Closest Distance Quotes

The point of marriage is not to create a quick commonality by tearing down all boundaries; on the contrary, a good marriage is one in which each partner appoints the other to be the guardian of his solitude, and thus they show each other the greatest possible trust. A merging of two people is an impossibility, and where it seems to exist, it is a hemming-in, a mutual consent that robs one party or both parties of their fullest freedom and development. But once the realization is accepted that even between the closest people infinite distances exist, a marvelous living side-by-side can grow up for them, if they succeed in loving the expanse between them, which gives them the possibility of always seeing each other as a whole and before an immense sky.

Once the realization is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue, a wonderful living side by side can grow, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see the other whole against the sky.

You're my closest friend and you're thousands of miles away.

Laughter is the closest distance between two people.

You're enjoying this, aren't you?" I'd feel better if I could guard your back." You're going to do that with a rifle from the closest hill, remember." Night vision and scope, fine, but I can't kill them all from a distance." You couldn't kill them all if you were johnny on the spot, either," I said. No but I'd feel better." Worried about me?" He shrugged. I'm your bodyguard. If you die under my protection, the other bodyguards will make fun of me." It took me a second to realize he was making a joke. Harley looked back at him with an almost surprised look. I don't think either of us heard humor from Edward much.

A complete sharing between two people is an impossibility and whenever it seems, nevertheless, to exist, it is a narrowing, a mutual agreement which robs either one member or both of his fullest freedom and development. But, once the realization is accepted that, even between the closest human beings, infinite distances continue to exist, a wonderful living side by side can grow up, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see the other whole and against a wide sky!

And if they do, I hope heaven is a road trip. I hope it’s you and me and Renny and Ted with nothing but time on our hands. I hope it’s, I don’t know, crossing an immeasurable distance with your closest friends.

I tended to find lines of poetry beautiful only when I encountered them quoted in prose, in the essays my professors had assigned in college, where the line breaks were replaced with slashes, so that what was communicated was less a particular poem than the echo of poetic possibility. Insofar as I was interested in the arts, I was interested in the disconnect between my experience of actual artworks and the claims made on their behalf; the closest I'd come to having a profound experience of art was probably the experience of this distance, a profound experience of the absence of profundity.

The free spirit again draws near to life - slowly, to be sure, almost reluctantly, almost mistrustfully. It again grows warmer about him, yellower as it were; feeling and feeling for others acquire depth, warm breezes of all kind blow across him. It seems to him as if his eyes are only now open to what is close at hand. he is astonished and sits silent: where had he been? These close and closest things: how changed they seem! what bloom and magic they have acquired! He looks back gratefully - grateful to his wandering, to his hardness and self-alienation, to his viewing of far distances and bird-like flights in cold heights. What a good thing he had not always stayed "at home," stayed "under his own roof" like a delicate apathetic loafer! He had been -beside himself-: no doubt about that. Only now does he see himself - and what surprises he experiences as he does so! What unprecedented shudders! What happiness even in the weariness, the old sickness, the relapses of the convalescent! How he loves to sit sadly still, to spin out patience, to lie in the sun! Who understands as he does the joy that comes in winter, the spots of sunlight on the wall! They are the most grateful animals in the world, also the most modest, these convalescents and lizards again half-turned towards life: - there are some among them who allow no day to pass without hanging a little song of praise on the hem of its departing robe. And to speak seriously: to become sick in the manner of these free spirits, to remain sick for a long time and then, slowly, slowly, to become healthy, by which I mean "healthier," is a fundamental cure for all pessimism.

By now, one second of time has passed. The universe has grown to a few light-years across,†† about the distance from the Sun to its closest neighboring stars.

What is aura? A peculiar web of space and time: the unique manifestation of a distance, however near it may be. To follow, while reclining on a summer’s noon, the outline of a mountain range on the horizon or a branch, which casts its shadow on the observer until the moment or  the hour partakes of their presence—this is to breathe in the aura of these mountains, of this branch. Today, people have as passionate an inclination to bring things close to themselves or even more to the masses, as to overcome uniqueness in every situation by reproducing it. Every day the need grows more urgent to possess an object in the closest proximity, through a picture or, better, a reproduction. And the reproduction, as the illustrated newspaper and weekly readily prove, distinguishes itself unmistakably from the picture. Uniqueness and permanence are as closely intertwined in the latter as transitoriness and reproducibility in the former.

Aye. 'Tis a free country." Monq had come to check on Elora just as she asked that question. "Well, that kind of has to be qualified," he interjected. "You can't come or go without a passport. You can't drive without a driver's license, registration, auto insurance and proof that your vehicle is up to code. You can't work or even get health care without a social security number. You have to pay taxes on everything including air and water. The closest distance between point A and B may involve paying a road toll. There are over three hundred thousand federal laws. You have to educate your children according to legal standards set by someone that's not you. There are laws about who can marry whom. But other than a few more such trivialities, it's a free country.

I hate running. Hate, hate, hate it. Running is something that skinny people do so they can brag about it to those of us who come in adult sizes. I’m actually an okay sprinter. I’ve got long legs, and I’m surprisingly nimble for a big dude, but distance running is for masochists and crazy people who want to collect foot problems and repetitive stress injuries. My insane runner friends kept trying to tell me that at some point you were supposed to get this euphoric feeling during a run, but as far as I could tell that was propaganda they told themselves to feel better about having such a ridiculous pastime. The closest I ever came to euphoria was when the aches got numb. Running sucks.

The aim of marriage, as I feel it, is not by means of demolition and overthrowing of all boundaries to create a hasty communion, the good marriage is rather one in which each appoints the other as guardian of his solitude and shews him this greatest trust that he has to confer. A togetherness of two human beings is an impossibility and, where it does seem to exist, a limitation, a mutual compromise which robs one side or both sides of their fullest freedom and development. “But granted the consciousness that even between the closest people there persist infinite distances, a wonderful living side by side can arise for them, if they succeed in loving the expanse between them, which gives them the possibility of seeing one another in whole shape and before a great sky!

Even between the closest human beings, infinite distances continue.

Just as teenagers can live in the same house as their parents, yet choose not to live “close” to them in partnership, so we can choose to be children of God, yet live very distant from God in our hearts. On the other hand, we can choose to have the closest partnership with Him, in which we know what He thinks, believes, and acts and what is important to Him. In this place of intimacy, we also discover just how close He wants to be with us.

In this summer heat, I must remember that the realest things are the closest and farthest away, like the warmth found in winter: the heat hidden in the folds of one's coat, a lost floating breath, a kiss across the distance of zero degrees.

Once the realization is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue to exist, a wonderful living side by side can grow up, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see the other whole against the sky.

According to Auster, proximity is deceptive, and anonymity is not only the misfortune of the masses, of the cities, but also a cancer gnawing away the family and marital unit. Human contact often masks a gulf that only death or distance can bridge. We are separated from others by those very things that also connect us; we are separated from ourselves by the illusion of self-knowledge. Just as we must forget ourselves in order to reach a certain level of self-truth, we must also leave others in order to find them in the prism of memory and separation. That which is closest is often the most enigmatic, and distance, like mourning and wandering, is also an instrument of redemption.

I don’t know if you’ve spent time in the Catskills. From a distance, say, the parking lot of the old Caldor’s (which became an Ames that became a Stop ‘N’ Shop) in Huguenot, they’ve always made me think of a herd of giant animals, all standing grazing on the horizon. Up close, when you’re driving among them with the early morning light breaking over their round peaks, they seem incredibly present, more real than real, these huge solid heaps of rock that wear their trees like mile-long scarves. You glance at them, trying to keep your eyes on the road, which is already pretty busy with people driving up for a weekend getaway, and somehow you wouldn’t be surprised if the mountain closest to you were to cast off its trees in one titanic shrug and start to lumber away, a vast, unimaginable beast. When you turn off onto whatever secondary road you need to take, and you’re following its twists and turns back into the mountains, and the ground is steep to either side of you, opening every now and then on a meadow, or an old house, you think, Here, there are secret places. Well,

THE SHACK SAT BACK from the palmettos, which sprawled across sand flats to a necklace of green lagoons and, in the distance, all the marsh beyond. Miles of blade-grass so tough it grew in salt water, interrupted only by trees so bent they wore the shape of the wind. Oak forests bunched around the other sides of the shack and sheltered the closest lagoon, its surface so rich in life it churned. Salt air and gull-song drifted through the trees from the sea.

We can see what is in front of us, but not what is behind, just as we can remember what happened in the past, but we can't remember the future. Not only that, but we can remember recent events much more clearly than long past events, captured neatly by the visual metaphor in which the past lines up before us, the most recent events being closest so that they clearly perceived (remembered), with long/past events far in the distance, remembered and perceived with difficulty.

Where do you go to make friends when you’re an adult? No, honestly, I’m asking, where do you do this? There are no more late-night study sessions or university social events. And while meeting friends at work is the obvious answer, your options are very limited if you don’t click with your colleagues or if you’re self-employed. (Also, if you’re only friends with people at work, who do you complain about your colleagues too?) I don’t volunteer. I don’t participate in organised religion. I don’t play team sports. Where do selfish, godless, lazy people go to make friends? That’s where I need to be. Nearly all of my closest friends have been assigned to me: either via seating chats at school, university room-mates, or desk buddies at work. After taking stock, I realise that most of my friends were forced to sit one metre away from me for several hours at a time. I’ve never actively reached out to make a new friend who wasn’t within touching distance. With no helpful administrators, just how do we go about making friends as adults? Is it possible to cultivate that intense closeness without the heady combination of naivety, endless hours of free time on hand and lack of youthful inhibitions? Or is that lost for ever after we hit thirty?

Annis, my Arese,” she says, her voice fluttering. “I love you. I love you, my little one.” One of the Georgia Man’s men walks toward us and grabs my mother by the same soft meat of her arm as I have done so many times. Cries rise from the people around us; a bolt of summer lightning flashes in the distance. The Georgia men are grabbing men and women and children on their way to their labor. The Georgia men are separating those to be sold. They have come for their goods to march to New Orleans. There is a sinking at the heart of me, a whirlpool sucking down and down. Surely the earth is opening to us. Surely this terrible world is swallowing me. I grab my mama’s wrists, sinewy as corn sheaves, and howl. “Mama,” I say. “I always be with you,” my mama says, and No she not, I think, no she not, as the closest Georgia Man, broad armed and dirt faced, wrenches her away. Pulls her back. My sire done chose her for the markets.

As people turned away, Kestrel saw a clear path to Irex, tall and black-clad in the center of the space marked for the duel. He smiled at her, and Kestrel was so thrown out of herself that she didn’t know her father had arrived until she felt his hand on her shoulder. He was dusty and smelled of horse. “Father,” she said, and would have tucked herself into his arms. He checked her. “This isn’t the time.” She flushed. “General Trajan,” Ronan said cheerfully. “So glad you could come. Benix, do I see the Raul twins over there, in the front, closest to the dueling ground? No, you blind bat. There, right next to Lady Faris. Why don’t we watch the match with them? You, too, Jess. We need your feminine presence so we can pretend that we’re only interested in the twins because you’d like to chat about feathered hats.” Jess squeezed Kestrel’s hand, and the three of them would have left immediately had the general not stopped them. “Thank you,” he said. Kestrel’s friends dropped their merry act, which Jess wasn’t performing well anyway. The general focused on Ronan, sizing him up like he would a new recruit. Then he did something rare. He gave a nod of approval. The corner of Ronan’s mouth lifted in a small, worried smile as he led the others away. Kestrel’s father faced her squarely. When she bit her lip, he said, “Now is not the time to show any weakness.” “I know.” He checked the straps on her forearms, at her hips, and against her calves, tugging the leather that secured six small knives to her body. “Keep your distance from Irex,” he said, his voice low, though the people nearest to them had withdrawn to give some privacy--a deference to the general. “Your best bet is to keep this to a contest of thrown knives. You can dodge his, throw your own, and might even get first blood. Make him empty his sheaths. If you both lose all six Needles, the duel is a draw.” He straightened her jacket. “Don’t let this turn into hand-to-hand combat.” The general had sat next to her at the spring tournament. He had seen Irex fight and directly afterward had tried to enlist him in the military. “I want you to be at the front of the crowd,” Kestrel said. “I wouldn’t be anywhere else.” A small crease appeared between her father’s brows. “Don’t let him get close.” Kestrel nodded, though she had no intention of taking his advice. She walked through the throngs of people to meet Irex.

Lastly, he hit on the idea of transferring the observer's position into the centre of the world, and to examine the variations in angular velocity, regardless of distance, as seen from the sun. And lo! it worked. The results were even more gratifying than he had expected. Saturn, for instance, when farthest away from the sun, in its aphelion, moves at the rate of 106 seconds arc per day; when closest to the sun, and its speed is at maximum, at 135 seconds arc per day. The ratio between the two extreme velocities is 106 to 135, which only differs by two seconds from 4:5. - the major third. With similar, very small deviations (which were all perfectly explained away at the end), the ratio of Jupiter's slowest to its fastest motion is a minor third, Mars' the quint, and so forth. So much for each planet considered by itself. But when he compared the extreme angular velocities of pairs of different planets, the results were even marvellous: "At the first glance the Sun of Harmony broke in all its clarity through the clouds." The extreme values yield in fact the intervals of the complete scale. But not enough: if we start with the outermost planet, Saturn, in the aphelion, the scale will be in the major key; if we start with Saturn in the perihelion, it will be in the minor key. Lastly, if several planets are simultaneously at the extreme points of their respective orbits, the result is a motet where Saturn and Jupiter represent the bass, Mars the tenor, Earth and Venus the contralto, Mercury the soprano. On some occasions all six can be heard together:

As all material creation consists of out-births of things spiritual, the spiritual world being the world of causes, and the natural world that of effects, and as effects are the repositories of their causes, the natural world is the reflection of the spiritual. For this reason, from the beginning of things, the sun has stood out as a pre-eminent symbol of the things of God. Of all inanimate things it bears the closest correspondence to the Supreme Being, for what it is in the natural world the Supreme Being is in the Spiritual. Its central fire is the correspondence of the essence of the Divine Nature--DIVINE LOVE; its heat the correspondence of the heat flowing from Divine Love, which is Divine Goodness and all that that comprises; its light the correspondence of Divine Truth which is the light proceeding from Divine Wisdom; and the union of heat and light in its central essence forever symbolizes the union of the Divine Love and Wisdom resulting from that of the Divine Will and Understanding. God is the SUN from whose heat and light--His Love and Wisdom--proceed all that is spiritual, and through the spiritual, by the medium of the natural sun, all that is natural. The sun is supreme in all natural things, and its operations run through all in its own world, but the Divine SUN from which it derives its origin is supreme in all and operates through all, above and below. And as the natural sun is everywhere present in its own realm, and all things derive their life and grow in more or less perfect measure according to their forms and distances, so is the Supreme One omnipresent, filling both the spiritual and the natural world.

Rita shook her head. “You see,” she went on as if she hadn’t heard a word I said, “this is exactly why it’s better to keep my distance.” I told Rita what I tell everyone who’s afraid of getting hurt in relationships—which is to say, everyone with a heartbeat. I explained to her that even in the best possible relationship, you’re going to get hurt sometimes, and no matter how much you love somebody, you will at times hurt that person, not because you want to, but because you’re human. You will inevitably hurt your partner, your parents, your children, your closest friend—and they will hurt you—because if you sign up for intimacy, getting hurt is part of the deal. But, I went on, what was so great about a loving intimacy was that there was room for repair. Therapists call this process rupture and repair, and if you had parents who acknowledged their mistakes and took responsibility for them and taught you as a child to acknowledge your mistakes and learn from them too, then ruptures won’t feel so cataclysmic in your adult relationships. If, however, your childhood ruptures didn’t come with loving repairs, it will take some practice for you to tolerate the ruptures, to stop believing that every rupture signals the end, and to trust that even if a relationship doesn’t work out, you will survive that rupture too. You will heal and self-repair and sign up for another relationship full of its own ruptures and repairs. It’s not ideal, opening yourself up like this, putting your shield down, but if you want the rewards of an intimate relationship, there’s no way around it. Still, Rita called me every day to let me know that Myron hadn’t responded. “Radio silence,” she’d say into my voicemail, then add sarcastically,

Missy and I were married on August 10, 1990. To say our marriage got off to a rocky start would be an understatement. My brothers and closest friends took me frog-hunting the night before my wedding for my bachelor party. As we were searching for frogs, my oldest brother, Alan, gave me a lot of advice on marriage in general as we motored along the bayou. The main thing he reminded me of is that God is the architect of marriage. Having a great relationship with our Creator is the best thing you can do for your marriage relationship. Alan gave me an illustration of a triangle with the husband and wife on the bottom corners and God at the top corner. His point was that as each person moves closer to God, they also move closer to each other. I never forgot that and he was right. I was mainly the motorman that night and was filled with anxiety and anticipation of the wedding. As we moved along, we saw two big frogs mating on the riverbank. “Whoa, there you go!” Al shouted. It kind of broke the ice for a conversation about intimacy and sex. Missy and I had not seen each other much in the previous couple of months because we couldn’t keep our hands off each other. Many times we had to remind each other of our commitment to stay pure and had had many prayers together. We were not perfect, but one of us would always stop things from getting too heated. Eventually, we decided to have only a long-distance relationship via telephone and our face-to-face encounters became limited to church and public gatherings. As our wedding was approaching, Missy and I were both a little bit nervous about having sex for the first time. I think that’s the way it is when you’re both virgins. We were both excited because we’d decided to save ourselves for marriage and our big night was finally here!

I’ll never forget this one night when Daddy had taken us way out to a little church up on a high ridge. There was no kind of instrumentation, and the hymns were all sung a cappella. During the preaching, there was a little more shouting from the congregation than usual. When it came time for us to sing, we were introduced by the preacher, a wiry little man with kind of a fiery look in his eyes. We stepped to the front and took our places on the old wood-plank platform to one side of the pulpit. Softly, I sung a note to get us started because it was decided I could come closest to hitting a key that we could all sing in. We began our songs, just as we had planned. I was aware that the pastor was on the stage behind us, but I didn’t think anything of it. After a while, I could feel Stella nudging me in the ribs, trying not to be noticed. I looked at her, and she motioned with her head slightly back toward where the preacher was standing. He seemed to be totally wrapped up in the spirit, nearly in a trance. I didn’t think too much of it, until I spotted a familiar sight—the back markings of a snake, a cottonmouth moccasin. I had seen them in the woods, usually scurrying across the path toward cover. They were afraid of me, and I was afraid of them. And up to now, we had always managed to keep our distance from each other. Here, apparently, they were a part of the worship service. I could see now, out of my peripheral vision, that the preacher had a full grown cottonmouth by the back of the head and it was twisting and coiling all around his forearm. Some members of the congregation were reaching out as if they wanted to touch it. The preacher was getting more and more worked up, and he reached into a wooden crate by the pulpit and took out two more snakes. This time he seemed to be holding them much more carelessly. He lifted them near his face as if daring them to strike. We sisters just kept on singing, unconsciously moving away from the snakes until we were very near the front of the platform. Just then, I noticed something that struck a note of fear in my heart much greater than that inspired by the snakes. My father had stepped into the back of the church to hear his little girls sing. Whatever he had been drinking didn’t impair his ability to see exactly what the preacher had in his hands. Just at that moment, the man and his snakes took a step toward the congregation, thus toward us. Daddy had seen enough. He charged down the aisle like a wild boar through a thicket. “You get them Goddamn snakes away from my kids!” Daddy bellowed with a force in his voice I had never heard before. It was amazing how quickly that preacher broke his trance and paid heed. He had heard the voice of a higher power, in this case a really pissed-off redneck. Daddy swooped us up and out the front door before we had time to think about what was happening. We didn’t even stop singing until we were almost down the steps into the churchyard. We were glad to be out of there, and I at least was proud that Daddy had come to our rescue. But Daddy obviously felt terrible about it. On the way home in the car, he got to feeling especially bad. “Goddamn! I can’t believe I said Goddamn in church!” he muttered to himself. He finally got so upset he had to stop the car and get out in the woods and, in his way, ask God’s forgiveness. I couldn’t help thinking how badly Mama had always wanted Daddy to walk down the church aisle and declare himself. Now he had certainly done that, although not I’m sure the way Mama had in mind.

At this scale what you actually sense is a space of possibilities, of ethereal electrostatic pushes and pulls. The closest comparison we can make to this experience is a blindfolded tasting of unknown foods and flavors. There is a menu of such sensations here, unique flourishes lined up end to end. Here's an entity we call a carbon atom. Here are ones called oxygen, nitrogen, hydrogen. They're clumped together as other recognizable things, relatively simple molecules called nucleotides: adenine, thymine, guanine, cytosine, arrayed along a pair of sugar-phosphate rails that curve off into the distance in either direction. But what any of these look like is no longer entirely meaningful. What is meaningful is the "state" of these entities, their electromagnetic energies, their vibrations and rotations, their still-intangible patterns of presence. Walking among them you are buffeted by a multitude of calls and entreaties in the form of attractions and repulsions, yet this seemingly disordered cacophony is shot through with regularity and information.

Not surprisingly, negative relationships were stressful. When officers felt undermined by their closest coworker, they were less committed, took more unauthorized breaks, and were absent from work more often. What happened when the undermining colleague was also supportive at times? Things didn’t get better; they got worse. Being undermined and supported by the same person meant even lower commitment and more work missed.* Negative relationships are unpleasant, but they’re predictable: if a colleague consistently undermines you, you can keep your distance and expect the worst. But when you’re dealing with an ambivalent relationship, you’re constantly on guard, grappling with questions about when that person can actually be trusted. As Duffy’s team explains, “It takes more emotional energy and coping resources to deal with individuals who are inconsistent.” In

Proxemics Proxemics is the study of how people use space. As a rule, people reveal how they feel toward each other by the distance they maintain between them. You can test this by observing people’s behavior in public. Where you place yourself in relation to others gives them direct information as to how you feel about them. Where they place themselves relative to you communicates a similar message to you. You can use this to understand the messages that others send to you, and to make sure that you in turn are sending appropriate messages to them. Different levels of physical closeness are appropriate for different levels of intimacy. Familiarize yourself with the four conversation zones listed below, and use the knowledge to interact more effectively: 1. Intimate distance: From actual touch to eighteen inches away. This distance is reserved for those people we are emotionally closest to. Sharing this zone is a sign of trust and an indication that one’s defenses have been lowered. When this zone is invaded inappropriately, we feel uncomfortable and threatened. It was the inability to recognize this distance that got Phil into trouble on his date with Carol. In dating, observing your companion’s reaction as you move into this zone is crucial. If you move within eighteen inches of your partner and he or she doesn’t retreat, it is an indication that the other person is comfortable. If the person moves away—even slightly—it is an indication that you have entered the intimate zone prematurely. If other indications suggest that this companion does in fact enjoy your company, continue to proceed. Most people will truly appreciate your ability to read them—much less awkward than having to discuss these things in the early stages of a friendship or potential romance! 2. Personal distance: Eighteen inches to four feet. This is the zone occupied by people who feel comfortable together. Eighteen inches is the distance at which most couples stand when in public, and the distance at which close friends might stand if they were having an intimate conversation. The far end of this range, from two and a half to four feet, is the zone beyond arm’s length. While this distance still indicates a reasonably close relationship, it is not nearly as intimate as the range of one and a half to three feet. 3. Social distance: Four to twelve feet. Generally the distance between people who work together and between the salesperson and customer in a store. The span of seven to twelve feet is usually reserved for more formal and impersonal situations. 4. Public distance: Twelve to twenty-five feet. The closer end of the span, twelve feet away, is what teachers usually use in the classroom. Anything further away suggests a lecture situation, in which conversation is almost impossible.

If you remove the negative people from your life, God will bring positive people into it. Is your inner circle of friends holding you back? Are those closest to you with you but not for you? If you find that it takes constant effort to win their support and encouragement, they likely don’t understand your destiny. The Scripture says, “Do not throw your pearls before swine” (Matthew 7:6 NASB). You could say your pearl is your gift, your personality. It’s who you are. When you get around true friends, people who really believe in you, they won’t be jealous of your gifts. They won’t constantly question who you are. They won’t try to talk you out of your dreams. It will be just the opposite. They’ll help you polish your pearl. They’ll give you ideas. They’ll connect you with people they know. They’ll help push you further along. Do not waste time with people who don’t value your gifts or appreciate what you have to offer. That’s casting your pearl before swine. Those closest to you should celebrate who you are and be happy when you succeed. They should believe the very best of you. If that doesn’t describe those in your inner circle, move them out. You can be nice. You can still be friends from a distance. But your time is too valuable to spend with people who are not 100 percent for you. It’s not the quantity of friends that’s important; it’s the quality of friends.

Tactical Consideration in Strikes and Kicks Used in Attack and Defense When you have enough time to identify a dangerous scenario before it starts, the primary attacks are kicks and secondary attacks are punches. In the short range it is faster to reach with a punch than to shift the body’s weight up for a kick. In the long range it is faster to leap one step and lift the leg for a kick instead of leaping two steps. Therefore in the long range, kicks are considered to be primary attacks. If you block a fake kick, attack at the same time. If your opponent tries to punch you, he would not succeed since he would have closed a two-step gap before reaching you while you were moving to block his kick as he started to move. Since he initially planned to lunge two steps forward to close the gap, he would not expect you to meet him halfway and it would break his train of thought. Another tactical move would be to move forward and close the gap without immediately attacking, and waiting for the opponent to attack first so that you could follow with a block and counterattack. However, your opponent could preemptively kick as you try to move in. Krav Maga defense techniques are designed to automatically counter a kick with a follow-up hand strike. First, the right hand goes to the left shoulder before it strikes, therefore catching the outside of the forearm in any such possible attack. During training and practice of that particular defense, the student should practice the defense with all the possible follow-up scenarios as well. Reaction Time Consideration Remember that you are a human being and your skeleton is designed for use in a unique way. If you try to crawl like a snake, or walk like a monkey, you will never reach the speed and balance of your natural movement. Therefore as a Krav Maga fighter you have the upper hand. If a martial artist attempts to get into a particular stance, or makes an opening statement with a few threatening moves and screams, or tries to fake an attack, you should know by now that he is wasting his energy and attacks and you should really react to his initial standing position when he is about to close the range, or preemptively attack if you think he is serious about hurting you. At times ignoring a person at the right time but yet being ready to counter him with the right timing will discourage a bully through the messages your body and actions deliver. From a distance, you can see that his closest limb, according to the striking distance, is what you should be concerned about. Follow your training and counterattack by blocking only the closest limb. If he fakes his first move, it should not be a great concern. While he is doing this, you should block the fake attack and counterattack him at the same time. He should never be able to get to his second planned attack.

Is this how it happens? Not with a bang, but with gaps between hangs that gradually get larger, and you forget to send that birthday message... and the only time you all get together is at weddings, but the weddings are running out, then months turn into years into decades and you're telling optimistic thirtysomethings that THIS is when friendships begin to fade. Please do not let me be that guy. I'm not resigning us to that fate, not yet. I'm old enough now to know that it's possible to grow distant from your closest friends. But it's not a foregone conclusion. These people mean too much to me. These people ARE me. The destabilizing feeling that sinks my stomach at the thought of losing them proves that better than any model of identity, better than even the brilliance of Virginia Woolf. So I'll work to stay in their lives. I'll make an effort to see them. I'll listen and share, ask for advice, tell them I love them. The distance between us makes it harder, but it's only our bodies that are distant. And the body misleads.

In August 2008, physicists Jere Jenkins and Ephraim Fischbach, of Purdue University, burst on the scene with an incredible claim. Decay constants are not so constant! Through detailed analysis, they found that the decay rate of radioactive manganese-54 (54Mn) fluctuates in correlation with solar flares (Jenkins and Fischbach 2008). And that was not all. It was also found that the decay rates of radioactive silicon-32 (32Si) and radioactive radium-226 (226Ra) vary over time and that the variations correlate with the changing distance between the Earth and the Sun (Jenkins et al. 2008). When the Earth is closest to the Sun (in January), the decay rate increases; when the Earth is farthest from the Sun (in July), the decay rate decreases. These are incredible, absolutely astounding results with profound ramifications.

The closest I can now explain it from the safety of this distance and this keyboard is that we both pitied one another as a bad fit for this world: What we saw and understood of the other made us sad for both the other person and ourselves, and if we could make it better for the other, well, it might be better for me, for us.

In its lifetime, an albatross is believed to fly around fifteen million miles. To put that into perspective, it is the same as flying half way to Mars when it is at its closest distance to the Earth.

the way the people closest to us are able so effortlessly to thrust us to the farthest distance

One cannot examine the actions of the Secret Service on November 22, 1963, without concluding that the Service stood down on protecting President Kennedy. Indeed, the 120-degree turn into Dealey Plaza violates Secret Service procedures, because it required the presidential limousine to come to a virtual stop. The reduction of the president’s motorcycle escort from six police motorcycles to two and the order for those two officers to ride behind the presidential limousine also violates standard Secret Service procedure. The failure to empty and secure the tall buildings on either side of the motorcade route through Dealey Plaza likewise violates formal procedure, as does the lack of any agents dispersed through the crowd gathered in Dealey Plaza. Readers who are interested in a comprehensive analysis of the Secret Service’s multiple failures and the conspicuous violation of longstanding Secret Service policies regarding the movement and protection of the president on November 22, 1963, should read Vince Palamara’s Survivor’s Guilt: The Secret Service and the Failure to Protect. The difference in JFK Secret Service protection and its adherence to the services standard required procedures in Chicago and Miami would be starkly different from the arrangements for Dallas. Palamara established that Agent Emory Roberts worked overtime to help both orchestrate the assassination and cover up the unusual actions of the Secret Service in the aftermath. Roberts was commander of the follow-up car trailing the presidential limousine. Roberts covered up the escapades of his fellow secret servicemen at The Cellar, a club in downtown Ft. Worth, where agents, some directly responsible for the safety of President Kennedy during the motorcade, drank until dawn on November 22. He also ordered a perplexed agent Donald Lawton off the back of the presidential limousine while at Love Field, thus giving the assassins clearer, more direct shots and more time to get them off. Also, although Roberts recognized rifle fire being discharged in Dealey Plaza, he neglected to mobilize any of the agents under his watch to act. To mask the inactivity of his agents, Roberts, in sworn testimony, falsely increased the speed of the cars (from 9–11 mph to 20–25 mph) and the distance between them (from five feet to 20–25 feet).85 No analysis of the Secret Service’s actions on the day of the assassination can be complete without mentioning that Secret Service director James Rowley was a former FBI agent and close ally of FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, as well as a crony of Lyndon Johnson. Hoover was one of Johnson’s closest associates. The FBI Director would take the unusual step of flying to Dallas for a victory celebration in 1948 when Johnson illegally stole his Senate seat through election fraud. Johnson and Hoover were neighbors in the Foxhall Road area of the District of Columbia. Hoover’s budget would virtually triple during the years LBJ dominated the appropriations process as Senate Majority Leader. Rowley was a protégé of the director and one of the few men who left the FBI on good terms with Hoover. Rowley’s first public service job in the Roosevelt administration was arranged for him by LBJ. The neglect of assigning even one Secret Service agent to secure Dealey Plaza, as well as cleaning blood and other relatable pieces of evidence from the presidential limousine immediately following the assassination, seizing Kennedy’s body from Parkland Hospital to prevent a proper, well-documented autopsy, failing to record Oswald’s interrogation—all were important pieces of the assassination deftly executed by Rowley.

She moved silently over the thick corridor carpet. The hinge side of the door was closest, and the knob side farthest. She ducked under the peephole’s field of view and flattened against the wall beyond the door. She reached out and tried the knob backhand. Long training. Always safer. Guns can shoot through doors. She mouthed “Locked,” and mimed that she needed the key. Sinclair tucked her purse and her licenses up under her arm and scrabbled in her bag. She came out with a brass key on a pewter fob. Reacher took it from her and tossed it to Neagley, who caught it one-handed and put it in the lock, from the same position, backhand again, at a distance, out of the line of fire. She

We had moved there, three years earlier, leaving behind our family home which was situated in the township of another state, over a thousand miles away. It could have been on another planet, the distance was so great. Once again, it was Dad’s job that had forced us to be uprooted from everything that was familiar. I recalled the vivid memory of being told I had to be separated from everything I knew and loved; my home, my school, my friends. And it was my two best friends, Millie and Blake, who I had found it hardest to say goodbye to. I remembered how distraught I had been at the thought of not being able to see them each day. Millie was my closest friend ever and Blake… he was my one true love.

Once the realization is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue to exist, a wonderful living side by side can grow up, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see the other whole and against a wide sky.

Your happiness is something that should come from within and should not be dependent on your lover or mate. Your well-being is not their responsibility, and theirs is not yours. Each person needs to look after himself or herself. In addition, you should learn not to allow your inner peace to be disturbed by the person you are closest to. If your partner acts in a way that undermines your sense of security, you should be able to distance yourself from the situation emotionally, “keep the focus on yourself,” and stay on an even keel. If you can’t do that, there might be something wrong with you.

I am not alone in the world but I share this world with others. To be able to live a healthy life in this world which judges me and asks me to play a role according to my physical identity, two things are necessary. First, that I must have my own inner privacy where I can hide from the face of the challenging world; and secondly, I must establish a hierarchy of relationships with this same world. In the inner circle of my life I find him or her who is closest to me. Around this circle of intimacy I find the circle of family and dear friends. Then, at a somewhat larger distance, I locate relatives, and acquaintances and, even further away, the associates in business and work. Finally, I am aware of the vast circle of people that I don’t know by name but who in some vague way also belong to this world, which I can call my world. Thus, I am surrounded by expanding circles […] I don’t say to the bus driver what I can say to my colleagues. I don’t say to my friends what I can say to my parents. But there is a place where nobody can enter, where I am completely by myself, where I develop my own most inner privacy. This is the place where I can meet God, who by His incarnation has thrown off his otherness. The possibility for a man to hide from the face of the world is a condition for the formation of any community.

From the den, they heard… like the busy whistling of a bird on a branch in springtime… a high-pitched breathy monologue, a squeaky soliloquy… Connor was talking, Connor was babbling, to Casey! They sat side by side on the den sofa – Casey, resting her head on her front paws, gazed off into the middle distance, while Conner looked down upon her from above and held forth. The mumble of little whispery syllables included, frequently, “Ay-ee,” followed by a deep breath, and then another arpeggio of nasally notes. The mother and the speech therapist couldn’t make out the subject, but they perceived emotion, syntax, punctuation, narrative arc, rising tension, and perhaps even denouement. Since Casey’s arrival, Connor had worked hard to speak loudly and clearly enough for his commands to be understood; now he seemed to have grasped the essence of speech as a medium for relaying one’s innermost thoughts and feelings to one’s closest friend.

I tended to find lines of poetry beautiful only when I encountered them quoted in prose, in the essays my professors had assigned in college, where the line breaks were replaced with slashes, so that what was communicated was less a particular poem than the echo of poetic possibility. Insofar as I was interested in the arts, I was interested in the disconnect between my experience of actual artworks and the claims made on their behalf; the closest I’d come to having a profound experience of art was probably the experience of this distance, a profound experience of the absence of profundity.

The Most Important Strategic Decision Was to Become a Genuine Retailer The fundamental job of a retailer is to buy goods whole, cut them into pieces, and sell the pieces to the ultimate consumers. This is the most important mental construct I can impart to those of you who want to enter retailing. Most “retailers” have no idea of the formal meaning of the word. Time and again I had to remind myself just what my role in society was supposed to be. Many of the policy decisions for a retailer boil down to this: How closely should we stick to the fundamental retailing job? “Retail” comes from a medieval French verb, retailer, which means “to cut into pieces.” “Tailor” comes from the same verb. The fact is that most so-called retailers don’t want to face up to their basic job. In Pronto Markets we did everything we could to avoid retailing. We tried to shift the burden to suppliers, buying prepackaged goods, hopefully pre-price-marked (potato chips, bread, cupcakes, magazines, paperback books) so we had no role in the pricing decision. The goods were ordered, displayed, and returned by outside salespeople. To this day, supermarkets fight with the retail clerks’ union to expand their right to let core store work be done by outsiders. Whole Earth Harry’s moves into wine and health foods had taken us quite a distance into genuine retailing. In our cheese departments we were literally taking whole wheels and cutting them into pieces. I took this as an analogy for what we should do with everything we sold. Getting rid of all outside salespeople was corollary to the programs that would unfold during the next five years. In Mac the Knife, no outsiders of any sort were permitted in the store. All the work was done by employees. The closest thing to it that I see these days is Costco, which shares many features with Trader Joe’s.

HOLMES, ON SPIRITUALISM A sitting room is not the proper setting for a spiritual awakening. As a horse forgets his shoes (he is not, after all, the one to nail them to his feet), so can a man forget his deceased wife despite previous adoration. Adoration: the sudden attention to such details (unbrushed coat, needlemark in the crook of an arm) in a lady’s appearance when these have not been marked before in one’s closest companion. When you assumed my death, you quit me after a quarter hour. I have trained you well in observation and distance. There are certain well-carved tables, excellent china, there are vessels for the quiet governesses of tragic good breeding who are pleased to rise from the dead and come back to their husbands for a justifiable fee. Come back. See, I am fond of charlatans. There is a certain amount of pleasure in disguise and the caught-breath escape from water and chains. The drowning or how it is imagined. If you had been watching closely? Then I could have returned sooner. Here I will differentiate between legerdemain and what meager love I have witnessed. What desire, to call back the dead to watch you take your tea.

The pilot tapped his GPS screen a few times until he found the nearest airport. "Closest airfields are north. The Virgin Islands.” “You crazy, man? They’re probably already tracking us on radar. DEA or the Coast Guard would probably be waiting for us...” Marco tapped on the touchscreen map. “What about this island over here? Says it’s got a private air strip. Small, but we could go there.” The pilot squinted down at the GPS chart. “I know that one. Some rich guy owns it, I think. He’ll probably have security guards.” Marco tapped the map again, changing the layering to show the satellite image. “The buildings are all on the northwest side of the island. It would take people time to get to the runway, even if they knew we were there. It’s been storming hard so they won’t be outside. We can land on goggles, keep the lights off. We’ll cut the engine as soon as we touch down. We only need ten, fifteen minutes at the most. I’ll check the oil and top us off, then we’ll take off before anyone has time to reach us.” The aircraft jolted as they flew through more turbulence. More lightning in the distance. “Fine,” said the pilot. Marco tapped on the GPS display screen. “There. Your waypoint is in.” The aircraft banked slowly left as the pilot turned them toward the private island.

It was Rilke who advised young poets about the wisdom of guarding the solitude of those we love. And then he promised: 'Once it is recognized that even among the closest people there remain infinite distances, a wonderful coexistence can develop once they succeed in loving the vastness between them that affords them the possibility of seeing each other in their full gestalt before a vast sky!' Young and poetic by disposition, I remember thinking that this was hard doctrine, and even now I am not sure I am always willing to accept it.

Connection to Others (Lifetraps: Emotional Deprivation and Social Exclusion) To develop a sense of connection, we need love, attention, empathy, respect, affection, understanding, and guidance. We need these things from both our family and peers. There are two forms of connection to others. The first involves intimacy. Usually, intimate relationships are those with family, lovers, and very good friends. They are our closest emotional ties. In our most intimate relationships, we feel the kind of connection that one feels with a mother or father. The second form involves our social connections. This is a sense of belonging, of fitting into the larger social world. Social relationships are those with circles of friends and with groups in the community. Connection problems can be subtle. You can look like you fit in perfectly well. You might have a family, loved ones, or be part of the community. Yet, deep down you feel disconnected. You feel alone, and long for a kind of relationships that you do not have. Only someone astute would notice that you are not really connecting with the people around you. You keep people at a little bit of a distance. You do not let anyone come too close. Or your problems may be more extreme. You be a loner – a person who has always been alone. If you have connection problems, then loneliness is an issue for you. You may feel that no one really knows you deeply and cares about you (the Emotional Deprivation lifetrap). Or you may feel isolated from the world, that you do not fit in anywhere (the Social Exclusion lifetrap). It is a feeling of emptiness – a hunger for connection.

Animals President Theodore Roosevelt (after whom the Teddy Bear is named) was particularly fond of animals, having five guinea pigs called Dr. Johnson, Bishop Doane, Fighting Bob Evans, Admiral Dewey, and Father O’Grady. He also owned a small bear called Jonathan Edwards, a lizard by the name of Bill, Baron Spreckle (a hen), a badger called Josiah, Eli Yale the parrot and - brilliantly - a snake known to his family as Emily Spinach. In its lifetime, an albatross is believed to fly around fifteen million miles. To put that into perspective, it is the same as flying half way to Mars when it is at its closest distance to the Earth. In possibly one of the cutest facts you will ever read, sea otters hold each other’s paws whilst they are asleep so they don’t drift apart from each other. Elephant shrews are more closely related to elephants than they are shrews. Some ribbon worms will eat themselves if they can’t find anything else to eat. Amazingly, they can consume up to 95% of their own bodyweight and still survive.

He had mastered the art of conducting a love affair through all its stages, from infatuation to consummation, wholly within its mind. How could he do that? The indispensable first step was to capture what he called “a living image” of the beloved and make it his own. Upon this image he would then dwell, giving breath to it, until he had reached a point where, still in the realm of the imagination, he could begin to make love to this succubus of his and eventually conduct her into the utmost transports; and this whole passionate history would remain unbeknown to the earthly original. [ On the erotic life ] It all hinged, he replied, on being able to capture, through the closest, most dedicated attention, that unique unconscious gesture, too slight or too fleeting to be noticed by the average eye, by which a woman gave herself away - gave away her erotic essence, that is to say, her soul. The way she turned her wrist to look at her wristwatch, for example, or the way she reached down to pull tight the strap of a sandal. Once that unique movement was caught, the erotic imagination could explore it at leisure until the woman’s every last secret was laid open, not excluding how she moved in the arms of a lover, how she came to her climax. From the giveaway gesture all followed “as if by fate”. [ On the erotic life ] That’s the beauty of thoughts, isn’t it, that distance doesn’t matter, and separation. [ On compassion ] The woman from Lausanne complains above all of loneliness. She has created a protective ritual for herself in which she retires to bed at night with music playing in the background and lies cosily reading a book, immersed in what she tells herself is bliss. Then, as she begins to reflect on her situation, bliss turns to disquiet. Is this truly the best that life affords, she asks herself - lying in bed alone with a book? Is it such a good thing to be a comfortable, prosperous citizen of a model democracy, secure in her home in the heart of Europe? Despite herself, she grows more and more agitated. She rises, dons dressing gown and slippers and takes up her pen. [ On fan mail ]

starlings’ cohesion is built on relentless attention to a small set of signals. Basically, each starling tracks the six or seven birds closest to it, sending and receiving cues of direction, speed, acceleration, and distance. That shared habit of intensive, up-close watching, amplified through the flock, allows the group to behave as one. In other words, the reason starling flocks can behave so intelligently has nothing to do with telepathy or magic and everything to do with a simpler ability: to pay focused attention to a small handful of key markers.

Without You Everything Is Hideous How are you? , sweetheart, here I am writing these letters and your thought does not leave me and here you are still the closest to me since that day, which did not end until now. I scatter my letters in front of your beautiful eyes to tell you that I am wrong and guilty ; Although I have not forgotten you for a moment, even while I am trying to convince myself that everything is finished from your point of view, but I make up for it and say well, this is enough for me to try to snatch her icy heart again, this heart that loved me with all sincerity that innocent childish heart that never hated One even over the one who is because of him has left me for a long time due to false suspicion I remember all your letters, so I read them from time to time How nice it was to call me a childish nickname - capturing like your cheeks a happy nickname. You didn’t know all my reasons, sweetie I indirectly told you about the biggest reason when I told you to read “So Forgive Me ”You are the most beautiful thing that has happened to me since I knew you. My beauty, today I want to tell you that you forgot something one day. You asked me: Have you loved before? So I told you : Yes I did it was a long time ago when I was a teenager; I never thought that I would love again after I was wounded by that deep wound, when I was left alone, the wolves of loneliness and separation scattered me, and no one comes to me to pull me from the bottom of the debris that happened in my heart, And to be honest, I was not afraid for myself as much as I feared for your tender heart; I don’t ever want to be the lover who leaves his lover, especially if it is you. My beautiful woman, I wanted to make sure that my heart never beats for anyone but you It’s not easy, believe me I admire you since we became close, since we started speaking in the innocent language of children, since you used to say to me you are late to respond, even if I was late for a few seconds since night became for us a second day we talk about it until dawn and more Since you were quarreling with others trying to make them understand my point of view. How delicious days were when you looked at me from a distance and smiled, and when I heard your laughter as much as I was jealous, my heart beat with joy All your conditions were beautiful even when you quarreled with me I am not here trying to tell you that I am innocent, I am not I hurt you many times but I swear it was not with intent They were rather fleeting and spontaneous things. I admit that I have hurt your pride and here I am now bearing the consequences of this matter, and I swear it is not an easy thing. But, my flower, when you told me that excuse to stay away from me for three months, it smashed me, how can someone take my moon from me? The one that shone my eyes and melted the ice around my heart after my heart became so attached to her that I became so addicted to her that when I talk to any girl I call her by your name. My little girl I lost my love previously, and I do not want to lose you, because I know that you are a twin of my soul, even if you deny this now, but in the depths of your heart you know the validity of this matter. I apologize for every moment that made you think with pain I just wanted to protect you from fleeting feelings or just those feelings that were attracted to you And I know you crave someone to love you just because you are beautiful I wanted to protect you from the feelings of a teenager And if it was a year or less late to reveal it You know that valuable things no matter how late they are, their value will be better, finer, sincere and thinner, and you deserve strong, sincere feelings that stem from the depths of the heart and from the depths of the soul feelings befitting you I see in you all the beauties in life And without you, everything is Hideous You have all my feelings, beautiful cheeks.

The codependency movement and other currently popular self-help approaches portray relationships in a way that is remarkably similar to the views held in the first half of the twentieth century about the child-parent bond (remember the “happy child” who is free of unnecessary attachments?). Today’s experts offer advice that goes something like this: Your happiness is something that should come from within and should not be dependent on your lover or mate. Your well-being is not their responsibility, and theirs is not yours. Each person needs to look after himself or herself. In addition, you should learn not to allow your inner peace to be disturbed by the person you are closest to. If your partner acts in a way that undermines your sense of security, you should be able to distance yourself from the situation emotionally, “keep the focus on yourself,” and stay on an even keel. If you can’t do that, there might be something wrong with you. You might be too enmeshed with the other person, or “codependent,” and you must learn to set better “boundaries.

We interact in a world curated mostly by commercial forces. We are pulled into a strange, manic, overcrowded realm of technology that taxes our focus. “What should I be doing right now?” is a question that feels more urgent than ever. Face-to-face, real-time connection to others feels fraught and awkward compared to the safe distance of digital communication. We maintain intimate virtual contact with strangers but seem increasingly isolated from our closest friends and family members.

Even those closest to him became frustrated—whenever they approached him with a concern, they were inevitably told to simply pray. On one occasion a group of priests from Alexandria visited Kyrillos with a "major" problem. On their way, still some distance off, one "who talked a lot but had a pure heart," moaned, "What's the point?...He will just tell us to pray.

No, I'll mostly be watching you, anyway.’ His fingers traced patterns across the skin of my arm, raising goosebumps. ‘Will you cry?’ ‘Probably,’ I admitted, ‘if I'm paying attention.’ ‘I won't distract you then.’ But I felt his lips on my hair, and it was very distracting. The movie eventually captured my interest, thanks in large part to Marcel whispering Romeo's lines in my ear-his irresistible, velvet voice made the actor's voice sound week and coarse by comparison. And I did cry, to his amusement, when Juliet woke and found her new husband dead. ‘I'll admit, I do sort of envy him here, ‘Marcel said, drying the tears with a lock of my hair. ‘She's very pretty.’ He made a disgusted sound. ‘I don't envy him the girl-just the ease of the suicide,’ he clarified in a teasing tone. ‘You humans have it so easy! All you have to do is throw down one tiny vial of plant extracts…’ ‘What?’ I gasped. ‘It's something I had to think about once, and I knew from Chiaz's experience that it wouldn't be simple. I'm not even sure how many ways Chiaz tried to kill himself in the beginning… after he realized what he'd become…’ His voice, which had grown serious, turned light again. ‘And he's still in excellent health.’ I twisted around so that I could read his face. ‘What are you talking about?’ I demanded. ‘What do you mean, this something you had to think about once?’ ‘Last spring, when you were… nearly killed…’ He paused to take a deep breath, snuggling to return to his teasing tone. ‘Of course, I was trying to focus on finding you alive, but part of my mind was making contingency plans. As I said, it's not as easy for me as it is for a human.’ For one second, the memory of my last trip to Phoenix washed over my head and made me feel dizzy. I could see it all so clearly-the the blinding sun, the heat waves coming off the concrete as I ran with desperate haste to find the sadistic angel who wanted to torture me to death. James, waiting in the mirrored room with my mother as his hostage-or so I'd thought. I hadn't known it was all a ruse. Just as James hadn't known that Marcel was racing to save me; Marcel made it in time, but it had been a close one. Unthinkingly, my fingers traced the crescent-shaped scar on my hand that was always just a few degrees cooler than the rest of my skin. I shook my head as if I could shake away the bad memories and tried to grasp what Marcel meant. My stomach plunged uncomfortably. ‘Contingency plans?’ I repeated. ‘Well, I wasn't going to live without you.’ He rolled his eyes as if that fact were childishly obvious. ‘But I wasn't sure how to do it- I knew Emmah and Joh would never help… so I was thinking maybe I would go to Italy and do something to provoke the Ministry.’ I didn't want to believe he was serious, but his golden eyes were brooding, focused on something far away in the distance as he contemplated ways to end his own life. Abruptly, I was furious. ‘What is Vulture?’ I demanded. ‘The Ministry is a family,’ he explained, his eyes still remote. ‘A very old, very powerful family of our kind. They are the closest thing our world has to a royal family, I suppose. Chiaz lived with them briefly in his early years, in Italy, before he settled in America-do you remember the story?’ ‘Of course, I remember.

Look, I’m not joking around. Smartphones are dangerous. Not because they may cause stress, anxiety, and even depression, but because they change your behavior. It seems like we can’t focus on one thing for more than 5 seconds. Why? Well, we can’t because our smartphone is constantly going off. Not because people are calling you (it seems like people are afraid of calling these days, but that’s another topic), but because you’re constantly getting notifications about THINGS THAT DON’T MATTER. Change Your Smartphone Behavior The same study I mentioned above also found something else: “Researchers asked participants to perform a concentration test under four different circumstances: with their smartphone in their pocket, at their desk, locked in a drawer and removed from the room completely.” The results are significant — test results were lowest when the smartphone was on the desk, but with every additional layer of distance between participants and their smartphones, test performance increased. Overall, test results were 26% higher when phones were removed from the room.” Sure, it’s just a study. And you don’t have to believe everything you read. But this is something I can personally attest. For the past two years, I’ve significantly changed my smartphone behavior. Namely: I have turned off ALL my notifications except messages and calls I’ve removed myself from all Whatsapp groups except for one with my closest friends I’ve removed all news apps (if something important happens, you’ll hear it from the people around you) I only consume music, paid journalism, articles from specific authors I follow, podcasts, YouTube videos (mostly to learn, but also for entertainment because I’m not a robot), books, and audiobooks on it For the rest, I use my phone to call, text, and to take notes, photos and videos Also, I’ve stopped immediately responding to notifications. That doesn’t mean I don’t value other people who try to reach me. It means that I refuse to be a slave to my phone. I control my phone. For most of us, it’s the other way around. In the past, Facebook, Instagram, Apple, Google, etc, all controlled my mind. Obviously, they still do because the only way to escape those idiots is to cut yourself off and run to the woods. That’s not realistic. I like my phone. But I don’t need it. The results have been great since I started using my smartphone in the above way. During the past two years, I got more things done than ever. And, I still have time to work out daily, hang out with my friends, have dinner with my family, and

The Umanar system was aflame from the massive blue giant at its center. Even from this distance Andien could see the apocalyptic majesty of the hot star igniting the massive super-planet closest to it, creating a slow, eons-long burn that left a flaming vapor trail across the system.

Face-to-face, real-time connection to others feels fraught and awkward compared to the safe distance of digital communication. We maintain intimate virtual contact with strangers but seem increasingly isolated from our closest friends and family members.

The sea dragons. Far below, the dragons danced on the surface of the ocean, tiny, glimmering worms on a gray floor. Their voices rang through the air, across the great distance and over the roar of Fingap Falls. The dragon song mingled with Leeli’s, and the music pulsed with joy and then sadness. Janner blinked with wonder when he focused again on the images swirling before him. He no longer saw Nugget but a spray of giant waves, then something red and gold—the dragons. He had only ever seen the creatures from the heights of the cliff, but now he could see them as if he floated just above the surface of the sea, a stone’s throw away. They were as beautiful as they were fearsome. Their bodies shimmered with metallic scales that swirled with color. The dragon closest to him glittered orange and gold, like the strikes of a thousand matchsticks, but its winglike fins cycled between shades of blue. Its head was sleek and graceful, perfect for slicing through the water, and its eyes—big and deep and serene—sent a chill down to Janner’s toes, because it was suddenly clear the dragon knew it was being watched. The eyes rolled back, and translucent lids slid over them as the dragon opened its mouth and sang. Teeth lined its mouth, but not in the crooked, yellow way of the Fangs or the toothy cows; these were straight and bright and sharp as needles. Janner pushed his mind through the image and looked again at his brother and sister. Leeli’s eyes were closed, and though she smiled, tears wet her cheeks while she played. Wind stirred Tink’s hair, and he stared at the empty air before him; his eyes flicked back and forth as if studying a drawing that hung a few feet before his face. The song changed to a gentle hum, and Janner turned his mind again to the floating image. A dragon rose from the waves bearing something

If the TM research was the only source of evidence suggesting that collective intentions can influence others at a distance, then that data would be interesting but concerns about their quasi-religious motivations would continue to simmer. Fortunately, there are completely independent experiments, conducted in entirely secular contexts, showing similar effects. Before discussing those experiments, it is instructive to consider an individual case of the power of “radiated nonviolence.” Paul Ekman is a prominent American psychologist who pioneered the analysis of micromovements in facial expressions. In his 2008 book, Emotional Awareness,264 coauthored with the Dalai Lama, Ekman discussed how he was healed from a long-term problem with anger just by being in the presence of the Dalai Lama. Ekman wrote: I had a very strong physical sensation for which we do not have an English word—it comes closest to “warmth,” but there was no heat. It certainly felt very good, and like nothing I have felt before or after.… As a scientist, I cannot ignore what I experienced.… I think the change that occurred within me started with that physical sensation. I think that what I experienced was—a non-scientific term—“goodness.” Every one of the other eight people I interviewed [who reported similar experiences] said they felt goodness; they felt it radiating and felt the same kind of warmth that I did. I have no idea what it is or how it happens, but it is not my imagination. Though we do not have the tools to understand it, that does not mean it does not exist.264 (page 229) Astonished at his response to the presence of the Dalai Lama, Ekman continued to investigate this phenomenon, which he mentioned in a 2009 interview with psychologist David Van Nuys. When asked about his as-yet unpublished study, he replied: The only thing that we carried to completion was a study of a single Buddhist monk, who’s been a monk for 32 years. And what we were able to do is to identify the differences between different forms of meditation and its impact on his mental state, and we were also able to show the calming effect that his presence had in discussion with people who are normally or typically very aggressive.

She was tired from the walk uptown, but still she took her journal out from her bag. She placed it open on her lap, holding the pen as her thinking prop. It was better to look like you were doing something when you stared into the distance, Ruth had learned. Otherwise it was likely that strange men would come over and try to talk to you. Her journal was her closest and most important relationship. It held everything.

I’d feel better if I could guard your back.” “You’re going to do that with a rifle from the closest hill, remember.” “Night vision and scope, fine, but I can’t kill them all from a distance.” “You couldn’t kill them all if you were johnny on the spot, either,” I said. “No, but I’d feel better.” “Worried about me?” He shrugged. “I’m your bodyguard. If you die under my protection, the other bodyguards will make fun of me.” It took me a second to realize he was making a joke. Harley looked back at him with an almost surprised look. I don’t think either of us heard humor from Edward much. I

Finally, the problem about working with friends is that it confuses the boundaries and distances that working requires. But if both partners in the arrangement understand the dangers involved, a friend often can be employed to great effect. You must never let your guard down in such a venture, however; always be on the lookout for any signs of emotional disturbance such as envy and ingratitude. Nothing is stable in the realm of power, and even the closest of friends can be transformed into the worst of enemies.