The Power of Vulnerability
http://www.ted.com Brene Brown studies human connection — our ability to empathize, belong, love. In a poignant, funny talk at TEDxHouston, she shares a deep insight from her research, one that sent her on a personal quest to know herself as well as to understand humanity. A talk to share.
This is an absolutely beautiful, honest, moving and amazing opportunity to self-analyse and recognise any life-dulling feelings of ‘unworthiness’. Don’t be bothered by the fact it’s 20 minutes. Trust me, 1 minute in you won’t even notice the next 19. They’re just moments in time, but you’ll experience a raw, honest, heartfelt lady who thought she had life worked out and ‘under control’ until she delved into “Vulnerability”. What happened next….
Janet
If We Hope to Survive
The components of the natural world are myriad but they constitute a single living system. There is no escape from our interdependence with nature; we are woven into the closest relationship with the Earth, the sea, the air, the seasons, the animals and all the fruits of the Earth. What affects one affects all – we are part of a greater whole – the body of the planet. We must respect, preserve, and love its manifold expression if we hope to survive.
Bernard Campbell, Human Ecology
printed in David Suzuki’s “The Sacred Balance”
The Interconnectedness of All Life
The forest is one big thing – it has people, animals and plants. There is no point in saving the animals if the forest is burned down. There is no point in saving the forest if the animals and people are driven away. Those trying to save the animals cannot win if the people trying to save the forest lose.
Bepkororoti, quoted in “Amazonian Oxfam’s Work in the Amazon Basin”
Peace, A Dream Unfolding
We must convince each generation that they are transient passengers on this planet earth. It does not belong to them. They are not free to doom generations yet unborn. They are not at liberty to erase humanity’s past nor dim its future.
Bernard Lown and Evjueni Chazov
To Educate the Human Potential
The stars, Earth, stones, life of all kinds, form a whole in relation to each other and so close is this relationship that we cannot understand a stone without some understanding of the great sun. No matter what we touch, an atom or a cell, we cannot explain it without knowledge of the universe. The laws governing the universe can be made interesting and wonderful to children, more interesting than things in themselves, and they begin to ask:
What am I?
What is the task of humanity in this wonderful universe?
Maria Montessori, To Educate the Human Potential
I Did Not Die
Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there; I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow,
I am the diamond glints on snow,
I am the sun on ripened grain,
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning’s hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight.
I am the soft starlight at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry,
I am not there; I did not die.
- Mary E. Frye 1932
Farewell Sam Faust. A much loved Proserpinian, father, husband, son and Grandson. Our hearts go out to Sam’s family in their time of sorrow.
Death is Nothing
I am in the Next Room
I am in the Next Room
“Death is nothing at all. I have only slipped away into the next room. I am I, and you are you. Whatever we were to each other, that we still are. Call me by my old familiar name, speak to me in the easy way you always used …. Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight? I am waiting for you … for an interval … somewhere near, just around the corner. All is well.”