posted January 05, 2008 08:49 PM         

"Life is the coexistence of all opposite values. Joy and sorrow, pleasure and pain, up and down, hot and cold, here and there, light and darkness, birth and death. All experience is by contrast, and one would be meaningless without the other."

-- Deepak Chopra

Life is full of dualities, opposites. Despite their apparent opposition, each extreme in a duality is necessary to fully actualize the other. Each depends on the existence of the other. For example, we cannot know honesty if we don’t know deception.

The key is to not resist or suppress the negative. We need to acknowledge its existence, though we may choose not to express it. When we embrace wholeness, we move to a higher perspective.

"The light which man has discovered within himself makes him more aware of the dark; through the good which attracts him, he sees the evil which is the line of least resistance; the activity leading to pain simultaneously permits him to visualize the contrasting pleasure, and thus he experiences something of both hell and heaven."

-- Aart Jurriaanse