The Royal Mountain

"Looking upon myself from the perspective of society, I am an average person. Facing myself intimately, immediately, I regard myself as unique, as exceedingly precious, not to be exchanged for anything else. No one will live my life for me, no one will think my thoughts for me or dream my dreams. In the eyes of the world, I am an average man. But to my heart I am not an average man. To my heart I am of great moment. The challenge I face is how to actualize the quiet eminence of my being." -Abraham Joshua Heschel

Humility is just as much the opposite of self-abasement as it is of self-exaltation. To be humble is not to make comparisons. Secure in its reality, the self is neither better nor worse, bigger nor smaller, than anything else in the universe. It is--is nothing, yet at the same time one with everything. It is in this sense that humility is absolute self-effacement. To be nothing in the self-effacement of humility, yet, for the sake of the task, to embody its whole weight and importance in your bearing, as the one who has been called to undertake it. To give to people, works, poetry, art, what the self can contribute, and to take, simply and freely, what belongs to it by reason of its identity. Praise and blame, the winds of success and adversity, blow over such a life without leaving a trace or upsetting its balance. Towards this, so help me, God--    -Dag Hammarskjold

"Would the crucifixion have had any sublimity or meaning if Jesus had seen Himself crowned with the halo of martyrdom? What we have later added was not there for him. And we must forget all about it if we are to hear his commands."  -Dag Hammarskjold

"All first-hand experience is valuable, and he who has given up looking for it will one day find that he lacks what he needs: a closed mind is a weakness, and he who approaches persons, or painting, or poetry without the youthful ambition to learn a new language and so gain access to someone else's perspective on life, let him beware." -Dag Hammarskjold

"Do you still need to evoke memories of a self-imposed humiliation in order to extinguish a smoldering self-admiration? To be pure in heart, among other things, means to have freed yourself from all such half-measures: from a tone of voice which places you in the limelight, a furtive acceptance of some desire of the flesh which ignores the desire of the spirit, a self-righteous reaction to others in their moments of weakness. Look at yourself in that mirror when you wish to be praised--or to judge. Do so without despairing." -Dag Hammarskjold

I Came to Believe - Johnny Cash

Help Me - Johnny Cash