Real life exists outside time and space; therefore, death can change the manifestation of life in this world, but it cannot destroy life itself.
Try to live with the part of your soul which understands eternity, which is not afraid of death. And that part of your soul is love.
June 11
All material changes in our everyday life are small in comparison with those in our spiritual life. There could be a change in feelings and actions, there could be a change in thoughts and ideas. In order to change your thoughts and ideas, you should concentrate your conscious mind on your spiritual requirements.
Every thought a person dwells upon, whether he expresses it or not, either damages or improves his life.
—LUCY MALORY
To vanquish sin, you must accept that the root of each sin is in a bad thought. We are all only the consequences of what we think.
—BUDDHA
We regret losing a purse full of money, but a good thought which has come to us, which we’ve heard or read, a thought which we should have remembered and applied to our life, which could have improved the world—we lose this thought and promptly forget about it, and we do not regret it, though it is more precious than millions.
June 12
Suffering is the necessary condition for spiritual and physical growth.
Really, really I tell you, you will cry, and you will fall, and the world will be glorified. You will be sad, and your sadness will become joy. A woman is in pain when she gives birth to a child, and after the birth she doesn’t remember, and she is joyful.
—JOHN 16:20-21
Very often we say that we don’t like suffering, that we have too much suffering, but sufferings, all kinds of sufferings, are always good for us. Sometimes, we even see that it is useful to suffer: children suffer when they grow, or when it is necessary that they clean an injury filled with filth. We cannot see the usefulness of moral sufferings, but those sufferings, too, make us better and closer to God.
We grow thus: We come closer to God and God comes closer to us as our will becomes united with the will of God.
—RALPH WALDO EMERSON
You should look in suffering for the seeds of your future spiritual growth, or the bitterness of suffering will be severe.
June 13
Intellect is the quality that makes us different from animals.
Buddha said: “In meditation, in speech, in life, in studies, I never forget about the most important thing: the requirements of the intellect.”
The moral and the intellectual are always in harmony.
If a self-confident man talks to a wise man, he will not understand the truth, just as a spoon will not understand the truth when it gets into the mouth.
—EASTERN WISDOM
I cannot came any improvement in anyone except with the help of the goodness and kindness which already is inherent in this person.
—IMMANUEL KANT
People spoil their life who neglect their intellect and say that it cannot guide them.
Intellect is the same in all people, and communication is based on intellect; therefore every man must correspond to its requirements.
June 14
When you make an effort not to blame other people, your life becomes much easier, but very few people make this small effort.
In the lives of the saints, there is the story of the hermit who saw in his dream a monk who had died long ago, and who had been rather weak in his life. The monk was in an especially lovely and honored part of paradise. The hermit asked, “How were you granted this place, with all your weaknesses?” and the monk answered that it was because he had never blamed, not a single person in his life.
Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things.
—ROMANS 2:1
The more strictly and mercilessly you judge yourself, the more just and kind you will be in the judgment of others.
—CONFUCIUS
Do not glorify in blaming and despising other people. A kind person should hide the shame of others, even those who have harmed him. Do not remember one who repents his former sins.
—The TALMUD
Unless you yourself are sinless, do not say a single word about the sins of others, but be quiet. If you make it a habit not to blame others, you will feel the growth of the ability to love in your soul, and you will see the growth of goodness in your life.
June 15
To love God means to love the highest possible good which we can imagine in all things.
People often say, “I do not understand love of God; what is love of God?” It would be more exact to say, “cannot understand love in this world without love of God.”
Real love of God is a moral feeling based on a clear understanding of His high, superior being; love of God coincides with love of virtue, truth, and kindness.
—WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING
A person who understands the law but who is far from the love of God is like a bank official who has keys for the inside of his building but not the key for the front door.
—The TALMUD
The commandments of God should be followed because of love of God, not because of fear of God.
—The TALMUD
If you love a person without loving God, which is the goodness inside of him, then you plant the seeds for future disappointments and sufferings with this love.
Those who say that they love God but dislike their neighbors are lying to people; those who love their neighbors but don’t love God are lying to themselves.
Only perfection is worth complete love. In order to feel complete love, we can either delude ourselves that some imperfect object of our love is “perfection” or we can love perfection, which is God.
June 16
The improvement of society can be achieved only by the moral improvement of individuals.
We live in an epoch of discipline, culture, and civilization, but not in an epoch of morality. In the present state, we can say that the happiness of the people grows, and yet the unhappiness of the people increases as well. How can we make people happy when they are not educated to have high morals? They do not become wise.
—IMMANUEL KANT
There can be only one way to fight the general evil of life: it is in the moral, religious, and spiritual perfection of your own life.
June 17
The misfortunes of war and preparations for war bear little relation to the reasons given to explain war: the real reasons are usually so insignificant that they are not even worth discussion, and they are completely unknown to those who die.
The madness of contemporary war is justified by dynastic interest, common nationalism, European equilibrium, or ambitions. If there are ambitions in people, this is a very strange way to sustain it, with all the crimes which happen to people during war: destruction of homes, plunder, and mass murder.
—ANATOLE FRANCE
You ask me, is it necessary for civilized people to make war? And I tell you not only is it “already” unnecessary, but it was never necessary, and not sometimes but always it destroys the normal development of humanity, destroys justice, and stops progress.
—GALSTON MOHK
Only during a period of war does it become obvious how millions of people can be manipulated. People, millions of people, are filled with pride while doing things which those same people actually consider stupid, evil, dangerous, painful, and criminal, and they strongly criticize these things—but continue doing them.