Please take a few moments today to offer a prayer for a friend of mine, Matt, who is undergoing a brain operation today. 
"If we study the lives of great men and women carefully and unemotionally we find that, invariably, greatness was developed, tested and revealed through the darker periods of their lives.
One of the largest tributaries of the RIVER OF GREATNESS is always the STREAM OF ADVERSITY."
~ Cavett Robert
"A "No" uttered from deepest conviction is better and greater than a "Yes" merely uttered to please, or what is worse, to avoid trouble.
-Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi
"I am now seventy-eight years old, and have seen so many, many things during my lifetime.
So many young people have died, so many people of my own age have died, so many old people have died.
So many people that were high up have become low.
So many people that were low have risen to be high up.
So many countries have changed.
There has been so much turmoil and tragedy, so many wars, and plagues, so much terrible destruction all over the world.
And yet all these changes are no more real than a dream.
When you look deeply, you realize there is nothing that is permanent and constant, nothing, not even the tiniest hair on your body.
And this is not a theory, but something you can actually come to know and realize and see, even, with your very own eyes."
—Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche. Courtesy of Rigpa: Glimpse of the Day, March 2nd,
"Trials, temptations, disappointments—all these are helps instead of hindrances, if one uses them rightly.
They not only test the fiber of character but strengthen it.
Every conquering temptation represents a new fund of moral energy.
Every trial endured and weathered in the right spirit makes a soul nobler and stronger than it was before."
~ James Buckham
