Quotes about Growth

This needed work is indeed "spiritual warfare," as the desert monks called it, since it takes conscious and sustained struggle to be aware of the shadow self—which only takes ever more subtle disguises the "holier" you get.

Far too many people just keep doing repair work on the container itself and never "throw their nets into the deep" (John 21:6)

So God, life, and destiny have to loosen the loyal soldier's grasp on your soul, which up to now has felt like the only "you" that you know and the only authority that there is. Our loyal solider normally begins to be discharged somewhere between the ages of thirty-five and fifty-five, if it happens at all; before that it is usually mere rebellion or iconoclasm.

but I do believe that the only way out of deep sadness is to go with it and through it.

It takes uncommon humility to carry both the dark and the light side of things. The only true perfection available to humans is the honest acceptance of our imperfection.

Once you wake up, as Jesus and Pope Francis have, you know that cleaning up is a constant process that comes on different timetables for different people, around many different issues, and for very different motivations. This is why love and growth demand discernment, not enforcement.

And to be fully honest, I think your heart needs to be broken, and broken open, at least once to have a heart at all or to have a heart for others.

Ken Wilber described the later stages of life well when he said that the classic spiritual journey always begins elitist and ends egalitarian. Always!

Eric Hoffer, the street philosopher, put it this way: "In times of great change [which is always], learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped for a world that no longer exists.

Falling upward is a "secret" of the soul, known not by thinking about it or proving it but only by risking it—at least once.

Owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we will ever do.

the little boy couldn't feel and admit the pain until he was sufficiently sure that love was there.