“The world is weary of me, and I am weary of it.”
—Charles D’Orleans
Category: TRANSCIENCE
-
The hardest thing about life, it seems, is the impossibility of holding on to it
—Grazie Sophia Christie -
For several days Michel kept the photograph beside him on his bedside table. The mysteries of time were banal, he told himself, this was the way of the world: youthful optimism fades, and happiness and confidence evaporate. He lay on his Bultex mattress, struggling to come to terms with the transience of life.
The Elementary Particles
Michel Houellebecq -
“Deep inside, each man feels—and believes—himself to be immortal, even if he knows he will perish the next moment. We can understand everything, admit everything, realize everything, except our death, even when we “ponder it unremittingly and even when we are resigned to it.”
—E. M. Cioran, The Trouble with Being Born
-
In life we pass through stages. The heart, thoughts, feelings and spirit all pass through them. Each stage has its impact and effect. It has a duration of time beyond which it does not go.
Happy is the one who looks continually with hope for the next stage.
Happy is the one whom difficulties do not send to the other extreme. For a difficulty is only a stage in life and the solution of that difficulty is yet another stage.
Live with faith that there will be a solution and rejoice as you look forward to what cannot be seen.
The world itself is only a stage in life that will arrive at another stage, that of eternity.
—H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Experiences in Life
-
Fr. Bishoy was away from the monastery for a short time, and upon his return he was told a monk had passed away. In the world, even though a person who has died is enjoying the sights and splendor of Paradise, people on earth tend to ignore that and simply bemoan their death. For monastics, however, death is not treated in the usual manner; they regard it as simply leaving the monastery and returning home to Paradise. Hence, upon hearing that his friend had died, Fr. Bishoy simply said, “Oh what a shame, I wish I could have said goodbye before he left.” But that was it: no tears, no big deal.
Orthodox Afterlife
John Habib -
What is this whole world, with all its continents, its past, present, and future? What does it amount to? Nothing! I resonate with a statement from one scholar who once said: “When I was a child I saw myself in comparison to the world as a small speck of sand on an endless beach of an endless ocean.” So what if someone lives in any given city within a specific country, which is part of a specific continent, which in turn is a small part of planet Earth, itself just one of innumerable planets? What would that mean? It is nothing. What does this person turn out to be? He says: “When I was a child, I saw myself as a small speck of sand on an endless beach of an endless ocean, but now I know that I am the endless ocean and the whole world is a small speck of sand on my beach.”
One who sits to think of the world finds that it is frivolous. If you asked him, “What is the world?” he would say, “A small speck of sand on my beach.” And if you asked, “What is your endless beach?” he would reply, “This is the beach leading to eternity.” If you see yourself as the image and likeness of God, then what does this world amount to? With all its noise, struggles, desires, and status, what does the world amount to? Nothing. This is a person’s valuation of the world.
—H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Monastic Treasures for All of Us
SO GOOD QUOTES 