“In our prayers and devotions, we need to reconnect with the sacred substance in creation. We need to place the earth within our hearts, and nourish it with our love, and offer it in remembrance of God.”

–from chapter 6 in Prayer of the Heart in Christian & Sufi Mysticism, a new book by Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee. With thanks to Working with Oneness.

Also see our latest issue for Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee’s reflections on the divine and the human: “Where the Two Seas Meet.”

From Parabola.

Courtesy of Caravan of Dreams.

Courtesy of Caravan of Dreams.

“To stop using my brain for thinking and to start using it for reflecting.” –-Richard Thompson Thank you, nevver.

“To stop using my brain for thinking and to start using it for reflecting.”

–-Richard Thompson

Thank you, nevver.

Photograph from the series “Fragrance from the Sufi Garden” by Shems Friedlander (source). Thank you, touba.

Photograph from the series “Fragrance from the Sufi Garden” by Shems Friedlander (source). Thank you, touba.

“The late Irina Tweedie was the author of Daughter of Fire, a diary of her intensive spiritual training in India with a Hindu Sufi master. In this moving and personal interview, the 80-year-old Mrs. Tweedie, who was a Sufi teacher in London, describes the bliss, peace and love—and the despair, hatred and loneliness—of her years of training in the Sufi tradition.”

—Courtesy of Thinking Allowed.

Here is a transcript of the interview as well.

“…it is in all the scriptures, in the Hindu Upanishads, everywhere it is said, and also in Christianity — it is the mind which is the greatest obstacle on the spiritual path, the constant automatic thinking of the mind, constantly churning memories and desires and thoughts of the future and so on and so forth. And this mind has to be stilled somehow, in order that spiritual experiences can come through. So while deep down, the mind is thrown into confusion, I could rather compare it — you know, the law of nature is everywhere. It’s “As above, so below” — on the spiritual plane, and also in this life. It is the pendulum going backward and forward. It’s one of the laws of nature; it’s going this way and then going back. So it is kept artificially between the desperation and the nearness.”

—Irina Tweedie

from parabola-magazine.

All this talk and turmoil and noise and movement and desire is outside of the veil; within the veil is silence and calm and rest.

— Abu Yazid Al-Bistami

Thank you, astroinquiry.

(Source: frederickwoodruff)

“The heart of man, if once expanded, becomes larger than all the heavens. The deep thinkers of all ages have therefore held that the only principle of awakening to life is the principle of emptying the self. In other words, making oneself clearer and more complete accommodation in order to accommodate all experiences more clearly and more fully. The tragedy of life, all its sorrows and pains, belong mostly to the surface of the life of the world. If one were fully awake to life, if one could respond to life, if one could perceive life, one would not need to look for wonders, one would not need to communicate with spirits; for every atom in this world is a wonder when one sees with open eyes.”Hazrath Inayat Khan Sometimes Facebook is pretty cool.

“The heart of man, if once expanded, becomes larger than all the heavens. The deep thinkers of all ages have therefore held that the only principle of awakening to life is the principle of emptying the self. In other words, making oneself clearer and more complete accommodation in order to accommodate all experiences more clearly and more fully.

The tragedy of life, all its sorrows and pains, belong mostly to the surface of the life of the world. If one were fully awake to life, if one could respond to life, if one could perceive life, one would not need to look for wonders, one would not need to communicate with spirits; for every atom in this world is a wonder when one sees with open eyes.”

Hazrath Inayat Khan

Sometimes Facebook is pretty cool.

Silent dhikr is a matter of longing and remembrance, of submission to remembrance, of guiding breath, of surrendering to the great spaciousness of the soul, sliding into the sea of light.
Coleman Barks, The Illuminated Prayer: The Five-Times Prayer of the Sufis (via touba)
These photographs are beautiful: From the series Sufism I hope that these photographs can begin to balance out all the images of burning effigies, violent Anti-American protests, IED attacks, and suicide bombers, that consistently appear on the covers of our newspapers and magazines. These images over time, will become a window into a world of music, dance, poetry, and above all Love in Islam, something we rarely see in the western press. Aaron Huey, photographer Thank you, findout. I would also like to thank 3oclockblues who left this insightful observation in my message box: In regards to your post about Sufism balancing out ‘the images of burning effigies, violent Anti-American protests, IED attacks, and suicide bombers’, it’s not likely to happen. Muslims don’t consider Sufism to be part of Islam, they claim the Sufis have altered the religion, and there is a lot of violence against them because of it in places like Pakistan and Afghanistan. Islam forbids things like music and dancing, and so Muslims claim Sufis are going against the religion by embracing these things. The verse commonly used as justification for dismissing the Sufi sect is 6:159 which says: ‘Have nothing to do with those who have split up their religion into sects. God will call them to account and declare to them what they have done.’

These photographs are beautiful:

From the series Sufism

I hope that these photographs can begin to balance out all the images of burning effigies, violent Anti-American protests, IED attacks, and suicide bombers, that consistently appear on the covers of our newspapers and magazines. These images over time, will become a window into a world of music, dance, poetry, and above all Love in Islam, something we rarely see in the western press.

Aaron Huey, photographer

Thank you, findout.

I would also like to thank 3oclockblues who left this insightful observation in my message box:

In regards to your post about Sufism balancing out ‘the images of burning effigies, violent Anti-American protests, IED attacks, and suicide bombers’, it’s not likely to happen. Muslims don’t consider Sufism to be part of Islam, they claim the Sufis have altered the religion, and there is a lot of violence against them because of it in places like Pakistan and Afghanistan. Islam forbids things like music and dancing, and so Muslims claim Sufis are going against the religion by embracing these things. The verse commonly used as justification for dismissing the Sufi sect is 6:159 which says:

‘Have nothing to do with those who have split up their religion into sects. God will call them to account and declare to them what they have done.’