Soul Paintings - Renate M. Kaufmann (top 100 books to read .txt) 📗

Resource Full


We each have the three energies we need to learn to manage - spirit, mind and body. All three need a good diet - body needs pure food (vegetarian), your mind needs positive ideas and images, and the spirit that you are needs time in silence and stillness to refresh and renew. These are our resources, and each one needs topping up, otherwise we run on empty and dis - ease comes to visit. But diet is just the beginning. Coming soon... exercise!




Spiritual Language


To create the future we desire we need a spiritual language; we must speak from the heart and in the language of the soul - a language of trust, faith and higher values, of inner growth, love and listening.




Love Is The Key


Love is a powerful force. It can take us to great heights and leave us feeling light and airy. Yet it has been the most abused and misused force. Many degraded things pass for love. True love is based on understanding, mutual trust and respect and not simply on transient emotions. Love is being in balance, that is, in harmony with the self, God and each other. Love dwells in the soul. We must allow this love to flow out and around us. Without love, all of life's treasures are locked away from our vision and experiences, for indeed 'love is the key.'




Harmony


Love dissolves hate. Kindness melts cruelty. Compassion calms passion. Cooperation evokes love and when we bow, others bend. This creates harmony.





True Peace


True peace can be experienced only when we stop giving and taking sorrow. In order not to give sorrow we need a clear heart that has no ill feelings and for not taking sorrow we need a big heart that can tolerate and help other souls to get over their weaknesses.




Cultivate Silence


Behind all creation is silence. Silence is the essential condition, the vital ingredient for all creation and all that is created. It is a power in its own right. The artist starts with a blank canvas - silence. The composer places it between and behind the notes. The very ground of your being, out of which comes all your thoughts, is silence. The way to silence is through meditation. When you arrive in your own silence you will know true freedom and real power. Stop, take a minute, and listen to the silence within you today. Then be aware of what disturbs your inner silence. It could be negative thoughts, memories, sensations. And when you are aware, you will know what is draining your creative power, and you will know what needs to change...on the inside!




Attitudes


When you extend pure love to everyone with selfless motivation that is an attitude of kindness. When you send good wishes and pure feelings to those who are in deep sorrow, that is an attitude of mercy. When you see the virtues rather than the weaknesses in people that is an attitude of compassion. When you bless and uplift someone even as they defame you, that is an attitude of forgiveness. When you tolerate a situation and take responsibility as well as give cooperation even when not appreciated, that is an attitude of humility and self-respect. Every second, every moment and every breath of your life is nurtured by attitude.




Want Not


Next time you are waiting for anything, notice what you are wanting! This will be a source of your tension or impatience. All desire has fear built in - fear of not getting or losing, even before your desire is fulfilled. The secret is to want nothing, and then magic happens, for loss and behold, all that you need and more arrives in your life, at the right time, in the right way.





An Oasis of Peace


Deep inside our consciousness is an oasis of peace. This is the molten core of the soul, but it is not hot, it is cool. Not passive, but a source of inner power to fuel our mind and intellect, so that we can create powerful thoughts and make accurate decisions. If you can learn to go to this centre, peace will be your companion, positivity your partner, and you will be able to chill out in one second, anywhere, anytime.





Be At Peace


You spend most of your life running after things, doing things. You forget that being comes before doing. Those who remember this secret make an effort to "be" and discover that when they stop and observe, life helps and brings whatever is needed. Learning to be is learning to be at peace. It is our most fundamental nature.




Think Eternity


Life experiences are like sentences - we are always looking for the full stop, the conclusion. It's OK to end a train of thought, but not thought itself. Thoughts are the beginning of our creation and are here to be creative. Thoughts are like the magic carpet on which the soul rides across eternity - in reality, there are no endings, no conclusions. Rest for the spirit (which is what we are) is when we allow only the current of the purest thoughts to flow through our mind - thoughts which carry good wishes and blessings for ourselves and others. This is not so much going with the flow, as being in the flow, and being refreshed by the flow. It is how we refresh ourselves. For when we have powerful, positive thoughts for and about others, who experiences them first?



Never Fight


Make today a breeze not a battle. Never fight. Nothing is worth fighting for. Wisdom never fights, it waits patiently, speaks positively, releases easily, sees benefit in everything and envisions a future of abundance...knowing that all needs will be met at the right moment, in the right way. If you think life is a struggle you will always be struggling, If you think life is a breeze, your attitudes and actions will convey lightness and easiness. And that's what attracts everything you need, and much more. Make today a breeze not a battle.





Near Contentment


When you can think of yesterday without regret and tomorrow without fear, you are near contentment.



Mind Matters


The most important part of you is your mind (not your brain - the brain is the hardware and the mind creates the software). Care for your mind, make friends with it, always feed it healthy food, engage it in positive activity, exercise it with knowledge and wisdom. Like a garden returns fragrance and beauty according to the care invested, so your mind will repay you with thoughts, ideas and visions of great beauty when tended and invested with care. Your mind is not made of matter but it does matter what you give it and what you create with it. Where your mind goes, you go. What your mind creates becomes your destiny.





Let Go

Just as the bird has to find the courage to let go of the branch in order to fly, so we also must let go of our branches if we are to know the exhilaration of soaring to the highest potential of our life. The branches we hold to are our inner attachments - our beliefs, ideas and memories. And then there are the outer attachments - people, possessions, positions and privileges are a few. But as long as we hold on to them we will live in fear (of letting go and loss) and we will never be free. And just watch those birds, by letting go of one branch they are able to spend the rest of their life alighting on a million other branches, and they enjoy the view from each. Are you flying and soaring in your life, or are you stuck on one branch, cursing others as they fly past. Go on, try it ...let go!

Text: Paintings by Renate M. Kaufmann
Publication Date: 04-20-2009

All Rights Reserved