Repetition is not failure. Ask the waves, ask the leaves, ask the wind.
Interpretation
Repetition is a natural part of life and should be embraced as a learning process rather than viewed as a failure.
In this quote, Mark Nepo emphasizes the importance of repetition in our lives and how it is a fundamental aspect of the natural world. Like the constant ebb and flow of waves, the rustling of leaves, and the shifting of the wind, repetition signifies growth, persistence, and the ongoing journey of understanding rather than merely a sign of failure. It encourages us to view our experiences, including setbacks and mistakes, as essential steps in our development and to remember that everything in nature experiences cycles of repetition.
In practice
During a motivational speech about resilience, I would quote this to illustrate that each setback is part of a learning process.
Four hundred year old trees, who draw aliveness from the earth like smoke from the heart of God, we come, not knowing you will hush our little want to be big; we come, not knowing that all the work is so much busyness of mind; all the worry, so much busyness of heart. As the sun warms anything near, being warms everything still and the great still things that outlast us make us crack like leaves of laurel releasing a fragrance that has always been.
Whatever difficulty you face, there are time-tried ways you can listen your way through. Because listening is the doorway to everything that matters. It enlivens the heart the way breathing enlivens the lungs. We listen to awaken our heart. We do this to stay vital and alive.
Let's be in awe which doesn't mean anything but the courage to gape like fish at the surface breaking around our mouths as we meet the air.
Water reflects everything it encounters. This is so commonplace that we think water is blue, when in fact it has no color.... But the water, the glorious water everywhere, has taught me that we are more than what we reflect or love. This is the work of compassion: to embrace everything clearly without imposing who we are and without losing who we are.
The further I wake into this life, the more I realize that God is everywhere and the extraordinary is waiting quietly beneath the skin of all that is ordinary. Light is in both the broken bottle and the diamond, and music is in both the flowing violin and the water dripping from the drainage pipe. Yes, God is under the porch as well as on top of the mountain, and joy is in both the front row and the bleachers, if we are willing to be where we are.
We work so hard to get somewhere, to realize a dream, to arrive at some destination, that we often forget that though some satisfaction may be waiting at the end of our endurance and effort, there is great and irreplaceable aliveness in the steps along the way.
I cannot conceive of a greater loss than the loss of one's self-respect.
Remember that the good angels do what they can to preserve men from sin and obtain God's honor. But they do not lose courage when men fail.
Produce what you consume; draw from the native element the necessaries of life. Permit no vitiated taste to lead you into the indulgence of expensive luxuries, which can only be obtained by involving yourselves in debt.
Good nature is worth more than knowledge, more than money, more than honor, to the persons who possess it.
Sometimes it's necessary to go a long distance out of the way in order to come back a short distance correctly.
Refusing to be disillusioned is the cause of much of the suffering of human life.
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