John [the father] kept saying, "You have a penis. That means you’re a boy." One day, Shannon noticed that her son had been in the bathroom an awfully long time and pushed the door open. "He had a pair of my best, sharpest sewing scissors poised, re...
Listen to what is being preached today. Look at everyone around us. You’ve wondered why they suffer, why they seek happiness and never find it. If any man stopped and asked himself whether he’s ever held a truly personal desire, he’d find the a...
These wonderful narrations inspired me with strange feelings. Was man, indeed, at once so powerful, so virtuous and magnificent, yet so vicious and base? He appeared at one time a mere scion of the evil principle, and at another as all that can be co...
I can't promise you that I won't hurt you," he said softly after it became clear I wasn't going to speak. Sincerity flowed from him like water in a river and it nearly broke my heart. "I can't say that I won't ever do something stupid, or forget your...
And so I urge you to still every motion that is not rooted in the Kingdom. Become quiet, hushed, motionless until you are finally centered. Strip away all excess baggage and nonessential trappings until you have come into the stark reality of the Kin...
Go to Zillicks down the block. It has three booths at the back. Go in the middle one and wait. When you lamp me turning the pages of the directory outside, shove your money in the return-coin slot and walk out. Take it easy. Don't let the druggist se...
Q. But it seems to me there are circumstances that simply induce one to have negative emotions! A. This is one of the worst illusions we have. We think that negative emotions are produced by circumstances, whereas all negative emotions are . This is ...
It meant leading my meta-life. Meta-life is the opposite of living in the moment. It's the syndrome of simultaneously having an experience and being an observer commenting on and questioning the experience. By observing something, you change it, some...
I keep thinking it's going to come back when I least expect it. When I'm at my happiest. So I'm always afraid to be happy." Zane looks out at the horizon. "You know, there are so many things that can go wrong in this world, you could spend your whole...
Come here, let me share a bit of wisdom with you. Have you given much thought to our mortal condition? Probably not. Why would you? Well, listen. There's no one alive who can say if he will be tomorrow. Our fate moves invisibly! A mystery. No one can...
Yes, I am finally a match for Amy. The other morning I woke up next to her, and I studied the back of her skull. I tried to read her thoughts. For once I didn't feel like I was staring into the sun. I'm rising to my wife's level of madness. Because I...
Children who are victimized through sexual abuse often begin to develop deeply held tenets that shape their sense of self: 'My worth is my sexuality. I'm dirty and shameful. I have no right to my own physical boundaries.' That shapes their ideas abou...
I am both numb and oversensitive, overwhelmed by the need, the raw and desperate need of the girls I am listening to and trying to help. I'm overdosing on the trauma of others, while still barely healing from my own. I cry for hour at home and have f...
The theatre is a tragic place, full of endings and partings and heartbreak. You dedicate yourself passionately to something, to a project, to people, to a family, you think of nothing else for weeks and months, then suddenly it's over, it's perpetual...
It has seemed to me sometimes as though the Lord breathes on this poor gray ember of Creation and it turns to radiance - for a moment or a year or the span of a life. And then it sinks back into itself again, and to look at it no one would know it ha...
Ik wilde niet aan haar denken en me op de mantra concentreren: MAAA, zei ik bij het inademenen en OEEMMM bij het uitademen. MAAA... het was vast al bijna twee uur... OEEMMM. MAAA... je zou het niet zeggen, maar die lotushouding zat niet echt lekker.....
Me refiero al error de hablar y tratar no con el hombre mismo sino con el retrato -casi el <>- que nos hemos hecho de él in mente. Y tiene que desviarse enormemente de este retrato para que lleguemos a darnos cuenta siquiera de ello. En la vida real...
Giovanni had awakened an itch, had released a gnaw in me. I realized it one afternoon, when I was taking him to work via the Boulevard Montparnasse. We had bought a kilo of cherries and we were eating them as we walked along. We were both insufferabl...
For I am—or I was—one of those people who pride themselves in on their willpower, on their ability to make a decision and carry it through. This virtue, like most virtues, is ambiguity itself. People who believe that they are strong-willed and th...
People talk about nightfall, or night falling, or dusk falling, and it’s never seemed right to me. Perhaps they once meant befalling. As in night befalls. As in night happens. Perhaps they, whoever they were, thought of a falling sun. That might be...
I decide to scope out craigslist to see all the vibrant economic employment opportunities available to me in this depression. Oh, I’m sorry, I mean “recession.” No matter how many millions of jobs are lost, how much debt our country accrues, or...
