John O'Donohue

The sacred duty of being an individual is to gradually learn how to live so as to awaken the eternal within you.

— John O'Donohue

“Take time to see the quiet miracles that seek no attention”

— John O'Donohue

So at the end of this day, we give thanks For being betrothed to the unknown.

— John O'Donohue

The visible is only the shoreline of the magnificent ocean of the invisible.

— John O'Donohue

The way you look at things is the most powerful force in shaping your life.

— John O'Donohue

The eternal world and the mortal world are not parallel, rather they are fused.

— John O'Donohue

...we are custodians of deep and ancient thresholds. In the human face you see that potential and the miracle of undying possibility.

— John O'Donohue

When you had an ‘anam cara,’ (soul friend), your friendship cut across all convention and category. You were joined in an ancient…

— John O'Donohue

To the judgmental eye, everything is closed in definitive frames. When the judgmental eye looks out, it sees things in terms of…

— John O'Donohue

the search for meaning is really the search for the lost chord. When the lost chord is discovered by humankind, the discord…

— John O'Donohue

All you can ever achieve is a sense of your soul. You gain little glimpses of its light, colors, and contours. You…

— John O'Donohue

Your soul is the priestess of memory, selecting, sifting, and ultimately gathering your vanishing days toward presence.

— John O'Donohue

I believe that our friends among the dead really mind us and look out for us. Often there might be a big…

— John O'Donohue

You are as young as you feel. If you begin to feel the warmth of your soul, there will be a youthfulness…

— John O'Donohue

I have never seen white so absolute / And alone, glistening in awkward form / Dreaming across the water a bright path.…

— John O'Donohue

Respectability and security are subtle traps on life's journey. Those who are drawn to extremes are often nearer to renewal and self-discovery.…

— John O'Donohue

When love awakens in your life, in the night of your heart, it is like the dawn breaking within you. Where before…

— John O'Donohue

Good friends won't let you off the hook when you shouldn't be let off the hook. You can let fall the masks…

— John O'Donohue

When you cease to fear your solitude, a new creativity awakens in you. Your forgotten or neglected wealth begins to reveal itself.…

— John O'Donohue

Although you should not erase your responsibility for the past, when you make the past your jailer, you destroy your future. It…

— John O'Donohue

When you begin to sense that your imagination is the place where you are most divine, you feel called to clean out…

— John O'Donohue

The human soul is hungry for beauty; we seek it everywhere - in landscape, music, art, clothes, furniture, gardening, companionship, love, religion,…

— John O'Donohue

I arise today... Blessed by all things / wings of breath, / delight of eyes, / wonder of whisper, / intimacy of…

— John O'Donohue

Consumerism is the worship of the god of quantity; advertising is its liturgy. Advertising is schooling in false longing.

— John O'Donohue

In order to keep our balance, we need to hold the interior and exterior, visible and invisible, known and unknown, temporal and…

— John O'Donohue

Listen carefully to yourself. Listen to what you dislike, and you will find most of the imagery is what you have received…

— John O'Donohue

“Take refuge in your senses, open up to all the small miracles you rushed through. Become inclined to watch the way of…

— John O'Donohue

You can trust the promise of this opening; Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning That is at one with your life's…

— John O'Donohue

May you see in what you do the beauty of your own soul. May the sacredness of your work bring healing, light…

— John O'Donohue

When you acknowledge the integrity of your solitude, and settle into its mystery, your relationships with others take on a new warmth,…

— John O'Donohue

It is lovely to meet an old person whose face is deeply lined, a face that has been deeply inhabited, to look…

— John O'Donohue

“The ancient rhythms of the earth have insinuated themselves into the rhythms of the human heart. The earth is not outside us;…

— John O'Donohue

We were sent into the world alive with beauty. As soon as we choose Beauty, unseen forces conspire to guide and encourage…

— John O'Donohue

In order to inherit your freedom, you need to go towards it. You have to claim your own freedom before it becomes…

— John O'Donohue

One of the most beautiful gifts in the world is the gift of encouragement. When someone encourages you, that person helps you…

— John O'Donohue

Either we are in the universe to inhabit the eternity of our souls and grow real, or else we might as well…

— John O'Donohue

“TO COME HOME TO YOURSELF May all that is unforgiven in you Be released. May your fears yield Their deepest tranquillities. May…

— John O'Donohue

We do not need to grieve for the dead. Why should we grieve for them? They are now in a place where…

— John O'Donohue

All through your life your soul takes care of you...your soul is alive and awakened, gathering, sheltering and guiding your ways and…

— John O'Donohue

The life and passion of a person leaves an imprint on the ether of a place. Love does not remain within the…

— John O'Donohue