“I always have a comfortable feeling that nothing is impossible if one applies a certain amount of energy in the right direction.”

From Around the World in 72 Days by Nellie Bly, journalist and adventurer (1865 – 1922), born on this day

“They say love is the best investment; the more you give, the more you get in return.”

Audrey Hepburn (1929 – 1993), born on this day

“There is only one page left to write on. I will fill it with words of only one syllable. I love. I have loved. I will love.”

From I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith (1896 – 1990), born on this day

“I prayed for change, so I changed my mind.
I prayed for guidance and learned to trust myself.
I prayed for happiness and realized I am not my ego.
I prayed for peace and learned to accept others unconditionally.
I prayed for abundance and realized my doubt kept it out.
I prayed for wealth and realized it is my health.
I prayed for a miracle and realized I am the miracle.
I prayed for a soul mate and realized I am the One.
I prayed for love and realized it’s always knocking, but I have to allow it in.”

Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī (1207 – 1273)

Beltane

“Beltain is a celebration of the potency of the Earth and the forces of Nature. This is the beginning of the most active part of the year and the beginning of Summer. All of life is bursting with fertility, sap is rising, birdsong fills the air and growth is everywhere..

Ask yourself what you wish to give energy to. Where will you put your focus? What can you change for the better? What actions can you make that will help the spread of goodwill and Love in the world? All too soon this highly fertile time will be spent, so make the most of its raw energy for initiating plans and visions. Everything you do now will bring you closer to your goals, as the expansive energy of the moment carries you along.”

From Earth Wisdom by Glennie Kindred

“In an extreme view, the world can be seen as only connections, nothing else. We think of a dictionary as the repository of meaning, but it defines words only in terms of other words. I liked the idea that a piece of information is really defined only by what it’s related to, and how it’s related. There really is little else to meaning. The structure is everything. There are billions of neurons in our brains, but what are neurons? Just cells. The brain has no knowledge until connections are made between neurons. All that we know, all that we are, comes from the way our neurons are connected.”

From Weaving the Web by Tim Berners-Lee, Unitarian-Universalist, CERN scientist and inventor of the World Wide Web, launched in the public domain on this day in 1989

“What is music to you? What would you be without music? Music is everything. Nature is music (cicadas in the tropical night). The sea is music, the wind is music. The rain drumming on the roof and the storm raging in the sky are music. Music is the oldest entity. The scope of music is immense and infinite. It is the ‘esperanto’ of the world.”

Duke Ellington, Jazz musician (1899 – 1974), born on this day

“There have been times, lately, when I dearly wished that I could change the past. Well, I can’t, but I can change the present, so that when it becomes the past it will turn out to be a past worth having.”

From I Shall Wear Midnight by Terry Pratchett (1948 – 2015), born on this day

Art: Past and Present No. 2: Prayer (1858) by Augustus Egg

“Be at peace with your own soul, then heaven and earth will be at peace with you. Enter eagerly into the treasure house that is within you, and you will see the things that are in heaven, for there is but one single entry to them both.”

St. Isaac the Syrian

“There is many a monster who wears the form of a man;
it is better of the two to have the heart of a man and the form of a monster. ”

Beauty and the Beast by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont (1711 – 1780), born on this day

Image by Jennie Harbour