This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Survival lies in sanity, and sanity lies in paying attention...the capacity for delight is the gift of paying attention.
Truth seeth God, and Wisdom beholdeth God, and of these two cometh the third: that is, a holy marvellous delight in God; which is Love. Where Truth and Wisdom are verily, there is Love verily, coming of them both. And all of God’s making: for He is endless sovereign Truth, endless sovereign Wisdom, endless sovereign Love, unmade; and man’s Soul is a creature in God which hath the same properties made, and evermore it doeth that it was made for: it seeth God, it beholdeth God, and it loveth God. Whereof God enjoyeth in the creature; and the creature in God, endlessly marvelling.
Chögyam Trungpa, fully Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche
Delight in itself is the approach of sanity. Delight is to open our eyes to the reality of the situation rather than siding with this or that point of view.
Reality |
From authors whom I read more than once I learn to value the weight of words and to delight in their meter and cadence -- in Gibbon's polyphonic counterpoint and Guedalla's command of the subjunctive, in Mailer's hyperbole and Dillard's similes, in Twain's invectives and burlesques with which he set the torch of his ferocious wit to the hospitality tents of the world's colossal humbug . . . I know no other way out of what is both the maze of the eternal present and the prison of the self except with a string of words.
Eternal | Hospitality | Present | Prison | Self | Wit | Words | Learn | Value |
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton, fully Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, Lord Lytton
It is noticeable how intuitively in age we go back with strange fondness to all that is fresh in the earliest dawn of youth. If we never cared for little children before, we delight to see them roll in the grass over which we hobble on crutches. The grandsire turns wearily from his middle-aged, care-worn son, to listen with infant laugh to the prattle of an infant grandchild. It is the old who plant young trees; it is the old who are most saddened by the autumn, and feel most delight in the returning spring.
Lucretius, fully Titus Lucretius Carus NULL
We are each of us angels with only one wing, and we can only fly by embracing one another.
Angels |
Marcus Aurelius, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus
Just that you do the right thing. The rest doesn't matter. Cold or warm. Tired or well-rested. Despised or honored. Dying...or busy with other assignments. Because dying, too, is one of our assignments in life. There as well: "To do what needs doing." Look inward. Don't let the true nature of anything elude you. Before long, all existing things will be transformed, to rise like smoke (assuming all things become one), or be dispersed in fragments...to move from one unselfish act to another with God in mind. Only there, delight and stillness...when jarred, unavoidably, by circumstances, revert at once to yourself, and don't lose the rhythm more than you can help. You'll have a better grasp of the harmony if you keep going back to it.
Better | God | Harmony | Nature | Rest | Right | Will | God |
Martin Tupper, fully Martin Farquhar Tupper
A babe in the house is a well-spring of pleasure, a messenger of peace and love, a resting place for innocence on earth, a link between angels and men.
Maya Angelou, born Marguerite Annie Johnson
We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.
May Sarton, pen name of Eleanore Marie Sarton
Whether success or failure: the truth of a life really has little to do with its quality. The quality of life is in proportion, always, to the capacity for delight. The capacity for delight is the gift of paying attention.
Maya Angelou, born Marguerite Annie Johnson
Touched by an Angel. We, unaccustomed to courage exiles from delight live coiled in shells of loneliness until love leaves its high holy temple and comes into our sight to liberate us into life. Love arrives and in its train come ecstasies old memories of pleasure ancient histories of pain. Yet if we are bold, love strikes away the chains of fear from our souls. We are weaned from our timidity In the flush of love's light we dare be brave And suddenly we see that love costs all we are and will ever be. Yet it is only love which sets us free.
Courage | Fear | Light | Loneliness | Love | Pleasure | Will |
Meister Eckhart, formally Meister von Hochheim
A question arises regarding the angels who dwell with us, serve us and protect us, whether their joys are equal to those of the angels in heaven, or whether they are diminished by the fact that they protect and serve us. No, they are certainly not; for the work of the angels is the will of God, and the will of God is the work of the angels; their service to us does not hinder their joy nor their working. If God told an angel to go to a tree and pluck caterpillars off it, the angel would be quite ready to do so, and it would be his happiness, if it were the will of God.
Angels | God | Joy | Question | Service | Will | Work | God |
Mencius, born Meng Ke or Ko NULL
There is no greater delight than to be conscious of sincerity on self-examination.
Mencius, born Meng Ke or Ko NULL
All things are already complete in us. There is no greater delight than to be conscious of right within us. If one strives to treat others as he would be treated by them, he shall not fail to come near the perfect life.
Right |
Meister Eckhart, formally Meister von Hochheim
Wisdom consists in doing the next think you have to do, doing it with your whole heart, and finding delight in doing it.
Think |
Meher Baba, born Merwan Sheriar Irani
It is better to deny God, than to defy God. Sometimes our weakness is considered strength, and we take delight in borrowed greatness. To profess to be a lover of God and then to be dishonest to God, to the world and to himself, is unparalleled hypocrisy. Difficulties give us the opportunity to prove our greatness by overcoming them.
Better | God | Greatness | Opportunity | Weakness | World | God |
Meher Baba, born Merwan Sheriar Irani
The entire process of withdrawing consciousness from the universe and becoming conscious of the Self is accompanied by an increasing control of all the vehicles of consciousness. Such control is made possible by the vivification and activisation of unused centres of control; and the functioning of new centres brings, in its train, a number of occult powers. These new powers are commonly known as siddhis; and they can come before the aspirant has become spiritually perfect. In fact, egoism can flourish through the acquisition of such occult powers ; and the aspirant may not only take delight in possessing them, but might actually use them for mundane purposes, from which he has not necessarily freed himself. Siddhis are, therefore, rightly regarded as obstacles in the attainment of realization.
Attainment | Consciousness | Control | Self | Universe |
The Means of obtaining Peace Internal, is not the delight of Sense nor Spiritual Consolation, but the denying of Self-love
Milarepa, fully Jetsun Milarepa NULL
I am Milarepa, the yogi from Tibet. There is a great purpose to not having possessions." He then explained this in a spiritual song: "I have no desire for wealth or possessions, and so I have nothing. I do not experience the initial suffering of having to accumulate possessions, the intermediate suffering of having to guard and keep up possessions, nor the final suffering of loosing the possessions. This is a wonderful thing. I have no desire for friends or relations. I do not experience the initial suffering of forming an attachment, the intermediate suffering of having disagreements with friends and family, nor the final suffering of parting with them. Therefore it is good to be without friends and relations. I have no desire for pleasant conversation. I do not experience the initial suffering of beginning conversation, the intermediate suffering of wondering whether to continue the conversation, nor the final suffering of the conversation deteriorating. Therefore I do not delight in pleasant conversation. I have no desire for a home land and have no fixed residence. I do not experience the initial suffering of partiality of thinking that 'this is my land and that place isn't.' I do not experience the intermediate suffering of yearning for my land. And I do not experience the final suffering of having to protect my land. Therefore I do not have a fixed abode.
Beginning | Conversation | Desire | Experience | Good | Land | Partiality | Purpose | Purpose | Suffering | Thinking | Wealth | Parting | Friends |
Mother Teresa, born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu NULL
God made the world for the delight of human beings-- if we could see His goodness everywhere, His concern for us, His awareness of our needs: the phone call we've waited for, the ride we are offered, the letter in the mail, just the little things He does for us throughout the day. As we remember and notice His love for us, we just begin to fall in love with Him because He is so busy with us -- you just can't resist Him. I believe there's no such thing as luck in life, it's God's love, it's His.
Awareness | Little | Love | Luck | World | Luck | Awareness |