“Walking was not fast enough so we ran. Running was not fast enough, so we galloped. Galloping was not fast enough, so we sailed. Sailing was not fast enough, so we rolled merrily along on long metal tracks. Long metal tracks were not fast enough, so we drove. Driving was not fast enough, so we flew.
Flying isn't fast enough, not fast enough for us. We want to get there faster. Get where? Wherever we are not. But a human soul can go only as fast as a man can walk, they used to say. In that case, where are all the souls? Left behind. They wander here and there, slowly, dim lights flickering in the marshes at night, looking for us. But they're not nearly fast enough, not for us, we're way ahead of them, they'll never catch up. That's why we can go so fast: our souls don't weigh us down.”
--Margaret Atwood, Bottle
--Margaret Atwood, Bottle
----------------
The purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls.”
--Pablo Picasso
--Pablo Picasso
---------------
“Living a lie – pretending everything is fine when we are actually discontented – is hard work and, in the long run, even bad for our health. We pay a high price for compromising on this honesty – and neglecting ourselves. Finding our inner passion, our mission in life, and connecting with who we really are, our spiritual being or our higher self – this is the key to success and fulfilment. Our ‘soul’ purpose is our sole purpose in life.”
--Kristiane Backer, From MTV to Mecca: How Islam Inspired My Life
--Kristiane Backer, From MTV to Mecca: How Islam Inspired My Life
-----------------
“How do you weigh a soul?
Is it heavy with love or hate?
Does it deny the things it's done?
Does it even remember its own name?
Does it miss those it has loved?
Does it long for the life it's lost?
How do you weigh a soul?
After it has paid the highest cost,
Does it lose the will to live?
Without a physical shell
Does it sense without hands
That can touch and truly feel
Does it need sustenance to last?
A cold drink or warm meal
How do you weigh a soul?
Are souls even real?”
--Ashley Jeffery, Soul Eater
Is it heavy with love or hate?
Does it deny the things it's done?
Does it even remember its own name?
Does it miss those it has loved?
Does it long for the life it's lost?
How do you weigh a soul?
After it has paid the highest cost,
Does it lose the will to live?
Without a physical shell
Does it sense without hands
That can touch and truly feel
Does it need sustenance to last?
A cold drink or warm meal
How do you weigh a soul?
Are souls even real?”
--Ashley Jeffery, Soul Eater
---------------
“The nurse of full-grown souls is solitude.”
--James Russell Lowell
--James Russell Lowell
----------------
“A writer is a person who cares what words mean, what they say, how they say it. Writers know words are their way towards truth and freedom, and so they use them with care, with thought, with fear, with delight. By using words well they strengthen their souls. Story-tellers and poets spend their lives learning that skill and art of using words well. And their words make the souls of their readers stronger, brighter, deeper.”
--Ursula K. Le Guin
--Ursula K. Le Guin
---------------
“Film as dream, film as music. No art passes our conscience in the way film does, and goes directly to our feelings, deep down into the dark rooms of our souls.”
--Ingmar Bergman
--Ingmar Bergman
----------------
"Sometimes the best and worst times of your life can coincide. It is a talent of the soul to discover the joy in pain—-thinking of moments you long for, and knowing you’ll never have them again. The beautiful ghosts of our past haunt us, and yet we still can’t decide if the pain they caused us out weighs the tender moments when they touched our soul. This is the irony of love.”
--Shannon L. Alder
--Shannon L. Alder
---------------
“I believe humans have souls, and I believe in the conservation of souls.”
--John Green, The Fault in Our Stars
--John Green, The Fault in Our Stars
---------------
“But souls can't be sold. They can only be lost and never found again.”
--Ray Bradbury, Long After Midnight
--Ray Bradbury, Long After Midnight
---------------
“Animals, like us, are living souls. They are not things. They are not objects. Neither are they human. Yet they mourn. They love. They dance. They suffer. They know the peaks and chasms of being.”
--Gary Kowalski, The Souls of Animals
--Gary Kowalski, The Souls of Animals
---------------
“Better lose your life than your soul…”
--Louisa May Alcott, Jo's Boys
--Louisa May Alcott, Jo's Boys
---------------
“Just above our terror, the stars painted this story
in perfect silver calligraphy. And our souls, too often
abused by ignorance, covered our eyes with mercy.”
--Aberjhani, I Made My Boy Out of Poetry
in perfect silver calligraphy. And our souls, too often
abused by ignorance, covered our eyes with mercy.”
--Aberjhani, I Made My Boy Out of Poetry
---------------
“Well-meaning, helpful, good-natured attitudes of mind have not come to be honored on account of their usefulness, but because they are states of richer souls that are capable of bestowing and have their value in the feeling of the plenitude of life.”
--Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will to Power
--Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will to Power
---------------
“Split second glimpses into souls are all I have managed to find.”
--Soren Narnia, Tyrant, Draw Thy Sword
--Soren Narnia, Tyrant, Draw Thy Sword
---------------
"Brother Cadfael knew better than to be in a hurry, where souls were concerned. There was plenty of elbow-room in eternity.”
--Ellis Peters, A Rare Benedictine
--Ellis Peters, A Rare Benedictine
---------------
“Only a spirit of artistic sincerity can console the souls of humankind.”
--Qiu Miaojin, Last Words from Montmartre
--Qiu Miaojin, Last Words from Montmartre
--------------
“I wondered whether music might not be the unique example of what might have been - if the invention of language, the formation of words, the analysis of ideas had not intervened - the means of communication of souls.”
--Marcel Proust, The Captive & The Fugitive
--Marcel Proust, The Captive & The Fugitive
---------------
“In reality, there are no enemies; we're all souls in growth, waking up”
--James Redfield, The Tenth Insight: Holding the Vision
--James Redfield, The Tenth Insight: Holding the Vision
---------------
“Life: composted lessons for our hearts to blossom into our souls.”
--Soul Dancer, Pay Me What I'm Worth
--Soul Dancer, Pay Me What I'm Worth
---------------
"When we face our fear of death and slow down our busy lives, we come to realize our relationships are precious, a part of life’s foundation. Knowing this fact helps us to understand that death’s true purpose is to teach us how to live.”
--Molly Friedenfeld, The Book of Simple Human Truths
--Molly Friedenfeld, The Book of Simple Human Truths
---------------
“Love is ageless and colorless. It is a spiritual force that binds two hearts and two souls together as one.”
--Ellen J. Barrier, The Price We Must Pay for Our Father's Sins
--Ellen J. Barrier, The Price We Must Pay for Our Father's Sins
--------------
“You have to be the nourishment for other people’s souls until they learn to feed on God.”
--Oswald Chambers
--Oswald Chambers
--------------
“Some things are so powerful and so beautiful that to see them will turn your soul inside out.”
--Dan Pearce, Single Dad Laughing
--Dan Pearce, Single Dad Laughing
--------------
“And as the ax bites into the wood, be comforted in the fact that the ache in your heart and the confusion in your soul means that you are still alive, still human, and still open to the beauty of the world, even though you have done nothing to deserve it.”
--Paul Harding, Tinkers
--Paul Harding, Tinkers
---------------
“Conscious humility is the decision to live from our hearts.”
--Molly Friedenfeld, The Book of Simple Human Truths
--Molly Friedenfeld, The Book of Simple Human Truths
---------------
“We must see people not as object but as beings, with souls and with bodies through which they express their souls.”
--Kate Wicker, Weightless: Making Peace With Your Body
--Kate Wicker, Weightless: Making Peace With Your Body
[cross-posted on correntewire]
----------------
Wow, what a great bunch of quotes. Love the first from Atwood. She has such a wonderful writing soul and I am gobbling up her novel called "CatsEye". right now. Just finished her short stories called Bluebeard's Egg....she seems to be able to see right into the souls of her characters.
"Soulshine"
When you can't find the light,
That guides you on the cloudy days,
When the stars ain't shinin' bright,
You feel like you've lost you're way,
When those candle lights of home,
Burn so very far away,
Well you got to let your soul shine,
Just like my daddy used to say.
[Chorus:]
He used to say soulshine,
It's better than sunshine,
It's better than moonshine,
Damn sure better than rain.
Hey now people don't mind,
We all get this way sometime,
Got to let your soul shine, shine till the break of day.
I grew up thinkin' that I had it made,
Gonna make it on my own.
Life can take the strongest man,
Make him feel so alone.
Now and then I feel a cold wind,
Blowin' through my achin' bones,
I think back to what my daddy said,
He said "Boy, in the darkness before the dawn:"
[Chorus:]
Let your soul shine,
It's better than sunshine,
It's better than moonshine,
Damn sure better than rain.
Yeah now people don't mind,
We all get this way sometimes,
Gotta let your soul shine, shine till the break of day.
Sometimes a man can feel this emptiness,
Like a woman has robbed him of his very soul.
A woman too, God knows, she can feel like this.
And when your world seems cold, you got to let your spirit take control.
[Chorus:]
Let your soul shine,
It's better than sunshine,
It's better than moonshine,
Damn sure better than rain.
Lord now people don't mind,
We all get this way sometimes,
Gotta let your soul shine, shine till the break of day.
Oh, it's better than sunshine,
It's better than moonshine,
Damn sure better than rain.
Yeah now people don't mind,
We all get this way sometimes,
Gotta let your soul shine, shine till the break of day.
~ Allman Brothers
~R~
When you can't find the light,
That guides you on the cloudy days,
When the stars ain't shinin' bright,
You feel like you've lost you're way,
When those candle lights of home,
Burn so very far away,
Well you got to let your soul shine,
Just like my daddy used to say.
[Chorus:]
He used to say soulshine,
It's better than sunshine,
It's better than moonshine,
Damn sure better than rain.
Hey now people don't mind,
We all get this way sometime,
Got to let your soul shine, shine till the break of day.
I grew up thinkin' that I had it made,
Gonna make it on my own.
Life can take the strongest man,
Make him feel so alone.
Now and then I feel a cold wind,
Blowin' through my achin' bones,
I think back to what my daddy said,
He said "Boy, in the darkness before the dawn:"
[Chorus:]
Let your soul shine,
It's better than sunshine,
It's better than moonshine,
Damn sure better than rain.
Yeah now people don't mind,
We all get this way sometimes,
Gotta let your soul shine, shine till the break of day.
Sometimes a man can feel this emptiness,
Like a woman has robbed him of his very soul.
A woman too, God knows, she can feel like this.
And when your world seems cold, you got to let your spirit take control.
[Chorus:]
Let your soul shine,
It's better than sunshine,
It's better than moonshine,
Damn sure better than rain.
Lord now people don't mind,
We all get this way sometimes,
Gotta let your soul shine, shine till the break of day.
Oh, it's better than sunshine,
It's better than moonshine,
Damn sure better than rain.
Yeah now people don't mind,
We all get this way sometimes,
Gotta let your soul shine, shine till the break of day.
~ Allman Brothers
~R~
The common eye sees only the outside of things, and judges by that, but the seeing eye pierces through and reads the heart and the soul, finding there capacities which the outside didn't indicate or promise, and which the other kind couldn't detect.
MARK TWAIN, Joan of Arc
MARK TWAIN, Joan of Arc
Thoughtful selection. I particularly liked the idea that life is composted lessons.
Here's another compelling poem re soul:
http://www.bu.edu/agni/poetry/print/2002/56-szymborska.html
A Few Words on the Soul
by Wislawa Szymborska
translated from the Polish by Stanislaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh
We have a soul at times.
No one’s got it non-stop,
for keeps.
Day after day,
year after year
may pass without it.
Sometimes
it will settle for awhile
only in childhood’s fears and raptures.
Sometimes only in astonishment
that we are old.
It rarely lends a hand
in uphill tasks,
like moving furniture,
or lifting luggage,
or going miles in shoes that pinch.
It usually steps out
whenever meat needs chopping
or forms have to be filled.
For every thousand conversations
it participates in one,
if even that,
since it prefers silence.
Just when our body goes from ache to pain,
it slips off-duty.
It’s picky:
it doesn’t like seeing us in crowds,
our hustling for a dubious advantage
and creaky machinations make it sick.
Joy and sorrow
aren’t two different feelings for it.
It attends us
only when the two are joined.
We can count on it
when we’re sure of nothing
and curious about everything.
Among the material objects
it favors clocks with pendulums
and mirrors, which keep on working
even when no one is looking.
It won’t say where it comes from
or when it’s taking off again,
though it’s clearly expecting such questions.
We need it
but apparently
it needs us
for some reason too.
http://www.bu.edu/agni/poetry/print/2002/56-szymborska.html
A Few Words on the Soul
by Wislawa Szymborska
translated from the Polish by Stanislaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh
We have a soul at times.
No one’s got it non-stop,
for keeps.
Day after day,
year after year
may pass without it.
Sometimes
it will settle for awhile
only in childhood’s fears and raptures.
Sometimes only in astonishment
that we are old.
It rarely lends a hand
in uphill tasks,
like moving furniture,
or lifting luggage,
or going miles in shoes that pinch.
It usually steps out
whenever meat needs chopping
or forms have to be filled.
For every thousand conversations
it participates in one,
if even that,
since it prefers silence.
Just when our body goes from ache to pain,
it slips off-duty.
It’s picky:
it doesn’t like seeing us in crowds,
our hustling for a dubious advantage
and creaky machinations make it sick.
Joy and sorrow
aren’t two different feelings for it.
It attends us
only when the two are joined.
We can count on it
when we’re sure of nothing
and curious about everything.
Among the material objects
it favors clocks with pendulums
and mirrors, which keep on working
even when no one is looking.
It won’t say where it comes from
or when it’s taking off again,
though it’s clearly expecting such questions.
We need it
but apparently
it needs us
for some reason too.
z -- thanks. you make me want to seek out Atwood. Handmaid's Tale was a great read. Woman against the patriarchy! best, libby
MCS, enjoying it from youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDIQ7Otf1mw
thanks so much for this. will be enjoying the idea of "soulshine" (reminds me of turning on your "heartlight" c/o Neil Diamond) henceforth with this so very cool refrain:
"Let your soul shine,
It's better than sunshine,
It's better than moonshine,
Damn sure better than rain."
Thanks so much for stopping by and sharing!
best, libby
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDIQ7Otf1mw
thanks so much for this. will be enjoying the idea of "soulshine" (reminds me of turning on your "heartlight" c/o Neil Diamond) henceforth with this so very cool refrain:
"Let your soul shine,
It's better than sunshine,
It's better than moonshine,
Damn sure better than rain."
Thanks so much for stopping by and sharing!
best, libby
jmac! thanks for stopping by and Twain, what a great source for soul-searching insights! Great quote! Here's another:
"Be careless in your dress if you must,
but keep a tidy soul."-
Following the Equator, Pudd'nead Wilson's Calendar
Reminds me of Picasso's above about washing daily life off the soul via art.
T.S. Eliot:
"I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope,
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing."
and one of my favorite quotes from him from Portrait of the Artist As a Young Man:
"I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my race."
best, libby
"Be careless in your dress if you must,
but keep a tidy soul."-
Following the Equator, Pudd'nead Wilson's Calendar
Reminds me of Picasso's above about washing daily life off the soul via art.
T.S. Eliot:
"I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope,
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing."
and one of my favorite quotes from him from Portrait of the Artist As a Young Man:
"I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my race."
best, libby
Daniel, thanks for commenting. Yes, that quote about life lessons "composting" I found most profound -- so clear, concise and, literally, "down to earth"! :-) best, libby
re my comment above to jmac quoting this from Eliot:
"I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope,
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing."
I think this quote explores well the difference between the heart and soul sensibilities!
"I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope,
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing."
I think this quote explores well the difference between the heart and soul sensibilities!
Also, the quote Dan mentioned as well, re the heart and soul differentiation. The hearts blossom into "soul wisdom", to paraphrase:
“Life: composted lessons for our hearts to blossom into our souls.”
--Soul Dancer, Pay Me What I'm Worth
“Life: composted lessons for our hearts to blossom into our souls.”
--Soul Dancer, Pay Me What I'm Worth
Some interesting quotes libby and I suppose that Atwood's is my favorite. But perhaps on account of my atheism, or something related to it, I don't think the soul is a real thing. To me it seems more a metaphorical way of talking so in that sense it's not that the concept is untrue. Rather, it's more akin to a sense of humor or an ethical sense. Neither of the latter denote anything tangible but it's meaningful to say of someone that they have a lousy sense of humor or a perverted moral compass. I guess my discomfort with the notion of a soul is its religious connotations whereby some belivers think there's something called a soul that lives on and perhaps suffers the torments of hell or the wondrous glories of a blessed afterlife. I don't at believe in a soul in that sense. But I wouldn't banish it from the language.
That's off the top of my head after a loooong day so I'll check back tomorrow to see if it makes sense.
That's off the top of my head after a loooong day so I'll check back tomorrow to see if it makes sense.
abra, nice of you to comment. you certainly remind me that I have a tendency to make serious assumptions that my belief system is automatically mirrored by others, if not completely at least significantly.
I guess your claiming "atheism" startles me since it is so foreign to my feelings. I certainly am no stranger to ambivalence and confusion. Agnosticism would not so much startle me.
I was raised Catholic and rejected the formal religion but have in particular an awe for the humanitarian sensibility (from the descriptions) of Christ. Myth or human, the mentoring was and is there for me. The Catholic ritualization I found confusing and patriarchally oppressive for a long time. I guess I was a cafeteria Catholic before formally leaving the Church, taking what I wanted and leaving the rest.
When the 12 step programs became a life raft for me socially and emotionally in late young adulthood I cultivated, as was encouraged in that culture and I am not sorry, a sensibility of a "Higher Power" as an unconditionally loving parent which offered some belated sense of existential security I lost out on as a child with parents who couldn't unconditionally love themselves and thus not offer that vital experience to their children or role mode that self-love and spiritual ease. I think that the Higher Power mindfulness encouraged by that system is wise in re-parenting ourselves to learn to give ourselves unconditional acceptance and fight automatic reactions of shame and guilt, etc.
"God the Father" type authoritarian religious upbringing is very dangerous (Alice Miller writes about that a lot). 12 steps program encouraged people to create and define their own versions of the HP or come even if they won't go there.
To be honest, I think "faith" with me is a "feeling" not an "idea". I talk about souls and spirituality without even factoring in the after-life questions. I think hells can happen on earth, and not necessarily to the allegedly "worthy". But I think there is a kind of hell that the anti-humane humans exist in on earth, the soul dead or soul dying. And they want to especially punish those more spiritually alive than they are by thrusting them into punishing prisons whether physical, economic, social, psychological or emotional. I think of the strong souls I have heard of held in Gitmo, or the souls of Assange, Snowden, Manning.
I think there is a heart factor importantly contributing to altruism, friendship and love, but I think the soul represents something distinct but very much tied with the heart as well as the mind. A "spiritual" wakefulness or mindfulness. A connection with integrity, morality and universality. The sensibility whereby people exist in their "higher self" dimension and not their "lower self" one as much as they humanly can. I think the EGO ("edging God out"=EGO) can be an enemy of our soul-spirit at times. Make us project our own character defects onto others and punish them out of our own shame and guilt and anxiety and a deadly perfectionism (the kind encouraged by authoritarian religions).
I feel I am doing a lousy job defending to you the "soul" concept with my right brain intuiter/feeler orientation.
Maybe it is an identification with one's human-ness and its potential to fight irrationality and reptilian brain self-protectiveness in oneself and others.
Maybe to you, a movie aficionado, what Bergman said above, about art and the conscience resonates? I see the impact of some movies as more than emotionally and intellectually moving when you have the real deal genius monumental type movies.
And then again, taste is relative.
And so are vocabs.
Finally, you might want to check out the poem I posted as a comment by Wislawa Szymborska. What a name!! She is wry and witty and probably gives the most honest assessment of the nature of the "soul." I would love to up the number of visits to me by my soul! In her poem the soul is not necessarily a conscience though approves of that. It is something else again. A jolt of spiritual connectedness that is an "alive high."
FWIW.
best, libby
I guess your claiming "atheism" startles me since it is so foreign to my feelings. I certainly am no stranger to ambivalence and confusion. Agnosticism would not so much startle me.
I was raised Catholic and rejected the formal religion but have in particular an awe for the humanitarian sensibility (from the descriptions) of Christ. Myth or human, the mentoring was and is there for me. The Catholic ritualization I found confusing and patriarchally oppressive for a long time. I guess I was a cafeteria Catholic before formally leaving the Church, taking what I wanted and leaving the rest.
When the 12 step programs became a life raft for me socially and emotionally in late young adulthood I cultivated, as was encouraged in that culture and I am not sorry, a sensibility of a "Higher Power" as an unconditionally loving parent which offered some belated sense of existential security I lost out on as a child with parents who couldn't unconditionally love themselves and thus not offer that vital experience to their children or role mode that self-love and spiritual ease. I think that the Higher Power mindfulness encouraged by that system is wise in re-parenting ourselves to learn to give ourselves unconditional acceptance and fight automatic reactions of shame and guilt, etc.
"God the Father" type authoritarian religious upbringing is very dangerous (Alice Miller writes about that a lot). 12 steps program encouraged people to create and define their own versions of the HP or come even if they won't go there.
To be honest, I think "faith" with me is a "feeling" not an "idea". I talk about souls and spirituality without even factoring in the after-life questions. I think hells can happen on earth, and not necessarily to the allegedly "worthy". But I think there is a kind of hell that the anti-humane humans exist in on earth, the soul dead or soul dying. And they want to especially punish those more spiritually alive than they are by thrusting them into punishing prisons whether physical, economic, social, psychological or emotional. I think of the strong souls I have heard of held in Gitmo, or the souls of Assange, Snowden, Manning.
I think there is a heart factor importantly contributing to altruism, friendship and love, but I think the soul represents something distinct but very much tied with the heart as well as the mind. A "spiritual" wakefulness or mindfulness. A connection with integrity, morality and universality. The sensibility whereby people exist in their "higher self" dimension and not their "lower self" one as much as they humanly can. I think the EGO ("edging God out"=EGO) can be an enemy of our soul-spirit at times. Make us project our own character defects onto others and punish them out of our own shame and guilt and anxiety and a deadly perfectionism (the kind encouraged by authoritarian religions).
I feel I am doing a lousy job defending to you the "soul" concept with my right brain intuiter/feeler orientation.
Maybe it is an identification with one's human-ness and its potential to fight irrationality and reptilian brain self-protectiveness in oneself and others.
Maybe to you, a movie aficionado, what Bergman said above, about art and the conscience resonates? I see the impact of some movies as more than emotionally and intellectually moving when you have the real deal genius monumental type movies.
And then again, taste is relative.
And so are vocabs.
Finally, you might want to check out the poem I posted as a comment by Wislawa Szymborska. What a name!! She is wry and witty and probably gives the most honest assessment of the nature of the "soul." I would love to up the number of visits to me by my soul! In her poem the soul is not necessarily a conscience though approves of that. It is something else again. A jolt of spiritual connectedness that is an "alive high."
FWIW.
best, libby
Some of these I liked better than others, but they were all food for thought.
"While I don't believe in the Soul, I believe in the concept of the soul; that better part of us." Me
"While I don't believe in the Soul, I believe in the concept of the soul; that better part of us." Me
Rodney, thanks so much for commenting. "The better part of us." Yes, works for me absolutely!!! best, libby
The biggest epiphany available to the human race is that each individual has/is a "Soul"
Wow! So much food for thought, it fairly makes me giddy!
Rated
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