Clouds heap upon clouds and it darkens. 
Ah, love, why dost thou let me wait outside at the door all alone?

In the busy moments of the noontide work I am with the crowd, 

but on this dark lonely day it is only for thee that I hope.

If thou showest me not thy face, 

if thou leavest me wholly aside,

I know not how I am to pass these long, rainy hours.

I keep gazing on the far away gloom of the sky,

 and my heart wanders wailing with the restless wind.

Rabindranath

Food for spiritual journey

He who wants to cross the spiritual sea is long-suffering, humble, vigilant and selfcontrolled.
If he impetuously embarks on it without these four virtues, he agitates his heart, but cannot cross.

 Stillness helps us by making evil inoperative. If it also takes to itself these four virtues in prayer, it is the most direct support in attaining dispassion.


Afflictions that come to us are the result of our own sins. But if we accept them patiently through prayer, we shall again find blessings.


The intellect cannot be still unless the body is still also; and the wall between them cannot be demolished without stillness and prayer.

The flesh with its desire is opposed to the spirit, and the spirit opposed to the flesh,and those who live in the spirit will not carry out the desire of the flesh 


Whatever we do without prayer and without hope in God turns out afterwards to be harmful and defective.


There is a sin which is always ‘unto death’ (1Jn 5:16): the sin for which we do not, repent. For this sin even a saint’s prayers will not be heard.


The sign of sincere love is to forgive wrongs done to us. It was with such love that the Lord loved the world.

We cannot with all our heart forgive someone who does us wrong unless we possess real knowledge. For this knowledge shows us that we deserve all we experience.


A passion which we allow to grow active within us through our own choice afterwards forces itself upon us against our will.


Saint Mark the Ascetic

“Your task is not to seek for
love, but merely to seek and
find all the barriers within
yourself that you have built
against it.”



Rumi

Knowing Truth and Being Truth

God is love. If God is love, love is most sacred. To utter this word without meaning, is a vain repetition. The lips of a person to whom it means something, are closed. He can say little. For love is a revelation in itself. No study is necessary, no meditation is needed, and no piety is required. If love is pure, if the spark of love has begun to glow, then there is no need to go somewhere to gain spirituality. Then spirituality is within. One must keep blowing the spark till it turns into a perpetual fire. The fire worshippers of old did not worship a fire which went out; they worshipped a perpetual fire. Where is that perpetual fire to be found? In one's own heart. The spark that one finds glowing for a moment and that then becomes dim, does not belong to heaven, for in heaven all things are lasting; it must belong to some other place. Love has become a word from the dictionary, a word which is used a thousand times a day, which means nothing. To the one who knows what it means, love means patience, love means endurance, love means tolerance, love means sacrifice, love means service. All things such as gentleness, humility, modesty, graciousness, kindness, all are the different manifestations of love. It is the same to say, 'God is all and all is God,' as to say, 'Love is all and all is love.' And it is to find it, to feel it, to experience its warmth, and to see in the world, the light of love, and to keep its glow, and to hold love's flame high, as the sacred torch, to guide one in life's journey. It is in this that the purpose of life is fulfilled. According to the common standard of life, a man with common sense is counted to be a right and a fit person. But, by a mystical standard, that person alone can begin to be right, who is beginning to feel sympathy with his fellow man. For by the study of philosophy and mysticism, by the practices of concentration and meditation, to what do we attain? To a capability that enables us to serve our fellow men better.

Truth is simple. But for the very reason that it is simple, people will not take it; because our life on earth is such that for everything we value, we have to pay a great price and one wonders, if truth is the most precious of all things, then how can truth be attained simply? It is this illusion that makes everyone deny simple truth and seek for complexity. Tell people about something that makes their heads whirl round and round and round. Even if they do not understand it, they are most pleased to think, 'It is something substantial. It is something solid. For, it is an idea we cannot understand, it must be something lofty.' But something which every soul knows, proving what is divine in every soul, and which it cannot help but know, that appears to be too cheap, for the soul already knows it. There are two things: knowing and being. It is easy to know truth, but most difficult to be truth. It is not in knowing truth that life's purpose is accomplished; life's purpose is accomplished in being truth.

Inayat Khan

faith and love

Faith and love which are gifts of the Holy Spirit are such great and powerful means that a person who has them can easily, and with joy and consolation, go the way Jesus Christ went. Besides this,
the Holy Spirit gives man the power to resist the delusions of the world so that although he makes use of earthly good, yet he uses them as a temporary visitor, without attaching his heart to them.
But a man who has not got the Holy Spirit, despite all his learning and prudence, is always more or less a slave and worshipper of the world.

St. Innocent of Irkutsk,

'There is One Moral, the love which springs forth from self-denial and blooms in deeds of beneficence.'

There are moral principles taught to mankind by various teachers, by many traditions, one differing from the other, which are like separate drops coming out of the fountain. But when we look at the stream, we find there is but one stream, although it turns into several drops on falling. There are many moral principles, just as many drops fall from one fountain; but there is one stream that is at the source of all, and that is love. It is love that gives birth to hope, patience, endurance, forgiveness, tolerance, and to all moral principles. All deeds of kindness and beneficence take root in the soil of the loving heart. Generosity, charity, adaptability, an accommodating nature, even renunciation, are the offspring of love alone. The great, rare and chosen beings, who for ages have been looked up to as ideal in the world, are the possessors of hearts kindled with love. All evil and sin come from the lack of love.
People call love blind, but love in reality is the light of the sight. The eye can only see the surface; love can see much deeper. All ignorance is the lack of love. As fire when not kindled gives only smoke, but when kindled, the illuminating flame springs forth, so it is with love. It is blind when undeveloped, but, when its fire is kindled, the flame that lights the path of the traveler from mortality to everlasting life springs forth. The secrets of earth and heaven are revealed to the possessor of the loving heart, the lover has gained mastery over himself and others, and he not only communes with God but also unites with Him.

Inayat Khan

Of Music and Harmony

This morning the music of a brass band which had stopped under my windows moved me almost to tears. It exercised an indefinable, nostalgic power over me; it set me dreaming of another world, of infinite passion and supreme happiness. Such impressions are the echoes of paradise in the soul; memories of ideal spheres, whose sad sweetness ravishes and intoxicates the heart. O Plato! O Pythagoras! ages ago you heard these harmonies—surprised these moments of inward ecstacy—knew these divine transports! If music thus carries us to heaven, it is because music is harmony, harmony is perfection, perfection is our dream, and our dream is heaven. This world of quarrels and bitterness, of selfishness, ugliness, and misery, makes us long involuntarily for the eternal peace, for the adoration which has no limits, and the love which has no end. It is not so much the infinite as the beautiful that we yearn for. It is not being, or the limits of being, which weigh upon us; it is evil, in us and without us. It is not all necessary to be great, so long as we are in harmony with the order of the universe. Moral ambition has no pride; it only desires to fill its place, and make its note duly heard in the universal concert of the God of love.

Amiel

The Smiling Forehead

By forehead is meant man's expression. The smiling forehead is the pleasant expression; it depends solely upon man's attitude to life. Life is the same for the saint and for Satan, and if men are different it is because of their outlook on life. The same life is turned by the one into heaven and by the other into hell. There are two attitudes: to one all is wrong, to the other all is right. Our life in the world from morning to evening is full of experiences, good and bad, which can be distinguished according to their degree. And the more we study the mystery of good and bad the more we see that there really is no such thing as good and bad. It is because of our attitude and the conditions that things seem good or bad. It is easy for an ordinary person to say what is good or bad, just or unjust – it is very difficult for a wise man. Although everyone, according to his outlook on life, turns things from bad to good and from good to bad, everyone has his own grade of evolution and reasons accordingly.


Sometimes one thing is subtler than others and then it is difficult to judge. There was a time when Wagner's music was not understood, and another time when he was considered the greatest of musicians. Sometimes things are good, but our own evolution makes them less good for us. What we considered good a few years ago may not seem good at a later degree of evolution. At one time a child appreciates a doll most, later it will prefer the work of great sculptors. This proves that at every step and degree of evolution man's idea of good and bad changes. Therefore a thinker will understand that there is no such thing as right or wrong. If there is wrong, all is wrong; if there is right, all is right.


No doubt there is a phase when man is a slave of what he has himself made right or wrong, and there is another phase in which he is master. This mastery comes from his realization of the fact that right and wrong are made by his own attitude to life, and then right and wrong, good and bad, will be his slaves, because he knows that it is in his power to turn the one into the other. It is this attitude that the ancient Sufis called mantiq (i.e. logic).


This opens the door to another mystery of life which shows that as there is duality in each thing so there is duality in every action: in everything that is just something unjust is hidden, in everything that is bad something good. Then one begins to see how the world takes all men's actions: one person sees only the good, another only the bad. In Sufi terms this particular attitude is called hairat, bewilderment. And just as to the average man moving pictures, theatres, bazaars are interesting, so to the Sufi the whole of life is interesting, a constant vision of bewilderment. He cannot explain this to the world because there are no words to explain it.


Can one compare any joy to that of taking things quietly, patiently and easily? All other joys come from outward sources, but this happiness is one's own property. When a person arrives at this feeling it expresses itself not in words, but in the 'smiling forehead'.


There is another side to this subject: man is pleased to see the one he loves, admires and respects, and if he frowns at someone it is because it is someone he does not admire or respect. Love is the divine essence in man and is due to God alone. Love for man is a lesson, it is a first step forward to the love of God.


In human love one begins to see the way to divine love, as the lesson of domestic life is learned by a little girl playing with her dolls. One learns this lesson by loving one person, a friend, a beloved, a father, mother, brother, sister, or teacher, but the use of love becomes wrong when that love is constantly developing for one only and not spreading. The water of a pond may turn bad, but the water of a river remains pure because it is progressing. By sincerely loving one person therefore one rears the plant of love and makes it grow and spread. Love has done its work when man has become all love – his atmosphere, his expression, every movement he makes. And how can such a man love one and refuse another? Such a countenance, such a presence becomes a blessing.


In the East, when we speak of saints or sages, it is not because of their miracles, it is because of their presence and their countenance which radiate vibrations of love. How does this love express itself? In tolerance, in forgiveness, in respect, in overlooking the faults of others. Their sympathy covers the defects of others as if they were their own; they forget their own interest in the interest of others. They do not mind what conditions they are in; be they high or humble, their foreheads are smiling. To their eyes everyone is the expression of the Beloved, whose name they repeat. They see the divine in all forms and in all beings.


Just as the religious person has a religious attitude in a temple, so the Sufi has that attitude before every being, for to him every being is the temple of the divine. Therefore the Sufi is always before his Lord. Whether a servant, a master, a friend, or a foe is before him, he is in the presence of God. For the one whose God is in the high heavens there is a vast gulf between him and God, but the one who has God always before him – he is always in God's presence, and there is no end to his happiness.


The idea of the Sufi is that however religious a person may be, without love he is nothing. It is the same with one who has studied thousands of books; without love he has learned nothing. Love is not in a claim of love; when love is born one hears its voice louder than the voice of man. Love needs no words; they are too inadequate to express it. In what little way love can express itself, it is in what the Persians call 'the laughing forehead'.


Inayat Khan

Duty

Never to tire, never to grow cold ; to
be patient, sympathetic, tender ; to look
for the budding flower and the opening
heart ; to hope always, like God ; to love
always, —this is duty.

Henri Amiel

What is it which saves?

What is it which saves?
 How can man be led to be truly
man ? Is the ultimate root of his being
responsibility, —yes or no ? And is doing
or knowing the right, acting or thinking,
his ultimate end ?
If science does not produce
love it is insufficient. Now, all that
science gives is the amor intellectualis of
Spinoza, light without warmth, a resignation
which is contemplative and grandiose,
but inhuman, because it is scarcely transmissible
and remains a privilege, one of the
rarest of all. Moral love places the centre
of the individual in the centre of being. It
has at least salvation in principle, the germ
of eternal life. To love is virtually to know ;
to know is not virtually to love ; there you
have the relation of these two modes of
man. The redemption wrought by science
or by intellectual love is then inferior to
the redemption wrought by will or by moral
love. The first may free a man from himself,
it may enfranchise him from egotism.
The second drives the ego out of itself,
makes it active and fruitful. The one is
critical, purifying, negative ; the other is
vivifying, fertilising, positive. Science,
however spiritual and substantial it may be
in itself, is still formal relatively to love.
Moral force is then the vital point.
And this force is only produced by moral
force. Like alone acts upon like. Therefore
do not amend by reasoning, but by example
; approach feeling by feeling ; do not
hope to excite love except by love. Be what
you wish others to become. Let your self
and not your words preach for you.

Henri Amiel

WE are like a stray line of a poem, which ever feels that it rhymes with another line and must find it, or miss its own fulfilment. This quest of the unattained is the great impulse in man which brings forth all his best creations. Man seems deeply to be aware of a separation at the root of his being, he cries to be led across it to a union; and somehow he knows that it is love which can lead him to a love which is final.

Rabindranath

मेत्ता

माता यथा नियं पुत्तमायुसा एकपुत्तमनुरक्खे।
एवम्पि सब्बभूतेसु, मानसं भावये अपरिमाणं॥


एक माँ के ह्रदय में अपने बच्चे के लिए, अपने एकमात्र बच्चे की रक्षा करने के लिए
जो अपरिमित भाव रहता है वही भाव समस्त प्राणियों के प्रति विकसित करना चाहिए ।


As a mother would risk her life to protect her child, her only child
even so should one cultivate a limitless heart with regard to all beings. 






मेत्तञ्‍च सब्बलोकस्मि, मानसं भावये अपरिमाणं।
उद्धं अधो च तिरियञ्‍च, असम्बाधं अवेरमसपत्तं॥


सम्पूर्ण सृष्टि के प्रति मैत्री का भाव रखते हुए - ऊपर, नीचे , चारों तरफ बिना किसी बाधा और बिना किसी वैर के - हृदय में अपरिमित भावना विकसित करनी चाहिए ।


With good will for the entire cosmos, cultivate a limitless heart:
Above, below, & all around, unobstructed, without hostility or hate।


तिट्ठं चरं निसिन्‍नो व [वा (सी॰ स्या॰ कं॰ पी॰)], सयानो यावतास्स वितमिद्धो [विगतमिद्धो (बहूसु)]।
एतं सतिं अधिट्ठेय्य, ब्रह्ममेतं विहारमिधमाहु॥


हर अवस्था में - चाहे आप खड़े हो, चल रहे हों , बैठे हों या लेटे हों - यदि आप जाग्रत हैं , तो आपके मन में हमेशा यही भाव हो - इसे ब्रह्म विहार कहा गया है ।








Whether standing, walking, sitting, or lying down, as long as one is alert, one should be resolved on this mindfulness. This is called a sublime abiding here & now.






The Khuddakapatha" (Khp 1-9), translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu. Access to Insight, August 1, 2010, http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/khp/khp.1-9.than.html।


हिन्दी अनुवाद: राजीव

Rahere

RAHERE, King Henry's jester, feared by all the Norman Lords
For his eye that pierced their bosoms, for his tongue that shamed their swords;
Fed and flattered by the Churchmen - well they knew how deep he stood
In dark Henry's crooked counsels - fell upon an evil mood.
Suddenly, his days before him and behind him seemed to stand
Stripped and barren, fixed and fruitless as those leagues of naked sand
When St. Michael's ebb slinks outward to the bleak horizon-bound,
And the trampling wide-mouthed waters are withdrawn from sight and sound.

Then a Horror of Great Darkness sunk his spirit and anon,
(Who had seen him wince and whiten as he turned to walk alone)
Followed Gilbert the Physician, and muttered in his ear,
"Thou hast it, O my brother?" "Yea, I have it," said Rahere.

"So it comes," said Gilbert smoothly, "man's most immanent distress.
'Tis a humour of the Spirit which abhorreth all excess;
And, whatever breed the surfeit - Wealth, or Wit, or Power, or Fame
(And thou hast each) the Spirit laboureth to expel the same.

"Hence the dulled eye's deep self-loathing - hence the loaded leaden brow;
Hence the burden of Wanhope that aches thy soul and body now.
Ay, the merriest fool must face it, and the wisest Doctor learn;
For it comes - it comes," said Gilbert, " as it passes - to return."

But Rahere was in his torment, and he wandered, dumb and far,
Till he came to reeking Smithfield where the crowded gallows are..
(Followed Gilbert the Physician) and beneath the wrynecked dead,
Sat a leper and his woman, very merry, breaking bread.

He was cloaked from chin to ankle - faceless, fingerless, obscene
Mere corruption swaddled man-wise, but the woman whole and clean;
And she waited on him crooning, and Rahere beheld the twain,
Each delighting in the other, and he checked and groaned again.

So it comes, - it comes," said Gilbert, "as it came when Life began.
'Tis a motion of the Spirit that revealeth God to man.
In the shape of Love exceeding, which regards not taint or fall,
Since in perfect Love, saith Scripture, can be no excess at all.

Hence the eye that sees no blemish - hence the hour that holds no shame.
Hence the Soul assured the Essence and the Substance are the same.
Nay, the meanest need not miss it, though the mightier pass it by;
For it comes - it comes," said Gilbert, "and, thou seest, it does not die!"


KIPLING

Free love

By all means they try to hold me secure
who love me in this world.
But it is otherwise with thy love
which is greater than theirs,
and thou keepest me free.
Lest I forget them they never venture to leave me alone.
But day passes by after day and thou art not seen.
If I call not thee in my prayers,
if I keep not thee in my heart,
thy love for me still waits for my love.

Rabindranath

Fool

O Fool, try to carry thyself upon thy own shoulders!
O beggar, to come beg at thy own door!
Leave all thy burdens on his hands who can bear all,
and never look behind in regret.
Thy desire at once puts out the light from the lamp
it touches with its breath.
It is unholy—-take not thy gifts through its unclean hands.
Accept only what is offered by sacred love.

Rabindranath

The Sweet Spirit of Love

The advice of anyone is never useful for lovers; this (love) is not like a flood which somebody might restrain.
An intellectual can never know the savor (in) the head of the (mystic)"drunkard,"
(and) a sensible person can never know the "senseless" state
of (such a) heart.
If kings smell those wines which lovers drink during the meetings of hearts,
they would become fed-up with kingship.
For the sake of (his beloved) Sheereen,
(King) Khosraw says farewell to his kingdom,
(and) Farhâd pounds a mountain with a pick-ax* for her sake as well.
From love of (his beloved) Laylà, Majnûn flees the circle of intellectuals,
(and the lover) Wâmiq has laughed at the foolish pride of every arrogant one.
That life (is) frozen which has passed without that sweet spirit (of love).
(And) that (delicious) kernel is putrid which is unaware of this special cheese.
If the sky were not a lover and bewildered like us, it would become weary of
its whirling and say, "It's enough for me! How (much) longer?"
The world (is) like a reed-pipe, and He blows into every hole of it; every wail it has (is) certainly from those two lips like sugar.
See how He blows into every (piece of) clay (and) into every heart; He gives a need and He gives a love which raises up a lament about misfortune.
If you uproot the heart from God, tell (me) whom will you place it with?
Anyone who is able to tear (his) heart from Him for a moment is without a soul!
I'm stopping. Be nimble and go up on top of the roof at night.
Make a happy uproar in the city, O soul, with a loud voice!

RUMI

UNITE WITH LOVE

Your intelligence is split into a hundred busy tasks,
in thousands of desires, in large and small things.
You must unite these scattered parts with love and
become as sweet as Samarkand and Damascus.
Once you are unified, grain by grain, then you can be
stamped with the royal seal.

RUMI

RUBY

At the hour of the morning-drink a beloved said to her lover
by way of trial, "O such-and-such son of such-and-such,
I wonder, do you love me or yourself more?
Tell the truth,O man of sorrows."

He replied, "I have become so naughted in thee that I am
full of thee from head to foot.
Of my existence there is nothing (left) in me but the name:
in my being there is naught but thee, O thou whose wishes are
gratified.
By that means I have become thus naughted, like vinegar, in
thee (who are) an ocean of honey."

As the stone that is entirely turned into pure ruby: it is filled
with the qualities of the sun.
That stony nature does not remain in it: back and front, it is
filled with sunniness.
Afterwards, if it loves  itself, that (self-love) is love of the sun,O youth;
And if it loves the sun with (all) its soul, `tis undoubtedly love
of itself.
Whether the pure ruby loves itself or whether it loves the sun,
There is really no difference in these two loves:
both sides(aspects) are naught but the radiance of the sunrise.
Until it (the stone) has become a ruby, it is an enemy to itself,
because it is not a single "I": two "I's" are there;
For the stone is dark and blind to the day (-light):
the dark is essentially opposed to light.
(If) it loves itself, it is an infidel, because it offers intense
resistance to the supreme Sun.
Therefore `tis not fitting that the stone should say "I," (for)
it is wholly darkness and in (the state of) death.

A Pharaoh said, "I am God" and was laid low;
a Mansur(Hallaj) said, "I am God" and was saved.
The former "I" is followed by God's curse and the latter"I" by God's mercy, O loving man;
For that one (Pharaoh) was a black stone, this one (Hallaj) a
cornelian; that one was an enemy to the Light, and this one
passionately enamoured (of it).

This "I," O presumptuous meddler, was "He" (God) in the inmost
consciousness, through oneness with the Light, not
through (belief in) the doctrine of incarnation.

Strive that thy stony nature may be diminished, so that thy
stone may become resplendent with the qualities of the ruby.

Show fortitude in (enduring) self-mortification and affliction;
continually behold everlasting life in dying to self.
(Then) thy stoniness will become less at every moment, the
nature of the ruby will be strengthened in thee.
The qualities of (self-) existence will depart from thy body,
the qualities of intoxication (ecstasy) will increase in thy head
(thy spiritual centre).
Become entirely hearing, like an ear, in order that thou mayst
gain an ear-ring of ruby.*

RUMI

LOVE

Love hath naught to do with the five (senses) and the six(directions): its goal is only (to experience) the attraction
exerted by the Beloved.
Afterwards, maybe, permission will come (from God): the secrets
that ought to be told will be told,
With an eloquence that is nearer (to the understanding).
The secret is partner with none but the knower of the secret;
in the sceptic's ear the secret is no secret (at all).
But (the command) to call (the people to God) comes down from the Maker:
what has he (the prophet or saint) to do with (their) acceptance or non-acceptance?
Noah continued to call (the people to God) for nine hundred years:
the unbelief of his folk was increasing from moment to moment.
Did he ever pull back the rein of speech? Did he ever creep into
the cave of silence?
He said (to himself), "Does a caravan ever turn back from a journey on account of the noise and clamour of dogs?
Or on a night of moonlight is the running of the full-moon in its course retarded by the dog's outcry?
The moon sheds light and the dog barks: every one proceeds according to his nature.
(The Divine) Destiny hath allotted to every one a certain service,suitable to his essential nature, (to be performed) in (the way of)probation.
Since the dog will not leave off his pestilent howling, I (who)am the moon, how should I abandon my course?"
Inasmuch as the vinegar increases acidity, therefore it is
necessary to increase the sugar.
Wrath is (like) vinegar, mercy like honey; and these twain are
the basis of every oxymel.
If the honey fail to withstand (be overpowered by) the vinegar,
the oxymel will be spoilt.
The people were pouring vinegar on him (Noah), and the Ocean(of Divine Bounty) was pouring more sugar for Noah.
His sugar was replenished from the Sea of Bounty, therefore
it was exceeding the vinegar of (all) the inhabitants of the world.


RUMI

LOVE

The love of God is everywhere in nature; yet we see destruction and misery and inequalities all around us. It is a difference of focus. If we focus our mind upon all that is good and beautiful we shall see God's love in spite of all the ugliness that exists in nature and especially in human nature. In doing so we will spread a cover over it; and by collecting everything beautiful in us we will be able to give to whatever lacks beauty from the supply in our own heart. But if we focus our attention upon ugliness it will grow in us, and there will come a time when we shall not be able to see any good anywhere; everywhere we look we will only see cruelty, unkindness, wickedness, and ugliness.

One may ask if in focusing one's mind on beauty alone, one is not in danger of shutting one's eyes to the ugliness and suffering one might otherwise alleviate. The answer is that in order to help the poor one needs to be rich, and in order to take away evil from a person one needs to have so much more good. That goodness has to be earned as money is earned; and that earning means collecting goodness wherever we find it. What happens is that man becomes agitated by the abundance of goodness that he sees; being himself poor he cannot add to it, and then he is drawn towards evil. Although he may unconsciously develop in his own nature a craving for the goodness he sees, that does not help him in his agitation; his looking at evil only adds another wicked person to the whole.

The one whose eyes are focused on beauty in time will join the good; he is getting the same impressions but the result is different. Besides, by criticizing, by judging, by looking at wickedness with contempt, one does not help the one who needs it. The person who is ready to overlook, forgive, and patiently tolerate all those disadvantages that he may have to meet with, is the one who can help.

One should love for the sake of love, not for a return. When one serves, one should serve for the sake of serving, not for acknowledgment or appreciation in any shape or form. In the beginning such a person may perhaps seem a loser, but in the end he will be the gainer, for he has lived in the world while yet holding himself above the world; the world cannot touch him.

Inayat Khan