The Paradox

This from Howard Thurman, Meditations of the Heart:

“The paradox:

All experience strips us of much except our sheer strength of mind, of spirit.

All experience reveals that upon these we must not fully depend.

Brooding over us and about us, even in the shadows of the paradox, there is something more –

There is strength beyond our strength, giving strength to our strength.

Whether we bow our knee before an altar or

Spend our days in the delusions of our significance,

The unalterable picture remains the same;

Sometimes in the stillness of the quiet, if we listen,

We can hear the whisper of the heart

Giving strength to weakness, courage to fear, hope to despair.”