Chains Courage Quotes

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Happy is the man who has broken the chains which hurt the mind, and has given up worrying once and for all.” "Be patient and tough; one day this pain will be useful to you.
Ovid (Metamorphoses)
We, unaccustomed to courage exiles from delight live coiled in shells of loneliness until love leaves its high holy temple and comes into our sight to liberate us into life. Love arrives and in its train come ecstasies old memories of pleasure ancient histories of pain. Yet if we are bold, love strikes away the chains of fear from our souls. We are weaned from our timidity In the flush of love's light we dare be brave And suddenly we see that love costs all we are and will ever be. Yet it is only love which sets us free.
Maya Angelou
Who but the artist has the power to open man up, to set free the imagination? The others - priest, teacher, saint, statesman, warrior - hold us to the path of history. They keep us chained to the rock, that the vultures may eat out our hearts. It is the artist who has the courage to go against the crowd; he is the unrecognized "hero of our time" - and of all time.
Henry Miller (Stand Still Like the Hummingbird)
Dear Child, Sometimes on your travel through hell, you meet people that think they are in heaven because of their cleverness and ability to get away with things. Travel past them because they don't understand who they have become and never will. These type of people feel justified in revenge and will never learn mercy or forgiveness because they live by comparison. They are the people that don't care about anyone, other than who is making them feel confident. They don’t understand that their deity is not rejoicing with them because of their actions, rather he is trying to free them from their insecurities, by softening their heart. They rather put out your light than find their own. They don't have the ability to see beyond the false sense of happiness they get from destroying others. You know what happiness is and it isn’t this. Don’t see their success as their deliverance. It is a mask of vindication which has no audience, other than their own kind. They have joined countless others that call themselves “survivors”. They believe that they are entitled to win because life didn’t go as planned for them. You are not like them. You were not meant to stay in hell and follow their belief system. You were bound for greatness. You were born to help them by leading. Rise up and be the light home. You were given the gift to see the truth. They will have an army of people that are like them and you are going to feel alone. However, your family in heaven stands beside you now. They are your strength and as countless as the stars. It is time to let go! Love, Your Guardian Angel
Shannon L. Alder
With every lecture, you’re forced to look again at every choice you’ve made over the lesson-by-lesson chain of your entire life. And after all these years, you see how little you have to work with, how limited your life and education have been. How scant was your courage and curiosity. Not to mention your expectations.
Chuck Palahniuk (Haunted)
A subject to which few intellectuals ever give a thought is the right to be a vagrant, the freedom to wander. Yet vagrancy is a deliverance, and life on the open road is the essence of freedom. To have the courage to smash the chains with which modern life has weighted us (under the pretext that it was offering us more liberty), then to take up the symbolic stick and bundle and get out.
Isabelle Eberhardt
Over the souls of men spread the condor wings of colossal monsters and all manner of evil things prey upon the heart and soul and body of Man. Yet it may be in some far day the shadows shall fade and the Prince of Darkness be chained forever in his hell. And till then mankind can but stand up stoutly to the monsters in his own heart and without, and with the aid of God he may yet triumph.
Robert E. Howard (The Savage Tales of Solomon Kane)
I don't belong there." "You do. Because of who you are. WHAT you are. One half brimming with dark curiosities and a fierce appetite for all things mad. But the other half whimsy and light - filled with courage and loyalty." He bites his lower lip, a gesture so minute I might've imagined it. "Nothing can break the chains you have on my heart. For you ARE Wonderland." -Unhinged, pg 179
A.G. Howard
pushing yourself to take simple actions creates a chain reaction in your confidence and your productivity.
Mel Robbins (The 5 Second Rule: Transform Your Life, Work, and Confidence with Everyday Courage)
For two centuries, Christians would be a persecuted minority. There was no worldly reward for being Christian. Being a follower of Christ took courage. The twelve apostles, and their first-century co-workers, suffered tribulation and sometimes death as they fulfilled the Great Commission Jesus had given them (Matt 28:19–20). They turned an iron empire upside down and changed our world forever.
James Allen Moseley (Biographies of Jesus' Apostles: Ambassadors in Chains)
What was life has crumbled. What was form, now falls away. Mortal chains unbind and the soul s free. May you find your way to the ancestors. May you find your path to the gods. May your bravery and courage be remembers in song and story, May your parents be proud, and ma our children carry your birthright. Sleep, and wander no more.
Yasmine Galenorn (Blood Wyne (Otherworld / Sisters of the Moon, #9))
God cannot remove the burdens of your heart, but he will prompt you where to go, what to say and what to do, in order to free yourself from your chains.
Shannon L. Alder
The people making you feel guilty for going your own way and choosing your own life are simply saying, ‘Look at me. I’m better than you because my chains are bigger.’ It takes courage to break those chains and define your own life.” So dare to live your precious days on Earth to their fullest, true to yourself, with open heart and thoughtful mind, and with the courage to change what doesn’t work and accept the consequences. You may find that you can fly farther than you ever imagined.
Vishen Lakhiani (The Code of the Extraordinary Mind: 10 Unconventional Laws to Redefine Your Life and Succeed On Your Own Terms)
It's a lie, you know," she whispered. "This prison, these chains. There is no darkness that light cannot overcome you only need the courage to believe it." —Tellie
H.S.J. Williams (Moonscript (Kings of Aselvia, #1))
One of the most powerful opponents of happiness is indeed fear. Unfortunately, the chains that bind people to their comfortable mediocrity are the same ones that bind their future to an unsuccessful destiny. The courage to dream is the very first step. LISTENING TO YOUR DREAMS is the second!
Rossana Condoleo (Happy Divorce: How to turn your divorce into the most brilliant and rewarding opportunity of your life!)
My Angel, My greatest hope is that you never have to read this. Vee knows to give you this letter only if my feather is burned and I’m chained in hell or if Blakely develops a devilcraft prototype strong enough to kill me. When war between our races ignites, I don’t know what will become of our future. When I think about you and our plans. I feel a desperate aching. Never have I wanted things to turn out right as as I do now. Before I leave this world, I need to make certain you know that all my love belongs to you. You are the same to me now as you were before you swore the Changeover Vow. You are mine. Always. I love the strength, courage, and gentleness of your soul. I love your body too. How could someone so sexy and perfect be mine? With you I have purpose-someone to love, cherish and protect. There are secrets in my past that weigh on your mind. You've trusted me enough not to ask about them, and it's your faith that has made me a better man. I don’t want to leave you with anything hidden between us. I told you I was banished from heaven for falling in love with a human girl. The I way I explained it, I risked everything to be with her. I said those words because they simplified my motivations. But they weren't the truth. The truth is I had become disenchanted with the archangels’s shifting goals and wanted to push back against them and their rules. That girl was an excuse to let go of an old way of living and accept a new journey that would eventually lead me to you. I believe in destiny, Angel. I believe every choice I've made has brought me closer to you. I looked for you for a very long time. I may have fallen from heaven but I fell for you. I will do whatever it takes to make sure you win this war. Nephilim will come out on top. You’ll fulfill your vow to the Black Hand and be safe. This is my priority even if the cost is my life. I suspect this will make you angry. It may be hard to forgive me. I promised that we would be together at the end of this and you may resent me for the breaking that vow. I want you to know I did everything to keep my word. As I write this I am going over ever possibility that will see us through this. I hope I find a way. But if this choice I have to make comes down to your or me, I choose you. I always have. All my love, Patch
Becca Fitzpatrick (Finale (Hush, Hush, #4))
The wind has many lovers and I am one of them, I move freely in her arms I know no chains, nor bound to anyone’s truth, you can call me a harlot of the wind, I take no offense, because I know at the end of my days, my face will show that I have been kissed by the breath of GOD. ~Micheline Jean louis
Micheline Jean Louis
If you can’t get yourself out of bed, then you’ll never be able to pursue all of the other changes that you want to make in your life. And if you take that simple step of taking control of your mornings, you’ll catalyze a chain of events that leads to change everywhere.
Mel Robbins (The 5 Second Rule: Transform Your Life, Work, and Confidence with Everyday Courage)
What I discovered is powerful: pushing yourself to take simple actions creates a chain reaction in your confidence and your productivity.
Mel Robbins (The 5 Second Rule: Transform Your Life, Work, and Confidence with Everyday Courage)
Don't pay attention to people Who tell you can't do it at lenght. Trusting your own instincts Can lead to what's quintessential. Make their limitation be your strenght. You might as well contradict them And then reach your full potential.
Ana Claudia Antunes (A-Z of Happiness: Tips for Living and Breaking Through the Chain that Separates You from Getting That Dream Job)
Anyone, anyone can break loose from his chains. That courage, no matter how deeply buried, is always waiting to be called out. All it needs is the right coaxing, the right voice to do that coaxing, and it will come roaring like a tiger.
William Melvin Kelley (A Different Drummer)
You never know whose chains you’ll unlock by having the courage to tell your truth, and you may even unlock your own.
Tabitha Brown (Feeding the Soul (Because It's My Business): Finding Our Way to Joy, Love, and Freedom (A Feeding the Soul Book))
Those who tell you that you cannot fly are the ones who chained themselves to the ground.
Sai Pradeep
By letting fear illuminate what’s in need of healing, not just in you, but in your family, you have the potential to heal not only yourself; you can break the chain of generational fear and heal your entire bloodline.
Lissa Rankin (The Fear Cure: Cultivating Courage as Medicine for the Body, Mind, and Soul)
Muslims need to wake up. They also need to start drinking wine, embrace any and all homoerotic tendencies, write some poetry and for the most part free themselves from the fundamentalist chains they have created (for themselves and everyone else!). The Muslim world will only be free when bars fill the streets and women show off their natural, feminine beauty. Muslims need to grow up and stop expecting everyone to be mindless sheep before a 1,400-year-old oral tradition. Nakedness will free Dar-el-Islam!
Irshad Manji (Allah, Liberty and Love: The Courage to Reconcile Faith and Freedom)
didn’t realise at the time how cheaply I had been bought. I didn’t free myself when I married my husband, as I’d thought. I didn’t elevate myself. I did the exact opposite. I married my pimp: I chained myself to him for life. Perhaps my daughter did the very thing I hadn’t had the courage to do.
Lucy Foley (The Paris Apartment)
I was very timid, and bound as with chains in a man-fearing spirit. When I arose to testify I trembled like a leaf, and began to make excuses - O God, send someone else! Then the Lord in a vision caused me to see the bottomless pit open in all its horror and woe. There was weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. It was surrounded by a great multitude of people who seemed unconscious of their danger, and without a moments warning they would tumble into this awful place. I was above the people on a narrow plank-walk, which wound up toward heaven; and I was exhorting and pleading with the people to come upon the plank and escape that awful place. Several started. There was a beautiful bright light above me, and I was encouraging them to follow that light and they would go straight to heaven. "In all these trials God was preparing me and opening the way for the great battle against the enemy of souls and now the great desire of my heart was to work for Jesus. I longed to win a star for the Savior's crown.
Maria Woodworth-Etter
Achievement is no hocus-pocus. It's focus, focus!
Ana Claudia Antunes (A-Z of Happiness: Tips for Living and Breaking Through the Chain that Separates You from Getting That Dream Job)
In darkness we gain a deeper understanding of light’s brilliance. And I found the courage to open my eyes, to see that I was never alone in the dark.
Erin Phillips (A Crown of Chains)
Your inner strength will lead you into a victorious future
S.L. Jones (Woman on Fire: 30-Day Journal & Guide to Break the Chain!)
That man, the unsubmissive and first, stands in the opening chapter of every legend mankind has recorded about its beginning. Prometheus was chained to a rock and torn by vultures—because he had stolen the fire of the gods. Adam was condemned to suffer—because he had eaten the fruit of the tree of knowledge. Whatever the legend, somewhere in the shadows of its memory mankind knew that its glory began with one and that that one paid for his courage.
Ayn Rand (The Fountainhead)
I think I know now why Jesus had such a tender spot in his heart for the poor. It takes great faith and simplicity of spirit to be poor and not despair. It takes enormous courage to decide to keep on living. The homeless are remarkable people. Their very life is a prayer -- desperate, silent, unspoken pleading with God to keep them alive. And by some miracle, no, not one miracle, but by a continuous chain of miracles all day long and all night, they do stay alive, especially on freezing cold days and nights.
Joseph F. Girzone (The Homeless Bishop)
Duty and courage had been made animate, and this was all the T'lan Imass were, and had been for hundreds of thousands of years. Yet, without choice, such virtues as duty and courage were transformed into empty, worthless words. Without mortality, hovering like an unseen sword overhead, meaning was without relevance, no matter the nature - or even the motivation behind - an act. Any act.
Steven Erikson (House of Chains (Malazan Book of the Fallen, #4))
Slavery is so vile and miserable an Estate of Man, and so directly opposite to the generous Temper and Courage of our Nation; that 'tis hardly to be conceived, that an Englishman, much less a Gentleman, should plead for't.. And truly, I should have taken Sr. Rt: Filmer's "Patriarcha" as any other Treatise, which would perswade all Men, that they are Slaves, and ought to be so, for such another exercise of Wit, as was his who writ the Encomium (Praise) of Nero, rather than for a serious Discourse meant in earnest, had not the Gravity of the Title and Epistle, the Picture in the Front of the Book, and the Applause that followed it, required me to believe, that the Author and Publisher were both in earnest. I therefore took it into my hands with all the expectation and read it through with all the attention due to a Treaties, that made such a noise at its coming abroad and cannot but confess my self mightily surprised, that in a Book which was to provide Chains for all Mankind, I should find nothing but a Rope of Sand, useful perhaps to such, whose Skill and Business it is to raise a Dust, and would blind the People, the better to mislead them, but in truth is not of any force to draw those into Bondage, who have their Eyes open, and so much Sense about them as to consider, that Chains are but an Ill wearing, how much Care soever hath been taken to file and polish them.
John Locke (Second Treatise of Government (Hackett Classics))
How closely women clutch the very chains that bind them! You think the Hindu custom barbarous—but would you have had the courage to appear here tonight if the Confederacy hadn’t needed you?
Margaret Mitchell (Gone with the Wind)
Therefore, according to the disposition of the state and the liberty Fortune allows us, we shall either extend or contract our activities; but at all events we shall stir ourselves and not be gripped and paralyzed by fear. He indeed will prove a man who, threatened by dangers on all sides, with arms and chains clattering around him, will neither endanger nor conceal his courage: for self-preservation does not entail suppressing onself. Truly, I believe, Curius Dentatus used to say that he preferred real death to living death; for the ultimate horror is to leave the number of the living before you die.
Seneca (On the Shortness of Life: Life Is Long if You Know How to Use It (Penguin Great Ideas))
Hamish Alexander-Harrington knew his wife as only two humans who had both been adopted by a pair of mated treecats ever could. He'd seen her deal with joy and with sorrow, with happiness and with fury, with fear, and even with despair. Yet in all the years since their very first meeting at Yeltsin's Star, he suddenly realized, he had never actually met the woman the newsies called "the Salamander." It wasn't his fault, a corner of his brain told him, because he'd never been in the right place to meet her. Never at the right time. He'd never had the chance to stand by her side as she took a wounded heavy cruiser on an unflinching deathride into the broadside of the battlecruiser waiting to kill it, sailing to her own death, and her crew's, to protect a planet full of strangers while the rich beauty of Hammerwell's "Salute to Spring" spilled from her ship's com system. He hadn't stood beside her on the dew-soaked grass of the Landing City duelling grounds, with a pistol in her hand and vengeance in her heart as she faced the man who'd bought the murder of her first great love. Just as he hadn't stood on the floor of Steadholders' Hall when she faced a man with thirty times her fencing experience across the razor-edged steel of their swords, with the ghosts of Reverend Julius Hanks, the butchered children of Mueller Steading, and her own murdered steaders at her back. But now, as he looked into the unyielding flint of his wife's beloved, almond eyes, he knew he'd met the Salamander at last. And he recognized her as only another warrior could. Yet he also knew in that moment that for all his own imposing record of victory in battle, he was not and never had been her equal. As a tactician and a strategist, yes. Even as a fleet commander. But not as the very embodiment of devastation. Not as the Salamander. Because for all the compassion and gentleness which were so much a part of her, there was something else inside Honor Alexander-Harrington, as well. Something he himself had never had. She'd told him, once, that her own temper frightened her. That she sometimes thought she could have been a monster under the wrong set of circumstances. And now, as he realized he'd finally met the monster, his heart twisted with sympathy and love, for at last he understood what she'd been trying to tell him. Understood why she'd bound it with the chains of duty, and love, of compassion and honor, of pity, because, in a way, she'd been right. Under the wrong circumstances, she could have been the most terrifying person he had ever met. In fact, at this moment, she was . It was a merciless something, her "monster"—something that went far beyond military talent, or skills, or even courage. Those things, he knew without conceit, he, too, possessed in plenty. But not that deeply personal something at the core of her, as unstoppable as Juggernaut, merciless and colder than space itself, that no sane human being would ever willingly rouse. In that instant her husband knew, with an icy shiver which somehow, perversely, only made him love her even more deeply, that as he gazed into those agate-hard eyes, he looked into the gates of Hell itself. And whatever anyone else might think, he knew now that there was no fire in Hell. There was only the handmaiden of death, and ice, and purpose, and a determination which would not— couldnot—relent or rest. "I'll miss them," she told him again, still with that dreadful softness, "but I won't forget. I'll never forget, and one day— oneday, Hamish—we're going to find the people who did this, you and I. And when we do, the only thing I'll ask of God is that He let them live long enough to know who's killing them.
David Weber (Mission of Honor (Honor Harrington, #12))
As soon as you are filled with awareness, the first thing that will happen is you will begin to see misery, the hell around you. Because you are the one who has created it. However, if you remain courageous and pass through the misery consciously, you will have cut the crop. You won’t have to go through the same miseries again. Once you have gone through this chain of miseries – the chain of karmas, the chain tied around your soul.... If you could pass through it without losing your consciousness, courageously, unworried; if you could determine, ”whatever misery I have created, I’ll go through it, I’ll go to the end of it. I want to arrive at that initial moment when I was innocent and the journey of suffering had not started yet, when my soul was absolutely pure and I had not gathered any misery – I am determined to penetrate up to that point regardless of any consequences, pain, or sorrow.
Osho (Bliss: Living beyond happiness and misery)
It is an extraordinary act of courage,’ said Tulas Shorn, ‘to come to know a stranger’s pain. To even consider such a thing demands a profound dispensation, a willingness to wear someone else’s chains, to taste their suffering, to see with one’s own eyes the hue cast on all things – the terrible stain that is despair.
Steven Erikson (Toll the Hounds (Malazan Book of the Fallen, #8))
It isn't the sort of argument Pointsman relishes either. But he glances sharply at this young anarchist in his red scarf. "Pavlov believed that the ideal, the end we all struggle toward in science, is the true mechanical explanation. He was realistic enough not to expect it in his lifetime. Or in several lifetimes more. But his hope was for a long chain of better and better approximations. His faith ultimately lay in a pure physiological basis for the life of the psyche. No effect without cause, and a clear train of linkages. "It's not my forte, of course," Mexico honestly wishing not to offend the man, but really, "but there's a feeling about that cause-and-effect may have been taken as far as it will go. That for science to carry on at all, it must look for a less narrow, a less . . . sterile set of assumptions. The next great breakthrough may come when we have the courage to junk cause-and-effect entirely, and strike off at some other angle." "No - not 'strike off.' Regress. You're 30 years old, man. There are no 'other angles.' There is only forward - into it – or backward.
Thomas Pynchon (Gravity’s Rainbow)
Sexual abuse is an experience, not a definition to be encased in; you are far greater than any experience suffered through the insidiousness of indifference in the form of pedophilia. Reaching out for help is not a weakness, it is strength and courage in action. Recovery is not easy nor is it a quick process however, all souls are worth the effort required. Who you have come to believe you are can be very divergent from who your naturally are.
Lorraine Nilon (Breaking Free From the Chains of Silence: A respectful exploration into the ramifications of abuse hidden behind closed doors)
The Slavery Abolition Act was signed in the yar of 1833, I say, as I sweep around his feet. 'But nobody is answering the abolition. The kings in Nigeria form before, they were selling people into slave work. Today, people are not wearing chain on their slaves and sending them abroad but salve trading is continuing. People are still breaking the Act. I want to do something to make it stop, to make people to behave better to other people, to stop slave-trading of the mind, not just of the body.
Abi Daré (The Girl with the Louding Voice)
I have in my files a copy of a letter written by Major Sullivan Ballou, a Union officer in the 2nd Rhode Island. He writes to his wife on the eve of the Battle of Bull Run, a battle he senses will be his last. He speaks tenderly to her of his undying love, of “the memories of blissful moments I have spent with you.” Ballou mourns the thought that he must give up “the hope of future years, when, God willing, we might still have lived and loved together, and seen our sons grown up to honorable manhood around us.” Yet in spite of his love the battle calls and he cannot turn from it. “I have no misgivings about, or lack of confidence in the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter . . . how great a debt we owe to those who went before us through the blood and sufferings of the Revolution . . . Sarah, my love for you is deathless, it seems to bind me with mighty cables that nothing but Omnipotence could break” and yet a greater cause “comes over me like a strong wind and bears me unresistably on with all these chains to the battle field.
John Eldredge (Wild at Heart Revised and Updated: Discovering the Secret of a Man's Soul)
ACHILLES – the best fighter of the Greeks who besieged Troy in the Trojan War; extraordinarily strong, courageous, and loyal, he had only one weak spot: his heel AENEAS – a Trojan hero, the son of Aphrodite and a favourite of Apollo; became king of the Trojan people AMPHORA (AMPHORAE, pl.) – a tall ceramic jar ANDROMEDA – the daughter of the Ethiopian king, Cepheus, and his wife, Cassiopeia; after Cassiopeia bragged that her daughter was more beautiful than the Nereids, Poseidon sent a sea monster, Cetus, to attack Ethiopia; Perseus saved Andromeda from the rock she was chained to as a sacrifice
Rick Riordan (Camp Half-Blood Confidential (Percy Jackson and the Olympians))
...Now let's set the record straight. There's no argument over the choice between peace and war, but there's only one guaranteed way you can have peace—and you can have it in the next second—surrender. Admittedly, there's a risk in any course we follow other than this, but every lesson of history tells us that the greater risk lies in appeasement, and this is the specter our well-meaning liberal friends refuse to face—that their policy of accommodation is appeasement, and it gives no choice between peace and war, only between fight or surrender. If we continue to accommodate, continue to back and retreat, eventually we have to face the final demand—the ultimatum. And what then—when Nikita Khrushchev has told his people he knows what our answer will be? He has told them that we're retreating under the pressure of the Cold War, and someday when the time comes to deliver the final ultimatum, our surrender will be voluntary, because by that time we will have been weakened from within spiritually, morally, and economically. He believes this because from our side he's heard voices pleading for "peace at any price" or "better Red than dead," or as one commentator put it, he'd rather "live on his knees than die on his feet." And therein lies the road to war, because those voices don't speak for the rest of us. You and I know and do not believe that life is so dear and peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery. If nothing in life is worth dying for, when did this begin—just in the face of this enemy? Or should Moses have told the children of Israel to live in slavery under the pharaohs? Should Christ have refused the cross? Should the patriots at Concord Bridge have thrown down their guns and refused to fire the shot heard 'round the world? The martyrs of history were not fools, and our honored dead who gave their lives to stop the advance of the Nazis didn't die in vain. Where, then, is the road to peace? Well it's a simple answer after all. You and I have the courage to say to our enemies, "There is a price we will not pay." "There is a point beyond which they must not advance." And this—this is the meaning in the phrase of Barry Goldwater's "peace through strength." Winston Churchill said, "The destiny of man is not measured by material computations. When great forces are on the move in the world, we learn we're spirits—not animals." And he said, "There's something going on in time and space, and beyond time and space, which, whether we like it or not, spells duty." You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We'll preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we'll sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness...
Ronald Reagan (Speaking My Mind: Selected Speeches)
July 14, 1861 Camp Clark, Washington My very dear Sarah: The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days — perhaps tomorrow. Lest I should not be able to write again, I feel impelled to write a few lines that may fall under your eye when I shall be no more… I have no misgivings about, or lack of confidence in the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter. I know how strongly American Civilization now leans on the triumph of the Government and how great a debt we owe to those who went before us through the blood and sufferings of the Revolution. And I am willing — perfectly willing — to lay down all my joys in this life, to help maintain this Government, and to pay that debt… Sarah my love for you is deathless, it seems to bind me with mighty cables that nothing but Omnipotence could break; and yet my love of Country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me unresistibly on with all these chains to the battle field. The memories of the blissful moments I have spent with you come creeping over me, and I feel most gratified to God and to you that I have enjoyed them for so long. And hard it is for me to give them up and burn to ashes the hopes of future years, when, God willing, we might still have lived and loved together, and seen our sons grown up to honorable manhood, around us. I have, I know, but few and small claims upon Divine Providence, but something whispers to me — perhaps it is the wafted prayer of my little Edgar, that I shall return to my loved ones unharmed. If I do not my dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, and when my last breath escapes me on the battle field, it will whisper your name. Forgive my many faults and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless and foolish I have often times been! How gladly would I wash out with my tears every little spot upon your happiness… But, O Sarah! If the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you; in the gladdest days and in the darkest nights … always, always, and if there be a soft breeze upon your cheek, it shall be my breath, as the cool air fans your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by. Sarah do not mourn me dead; think I am gone and wait for thee, for we shall meet again…
Sullivan Ballou
{From Luther Burbank's funeral. He was loved until he revealed he was an atheist, then he began to receive death threats. He tried to amiably answer them all, leading to his death} It is impossible to estimate the wealth he has created. It has been generously given to the world. Unlike inventors, in other fields, no patent rights were given him, nor did he seek a monopoly in what he created. Had that been the case, Luther Burbank would have been perhaps the world's richest man. But the world is richer because of him. In this he found joy that no amount of money could give. And so we meet him here today, not in death, but in the only immortal life we positively know--his good deeds, his kindly, simple, life of constructive work and loving service to the whole wide world. These things cannot die. They are cumulative, and the work he has done shall be as nothing to its continuation in the only immortality this brave, unselfish man ever sought, or asked to know. As great as were his contributions to the material wealth of this planet, the ages yet to come, that shall better understand him, will give first place in judging the importance of his work to what he has done for the betterment of human plants and the strength they shall gain, through his courage, to conquer the tares, the thistles and the weeds. Then no more shall we have a mythical God that smells of brimstone and fire; that confuses hate with love; a God that binds up the minds of little children, as other heathen bind up their feet--little children equally helpless to defend their precious right to think and choose and not be chained from the dawn of childhood to the dogmas of the dead. Luther Burbank will rank with the great leaders who have driven heathenish gods back into darkness, forever from this earth. In the orthodox threat of eternal punishment for sin--which he knew was often synonymous with yielding up all liberty and freedom--and in its promise of an immortality, often held out for the sacrifice of all that was dear to life, the right to think, the right to one's mind, the right to choose, he saw nothing but cowardice. He shrank from such ways of thought as a flower from the icy blasts of death. As shown by his work in life, contributing billions of wealth to humanity, with no more return than the maintenance of his own breadline, he was too humble, too unselfish, to be cajoled with dogmatic promises of rewards as a sort of heavenly bribe for righteous conduct here. He knew that the man who fearlessly stands for the right, regardless of the threat of punishment or the promise of reward, was the real man. Rather was he willing to accept eternal sleep, in returning to the elements from whence he came, for in his lexicon change was life. Here he was content to mingle as a part of the whole, as the raindrop from the sea performs its sacred service in watering the land to which it is assigned, that two blades may grow instead of one, and then, its mission ended, goes back to the ocean from whence it came. With such service, with such a life as gardener to the lilies of the field, in his return to the bosoms of infinity, he has not lost himself. There he has found himself, is a part of the cosmic sea of eternal force, eternal energy. And thus he lived and always will live. Thomas Edison, who believes very much as Burbank, once discussed with me immortality. He pointed to the electric light, his invention, saying: 'There lives Tom Edison.' So Luther Burbank lives. He lives forever in the myriad fields of strengthened grain, in the new forms of fruits and flowers, plants, vines, and trees, and above all, the newly watered gardens of the human mind, from whence shall spring human freedom that shall drive out false and brutal gods. The gods are toppling from their thrones. They go before the laughter and the joy of the new childhood of the race, unshackled and unafraid.
Benjamin Barr Lindsey
the case is even stronger, and the parallel with madness is yet more strange. For it was our case against the exhaustive and logical theory of the lunatic that, right or wrong, it gradually destroyed his humanity. Now it is the charge against the main deductions of the materialist that, right or wrong, they gradually destroy his humanity; I do not mean only kindness, I mean hope, courage, poetry, initiative, all that is human. For instance, when materialism leads men to complete fatalism (as it generally does), it is quite idle to pretend that it is in any sense a liberating force. It is absurd to say that you are especially advancing freedom when you only use free thought to destroy free will. The determinists come to bind , not to loose . They may well call their law the "chain" of causation. It is the worst chain that ever fettered a human being. You may use the language of liberty, if you like, about materialistic teaching, but it is obvious that this is just as inapplicable to it as a whole as the same language when applied to a man locked up in a mad-house. You may say, if you like, that the man is free to think himself a poached egg. But it is surely a more massive and important fact that if he is a poached egg he is not free to eat, drink, sleep, walk, or smoke a cigarette. Similarly you may say, if you like, that the bold determinist speculator is free to disbelieve in the reality of the will. But it is a much more massive and important fact that he is not free to raise, to curse, to thank, to justify, to urge, to punish, to resist temptations, to incite mobs, to make New Year resolutions, to pardon sinners, to rebuke tyrants, or even to say "thank you" for the mustard.
G.K. Chesterton (Orthodoxy)
But are you not being a trifle naive? It sounds as if you supposed that argument was the way to keep him out of the Enemy's clutches. That might have been so if he had lived a few centuries earlier. At that time the humans still knew pretty well when a thing was proved and when it was not; and if it was proved they really believed it. They still connected thinking with doing and were prepared to alter their way of life as the result of a chain of reasoning. But what with the weekly press and other such weapons we have largely altered that. Your man has been accustomed, ever since he was a boy, to have a dozen incompatible philosophies dancing about together inside his head. He doesn't think of doctrines as primarily “true” of “false”, but as “academic” or “practical”, “outworn” or “contemporary”, “conventional” or “ruthless”. Jargon, not argument, is your best ally in keeping him from the Church. Don't waste time trying to make him think that materialism is true! Make him think it is strong, or stark, or courageous — that it is the philosophy of the future. That's the sort of thing he cares about. The trouble about argument is that it moves the whole struggle onto the Enemy's own ground. He can argue too; whereas in really practical propaganda of the kind I am suggesting He has been shown for centuries to be greatly the inferior of Our Father Below. By the very act of arguing, you awake the patient's reason; and once it is awake, who can foresee the result? Even if a particular train of thought can be twisted so as to end in our favour, you will find that you have been strengthening in your patient the fatal habit of attending to universal issues and withdrawing his attention from the stream of immediate sense experiences. Your business is to fix his attention on the stream. Teach him to call it “real life” and don't let him ask what he means by “real”.
C.S. Lewis (The Screwtape Letters)
The northern boreal world was unique and unlike any other on earth, still undisturbed, with deep linkages to other sub-artic cultures and its unbroken chain of story-lives going back into the pre-Columbian past. The forests are as yet uncut, the greed of great cities for water and power has, as yet, dammed up only a few of its rivers. It has not been trampled by gold-seekers and ideology-mad politicos and marked by the uncounted deaths that has made Siberia a land of tears and terror and pollution. It is still clean and mostly aboriginal and the call of the wild is a melody arriving from inside us, out of our own distant past. Somewhere in the world there are rock paintings created by the ancestors of each one of us, and there are songs behind the dancing figures, and thoughts behind the songs. It is a past to be reckoned with, replete with action, violence, wars, discord, resolution, and courage, star-legends with episodes following one on the heels of another.
Paulette Jiles (North Spirit: Sojourns Among the Cree and Ojibway)
That might have been so if he had lived a few centuries earlier. At that time the humans still knew pretty well when a thing was proved and when it was not; and if it was proved they really believed it. They still connected thinking with doing and were prepared to alter their way of life as the result of a chain of reasoning. But what with the weekly press and other such weapons we have largely altered that. Your man has been accustomed, ever since he was a boy, to have a dozen incompatible philosophies dancing about together inside his head. He doesn’t think of doctrines as primarily ‘true’ or ‘false’, but as ‘academic’ or ‘practical’, ‘outworn’ or ‘contemporary’, ‘conventional’ or ‘ruthless. Jargon, not argument, is your best ally in keeping him from the Church. Don’t waste time trying to make him think that materialism is true! Make him think it is strong, or stark, or courageous—that it is the philosophy of the future. That’s the sort of thing he cares about.
C.S. Lewis (The Screwtape Letters)
Qualities such as honesty, determination, and a cheerful acceptance of stress, which can all be identified through probing questionnaires and interviews, may be more important to the company in the long run than one's college grade-point average or years of "related experience." Every business is only as good as the people it brings into the organization. The corporate trainer should feel his job is the most important in the company, because it is. Exalt seniority-publicly, shamelessly, and with enough fanfare to raise goosebumps on the flesh of the most cynical spectator. And, after the ceremony, there should be some sort of permanent display so that employees passing by are continuously reminded of their own achievements and the achievements of others. The manager must freely share his expertise-not only about company procedures and products and services but also with regard to the supervisory skills he has worked so hard to acquire. If his attitude is, "Let them go out and get their own MBAs," the personnel under his authority will never have the full benefit of his experience. Without it, they will perform at a lower standard than is possible, jeopardizing the manager's own success. Should a CEO proclaim that there is no higher calling than being an employee of his organization? Perhaps not-for fear of being misunderstood-but it's certainly all right to think it. In fact, a CEO who does not feel this way should look for another company to manage-one that actually does contribute toward a better life for all. Every corporate leader should communicate to his workforce that its efforts are important and that employees should be very proud of what they do-for the company, for themselves, and, literally, for the world. If any employee is embarrassed to tell his friends what he does for a living, there has been a failure of leadership at his workplace. Loyalty is not demanded; it is created. Why can't a CEO put out his own suggested reading list to reinforce the corporate vision and core values? An attractive display at every employee lounge of books to be freely borrowed, or purchased, will generate interest and participation. Of course, the program has to be purely voluntary, but many employees will wish to be conversant with the material others are talking about. The books will be another point of contact between individuals, who might find themselves conversing on topics other than the weekend football games. By simply distributing the list and displaying the books prominently, the CEO will set into motion a chain of events that can greatly benefit the workplace. For a very cost-effective investment, management will have yet another way to strengthen the corporate message. The very existence of many companies hangs not on the decisions of their visionary CEOs and energetic managers but on the behavior of its receptionists, retail clerks, delivery drivers, and service personnel. The manager must put himself and his people through progressively challenging courage-building experiences. He must make these a mandatory group experience, and he must lead the way. People who have confronted the fear of public speaking, and have learned to master it, find that their new confidence manifests itself in every other facet of the professional and personal lives. Managers who hold weekly meetings in which everyone takes on progressively more difficult speaking or presentation assignments will see personalities revolutionized before their eyes. Command from a forward position, which means from the thick of it. No soldier will ever be inspired to advance into a hail of bullets by orders phoned in on the radio from the safety of a remote command post; he is inspired to follow the officer in front of him. It is much more effective to get your personnel to follow you than to push them forward from behind a desk. The more important the mission, the more important it is to be at the front.
Dan Carrison (Semper Fi: Business Leadership the Marine Corps Way)
In all the countries of Europe, and in America, too, there now is something that abuses this name: a very narrow, imprisoned, chained type of spirits who want just about the opposite of what accords with our intentions and instincts—not to speak of the fact that regarding the new philosophers who are coming up they must assuredly be closed windows and bolted doors. They belong, briefly and sadly, among the levelers—these falsely so–called ‘free spirits’—being eloquent and prolifically scribbling slaves of the democratic taste and its ‘modern ideas’; they are all human beings without solitude, without their own solitude, clumsy good fellows whom one should not deny either courage or respectable decency—only they are unfree and ridiculously superficial, above all in their basic inclination to find in the forms of the old society as it has existed so far just about the cause of all human misery and failure—which is a way of standing truth happily upon her head! What they would like to strive for with all their powers is the universal green–pasture happiness of the herd, with security, lack of danger, comfort, and an easier life for everyone; the two songs and doctrines which they repeat most often are ‘equality of rights’ and ‘sympathy for all that suffers’—and suffering itself they take for something that must be abolished. We opposite men, having opened our eyes and conscience to the question where and how the plant ‘man’ has so far grown most vigorously to a height—we think that this has happened every time under the opposite conditions, that to this end the dangerousness of his situation must first grown to the point of enormity, his power of invention and simulation (his ‘spirit’) had to develop under prolonged pressure and constraint into refinement and audacity, his life–will had to be enhanced into an unconditional power– will. We think that hardness, forcefulness, slavery, danger in the alley and the heart, life in hiding, stoicism, the art of experiment and devilry of every kind, that everything evil, terrible, tyrannical in man, everything in him that is kin to beasts of prey and serpents, serves the enhancement of the species ‘man’ as much as its opposite does.
Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil)
Exactly. Even then the possessing classes only suffer relatively. They put down their cars or close their country houses, thus adding to unemployment, but not greatly inconveniencing themselves. But the people starve. Then they will listen to you when you tell them they have nothing to lose but their chains, and when you dangle before them the bait of other people’s property the greed, the envy, which they’ve had to repress because they had no means of gratifying them, are let loose. With liberty and equality as your watchwords you can lead them to the attack. The history of the last five-and-twenty years shows that they’re bound to win. The possessing classes are enervated by their possessions, they’re humanitarian and sentimental, they have neither the will nor the courage to defend themselves; their counsels are divided, and when their only chance is in immediate and ruthless action they waste their time in recrimination. But the mob, which is the instrument of the revolutionary leaders, is a thing not of reason but of instinct, it is amenable to hypnotic suggestion and you can rouse it to frenzy by catchwords; it is an entity, and so is indifferent to the death in its ranks of such as fall; it knows neither pity nor mercy. It rejoices in destruction because in destruction it becomes conscious of its own power.
W. Somerset Maugham (Christmas Holiday (Vintage International))
The myth that morality and fidelity are old-fashioned and trite can imprison more than just one individual as generations are affected by the choices perpetuated by this lie. The myth that withholding judgment or having charity means that all values are relative and should be given equal importance or loyalty creates a heavy chain that eventually traps a person in doubt and disaffection, leaving him or her to be constantly "driven with the wind and tossed" (see James 1:6). However, confidence that Christ honors those who honor him (see 1 Samuel 2:30) provides an anchor to our souls (see Ether 12:4) whereby we are capable of giving affirmative answers to those who question the "reason of the hope that is in [us]" (1 Peter 3:15). I remember one of my saddest moments as a faculty member at BYU. One of my students came to me in emotional tatters. She had come to BYU looking for a supportive community that shared her values, something she had not enjoyed being the only Mormon in her high school. Instead her peers at BYU teased, sneered at, and demeaned her because she was not willing to watch an R-rated movie. How proud I was of her! Despite the hurt of rejection "by her own," her faith carried her through the social prison created by her peers. To "stand in holy places, and be not moved" (D&C 87:8) in today's world requires faith, courage, poise, and patience.
Sandra Rogers
I will always be grateful to have been the Democratic Party’s nominee and to have earned 65,844,610 votes from my fellow Americans. That number—more votes than any candidate for President has ever received, other than Barack Obama—is proof that the ugliness we faced in 2016 does not define our country. I want to thank everyone who welcomed me into their homes, businesses, schools, and churches over those two long, crazy years; every little girl and boy who ran into my arms at full speed or high-fived me with all their might; and the long chain of brave, adventurous people, stretching back generations, whose love and strength made it possible for me to lead such a rewarding life in the country I love. Thanks to them, despite everything else, my heart is full. I started this book with some words attributed to one of those pathbreakers, Harriet Tubman. Twenty years ago, I watched a group of children perform a play about her life at her former homestead in Auburn, New York. They were so excited about this courageous, determined woman who led slaves to freedom against all odds. Despite everything she faced, she never lost her faith in a simple but powerful motto: Keep going. That’s what we have to do now, too. In 2016, the U.S. government announced that Harriet Tubman will become the face of the $20 bill. If you need proof that America can still get it right, there it is.
Hillary Rodham Clinton (What Happened)
We arrived here yesterday . The ambassador is indisposed and will therefore be staying indoors for a few days. If only he were not so morose, all would be well. I can see all too clearly Fate has severe trials in store for me. But courage! A lighthearted spirit can put up with anything. A light heart? It makes me laugh, the way the words flow from my pen: oh, if there were a little more lightheartedness in my veins I should be the happiest creature under the sun. Am I to despair of my own powers, my own gifts, when others with paltry abilities and talents go showing off, smugly self-satisfied? Dear God who bestowed all these gifts on me, why didst Thou not keep half back, and in their place grant me confidence and contentment? Patience! Patience! All will improve. And I tell you, my dear fellow, you were right. I feel far better within myself now that I am among these people, kept busy day in, day out, watching their doings and goings-on. It is true that, since we are so constituted as to be forever comparing ourselves with others and our surroundings with ourselves, our happiness or misery depends on the things in our environment; and, this being so, nothing is more dangerous than solitude. It is in the nature of our imagination to be rising, impelled and nurtured by the fantastic images of poetry; and it conceives of a chain of beings with ourselves as the most inferior and everything else more glorious and with greater perfections. All of this is quite natural. We often feel that we lack something and seem to see that very quality in someone else, promptly attributing all our own qualities to him too, and a kind of ideal contentment as well. And so the happy mortal is a model of complete perfection – which we have ourselves created. On the other hand, once we set to work diligently, in spite of all our shortcomings and the toilsomeness of it, we quite often find that in our leisurely, tacking style we make better headway than others who sail and row – and it gives us a genuine sense of ourselves, to keep pace with others or indeed outstrip them.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (The Sorrows of Young Werther)
Friday, March 24, 1944 ...Have my parents forgotten that they were young once? Apparently they have. At any rate, they laugh at us when we're serious, and they're serious when we're joking. Saturday, March 25, 1944 I don't have much in the way of money or worldly possessions, I'm not beautiful, intelligent or clever, but I'm happy, and I intend to stay that way! I was born happy, I love people, I have a trusting nature, and I'd like everyone else to be happy too. Friday, March 31, 1944 My life here has gotten better, much better. God has not forsaken me, and He never will. Wednesday, April 5, 1944 ...I can't imagine having to live like Mother, Mrs. van Daan and all the women who go about their work and are then forgotten. I need to have something besides a husband and children to devote myself to! I don't want to have lived in vain like most people. I want to be useful or bring enjoyment to all people, even those I've never met. I want to go on living even after my death! And that's why I'm so grateful to God for having given me this gift, which I can use to develop myself and to express all that's inside me! When I write I can shake off all my cares. My sorrow disappears, my spirits are revived! But, and that's a big question, will I ever be able to write something great, will I ever become a journalist or a writer? Tuesday, April 11, 1944 We've been strongly reminded of the fact that we're Jews in chains, chained to one spot, without any rights, but with a thousand obligations. We must put our feelings aside; we must be brave and strong, bear discomfort without complaint, do whatever is in our power and trust in God. One day this terrible war will be over. The time will come when we'll be people again and not just Jews! ...It's God who has made us the way we are, but it's also God who will lift us up again... ... I know what I want, I have a goal, I have opinions, a religion and love. If only I can be myself, I'll be satisfied. I know that I'm a woman, a woman with inner strength and a great deal of courage! If God lets me live, I'll achieve more than Mother ever did, I'll make my voice heard, I'll go out into the world and work for mankind! I know now that courage and happiness are needed first! Monday, April 17, 1944 Oh yes, I still have so much I want to discuss with him, since I don't see the point of just cuddling. Sharing our thoughts with each other requires a great deal of trust, but we'll both be stronger because of it!
Anne Frank (The Diary Of a Young Girl)
In all the countries of Europe and in America as well there is now something which drives people to misuse this name, a very narrow, confined, chained-up type of spirit which wants something rather like the opposite of what lies in our intentions and instincts — to say nothing of the fact that, so far as those emerging new philosophers are concerned, such spirits definitely must be closed windows and bolted doors. To put the matter briefly and seriously, these falsely named “free spirits” belong with the levellers, as eloquent and prolific writing slaves of democratic taste and its “modern ideas”: collectively people without solitude, without their own solitude, coarse brave lads whose courage or respectable decency should not be denied. But they are simply unfree and ridiculously superficial, above all with their basic tendency to see in the forms of old societies up to now the cause for almost all human misery and failure, a process which turns the truth happily on its head! What they would like to strive for with all their powers is the universal, green, pasture-happiness of the herd, with security, absence of danger, comfort, an easing of life for everyone. The two songs and doctrines they sing most frequently are called “equality of rights” and “pity for all things that suffer” — and they assume that suffering itself is something we must do away with. We who are their opposites, we who have opened our eyes and consciences for the question of where and how up to now the plant “man” has grown most powerfully to the heights, we think that this has happened every time under the opposite conditions, that for this to happen the danger of his situation first had to grow enormously, his power of invention and pretence (his “spirit”—) had to develop under lengthy pressure and compulsion into something refined and audacious, his will for living had to intensify into an unconditional will to power: — we think that hardness, violence, slavery, danger in the alley and the heart, seclusion, stoicism, the art of the tempter, and devilry of all kinds, that everything evil, fearful, tyrannical, predatory, and snake-like in human beings serves well for the ennobling of the species “man,” as much as its opposite does: — in fact, when we say only this much we have not said enough, and we find ourselves at any rate with our speaking and silence at a point at the other end of all modern ideology and things desired by the herd, perhaps as their exact opposites?
Friedrich Nietzsche (Beyond Good and Evil)
There is no suffering, except remorse, so fatal as that which comes from the consciousness of strangled ambition, blasted hope, stifled aspiration. To be conscious that we possess decided ability for some particular calling, and to be compelled by circumstances, year after year, to be chained to drudgery which the heart loathes, requires supreme courage.
Orison Swett Marden (The Joys of Living)
1.  Declaration of Intent: Hand lifting to the sky The first step is the collective declaration of intent to reestablish Kintuadi between Creator, Catalyst and Creation. That collective intent was implemented and manifested by the physical act of hand lifting to the sky.   Objective: To first acknowledge that we are lost due to a false start and to seek the alignment and the Kintuadi of 3 Components; Creator, Catalyst and Creation (CCC).   2.  Commitment and Decision: Cross Jumping The second step is the collective commitment and decision to abandon sinful, flesh and material driven life, and jump to the side of the creator and Christ. That collective commitment and decision was implemented and manifested by the physical act of cross jumping.   Objective: To stop and commit to a change of direction.   3.  Fasting and Meditation: Spiritual Retreat The third step is the collective fasting and meditation to gradually reduce total dependency on flesh and material driven life. This is the step of seeking spiritual enlightment, guidance and purpose for life. It is achieved by a temporary but frequent isolation and spiritual retreats. During this step, the body and soul are cleansed and fed with spiritual food.   Objective: To stop dependency on human guidance but seeks spiritual guidance and direction.   4.  Devotion and Service to God: Temple Construction (1987) The fourth step is the collective devotion and service to God. Now that body and soul are cleansed and fed spiritually, man devotion and service to god is manifested by the construction of the temple as an offering to God. The real temple is the body of Christ, the supreme sacrifice.   Objective: To regain God’s trust by gradually training the flesh and material wealth to serve God.   5.  Prayers and Faith Consolidation: Spiritual Soiree (1990s) Now that body and soul have constructed the sanctuary, the place of reunion and spiritual communion with God. This fifth step is the step of collective prayers and faith consolidation at the sanctuary, the place of invocation and the real body of Christ, our Catalyst.   Objective: To repair and reestablish communication between Creator, Catalyst and Creation.   6.  Redemption: The Begging for forgiveness; December 24, 1992 In the name of all humanity, on December 24, 1992 followers of Simon Kimbangu lead by Papa Dialungana Kiangani (Kimbangu son) gathered inside the temple in Nkamba, all wearing sac clothes and begged for the forgiveness of Adamus and eve original sin. After asking for forgiveness that Adamus himself did not have the courage to ask, the Kimbanguists burned all sac clothes. In 1994, Adeneho Nana Oduro Numapau II, President of the Ghana National House of Chiefs, initiated ceremonies in Africa and the Americas to beg forgiveness of African Americans for his ancestors ‘involvement in the slave trade.   Objective: To reestablish and maintain interconnectivity between Creator, Catalyst and Creation.   7.  Return to Eden, the Realm of Kintuadi (Oneness) December 24th, 1992 marked the beginning of a new spiritual era for mankind in general but for Africans in particular. The chains of physical and spiritual slavery were broken on that date. The spiritual exodus from Egypt, the land of Slavery to Eden, the Promised Land also started that date. On May 10, 1994 Nelson Mandela was inaugurated as the first black President of South Africa, Africa most powerful country. On January 20, 2009, Barack Hussein Obama was inaugurated as the first African American president of the United States, the most powerful country on earth.   Objective: To enjoy the Oneness between Creator, Catalyst and Creation.  Chapter 27  Kimbangu’s Wife, 3 sons  and 30 Grand Children As stated in chapter 11, few months after Kimbangu’s birth, his mother Luezi died, so Kimbangu did not know his biological mother and was raised by Kinzembo, his maternal aunt.
Dom Pedro V (The Quantum Vision of Simon Kimbangu: Kintuadi in 3D)
I must die. But must I die groaning? I must be imprisoned. But must I whine as well? I must suffer exile. Can any one then hinder me from going with a smile, and a good courage, and at peace? 'Tell the secret.' I refuse to tell, for this is in my power. 'But I will chain you.' What say you, fellow? Chain me? My leg you will chain—yes, but my will—no, not even Zeus can conquer that. 'I will imprison you.' My bit of a body, you mean. 'I will behead you.' Why? When did I ever tell you that I was the only man in the world that could not be beheaded?
Anonymous
I must die. But must I die groaning? I must be imprisoned. But must I whine as well? I must suffer exile. Can any one then hinder me from going with a smile, and a good courage, and at peace? 'Tell the secret.' I refuse to tell, for this is in my power. 'But I will chain you.' What say you, fellow? Chain me? My leg you will chain—yes, but my will—no, not even Zeus can conquer that. 'I will imprison you.' My bit of a body, you mean. 'I will behead you.' Why? When did I ever tell you that I was the only man in the world that could not be beheaded? These are the thoughts that those who pursue philosophy should ponder, these are the lessons they should write down day by day, in these they should exercise themselves.
Anonymous
A subject to which few intellectuals ever give a thought is the right to be a vagrant, the freedom to wander. Yet vagrancy is a deliverance, and life on the open road is the essence of freedom. To have the courage to smash the chains with which modern life has weighted us (under the pretext that it was offering us more liberty), then to take up the symbolic stick and bundle and get out. —ISABELLE EBERHARDT, EXPLORER
Jen Kirkman (I Know What I'm Doing and Other Lies I Tell Myself: Dispatches from a Life Under Construction)
When I told you I loved you, I meant it. Love, as you said before, it’s violent, it’s furious. A storm of rage that burns right down to my soul. And that storm, that violent rage that you give me with your love makes me fight, it makes me strong as a person and it gives me courage, Anderson.
D.H. Sidebottom (Chained (Caged, #2))
My heart hurt. Regret ached at every part of me. I loved her. I always had, yet I hadn’t ever had the fucking courage to tell her that. A part of me had thought that if I said it out loud then she’d be taken from me, like everything else I had loved in my life had been. And what if it was too damn late? Too late for her to ever know how I felt about her? “Why
D.H. Sidebottom (Chained (Caged, #2))
The gospel breaks the chains of reciprocity and the circular exchange. Since there is nothing we ultimately need from one another, we are free to do everything for one another. We can spend our lives giving instead of taking, going to the back instead of getting to the front, sacrificing ourselves for others instead of sacrificing others for ourselves. The gospel alone liberates us to live a life of scandalous generosity, unrestrained sacrifice, uncommon valor, and unbounded courage.
Tullian Tchividjian (It Is Finished: 365 Days of Good News)
It is about being resilient. I am resilient. Why would I not be? Where is the alternative? I need to respect my genes. Why I say this? Each one of us exists because we have the seed of resilience in our genes. We are descendants of those who survived hostile environments from millennia to millennia, generation to generation. Only some of us are not able to get in touch with the seed because we punish our mind and body by giving them too much of negativity and useless inputs. Yes, resilience is in our genes. If someone down the chain had not been resilient we won't be there at one end of the chain in the present..
Ramesh Sood (Untitled: Life's Random Lessons)
But even then, it takes a certain amount of courage to be the first one to come out and blame someone else. What if no one else joins you? No one else stands up to condemn the wrongdoer? On the other hand, it’s easy to join in condemning someone once someone else has gotten the ball rolling. You don’t even have to put yourself out there; all you have to do is say, “Me, too!” It doesn’t end there: You also get the benefit of feeling that you’re doing good by picking on someone evil—it can even be a kind of stress release. Once you’ve done it, though, you may find that you want that feeling again—that you need someone else to accuse just to get the rush back. You may have started with real bad guys, but the second time around you may have to look further down the food chain, be more and more creative in your charges and accusations.
Kanae Minato (Confessions)
Yet even with a voting rights bill, the United States would not be finished, President Johnson had the courage to declare in his commencement address to Howard University graduates in June. “You do not take a person who, for years, has been hobbled by chains[,] and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say, ‘you are free to compete with all the others,’ and still justly believe that you have been completely fair.
Ibram X. Kendi (Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America)
Prologue “Pain!. Oh, Father of the Dark, how it hurts! My muscles, my bones – every millimeter of my body. Damn locusts! They’re skinning me alive. Do I have any skin left? It seems like it will never end. How many years have passed since I’ve been buried here? One, two, ten? Or maybe, a hundred? Time itself has melded into total dusky looming. A bloody and merciless one. All my thoughts have been mixed up since I’ve been immured in this stone coffin. Without any possibility of escape. Without any chance for freedom. I feel endless agony under the teeny weeny teeth of ghostly beasts. And their small daggers shred my immortal flesh. Time after time, they’re driving me to madness. But I’ll find a way out, or my name is not Rave Eridanus Castro-Firel. And then, I swear, I’ll kill everyone who has taken part in torturing me. Ulfricus, you traitor ass. I hope your soul has never found sanctuary and is being tormented somewhere in the abyss of the Twilight, while I’m decaying here, in immortality. I hope you’re answering for every minute I’ve spent here, in this tomb. Even for every second. And if not, I promise I’ll kill all your relatives. Every person you love. Your wife, your children, your parents, your grandchildren. And your dam cat,...” The man’s interior monologue was interrupted by a restrained growl. “Oh, demons, how it hurts!.. But wait. Someone will surely wander across this damn field again. Someone whom I’ll kill without coming out of the ground. I’ll exhaust the last drop of magic. And, one day, I’ll be able to get out of this trap. Oh, no, who am I kidding? Nobody has appeared here so far. Even animals avoid coming to my field. I don’t sense any living being whose energy I could suck dry and use to appease the burning, even a little... They all sense me. They don’t understand, but they sense that death is there under their feet. Oh, Father of the Dark, I’ll be decomposing here forever! Damn Ulfricus, Banshee take your soul into the Twilight and love it to death.” The internal voice stopped again, and the man stopped short, listening attentively to the sounds of the outer world. “Oh, that just can’t be... Now for the first time since so long ago! A woman. A girl. A very young one. I can almost hear her heart beating... I feel the energy concealed in her blood. Come closer, dear. I don’t have to get out of here to play with you. So sweet... I can practically feel your odor. A strange, unusual smell of blood. What’s wrong with you? You’re a necromancer, for sure. Almost my soulmate. Well, even this won’t save you. Come closer, dear... Yes, this way. Oh Dark! what magic you eradiate! But not black, certainly not. I couldn’t care less. Any energy will suit me...” At this point, somewhere on the surface, somewhere nearby, a woman began singing. The accursed man, chained in the living grave, lay down, having suddenly forgotten the respiratory reflex, which still had not been exterminated through hundreds of years spent under the ground. Without air, without life. “What a pretty voice. A very, very pretty voice. I haven’t heard human voices for so long...” The man’s broad chest rose again. Then, a sequence of dark thoughts continued: “A girl with a ringing voice and strange magic... You’ve come here to the Ash Field in vain. You’re so enigmatic and courageous. You’re alive. But not for long.
Silvia Liam (Do Not Awaken The Undead King)
Let us brace our offended solitary mindset in spite of COVID-19 as the world’s finest hour perpetual uncertainty, let us brace our hearts as the very center of our hearts is an armored supreme excellence to be victorious by an unequivocal perseverance and hope, let us brace unconditional Love, kindness and triumph to be the masters of our own chain of destiny, let us brace unity and oneness to beckon for victorious war against fear and the inherent vice of crisis at its peril.
Dr. Tony Beizaee
To take advantage of our maladaptive emotions we should create a list of small actionable steps that gradually expose us to the situations we fear. Each step should take us progressively further out of our comfort zone but if we can commit to taking at least one step each day we will have turned our maladaptive emotions from inhibitors of our well-being to promoters of a stronger self. When a distressing emotion is triggered through this exercise we merely need to label it, accept it, and then move forward regardless of how uncomfortable we feel. If we are consistent in our practice we will likely notice that our maladaptive emotions arise with diminished frequency. But even if they continue to be part of our life this exercise will teach us that distressing emotions need not be chains that limit us and that action can be taken even in their presence. We will have learned, in other words, the art of acting with courage.
Academy of Ideas
If we can get the upper hand on our laziness and display the courage to face up to the tasks of life, then these tasks act as guides marking the path toward a healthy development. Fate leads us forward. But if our laziness and fear get the upper hand and we neglect the tasks of life, then they become chains around our neck. We become the ‘unwilling’, in the words of Cleanthes, whom fate drags forward. The neurotic, according to Jung, is the man or woman who walks among the unwilling, who has adopted, in other words, a faulty attitude towards the tasks of life.
Academy of Ideas
On the Training of Doctors is dedicated to everyone in the world that defies conventions. It is dedicated to those that take the chance to be themselves in a world that demands compliance to norms. We dedicate this book to everyone in the queer, BDSM Lifestyler/kinkster, geek/nerd, neurodivergent, pagan, artistic, writing, transgender communities, and any other community that dares to defy the “norms”. There is nothing that takes more courage than to stand up and be yourself when those around us demand that we conform. We refuse to conform. We refuse to comply. We are beautiful and unique. We are never going to go away, and we are going to change the world.
Beverly L. Anderson (Stolen Innocence (Doctor's Training #1; Chains of Fate #1))
she takes a deep breath and runs a finger under the chain around her neck. “My dad gave me these charms, and each one represents something different. The raven protects against black magic. The bear inspires courage. The fish signifies a refusal to recognize other people’s magic.” “I never knew those charms had meaning.” Absently, Vivian reaches up and touches her own necklace. Looking closely at the silver pendant for the first time, Molly asks, “Is your necklace—significant?” “Well, it is to me. But it doesn’t have any magical qualities.” She smiles. “Maybe it does,” Molly says. “I think of these qualities as metaphorical, you know?
Christina Baker Kline (Orphan Train)
Perhaps there are resources of courage, creativity and higher intelligence latent in each of us. Perhaps a sociological chain reaction can still be set in action if enough people learn how to transcend fashionable self-pity and make an effort to become happier and more efficient. Perhaps we are not dead yet, but only hypnotized by morbid and moribund philosophies. Perhaps the powers of the human brain have never fully been released in the paleolithic, neolithic, feudal, capitalist or socialist games. Perhaps the limits that seem to restrict us are only bad habits and we can transcend all of them. And – this is the major theme of the pages to follow – perhaps the human brain can be used for fun and profit; perhaps the brain is not designed for failure, as current intellectual dogma holds, but for “total success in Universe” as Bucky Fuller claimed.
Robert Anton Wilson (Sex, Drugs & Magick – A Journey Beyond Limits)
Peace. Warm yourself, warrior, while I tell you of peace. History is unerring, and even the least observant mortal can be made to understand, through innumerable repetition. Do you see peace as little more than the absence of war? Perhaps, on a surface level, it is just that. But let me describe the characteristics of peace, my young friend. A pervasive dulling of the senses, a decadence afflicting the culture, evinced by a growing obsession with low entertainment. The virtues of extremity — honour, loyalty, sacrifice — are lifted high as shoddy icons, currency for the cheapest of labours. The longer peace lasts, the more those words are used, and the weaker they become. Sentimentality pervades daily life. All becomes a mockery of itself, and the spirit grows… restless. Is this a singular pessimism? Allow me to continue with a description of what follows a period of peace. Old warriors sit in taverns, telling tales of vigorous youth, their pasts when all things were simpler, clearer cut. They are not blind to the decay all around them, are not immune to the loss of respect for themselves, for all that they gave for their king, their land, their fellow citizens. The young must not be abandoned to forgetfulness. There are always enemies beyond the borders, and if none exist in truth, then one must be fashioned. Old crimes dug out of the indifferent earth. Slights and open insults, or the rumours thereof. A suddenly perceived threat where none existed before. The reasons matter not — what matters is that war is fashioned from peace, and once the journey is begun, an irresistible momentum is born. The old warriors are satisfied. The young are on fire with zeal. The king fears yet is relieved of domestic pressures. the army draws its oil and whetstone. Forges blast with molten iron, the anvils ring like temple bells. Grain-sellers and armourers and clothiers and horse-sellers and countless other suppliers smile with the pleasure of impending wealth. A new energy has gripped the kingdom, and those few voices raised in objection are quickly silenced. Charges of treason and summary execution soon persuade the doubters. Peace, my young warrior, is born of relief, endured in exhaustion, and dies with false remembrance. False? Ah, perhaps I am too cynical. Too old, witness to far too much. Do honour, loyalty and sacrifice truly exist? Are such virtues born only from extremity? What transforms them into empty words, words devalued by their overuse? What are the rules of the economy of the spirit, that civilization repeatedly twists and mocks? Withal of the Third City. You have fought wars. You have forged weapons. You have seen loyalty, and honour. You have seen courage and sacrifice. What say you to all this?" "Nothing," Hacking laughter. "You fear angering me, yes? No need. I give you leave to speak your mind." "I have sat in my share of taverns, in the company of fellow veterans. A select company, perhaps, not grown so blind with sentimentality as to fashion nostalgia from times of horror and terror. Did we spin out those days of our youth? No. Did we speak of war? Not if we could avoid it, and we worked hard at avoiding it." "Why?" "Why? Because the faces come back. So young, one after another. A flash of life, an eternity of death, there in our minds. Because loyalty is not to be spoken of, and honour is to be endured. Whilst courage is to be survived. Those virtues, Chained One, belong to silence." "Indeed. Yet how they proliferate in peace! Crowed again and again, as if solemn pronouncement bestows those very qualities upon the speaker. Do they not make you wince, every time you hear them? Do they not twist in your gut, grip hard your throat? Do you not feel a building rage—" "Aye. When I hear them used to raise a people once more to war.
Steven Erikson (Midnight Tides (Malazan Book of the Fallen, #5))
In this new world, you own the impacts of your business from deep in the supply chain to the end of a product’s life, and stakeholders will make sure you know it.
Paul Polman (Net Positive: How Courageous Companies Thrive by Giving More Than They Take)
Are you producing energy or manufacturing something cheaply with fossil fuels? Then, you’re more profitable because you’ve avoided the costs that carbon and air pollution impose on society, from reduced health downwind to global climate change. Do you make a food product that’s profitable? Its high margins could depend on slave labor and deforestation in the supply chain.
Paul Polman (Net Positive: How Courageous Companies Thrive by Giving More Than They Take)
Forgive those people that hurt you so you can put the past behind you. Break those chains. Restore strength that leads to peace, joy, and achieving abundance. Shift your energy to battles that bring you back into your purpose immersing yourself in things that feed your spirit.
Germany Kent
Who you thought you were or your life as you knew it may have been smashed to pieces. But here’s the thing. The pieces are all still there. They may scatter, and they may hide. But they don’t go away. What each of us has the ability to do is courageously look for and gather the pieces and then reassemble them. The amazing thing is, they will fit together differently, creating a new picture of you and your life, one that shows the world what you are truly made of.
Keryl Pesce (Hello Beautiful: Break free from the chains of regret, comparison, and self-doubt, and discover the freedom, power, and beauty of being the real you.)
Everything that mattered in Hank Reed’s life, outside of his family, revolved around horses. Starting with his days as a cadet, he had lived in a world that could measure everything—honor, kindliness, discipline, sporting spirit, diligence, and, most of all, courage—in equestrian terms. His brain was crammed with the nomenclature of horses: cantle, withers, curb chain, bran mash, fetlock, stock tie, near side, picket line. He knew the aids for a flying lead change, the correct attire for a foxhunt, the thunder of charging by platoon, and the serenity of riding alone on a quiet path, with only his mount’s breaths and cadenced footsteps for company. The rhythm of a horse’s strides was like music to him—the walk a ballad in four/four time, the trot a rousing two-beat march, the canter a smooth three-beat waltz. Reed knew the scent of fresh straw in the stable, the tickle of a horse’s whiskers as it nuzzled up a carrot. He knew that endless moment when a fall was inevitable and then the sudden breathless smack of landing hard on packed dirt. He knew what the end of a day on horseback felt like, salty with sweat, dirt under his fingernails, and a mind whitewashed from all worry. More than anything, Hank Reed understood what was unspoken among all of these horse soldiers. Sunburned, brusque, tough, accustomed to giving and taking orders, they knew that if you live, eat, sleep, and breathe horses for long enough, they become part of you, and your soul is forever altered.
Elizabeth Letts (The Perfect Horse: The Daring U.S. Mission to Rescue the Priceless Stallions Kidnapped by the Nazis)
Withal of the Third City. You have fought wars. You have forged weapons. You have seen loyalty, and honour. You have seen courage and sacrifice. What say you to all this?’ ‘Nothing,’ Withal replied. Hacking laughter. ‘You fear angering me, yes? No need. I give you leave to speak your mind.’ ‘I have sat in my share of taverns,’ Withal said, ‘in the company of fellow veterans. A select company, perhaps, not grown so blind with sentimentality as to fashion nostalgia from times of horror and terror. Did we spin out those days of our youth? No. Did we speak of war? Not if we could avoid it, and we worked hard at avoiding it.’ ‘Why?’ ‘Why? Because the faces come back. So young, one after another. A flash of life, an eternity of death, there in our minds. Because loyalty is not to be spoken of, and honour is to be endured. Whilst courage is to be survived. Those virtues, Chained One, belong to silence.’...
Steven Erikson (Midnight Tides (Malazan Book of the Fallen, #5))
Every single day there are people coming back from the depths of addiction and abuse and unimaginable suffering and rising higher than the world expects, breaking chains, fighting for others, pulling their friends up, sometimes fearless often being courageous in the midst of fear, don’t give up on anyone, don’t give up on you. You may be down but you are not out.
Janet Autherine (The Heart and Soul of Black Women: Poems of Love, Struggle and Resilience)
There's a fine line between limiting yourself and knowing your limit. Once you cross the line in, you might eliminate, or rather, sublime it!
Ana Claudia Antunes (A-Z of Happiness: Tips for Living and Breaking Through the Chain that Separates You from Getting That Dream Job)
Where she saw weakness, I saw strength. Where she saw fear, I saw resilience. Where she saw timidity, I saw courage. Unlike me, Shannon didn't need to alter her mind to survive the world we lived in. She thought she was the weakest link in the family chain, when it couldn't be further from the truth. My sister was titanium.
chloe wash
We are born free, but we are not allowed to live in freedom by the society. Everybody is born in freedom, but everybody lives in a prison. Everybody lives as a prisoner and dies as a prisoner.  The most spiritual act in life is to live in freedom. Meditation is the way to regain your freedom. Meditation is the way to destroy all the barriers and bondages that have been created by the society, the state, the establishment, the status quo and the church. The society do not want you to live in freedom, because a free person cannot be controlled, manipulated and exploited. A free person cannot be reduced to a thing, a possession. The society do not believe in man, the society believes in machines, because machines are obedient and do not rebel. Man can rebel, which is why each child is chained in such a way that very few people are able to live a life of freedom. Meditation is a declaration of freedom. A meditator has to be alert, aware, adventurous and courageous to live in freedom. A meditator's search is for freedom, and when he is totally free he knows God.
Swami Dhyan Giten (Meditation: A Love Affair with the Whole - Thousand and One Flowers of Silence, Love, Joy, Truth, Freedom, Beauty and the Divine)
Sure, there were exceptions. The city of Sparta? They loved Ares. Of course, they were the manly men of Greece who ate nails and steroids for breakfast, so I guess that made sense. In the center of town they had a statue of Ares all chained down, the theory being that if they kept Ares in shackles he couldn’t desert them, so the Spartans would always have courage and victory. Still. Chaining down the god of war? That’s hard-core.
Rick Riordan (Percy Jackson's Greek Gods)
Blaming everyone and everything else for our problems and challenges may be the norm and may provide temporary relief from the pain, but it also chains us to these very problems. Show me someone who is humble enough to accept and take responsibility for his or her circumstances and courageous enough to take whatever initiative is necessary to creatively work his or her way through or around these challenges, and I’ll show you the supreme power of choice.
Stephen R. Covey (The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change)
But just before I head inside, I pause for a second to take in the enormity of the moment and my small role in it. Five stories up and I'm still standing on hallowed ground. Caskets and chains and splintered beams of slave ships, knives and forks and salt shakers, Woolworth stools and mammy figurines, freedom and blood, progress and pain, voices raised and voices silenced, courage. The purpose of this museum is to resurrect the dead, to honor their lives, to celebrate their progress, to remember their suffering, to never forget their stories. This building is an argument that these stories, traditions, this suffering, this history, matters. In three weeks, I will open my restaurant and with it, I'll have a chance to add my voice to that chorus. To prove that my story, like the millions of voices behind and beneath me, matters. As I push open the kitchen door, the last of my smile fades and I get back to work. I'm standing on stories, and this is my own.
Kwame Onwuachi (Notes from a Young Black Chef)
In the villages and factories, people from the district committees of the Communist Party travelled around, meeting people. Yet not one of them was capable of giving an answer if they were asked what decontamination was, how children could be protected, or what the coefficients were for radionuclides finding their way into the food chain. Neither could they if asked about alpha, beta and gamma particles, nor about radiobiology, ionizing radiation, let alone isotopes. For them, that was all something from another planet. They gave lectures about the heroism of Soviet people, symbols of military courage, and the wiles of Western intelligence services.
Svetlana Alexievich (Chernobyl Prayer: Voices from Chernobyl (Penguin Modern Classics))
In phantom father's shadow, I still roam, A love unwritten, a yearning for home. First male touch, a myth my heart craves, His absence echoes in unspoken graves. I search for him in faces passing by, A familiar line, a flicker in their eye. His name a whisper on the wind's soft sigh, A ghost I chase, a tear that won't dry. But love, it blooms in unexpected ways, In mentors' wisdom, friends' unwavering gaze. In echoes of kindness, hands that hold me tight, In lessons learned from shadows and from light. So father, phantom, wherever you may be, Though you left me wanting, I set myself free. From the chains of longing, the hunger for your face, I build my own fortress, in this heart's embrace. With threads of resilience, I weave my own song, A tapestry of strength, where I belong. No longer searching in the empty air, My love blooms within, a flame I dare to share. And though the echo of your absence may remain, It no longer defines me, a dance in the rain. I rise above the loss, with spirit bright and bold, My own story unfolds, in colors yet untold. So let the phantom father fade into the mist, His memory a whisper, a lesson I've kissed. For I am the daughter, of courage and grace, And love, my own compass, lights up this space.
Mriganka Sekhar Ganguly
Why should one feel ashamed to hope for freedom?— because nobody is preventing you. You can be free this very moment. But those attachments…they have gone very deep in you; they have become almost your very existence. They may be bringing misery to you but they also bring moments of happiness. They may be creating chains for your feet, but they also give you moments of dance.
Osho (Freedom: The Courage to Be Yourself)
While you might outsource your supply chain, your logistics, or your investments, you do not outsource your responsibility for them. It's getting harder every day to externalize environmental and social costs that your business imposes on society
Paul Polman (Net Positive: How Courageous Companies Thrive by Giving More Than They Take)
The War demonstrates the extent to which man is the key to the outcome of war,” wrote Michael Herzog. “The training and skill of the soldier, his motivation, the quality of the chain of command, initiative, courage and perseverance all underlie the War’s result far more than any weapons. Even in the era of technology, man still stands at the center of the picture.”50
David H. Petraeus (Conflict: The Evolution of Warfare from 1945 to Ukraine)
If you choose freedom, then you have to destroy all the strategies of others that make you a slave. That’s what I am trying to do here: trying to cut all your chains, making you free from everything so that you can be yourself And the moment you are yourself, you start growing, you become greener.
Osho (Freedom: The Courage to Be Yourself)
However, I have to free my mind of these concerns. I accept that I have to die this evening. But the manner in which that death comes is of enormous importance. Maybe those who die between fouled bedsheets are braver than the warrior who charges into the face of death. A feverish and degrading and debilitating death burns up the energy that physical courage and spiritual courage require. And dying by torture, as Saint Joan did at the stake, can be much worse. My stomach curdles when I look at the men with chains dripping from their hands.
James Lee Burke (Every Cloak Rolled in Blood (Holland Family Saga, #4))
It’s not my job to straighten them out. Only they can do that. I talk to them and hopefully find the right keys to unlock the chains tethering them to their demons. If I’m lucky enough to figure that out, then I open a door and show them how to get there so they can leave those monsters behind. But it’s up to them to muster the courage to get to the door, to walk through it, and not stumble back.
Melissa Foster (The Trouble with Whiskey (The Whiskeys: Dark Knights at Redemption Ranch, #1))
You carry hope with you, Bayloo. Now fly, noble dragon. With courage. Find your sister. Then return to us. I too believe there is hope.
Bethy Rann - A Dragon's Chains