Catherine of Aragon said,"None get to God but through trouble."



In his memoir What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, the Japanese writer Haruki Murakami reflects on why runners spend so much time and energy on long distance runs: "It’s precisely because of the pain, precisely because we want to overcome that pain, that we can get a feeling, through this process, of really being alive."



Mark Twain said that if he’d had more time, he would have said less.

Michelangelo said that his David was in the stone clamoring to be freed.



You can own something and not possess it.

You can possess something and not own it.



David Bayles and Ted Orland in their book Art and Fear tell the story of a ceramics teacher who divided the class into two groups—one group would be graded on how much they created in the designated time, while the other group would be graded on the quality of the one work they made.

In the end, it was the "quantity" group that ended up producing the works of most quality.

They conclude "that while the ‘quantity’ group was busy churning out piles of work—and learning from their mistakes—the ‘quality’ group had sat theorizing about perfection, and in the end had little more to show for their efforts than grandiose theories and a pile of dead clay."



Now it’s absolutely necessary for us to own and name and claim and make amends for our failures and mistakes and sins and wrongs where others are concerned.

But to stop there is tragic.

It isn’t just a failure, a mistake, a sin, a wrong . . .

It’s also an opportunity

to grow, expand, evolve, learn.




The Franciscan priest Richard Rohr points out that Native Americans have a tradition of leaving a blemish in one corner of the rug they are weaving because they believe that’s where the spirit enters.




I want desperately for things to go "how they’re supposed to." Which is another way of saying "how I want them to," which is another way of saying "according to my plan."



It’s in that place that we’re reminded that true life comes when we’re willing to admit that we’ve reached the end of ourselves, we’ve given up, we’ve let go, we’re willing to die to all of our desires to figure it out and be in control.

We lose our life, only to find it.