All experience strips us of much except our sheer strength of mind, of spirit.
All experience reveals that upon these we must not finally depend.
Brooding over us and about us, even in the shadows of the paradox, there is something more—
There is a strength beyond our strength, giving strength to our strength.
Whether we bow our knee before an altar or
Spend our days in the delusions of our significance,
The unalterable picture remains the same;
Sometimes in the stillness of the quiet, if we listen,
We can hear the whisper in the heart
Giving strength to weakness, courage to fear, hope to despair.
–Howard Thurman, Meditations of the Heart, p. 95-96
