good quotes

"The capacity to blunder slightly is the real marvel of DNA.  Without this special attribute, we would still be anaerobic bacteria and there would be no more music" 

Lewis Thomas, "Lives of a Cell"

"Our longing for the eternal kindles our imagination to bless.  Regardless of how we configure the eternal, the human heart continues to dream of a state of wholeness, that place where blindness will transform into vision, where damage will be made whole, where the clenched question will open in the house of surprise, where the travails of life's journey will enjoy a homecoming.  To invoke a blessing is to call some of that wholeness upon a person now."

John O'Donohue, "To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings"

"The criteria for success: You are free, you live in the present moment, you are useful to the people around you, and you feel love for all humanity"

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

All around the world people are waking up to a new sense of urgency to discover who they really are beyond the world of form and materialism.  What if the exploration they set out on was one of remembering their true selves rather than one of problem solving or the endless corrections of imagined  inadequacies? Maybe you are just perfect the way you are.  Maybe we have all been heading towards this time of collective remembering and all one really has to do every day is choose what is true and act from that.  Trust your mistakes, they have led you to this moment, where you can manifest a miracle--and where the real you resides.

Francine Marie-Sheppard

www.francinemarie.com

hello@francinemarie.com

Find your voice--be positive

"Stop thinking this is all there is.  Realize that for every ongoing war and religious outrage and environmental devastation and bogus Iraqi attack plan, there are a thousand counter-balancing acts of staggering generosity and humanity and art and beauty happening all over the world, right now, on a breathtaking scale, from flower box to cathedral.  Resist the temptation to drown in fatalism, to shake your head and sigh and just throw in the karmic towel.  Realize that this is the perfect moment to change the energy of the world, to step right up and crank your personal volume; right when it all seems dark and bitter and offensive and acrimonious and conflicted and bilious....there's your opening.

Remember magic!  And, finally, believe you are part of a groundswell, a resistance, a seemingly small but actually very, very large impending karmic overhaul, a great shift, the beginning of something important and potent and unstoppable."

--Mark Morford, from his column in the San Francisco Chronicle newspaper