Beauty & the Human Spirit

Helen Keller once said ‘The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched, they must be felt with the heart.’  

At times throughout our lives we face an emptiness that is crying out for a mystical experience.  The experience may beg for questions such as:

• In what situations can a mystical experience be found in beauty?

• Is beauty really in the eye of the beholder or is it a universal phenomenon? 

• How can beauty alert us to ways in which we need to be transformed? 

• Can beauty inflame our souls to a higher spiritual experience?

• When can beauty allure us to new spiritual paths? 

• In what way can a strong spiritual life emerge from experience of beauty?

• In what ways can beauty emerge from living in the sacred?

• Under what circumstances can the human spirit create beauty from the brokenness of life?

• Can beauty have its origins in spiritual or emotional darkness and melancholy?

• How can beauty come out of adversity & distress?

• What is the relationship between physical beauty and spiritual beauty?

• What is the connection between inner and outer beauty?

• What makes a person beautiful?

• What are the consequences of a distorted sense of beauty?

• In what ways can beauty a gift or a curse?

• How does creating a space of grace and order contribute to beauty?

• How do music, dance and art contribute to or distract from beauty?

• When is movement and speech beautiful?

• Is beauty an expression of our nature?

• Can beauty help us feel more connected with all creation?

• How can beauty help us appreciate the gifts in others?

• How can the beauty of nature become a life lesson?

• What is beauty?

• What does beauty mean to you?

• What is the source of beauty?

• What is the role of beauty in your life?

• Where do you find beauty?

• How do you recognize beauty?

• Is beauty innate or acquired?

“Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.”

-Confucius

“True beauty lies in purity of the heart.”

-M. Gandhi

“Open your eyes and you will see the beauty of the Universe. Open your mind and you will understand the Universe. Open your heart and the Universe is yours.”

- Buddha

“Everything in the universe is a pitcher brimming with wisdom and beauty.”

-Rumi

“Since love grows within you, so beauty grows. For love is the beauty of the soul.”

-Saint Augustine

“The body without spirit is not capable of real accomplishment. Although it may be in the utmost condition of beauty and excellence, it is, nevertheless, in need of the spirit. The chimney of the lamp, no matter how polished and perfect it be, is in need of the light. Without the light, the lamp or candle is not illuminating. Without the spirit, the body is not productive.”

-Abdu’l-Baha

“Never lose an opportunity of seeing anything beautiful, for beauty is God's handwriting.”

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Every cell in your body is seeking fulfillment through joy, beauty, love & appreciation.”

-Deepak Chopra

“O Thou Whose face is the object of my adoration, Whose beauty is my sanctuary, Whose habitation is my goal, Whose praise is my hope, Whose providence is my companion, Whose love is the cause of my being, Whose mention is my solace, Whose nearness is my desire, Whose presence is my dearest wish and highest aspiration.”

-Baha’u’llah

“When you reach the heart of life you shall find beauty in all things, even in the eyes that are blind to beauty.

-K. Gibran

“It is time for parents to teach young people early on that in diversity there is beauty and there is strength.”

-Maya Angelou

“Something very beautiful happens to people when their world has fallen apart: a humility, a nobility, a higher intelligence emerges at just the point when our knees hit the floor.”

-Marianne Williamson

“Men who suffer not, attain no perfection. The plant most pruned by the gardeners is that one which, when the summer comes, will have the most beautiful blossoms and the most abundant fruit.”

― Abdu'l-Bahá

“The spirit in man has been created in accordance with the image of beauty, so that whenever it either hears or sees anything beautiful, it may have a propensity towards it, and seek for communion with it.”

-Muhammad Al-Ghazali

“Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.”

-Rumi

Peace is of the heart, not of the mind.  To know peace you have to find out what beauty is.  The way you talk, the words you use, the gestures you make, these things matter very much, for through them you will discover the refinement of your own heart.  Beauty cannot be defined, it cannot be explained in words.  It can be understood only when the mind is very quiet.”

-Krishnamurti

“The only lasting beauty is the beauty of the heart.”

-Rumi

“When man in all conditions is pure and immaculate, he will become the center of the reflection of the manifest Light. In all his actions and conduct there must first be purity, then beauty and independence. The channel must be cleansed before it is filled with sweet water. The pure eye comprehendeth the sight and the meeting of God; the pure nostril inhaleth the perfumes of the rose-garden of bounty; the pure heart becometh the mirror of the beauty of truth.”

-Abdu’l-Baha

“Where shall you seek beauty, and how shall you find her unless she herself be your way and your guide?

And how shall you speak of her except she be the weaver of your speech?

The aggrieved and the injured say, "Beauty is kind and gentle.

Like a young mother half-shy of her own glory she walks among us."

And the passionate say, "Nay, beauty is a thing of might and dread.

Like the tempest she shakes the earth beneath us and the sky above us."

The tired and the weary say, "Beauty is of soft whisperings. She speaks in our spirit.

Her voice yields to our silences like a faint light that quivers in fear of the shadow."

But the restless say, "We have heard her shouting among the mountains,

And with her cries came the sound of hoofs, and the beating of wings and the roaring of lions."

At night the watchmen of the city say, "Beauty shall rise with the dawn from the east."

And at noontide the toilers and the wayfarers say,

"We have seen her leaning over the earth from the windows of the sunset."

In winter say the snow-bound, "She shall come with the spring leaping upon the hills."

And in the summer heat the reapers say,

"We have seen her dancing with the autumn leaves,

and we saw a drift of snow in her hair."

All these things have you said of beauty,

Yet in truth you spoke not of her but of needs unsatisfied,

And beauty is not a need but an ecstasy.

It is not a mouth thirsting nor an empty hand stretched forth,

But rather a heart enflamed and a soul enchanted.

It is not the image you would see nor the song you would hear,

But rather an image you see though you close your eyes and a song you hear though you shut your ears.

It is not the sap within the furrowed bark, nor a wing attached to a claw,

But rather a garden for ever in bloom and a flock of angels for ever in flight.

People of Orphalese, beauty is life when life unveils her holy face.

But you are life and you are the veil.

Beauty is eternity gazing at itself in a mirror.

But you are eternity and you are the mirror.”

-K. Gibran

“Never downplay your intelligence.  Dumb is not cute. Integrity, dignity, and wisdom are the true indicators of beauty.”

-Marianne Williamson

 “Without transcendence, life has no beauty”

-Deepak Chopra

“Mortal charm shall fade away, roses shall give way to thorns, and beauty and youth shall live their day and be no more. But that which eternally endureth is the Beauty of the True One, for its splendour perisheth not and its glory lasteth for ever; its charm is all-powerful and its attraction infinite.”

-Baha’u’llah

“The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science.”

-Albert Einstein

“The flower that blooms in adversity is the rarest and most beautiful of all.”

-Mulan

“May you walk in beauty.”

-Navaho blessing

“A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”

-Albert Einstein

“O SON OF EARTH! Wouldst thou have Me, seek none other than Me; and wouldst thou gaze upon My beauty, close thine eyes to the world and all that is therein; for My will and the will of another than Me, even as fire and water, cannot dwell together in one heart.”

-The Hidden Words

“Beauty is the gift from God.”

-Aristotle

“You are altogether beautiful, my love; there is no flaw in you.”

-Song of Solomon

“Knowledge is light, life, felicity, perfection, beauty and the means of approaching the Threshold of Unity. It is the honor and glory of the world of humanity, and the greatest bounty of God.”

-Abdu'l-Bahá

“We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.”

-Maya Angelou

“Beauty's voice speaks gently: it creeps only into the most awakened souls.”

-Nietzsche