With a new year comes a new expression.

Thought for the day will cease and will be replaced by Words For The Week. These will posted once a week on Monday mornings.

Thank you for reading and expressing your appreciation on Thought for the day.

“Lost in awe at the beauty around me, I must have slipped into a state of heightened awareness. It is hard – impossible really – to put into words the moment of truth that suddenly came upon me then. Even the mystics are unable to describe their brief flashes of spiritual ecstasy. It seemed to me, as I struggled afterward to recall the experience, the self was utterly absent: I and the chimpanzees, the earth and trees and air, seemed to merge, to become one with the spirit power of life itself. The air was filled with a feathered symphony, the evensong of birds. I heard new frequencies in their music and also in singing insects’ voices – notes so high and sweet I was amazed. Never had I been so intensely aware of the shape, the color of the individual leaves, the varied patterns of the veins that made each one unique. Scents were clear as well, easily identifiable: fermenting, overripe fruit; waterlogged earth; cold, wet bark; the damp odor of chimpanzee hair, and yes, my own too. And the aromatic scent of young, crushed leaves was almost overpowering.

That afternoon, it had been as though an unseen hand had drawn back a curtain and, for the briefest moment, I had seen through such a window. In a flash of “outsight” I had known timelessness and quiet ecstasy, sensed a truth of which mainstream science is merely a small fraction. And I knew that the revelation would be with me for the rest of my life, imperfectly remembered yet always within. A source of strength on which I could draw when life seemed harsh or cruel or desperate.”

Jane Goodall (1934 – 2025), primatologist and environmental activist

“Where are you now, my good friend? Are you out in the field, in the forest, on the mountain, in a military camp, in a factory, at your desk, in a hospital, in prison? Regardless of where you are, let us breathe in and out together and allow the sun of awareness to enter. Let us begin with this breath and this awareness. Whether life is an illusion, a dream, or a wondrous reality depends on our insight and our mindfulness. Awakening is a miracle. The darkness in a totally dark room will disappear the moment the light is switched on. In the same way, the second the sun of awareness begins to shine, life will reveal itself as a miraculous reality.”

From Peace Is This Moment: Mindful Reflections for Daily Practice by Thich Nhat Hanh

“”In all things we should try to make ourselves be as grateful as possible. For gratitude is a good thing for ourselves, in a manner in which justice, commonly held to belong to others, is not. Gratitude pays itself back in large measure.” Seneca, Moral Letters, 81.19

Think of all the things you can be grateful for today. That you are alive, that you live in a time primarily of peace, that you have enough health and leisure to read this.. What of the little things? The person who smiled at you, the woman who held the door open, that song you like on the radio, the pleasant weather.
Gratitude is infectious. Its positivity is radiant.
Even if today was your last day on earth – if you knew in advance that it was going to end in a few short hours – would there still be plenty to be grateful for? How much better would your life be if you kicked off every day like that? If you let it carry through from morning to night and touch every part of your life?”

From The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman

“Real rest feels like every cell is thanking you for taking care of you. It’s calm, not full of checklists and chores. It’s simple: not multitasking; not fixing broken things.”

Jennifer Williamson, writer

“O noble Love, do in me Your holy will in all things
My life and my death belong to you.
May you make of me one of those spirits tuned to perfect praise
Who let God be God in silence.”

Hadewijch of Antwerp, 13th century mystic

“If you have patience, then you’ll also have love. Patience leads to love. If you forcefully open the petals of a bud, you won’t be able to enjoy its beauty and fragrance. Only when it blossoms by following its natural course, will the beauty and fragrance of a flower unfold.”

Sri Mata Amritanandamayi Devi, known as Amma

Christmas Day

“It is in the simplicity of your ordinary walk that you have to find the secret, which is hidden from so many, of something great and new: love.”

Josemaría Escrivá de Balaguer y Albás (1902 – 1975)

“Lord, may we all love Your creation-
All the earth and every grain of sand in it.
May we love every leaf, every ray of Your light.
For we acknowledge to You that all life is
Like an ocean, all is flowing and blending
And that to withhold any measure of
Love from anything in Your universe
Is to withhold the same measure from You.”

Fyodor Dostoyevsky, novelist (1821 – 1881)

“Is there anything that can take from you the hope of being someday in the God you are helping to create in each attentive act of love?

Please celebrate this Christmas with the earnest faith that He may need this very anguish of yours in order to begin. These very days that are such a trial for you may well be the time when everything in you is working at Him, as once you so urgently did as a child. Be patient and without resentment, and know that the least we can do is make His Becoming no more difficult than Earth makes it for spring when it wants to arrive. Be comforted and be glad.”

From Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke, Rome, 23 December 1903