The menu is not the dinner

…the symbol is not the reality. The map is not the territory. The menu is not the dinner. The experience is not its measurement. However, our compulsion to do this all the time creates a mad and demented and crazy world. In valuing the symbols and ignoring the reality, we rape the earth, destroy the forests and murder ourselves and our ecosystem.

If you think money is wealth, you will always be poor. If you hold on to symbols, you will live in fear. Money is not valuable in and of itself.

What is valuable is you and me and our transaction of love. If you are not here, you will never get there, because when you get there, you won’t be here.

Addiction to time is the terrifying fear of death because death, in our imagination, stops the future, but the future is never here.

I can only taste, smell, see, feel, hear, NOW.

And when I’m doing that, that is the definition of being alive.

Not doing that, I’m dead already.

Therefore, please wake up and be alive – NOW –

From How to Know God Deepak Chopra

Posted by | Paul Reynolds

“Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu, Buddhist, Sufi, or Zen. Not any religion or cultural system…..” - Rumi

For over 30 years Paul Reynolds has collected and shared inspiration from a wide variety of sources. Embracing the philosophy that at the core of all these expressions is the reminder that we are loved and supported every moment. This unending stream of inspiration, imagination and wisdom is posted via his weekly ‘Living the Question Blog’, which has become ‘home’ for those discoveries. If you would like to receive the readings and share them with those you feel will benefit, please fill out the ‘Subscribe’ form to the right and Paul’s selections will come to your email every Friday.

Comments are closed.