If you are a Buddhist, inspire yourself by thinking of the bodhisattva. If you are a Christian, think of the Christ, who came not to be served by others but to serve them in joy, in peace, and in generosity. For these things, these are not mere words...
Perhaps this was the first instance of that quiet way of "speaking for" a place not yet occupied, or at least not improved as much as it may be, which their descendants have practised, and are still practising so extensively. Not Any seems to have be...
It was the first time I saw the look on the face of the people I robbed: it was ugly. I was the cause of such ugliness, and the only thing that made me feel was a cruel pleasure which, I thought, was bound to transfigure my own face, to make me respl...
God gave Adam and Eve that free will and choice. He gave them one warning: eat of any tree that is here, including the wonderful tree of life, but don’t eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil…I wish Adam and Eve had thought more abou...
But people like the doll guy who sells women and the dog guy who buys women, and other guys who, say, rape women, or maybe don’t go as far as violent rape but treat women like objects instead of people—sure, there’s a difference in the level of...
I had a dream about you. Knowing that women like to buy two things above all else, shoes and purses, I combined the two into one product that looked like Margaret Thatcher’s dress on your feet. You asked if my shoes made your ass look fat, and I re...
There is no such thing as escape after all, only an exchange of one set of difficulties for another. It wasn't Mark or the farm or marriage I was trying to shake loose from but my own imperfect self, and even if I kept moving, she would dog me all th...
In any profession, you will be respected if you are good at your job – not because you are good at talking about your beliefs. It may be quite irrational, but the fact is that, if you are recognized as being outstanding on one thing, you will be li...
Life was a bloody battlefield until I conquered the enemy and won the war. Now, life is a journey, and I am a warrior. Prepared for anything and weakened by nothing. There are hills and dales, mountains and plateaus, blind spots and brilliant vistas,...
The wise thing is for us diligently to train ourselves to lie thoughtfully, judiciously; to lie with a good object, and not an evil one; to lie for others' advantage, and not our own; to lie healingly, charitably, humanely, not cruelly, hurtfully, ma...
How can love be worthy of its name if one selects solely the pretty things and leaves out the hardships? It is easy to enjoy the good and dislike the bad. Anybody can do that. The real challenge is to love the good and the bad together, not because y...
But that's life. That's your education. A series of opportunities and missed opportunities. Exams and grades and blue books and blue balls and majors and minors and liberal arts and liberal minds. The scam of it is, no matter how much you paid or how...
What are you going to do? Are you going to live in the dark, locked in here? Afraid to look out, answer the door, leave? Yes, he's out there, and he's clearly not going to leave you alone until one of three things happens: he hurts you and gets arres...
The coolness of Buddhism isn't indifference but the distance one gains on emotions, the quiet place from which to regard the turbulence. From far away you see the pattern, the connections, and the thing as whole, see all the islands and the routes be...
You'll call me a damned Jew, a Christ murderer, a secret worshipper of pigs and a kidnapper of christian children.' This was all said cheerfully. 'How absurd! Who would want to kidnap children, Christian or otherwise? Vile things. The only mercy of c...
The cow-shaped cookies have a beef flavoring, the turkey-shaped cookies have a poultry flavoring, and..." Jane held up one of the cookies. "Human-flavored?" Meg stifled a sigh. That would be the first thing on her feedback list: don't make people-sha...
Is your cucumber bitter? Throw it away. Are there briars in your path? Turn aside. That is enough. Do not go on and say, "Why were things of this sort ever brought into this world?" neither intolerable nor everlasting - if thou bearest in mind that i...
You live as if you were destined to live forever, no thought of your frailty ever enters your head, of how much time has already gone by you take no heed. You squander time as if you drew from a full and abundant supply, though all the while that day...
The truth is, what you do matters. What you do today matters. What you do every day matters. Successful people just do the things that seem to make no difference in the act of doing them and they do them over and over and over until the compound effe...
When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be ve...
Now that Olive was grown, I didn't know what to do with myself. You could build your life around one single thing, like a view or a child, but that was risky. You had so much to lose.
