When we read the lives of the saints, we are struck by a certain large leisure which went hand in hand with remarkable effectiveness. They were never hurried; they did comparatively few things, and these not necessarily striking or important; and they troubled very little about their influence. Yet they always seemed to hit the mark; their simplest actions had a distinction, an exquisiteness that suggest the artist. The reason is not so far to seek. Their sainthood lay in their habit of referring the smallest actions to God. They lived in God; they acted from a pure motive of love towards God. They were free from self-regard as from slavery to the good opinion of others. God saw and God rewarded: what else did they need? They possessed God and possessed themselves in God. Hence the inalienable dignity of the meek, quiet figures that seem to produce such marvelous effects with such humble materials.

-from Creative Prayer

Remind yourself that all you can and need to know about God is found in Jesus.

All genuine growth in our lives, and all healthy spiritual activity, is the result of our resting in an experience of the true God loving us for free–not because of what we do, but just because of who we are and who he is.

-Greg Boyd & Al Larson, Escaping the Matrix

Nothing is more practical than finding God, than falling in love in a quite absolute, final way. What you are in love with, what seizes your imagination, will affect everything.

It will decide what will get you out of bed in the morning, what you will do with your evening, how you spend your weekends, what you read, whom you know, what breaks your heart, and what amazes you with joy and gratitude. Fall in love, stay in love, and it will decide everything.

-Pedro Arrupe

Disciplines of engagement are like breathing in, and disciplines of abstinence are like breathing out. We need to exhale as well as inhale.

Practices of simplicity keep us from becoming bloated and swollen–unable to digest or use what we have taken in.

-Jan Johnson

Each morning as we rise from sleep we can say, “This day God will send me whatever support, whatever guidance, whatever forgiveness I need.” It is only a matter of remaining alert, watching for God’s agents.

-Michael Casey

Jesus’s sleep [on the boat in the storm] is like the sleep of the sower (Mk.4:27). He has done the work that is expected of him. The rest is left in God’s hands. The attitude of peaceful trust is the result of an unambiguous commitment to the Father’s will. On the one hand, there is a fervent and proactive sense of mission, to complete the work given me to do. This is complemented, on the other hand, by a placid expectation that the rest of the pieces will fit in place without my being unduly concerned about them.

-Michael Casey

Keep this in mind: to be full of things is to be empty of God, while to be empty of things is to be full of God.

-Meister Eckhart

Souls are living.

Like all living things, souls can thrive or they can shrivel.

Quite simply, a soul is healthy to the extent that it maintains a strong connection and receptivity to God.

-Mindy Caliguire

Do not think that what your thoughts dwell upon is of no matter. Your thoughts are making you.

-Bishop Steere