One morning, as a fire flamed back of a handsome eighteenth-century glass screen, I looked for the silence underneath the explosions of the fire... By now I was adept at finding the silence wherever it was. As I settled into it this morning, letting it fill my ears, mind and being, I heard the words: "I'll never abandon you, no matter what you do." ... Once I heard it, I learned to go and find, first the silence and then to wait for the voice. It comes OUT of the silence. It doesn't always come. But somehow I know it will again. And this knowledge has changed my existence. What I have to do, I now understand, is keep myself ready to hear it when it does.
Practice is everything; you practice to acquire facility in every art; but not one of these will repay you to the extent that the practice of joyousness will.Fall asleep at night, awaken in the morning; in the silence know, "All is joy." Then one day it will begin to work within you; you'll retain that joy as a permanent consciousness. Seek ye the realm of joy -- one of Love's holy attributes!