Author: tomstellawebsite

REACHING IN “Some people don’t know what “reaching in” means, despite the fact that for millennia the world’s wisdom traditions have majored in mapping various pathways to the soul…      “When we’re young and wholly engaged with the external world, we may manage to feel “alive” for a while without an inner life. But when … Continue reading Reaching In

“Every Monday a train pulled into the station and loaded up the next list of people who had been chosen for Auschwitz. It was an anteroom of hell, and they all knew it. And yet Etty wrote that her months “behind razor wire,” as she put it, when she spent her days attending to the … Continue reading Actions Speak Louder

“It seems to me that I have greater peace… when I am not “trying to be contemplative.” Or trying to be anything special, but simply orienting my life fully and completely towards what seems to be required of a man like me at a time like this.”      “Simple and true, that, but so easily … Continue reading The Lofty in the Little

“One of the biggest problems with a life is that, well, we miss too much of it. Not literally of course, but think about it. How much of your time are you really present? We are not completely conscious of the present moment most of the time in ordinary life. Much of our attention is … Continue reading Mindfulness is Not Enough

KICK ASS FOR THE BELOVED      “In studying the lives of these wonderful saints, I can’t imagine any of them saying “no” if they were asked if we could freely adapt their words to a few bluegrass tunes or whiskey-soaked jazz. I think they might shout, “Go for it, baby; set the world on fire … Continue reading Kick Ass for the Beloved

 “I was alone. It was very quiet. It was maybe around one o’clock… I knew I was at the brink. I knew I was about to go over it. I knew it, and I didn’t care. It was too much to care. I was too  weak.  Slide on over the edge and down. Over…over the … Continue reading We Are Not Alone

“Perhaps the root cause of stress is not overbearing bosses, ill-behaved children or the breakdown of relationships. It is the loss of a sense of our soul. If so, all the ways in which we have attempted to ease stress cannot heal it at the deepest level. Stress may heal only through the recognition that … Continue reading We Are Spiritual Beings

     “I dreamed a few years back that I was in a supermarket checking out when I had the stark and luminous and devastating realization …that my life would end. I wept in line watching people go by with their carts, watching the cashier move items over the scanner, feeling such an absolute love for … Continue reading Appreciating Life

SAY YES “I don’t know Who – or what – put the question. I don’t know when it was put. I don’t even remember answering.  But at some moment, I did answer Yes to Someone – or Something – and from that hour I was certain that existence is meaningful and that my life, in … Continue reading Say Yes

“At the beginning of the twenty-first century, to feel alone or want to be alone is deeply unfashionable: to admit to feeling alone is to reject and betray others, as if they are not good company, and do not have entertaining, interesting lives of their own to distract us; and to actually seek to be … Continue reading On Being Alone