He had read lots of stories where heroes succeeded in spite of long odds, where they accomplished a task that everyone else had failed at. He wondered for the first time about all the people who'd gone before those heroes, about whether they'd been a...
Everything, all those great things, had happened so far away--or so it seemed to [Mma Ramotswe] at the time. The world was made to sound as if it belonged to other people--to those who lived in distant countries that were so different from Botswana; ...
It’s easy to give God a list of excuses for not feeling worthy or as capable as someone else, in our service to him. The problem is that God doesn’t call those who are unprepared or incapable. He calls those who have the talent and ability to ser...
He wondered if today was that day, if he’d wake up different, wake up someone else who remembered him fondly. A new Doctor. He wondered if he’d approve. Would he be more gentle? That might not be so bad. More vengeful? He hoped not. Maybe he’d ...
She'd spoken of their happiness as though it were an undeniable fact, no matter what happened--apart from everything else and not subject to it. It was a new idea for him, that happiness wasn't a mystical place to be reached or won--some bright terra...
His name feels like a secret, and now he's wearing it on his wrist. I want to know all about this girl who put it there. What she looks like. If she's got freckles, fair hair or dark, like his. If she's scrappy or etheral, funny or serious, scrape-kn...
He taunted me, "Pony boy, pony boy," because I liked ponies. Pony boy. He always came to vent his anger of dragons on me. They must really like us. They hide behind their Wasp Queen and pretend to hate us dragons, but in truth they love us. Why else ...
Real is...just being you. It's not letting yourself be defined by other people's opinions of you, of who they think you are, or what they expect you to be. It's refusing to let them squash you into the box they've built for you, and just being yourse...
Tell me,' asked Stas, 'what is a wicked deed?' 'If anyone takes away Kali's cow,' he answered after a brief reflection, 'that then is a wicked deed.' 'Excellent!' exclaimed Stas, 'and what is a good one?' This time the answer came without any reflect...
To reverse the effects of civilization would destroy the dreams of a lot of people. There's no way around it. We can talk all we want about sustainability, but there's a sense in which it doesn't matter that these people's dreams are based on, embedd...
I am a drifter, and as lonely as that can be, it is also remarkably freeing. I will never define myself in terms of anyone else. I will never feel the pressure of peers or the burden of parental expectation. I can view everyone as pieces of a whole, ...
And at the place where time stands still, one sees lovers kissing in the shadows of buildings, in a frozen embrace that will never let go. The loved one will never take his arms from where they are now, will never give back the bracelet of memories, ...
Shall I pour for you madam?” he asks. It is an appropriate question and yet he makes it sound like a scorching proposal… “Mmmm, please,” is all I manage in reply. I watch him filling the crystal flutes one at a time. He is meticulous and seem...
Planning is worrying, only in a productive, proactive form. Worry has to be a large element of planning, or else how could you project different possible scenarios, situations, outcomes, and probabilities, and then plot a course of action? A worry-fr...
Groceries, you need to learn how to select your thoughts just the same way you select what clothes you're gonna wear every day. This is a power you can cultivate. If you want to control things in your life so bad, work on the mind. That's the only th...
This is what we are like. Collectively, as a species, this is our emotional landscape. I met an old lady once, almost one hundred years old, and she told me, "There are only two questions that human beings have ever fought over, all through history. ...
One thing I do know about intimacy is that there are certain natural laws which govern the sexual experience of two people, and that these laws cannot be budged any more than gravity can be negotiated with. To feel physically comfortable with someone...
This is what we are like. Collectively as a species, this is our emotional landscape. I met an old lady once, almost 100 years old, and she told me, "There are only two questions that human beings have ever fought over, all through history. How much ...
Speaking of shabby looks, we're going to have to give you a haircut soon. ...WHAT? These feathers are getting messy. LET ME UNDERSTAND THIS CORRECTLY. YOU WISH TO CUT MY MANE? Thunder tigers grow manes? OF COURSE! HOW ELSE WOULD YOU TELL MALES FROM F...
Tell a devout Christian that his wife is cheating on him, or that frozen yogurt can make a man invisible, and he is likely to require as much evidence as anyone else, and to be persuaded only to the extent that you give it. Tell him that the book he ...
Now Vegas, while you were asleep your classmates and I were discussing time manipulation. What are your thoughts on the subject?” “Well,” Vegas turned to the class, his captive audience and smiled, “if you can manipulate time so this bell wou...
