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When your tongue is silent, you can rest in the silence of the forest. When your imagination is silent, the forest speaks to you. It tells you of its unreality and of the Reality of God. But when your mind is silent, then the forest suddenly becomes magnificently real and blazes transparently with the Reality of God.

Thomas Merton

Actions are the doors and windows of being. Unless we act, we have no way of knowing what we are.
THOMAS MERTON

Act Action Spiritual Way
Let us come alive to the splendor that is all around us and see the beauty in ordinary things.
THOMAS MERTON

Alive Beautiful Ordinary See
Every breath we draw is a gift of God’s love; every moment of existence is a grace.
THOMAS MERTON

Breathe Existence Gift God Grace Moments
The spiritual life is first of all a life. It is not merely something to be known and studied, it is to be lived.
THOMAS MERTON

Life Live Philosophy Spiritual Study
Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.
THOMAS MERTON

Art Lose Ourselves Time
What can we gain by sailing to the moon if we cannot cross the abyss that separates us from ourselves?
THOMAS MERTON

Moon Ourselves Separate Travel
For although God is right with us and in us and out of us and all through us, we have to go on journeys to find him.
THOMAS MERTON

God Himself Journey Right
People may spend their whole lives climbing the ladder of success only to find, once they reach the top, that the ladder is leaning against the wrong wall.
THOMAS MERTON

Live People Reach Success Wall Wrong
Weaknesses and deficiencies play a most important part in all our lives. It is because of them that we need others and others need us. We are not all weak in the same spots, and so we supplement and complete one another, each one making up in himself for the lack in another.
THOMAS MERTON

Himself Important Live Need Play Role Weakness
The more you try to avoid suffering, the more you suffer, because smaller and more insignificant things begin to torture you, in proportion to your fear of being hurt. The one who does most to avoid suffering is, in the end, the one who suffers most.
THOMAS MERTON

Avoid Beginning End Hurt Philosophy Suffering Try Yourself
What do I mean by loving ourselves properly? I mean first of all, desiring to live, accepting life as a very great gift and a great good, not because of what it gives us, but because of what it enables us to give to others.
THOMAS MERTON

Acceptance Desire Generosity Goodness Greatness Life Live Love Ourselves Self Love
Gratitude takes nothing for granted, is never unresponsive, is constantly awakening to new wonder.
THOMAS MERTON

Gratitude Respond Wake Up Wonder
Fear narrows the little entrance of our heart. It shrinks up our capacity to love. It freezes up our power to give ourselves.
THOMAS MERTON

Capacity Fear Heart Love Ourselves Power
In Silence God ceases to be an object and becomes an experience.
THOMAS MERTON

Experience God Silence
The whole idea of compassion is based on a keen awareness of the interdependence of all these living beings, which are all part of one another, and all involved in one another.
THOMAS MERTON

Compassionate Ideas Interdependent Live Oneself
Every one of us is shadowed by an illusory person: a false Self. We are not very good at recognizing illusions, least of all the ones we cherish about ourselves.
THOMAS MERTON

Embrace Goodness Illusion Ourselves Person Recognition Shadow

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