🌀

All the darkness in the world cannot extinguish the light of a single candle. 

~ St. Francis of Assisi

in the face of so much mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical suffering, may we be embodiments of love and wisdom, lighting the path toward ending suffering, not adding to it.

may hearts open, may wisdom arise.

~j
⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#darkness #light #candle #suffering #love #wisdom #OpenHeart #path #practice #JinpaLhaga #JMWart #art #SaintFrancisOfAssisi #StFrancis #SaintFrancisQuotes

🌀

ultimately no matter what anyone else does around us or even to us, our words and actions are our responsibility. 

whether we invoke or add to the darkness, or illuminate the world around us with our love, is our choice.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#choices #light #shadow #love #OpenHeart #wisdom #path #practice #JinpaLhaga #JMWart #MayaAngelouQuotes

🌀

we must be mindful

treading carefully

in this moment

to not easily dismiss

the injury, the grief,

the generational trauma

of others.

lest we alienate the suffering

with our lack of empathy

and heart.

we must be mindful

treading carefully

in this moment

when our sight is set

on a “justice”

that blinds us to empathy

that we don’t get lost

within

the landscape of vengeance.

its

mountains of righteousness

its

valleys of fear

its

waves of anger.

in the death of the innocent

we lose our cause

we lose ourselves

we lose

what it means to be

human (humane)

becoming the very monster

we hate and seek to slay

planting new seeds of death

and suffering

for generations to come.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#terrorism #hurt #harm #grief #suffering #war #hate #violence #vengeance #trauma 

#empathy #love #PlantingSeeds #OpenHeart #future #justice #peace #life #path #practice #JinpaLhaga #JMWart #art

*RUNE KEY

Berkano – Birth/Growth

Raidho – Journey/Evolution

Wunjo – Joy/Comfort

Gebo – Gifts/Sacrifice

Sowilo – Sun/Realization

“So war and peace start in the human heart. Whether that heart is open or whether that heart closes has global implications.”
~ Pema Chödrön.

🕊️♥️🙏🏼

🌀

Happy Halloween (and Samhain for those who observe it) to you, my friends!!

🎃👻🧛🏻‍♂️🕷️🐺🧙🏻‍♀️🕸️

may we learn to shine our light in even the darkest of times! 🕯️

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#Halloween #Samhain #Dark #Light #path #practice #JinpaLhaga #RamDassQuotes

🌀

no one is forcing us to sit and breathe with our pain, to alchemize it within our heart, our body of love,  transforming it into precious life, instead of transmitting it to others as harm and death.

what a miracle this heart and body are, born of Love’s lingering stardust. bright, burning, luminous.

the dark is just forgotten light. 

may we remember who we are, that we are of each other, for each other, embodiments of the vast oneness, from beginning-less time. embodiments of Love.

what is vengeance, but a prison of forgotten love and light? 

be free.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#love #light #OpenHeart #alchemy #interdependence #OneLove #JinpaLhaga #SanayaRomanQuotes

🌀

i am grieving, this night as the ones before

the lives so viciously ended on October the 7th.

the mothers, the fathers, the daughters and sons, babies. babies.

the sisters, the brothers, grandparents, and friends. gone. gone.

i am grieving the trauma. rivers and oceans of tears and blood.

i am grieving the taken, stolen and held hostage.

their families waiting. waiting.

i am grieving the fear this has awakened in so many. 

the fear in my friends’ eyes.

i am grieving the loss of soul that can so callously commit such horror 

and destruction.

i am grieving anti-Semitism and its rise. 

i am grieving the loss of conscience that aligns with terror.

i am grieving the loss of awareness drowning in a sea of confusion and conflation.

i am grieving the innocent caught in the fiery fury of revenge.

the mothers, the fathers, the daughters and sons, babies. babies.

the sisters, the brothers, grandparents, and friends. gone. gone.

cut off. no water, no food, no fuel, no communication out or in.

i am grieving loyalty to governments instead of principle.

what about the injured in hospitals 

desperate to hold onto this one precious life?

where do parents run to protect their children? 

i am grieving the trauma. mountains and valleys of rubble and blood.

i am grieving justice lost in pursuit of vengeance.

how many thousands must perish?

i need a number,

so my heart can prepare to hold them all.

i am grieving the descent into blindness that no longer

sees all lives as sacred. falling. falling.

where are the hostages? will they survive this?

will they find freedom through rubble and smoke?

the name of God is the sound of the breath – YHWH.

“just breathe” i tell myself.

the name passes over my lips. 

every breath a prayer.

Jew, Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Buddhist, Agnostic and so many others, all one breath. 

Israeli, Palestinian, all one breath.

when we breathe our first, when we breathe our last,

and all the in-betweens, honored with love not blood.

we have failed.

can we finally shed the stench and stain of it all,

the decaying ways of violence and death?

i am grieving. 

will you grieve with me?

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#Israel #Palestine #suffering #grief #JinpaLhaga #JMWart

🌀

“Fear is the cheapest room in the house. I would like to see you living in better living conditions.”

~ Hafiz

fear moves us in regrettable ways. it shrinks us and walls up our heart. it can lead to greed and aggression. fear can make us forget our shared humanity. fear is a sort of death isn’t it? 

love on the other hand, opens and expands us, aligning us with generosity and vastness of life. may we choose love. may we lean into love.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#fear #love #OpenHeart #path #practice #JinpaLhaga #HafizQuotes 

pic credit: unknown

🌀

it is our collective responsibility as a world community to engage our empathy, compassion, and wisdom to address harm and suffering, to undo and heal the patterns that continue cycles of harm and suffering in the world for all peoples without bias, tribalism, and discrimination. 

it is our individual responsibility as interdependent participants in this world to begin with our own heart and mind.

may hearts open, may wisdom arise.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#harm #suffering #healing #peace #heart #mind #interdependence #OpenHeart #wisdom #path #practice #JinpaLhaga #ShantidevaQuotes #PemaChodronQuotes

🌀

we belong to each other, a truth that transcends all of our constructed and perceived divisions. divisions born out of the most basic ignorance that we are separate. this sense of separateness gives rise to fear which manifests as greed, and as aggression.

we are not separate. we are interdependent, deeply connected from the very source of our being through to the consequences of our words and actions.

so yes, we must love our neighbor as ourself, because ultimately there is no difference, no separation, from the star dust from which we are all made to the experiences of loss and love we all have in this life. 

when people tell you otherwise and ask you to name enemies and to pick sides, tell them you have picked a side – the wounded, the hurting, the suffering, which includes everyone. and your answer to such suffering is to love. and who to love? everyone.

this is the shared space we can work from to bring about justice and healing.

may hearts open, may wisdom arise.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#WeBelongToEachOther #interdependence #suffering #healing #love #OpenHeart #path #practice #JinpaLhaga #TaisenDeshimaruQuotes