Gunilla Norris > Quotes

“Within each of us there is a silence, a silence as vast as the universe. And when we experience that silence, we remember who we are.”
― Gunilla Norris

“Within each of us there is a silence
—a silence as vast as a universe.
We are afraid of it…and we long for it.

When we experience that silence, we remember
who we are: creatures of the stars, created
from the cooling of this planet, created
from dust and gas, created
from the elements, created
from time and space…created
from silence.

In our present culture,
silence is something like an endangered species…
an endangered fundamental.

The experience of silence is now so rare
that we must cultivate it and treasure it.
This is especially true for shared silence.

Sharing silence is, in fact, a political act.
When we can stand aside from the usual and
perceive the fundamental, change begins to happen.
Our lives align with deeper values
and the lives of others are touched and influenced.

Silence brings us back to basics, to our senses,
to our selves. It locates us. Without that return
we can go so far away from our true natures
that we end up, quite literally, beside ourselves.
We live blindly and act thoughtlessly.

We endanger the delicate balance which sustains
our lives, our communities, and our planet.
Each of us can make a difference.

Politicians and visionaries will not return us
to the sacredness of life.
That will be done by ordinary men and women
who together or alone can say,
"Remember to breathe, remember to feel,
remember to care,
let us do this for our children and ourselves
and our children's children.
Let us practice for life's sake.”
― Gunilla Norris

“have a kink as solid and full of habit as the ones in the hose. Slowly I pull out the full length of the hose and lay it where it needs to be before I turn on the water. Inside, too, I must unroll my full attention. Old habits of thought twist themselves into kinks and knots. We will be forced to acknowledge this again and again.”
― Gunilla Norris, A Mystic Garden: Working with Soil, Attending to Soul

“The great physicist Niels Bohr said, “There are two types of truth. In the shallow type, the opposite of a true statement is false. In the deeper kind, the opposite of a true statement is equally true.”
― Gunilla Norris, A Mystic Garden: Working with Soil, Attending to Soul

“My garden is a place of commitment and neglect, of arrogance and humility. It is a place of taking stock and of deep silence—a place of contemplation. And so for me over time it has become a place of grace.”
― Gunilla Norris, A Mystic Garden: Working with Soil, Attending to Soul

“in self-acceptance there is no tally sheet. There are no check marks. There is, instead, an inner transparency. We own how we project on others what we have not yet worked through. We are aware of how we resist knowing the ways we hide so we can be what we call safe. We confess both our beauty and our faults and are open to forgiveness. Worthiness then comes to us as a matter of course. We do not earn it. It is a given we can humbly accept as fundamental and true. Projection It’s hard to respect and love another fully until we respect and love ourselves. This is an obvious truth, but hard to live. As much as we may want to love our heart’s friend with complete freedom and depth, we may not be able to. Aspects of ourselves that we have not yet learned to know and love into healing and maturity get in the way.  It is usually in the deep loves of our lives that pockets of unworthiness surface. The very safety of love seems to give permission for that which is unloved to emerge. When we are safe, open and vulnerable, we are also easily re-injured.  As loving friends we try to see each other as well as we can, but we are destined to be faulty witnesses from time to time. The parts we enjoy, admire and are happy about are what attract us to each other. We sense an affinity with what we see either because we have it as a capacity as well, or we have it as a potential to be developed.”
― Gunilla Norris, Sheltered in the Heart

“Understanding   How much we long to be understood. Fundamentally this is not about being in agreement though that seems to make things appear easier. But understanding is much deeper than that. It is a profound spaciousness that grants another person the chance to be known from their own perspective and revealed in their history, their joys, their sorrows, their struggles and strengths. When we really understand one another that way it is like making a beautiful ring of support. The jewel of the self is given a setting in which to be held and seen. It is one of the dearest parts of friendship. The Past When we embrace the sanctity in each other we have a foundation on which much can be built.”
― Gunilla Norris, Sheltered in the Heart

“ When we understand our lives better, we can see where such strength was at work. Always a gift given by Spirit, it is a surprise to us that we were able to prevail. Is it not often after the fact that we discover we have been given the gift of strength?  A true friend can give us encouragement by knowing our history, our joys and our sorrows, our struggles and our strengths, and in their eyes we can see ourselves better. ~ What one person carries easily another person cannot bear. We join strength with strength. A single stick is easily broken. Two sticks together are harder to snap. Together we bear our own and each other’s burdens better, and we understand when the other must go it alone. Sometimes holding is simply the ability to see a bigger picture. Sometimes holding is support and nurturing help, and sometimes holding is holding back and letting things be. In retrospect the latter is often sensed as profound help though in the present we might feel it as counter intuitive. We are, after all, still present for one another though we are not “doing anything”.”
― Gunilla Norris, Sheltered in the Heart

“Something has begun that is vital.  Without words we seem to know this. Over time we will discover how we meet in being, in time, in place, in potential and in willingness. Overtime we will savor the joys of deep friendship. Being To have a deep friend is to have very special support—yet not as we usually think of support. Such a friend is not a crutch. Such a friend is not someone who will do the inner work we ourselves refuse to do, nor is it someone we hang on to out of loneliness or other unexamined reasons.”
― Gunilla Norris, Sheltered in the Heart

“We meet in being, in time, and in place. The situations we are in color our experiences very much. A deep friend can be met on a train, in the work place, on vacation, in a bank or a barrack. We belong to places even if those places are transient. We cannot be together unless we converge in place and in time.  Now with the Internet a friend can be met in a placeless place, a virtual space. But sooner or later we will want to find our friend in the solidity of an actual location. Being human we need to touch one another, to come together in more than imagination, thought or word.”
― Gunilla Norris, Sheltered in the Heart

“a different order of commitment. We don’t state priorities when we marry, enter a religious order, or commit our lives to something for the long haul. We take vows. They are of a greater magnitude. We take them in front of others to be witnessed by them and to have their support. We know a vow needs to be made with our whole being, for once decided upon and witnessed, our lives will be profoundly changed. It is a promise given to our selves and to Spirit.  A vow can be thought of as a spine. It holds us up. It holds us together. To break it is to break apart. To make a vow is to name the commitment to something or to someone and to the loneliness such a commitment entails. Vows are up to us to keep. No one can live them for us.”
― Gunilla Norris, Sheltered in the Heart

“as if we were mysteriously brought to a trailhead to begin a journey. We do not know where the path may lead; only that Spirit has opened a way for us both. ~ We usually sense affinity at once, but it can also happen with someone we initially have little in common with, who in time is revealed to be a deep friend. The fact dawns on us slowly. Many small events are needed before a match is struck and we find our hearts kindled. Moments of knowing can never be planned. They are given to us. Our responding “yes” is given to us as well. We cannot force it. We can only recognize it and then gratefully receive it.”
― Gunilla Norris, Sheltered in the Heart