Beauty is Life when Life reveals its Holy face.
~Kahlil Gibran
Everything has beauty,
but not everyone sees it.
~Confucius
There is no creature that does not have a radiance. Be it greenness of seed, blossom or beauty, it could not be creation without it. To be a creature is to be brilliant, beautiful, and on fire.
~Hildegard of Bingen
When it comes to beauty, may we have a beholder’s eye; an infinite witness within, and the ability to see the splendor that exists at every turn. The more beauty we perceive, the more open our hearts will become, and that beauty beheld will venture in, until it lights our luminous souls, sings in our gorgeous ears, and dances like brilliant diamonds in our smiling and radiant eyes…Ingrid
The question is not what you look at,
but what you see.
~Henry David Thoreau
If the doors of perception were cleansed,
Everything would appear to man as it is, infinite.
~William Blake
Here is my secret. It’s quite simple:
one sees clearly only with the heart.
Anything essential is invisible to the eyes.
–Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
The Divine Manifestation is ubiquitous,
Only our eyes are not open to it.
~Joseph Campbell
…Viewing the world with the eyes of the heart,
it is illumined by our own inner light…
~Ingrid Goff-Maidoff
…With an eye made quiet
by the power of harmony
and the deep power of joy,
we see into the life of things.
~William Wordsworth
…I realized that what had changed was not outside
in the trees and streams and birds, but inside me.
As the mystics say, I was seeing the world by the light within. Through years of dedicated endeavor, the lamp had been lit in the depths of my consciousness, and all of nature had assumed an indescribable splendor.
~Eknath Eswaren
What is beauty,
if not the light of
a joy filled heart?
~Ingrid Goff-Maidoff
Beauty will come in the dawn
And beauty will come with the sunlight.
Beauty will come to us from everywhere,
Where heaven ends, where the sky ends.
Beauty will surround us.
We will walk in beauty.
~Billy Yellow, Navajo Medicine Man
Though we travel the world over
to find the beautiful,
we must carry it with us
or we find it not.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson
Excerpted from the book, JOY, LIGHT, BEAUTIFUL WISDOM
{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
Ingrid,
I love this thought of yours…
“…Viewing the world with the eyes of the heart,
it is illumined by our own inner light…”
The process you describe here—to see beauty all around—to seek out and focus in on beauty is a profound practice. Much like a gratitude practice, I believe, and quite life changing. We begin to see what is, even, as you say, the small unique beauties in each tender thing, instead of what is missing or unappealing. We look for the good, the light, and, in time, we become (embody) that beauty, that light.
I’m enjoying the book from which you quote, your gift book, “Joy, Light: Beautiful Wisdom.” It is simply stunning and I really encourage any readers here to gift one to themselves. It does elevate one to a higher level of awareness.
Thank you for the gift of these thoughts today….