Freedom

"The only way you will ever be free is when you decide you have had enough of living up to the standards other people force upon you through shame. Never wear their chains of judgment when they can’t break free of their own."

"Though the wind was commanding the sand into even ridges, it couldn't control the sea."

"If God loves the world, might that not be proved in my own love for it? I prayed to know in my heart His love for the world, and this was my most prideful, foolish, and dangerous prayer. It was my step into the abyss. As soon as I prayed it, I knew that I would die. I knew the old wrong and the death that lay in the world. Just as a good man would not coerce the love of his wife, God does not coerce the love of His human creatures, not for Himself or for the world or for one another. To allow that love to exist fully and freely, He must allow it not to exist at all. His love is suffering. It is our freedom and His sorrow. To love the world as much even as I could love it would be suffering also, for I would fail. And yet all the good I know is in this, that a man might so love this world that it would break his heart."

"Miracles can only inhabit the reality of our awareness when we surrender our need for the familiar to our desire for the limitless."

"Those who have suffered in the hands of others,know what it is to be free."

"A human being can only take so much when their basic rights as a citizen of the earth are being denied to them – or sold at a high cost."

"Cut away the nonsense, the drama, the regret, the scars of the past, and make a decision to no longer let them govern your happiness and freedom."

"Time is not an enemy as such, but a missing person, sending cryptic postcards from the past."

"He remembers how someone – he forgets who – once said in a sarcastic tone, “Isn’t she just Little Miss Sweetness and Light?” – and it was a statement that put him off proposing. It made him seriously reassess his options. He didn’t want to be with someone others saw as overly-moral because he has flaws, he has weaknesses. How would his mistakes compare to her virtuousness? She used to dislike the competitiveness at work, the way she claimed she could never really make friends with anyone because everything was always so fake and cut-throat and he used to berate her for it, used to tell her to accept it, to realise the truth about life and relationships – but she wouldn’t take it. She was always thinking too hard about everything, always questioning her motives. Surely, if he’d married her, she’d have started questioning his."

"Nearly two years of dates. Still no question. Her mother and father want to set a proper date. Still no question. Her friends keep asking, when, Natasha? When? But she still hasn’t been asked The Question. It’s enjoyable to be the one with all the secrets, but in her honest mind – the hidden part that’s always sleeping – the secrets he keeps about when and if give her a feeling inside she’s never really understood completely – a sensation she had as a child when she got to the end of a fairytale where never-ending love and happiness were all but expected and wondered whether there might be…. one last page."

"Trap yourself inside your own brain, switch off the light, block all the escape routes, then turn your back on everything you know to be reality and try and survive there. Try. Living. Nowhere."

"Home is in my hair, my lips, my arms, my thighs, my feet and my hands. I am my own home. And when I wake up crying in the morning, thinking of how lonely I am, I pinch my skin, tug at my hair, remind myself that I am alive. Remind myself to step outside and greet the morning. Remind myself that it’s all about forward motion. It’s all about change. It’s all about that elusive state. Freedom."

"When men reject reason, they have no means left for dealing with one another — except brute, physical force."

"If you live life on your own terms it shouldn’t feel like a jail cell."

"The great mission of our day is not conquering the sea or space, disease or tyranny. The grand quest which calls to the hero in every one of us is to become fully alive--to stand up and claim our birthright, which is inner freedom, love and radiant purpose. By fulfilling this, we transform the world."

"Practice appreciation for who you are and what you have… and allow your life to unfold in the most amazing way."

"Before embarking on a voyage, first speak with the ancient sailors, listen to and understand the winds, then patiently make a boat and sail. Yet, even then, be open to other dreams, changes, circumstances. Throughout our lives, we limit ourselves to fixed goals, only to get on the local ferry and just travel the distance between two known points. Yet, we create an illusion of freedom and choice, accompanied by a sense of independence. Thus, we carefully study weather reports, ride on the port side on odd numbered days, starboard on holidays, have tea at fixed times, never speak with those who wear glasses, always smile at those who wear green and of course allow ourselves just the slight possibility of a dream about jumping ship and going off to our island one day. C'est la vie? Our predictably totalitarian lives are an insult to the human spirit."

"What is the most important thing in your life?For me, it is my freedom of mind, my freedom to choose my own ways of self-construction or self-destruction."

"A truly free man is not free 'from' anything, nor free 'to' anything, he is just free. Free within himself."

"When a man does not dwell in self, then things will of themselves reveal their forms to him. His movement is like that of water, his stillness like that of a mirror, his responses like those of an echo."