AOM Meditations: 010521

by Richard Laeton

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One of the stupidest statements of GREED I've ever heard is that 'we can't help others because someone might take advantage of our help'. So millions must starve because one jerk might steal some of the food we are giving. This is the idiotic insanity of GREED and only spoken by greedy selfish people who do not want to help others. (I heard Repugnican Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin say  this on the Senate floor.)

~AOM

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"Want to change the system - 

be revolutionary - 

be kind and give to others- 

help others. 

The system will fall 

if more of us live compassion, empathy and love."

~Unknown

~*~

"If you lead with light and love

Only good will come from it."

~Unknown

by Richard Laeton

AOM Meditations: 121420

Doradus Fighter desktop wallpaper by Ray's Gay Wallpapers

Link to Ray's Gay Wallpappers

I recommend visiting Ray's blog and leave him a comment

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AOM Meditations: 042320

Moonrise; Catalina Island, California

by Leah Berman

landscape photos & looping videos in nature (website link)

Thanks to our Friend, David, for sending us this beautiful art

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“Loneliness is the poverty of self; 

solitude is richness of self.”

~May Sarton

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“A man can be himself only so long as he is alone; and if he does not love solitude, he will not love freedom; for it is only when he is alone that he is really free.”

~Arthur Schopenhauer

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“Guard well your spare moments. They are like uncut diamonds. Discard them and their value will never be known. Improve them and they will become the brightest gems in a useful life.”

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

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“I hold this to be the highest task of a bond between two people: that each should stand guard over the solitude of the other.”

~Rainer Maria Rilke

(Letters to a Young Poet)

AOM Meditations: 022820

Celestial Being by Valerhon

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“As I began to love myself I found that anguish and emotional suffering are only warning signs that I was living against my own truth. Today, I know, this is “AUTHENTICITY”.

As I began to love myself I understood how much it can offend somebody if I try to force my desires on this person, even though I knew the time was not right and the person was not ready for it, and even though this person was me. Today I call it “RESPECT”.

As I began to love myself I stopped craving for a different life, and I could see that everything that surrounded me was inviting me to grow. Today I call it “MATURITY”.

As I began to love myself I understood that at any circumstance, I am in the right place at the right time, and everything happens at the exactly right moment. So I could be calm. Today I call it “SELF-CONFIDENCE”.

As I began to love myself I quit stealing my own time, and I stopped designing huge projects for the future. Today, I only do what brings me joy and happiness, things I love to do and that makes my heart cheer, and I do them in my own way and in my own rhythm. Today I call it “SIMPLICITY”.

As I began to love myself I freed myself of anything that is no good for my health – food, people, things, situations, and everything that drew me down and away from myself. At first I called this attitude a healthy egoism. Today I know it is “LOVE OF ONESELF”.

As I began to love myself I quit trying to always be right, and ever since I was wrong less of the time. Today I discovered that is “MODESTY”.

As I began to love myself I refused to go on living in the past and worrying about the future. Now, I only live for the moment, where everything is happening. Today I live each day, day by day, and I call it “FULFILLMENT”.

As I began to love myself I recognized that my mind can disturb me and it can make me sick. But as I connected it to my heart, my mind became a valuable ally. Today I call this connection “WISDOM OF THE HEART”.

We no longer need to fear arguments, confrontations or any kind of problems with ourselves or others. Even stars collide, and out of their crashing new worlds are born. Today I know “THAT IS LIFE”!”

~Charlie Chaplin

AOM Meditations: 022520

Dreams of Pisces by AOM

~*~

COMING FORTH INTO THE LIGHT

"I was born the day

I thought:

What is?

What was?

And

What if?

I was transformed the day

My ego shattered,

And all the superficial, material

Things that mattered

To me before,

Suddenly ceased

To matter.

I really came into being

The day I no longer cared about

What the world thought of me,

Only on my thoughts for

Changing the world.”

~Suzy Kassem

~*~

“This life is for loving, sharing, learning, smiling, caring, forgiving, laughing, hugging, helping, dancing, wondering, healing, and even more loving. I choose to live life this way. I want to live my life in such a way that when I get out of bed in the morning, the devil says, 'aw shit, he's up!”

~Steve Maraboli

AOM Meditations: 122019

by Rexisky

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“Oh look, yet another Christmas TV special! How touching to have the meaning of Christmas brought to us by cola, fast food, and beer.... Who'd have ever guessed that product consumption, popular entertainment, and spirituality would mix so harmoniously? ”

~Bill Watterson

(The Essential Calvin and Hobbes)

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“Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before! What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas ...perhaps ...means a little bit more!”

~Dr. Seuss

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“Want to keep Christ in Christmas? Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, forgive the guilty, welcome the unwanted, care for the ill, love your enemies, and do unto others as you would have done unto you.”

~Steve Maraboli

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“My idea of Christmas, whether old-fashioned or modern, is very simple: loving others. Come to think of it, why do we have to wait for Christmas to do that?”

~Bob Hope

AOM Meditations: 071219

by Richard Laeton

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"In a typical day that teeters between anxiety and boredom, flow experiences are those flashes of intense living -- bright against the dull. These optimal experiences can happen when we're engaged in work paid and unpaid, in sports, in music, in art."

~Ariel Gore

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“Contrary to what we usually believe, moments like these, the best moments in our lives, are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times—although such experiences can also be enjoyable, if we have worked hard to attain them. The best moments usually occur when a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile. Optimal experience is thus something that we make happen. For a child, it could be placing with trembling fingers the last block on a tower she has built, higher than any she has built so far; for a swimmer, it could be trying to beat his own record; for a violinist, mastering an intricate musical passage. For each person there are thousands of opportunities, challenges to expand ourselves.” 

~Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

(Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience)

AOM Meditations: Failure

Invictus by Cerulean vii 

(deviantArt link)

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"You're making a common mistake," he said. "You're thinking of failure as the enemy of success. But it isn't at all. Failure is a teacher--a harsh one, perhaps, but the best. You say you have a desk full of rejected manuscripts? That's great! Every one of those manuscripts was rejected for a reason. Have you pulled them to pieces looking for that reason?  That's what I have to do when an idea backfires or a sales program fails. You've got to put failure to work for you."

He folded his napkin and put it beside his plate. "You can be discouraged by failure--or you can learn from it. So go ahead and make mistakes. Make all you can. Because, remember, that's where you'll find success. On the far side of failure."

~Arthur Gordon, quoting Thomas J. Watson

~*~

"Failures

'Tis better to have tried in vain,

Sincerely striving for a goal,

Than to have lived upon the plain

An idle and a timid soul.

'Tis better to have fought and spent

Your courage, missing all applause,

Than to have lived in smug content

And never ventured for a cause.

For those who try and fail may be

The founders of a better day;

Though never theirs the victory,

From them shall others learn the way."

~Edgar Guest

~*~

"Fear of failure

So much of life involves risk

and the possibility of failure.

If you are not afraid of failure,

you will take many more risks in your life.

The more risks you take,

the more alive you will feel.

You are afraid of failure

because you fear rejection.

The moment you give up seeking

acceptance from others,

your fear of rejection will disappear.

And with it, the fear of failure."

~Leonard Jacobson

AOM Meditations: 052118

(digital artist unknown)

The Starry Night by Vincent van Gogh and 

The Great Wave Of Kanagawa by Katsushika Hokusai

Thanks to our Friend for sending us this beautiful art

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"When we fully understand the brevity of life, its fleeting joys and unavoidable pains; when we accept the facts that all men and women are approaching an inevitable doom: the consciousness of it should make us more kindly and considerate of each other. This feeling should make men and women use their best efforts to help their fellow travelers on the road, to make the path brighter and easier as we journey on. It should bring a closer kinship, a better understanding, and a deeper sympathy for the wayfarers who must live a common life and die a common death.” 

~Clarence Darrow, 

(The Essential Words and Writings of Clarence Darrow)

~*~

“Spirituality is recognizing and celebrating that we are all inextricably connected to each other by a power greater than all of us, and that our connection to that power and to one another is grounded in love and compassion. Practicing spirituality brings a sense of perspective, meaning and purpose to our lives.”

~Brené Brown

(The Gifts of Imperfection)

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"Every morning, when we wake up, 

we have twenty-four brand-new hours to live. 

What a precious gift! 

We have the capacity to live in a way 

that these twenty-four hours 

will bring peace, joy, and happiness 

to ourselves and others."

~Thich Nhat Hanh

AOM Meditations: 051518

Inside a Meditative Mind by AOM

The outline of the head and ears

is formed by the outline of two violins

The design around Buddha's head is formed

By twenty violins manipulated to form the circle

Look close - You'll see they are violins

~*~

This is a post from a wonderful Tumblr blog

ZEN MISTER (link)

I highly recommend regular visits to his blog

To enrich yourself with his wisdom

A QUESTION:

"Why should we meditate? Why should we be so conscious of our inner voice, thoughts and feelings? Why should we have a spiritual practice? Wouldn’t it be enough to just live, and enjoy every moment as best we can? Could this whole spiritual/ mindfulness movement just be another mask of the ego?"

AN ANSWER:

"Until you break through your ego, everything is a mask of the ego. We meditate to learn how to live with the ego. We learn about our thought habits and how they relate to our feeling habits. If we could just live and enjoy the moment, we wouldn’t need to practice skills that help us do that.

A spiritual practice helps us make sense of our physical existence. As we try to make sense of the world and our place in it, we find that there is a lot we don’t know. What we don’t know is so huge it is overwhelming, so we pretend to know things instead. Spiritual practices often put large chunks of what we don’t know into a smaller, manageable package that we can pretend to understand. The term “ego” explains a lot of mental processes that create the sensation that we are something separate from everything else. Having a word to describe an invisible mask that we wear helps us pretend to understand that such a mask exists.

We meditate to see what is happening. When we are not mediating, our minds do their things and we follow along with whatever beliefs and habits drive us. Meditating gives us a different perspective into our mind and trains our mind to function differently. It changes the structure of our brain to support the different kind of functioning.

A meditation practice is like binoculars for bird watchers, or telescopes for astronomers. It helps us focus on things that are hard to see without it. As with anything we do, our egos will find creative ways to be involved. So we sit, and watch, and see what is happening."

~Zen Mister (link)

Parting Shot: 032818

AOM Meditations: EMERSON (032018)

Thanks to a Friend of AOM for sharing his art with us

~*~

EMERSON

One of my favorite wise men

Quotes from Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Write it on your heart

that every day is the best day in the year.

He is rich who owns the day, 

and no one owns the day

who allows it to be invaded 

with fret and anxiety.

Finish every day and be done with it.

You have done what you could.

Some blunders and absurdities, no doubt crept in.

Forget them as soon as you can, 

tomorrow is a new day;

begin it well and serenely, with too high a spirit

to be cumbered with your old nonsense.

This new day is too dear,

with its hopes and invitations,

to waste a moment on the yesterdays.”

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

(Collected Poems and Translations)

~*~

“What lies behind us and what lies before us 

are tiny matters 

compared to what lies within us.” 

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

~*~

“The glory of friendship 

is not the outstretched hand, 

not the kindly smile, 

nor the joy of companionship; 

it is the spiritual inspiration that comes to one 

when you discover that someone else 

believes in you 

and is willing to trust you with a friendship.” 

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

~*~

“Make your own Bible. 

Select and collect all the words and sentences 

that in all your readings have been to you 

like the blast of a trumpet.” 

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

AOM Meditations: 010218

It is Over There

Thanks to a Friend of AOM 

for creating and sharing his wonderful artwork with us

~*~

2018 Auspices

"There are four things I invite you all to contemplate for the new year in the coming days. They are: a seed to plant, a wave to surf, a wound to heal, a burden to drop. 

By examining these four ideas and setting them as intentions going into January, you will have tangible goals for the somewhat intangible challenges in our lives. 

A seed to plant. No lasting change happens overnight. If we really wish to make a substantial change in the new year, then we must be ready to nurture and grow that change. Start small and let it expand naturally. Contemplate what you would like to plant for your life in the coming year. 

A wave to surf. Not everything is under our control. Sometimes the hardest work is learning to surrender to your limits. What is something you just need to accept this coming year? Far from admitting defeat, this newfound acceptance will become a source of flow for you. Decide what you need to stop fighting and instead start surfing upon it. 

A wound to heal. Has there been a past pain or event that you have been walking with up until now? What are some ways you have avoided healing or even become attached to this wound? Choose a past grievance to forgive, a hangup to get over, or a traumatic event to work on accepting. 

A burden to drop. What “ought” and “should” thoughts have you been carrying around? Examine what identities or ambitions you have been knowingly or unknowingly carrying with you. Which of these hold you back? Which of them actively cause you pain because you are compelled to lug them around? Find one that no longer serves its purpose and drop it." 

~The Lazy Yogi on Tumblr (link)

Photo of the Day: DoMz Designs Deyvis G. Mazonis

DoMz Designs by Deyvis G. Mazonis

Deyvis G. Mazonis has 13 years of experience 

in Contemporary Art, Esculpture, Comics 

and 7 years in Graphic Design (Digital Art).

If you want to see more artworks visit:

https://domzdesigns.deviantart.com/gallery/

Gallery AOM: The Artistry of D Diarte

The Phenomenal Artistry of

 ~ D  D  i  a  r  t  e ~

Visit and View more of their Exquisite Art

DDiarte (link)

Parting Shot: 120417