The religions of the world are luminous in their individuality, and they have valuable social and soulmaking functions. Surely someday we will quit k…

- Coleman Barks

The mystics always say that the experience they're talking about is ineffable, that you can't say it. Rumi was asked one time why he talked so much a…

- Coleman Barks

If you think there's an important difference between being a Christian or a Jew or a Hindu or a Muslim or a Buddhist, then you're making a division b…

- Coleman Barks

[Rumi] is trying to get us to feel the vastness of our true identity... like the sense you might get walking into a cathedral.

- Coleman Barks

Longing becomes more poignant if in the distance you can't tell whether your friend is going away or coming back. The pushing away pulls you in.

- Coleman Barks

It's such a foolish thing to argue about names, when what we're doing is all one thing.

- Coleman Barks

When you meet a new friend, the world has more light in it, doesn't it? Things become more spontaneous, and more full of laughing and freedom and nov…

- Coleman Barks

Anything you grab hold of on the bank breaks with the river's pressure. When you do things from your soul, the river itself moves through you. Freshn…

- Coleman Barks

Ramana Maharshi and Rumi would agree: the joy of being human is in uncovering the core we already are, the treasure buried in the ruin.

- Coleman Barks