Michelle > Recent Status Updates

It feels good to be back in a classic lit mode. I’m enjoying this book more than I did initially, though I’m still not totally sure I’ll love it when I’m done.

Horrifying. I hate almost all technology at this point and feel violated. Yes, it’s a novel but might as well be labeled nonfiction.

Excuses fall flat in the presence of quiet, inarguable wisdom. “To the extent that [a man] recognizes that he is on the wrong track and becomes aware of the attitudes and forces bedeviling and pushing him to self destruction, he is bound to do everything in his power to find the right path.” Personally I need look no farther than the phone in my hand for “bedeviling forces.”

Orwellian in feel. That’s an understatement. Lots of words that seem to be newspeak.

My progress is slow but I am studying carefully and feeling my awareness expand as I learn about what it means to find the power innate in every human. It’s already there, waiting to be acknowledged. Each of us, a Divine Being. This book is worship.

“Impressions that come, so to speak, from 'elsewhere’, stirring us to our
depth - rousing, enriching and transforming us - enable us not only to believe but to know without doubt that we participate in a level of Being that is 'quite other' than that of our familiar world existence and which we call
"transcendental'.”

“Our most fundamental yearning is for something which in our essential being we really are and are intended to be.”

It cannot be too strongly urged that every attempt to realize the true self is doomed to failure unless the depths within are cleansed first.

1. All Is One
2. Honor One Another
3. Honor Oneself
4. Love Is Divine Power
5. Surrender Personal Will to Divine Will
6. Seek Only the Truth
7. Live in the Present Moment

“Consciousness is the ability to release the old and embrace the new with the awareness that all things end at the appropriate time and that all things begin at the appropriate time’l

The Path to the Empowered Heart begins with a commitment to “healing all the way to the source of the pain. This means turning inward and coming to know your wounds.” (Instead of using them as excuses or running from them).

I forgot to add this book when I started it. It’s a fascinating look at the connection between spirit and body, highlighting the common ground between most of the major faith traditions.

Not thrilled about feeling the need to switch to this book but determined to prioritize my health.

“We must reserve a little back-shop, all our own, entirely free, wherein to establish our true liberty and principal retreat and solitude.” ~Montaigne

Such fun. These creatures are a delight.

“What will be the end? That is not for me to know. Life poses questions and that two-headed spirit that rules the beginning and end of things called Death, has all the answers.”

“You are dissipating your powers in things that have no real meaning.” Could the wasteland that is social media be summed up more perfectly?

There is a universality to Hurston’s vulnerability. “I wanted what they could not conceive of.
I could not reveal myself for lack of expression, and then for lack of hope of understanding, even if I could have found the words. I was not comfortable to have around. Strange things must have looked out of my eyes like Lazarus after his resurrection.”
There seems to be real loneliness in the examined life.

The beauty of Hurston’s writing pairs amazingly with the weight of the personal history she shares. It’s difficult to read at times because the pain is so eloquently expressed, but worth it.

“I wanted to be away from drabness and to stretch my limbs in some mighty struggle.”

Just getting started. I had to move this forward because it’s a library book and I feel pressure. I don’t like reading under pressure but hopefully I can get past it. I’m so interested in Hurston’s background after reading Their Eyes Were Watching God.