Quote of the Week 158 - The Four Perfections

“In the Buddhist tradition there are four ‘perfections’ for which we strive – in our own non-striving way, of course: compassion, loving-kindness, equanimity, and joy.”

--Geri Larkin, Spirituality and Health magazine Sept/Oct 2010 issue

Quote of the Week 157 - Persistent Optimism

Many of the Hasidic rabbis were noted for their optimistic faith in their fellow men, which could not be weakened in the face of overwhelming evidence of man’s perverseness. “Rabbi,” one of the disciples complained, “some of the congregants are gossiping in the midst of prayer!” “How wonderful are Thy people, O Lord,” the rabbi retorted. “Even in the midst of gossip, they devote a few moments to prayer!”

--Source Forgotten

Quote of the Week 156 - Silence and Love

Silence is not the absence of something but the presence of everything.

Natural quiet allows us to fall in love with a place and appreciate how unique it is. Noise detaches us – not only from our surroundings but also from each other. Research shows that in noisy areas people are much less likely to help each other. That’s one of the greatest lessons I’ve learned from being in natural silence: that we can begin to feel love for a place and, through it, for everything. This is crucial for the health of our planet because, when you love something, caring for it becomes effortless. Just as we care for the people we love without asking, “What will I get out of it?” so does love enable us to care for our world without running a cost-benefit analysis to see whether it’s “worth it.”

--Gordon Hempton, quoted in the article “Quiet, Please” by Leslee Goodman in the September 2010 edition of The Sun magazine. Hempton is an “acoustic ecologist” devoted to exploring, examining and recording the “silence” in various natural environments devoid of man-made noise, and advocating for establishing locations where silence prevails with little or no man-made noise. He is the coauthor of a book, One Square Inch of Silence: One Man’s Quest to Preserve Quiet.

There are many wonderful quotes about Silence in the Sunbeams section at the end of this edition.