“Old habit of mind is one of the toughest things to get away from in the world.”
-Mark Twain (aka Samuel Clemens (1835-1910), in A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur’s Court, Ch. 22: The Holy Fountain
“Old habit of mind is one of the toughest things to get away from in the world.”
-Mark Twain (aka Samuel Clemens (1835-1910), in A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur’s Court, Ch. 22: The Holy Fountain
#17: "Keep your desk and workspace bare. Treat every object as an imposition upon your attention, because it is. A workspace is not a place for storing things. It is a place for accomplishing things."
“I'm learning to surrender both to the grueling work and to the isolation. When I need centering, I sing a favourite hymn, "Spirit of God descend upon my heart," which also allows me to eavesdrop on my spirit and pick up on its mumblings.”
-Joan Anderson, in A Year By The Sea, p.131
“Our time is our life, and our attention is the doorway to our hearts.”
-John Mark Comer in The Ruthless Elimination Of Hurry: How to Stay Emotionally Healthy and Spiritually Alive in the Chaos of the Modern World
“My mind wanders to a friend who trained monks in ritualization. “When they started Communion,” she explained, “they would pick up the chalice without giving it any thought, purely an object to be used, not treated as holy. What they needed to learn was the importance of developing a relationship with liturgical things and become involved with them. Only then would the ceremony have meaning.”
Listening to her, I couldn't help but imagine what my world might be like if I looked at the human beings I was closest to as holy and treated them with that same sense of respect.”
-Joan Anderson, in A Year By The Sea, p. 73-74
A perspective pointer toward gratitude for added benefits of getting out of bed on chilly winter mornings to go to work (besides the glorious sunrise bonus!):
“My grandmother used to say, “As the hands toil, so the spirit is raised above the troubled motions of the mind.”
-Joan Anderson, in A Year By The Sea, p. 69
“Each first of January that we arrive at is an imaginary milestone — at once a resting place for thought and meditation, and a starting place for fresh exertion in the performance of our journey. The man who does not at least propose to himself to be better this year than he was last must be either very good or very bad indeed.”
- Charles Lamb (1775-1834), as quoted by Joan Anderson, in A Year By The Sea, p.82