Like some homeopathic cure, our very sense of imprisonment can be a step toward liberation. We need not rebel against our temporally determined roles. Merely to recognize them is to limit their power over us. The liberation implied by such awareness ...
Great travel writing consists of equal parts curiosity, vulnerability and vocabulary. It is not a terrain for know-it-alls or the indecisive. The best of the genre can simply be an elegant natural history essay, a nicely writ sports piece, or a well-...
A dog is a pitiful thing, depending wholly on companionship, and utterly lost except in packs or by the side of his master. Leave him alone and he does not know what to do except bark and howl and trot about till sheer exhaustion forces him to sleep....
The beauty of this idea is that my decision to keep Peeta alive at the expense of my own life is itself an act of defiance. A refusal to play the Hunger Games by the Capitol's rules. My private agenda dovetails completely with my public one. And if I...
This time it was the sentence opening the last part of a story I had worked on for months: a sentence as is often worked off paper first. The pace of narrative and interest in character do not readily help the writer's hand to set down a sentence of ...
This was no longer art: it even destroyed the harmony of the portrait itself. They were alive, they were human eyes! It seemed as if they had been cut out of a living man and set there. Here there was not that lofty pleasure which comes over the soul...
Feel the energy, starting with your hands, and if you maintain the sensation of being connected to that energy as you pray, you can be more deeply immersed in your prayer. The reason is because the entire universe itself is composed of the energy you...
The white cat symbolizes the silvery moon prying into corners and cleansing the sky for the day to follow. The white cat is "the cleaner" or "the animal that cleans itself," described by the Sanskrit word Margaras, which means "the hunter who follows...
The policies the US government is following are dangerous for its citizens. It's true that you can bomb or buy out anybody that you want to, but you can't control the rage that's building in the world. You just can't. And that rage will express itsel...
It’s been my experience that most folk who ride trains could care less where they’re going. For them it’s the journey itself and the people they meet along the way. You see, at every stop this train makes, a little bit of America, a little bit ...
Who are theologians? What kind of self-identity could or should a theologian claim? Should a theologian be a defender or transmitter of Christian _tradition_? What if the _tradition_ itself carries a dark side, implicitly or explicitly, bounded by re...
Aye lass,” nodded Gizurr, “you are quite the beauty for sure. I’d certainly offer to buy you a beer or two if I ever met you in a pub and that’s a fact.” Ragni tutted and elbowed Gizurr in the ribs, “Have some respect, she looks young eno...
but as he plodded along a vague and almost hallucinatory pall hazed over his mind; he found himself at one point, with no notion of how it could be, a step from an almost certain fatal cliffside fall—falling humiliatingly and helplessly, he thought...
The contemplation of consciousness—which is the contemplation of no-thing whatsoever—is endlessly fascinating. It’s like staring at a candle in a dark night—you find yourself mesmerized by something that is unchanging yet infinitely compellin...
The image titled “The Homeless, Psalm 85:10,” featured on the cover of ELEMENTAL, can evoke multiple levels of response. They may include the spiritual in the form of a studied meditation upon the multidimensional qualities of the painting itself...
Giraldus claimed that he had heard about Eleanor's adultery with Geoffrey from the saintly Bishop Hugh of Lincoln, who had learned of it from Henry II of England, Geoffrey's son and Eleanor's second husband. Eleanor was estranged from Henry at the ti...
In all poor countries, where general culture is not very advanced, monasteries give to the masses the silence, poetry and music, for which their souls unconsciously yearn. As soon, however, as a people grows prosperous, educates itself and finds its ...
Shhh, Eena, it’s going to be okay. I promise, you’ll get through this.” She didn’t fight him, but grabbed onto his shirt, weeping softly into it as before. He began to hum faintly, a familiar Earth tune. Soon he was singing the words in that ...
As soon as he had disappeared Deborah made for the trees fringing the lawn, and once in the shrouded wood felt herself safe. She walked softly along the alleyway to the pool. The late sun sent shafts of light between the trees and onto the alleyway, ...
He is as good as anybody in this parish! He is very particular, too, about going to church-yes, he is!' 'I am afeard nobody ever saw him there. I never did, certainly.' 'The reason of that is,' she said eagerly, 'that he goes in privately by the old ...
How we feel about ourselves, the joy we get from living, ultimately depend directly on how to the mind filters and interprets everyday experiences. Whether we are happy depends on inner harmony, not on the controls we are able to exert over the great...
