“
Depth of friendship does not depend on length of acquaintance
”
”
Rabindranath Tagore
“
Oh shoot. That’s the kind of stuff that gets me in trouble. My Gram is right. I got a bad mouth.
”
”
R. Gerry Fabian (Just Out Of Reach)
“
If someone told me that I could live my life again free of depression provided I was willing to give up the gifts depression has given me--the depth of awareness, the expanded consciousness, the increased sensitivity, the awareness of limitation, the tenderness of love, the meaning of friendship, the apreciation of life, the joy of a passionate heart--I would say, 'This is a Faustian bargain! Give me my depressions. Let the darkness descend. But do not take away the gifts that depression, with the help of some unseen hand, has dredged up from the deep ocean of my soul and strewn along the shores of my life. I can endure darkness if I must; but I cannot lie without these gifts. I cannot live without my soul.' (p. 188)
”
”
David Elkins (Beyond Religion: A Personal Program for Building a Spiritual Life Outside the Walls of Traditional Religion)
“
It's a good sign but rare instance when, in a relationship, you find that the more you learn about the other person, the more you continue to desire them. A sturdy bond delights in that degree of youthful intrigue. Love loves its youth.
”
”
Criss Jami (Killosophy)
“
I came to realize that one single human being, comprehended in his depth, who gives generously from the treasures of his heart, bestows on us more riches than Caesar or Alexander could ever conquer. Here is our kingdom, the best of monarchies, the best republic. Here is our garden, our happiness.
”
”
Ernst Jünger (The Glass Bees)
“
Those final weeks, spanning end of summer and the beginning of another autumn, are blurred in memory, perhaps because our understanding of each other had reached that sweet depth where two people communicate more often in silence than in words: an affectionate quietness replaces the tensions, the unrelaxed chatter and chasing about that produce a friendship’s more showy, more, in the surface sense, dramatic moments.
”
”
Truman Capote (Breakfast at Tiffany’s and Three Stories)
“
True friends are not mirrors where we can always see ourselves reflected in a positive light.
”
”
Shannon L. Alder
“
If love makes you sad, you acquire a little depth, a little compassion. If it makes you happy, you learn how to be joyous. Every relationship should color your soul to a certain degree, don't you think? Every friendship, every love affair - each one should build up the chambers of your heart the way a sea creature builds the chamber of his shell.
”
”
Sharon Shinn (Jovah's Angel (Samaria, #2))
“
The worst thing is that we live in a contaminated moral environment. We feel morally ill because we became used to saying something different from what we thought. Concepts such as love, friendship, compassion, humility or forgiveness lost their depth and dimension.
”
”
Václav Havel
“
This, then, is friendship. A family you choose. What you give to it, you give freely. What you withhold from it, measures its depth.
”
”
Steven Erikson (Fall of Light (The Kharkanas Trilogy, #2))
“
There are more benefits to happiness. The power of happiness enables more success in marriages, added friendships, higher incomes, and better work performance. With more friends, happy people have a superior support system. They have an easier time navigating through life because their optimistic outlook eases pain, sadness, and grief. They smile more and engage in more in-depth and more meaningful conversations.
”
”
Robert Gill Jr. (Happiness Power: How to Unleash Your Power and Live a More Joyful Life)
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If it takes night to make day, pain to know pleasure, black to make white, then doesn't it stand to reason that the depth of our friendships could be measured by the quality of our enemies?
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”
Michael Snyder (My Name Is Russell Fink)
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Even there, in the mines, underground, I may find a human heart in another convict and murderer by my side, and I may make friends with him, for even there one may live and love and suffer. One may thaw and revive a frozen heart in that convict, one may wait upon him for years, and at last bring up from the dark depths a lofty soul, a feeling, suffering creature; one may bring forth an angel, create a hero! There are so many of them, hundreds of them, and we are all to blame for them. [...] If they drive God from the earth, we shall shelter Him underground.
”
”
Fyodor Dostoevsky (Notes from Underground, White Nights, The Dream of a Ridiculous Man, and Selections from The House of the Dead)
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However, you'll all find, if you haven't found it out already, that a time comes in every human friendship when you must go down into the depths of yourself, and lay bare what is there to your friend, and wait in fear for his answer.
”
”
Thomas Hughes (Tom Brown's Schooldays (Tom Brown, #1))
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I don't want fleeting friendships or relationships or passion in life, give me fleeting moments in coffee shops and walks by the water but I will never be satisfied with empty kinships that are fleeting & undecided. Those connections are what make us all human and I dare not settle my wild little heart for something of so little depth.
”
”
Nikki Rowe
“
The depth of friendship depends on the depth of our love.
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”
Debasish Mridha
“
But friendship, as defined by everyone, was alien, fallow stuff I cared nothing for. What I may have wanted instead, from the moment he stepped out of the cab to our farewell in Rome, was what all humans ask of one another, what makes life livable.
”
”
André Aciman (Call Me by Your Name)
“
My advice is to stop trying to "network" in the traditional business sense, and instead just try to build up the number and depth of your friendships, where the friendship itself is its own reward. The more diverse your set of friendships are, the more likely you'll derive both personal and business benefits from your friendship later down the road. You won't know exactly what those benefits will be, but if your friendships are genuine, those benefits will magically appear 2-3 years later down the road.
”
”
Tony Hsieh (Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose)
“
The greater our understanding of the Bible’s teaching about the depth of human sin, the less we are likely to be shocked by the revelations of our friends’ struggles, and the more we will be willing to be open with them about our own. From
”
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Vaughan Roberts (True Friendship)
“
Depths of Friendship
...under fathoms deep
of dark and bitter cold
an eerie oscillation
reverberated brash and bold...
”
”
Muse (Enigmatic Evolution)
“
Among the worst things about growing old is the loss of those irreplaceable friends who added richness and depth to your life.
”
”
Pat Conroy (A Lowcountry Heart: Reflections on a Writing Life)
“
That's the thing about knowing someone your entire life. You have a common history; it binds, provides a depth that new friendships, new loves, can never create. It lets two folks be in the room together without having to explain their silences. Or their passions.
”
”
Jessica Maria Tuccelli (Glow)
“
It rasped her, though, to have stirring about in her this brutal monster! to hear twigs cracking and feel hooves planted down in the depths of that leaf-encumbered forest, the soul; never to be content quite, or quite secure, for at any moment the brute would be stirring, this hatred, which, especially since her illness, had power to make her feel scraped, hurt in her spine; gave her physical pain, and made all pleasure in beauty; in friendship, in being well, in being loved and making her home delightful rock, quiver and bend as if indeed there were a monster grubbing at the roots, as if the whole panoply of content were nothing but self love! this hatred!
”
”
Virginia Woolf (Mrs. Dalloway)
“
Most of the truly kind people of this world show some measure of discomfort when offered kindness. Their gratitude stems not only from their understanding of the depth of the force of kindness, but also from their conviction that kindness should not be taken for granted.
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”
Janvier Chouteu-Chando (The Girl on the Trail)
“
It was not something you could call friendship; it was at once less and more. The sharing of such experiences created a bond and set them apart from all others. It was not something that could be told to another person. There were no words with a meaning both could understand which would impart the physical horror or the heights and depths of emotion.
”
”
Anne Perry (A Sudden, Fearful Death (William Monk, #4))
“
I receive remarkable letters. They are opened for me, unfolded, and spread out before my eyes in a daily ritual that gives the arrival of the mail the character of a hushed and holy ceremony. I carefully read each letter myself. Some of them are serious in tone, discussing the meaning of life, invoking the supremacy of the soul, the mystery of every existence. And by a curious reversal, the people who focus most closely on these fundamental questions tend to be people I had known only superficially. Their small talk has masked hidden depths. Had I been blind and deaf, or does it take the harsh light of disaster to show a person's true nature?
Other letters simply relate the small events that punctuate the passage of time: roses picked at dusk, the laziness of a rainy Sunday, a child crying himself to sleep. Capturing the moment, these small slices of life, these small gusts of happiness, move me more deeply than all the rest. A couple of lines or eight pages, a Middle Eastern stamp or a suburban postmark... I hoard all these letters like treasure. One day I hope to fasten them end to end in a half-mile streamer, to float in the wind like a banner raised to the glory of friendship.
It will keep the vultures at bay.
”
”
Jean-Dominique Bauby (The Diving Bell and the Butterfly: A Memoir of Life in Death)
“
There was a time you longed for people to love you. You prayed that they’d see or hear you. You wished
they could see the depth, truth, and message in front
of them. Their words, actions, and mindsets pushed you away,
but you always pulled yourself back. You made excuses like: “But I love her/him/them” “But that’s family”
“But they’ve been in my life for so long” Until you finally told yourself “I can’t.” There are some pains, tactics, and revelations you
can’t bounce back from or unsee—so you don’t. You
just never come back. To the person that has removed themselves from that
group, friendship, or relationship—trust and believe
that sometimes the right decision doesn’t always feel
good and is seldom understood by the masses. Choose
your peace, well-being, and self-love anyway. Some roads are difficult to leave behind but destructive
to stay on.
”
”
Morgan Richard Olivier (The Tears That Taught Me)
“
He was interested in the sudden friendship between two women so apparently dissimilar as Miss Bartlett and Miss Lavish. They were always in each other's company, with Lucy a slighted third. Miss Lavish he believed he understood, but Miss Bartlett might reveal unknown depths of strangeness, though not, perhaps, of meaning.
”
”
E.M. Forster (A Room with a View)
“
True friendship is a sacred, important thing, and it happens when we drop down into that deeper level of who we are, when we cross over into the broken, fragile parts of ourselves. We have to give something up in order to get friendship like that. We have to give up our need to be perceived as perfect. We have to give up our ability to control what people think of us. We have to overcome the fear that when they see the depths of who we are, they’ll leave. But what we give up is nothing in comparison to what this kind of friendship gives to us. Friendship is about risk. Love is about risk. If we can control it and manage it and manufacture it, then it’s something else, but if it’s really love, really friendship, it’s a little scary around the edges.
”
”
Shauna Niequist (Cold Tangerines: Celebrating the Extraordinary Nature of Everyday Life)
“
No muscles without strength, friendship without trust, opinion without consequence, change without aesthetics, age without values, life without effort, water without thirst, food without nourishment, love without sacrifice, power without fairness, facts without rigor, statistics without logic, mathematics without proof, teaching without experience, politeness without warmth, values without embodiment, degrees without erudition, militarism without fortitude, progress without civilization, friendship without investment, virtue without risk, probability without ergodicity, wealth without exposure, complication without depth, fluency without content, decision without asymmetry, science without skepticism, religion without tolerance, and, most of all: nothing without skin in the game.
”
”
Nassim Nicholas Taleb (Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life (Incerto, #5))
“
It is quite one thing to admit a fault to yourself. It is another thing entirely to have a friend not only agree with you, but point out the full depth of the fault.
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”
Robin Hobb (Assassin's Quest (Farseer Trilogy, #3))
“
There has been a cultural shift in the way we communicate, and that, in turn, has had an effect on our relating. We have traded substance and depth for speed and convenience.
”
”
Philip D. Halfacre (Genuine Friendship: The Foundation for All Personal Relationships, Including Marriage and the Relationship With God)
“
It's not the number of contacts you cultivate but the diversity and depth of connections that leverage your opportunity to use best talents more often to accomplish more.
”
”
Kare Anderson (Mutuality Matters How You Can Create More Opportunity, Adventure & Friendship With Others)
“
Amma, we have only known one another, what? A moon? I would hope, then, that you of all people would understand length of acquaintanceship does not equate to depth of friendship.
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”
A.K. Caggiano (Summoned to the Wilds (Villains & Virtues, #2))
“
It is true that some friendships may not be capable of surviving the challenge of building emotional depth, but one could argue that those friendships may not be of high quality anyway.
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Jonice Webb (Running on Empty: Overcome Your Childhood Emotional Neglect)
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Good conversation is the enemy of falsity, facade, and shallowness. It chases the truth of things, it demolishes the flimsy foundation of facade and it penetrates the depths so as to soar into unfolding possibility.
”
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John O'Donohue (Walking in Wonder: Eternal Wisdom for a Modern World)
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Last night, I felt a depth of sadness that I haven't felt or allowed myself to feel in a while. I mourned for Mia, the loss of our friendship, and mostly for the loss of my history, the lost memory of who I once was.
”
”
Heather Dark, excerpt from The Designer Wife
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How closely flattery resembles friendship! It not only apes friendship, but outdoes it, passing it in the race; with wide-open and indulgent ears it is welcomed and sinks to the depths of the heart, and it is pleasing precisely wherein it does harm.
”
”
Seneca
“
One of my favorite prayers is God, how can I love on you today? As I sit in silence of those words, sometimes I'll feel compelled to sing or read a passage of Scripture, or I'll be reminded of someone with a need I can meet; but on some of the most meaningful days, God simply says, just be with me. I sit in the silence and enjoy stillness with God. No agenda. No words. No words. No challenge. No correction or instruction. Just being together. In those moments, I'm reminded that the heart of faith is simply being with God. I sense God's love. Some of my best friendships reach a level at which we can sit together without having to say anything and still enjoy each other's presence. The same is true for God, and I love to experience that depth of love in my relationship with Christ." -Hungry for God
”
”
Margaret Feinberg (Hungry for God: Hearing God's Voice in the Ordinary and the Everyday)
“
Selfishness sinks ships: friendships, partnerships, relationships, championships, even leaderships. Like an iceberg tearing through the hull of an ocean liner, selfishness will inevitably send all of those ships plummeting to the depths of the abyss. Selfishness sinks ships.
”
”
Lance Loya
“
And it is in New York I have those strangest things of all: human friendships. Not many friendships and not of spent familiarities: for I don't like actual human beings too much around me. But yet friendships made of the edges of thoughts and vivid pathos and pregnant odds and ends of nervous human flesh and fire.
It is in New York I go to the apartment of a Friend at the end of an afternoon. In the apartment are some persons having tea, men and women. The Friend greets me at the door. She wears maybe a dress of thin dark and light silk, shaped in the quaint outlandish fashion of the hour. And she has shrewd kindly eyes like a Rembrandt portrait, and a worn New-York-ish Latin-ish brain and heart both of which are made of steel, sparkle and the very plain red meat of living. She says, 'Hello-Mary-Mac-Lane,' and clasps my hand, and we exchange a glance of no real understanding at all but suggesting warmed challenge of personality, and an oblique sweet call of depth to depth, and of friendship which by mere force of preference and of our separate quality and calibre is true rather than false. So close and no closer may friendship be. And friendship with-all, is closer than any love. It is the closest human beings ever come to meeting.
”
”
Mary MacLane (I, Mary MacLane: A Diary of Human Days)
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Friendship is the call out of isolation and selfishness in order to teach me how to love and how to serve. But without stability, friendship - real soul-searing friendship, the kind that makes us choose between domination and infatuation and possessiveness and dependence for growth and freedom and depth and responsibility and self-knowledge - is impossible.
Stability is what enables us, in other words, to live totally in God and totally for others.
”
”
Joan D. Chittister (Wisdom Distilled from the Daily: Living the Rule of St. Benedict Today)
“
Saddened by the misfortune of the Jews, remembering his friendship with Christians, increasingly mannered and affected as time went on for reasons to be revealed in due course, he now looked like a pre-Raphaelite worm on to which hairs had been indecently grafted, like threads in the depths of an opal.
”
”
Marcel Proust (The Guermantes Way)
“
A dark shadow rose from the depth of the watercourse. Forced to crawl out of the oceans rolling waves, it struggled against the pull of the undertow. Rising, it moved further up the white sandy beach away from the cold water. The creature collapsed onto the cool sand as the crescent moon above shone on his sleek gray skin revealing two immense leather-like wings protruding from his back. Exhaustion clouded his mind.
The darkness of night was soothing, refreshing. Somehow he knew it would bring him strength and sustenance. The creature watched as a great rolling storm cloud sunk into the salty water before him and he tried to remember why he had come.
”
”
Alaina Stanford (As Darkness Falls (Hypnotic Journey #3))
“
I don’t think I meant a word of it. But this is how you speak when you’re in a bathroom stall in your twenties, high on cocaine, and testing the depths of your friendships.
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”
Sloane Crosley (Cult Classic)
“
The two men were still in the habit of taking this last glass together; the depth and endurance of friendship marked as much in their silence as in the words.
”
”
Guy Gavriel Kay (The Lions of Al-Rassan)
“
The depth of love is immeasurable, when you scale it, you will only see and experience it to the degree of your scales.
”
”
Wayne Chirisa
“
While others look at her surface, a true friend searches for her depth.
”
”
Giovannie de Sadeleer
“
Who you meet is more important than where you go. Adventures are best remembered by the depth of connections with friends, not countries visited.
”
”
Francis Shenstone (The Explorer's Mindset: Unlock Health Happiness and Success the Fun Way)
“
Love your friends from the depth of your heart but don’t ever be blind to their faults.
”
”
Michael Bassey Johnson (The Infinity Sign)
“
Have I ever once let you fall?”
Her tender gaze fell on mine, years of friendship swirling in their brown depths. “Never.
”
”
Amie Knight (The First Score (Summerville Sports #2))
“
He showed the fineness of his nature by being kinder to me after that misunderstanding than before. Nay, the very incident which, by my theory, must in some degree estrange me and him, changed, indeed, somewhat our relations; but not in the sense I painfully anticipated. An invisible, but a cold something, very slight, very transparent, but very chill: a sort of screen of ice had hitherto, all through our two lives, glazed the medium through which we exchanged intercourse. Those few warm words, though only warm with anger, breathed on that frail frost-work of reserve; about this time, it gave note of dissolution. I think from that day, so long as we continued friends, he never in discourse stood on topics of ceremony with me.
”
”
Charlotte Brontë
“
He felt a keen regret that he had spoken so of Dave Masters, the defiant boy they both had loved, whose ghost had held them, all these years, in a friendship whose depth they had never quite realized.
”
”
John McGahern (Stoner)
“
What is the root of the sin of sexual identity? Being a lesbian was not just a description of the kind of sex I liked to have. Being a lesbian encompassed a whole range of feelings and perception, character qualities, and sensibilities. It reflected the depth of my nonsexual friendships and the integrated community I wanted to build with women. Being a lesbian also reflected the kind of professor I was, the classes I taught, the books I read, and the dissertations I directed. I was all in. And, I was a jumble of emotions, because according to the Bible, what I called community, God called idolatry.
”
”
Rosaria Champagne Butterfield (Openness Unhindered: Further Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert on Sexual Identity and Union with Christ)
“
IMPOSSIBLE FRIENDSHIPS For example, with someone who no longer is, who exists only in yellowed letters. Or long walks beside a stream, whose depths hold hidden porcelain cups—and the talks about philosophy with a timid student or the postman. A passerby with proud eyes whom you’ll never know. Friendship with this world, ever more perfect (if not for the salty smell of blood). The old man sipping coffee in St.-Lazare, who reminds you of someone. Faces flashing by in local trains— the happy faces of travelers headed perhaps for a splendid ball, or a beheading. And friendship with yourself —since after all you don’t know who you are.
”
”
Adam Zagajewski (Eternal Enemies: Poems)
“
Last night, I felt a depth of sadness that I haven't felt or allowed myself to feel in a while. I mourned for Mia, the loss of our friendship, and mostly for the loss of my history, the lost memory of who I once was.
”
”
Heather Dark (The Designer Wife)
“
Like literature, music can overwhelm you with sudden emotion, can move you to absolute sorrow or ecstasy; like literature, painting has the power to astonish, and to make you see the world through fresh eyes. But only literature can put you in touch with another human spirit, as a whole, with all its weaknesses and grandeurs, its limitations, its pettinesses, its obsessions, its beliefs; with whatever it finds moving, interesting, exciting or repugnant. Only literature can give you access to a spirit from beyond the grave – a more direct, more complete, deeper access than you’d have in conversation with a friend. Even in our deepest, most lasting friendships, we never speak as openly as when we face a blank page and address a reader we do not know. The beauty of an author’s style, the music of his sentences have their importance in literature, of course; the depth of an author’s reflections, the originality of his thought certainly can’t be overlooked; but an author is above all a human being, present in his books, and whether he writes very well or very badly hardly matters – as long as he gets the books written and is, indeed, present in them.
”
”
Michel Houellebecq (Soumission)
“
In post-modern culture there is a deep hunger to belong. An increasing majority of people feel isolated and marginalised. Experience is haunted by fragmentation. Many of the traditional shelters are in ruins. Society is losing the art of fostering community. Consumerism is now propelling life towards the lonely isolation of individualism. Technology pretends to unite us, yet more often than not all it delivers are simulated images. The “global village” has no roads or neighbours; it is a faceless limbo from which all individuality has been abstracted. Politics seems devoid of the imagination that calls forth vision and ideals; it is becoming ever more synonymous with the functionalism of economic pragmatism. Many of the keepers of the great religious traditions now seem to be frightened functionaries; in a more uniform culture, their management skills would be efficient and successful. In a pluralistic and deeply fragmented culture, they seem unable to converse with the complexities and hungers of our longing. From this perspective, it seems that we are in the midst of a huge crisis of belonging. When the outer cultural shelters are in ruins, we need to explore and reawaken the depths of belonging in the human mind and soul; perhaps, the recognition of the depth of our hunger to belong may gradually assist us in awakening new and unexpected possibilities of community and friendship.
”
”
John O'Donohue (Eternal Echoes: Celtic Reflections on Our Yearning to Belong)
“
They are love, those rare blinding early friendships. Not everyone has them, and almost no one gets more than one. The others, the later ones, are not the same. These first grow in a soil found only in the country of the young and are possible only there, because their medium is unbroken time and proximity and discovery. Later, there is not enough of any of those for the total, ongoing immersions that these friendships are...These friendships may continue past first youth, but I don't think they often do. Their primary strength is that fire of exploration and validation. The friend becomes a cicerone, to go with you down to the bottom of your deepest depths and out to the farthest crannies of your being. All your senses are open, all your reservoirs fill up at a prodigious rate, all your motors hum.
”
”
Anne Rivers Siddons (Outer Banks)
“
You all have art, social issues, friendships, diversions, families, duty, while I, in the depth, have NOTHING. It all falls off like the skin and under the skin there is living flesh or fire—I’m Psyche. I do not fit into any form, not even the simplest form of my poems.
”
”
Marina Tsvetaeva
“
Nor is it easy to find men who will go down to calamity's depths for a friend. Ennius, however, is right when he says:
When Fortune's fickle the faithful friend is found;
yet it is on these two charges that most men are convicted of fickleness: they either hold a friend of little value when their own affairs are prosperous, or they abandon him when his are adverse. Whoever, therefore, in either of these contingencies, has shown himself staunch, immovable, and firm in friendship ought to be considered to belong to that class of men which is exceedingly rare — aye, almost divine.
”
”
Marcus Tullius Cicero (De Amicitia = (On Friendship))
“
People like to believe that women like Tavia will be punished eventually, that, having been given too much in the way of luster, they must lack the intelligence or depth that would bring them true happiness. We are all but promised that such women will make some horrible mistake early on, usually one involving a man who pays them too much attention, or they'll take what the world offers them and burn up quickly. Beauty ensures there will be no close friendships to see them through. How could they have friends when other women are hobbled by jealousy, when men only want to sleep with them?
”
”
Ann Patchett (These Precious Days: Essays)
“
Who am I? I am a teller of stories. I have lived as a priest, a prince, and a peasant. I have known the heights of joy and the depths of pain. I have known friendship as well as betrayal, hate as well as love. I have served but one God, who has upheld me through my whole life, even in the darkest of moments.
”
”
Sarah Holman (Adventures and Adversities (Tales of Taelis #1))
“
It rasped her, though, to have stirring about her this brutal monster! to hear twigs cracking and feel hooves planted down in the depths of that leaf-encumbered forest, the soul; never to be content quite, or quite secure, for at any moment the brute would be stirring, this hatred, which, especially since her illness had power to make her feel scraped, hurt in her spine; gave her physical pain, and made all pleasure in beauty, in friendship, in being well, in being loved and making her home a delightful rock, quiver, and bend as if indeed there were a monster grubbing at the roots, as if the whole panoply of content were nothing but self love! this hatred!
”
”
Virginia Woolf (Mrs. Dalloway)
“
There are many things that I should say to you all now. Perhaps I should speak of loyalty, honour and friendship. Maybe even mention love, that fickle mistress that rules all our hearts. But I shall not. Instead I choose to offer you words that I hope convey the depth of my profound philosophy on the meaning of life.
Life. Ah, my friends, yes. Life is a journey. I know now that the aim of that mystical venture is not to arrive at our respective pyres in a well preserved body but rather to career in wildly, presenting a body ravaged by a life that has been lived to the full, shouting the words, "Damn! That was fun! Can I do it again?" Samson. Eternal Winter.
”
”
Kirsten Jones (Eternal Winter (Isle of Dreams, #4))
“
You see that God deems it right to take from me any claim to merit for what you call my devotion to you. I have promised to remain forever with you, and now I could not break my promise if I would. The treasure will be no more mine than yours, and neither of us will quit this prison. But my real treasure is not that, my dear friend, which awaits me beneath the somber rocks of Monte Cristo, it is your presence, our living together five or six hours a day, in spite of our jailers; it is the rays of intelligence you have elicited from my brain, the languages you have implanted in my memory, and which have taken root there with all of their philological ramifications. These different sciences that you have made so easy to me by the depth of the knowledge you possess of them, and the clearness of the principles to which you have reduced them – this is my treasure, my beloved friend, and with this you have made me rich and happy. Believe me, and take comfort, this is better for me than tons of gold and cases of diamonds, even were they not as problematical as the clouds we see in the morning floating over the sea, which we take for terra firma, and which evaporate and vanish as we draw near to them. To have you as long as possible near me, to hear your eloquent speech, -- which embellishes my mind, strengthens my soul, and makes my whole frame capable of great and terrible things, if I should ever be free, -- so fills my whole existence, that the despair to which I was just on the point of yielding when I knew you, has no longer any hold over me; this – this is my fortune – not chimerical, but actual. I owe you my real good, my present happiness; and all the sovereigns of the earth, even Caesar Borgia himself, could not deprive me of this.
”
”
Alexandre Dumas (The Count of Monte Cristo)
“
Eventually I had gotten it together enough to call her. I did so partly to let her know where I was and partly to almost brag about where I was. Whenever I’d get morose, sulky, or stuck somewhere between crabby and suicidal, she was quick to say something disarming or indirectly tell me things weren’t that bad. Laura wasn’t exactly dismissive of my feelings, but I often left our conversations feeling like she didn’t quite get how harsh things felt for me—or at least that she wasn’t willing to acknowledge it. This frustrated and upset me. I spent so much time trying to hide the depths of my feelings and the clusterfuckedness of my life from everyone, except her. The one person I was honest with was often telling me that I was being too dramatic, or overdramatic, or overthinking things, or would I just please change the subject. It wasn’t like she didn’t believe me—it was more like she questioned why I let things bother me so much. In a small way, ending up in the mental ward was a strange kind of validation for me. Being in Timken Mercy proved that when I was insisting that things were terrible, and she kept insisting that they weren’t, they were, in fact, kind of terrible.
”
”
Eric Nuzum (Giving Up the Ghost: A Story About Friendship, 80s Rock, a Lost Scrap of Paper, and What It Means to Be Haunted)
“
Those, final weeks, spanning end of summer and the beginning of another autumn, are blurred in memory, perhaps because our understanding of each other had reached that sweet depth where two people communicate more often in silence than in words: an affectionate quiet-ness replaces the tensions, the unrelaxed chatter and chasing that produce a friendship's more showy, more, in the surface sense, dramatic moments.
”
”
Truman Capote
“
But my partner died, and now I detest my work, and I have been blue. More than blue really. I have been in the depths of despair. My grandfather, Fred, who I adored, recently died. It begins to seem to me that life is little more than a series of losses, and as you must know by now, I hate losing. And I suppose I came to Friendship because I no longer wished to be in the place I lived and sometimes I no longer wished to even be in my body.
”
”
Gabrielle Zevin (Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow)
“
Neely McIntire," I said, clamping a sweaty hand behind her neck. "Friendship be damned!"
Hayden yanked me forward. I had time to make a very girly sound before his lips began to move furiously over mine. His touch left behind the tingle of cinnamon gum. One of his hands slowly slid down and pressed into the small of my back. For a second, I thought the sun had washed over me. But this heat cuddled around me, pushing its way through my clothes.
"Stmmmmp," I tried to say around his lips.
My knees wobbled as he wound his fingers into the curls at my neck, holding my face firmly against his.
"No." The hot pressure of his hand increased. A rumbling protest came from his throat when I dug my nails into his collarbones.
"Lemme go," I managed to gasp when he kissed the corner of my mouth.
"No," he whispered. His voice became a yielding puff of smoke. It slipped into my ears and coaxed something familiar from the broken depths.
The urge to fight drained away. This wisp of memory warmed me, relaxed tensed muscles, but tightened other places.
My fists uncurled and gripped his shoulders. "Why are you doing this?"
"I want you to come back to me, Neely," he said, wrapping his arms around my waist to press our hips together. Fiery lips caressed my face and neck. "I know you're in there somewhere. Come back, come back, come back," he whispered between kisses.
”
”
K.D. Wood (Unwilling (Unwilling #1))
“
Much of the Bible is but a voice coming out of the depths of the past. No one knows the names of all the holy men who, moved by the Spirit, wrote the wonderful words. Many of the sweetest of the Psalms are anonymous. Yet no one prizes the words less, nor is their power to comfort, cheer, inspire, or quicken any less, because they are only voices. After all, it is a great thing to be a voice to which men and women will listen, and whose words do good wherever they go.
”
”
J.R. Miller (Personal Friendships of Jesus)
“
The depth and intensity of the friendship will depend upon variety and extent of the things we do and enjoy together. Will the friendship be constant? That again depends upon the permanence of our common interests, and upon whether or not our interests grow into ever-widening circles, so that we do not stagnate. The highest friendship demands growth. “It must be progressive as life itself is progressive.” Friends must walk together; they cannot long stand still together, for that means death to friendship and to life.
”
”
Frank C. Laubach (Letters by a Modern Mystic)
“
It is this third stage that is really vital. How is it to be achieved? Precisely as any friendship is achieved—by doing things together. The depth and intensity of the friendship will depend upon variety and extent of the things we do and enjoy together. Will the friendship be constant? That again depends upon the permanence of our common interests, and upon whether or not our interests grow into ever-widening circles, so that we do not stagnate. The highest friendship demands growth. “It must be progressive as life itself is progressive.
”
”
Frank C. Laubach (Letters by a Modern Mystic)
“
It rasped her, though, to have stirring about in her this brutal monster! to hear twigs cracking and feel hooves planted down in the depths of that leaf-encumbered forest, the soul; never to be content quite, or quite secure, for at any moment the brute would be stirring, this hatred, which, especially since her illness, had power to make her feel scraped, hurt in her spine; gave her physical pain, and made all pleasure in beauty, in friendship, in being well, in being loved and making her home delightful rock, quiver, and bend as if indeed there were a monster grubbing at the roots, as if the whole panoply of content were nothing but self love! this hatred!
”
”
Virginia Woolf (Complete Works of Virginia Woolf)
“
...if love...is a function of man's sadness, friendship is a function of his cowardice; and if neither can be realised because of the impenetrability (isolation) of all that is not 'cosa mentale,' at least the failure to possess may have the nobility of that which is tragic, whereas the attempt to communicate where no communication is possible is merely a simian vulgarity, or horribly comic, like the madness that holds a conversation with the furniture. - For an artist therefore, the only possible spiritual development is in the sense of depth. The artistic tendency is not expansive, but a contraction. And art is the apotheosis of solitude. There is no communication because there are no vehicles of communication.
”
”
Martin Esslin (The Theater of the Absurd)
“
Friendship is not merely devoid of virtue, like conversation, it is fatal to us as well. For the sense of boredom which those of us whose law of development is purely internal cannot help but feel in a friend’s company (when, that is to say, we must remain on the surface of ourselves, instead of pursuing our voyage of discovery into the depths)—that first impression of boredom our friendship impels us to correct when we are alone again, to recall with emotion the words which our friend said to us, to look upon them as a valuable addition to our substance, when the fact is that we are not like buildings to which stones can be added from without, but like trees which draw from their own sap the next knot that will appear on their trunks, the spreading roof of their foliage.
”
”
Marcel Proust (In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower)
“
The third feature which is of importance for romantic subjectivity within its mundane sphere is fidelity. Yet by ‘fidelity’ we have here to understand neither the consistent adherence to an avowal of love once given nor the firmness of friendship of which, amongst the Greeks, Achilles and Patroclus, and still more intimately, Orestes and Pylades counted as the finest model. Friendship in this sense of the word has youth especially for its basis and period. Every man has to make his way through life for himself and to gain and maintain an actual position for himself. Now when individuals still live in actual relationships which are indefinite on both sides, this is the period, i.e. youth, in which individuals become intimate and are so closely bound into one disposition, will, and activity that, as a result, every undertaking of the one becomes the undertaking of the other. In the friendship of adults this is no longer the case. A man’s affairs go their own way independently and cannot be carried into effect in that firm community of mutual effort in which one man cannot achieve anything without someone else. Men find others and separate themselves from them again; their interests and occupations drift apart and are united again; friendship, spiritual depth of disposition, principles, and general trends of life remain, but this is not the friendship of youth, in the case of which no one decides anything or sets to work on anything without its immediately becoming the concern of his friend. It is inherent essentially in the principle of our deeper life that, on the whole, every man fends for himself, i.e. is himself competent to take his place in the world. Fidelity in friendship and love subsists only between equals.
”
”
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
“
This love is like a dive under the ocean.
When I first saw you I was fascinated by the extensiveness and you were so beautiful. I did not believe you were so deep that I went downstairs. I wanted to know and see what you have - in the depths, all the way down to darkness. Until I was slowly breathed but I wanted to continue. I visit your paradise peacefully and peacefully. The place where the problem is not heavy and I'm free. But as a dive in the sea, my air gradually decreased. I had to go up and assemble a new hope. That's when I'm dialing again I'm stronger, and I can see the depth of your mystery. The ocean will be ashamed of the depth of my love. With every sinking and flight in your abyss, I feel the light of the world even though my breathing is getting dramatic. As I have this love for you, every time I feel, I'm trying to stop myself coming back and coming back to the sea you built in my heart.
”
”
Sphencer D. Perales
“
THAT ESSENTIAL QUALITY of sympathy was never absent from Morgenthau’s relationship with Hannah Arendt, colored, it should be said, by an element of the erotic. They met in the early 1950s and developed an unshakeable friendship that lasted up to her death in 1975. Hans Jonas, who had known Arendt since their student days in Germany during the 1920s and who saw her every day when they were both attending the University of Marburg, remembered that “it was almost to be taken for granted that men of high intelligence and sensibility would be enchanted by Hannah.” Morgenthau was enchanted. “What struck one at first meeting Hannah Arendt,” he recalled, was “the vitality of her mind, quick—sometimes too quick—sparkling, seeking and finding hidden meanings and connections beneath the surface of man and things.” She had an extraordinary depth of knowledge combined with rare intellectual passion. “As others enjoy playing cards or the horses for their own sake, so Hannah Arendt enjoyed thinking.
”
”
Barry Gewen (The Inevitability of Tragedy: Henry Kissinger and His World)
“
maternal love, the most successful object of the religious imagination of romantic art. For the most part real and human, it is yet entirely spiritual, without the interest and exigency of desire, not sensuous and yet present: absolutely satisfied and blissful spiritual depth. It is a love without craving, but it is not friendship; for be friendship never so rich in emotion, it yet demands a content, something essential, as a mutual end and aim. Whereas, without any reciprocity of aim and interests, maternal love has an immediate support in the natural bond of connection. But in this instance the mother’s love is not at all restricted to the natural side. In the child which she conceived and then bore in travail, Mary has the complete knowledge and feeling of herself; and the same child, blood of her blood, stands all the same high above her, and nevertheless this higher being belongs to her and is the object in which she forgets and maintains herself. The natural depth of feeling in the mother’s love is altogether spiritualized; it has the Divine as its proper content, but this spirituality remains lowly and unaware, marvellously penetrated by natural oneness and human feeling. It is the blissful maternal love, the love of the one mother alone who was the first recipient of this joy. Of course this love too is not without grief, but the grief is only the sorrow of loss, lamentation for her suffering, dying, and dead son, and does not, as we shall see at a later stage,[9] result from injustice and torment from without, or from the infinite battle against sins, or from the agony and pain brought about by the self. Such deep feeling is here spiritual beauty, the Ideal, human identification of man with God, with the spirit and with truth: a pure forgetfulness and complete self-surrender which still in this forgetfulness is from the beginning one with that into which it is merged and now with blissful satisfaction has a sense of this oneness.
In such a beautiful way maternal love, the picture as it were of the Spirit, enters romantic art in place of the Spirit itself because only in the form of feeling is the Spirit made prehensible by art, and the feeling of the unity between the individual and God is present in the most original, real, and living way only in the Madonna’s maternal love. This love must enter art necessarily if, in the portrayal of this sphere, the Ideal, the affirmative satisfied reconciliation is not to be lacking. There was therefore a time when the maternal love of the blessed Virgin belonged in general to the highest and holiest [part of religion] and was worshipped and represented as this supreme fact. But when the Spirit brings itself into consciousness of itself in its own element, separated from the whole natural grounding which feeling supplies, then too it is only the spiritual mediation, free from such a grounding, that can be regarded as the free route to the truth; and so, after all, in Protestantism, in contrast to mariolatry in art and in faith, the Holy Spirit and the inner mediation of the Spirit has become the higher truth.
”
”
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
“
Since I did Selection all those years ago, not much has really changed.
The MOD (Ministry of Defence) website still states that 21 SAS soldiers need the following character traits: “Physically and mentally robust. Self-confident. Self-disciplined. Able to work alone. Able to assimilate information and new skills.”
It makes me smile now to read those words. As Selection had progressed, those traits had been stamped into my being, and then during the three years I served with my squadron they became molded into my psyche.
They are the same qualities I still value today.
The details of the jobs I did once I passed Selection aren’t for sharing publicly, but they included some of the most extraordinary training that any man can be lucky enough to receive.
I went on to be trained in demolitions, air and maritime insertions, foreign weapons, jungle survival, trauma medicine, Arabic, signals, high-speed and evasive driving, winter warfare, as well as “escape and evasion” survival for behind enemy lines.
I went through an even more in-depth capture initiation program as part of becoming a combat-survival instructor, which was much longer and more intense than the hell we endured on Selection.
We became proficient in covert night parachuting and unarmed combat, among many other skills--and along the way we had a whole host of misadventures.
But what do I remember and value most?
For me, it is the camaraderie, and the friendships--and of course Trucker, who is still one of my best friends on the planet.
Some bonds are unbreakable.
I will never forget the long yomps, the specialist training, and of course a particular mountain in the Brecon Beacons.
But above all, I feel a quiet pride that for the rest of my days I can look myself in the mirror and know that once upon a time I was good enough.
Good enough to call myself a member of the SAS.
Some things don’t have a price tag.
”
”
Bear Grylls (Mud, Sweat and Tears)
“
The difference between Plato’s theory on the one hand, and that of the Old Oligarch and the Thirty on the other, is due to the influence of the Great Generation. Individualism, equalitarianism, faith in reason and love of freedom were new, powerful, and, from the point of view of the enemies of the open society, dangerous sentiments that had to be fought. Plato had himself felt their influence, and, within himself, he had fought them. His answer to the Great Generation was a truly great effort. It was an effort to close the door which had been opened, and to arrest society by casting upon it the spell of an alluring philosophy, unequalled in depth and richness. In the political field he added but little to the old oligarchic programme against which Pericles had once argued64. But he discovered, perhaps unconsciously, the great secret of the revolt against freedom, formulated in our own day by Pareto65; ‘To take advantage of sentiments, not wasting one’s energies in futile efforts to destroy them.’ Instead of showing his hostility to reason, he charmed all intellectuals with his brilliance, flattering and thrilling them by his demand that the learned should rule. Although arguing against justice he convinced all righteous men that he was its advocate. Not even to himself did he fully admit that he was combating the freedom of thought for which Socrates had died; and by making Socrates his champion he persuaded all others that he was fighting for it. Plato thus became, unconsciously, the pioneer of the many propagandists who, often in good faith, developed the technique of appealing to moral, humanitarian sentiments, for anti-humanitarian, immoral purposes. And he achieved the somewhat surprising effect of convincing even great humanitarians of the immorality and selfishness of their creed66. I do not doubt that he succeeded in persuading himself. He transfigured his hatred of individual initiative, and his wish to arrest all change, into a love of justice and temperance, of a heavenly state in which everybody is satisfied and happy and in which the crudity of money-grabbing67 is replaced by laws of generosity and friendship. This dream of unity and beauty and perfection, this æstheticism and holism and collectivism, is the product as well as the symptom of the lost group spirit of tribalism68.
”
”
Karl Popper (The Open Society and Its Enemies)
“
Real life is so all-absorbing that it doesn’t leave us time to create an imaginary, parallel life.
It’s very hard not to stay in love with or be captivated by someone who makes us laugh and does so even though he often mistreats us; the hardest thing to give up is that companionable laughter, once you’ve met someone and decided to stay with them.
How cast down we are by rejection, and how much power accrues to the person to whom we gave that power, for no one can take power unless it is first given or conferred, unless you’re prepared to adore and fear that person, unless you aspire to being loved by him or to enjoy his unswerving approval, any such ambition is a sign of conceit and that conceit is what weakens and leaves us defenseless: once that ambition remains unsatisfied or unfulfilled, it marks the beginning of our downfall.
Sensations are unstable things, they become transformed in memory, they shift and dance, they can prevail over what was said and heard, over rejection or acceptance. Sometimes, sensations can make us give up and, at others, encourage us to try again.
That Spanish mania for mixing business deals with a semblance of incipient friendship.
In Spain, oddly enough, it’s considered far more prestigious to be known by one’s first name, and this applies to only four or five or six people: “Federico” is always García Lorca, just as “Rubén” is Rubén Darío, “Juan Ramón” is the Nobel Laureate Jiménez, “Ramón” is Gómez de la Serna, “Mossèn Cinto” is Verdaguer and, five centuries on, “Garcilaso” is Garcilaso de la Vega.
In the face of ignorance, one is always free to invent.
“Far too civilized. Airport hub. Business deals by the shedload. No, I don’t like it, I don’t like it all. Tons of visitors. The annual Buchmesse. Money calling to money.
Rumor on the other hand is what lasts, it’s unstoppable, undying, the one thing that endures. I certainly don’t want to give that imbecile the gift of a rumor.
He probably often had such attacks of oral literature.
Whoever he was with and whatever the circumstances, he found it hard not to slip into pedantic, didactic mode.
Like many unhappy, lonely people, he kept a diary.
Curiosity makes us lose all caution.
Unhappy people often insist on trying to uncover the full magnitude of their unhappiness, or choose to investigate other people’s lives as a distraction from their own.
The eyes of the imagination, which are the eyes that best remember a scene and best recall it later.
In the middle of the night everything seems plausible and real.
Desire is a selfish thing too and will do almost anything to achieve satisfaction—lie, flatter, take risks, inveigle, make false promises.
A nostalgia for the life you discarded always lingers on in the inner depths of your being, and, during bad times, you seek refuge in it as you might in a daydream or a fantasy.
I sometimes think that the bonds of deceit and unhappiness are the strongest of all, as are those of error; they may bind even more closely than those of openness, contentment and sincerity.
We do sometimes bring about what we most fear because the only way of freeing ourselves from that fear is for the bad thing actually to have happened, for it to be in the past and not in the future or in the realm of possibilities. For it to remain behind.
”
”
Javier Marías (Así empieza lo malo)
“
And yet God, who knows every secret about us, loves us at a depth we cannot begin to fathom (Ephesians 3:19). How much more should we—as imperfect people—reach out to our spouse in grace, accepting them for who they are and assuring them their friendship and secrets are safe with us?
”
”
Stephen Kendrick (The Love Dare)
“
Loneliness is not the absence of people but the absence of like-minded people.
”
”
Alistair Abram Akrofi-Mantey (The Depths of A Mad Mind)
“
Passionate people always protest in airy voices about the significance of having meaningful conversations. “We shall speak to each other with profundity! No time for small talk! I want deeper!” But to be fair, what could possibly come out of thirty seconds in a café? It would be quite uncomfortable if two people were to race and pour their deepest sorrows on the other. Though perhaps the depth is in the trust. In peculiar sharing. That to have satisfaction in a conversation doesn’t
mean spilling your problems on the floor, or violently expressing how wiggly the tables are, but instead asking you to admit that the table reminds you of the long wooden bar you had at home with silver lining, back in Wyoming.
”
”
Kristian Ventura (The Goodbye Song)
“
(约克大学毕业证高仿学位证书((+《Q微2026614433》)))购买York毕业证修改York成绩单购买约克大学毕业证办york文凭办加拿大高仿毕业证约克大学毕业证购买约购买修改成绩单挂科退学如何进行学历认证留学退学办毕业证书/ 出国留学无法毕业买毕业证留学被劝退买毕业证(非正常毕业教育部认证咨询) York University
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A Roxane Gay's Audacious Book Club Pick!
A Most Anticipated Book From: Vulture * LitHub * Harper's Bazaar * Elle * Buzzfeed
A vibrant story collection about Cambodian-American life--immersive and comic, yet unsparing--that offers profound insight into the intimacy of queer and immigrant communities
Seamlessly transitioning between the absurd and the tenderhearted, balancing acerbic humor with sharp emotional depth, Afterparties offers an expansive portrait of the lives of Cambodian-Americans. As the children of refugees carve out radical new paths for themselves in California, they shoulder the inherited weight of the Khmer Rouge genocide and grapple with the complexities of race, sexuality, friendship, and family.
A high school badminton coach and failing grocery store owner tries to relive his glory days by beating a rising star teenage player. Two drunken brothers attend a wedding afterparty and hatch a plan to expose their shady uncle's snubbing of the bride and groom. A queer love affair sparks between an older tech entrepreneur trying to launch a "safe space" app and a disillusioned young teacher obsessed with Moby-Dick.
”
”
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“
True friendship is a sacred, important thing, and it happens when we drop down into that deeper level of who we are, when we cross over into the broken, fragile parts of ourselves. We have to give something up in order to get friendship like that. We have to give up our need to be perceived as perfect. We have to give up our ability to control what people think of us. We have to overcome the fear that when they see the depths of who we are, they’ll leave.
”
”
Shauna Niequist (Cold Tangerines: Celebrating the Extraordinary Nature of Everyday Life)
“
No muscles without strength, friendship without trust, opinion without consequence, change without aesthetics, age without values, life without effort, water without thirst, food without nourishment, love without sacrifice, power without fairness, facts without rigor, statistics without logic, mathematics without proof, teaching without experience, politeness without warmth, values without embodiment, degrees without erudition, militarism without fortitude, progress without civilization, friendship without investment, virtue without risk, probability without ergodicity, wealth without exposure, complication without depth, fluency without content, decision without asymmetry, science without skepticism, religion without tolerance,
”
”
Nassim Nicholas Taleb (Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life (Incerto, #5))
“
The awareness of mortality casts a bittersweet shadow over the vibrancy of life and love. We exist in a state of impermanence, where beauty fades and connection dissolves. Yet, it is precisely this impermanence that imbues life with its preciousness and love with its urgency. In the face of oblivion, love becomes a defiant act, a bridge we build across the chasm of the ephemeral, a testament to the enduring power of connection in a fleeting existence."
The quote's appreciation for love in the face of life's fleeting nature echoes Epicurean ideals. This emphasizes the existentialist concept of living in a finite world and the absurdist notion of creating meaning in the face of nothingness. It highlights love as a way to transcend the impermanence of life and forge a connection that defies the inevitable.
The concept of finding meaning and beauty in a world wracked by impermanence aligns closely with the philosophy of Epicurus.
Epicureanism emphasizes living a virtuous and pleasure-filled life while minimizing pain. Though often misinterpreted as mere hedonism, Epicurus also stressed the importance of intellectual pursuits, close friendships, and facing mortality with courage.
Unfortunately, Epicurus himself didn't write any essays or novels in the traditional sense. Most of his teachings were delivered in letters and discourses to his students and followers. These were later compiled by others, most notably Hermarchus, who helped establish Epicurean philosophy.
The core tenets of Epicureanism are scattered throughout various ancient texts, including:
*Principal Doctrines: A summary of Epicurus' core beliefs, likely compiled by Hermarchus.
*Letter to Menoeceus: A letter outlining the path to happiness through a measured approach to pleasure and freedom from fear.
*Vatican Sayings: A collection of sayings and aphorisms attributed to Epicurus.
These texts, along with Diogenes Laërtius' Lives and Sayings of the Philosophers, which includes biographical details about Epicurus, provide the best understanding of his philosophy.
Love is but an 'Ephemeral Embrace'. Life explodes into a vibrant party, a kaleidoscope of moments that dims as the sun dips below the horizon. The people we adore, the bonds we forge, all tinged with the bittersweet knowledge that nothing lasts forever. But it's this very impermanence that makes everything precious, urging us to savor the here and now.
Imagine Epicurus nudging us and saying, "True pleasure isn't a fleeting high, it's the joy of sharing good times with the people you love." Even knowing things end, we can create a life brimming with love's connections. Love becomes an act of creation, weaving threads of shared joy into a tapestry of memories.
Think of your heart as a garden. Love tells you to tend it with care, for it's the source of connection with others. In a world of constant change, love compels us to nurture our inner essence and share it with someone special. Love transcends impermanence by fostering a deep connection that enriches who we are at our core.
Loss is as natural as breathing. But love says this: "Let life unfold, with all its happy moments and tearful goodbyes. Only then can you understand the profound beauty of impermanence." Love allows us to experience the full spectrum of life's emotions, embracing the present while accepting impermanence. It grants depth and meaning to our fleeting existence.
Even knowing everything ends, love compels us to build a haven, a space where hearts connect. It's a testament to the enduring power of human connection in a world in flux.
So let's love fiercely, vibrantly, because in the face of our impermanence, love erects a bridge to something that transcends the temporary.
”
”
Monika Ajay Kaul
“
Carmen [pet starling] brings joy and depth and insight to our family. I believe she has a good life, and I am glad she did not die with her nest mates. But not one single day passes that I do not wish I could see her fly free.
”
”
Lyanda Lynn Haupt (Mozart's Starling)
“
When I wasn’t racked with insecurity, I was wildly arrogant. All three of us were. We had the confidence of white men, which was swiftly cut down after graduation, upon our separation, when each of us had to prove ourselves again and again, because we were, at every stage of our careers, underestimated. But I wouldn’t have had it any other way. That struggle kept me faithful to the creative imagination cultivated by our friendship, which was an imagination chiseled by rigor and depth to reflect the integrity of our discontented consciousness.
”
”
Cathy Park Hong (Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning)
“
Thomas skillfully crafts a narrative that not only delves into the complexities of Christopher's internal struggles but also unravels the dynamics of his family and friendships. The author presents a nuanced portrayal of a young man caught between the expectations of his family and the skepticism of his friends, adding layers of depth to the central conflict.
Cheryl Thomas's writing exudes authenticity and a deep understanding of human nature. Her characters come alive with actual personalities, problems, and relationships, creating a rich and immersive reading experience. The narrative not only explores the struggles of an individual but also touches on broader spiritual themes that add depth to the storytelling.
"The Last One" is not just a tale of personal choices but a profound exploration of destiny and the impact of one individual's decisions on the entire human race. As readers journey through this gripping narrative, they are invited to contemplate the profound implications of the choices we make and the redemptive power of divine intervention.
In conclusion, Cheryl Thomas's "The Last One" is a masterfully crafted work that combines elements of suspense, spiritual exploration, and dynamic character development. This book is a testament to Thomas's ability to breathe life into her storytelling, making it a must-read for those seeking a thought-provoking and immersive literary experience.
”
”
In-house scouts and editors for the Festival of Books, University of Southern CA
“
I feel a sudden wave of nerves, which is a bit irrational, since me and Juliet are practically soulmates -- two beings who found each other in the depths of the internet against all odds.
”
”
Alice Oseman (I Was Born for This (I Was Born for This, #1))
“
But no one she felt any obligation to, no one she had to put herself out for. She thought it could be a two-edged sword, friendship. You’d end up giving more than you got.
”
”
Ann Cleeves (Hidden Depths (Vera Stanhope #3))
“
She saw the delight and excitement Samuel gave her as a wage, her dues for living such a boring and unadventurous married life, for keeping the Calvert show on the road. She knew it wasn’t the way women usually looked at things, but couldn’t see why they couldn’t all maintain a civilized friendship.
”
”
Ann Cleeves (Hidden Depths (Vera Stanhope #3))
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Sometimes, Anselm – and especially with the most important parts of our lives – we cannot share who we are. We can give the facts, as information, to a stranger; but with a friend we want to give that little bit more, something that changes the facts into flesh and spirit . . . and at certain times we can’t do it. Because ultimately we can’t give away our depths: they lie beyond our grasp. It is when we most want to do so that we realize how immense we are . . . more vast and mysterious than the night sky; and alone.
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William Brodrick (The Day of the Lie (Father Anselm, #4))
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After Mrs. Culpepper, Max probably knew more about her than any other person in her life. They were the only two people who knew of her dream to buy a country cottage. And he was the only one to know of her silly wish for a hound.
Which, now that she thought on it, was a sad state of affairs, indeed. She had no better claim to friendship outside of Mrs. Culpepper than a man with whom she'd spent such a nominal amount of time? And who had been read to toss her bodily from Caldwell Manor only yesterday?
Surely she had more depth of character than what could be mined in the course of an evening. She did not begin and end with her dreams of a thousand pounds, a hound, and a home. She was vastly more complex, far more interesting than that. She had to be. The alternative was too depressing to entertain. Almost as depressing as never having known a friend who'd not been paid to keep her company. But that, at least, could be changed.
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Alissa Johnson (Practically Wicked)
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The way I see it,” she went on, “our friendship, and our working relationship, were solid foundations we built over time. Now you’re here wanting more, and the way we started that next step was with a kiss. So I feel like we’ve done just about everything two people can do in getting to know each other except…finish that kiss. It seemed to me that the logical next step, the next piece of information we needed to know, was what comes next when we let that kiss go to its natural conclusion.”
She did smile then, and her emerald green eyes blazed as she let down a guard he didn’t know she’d still had erected, letting him see for the first time the rest of what she was feeling. “Or at least that was my rationale for finally letting myself have what I fantasized about having, all those months I worked next to you.”
He opened his mouth, then shut it again when her words sank in. “I--what did you just say?”
Her smile remained, but there was a new light flickering in the depths of her eyes now, one that somehow managed to look bold, excited, and endearingly nervous all at the same time. “You weren’t alone, Cooper, in wanting…what you wanted. At least the physical attraction part anyway. I should have been more forthright about that when you showed up at the pub, or afterward. But at least try to see this from my perspective. Suddenly, out of the blue, the man I lusted after all those months was standing, quite improbably, right in front of me, in his full, Technicolor gorgeousness, looking even better than the guy I was sure I’d exaggerated and romanticized. Right there, in the flesh. And before I could even begin to get a grip on that, you went all going down on bended knee on me, and--it was all so much, too much, to even begin to process.”
She let out a short, disbelieving laugh. “Maybe if you’d just dragged me into your arms and not given me a chance to think, I might have surrendered right there on the spot, and the rest of the Cove be damned. But instead you’re all sincere, with your big, beautiful heart hanging on your sleeve, all earnest and lovely, and I so didn’t deserve anything like that, not after the way I left things between me and your entire family. I didn’t have the first clue what to do with that. With you.” Her smile turned decidedly rueful. “So, naturally, I resorted to form. I shut you down, told you to go away. If I couldn’t run away, I was going to make damn sure you did. I mean, it was one thing to leave Cameroo, then insult you and your family by not keeping in touch. It was another thing entirely to do it again, right to your face.”
“I hate to interrupt,” he said, trying like hell not to grin, then drag her into his lap to do what he apparently should have done the moment he’d laid eyes on her again. “But I haven’t heard a word you’ve said since that part where you’ve been lusting after me for two years.
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Donna Kauffman (Starfish Moon (Brides of Blueberry Cove, #3))
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In these now canonical pieces, Greenberg, following Trotsky, had insisted on the need for avant-garde art to retain its independence not only from bourgeois values, but also from explicitly leftist habits of thought: Only by retaining total independence, believed Greenberg, could art offer effective resistance to forces of standardization and control in society at large. To maintain this autonomy, he argued, progressive art had to burn away everything that was incidental to the medium itself. That meant ridding painting of its traditional preoccupation with creating illusions of three-dimensionality and depth. And it meant the end of all other gambits that were in less-than-total accord with the innate properties of the medium. The artwork, he believed, must be made to surrender to “the resistance of the medium.” To
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Sebastian Smee (The Art of Rivalry: Four Friendships, Betrayals, and Breakthroughs in Modern Art)