to humanity. —Robert A. Heinlein

A seed neither fears light nor darkness, but uses both to grow.― Matshona Dhliwayo

Inside the seed are many trees… Inside You are many kingdoms. ― Bert McCoy 

We know we cannot plant seeds with closed fists. To sow, we must open our hands. —Adolfo Perez Esquivel

The Kingdom isn’t some far off place you go where you die, the Kingdom is at hand—among us and beyond us, now and not-yet. It is the wheat growing in the midst of weeds, the yeast working its magic in the dough, the pearl germinating in a sepulchral shell. It can come and go in the twinkling of an eye, Jesus said. So pay attention; don’t miss it.  — Rachel Held Evans

You were designed for accomplishment, engineered for success, and endowed with the seeds of greatness. — Zig Ziglar

Help young people. Help small guys. Because small guys will be big. Young people will have the seeds you bury in their minds, and when they grow up, they will change the world.— Jack Ma
Deep in the secret world of winter’s darkness, deep in the heart of the Earth, the scattered seed dreams of what it will accomplish, some warm day when its wild beauty has grown strong and wise. ― Solstice

The greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not on our circumstances. We carry the seeds of the one or the other about with us in our minds wherever we go. — Martha Washington

Failure holds the seeds for greatness – so long as you water those seeds with introspection, they can be the root of your success. —Daniel Lubetzky
The season of failure is the best time for sowing the seeds of success.— Paramahansa Yogananda
We take the action—soup kitchens, creek restoration, mentoring—and then the insight follows: that by showing up with hope to help others, I’m guaranteed that hope is present. Then my own hope increases. By creating hope for others, I end up awash in the stuff.
     We create goodness in the world, and that gives us hope. We plant bulbs in the cold, stony dirt of winter and our aging arthritic fingers get nicked, but we just do it, and a couple of months later life blooms—as daffodils, paperwhites, tulips.. — Anne Lamott

Seeds are powerful. They operate in our culture and in our psyche on a literal and metaphorical level like nothing else. They are possibility incarnate – a tiny gift package wrapped in a protective outer layer with infinite potential to sprout, grow, and produce more seeds while providing food and shelter to humans and animals alike. Joan Chittister writes, “In every seed lie the components of all life the world has known from all time to now.”
Our ancestors have been saving, selecting, and planting seeds for thousands of years, which is largely why we are here today. It is an essential part of the human discipline. — Farmer Kyle of Bellwether Farm

The seed of God is in us. Given an intelligent and hard-working farmer, it will thrive and grow up to God, whose seed it is, and accordingly its fruits will be God-nature. Pear seeds grow into pear trees, nut seeds into nut trees, and God-seed into God. — Meister Echkhart

Dreams are the seeds of change. Nothing ever grows without a seed, and nothing ever changes without a dream. — Debby Boone

God does not only sow his seed in good soil. He loves us with such abandon that he scatters that love far and wide. He does not want to miss the chance of reaching even one lost soul. And in these times, the thorns and weeds, may be the very thing that brings us back to a deeper relationship with God. —Kate Nicholsan

The focus is what is right before you – to give it your best. It sows the seeds of tomorrow. — Kiran Bedi
Carbonized grains of wheat unearthed
From the seventh millennium B.C. town of Jarmo
In the Tigris-Euphrates basin
Match the grains of three kinds of wheat still extant,
Two wild, one found only in cultivation.
The separate grains
Were parched and eaten,
Or soaked into gruel, yeasted, fermented.
Took to the idea of bread,
Ceres, while you were gone.
Wind whistles in the smokey thatch,
Oven browns its lifted loaf,
And in the spring the nourished seeds,
Hybrid with wild grass,
Easily open in a hundred days,
And seeded fruits, compact and dry,
Store well together.
They make the straw for beds,
They ask the caring hand to sow, the resting foot
To stay, to court the seasons.
— Josephine Miles, Fields of Learniing (excerpt)
In Case of Complete Reversal 
— Kay Ryan
Born into each seed
is a small anti-seed
useful in case of some
complete reversal:
a tiny but powerful
kit for adapting it
to the unimaginable.
If we could crack the
fineness of the shell
we’d see the
bundled minuses
stacked as in a safe,
ready for use
if things don’t
go well.

THRESHOLDS — John O’Donohue, from To Bless the Space Between Us

Within the grip of winter, it is almost impossible to imagine the spring. The gray perished landscape is shorn of color. Only bleakness meets the eye; everything seems severe and edged. Winter is the oldest season; it has some quality of the absolute. Yet beneath the surface of winter, the miracle of spring is already in preparation; the cold is relenting; seeds are wakening up. Colors are beginning to imagine how they will return. Then, imperceptibly, somewhere one bud opens and the symphony of renewal is no longer reversible. From the black heart of winter a miraculous, breathing plenitude of color emerges.

The beauty of nature insists on taking its time. Everything is prepared. Nothing is rushed. The rhythm of emergence is a gradual slow beat always inching its way forward; change remains faithful to itself until the new unfolds in the full confidence of true arrival. Because nothing is abrupt, the beginning of spring nearly always catches us unawares. It is there before we see it; and then we can look nowhere without seeing it.

Change arrives in nature when time has ripened. There are no jagged transitions or crude discontinuities. This accounts for the sureness with which one season succeeds another. It is as though they were moving forward in a rhythm set from within a continuum.

To change is one of the great dreams of every heart – to change the limitations, the sameness, the banality, or the pain. So often we look back on patterns of behavior, the kind of decisions we make repeatedly and that have failed to serve us well, and we aim for a new and more successful path or way of living. But change is difficult for us. So often we opt to continue the old pattern, rather than risking the danger of difference. We are also often surprised by change that seems to arrive out of nowhere.

We find ourselves crossing some new threshold we had never anticipated. Like spring secretly at work within the heart of winter, below the surface of our lives huge changes are in fermentation. We never suspect a thing. Then when the grip of some long-enduring winter mentality begins to loosen, we find ourselves vulnerable to a flourish of possibility and we are suddenly negotiating the challenge of a threshold.

At any time you can ask yourself: At which threshold am I now standing? At this time in my life, what am I leaving? Where am I about to enter? What is preventing me from crossing my next threshold? What gift would enable me to do it? A threshold is not a simple boundary; it is a frontier that divides two different territories, rhythms and atmospheres. Indeed, it is a lovely testimony to the fullness and integrity of an experience or a stage of life that it intensifies toward the end into a real frontier that cannot be crossed without the heart being passionately engaged and woken up. At this threshold a great complexity of emotions comes alive: confusion, fear, excitement, sadness, hope. This is one of the reasons such vital crossing were always clothed in ritual. It is wise in your own life to be able to recognize and acknowledge the key thresholds; to take your time; to feel all the varieties of presence that accrue there; to listen inward with complete attention until you hear the inner voice calling you forward. The time has come to cross.

To acknowledge and cross a new threshold is always a challenge. It demands courage and also a sense of trust in whatever is emerging. This becomes essential when a threshold opens suddenly in front of you, one for which you had no preparation. This could be illness, suffering or loss. Because we are so engaged with the world, we usually forget how fragile life can be and how vulnerable we always are. It takes only a couple of seconds for a life to change irreversibly. Suddenly you stand on completely strange ground and a new course of life has to be embraced. Especially at such times we desperately need blessing and protection. You look back at the life you have lived up to a few hours before, and it suddenly seems so far away. Think for a moment how, across the world, someone’s life has just changed – irrevocably, permanently, and not necessarily for the better – and everything that was once so steady, so reliable, must now find a new way of unfolding.

Though we know one another’s names and recognize one another’s faces, we never know what destiny shapes each life. The script of individual destiny is secret; it is hidden behind and beneath the sequence of happenings that is continually unfolding for us. Each life is a mystery that is never finally available to the mind’s light or questions. That we are here is a huge affirmation; somehow life needed us and wanted us to be. To sense and trust this primeval acceptance can open a vast spring of trust within the heart. It can free us into a natural courage that casts out fear and opens up our lives to become voyages of discovery, creativity, and compassion. No threshold need be a threat, but rather an invitation and a promise.

Whatever comes, the great sacrament of life will remain faithful to us, blessing us always with visible signs of invisible grace. We merely need to trust.

ON SOWING & PLANTING

Although nature has proven season in and season out that if the thing that is planted bears at all, it will yield more of itself, there are those who seem certain that if they plant tomato seeds, at harvesttime they can reap onions.
Too many times for comfort I have expected to reap good when I know I have sown evil. My lame excuse is that I have not always known that actions can only reproduce themselves, or rather, I have not always allowed myself to be aware of that knowledge. Now, after years of observation and enough courage to admit what I have observed, I try to plant peace if I do not want discord; to plant loyalty and honesty if I want to avoid betrayal and lies.
Of course, there is no absolute assurance that those things I plant will always fall upon arable land and will take root and grow, nor can I know if another cultivator did not leave contrary seeds before I arrived. I do know, however, that if I leave little to chance, if I am careful about the kinds of seeds I plant, about their potency and nature, I can, within reason, trust my expectations. — Maya Angelou

It is memory that provides the heart with impetus, fuels the brain, and propels the corn plant from seed to fruit. — Joy Harjo

There are two kinds of compassion. The first comes from a natural concern for friends and family who are close to us. This has limited range but can be the seed for something bigger. We can also learn to extend a genuine concern for others’ well-being, whoever they are. That is real compassion, and only human beings are capable of developing it. — Dalai Lama

Everything we do seeds the future. No action is an empty one. — Joan D. Chittister

Whether we have happiness or not depends on the seeds in our consciousness. If our seeds of compassion, understanding, and love are strong, those qualities will be able to manifest in us. If the seeds of anger, hostility and sadness in us are strong, then we will experience much suffering. To understand someone, we have to be aware of the quality of the seeds in his consciousness. And we need to remember that his is not solely responsible for those seeds. His ancestors, parents, and society are co-responsible for the quality of the seeds in his consciousness. When we understand this, we are able to feel compassion for that person. With understanding and love, we will know how to water our own beautiful seeds and those of others, and we will recognize seeds of suffering and find ways to transform them. — Thich Nhat Hanh

ON SPIRITUAL SOIL

… our capacity to listen, to be plowed up by what we hear so that we can nurture the seeds of divinity when we encounter them. If we resist being unsettled and loosened and turned into good soil, then the religiosity that has gotten us this far will begin to slip away. We will abandon the spiritual life and say that it was doing nothing for us.  But if we accept our discomfort and truly listen with open ears, even knowing that what we hear might change and disrupt us, we will begin to grow, and find our capacity to see and hear expanding day by day. — Karl Stevens, article: https://dsobeloved.org/luke-81-25-being-the-good-soil/

Every moment and every event of every man’s life on earth plants something in his soul. For just as the wind carries thousands of winged seeds, so each moment brings with it gems of spiritual vitality that come to rest imperceptibly in the minds and wills of men. Most of these unnumbered seeds perish and are lost, because men are not prepared to receive them: for such seeds as these cannot spring up anywhere except in the good soil of freedom, spontaneity and love. — Thomas Merton

We are all trying to let our mind and heart go their own way—centred on money or pleasure or ambition—and hoping, in spite of this, to behave honestly and chastely and humbly. And that is exactly what Christ warned us you could not do. As He said, a thistle cannot produce figs. If I am a field that contains nothing but grass-seed, I cannot produce wheat. Cutting the grass may keep it short: but I shall still produce grass and no wheat. If I want to produce wheat, the change must go deeper than the surface. I must be ploughed up and re-sown. — CS Lewis

 

THIS WEEK with JCC and Around Town: April 21-26

By jacksonnhccPosted on Posted in Calendar, HomeTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Notes: 

  • MASKS: We have a small startup supply of homemade masks, prepared as an additional form of community support and ministry. These were lovingly sewn by Meg Phillips. Each is packaged in a ziploc bag and they are available in the front hall of the church sanctuary (doors open 24/7). We hope to get them out to people who most need them. Some are being distributed directly, others are simply there for pickup. If you need a mask, and these are all gone, please contact the church.
  • SUPPORT: Do you need support of any kind? We have volunteers ready to assist with errands and other projects (via library’s Jackson Bridge listserv), access to emergency supplies, and Rev Gail is available for emotional and spiritual companionship. Email the church: jcchurch@jacksoncommunitychurch.org
  • Jackson Public Library’s Guide to Online Services (activities, events, reading and information materials, etc)
  • Conway Daily Sun’s list of virtual THINGS to DO
  • Support Local Businesses doing Take Out. Complete list from Conway Daily Sun.

All Week: RING the CHURCH BELL!Would you like to ring the bell at church? We want to ring it every day, so we’re asking for volunteer bell-ringers. The front door is open 24/7 and we need volunteers for Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday. We have Wednesday and Friday covered. Ideally, ring the bell at noon. If you want to be on the schedule to ring the church bell, please contact the church.

TUE, April 21

  • Community Event: STORYTIME with Miss Meredith
    9am • Jackson Library
  • Community Event: MT WASHINGTON OBSERVATORY’S VIRTUAL CLASSROOM (Facebook Live)
    11:15am • Mon, Tue, Fri @ Facebook Live
    Connect live to the highest peak in the Northeastern US, Mount Washington, New Hampshire, as Weather Observers and Education Specialists at the non-profit Mount Washington Observatory present a Facebook Live program called “Home of the World’s Worst Weather Live.”
  • Closed Event: CLERGY LUNCH
    Noon • Zoom
    Local clergy convene for conversation to organize events & worship, coordinate spiritual support to community during pandemic (providing rotating voluntary chaplaincy services to hospital), and offer peer support.
  • RING BELL
    Noon • Jackson Community Church
  • DEACONS MEETING (zoom)
    4pm • Zoom App – Meeting ID: 968 5393 2521 (password required, jacksoncommunitychurch.org)
    Meet to check on community care network, worship plans, and other ideas to provide support to congregation and wider community. Option: call in by touch-tone phone – 929.436.2866, Meeting ID: 968 5393 2521 (password required)
  • Community Event: LIBRARY PICKUP HOURS
    2-6pm • Jackson Public Library
    Order one workday in advance. Please email with the title, author, and what formats you will accept (eBook, downloadable audio, Kindle, paperback or hardcover, anything else).

WED, April 22: EARTH DAY!

  • 50 YEARS of EARTH DAY
    Everywhere, all day, outside!
  • BREAKFAST with REV GAIL (zoom)
    8am • ZOOM app meeting ID: 170985789 (password required, email the church: jacksoncommunitychurch.org)
    Call to talk & gather. Option: Call in via touch-tone phone: 929.436.2866, meeting ID: 170985789
  • Community Event: STORYTIME with Miss Meredith
    9am • Jackson Library
  • RING BELL
    Noon • Jackson Community Church

THURS, April 23

  • Community Event: STORYTIME with Miss Meredith
    9am • Jackson Library
  • RING BELL
    Noon • Jackson Community Church
  • Community Event: ANCIENT TREES of NORTH AMERICA (via ZOOM)
    7pm • ZOOM app link Tin Mountain virtual program: Take a photographic journey across North America to see the oldest trees.

FRI, April 24

  • BREAKFAST & CONVERSATION with REV GAIL (via ZOOM)
    8am • ZOOM meeting ID: 170985789 (password required, email the church: jacksoncommunitychurch.org)
    Call to talk & gather. Option: Call in via touch-tone phone: 929.436.2866, meeting ID: 170985789.
  • Community Event: STORYTIME with Miss Meredith
    9am • Jackson Library
  • Community Event: MT WASHINGTON OBSERVATORY’S VIRTUAL CLASSROOM (Facebook Live)
    11:15am • Mon, Tue, Fri @ Facebook Live
    Connect live to the highest peak in the Northeastern US, Mount Washington, New Hampshire, as Weather Observers and Education Specialists at the non-profit Mount Washington Observatory present a Facebook Live program called “Home of the World’s Worst Weather Live.”
  • RING BELL
    Noon • Jackson Community Church
  • C3: COCKTAILS & CHRISTIAN CONVERSATIONS (zoom)
    5pm • ZOOM meeting ID: 170985789 (password required, email the church: jacksoncommunitychurch.org)
    This week our hosts are Ginger & David Perkins. Reflect together on Christ’s appearances between Easter (resurrection) and Pentecost (Holy Spirit comes to his followers). This week’s visit is the conversation between Christ and his followers behind a locked door, including Thomas, who doubts and asks for proof. Bring your favorite beverage & come to ZOOM ready to listen and share. This week we will focus on John 20:19-29. Option: Call in via touch-tone phone: 929.436.2866, meeting ID: 170985789.

SAT, April 25

  • RING BELL
    Noon • Jackson Community Church
  • Community Event: LIBRARY PICKUP HOURS
    2-6pm • Jackson Public Library
    Order one workday in advance. Please email with the title, author, and what formats you will accept (eBook, downloadable audio, Kindle, paperback or hardcover, anything else).

SUN, April 26

  • INTERFAITH GATHERING (via ZOOM)
    8am • Zoom app link meeting ID# 142985761  (password required, email the church: jacksoncommunitychurch.org by **7:30am** for info)
    Gather for poetry, conversation, readings & prayer. Bring your own caffeine. Option: Call on touch-tone phone: 929.436.2866, meeting ID# 142985761 (password required, email the church: jacksoncommunitychurch.org by **7:30am** for info)
  • CHOIR PRACTICE (via ZOOM)
    9:00am • Zoom app link  (password required, email the church: jacksoncommunitychurch.org by **7:30am** for info)
    Choir practice with choir director Billy Carleton and music director Alan Labrie. Option: Call on touch-tone phone: 929.436.2866, meeting ID# 142985761 (password required, email the church: jacksoncommunitychurch.org by **7:30am** for info)
  • VIRTUAL WORSHIP SERVICE (via ZOOM)
    10:30am • Zoom meeting ID# 142985761 (password required, email the church: jacksoncommunitychurch.org by **7:30am** for info)
    Join us for worship, special music, communal prayer, scripture, and reflection. Stay for virtual coffee hour. Service will also be live-streamed to website and Facebook (if technology supports this function on the day of event). Afterward, recordings of worship service will be posted to Facebook, Vimeo.com channel & Youtube.com channel. Option: Call on touch-tone phone: 929.436.2866, meeting ID# 142985761 (password required, email the church: jacksoncommunitychurch.org by **7:30am** for info)
  • VIRTUAL COFFEE HOUR
    Stay after worship and we will break into small groups for brief social opportunity. Same link as worship.
  • RING BELL
    Noon • Jackson Community Church

Meditations: Locked rooms, open doors

By jacksonnhccPosted on Posted in Adult, Home, Weekly MeditationsTagged , , , , , , , , , , , ,

I wish in the city of your heart
you would let me be the street
where you walk when you are most
yourself. I imagine the houses:
It has been raining, but the rain
is done and the children kept home
have begun opening their doors.
― Robley Wilson

Be an opener of doors. ― Ralph Waldo Emerson

Look on every exit as being an entrance somewhere else.
― Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

I thought how unpleasant it is to be locked out; and I thought how it is worse, perhaps, to be locked in. — Virginia Woolf

A very little key will open a very heavy door. ― Charles Dickens, Hunted Down

If you feel you have to open a particular door, open it, otherwise all your life that door will haunt your mind! … All the doors you ignored or refused to enter represents your uncreated fates!  ― Mehmet Murat ildan

That door had a lot to say, people entered and people left but never the same! ― Jasleen Kaur Gumber

This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meaness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whomever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
— Jalal ad-Din Rumi

The same way one tells a recipe, one tells a family story. Each one of us has our past locked inside. — Laura Esquivel

The man who comes back through the Door in the Wall will never be quite the same as the man who went out. He will be wiser but less sure, happier but less self-satisfied, humbler in acknowledging his ignorance yet better equipped to understand the relationship of words to things, of systematic reasoning to the unfathomable mystery which it tries, forever vainly, to comprehend …  ― Aldous Huxley, The Doors of Perception

For the Yupik, all life was continuous, animal with human with ‘spirit’ and recognizing that continuum allowed them to undergo transformations that we, locked into our disappointingly Cartesian skins, find impossible even to imagine. — John Burnside

… a face is studied like a key
for the mystery of what it once opened …
— C.D. Wright (excerpt) from Floating Trees

It’s human nature that we come in our own flavours, and it doesn’t make sense to write a monochromatic or monocultural story unless you’re doing something extremely small—a locked room-style story. — N.K. Jemisin

I have to live within my memories, within my private universe, and continually return to China, the land where my thoughts are locked. This is a very painful kind of existence, this feeling of nowhereness. — Ma Jian

We are tired of being beaten by policemen. We are tired of seeing our people locked up in jails over and over again. And then you holler, ‘Be patient.’ How long can we be patient? — John Lewis

Abrir una puerta nueva sin cerrar la anterior no lleva a ninguna parte. ― Flavia Company, Haru: Un día es una vida

There’s a lot of conflict and darkness inside everybody’s family. We all pretend to outsiders that it’s not so, but behind locked doors, there are usually high emotions running. — Salman Rushdie

People —running from unhappiness, hiding in power — are locked within their reputations, ambitions, beliefs. — Richard Avedon

I was in a form of prison; not necessarily with bars, but I was locked to that machine three days a week, and I couldn’t plan work, I couldn’t plan vacations, I couldn’t plan dinner, I couldn’t plan homework, I couldn’t plan nothing because at the end of the day, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, I had to be at dialysis. — Grizz Chapman

Custom is a prison, locked and a barred by those who long ago were dust, the keys of which are in the keeping of the dead. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Pass It On, III — Rachel Hades
… Death makes life shine:
a tiredness, a flickering between
ages, which is each age;
a piling up to tottering
and falling back to sand.
So much for cycle. The front door lock
sticks each fall when we’re first back.
We are advised to oil it.
Olive oil in the keyhole:
again the old key turns.
Once again to meander
… Ideas of the eternal,
once molten, harden; cool.
Oil, oil in the lock.
The old key turns.

The ultimate wisdom which deals with beginnings, remains locked in a seed. There it lies, the simplest fact of the universe and at the same time the one which calls faith rather than reason. — Hal Borland

The living cell almost always contains, locked in its interior, the visible or invisible products of its physiological activity or its nourishment. — Albrecht Kossel

The universe is like a safe to which there is a combination. But the combination is locked up in the safe. — Peter De Vries

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