Wherever the poetry of myth is interpreted 

as biography, history, or science, 

it is killed.

Mythologies are in fact the public dreams 

that move and shape societies, 

and conversely 

one’s own dreams are the little myths 

of the private gods, antigods, and guardian powers 

that are moving and shaping oneself: 

revelations of the actual fears, desires, aims and values 

by which one’s life is subliminally ordered.

The courage to face the trials 

and to bring a whole new body of possibilities 

into the field of interpreted experience 

for other people to experience

 - that is the hero's deed.

The privilege of a lifetime

is being who you are.

'All life,' said the Buddha, 'is sorrowful'; 

and so, indeed, it is. 

Life consuming life: 

that is the essence of its being, 

which is forever a becoming. 

'The world,' said the Buddha, 'is an ever-burning fire.' 

And so it is. 

And that is what one has to affirm, 

with a yea! a dance! 

a knowing, solemn, stately dance 

of the mystic bliss beyond pain 

that is at the heart of every mythic rite.

I am tomorrow, 

or some future day, 

what I establish today. 

I am today 

what I established yesterday 

or some previous day.

The secret of dreams is that 

subject and object are the same. 

The object is self-luminous, 

fluent in form, 

multivalent in its meanings. 

It’s your dream, 

the manifestation of your will.

It is vain to talk of the interest of the community, 

without understanding what is the interest of the individual.

Shakespeare said that art is a mirror held up to nature. 

And that's what it is. 

The nature is your nature, 

and all of these wonderful poetic images of mythology 

are referring to something in you. 

When your mind is simply trapped by the image out there 

so that you never make the reference to yourself, 

you have misread the image.

Experience is not what happens to you; 

it's what you do with what happens to you.

The way is not in the sky. 

The way is in the heart.

I believe there is no philosophical high-road in science, 

with epistemological signposts. 

No, 

we are in a jungle and find our way by trial and error, 

building our road behind us as we proceed.

A great pleasure in life 

is doing what people say 

you cannot do.

When God says, 

"I'm no metaphor. I'm a fact," 

you're in trouble.