The Brown Book Commentaries

―Avoid looking for new ways to flee across the chessboard. Listen to Hear ‗checkmate‘
spoken directly to you.‖ ~ Rumi
Running from that which is feared guarantees that we will soon be assaulted by the same …
Similarly, striving to attain victory or success assures that we will ultimately lose the contest most
worth winning. Until we make our lives about serving others in joyous self-sacrifice, we will be
ruled by fear & pain & suffering … And until we make our lives about brining other their greatest
victory, we will never know our own.
―Be Source, not result.‖ ~ Rumi
We are here to forge ahead with boldness into each moment – not to be governed by
circumstance or ruled by fate, but to choose how we respond to the same – to never know with
certainty whether our efforts will bear the glorious fruits of Peace or Joy, and yet to courageously
engage each moment with that same harvest being our sole intention.
―We are the mirror as well as the face in it. We are tasting the taste, this Ruler of Eternity.
We are pain and what causes pain. We are the sweet, cold water and the jar that pours.‖ ~ Rumi
This is what Love is – caring for the other so completely that all personal worries and all selfcentered
hopes melt into nothingness. Real Love knows neither Lover nor Beloved – for real Love
experiences the two as One. Indeed, there can be no real Love unless the Giving thereof becomes the
greatest Gift; and there can be no real Love unless the Receiving thereof becomes the greatest Giving.
―Those who do not Feel this Love pulling them like a River … Those who do not drink of
dawn like a cup of spring water or take in a sunset like a succulent supper … Those who do not want
to change, Let them sleep.‖ ~ Rumi
We cannot ever know Love until we feel our Loving, and we cannot ever feel that Loving until
we have the courage to fully Give our Love … Of course, there will frequently be those who refuse
to honor the same; far more often than not there will be those who reject our Love rather than have
the Great Courage required to take it on. And when this happens, we are indeed to continue Giving
to them – indeed, to give them every opportunity to receive the very thing for which they have been
yearning since their conception; and thereby awaken to their own Mission that is even now calling
them to Give. And yet if their rejection remains steadfast, if they show a staunch unwillingness to
wake to what could be, we are to let them sleep – to be ever ready to embrace them should they
come to us, and yet to turn and seek others more willing until such time might come.
―I have lived on the lip of insanity; wanting to know reasons … Knocking on a door – it
opens. I have been knocking from the inside!‖ ~ Rumi
We only arrive at our deepest Awareness of Truth in the moment we realize that we have been
privy since birth to everything we ever truly needed to Know. The ―insanity‖ referenced here is
our ego‘s incessant striving to know that which cannot be known – its bizarre tendency to gravitate
towards delusions of religious &/or scientific certainty, when it is only doubt-piercing actions of
calm courage that bring our Soul its true redemption.
―You‘ve heard it said that there‘s a window that opens from one mind to another. But if there
is no wall, there is no need for fitting a window.‖ ~ Rumi
212
We can only truly Communicate with another in those moments when our empathy for her or
him intensifies to the point that – for all perceptive purposes – we become One with them … We
cannot truly listen to another until we Hear her as though we are the one speaking; and we cannot
truly speak to another until we See him as though we are the one listening.