2 Great Posts from fb Friends. I Needed Them Both!

Luck is not chance –
It’s toil –
Fortune’s expensive smile
Is earned.
– Emily Dickinson
Training the mind is just that – a matter of training.

It’s a little like tennis. Championship tennis players have amazing skills and can direct the ball wherever they like: along the sideline two feet from the baseline, precisely. But the untrained player is going to find that most of his or her strokes will be out-of-bounds. This is because he or she hasn’t learned tennis.

In tennis, we understand perfectly that the person who hasn’t practiced is not going to enter championship play at Wimbledon and win the prize. I have never heard of anybody talking about instant mastery of tennis. So why do we think that love will be instant, or spiritual growth will be instant?

All of this calls for a lot of hard work. If we start today with all the zeal and the enthusiasm we are capable of, we can undertake this greatest of adventures – training the mind. Then, like the tennis pro, we can direct our thoughts just as we like: over the net and just inside the court.
-- Eknath Easwaran
Thought for the day
Blue Mountain Center of Meditation & Nilgiri Press

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Whatever happens to you, don’t fall in despair. Even if all the doors are closed, a secret path will be there for you that no one knows. You can’t see it yet but so many paradises are at the end of this path. Be grateful! It is easy to thank after obtaining what you want, thank before having what you want.

~ ~Shams Tabrizi ♥ image: Saul Landell