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The
Creative Life (extract)
You must never slacken in your efforts to build new lives for yourselves.
Creativeness means pushing open the heavy door to life. This is not an easy struggle.
Indeed, it may be the hardest task in the world. For opening the door to
your own life is more difficult than opening the doors to the mysteries of the
Universe. But the act of opening your door vindicates your existence as a human
being and makes life worth living. No-one is lonelier or unhappier than
the person who does not know the pure joy of creating a life for himself. To
be human is not merely to stand erect and manifest reason and intellect: To
be human in the full sense of the word is to lead a creative life. The
fight to create a new life is a truly wonderful thing, revealing radiant wisdom,
the light of intuition that leads to an understanding of the Universe, the strong
will of justice and a determination to challenge all attacking evils, the compassion
that enables you to take upon yourself the sorrows of others, and a sense of
union with the energy of compassion gushing forth from the cosmic source of life
and creating an ecstatic rhythm in the lives of all men. As you challenge
adversity and polish the jewel that is life, you will learn to walk the supreme
pathway of true humanity. He who leads a creative life from the present
into the future will stand in the vanguard of history. I think of this
flowering of the creative life as the human revolution that is your mission now
and throughout your lives.
Daisaku Ikeda, President, Soka Gakkai International
A Poem
Until one is committed, there is hesitancy,
The chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness.
Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there
Is one elementary truth - ignorance of which kills
Countless ideas and splendid plans:
That the moment one definitely commits oneself,
Then Providence moves too.
All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred.
A whole stream of events issue from the decision, raising in one's favour all
manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no
man could have dreamed would have come his way.
Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius, power and imagination in it.
Begin it now.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe / William Hutchinson Murray
A Presidential Opinion
“It is not the critic
who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled,
or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs
to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by
the dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and
comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasms, the
great devotions and spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the
best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who,
at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly; so that
his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know
neither victory nor defeat.”
Theodore
Roosevelt, US President
A Poem
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented & fabulous?
Actually, who are we NOT to be?...
Your playing small doesn't serve the world.
There's nothing enlightened about shrinking
So that other people won't feel insecure around you...
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission
to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear,
Our presence automatically liberates others…
Marianne Williamson
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