Human Nature is Life's Greatest Riddle

Life is a riddle.
We cannot expect to understand life's twists and turns as they occur each day,
and we greatly frustrate ourselves in the futile attempt.
Be content to appreciate that there is an overarching purpose,
though that purpose be known only to God, and to history.
Choose service. Choose joy. Accept the unknowing.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

To be surprised, to wonder, is to begin to understand.
- Jose Ortega Y Gasset

We learn more by looking for the answer
to a question and not finding it
than we do from learning the answer itself.
- Lloyd Alexander

True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize
how little we understand about life,
ourselves, and the world around us.
- Socrates

Half of everything you were ever taught is wrong;
the question is which half.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The book of life is filled with incoherent riddles.
(and human nature is perhaps life's greatest riddle.)
Life's true lessons are inscribed in a corner of the margin.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Read more about The Book of Life

Further reading:  The Nature of Learning

Lessons from Life

Beyond Understanding
      

Aspiration AND Pragmatism

Remember, no matter where you go, there you are.
- Confucius

If you do not know where you come from, then you don't know where you are,
and if you don't know where you are, then you don't know where you're going.
And if you don't know where you're going, you're probably going wrong.
- Terry Pratchett

When you jump for joy, beware that no one
moves the ground from beneath your feet.
- Stanislaw Jerszy Lec

The more one does and sees and feels, the more one is able to do,
and the more genuine may be one's appreciation
of fundamental things like home,
and love, and understanding companionship.
- Amelia Earhart

Keep your feet firmly planted on the ground
as you reach for the stars.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Honor Your Roots

Perspective on Tradition: An Open Mind

A Strong Foundation

Fulfill Your Dreams
    

Be a Thankful Receiver

Everything is a miracle,
not just the beautiful and lovely things.
- Anonymous

There can be no joy without gratitude.
- Richard Paul Evans

Today I offer a prayer of forgiveness:
forgive the pettiness of my ingratitude...
the absence of profound thankfulness.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

Gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us to encounter
everyday epiphanies, those transcendent moments of awe
that change forever how we experience life and the world.
- John Milton

Look at everything as though you were seeing it
either for the first or last time.
Then your time on earth will be filled with glory.
- Betty Smith

Today's affirmation:
I Receive ALL of Life with Thanksgiving -
I have gratitude for EVERYTHING
that has ever occurred to bring me to this moment.
I give thanks for the joys and the sufferings,
the moments of peace and the flashes of anger,
the compassion and the indifference,
the roar of my courage and the cold sweat of my fear.
I accept gratefully the entirety of my past and my present life.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading:; Yes, YOU Can Be Happy

Gratitude for All of Life

Tending the Garden of Our Lives
    

Seek to Understand More and to Fear Less

Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood.
Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.
- Marie Curie

Seek To Understand, Rather Than To Fear.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Who never walks save where he sees
men's tracks, makes no discoveries.
- J. G. Holland

No pessimist ever discovered the secret of the stars,
or sailed to an uncharted land,
or opened a new doorway for the human spirit.
- Helen Keller

Seeds of great discoveries are constantly floating around us,
but they only take root in minds well prepared to receive them.
- Joseph Henry

Preparation and Awareness Beget Innovation.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: The Darkest Night
 
Choose To Be Fearless

From Your Own Darkness

Seek the Truth
      

Uncertain Times Can Be Fertile Ground for Social Progress

Difficulties are meant to rouse, not discourage.
The human spirit is to grow strong by conflict.
- William Ellery Channing

There is a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in.
- Leonard Cohen

If life were predictable
it would cease to be life,
and be without flavor.
- Eleanor Roosevelt

Our Lives Expand in Uncertain Times.
If our world were as predictable as we believe it should be,
we would never be inspired to be creative or adventurous.
Let us give thanks that our world is designed to challenge us
and to bring out the best of the human spirit.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The only thing that makes life possible
is permanent, intolerable uncertainty;
not knowing what comes next.
- Ursula K. Le Guin

Further reading: An Uncertain World

Progress of the Human Mind

Never Try To Stop The Music

Predictable?

Is Now a Time to be Reasonable?

Box of Chocolates
      

Welcome the Unexpected - Cherish Adventure

Faith means living with uncertainty -
feeling your way through life,
letting your heart guide you like a lantern in the dark.
- Dan Millman

Mama always said life was like a box of chocolates.
You never know what you're gonna get.
- the movie Forrest Gump

The movie character Forrest Gump describing life
as being "like a box of chocolates,"
is such a positive upbeat way of
characterizing the uncertainty of life.
I have no idea what life will give me next,
but whatever it is, it will be sweet.

Welcome the Unexpected.
Most people think of surprises as being something unpleasant.
Consider moving past this instinctive fear of the unknown
and welcoming the unexpected.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Cherish the uncertainty of life's adventures.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Sometimes the things you really want sneak in the back door. Notice.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

Further reading: The Edge of All We Know

Finding A Way

Appreciate the Unexpected

Addicted to safety?
     

In the midst of difficulty lies opportunity

Not what we experience,
but how we perceive what we experience,
determines our fate.
- Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach

Stay Alert, and doors will open.
You can never know when and where a magic door will open for you,
so pay attention, stay watchful, and never give up hope.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Every problem has in it the seeds of its own solution.
If you don't have any problems, you don't get any seeds.
- Norman Vincent Peale

In the midst of difficulty lies opportunity.
- Albert Einstein

Further reading: Pay Attention

The Door Will Be Opened To You

What We Perceive