Blogger Maria Popova is celebrating 18 years of one of my favorite blogs “The Marginalian” (formerly known as Brain Pickings): “Somewhere along the way, you realize that no one will teach you how to live your own life — not your parents or your idols, not the philosophers or the poets, not your liberal arts education or your twelve-step program, not church or therapy or Tolstoy. No matter how valuable any of that guidance, how pertinent any of that wisdom, in the end you discover that you make the path of life only by walking it with your own two feet under the overstory of your own consciousness — that singular miracle never repeated in all the history and future of the universe, never fully articulable to another.
Continue reading “18 Life-Learnings from 18 Years of The Marginalian”This Be The Verse; Philip Larkin
They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.
But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another’s throats.
Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don’t have any kids yourself.
10 Reasons to Start Today
Craig Harper writes:
1. You’ll never have more time than you do right now.
2. Most people procrastinate because of fear, not logic or reason.
3. Unused potential is wasted potential.
4. Planning, thinking and rationalising, is not doing. Life is not a theory.
5. If you start today, a week from now you’ll be in the middle of a change process rather than talking about one.
6. Taking action builds your emotional and psychological muscles.
7. Transformation lives in the application of the information; not the knowing.
8. It won’t be magically easier a week or month from now.
9. The ‘Opportunity Fairy’ isn’t coming any time soon, so you may need to create one of your own (an opportunity, not a fairy).
10. You’ve put it off for long enough.
11. (bonus tip, no extra charge) I can’t be sure but I think people are on to your excuse-making bullshit.
Related articles
- STOP MAKING EXCUSES! 30-Day Challenge (aliciaanabelsantos.wordpress.com)
- Top 10 Procrastinating Cities (turbotax.intuit.com)
- Is Procrastination Holding You Back? (powerhomebiz.com)
- Why To Stay In the Same Job For 10 Years (debtconsolidationusa.com)
- to fellow procrastinators (graceyck.wordpress.com)
- What is your excuse? (missskippingalong.com)
- 10 Habits to Quit in Order to Be Happy (healthcarespectator.wordpress.com)
- Change “the Change”? (gfsmiley.wordpress.com)
Our aim should …
Our aim should be to not seek and chase for Love, but to BE IT. This means self-love first. True Love isn’t setting HUGE expectations on someone else that they always make you happy and fulfilled.
True Love is being so full of self-love and the Love of The Uni-verse that you have more than enough Love to hold your own darkness and light and the darkness and light of the other people. True Love is radical acceptance of yourself and the person you are in a relationship with.
Looking for someone to complete you is to deny your innate potential to be an already full and integrated being. You are giving someone else a power that only you have.
Make love of yourself perfect…
You are perfect, only you don’t know it.
Learn to know yourself and you will discover wonders.
All you need is already within you, only you must approach yourself with reverence and love.
Self-condemnation and self-distrust are grievous errors.
Your constant flight from pain and search for pleasure is a sign of the love you bear for yourself;
all I plead with you is this: make love of yourself perfect.
Deny yourself nothing – give yourself infinity and eternity and discover that
you do not need them; you are beyond.Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
The Timeless Teachings of “The Road Not Taken”

The folks at FinerMinds say…
For all you poets, romantics and lovers of literature out there, today is World Poetry Day.
To pay homage to all the weavers and rhymers of words, we wanted to share one the top poems of all time (which also happens to be a personal favorite of ours), The Road Not Taken, by Robert Frost.
“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Continue reading “The Timeless Teachings of “The Road Not Taken””
Instruction on Love
Beth Lapides writes:
These are the instructions for love that I have been given. Love yourself. Love something bigger than yourself. Love something smaller than yourself. Love something the same size as yourself. Love as a verb, not a noun. Not a thing, an action. Love whoever comes into your path and seek out those for whom your love is abiding.
Love without resentment something you both love and resent. Love without anger someone you both love and are angry with. Love your anger and resentment if this is not possible.
Love what might be without knowing what it is. For today think of possibility, not uncertainty. Love the absence of trouble in whatever areas your life is trouble-free. Love your troubles, as they are agents of change.
Love the part of you that you love easily with the part of you that you love less so. Love a part of you that is hard to love with a part of you that you love easily. Continue reading “Instruction on Love”
Tell me, what is it you plan to do?

“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
Mary Oliver
via Tumblr
I won’t give up
When I look into your eyes
It’s like watching the night sky
Or a beautiful sunrise
Well there’s so much they hold
And just like them old stars
I see that you’ve come so far
To be right where you are
How old is your soul?
I won’t give up on us
Even if the skies get rough
I’m giving you all my love
I’m still looking up
And when you’re needing your space
To do some navigating
I’ll be here patiently waiting
To see what you find
‘Cause even the stars they burn
Some even fall to the earth
We’ve got a lot to learn
God knows we’re worth it
No, I won’t give up
I don’t wanna be someone who walks away so easily
I’m here to stay and make the difference that I can make
Our differences they do a lot to teach us how to use the tools and gifts
We got yeah we got a lot at stake
And in the end,
You’re still my friend at least we didn’t tend
For us to work we didn’t break, we didn’t burn
We had to learn, how to bend without the world caving in
I had to learn what I got, and what I’m not
And who I am
I won’t give up on us
Even if the skies get rough
I’m giving you all my love
I’m still looking up
I’m still looking up
I won’t give up on us
God knows I’m tough, he knows
We got a lot to learn
God knows we’re worth it
I won’t give up on us
Even if the skies get rough
I’m giving you all my love
I’m still looking up…
Love People For Who They Are
There is something magical that happens when you tell someone you love them just the way they are. In my experience, it gives me freedom from beating myself up over past mistakes and contrary to what you might think, it makes me want to be even better! My life partner, however, thinks that it means that I’ll stop trying so she’ll never say the words “I love you just the way you are”. The answer for me anyway is that I need to love MYSELF for who I am, not for who I will be someday…
A Poem For Those Finding It Tough To Trust
notsalmon via A Poem For Those Finding It Tough To Trust.
A poem and reminder for life’s stormy times…
notsalmon via A poem and reminder for life’s stormy times….
Your Other Half Is Within You!
Jenna Phillips writes:
We LOVE love. We write poems about it. We sing songs about it. We create lines that wrap around the building to watch the latest film about it.
We crave it, want it and search for it on a daily basis. At times, the search for our idealistic love – or soul mate – can be exhausting and disappointing. We go on unfulfilling dates and wonder why our fantasy of meeting our life partner while we both reach for the same apple at farmers’ market hasn’t happened yet. We people-watch and measure up possible contenders for the position of our “other half”. You know – that person who will complete us, make us happy or fulfill our innermost desires.
Jeez! That’s a whole lot of pressure to put on another person, and giving anyone that kind of power takes away from our own. What if you were to realize, in this exact moment, that you are 100% fulfilled? Yes, your other half is already within you. There is no separation of the incredible being that you’ve always been. Your authentic Self is whole and complete.
The truest part about your existence is pure love. You already have it within you, and you’ve had it all along. You don’t need to go find it from someone else to feel or be loved. It’s no one else’s job to make sure you smile. You can smile whenever you want. Smile right now. Do it! See how great that feels? That was actually 100% your choice. I didn’t make you do it. That choice was entirely up to you.
We have the ability, the power and the choice to acknowledge that we are perfect RIGHT NOW. When we accept that we are fulfilled, lovable and powerful – we seem to attract people who, in fact, add to those qualities. When we search for people to bring us up and out of our state of misery, we attract people who reflect exactly that. Instead of searching for love, own it. Instead of talking about it, BE about it. Instead of complaining about it, celebrate it.
Every person we encounter is a perfect reflection of what’s going on within us. Instead of looking for someone, and then trying to mold them into a “perfect something” we want to look at, what about splashing water on our own face? What about combing our own hair and straightening our own shirt? What about choosing to be the best versions of ourselves?
Well, luckily for us, since everyone is our reflection we get to look at LOVE, beauty, awesomeness and fulfillment if we choose to BE all of that. True love starts with YOU. Search no more.” via Your Other Half Is Within You!.
Imperfection
“We learn from Tony Robbins that everyone’s core fear is that they are not enough, and that because they aren’t enough, they won’t get Love. And LOVE is the oxygen of the Soul.
This much we know already.
But then I thought about what made me successful and what made so many people I know successful and what I love about my favorite characters. And there was always something in common.
The imperfect person overcomes. It boils down to that.
So I had an “ah-ha!” on the phone with my client and I blurted out, “We become successful by admitting we are not perfect, rather than trying to be perfect and thinking that we’re not enough.”
And I think this about sums it up.” via OK, I just had a MAJOR AHA moment! Check it out!.
Practice Rapture
What if the measure of our value in this lifetime is not…
- how tidy we kept our car
- whether our kid’s nose had snot crusted on it
- how flat our stomach was
- the number of zeroes in our bank account
But how diligently we practice rapture? Not perfectly, but devotedly studying passion.” via Practice Rapture: Ecstatic Sensual Poetry from Mirabai – The Hot Love Revolution: Monogamy is the hottest place on earth.…
PS Michele Christensen, the woman who wrote this post, is one of the hottest, sexiest bloggers on the planet and she writes about the joy of monogomy at http://hotloverevolution.com/. Follow her blog — you’ll love it…
No More Excuses!
The Daily Love via Visual Inspiration: No More Excuses!.
Make you feel my love
When the rain is blowing in your face
and the whole world is on your case
I could offer you a warm embrace
to make you feel my love…
When the evening shadows and the stars appear
And there is no one there to dry your tears
I could hold you for a million years
to make you feel my love…















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