Anthony Lawlor (born 13 June 1959) is a former Irish Fine Gael politician who served as a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Kildare North constituency from 2011 to 2016.
For thousands of years, much of humankind has believed that only special places are infused with the sacred and that you must get away from the everyday in order to find it. Not so, everything is infused with the holy--from chairs to clothing to kitchen stoves.
Thus, flexibility, as displayed by water, is a sign of life. Rigidity, its opposite, is an indicator of death.
Architecture is made of memory. The slope of a roof, the shape of a window, and the color of a door contain the record of the minds that conceived them and the hands that crafted them.
The sacred cannot be precisely defined. Each of us perceives it through the lens of a unique personal history. For me, sacredness is an experience of the inner radiance of life, the unseen force that transforms and nourishes the physical world but is never limited by it. There is something more to it, a mystery that is never totally grasped.
In my view, the holy is not based so much on the physical environment, but on the experience and perceptions of it.
Currents of energy shimmer through our bodies. Like shooting stars, we rocket through spacious stillness. But this silent, unmoving background is nothing like the granite ideas we use trying to take root in groundless soil.
Dreaming is a journey through wonder, surprise, and freedom.
The word sacred comes from sacrifice, to cut up. That means that in order to have a sacred journey, you have to give up something, sacrifice; but few people today in the West want to hear about that. Americans want the boon without the labyrinth. Pilgrimage starts the wheel, it turns the wheel of samsara, the wheel of life, and we have to live with the consequences.
Since every building and designed object is made of memory, every place can become a memorial for re-membering our lives and the world around us. . . a place to recollect the fragments of our lives into a revitalized whole.
Running water is perceived as being filled with vitality.
The pleasure of the soul appears to be found in the journey of discovery, the unfolding revelation of expanded insight and experience.
We might as well give in to the tug of our spirits to explore this confounding and wondrous world. We might as well greet each other as endless pilgrims and bid each other well on our way. Because we're already on the road.
Over time, each day has become another stretch on an endless pilgrimage road. The terrain of this sacred journey has become fluid and ever-shifting. Every step of the way is an arrival, but not a place to linger.
A place of solitude offers a retreat from the opposing forces and diverse demands of living, an entry into a state of peace and unity. Mind and body can retire from confusion and conflict to a sanctuary of clarity and harmony
We are all pilgrims on an elusive and endless road. . . Despite our attempts to build lives on stone foundations, our spirits continuously flow. Endless streams of consciousness ripple through our minds.