At this very moment, all of us are living through the present moment, but what are we making of it as we do so? Are we even aware of its passing? Are we making this time count? So many things are running through my mind when I think along this line and realize just how much I leave at the end of the end that I do not complete. I know I have my own piece of garden, a corner of the universe that is mine to transform. My own corner of the universe is my own life—my relationships, my home, my friends and my family. Everything going on in my life is an opportunity for me to share love.

John Welwood once said , ” Magic is a sudden opening of the mind to the wonder of existence. It is a sense that there is much more to life than we usually recognize; that we do not have to be confined by the limited views that our family, our society, or our own habitual thoughts impose on us; that life contains many dimensions, depths, textures, and meanings extending far beyond our familiar beliefs and concepts.”

We also need to think about a few lessons in life we need to learn. I wish you the ability and the openness to learn always, all through life. We are fortunate to be a part of a world that is full of lessons, minute after minute, day after day, and if we can learn from these lessons, we can become people of love and hope and peace. As long as we always remember that there is much to learn and that we cannot predict who will be our most important teachers, we will continue to learn.

May you always find the important lessons that are in each occurrence in our lives, the lessons that help us to grow into the people we were meant to be. Nothing happens to us or with us that doesn’t have some sort of lesson to take from it, even if that lesson is sometimes just reassurance that we’re moving in the right direction. Many people choose to ignore the lessons, feeling that they already know what they need to know, or they don’t even see them to begin with, for their eyes and minds and hearts are closed to growth and change.

I wish you the willingness to change, for many of life’s lessons call on us to change a way of doing or thinking that we’ve been holding on to for a very long time, and that may be more destructive to us than helpful. Learning is not very useful if we don’t allow the lessons to have an effect on us, and we can allow that to happen only if we’re open to the possibility that a change is necessary. How often have we seen people who have held on to their way of doing things even when it’s very clear to us that they’re hurting themselves and others by doing so? Just having the willingness to consider change is one of the greatest blessings that I can wish you.

Now for more quotes.

They always say time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself.
Andy Warhol (1928 - 1987), The Philosophy of Andy Warhol

Only I can change my life. No one can do it for me.
Carol Burnett (1936 - )

Change is the constant, the signal for rebirth, the egg of the phoenix.
Christina Baldwin

We all have big changes in our lives that are more or less a second chance.
Harrison Ford (1942 - ), quoted by Garry Jenkins in ‘Harrison Ford: Imperfect Hero’

Things do not change; we change.
Henry David Thoreau (1817 - 1862), Walden (1970)

Nothing endures but change.
Heraclitus (540 BC - 480 BC), from Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers

It’s not that some people have willpower and some don’t. It’s that some people are ready to change and others are not.
James Gordon, M.D.

Affirmations are like prescriptions for certain aspects of yourself you want to change.
Jerry Frankhauser

Change has a considerable psychological impact on the human mind. To the fearful it is threatening because it means that things may get worse. To the hopeful it is encouraging because things may get better. To the confident it is inspiring because the challenge exists to make things better.
King Whitney Jr.

We did not change as we grew older; we just became more clearly ourselves.
Lynn Hall, Where Have All the Tigers Gone?, 1989

The universe is change; our life is what our thoughts make it.
Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121 AD - 180 AD), Meditations

Any transition serious enough to alter your definition of self will require not just small adjustments in your way of living and thinking but a full-on metamorphosis.
Martha Beck, O Magazine, Growing Wings, January 2004

The more things change, the more they remain… insane.
Michael Fry and T. Lewis, Over the Hedge, 05-09-04

There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered.
Nelson Mandela (1918 - ), ‘A Long Walk to Freedom’

Change your thoughts and you change your world.
Norman Vincent Peale (1898 - 1993)

Turbulence is life force. It is opportunity. Let’s love turbulence and use it for change.
Ramsay Clark

This isn’t good or bad. It’s just the way of things. Nothing stays the same.
Real Live Preacher, RealLivePreacher.com Weblog, January 03, 2004