Cacophony

Image credit: James Woodward

The press, the media, the internet—they'll make the noise, make the screaming, the screaming all the time, and the truth and my voice will be lost. The blaming and the noise, human things, they'll make it about human things, not the truth. How can anyone live with it? How can anyone live with so much screaming in their lives, all the time? 

~ Claire North

Truth

Source: Pixabay

I have one major rule: Everybody is right. More specifically, everybody — including me — has some important pieces of truth, and all of those pieces need to be honored, cherished, and included in a more gracious, spacious, and compassionate embrace.

~ Ken Wilber

Even-Keeled and At-Eased

Source: Favim

But the truth is, I am Thursday on a Monday. I

Am the walking calendar alive of mixed-up days and dim hours. I have

A week inside of me, a week or a year, time out of order. I have contracted

With the world to behave, to try, hard, to be Monday on a Monday. I

Look like I am happiness, don’t you think? On Monday, to you I have

The right laugh, and seem always to be even-keeled and at-eased.

~ Alberto Ríos

Entrance

Source: Favim

Whoever you are: step out of doors tonight,

out of the room that lets you feel secure.

Infinity is open to your sight.

Whoever you are.

With eyes that have forgotten how to see

from viewing things already too well-known,

lift up into the dark a huge, black tree

and  put it in the heavens:  tall, alone.

And you have made the world and all you see.

It ripens like the words still in your mouth.

And when at last you comprehend its truth,

then close your eyes and gently set it free.

~ Rainer Maria Rilke

(Translated by Dana Gioia)

Entrance

Source: Favim

Whoever you are: step out of doors tonight,

out of the room that lets you feel secure.

Infinity is open to your sight.

Whoever you are.

With eyes that have forgotten how to see

from viewing things already too well-known,

lift up into the dark a huge, black tree

and  put it in the heavens:  tall, alone.

And you have made the world and all you see.

It ripens like the words still in your mouth.

And when at last you comprehend its truth,

then close your eyes and gently set it free.

~ Rainer Maria Rilke

(Translated by Dana Gioia)

The truth about news

Source: Plugged In

For those who think it's their civic duty to stay up-to-date on world affairs... Bear in mind that almost every source of news makes their money through advertisements. In order to stay in business and earn a profit, these news outlets need as many people to see their ads as possible. And because they're all selling the same product, they have to fight each other for your attention every single minute. The way the news earns your attention is NOT by providing you with useful or accurate information, but by shocking you with sensationalist headlines and artificial drama. In other words, the only way the news knows how to stay in business is by winding us all up. We're especially profitable for them when we are collectively terrified or enraged. Terrorist attack? Cha-ching! Non-stop coverage!

The sad truth is that news outlets no longer care about investigative reporting, biased agendas, relevant information, facts or whether they're poisoning their audience's psyche. All they care about is numbers: page views, shares, eyeballs for their ads. Even the "truth deliverers" and conspiracy websites play this game. It's an impossible undertaking to sort through their incessant distortion of reality, and you can never be sure if what you're reading is true...

~ Charlie Hoehn

The truth about news

Source: Plugged In

For those who think it's their civic duty to stay up-to-date on world affairs... Bear in mind that almost every source of news makes their money through advertisements. In order to stay in business and earn a profit, these news outlets need as many people to see their ads as possible. And because they're all selling the same product, they have to fight each other for your attention every single minute. The way the news earns your attention is NOT by providing you with useful or accurate information, but by shocking you with sensationalist headlines and artificial drama. In other words, the only way the news knows how to stay in business is by winding us all up. We're especially profitable for them when we are collectively terrified or enraged. Terrorist attack? Cha-ching! Non-stop coverage!

The sad truth is that news outlets no longer care about investigative reporting, biased agendas, relevant information, facts or whether they're poisoning their audience's psyche. All they care about is numbers: page views, shares, eyeballs for their ads. Even the "truth deliverers" and conspiracy websites play this game. It's an impossible undertaking to sort through their incessant distortion of reality, and you can never be sure if what you're reading is true...

~ Charlie Hoehn

Poem: The Rules of Evidence

Source: Tumblr/Favim

What you want to say most
is inadmissible.
Say it anyway.
Say it again.
What they tell you is irrelevant
can’t be denied and will
eventually be heard.
Every question
is a leading question.
Ask it anyway, then expect
what you won’t get.
There is no such thing
as the original
so you’ll have to make do
with a reasonable facsimile.
The history of the world
is hearsay. Hear it.
The whole truth
is unspeakable
and nothing but the truth
is a lie.
I swear this.
My oath is a kiss.
I swear
by everything
incredible.

~ Lee Robinson

Poem: The Rules of Evidence

Source: Tumblr/Favim

What you want to say most
is inadmissible.
Say it anyway.
Say it again.
What they tell you is irrelevant
can’t be denied and will
eventually be heard.
Every question
is a leading question.
Ask it anyway, then expect
what you won’t get.
There is no such thing
as the original
so you’ll have to make do
with a reasonable facsimile.
The history of the world
is hearsay. Hear it.
The whole truth
is unspeakable
and nothing but the truth
is a lie.
I swear this.
My oath is a kiss.
I swear
by everything
incredible.

~ Lee Robinson

Telling the truth

Source: Photobucket/Favim

“A Spanish poet, Antonio Machado, once said: ‘Dijiste media verdad. Dirán que mientes dos veces si dices la otra mitad.’”
“Translated means…”
“You told a half-truth. They’ll say you lie twice when you tell the other half.”

~ Olga Núñez Miret

Telling the truth

Source: Photobucket/Favim

“A Spanish poet, Antonio Machado, once said: ‘Dijiste media verdad. Dirán que mientes dos veces si dices la otra mitad.’”
“Translated means…”
“You told a half-truth. They’ll say you lie twice when you tell the other half.”

~ Olga Núñez Miret

The Lamp

Source: DHD Multimedia Gallery

I write in order to comprehend not to express myself
I don’t grasp anything I’m not ashamed to admit it
sharing this not knowing with a maple leaf
So I turn with questions to words wiser than myself
to things that will endure long after us
I wait to gain wisdom from chance
I expect sense from silence
Perhaps something suddenly will happen
and pulse with hidden truth
like the spirit of the flame in the oil lamp
under which we bowed our heads
when we were very young
and grandma crossed the bread with a knife
and we believed in everything
So now I yearn for nothing as much
as for that faith

~ Anna Kamienska

The Lamp

Source: DHD Multimedia Gallery

I write in order to comprehend not to express myself
I don’t grasp anything I’m not ashamed to admit it
sharing this not knowing with a maple leaf
So I turn with questions to words wiser than myself
to things that will endure long after us
I wait to gain wisdom from chance
I expect sense from silence
Perhaps something suddenly will happen
and pulse with hidden truth
like the spirit of the flame in the oil lamp
under which we bowed our heads
when we were very young
and grandma crossed the bread with a knife
and we believed in everything
So now I yearn for nothing as much
as for that faith

~ Anna Kamienska

Quote on life

Photo credit: andrebog from morguefile.com

Life is a performance, I thought. Perhaps the word "illusion" would have meant more or less the same thing, but to me "performance" seemed closed to the truth. Standing there in the midst of the crowd that evening, I felt this realization swirl dizzily through my body in a dazzling splendor of light, if only for an instant. Each one of us continues to carry the heart of each self we've ever been, at every stage along the way, and a chaos of everything good and rotten. And we have to carry this weight all alone, through each day that we live. We try to be as nice as we can to the people we love, but we alone support the weight of ourselves.

~ Banana Yoshimoto

Quote on life

Photo credit: andrebog from morguefile.com

Life is a performance, I thought. Perhaps the word "illusion" would have meant more or less the same thing, but to me "performance" seemed closed to the truth. Standing there in the midst of the crowd that evening, I felt this realization swirl dizzily through my body in a dazzling splendor of light, if only for an instant. Each one of us continues to carry the heart of each self we've ever been, at every stage along the way, and a chaos of everything good and rotten. And we have to carry this weight all alone, through each day that we live. We try to be as nice as we can to the people we love, but we alone support the weight of ourselves.

~ Banana Yoshimoto

Quote on lies

Credit: lovinunicorn from fanpop

But what do I care? Don't lies eventually lead to the truth? And don't all my stories, true or false, tend toward the same conclusion? Don't they all have the same meaning? So what does it matter whether they are true or false if, in both cases, they are significant of what I have been and what I am? Sometimes it is easier to see clearly into the liar than into the man who tells the truth. Truth, like light, blinds. Falsehood, on the contrary, is a beautiful twilight that enhances every object.

~ Albert Camus

Quote on lies

Credit: lovinunicorn from fanpop

But what do I care? Don't lies eventually lead to the truth? And don't all my stories, true or false, tend toward the same conclusion? Don't they all have the same meaning? So what does it matter whether they are true or false if, in both cases, they are significant of what I have been and what I am? Sometimes it is easier to see clearly into the liar than into the man who tells the truth. Truth, like light, blinds. Falsehood, on the contrary, is a beautiful twilight that enhances every object.

~ Albert Camus

Quote on surprises

Image: Ambro/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Well, we all like things to be predictable, don't we? We expect things to be safe and to keep on happening just the way they always have. We expect the sun to rise in the morning. We expect to get up, survive the day and finish up back in bed at the end of it, ready to start all over again the next day. But maybe that's just a trick we play on ourselves, our way of making life seem ordinary. Because the truth is, life is so extraordinary that for most of the time we can't bring ourselves to look at it. It's too bright and it hurts our eyes. The fact of the matter is that nothing is ever certain. But most people never find that out until the ground suddenly disappears from beneath their feet.

~ Steve Voake

Quote on surprises

Image: Ambro/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Well, we all like things to be predictable, don't we? We expect things to be safe and to keep on happening just the way they always have. We expect the sun to rise in the morning. We expect to get up, survive the day and finish up back in bed at the end of it, ready to start all over again the next day. But maybe that's just a trick we play on ourselves, our way of making life seem ordinary. Because the truth is, life is so extraordinary that for most of the time we can't bring ourselves to look at it. It's too bright and it hurts our eyes. The fact of the matter is that nothing is ever certain. But most people never find that out until the ground suddenly disappears from beneath their feet.

~ Steve Voake

All Roads That Lead To God Are Good

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

All roads that lead to God are good.
What matters it, your faith, or mine?
Both centre at the goal divine
Of love’s eternal Brotherhood.

The kindly life in house or street –
The life of prayer and mystic rite –
The student’s search for truth and light –
These paths at one great Junction meet.

Before the oldest book was writ,
Full many a prehistoric soul
Arrived at this unchanging goal,
Through changeless Love, that leads to it.

What matters that one found his Christ
In rising sun, or burning fire?
In faith within him did not tire,
His longing for the Truth sufficed.

Before our modern hell was brought
To edify the modern world,
Full many a hate-filled soul was hurled
In lakes of fire by its own thought.

A thousand creeds have come and gone,
But what is that to you or me?
Creeds are but branches of a tree –
The root of love lives on and on.

Though branch by branch proved withered wood,
The root is warm with precious wine.
Then keep your faith, and leave me mine –
All roads that lead to God are good.

~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox