18 March 2024

Prayer is the lifting of heart to God, or, put another way, prayer is the loving of God.
When I was a teenager I loved browsing through the National Geographic magazine in the public library. I remember one occasion looking at a pull-out photograph of the Amazon rainforest in which two European explorers gazed seriously at the camera. As I studied the picture I suddenly became aware of numerous smaller native tribes people also standing amongst the trees. I hadn't noticed them before, not because they were camoflaged but because they looked part of the scene; they didn't stand out as something alien or other; they belonged there. And whereas the Europeans seemed to come out of the photo towards me, the natives literally receded into the trees. In fact they looked exactly like the trees – as though they had extruded up from the Earth beneath their feet. At the time I was struck by how insignificant and primitive the natives looked compared to the civilized Europeans. But now, my work, which is my day, everyday, aspires to become as those natives. As naked and as natural as can be.
We must be free not because we claim freedom, but because we practice it.
nothing quite as painful as the truth
and if it doesn't hurt then it's trivial
the spiritual life is a life of occasional glimmers
spiritual work has absolutely nothing to do with concentrating the mind to get what you want and everything to do with humbly offering the heart to God
Spiritual work is negative, reductive, subtractive. Peeling away layer after layer after layer until one arrives at pure naked essence. As close to God as we are likely to get.
I must leave Ireland and create in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my race!
if the work is about getting your own way then it has no spiritual content
listen not to hear but to connect

17 March 2024

always turning the spotlight back on the self
exposing its insidious presence at every level
We all carry trauma. If we didn't then we would be enlightened. The average modern life aims to keep trauma brushed under the carpet: everything is organised so that it never shows its ugly face. This leads to a life of depression, mild or extreme, the price most are prepared to pay for ease, comfort and seeming peace. It takes a special sort of person to willingly open the can of worms, peel off the scab and let the wound weep. And why do they do it? Because some need truth, they cannot live a lie. They much prefer the agony of facing truth to the comfort of hiding from truth. They have what I call soul.
Resentment is a communicable disease and should be quarantined.
if God really loves you he will deny you want you want
with the object of desire comes unforeseen consequences
depression is not a sickness
it is a sin

16 March 2024

the work is infinite—endless
never done