“Social situations often evoke anxiety as well as excitement. This is especially so when we are meeting new people. How can we bridge that gap of awkwardness? How can we begin to know someone better? Some people find it uncomfortable to allow silence into a conversation, while others feel safe only when asking the questions or interacting superficially. And while a casual understanding may be perfectly okay for certain relationships and acquaintances, what is lost when we view the world and others superficially?

There are ways to move beyond shallow-speak and to break out of our individual perspective. The doorway into another’s world can be found when we allow space for silence and deep listening. To venture into and experience this space is to discover that each of us is really the essence of pure meaning and attention.”

Donald Altman, in “The Mindfulness Code”

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Jeff Maziarek, author of Spirituality Simplified and Codi’s Journey, launched Pondercentral.com in April 2007 as a Web-based forum for “PONDER on THIS,” a series of weekday inspirational email messages he began sending to subscribers in March 1999. A FREE service since its inception, “PONDER on THIS” provides subscribers with meaningful content to assist them on their individual paths of spiritual growth. In addition, it benefits subscribers, authors, and publishers by including links to Amazon.com where subscribers can learn more about the book being quoted, and also purchase it.

“Spiritual awakening is spread by overflow. We cannot force another into higher consciousness. We are all like flower buds – we must open and bloom at our own rate, catalyzed by the warmth of the sun. The best way to support another person in their growth is to love them. They will feel so free and easy in our presence that their blocks to growth will just melt away.

No amount of preaching, teaching, or pressuring will speed up their evolution, and it may even retard it. We may share, offer ideas, and invite if we feel to do so, yet this reaching out must be offered lightly, with an open hand, so that our friend feels completely free to accept our invitation or decline it. That’s the way sharing God has got to be. God must be chosen.”

Alan Cohen, in “The Dragon Doesn’t Live Here Anymore”

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Jeff Maziarek, author of Spirituality Simplified and Codi’s Journey, launched Pondercentral.com in April 2007 as a Web-based forum for “PONDER on THIS,” a series of weekday inspirational email messages he began sending to subscribers in March 1999. A FREE service since its inception, “PONDER on THIS” provides subscribers with meaningful content to assist them on their individual paths of spiritual growth. In addition, it benefits subscribers, authors, and publishers by including links to Amazon.com where subscribers can learn more about the book being quoted, and also purchase it.

“If you see a beggar, don’t be taken in. Ask him instead, “Why are you standing here begging on this street corner, Oh great one?” Let him know that you see who he really is. Look into his eyes and see his divinity with your own, and then ask him how you can be of help.

You see, powerlessness is a great disguise. Look behind the veil and say “I remember you brother.” Don’t just give the beggar money and walk on without acknowledging him. If you wish to give him money, do so. But do not pass by without acknowledging him. For it is not money he needs, but your love, your blessing, your acknowledgment.”

Paul Ferrini, in “The Silence of the Heart”

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Jeff Maziarek, author of Spirituality Simplified and Codi’s Journey, launched Pondercentral.com in April 2007 as a Web-based forum for “PONDER on THIS,” a series of weekday inspirational email messages he began sending to subscribers in March 1999. A FREE service since its inception, “PONDER on THIS” provides subscribers with meaningful content to assist them on their individual paths of spiritual growth. In addition, it benefits subscribers, authors, and publishers by including links to Amazon.com where subscribers can learn more about the book being quoted, and also purchase it.

“If you wish to be fully alive you must develop a sense of perspective. Life is infinitely greater than this trifle your heart is attached to and which you have given the power to so upset you. Trifle, yes, because if you live long enough a day will easily come when it will cease to matter. It will not even be remembered – your own experience will confirm this. Just as today you barely remember, are no longer the least bit affected by those tremendous trifles that so disturbed you in the past.”

Fr. Anthony DeMello, in “The Way to Love”

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Jeff Maziarek, author of Spirituality Simplified and Codi’s Journey, launched Pondercentral.com in April 2007 as a Web-based forum for “PONDER on THIS,” a series of weekday inspirational email messages he began sending to subscribers in March 1999. A FREE service since its inception, “PONDER on THIS” provides subscribers with meaningful content to assist them on their individual paths of spiritual growth. In addition, it benefits subscribers, authors, and publishers by including links to Amazon.com where subscribers can learn more about the book being quoted, and also purchase it.

“Surrender is the simple but profound wisdom of yielding to rather than opposing the flow of life. The only place where you can experience the flow of life is in the Now, so to surrender is to accept the present moment unconditionally and without reservation. It is to relinquish inner resistance to what is.

Inner resistance is to say “no” to what is, through mental judgment and emotional negativity. It becomes particularly pronounced when things “go wrong”, which means that there is a gap between the demands or rigid expectations of your mind and what is. That is the pain gap. If you have lived long enough you will know that things “go wrong” quite often. It is precisely at those times that surrender needs to be practiced if you want to eliminate pain and sorrow from your life. Acceptance of what is immediately frees you from mind identification and thus reconnects you with Being. Resistance is the mind.”

Eckhart Tolle, in “The Power of Now”

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Jeff Maziarek, author of Spirituality Simplified and Codi’s Journey, launched Pondercentral.com in April 2007 as a Web-based forum for “PONDER on THIS,” a series of weekday inspirational email messages he began sending to subscribers in March 1999. A FREE service since its inception, “PONDER on THIS” provides subscribers with meaningful content to assist them on their individual paths of spiritual growth. In addition, it benefits subscribers, authors, and publishers by including links to Amazon.com where subscribers can learn more about the book being quoted, and also purchase it.