davetown - Tumblr blog

[davetown]

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.

— Rumi

[davetown]

Don’t try to picture everything bad that could possibly happen. Stick with the situation at hand and ask, ‘Why is this so unbearable? Why can’t I endure it?’ You’ll be embarrassed to answer. Then remind yourself that past and future have no power over you. Only the present.

Marcus Aurelius (121 CE - 180 CE) Roman Emperor and Stoic

(via panatmansam)

[davetown]

non scholae, sed vitae discendum est 

(We must learn not for school but for life)

[davetown]

[davetown]

Photo Photos Spider Web

[davetown]

Everywhere, people in governments are running around, stomping big black boots in patterns dictated by that Ministry of Silly Walks, making great huffs and puffs about the evils of the rival and the glories of the homeland.

Bob Waldrop

[davetown]

For what prevents us from saying that the happy life is to have a mind that is free, lofty, fearless and steadfast - a mind that is placed beyond the reach of fear, beyond the reach of desire, that counts virtue the only good, baseness the only evil, and all else but a worthless mass of things, which come and go without increasing or diminishing the highest good, and neither subtract any part from the happy life nor add any part to it? A man thus grounded must, whether he wills or not, necessarily be attended by constant cheerfulness and a joy that is deep and issues from deep within, since he finds delight in his own resources, and desires no joys greater than his inner joys.

 Seneca, The Stoic Philosophy of Seneca: Essays and Letters

[davetown]

Understanding someone’s suffering is the best gift you can give another person. Understanding is love’s other name. If you don’t understand, you can’t love

Thich Nhat Hahn

[davetown]

We were all created in His image, and yet we were each created different and unique. No two people are alike. No hearts beat to the same rhythm. If God had wanted everyone to be the same, He would have made it so. Therefore, disrespecting differences and imposing your thoughts on others is an amount to disrespecting God’s holy scheme.

Shams Tabrizi  (via thelittlephilosopher)

[davetown]

Good thing I’m not superstitious.

[davetown]

The war on drugs is built on the idea that the chemicals are the problem. Once you realize that disconnection and isolation are the drivers of addiction, you suddenly realize that what we do actually makes addiction worse. We take addicts who are addicted because they’re isolated and suffering, isolate them in prison cells and make it impossible for them to get jobs when they leave, and inflict more pain and suffering on them. As the doctor from Vancouver said to me, if you wanted to create a system that would make addiction worse, you would create the system that we have.

Everything you know about drug addiction is wrong  (via rebirthofalibra)

[davetown]

Snow Day II.

[davetown]

Snow day.

[davetown]

Don’t move a child roughly if you can move her gently; Don’t move her gently if you can tell her to move; Don’t tell her if you can ask her.

Alfie Kohn

(from the book Punished By Rewards)

[davetown]

Christmas Music For People Who Hate Christmas Music

[davetown]

Thanksgiving in a Box

Thanksgiving came in a box this year. It was down at the Piggly Wiggly, Stacked with all the other Thanksgiving boxes, Beside a Christmas display.

There were turkey sandwiches covered with Corrugated guaranteed stay-fresh wrap And a bottle of cranberry soda As the turkey self-basted In the solid-state microwave For eleven minutes.

It was 80 degrees outside As the the Indians and Pilgrims Played soccer in the front yard.

What did our forefathers do without styrofoam?

-- Randy Harris

[davetown]

Rarely, if ever, does an empathic response start with “at least…”

Brené Brown