🌙 “Yesterday Is but Today’s Memory…”: Wisdom from Khalil Gibran

Have you ever considered that our obsession with measuring time might be missing the point entirely? Khalil Gibran's masterpiece "The Prophet" offers us a profound alternative perspective that could transform how we experience each moment of our lives.

Today I felt moved to share a beautiful passage from "The Prophet" that speaks to the nature of time itself. Published in 1923, this timeless work continues to offer wisdom that feels startlingly relevant to our rushed modern existence. Gibran challenges our conventional understanding of time as something linear that can be divided, measured, and controlled. Instead, he invites us to recognize the timelessness that dwells within each of us.

The passage I read contains some of Gibran's most breathtaking insights: "Yesterday is but today's memory and tomorrow is today's dream," and "that which sings and contemplates in you is still dwelling within the bounds of that first moment which scattered the stars into space." These words remind us that our consciousness participates in something eternal, beyond the constraints of clocks and calendars. When Gibran describes love and time as "undivided and paceless," he offers us a powerful metaphor for understanding our own boundless nature.

I hope these words provide a moment of reflection in your day. What would change in your life if you embraced the timelessness Gibran describes? How might you move through your days differently? Take a moment to contemplate this wisdom, and perhaps you too will find yourself inspired to "let today embrace the past with remembrance and the future with longing." Remember to subscribe for more moments of reflection and inspiration that help us all live more fully in the present moment.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to Khalil Gibran's The Prophet
• 1:17 Reading from The Prophet on Time
• 2:16 Personal Reflection and Closing Thoughts

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:23

Hey there, every now and then I look to Khalil Gibran's timeless masterpiece, the Prophet, which was published back in 1923. And it's a beautiful poem with a potent message of self-understanding and spiritual growth, and I find it so inspiring, and I thought I just, and I find it so inspiring and I thought I just was moved to pick it up today and just opened it to page 73, where he's speaking of time. So I'm just gonna read it to you in lieu of a meditation today, and maybe it's something for you to meditate on. So here we go.

Speaker 1: 1:08

An astronomer said Master, what of time? And he answered you would measure time, the measureless and the immeasurable. You would adjust your conduct and even direct the course of your spirit according to hours and seasons Of time. You would make a stream upon whose bank you would sit and watch its flowing. Yet the timeless in you is aware of life's timelessness and knows that yesterday is but today's memory and tomorrow is today's dream.

Speaker 1: 1:59

And that which sings and contemplates in you is still dwelling within the bounds of that first moment which scattered the stars into space. Who among you does not feel that his power to love is boundless? And yet who does not feel that that very love, though boundless, encompassed within the center of his being and moving not from love thought to love thought, nor from love deeds to other love deeds and is not time, even as love is undivided and paceless. Undivided and paceless. But if, in your thought, you must measure time into seasons, let each season encircle all the other seasons and let today embrace the past with remembrance and the future with longing. It's beautiful, isn't it? Yesterday is but today's memory and tomorrow is today's dream. And that which sings and contemplates in you is still dwelling within the bounds of that first moment which scattered the stars into space. I mean, wow. I hope you find that as beautiful and thought-provoking as I do. I'm Lisa Hopkins. Thanks so much for listening. Stay safe and healthy, everyone, and remember to live in the moment.