The Tale of Bark - Day 303

The truck of this tree twists around in a spiral motion adding a strange beauty to the once living trunk.  Scientifically speaking, it is said that a twisted truck is the result of a tree standing in an area of strong winds.  The twists add strength to the tree and keep it from toppling over.  Often, you cannot see the twists until after the bark falls off the tree.

Pain is inevitable.  Suffering is optional.  ~M. Kathleen Casey

The turning point in the process of growing up is when you discover the core of strength within you that survives all hurt.  ~Max Lerner, The Unfinished Country, 1950

Lone Flower In The Afternoon - Day 302

Among all the brown, I found a single green plant, and within this plant I found a single flower.  It reminded me, that if we look hard enough, we can find beauty in even the desolate places.  

People often say that 'beauty is in the eye of the beholder,' and I say that the most liberating thing about beauty is realizing that you are the beholder. This empowers us to find beauty in places where others have not dared to look, including inside ourselves.

Salma Hayek

Macro Friday - Purple Beauty - Day 301

Today is Macro Friday once again, and I am linking up with Blogging From Bolivia to share my shot of the week.  Hope to see you there!

Flowers seem intended for the solace of ordinary humanity.  ~John Ruskin

“Little things seem nothing, but they give peace,

like those meadow flowers which individually seem odorless

but all together perfume the air.”   Georges Bernanos 

Butterfly - Day 300

I am thinking that I had no idea how hard it would be to get a couple of simple shots of a butterfly.  These are straight out of my camera and I really enjoyed trying!

"Happiness is a butterfly, which when pursued, is always just beyond your grasp,

but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you."  Nathaniel Hawthorne

"The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough."

Rabindranath Tagore

"There is nothing in a caterpillar that tells you it's going to be a butterfly."

R. Buckminster Fuller

Uphill - Day 299

"The battle of life is, in most cases, fought uphill; and to win it without a struggle were perhaps to win it without honor. If there were no difficulties there would be no success; if there were nothing to struggle for, there would be nothing to be achieved."  Samuel Smiles

Finding Root - Day 298

"God is more concerned with who we are than who we think we are.

He doesn't care how many talks we do or how big they are.

What matters is that we become what God wants us to be." 

Joshua Kang

“The abundant life is within our reach if only we will drink deeply of living water, fill our

hearts with love, and create of our lives a masterpiece.”

Joseph B. Wirthlin, “The Abundant Life,”

Ensign , May 2006, 99–102

Burned Up - Day 297

"Find a place inside where there is joy and the joy will burn out the pain."
Joseph Campbell