Destined For Great Things Quotes

You humans always think you’re destined for things, for tragedy or for greatness. Destiny is a myth. Destiny is the only myth. The gods choose nothing. You chose.

The great Sufi poet and philosopher Rumi once advised his students to write down the three things they most wanted in life. If any item on the list clashes with any other item, Rumi warned, you are destined for unhappiness. Better to live a life of single-pointed focus, he taught. But what about the benefits of living harmoniously among extremes? What if you could somehow create an expansive enough life that you could synchronize seemingly incongruous opposites into a worldview that excludes nothing?

She’s not just any Moroi. She’s royal. A princess. And you’ve seen how she is! Smart and strong and beautiful. She’s destined for great things, and one of them isn’t being involved with a controversial guardian like me. Her bloodline’s regal.Hell, I don’t even know who my dad is. Dating her is not even possible. My job is to protect her. To keep her safe. That’s where all my attention needs to be.

We are born into this time and must bravely follow the path to the destined end. There is no other way. Our duty is to hold on to the lost position, without hope, without rescue, like that Roman soldier whose bones were found in front of a door in Pompeii, who, during the eruption of Vesuvius, died at his post because they forgot to relieve him. That is greatness. That is what it means to be a thoroughbred. The honorable end is the one thing that can not be taken from a man.

They're not that different from you, are they? Same haircuts. Full of hormones, just like you. Invincible, just like you feel. The world is their oyster. They believe they're destined for great things, just like many of you, their eyes are full of hope, just like you. Did they wait until it was too late to make from their lives even one iota of what they were capable? Because, you see gentlemen, these boys are now fertilizing daffodils. But if you listen real close, you can hear them whisper their legacy to you. Go on, lean in. Listen, you hear it? - - Carpe - - hear it? - - Carpe, carpe diem, seize the day boys, make your lives extraordinary.

Are some people destined for a great fate, or to do great things? Or is it only that they're born somehow with that great passion -- and if they find themselves in the right circumstances, then things happen? It's the sort of thing you wonder...

A Psalm of Life Tell me not in mournful numbers, Life is but an empty dream! For the soul is dead that slumbers, And things are not what they seem. Life is real! Life is earnest! And the grave is not its goal; Dust thou are, to dust thou returnest, Was not spoken of the soul. Not enjoyment, and not sorrow, Is our destined end or way; But to act, that each tomorrow Find us farther than today. Art is long, and Time is fleeting, And our hearts, though stout and brave, Still, like muffled drums, are beating Funeral marches to the grave. In the world's broad field of battle, In the bivouac of Life, Be not like dumb, driven cattle! Be a hero in the strife! Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant! Let the dead Past bury its dead! Act, - act in the living Present! Heart within, and God o'erhead! Lives of great men all remind us We can make our lives sublime, And, departing, leave behind us Footprints on the sand of time; Footprints, that perhaps another, Sailing o'er life's solenm main, A forlorn and shipwrecked brother, Seeing, shall take heart again. Let us then be up and doing, With a heart for any fate; Still achieving, still pursuing, Learn to labor and to wait.

Believe deep down in your heart that you're destined to do great things.

He shook his head pityingly. “This, more than anything else, is what I have never understood about your people. You can roll dice, and understand that the whole game may hinge on one turn of a die. You deal out cards, and say that all a man's fortune for the night may turn upon one hand. But a man's whole life, you sniff at, and say, what, this naught of a human, this fisherman, this carpenter, this thief, this cook, why, what can they do in the great wide world? And so you putter and sputter your lives away, like candles burning in a draft.” “Not all men are destined for greatness,” I reminded him. “Are you sure, Fitz? Are you sure? What good is a life lived as if it made no difference at all to the great life of the world? A sadder thing I cannot imagine. Why should not a mother say to herself, if I raise this child aright, if I love and care for her, she shall live a life that brings joy to those about her, and thus I have changed the world? Why should not the farmer that plants a seed say to his neighbor, this seed I plant today will feed someone, and that is how I change the world today?” “This is philosophy, Fool. I have never had time to study such things.” “No, Fitz, this is life. And no one has time not to think of such things. Each creature in the world should consider this thing, every moment of the heart's beating. Otherwise, what is the point of arising each day?

Believe in yourself. Believe in your capacity to do great and good things. Believe that no mountain is so high that you cannot climb it. Believe that no storm is so great that you cannot weather it. You are not destined to be a scrub. You are a child of God, of infinite capacity. Believe that you can do it whatever it is that you set your heart on. Opportunities will unfold and open before you. The skies will clear when they have been dark with portent...He who is our Eternal Father has blessed you with miraculous powers of mind and body. He never intended that you should be less than the crowning glory of His creations.

The great Sufi poet and philosopher Rumi once advised his students to write down the three things they most wanted in life. If any item on the list clashes with any other item, Rumi warned, you are destined for unhappiness.

Perhaps, says the genius, music doesn't change us that much, nor does great art change us. Instead, it reminds us of who, despite all our claims or denials, we've always known we were and are destined to remain. It reminds us of the mileposts we've buried and hidden and then lost, of the people and things that mattered despite our lies, despite the years. Music is no more than the sound of our regrets put to a cadence that stirs the illusion of pleasure and hope. It's the surest reminder that we're here for a very short while and that we've neglected or cheated or, worse yet, failed to live our lives. Music is the unlived life. You've lived the wrong life, my friend, and almost defaced the one you were given to live.

Avoid trivial pursuits. You are a child of God, destined for glory, and called to do great things in His Name. Do not waste your life on hobbies, sports, and other recreational pursuits. Do not throw away the precious moments of your life on entertainment, movies, and video games. Though some of these things can properly have a 'small place' in the Christian’s life, we must be careful not to give undue attention to temporal and fruitless activities. Do not waste your life. Employ the time of your youth in developing the character and skills necessary to be a useful servant of God.

I was destined for Great Things, confirmed by a physical welling of promise I couldn’t deny or explain. One just knows these things. Like good luck, you have it or you don’t. I always knew I had it.

You fight, work, sweat, nearly kill yourself, sometimes do kill yourself, trying to accomplish something — and you can’t. Not from any fault of yours. You simply can do nothing, neither great nor little — not a thing in the world — not even marry an old maid, or get a wretched 600-ton cargo of coal to its port of destination.

On the day before classes were supposed to start, Mama took me out to dinner. “You’re destined to do small great things,” she told me. “Just like Dr. King said.” She was referring to one of her favorite quotes: If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way.

The endless void of space stretched out before it. Millennia had passed as it roared through the plane of the Milky Way galaxy. The awesome ellipse of its original path was continually altered by intermittent proximity to myriad stars. It gave off minute bits of itself as it rocketed silently through the vacuum of space, but still, after all these millennia it was counted large as such things were measured, and the fact that it had never collided with anything else after such a tremendous interval of travel was a mute testimony to the vastness and comparative emptiness of the universe. Much as humans, on a molecular level, are comprised mostly of space not of matter, so the universe, for all its galaxies and solar systems, is comprised primarily of interconnecting emptiness. Dark, colossal, mindless, and mighty in its mass and velocity, it came on and on through space. The great alignment had set it on a new path. Now, one last nudge from the Red Giant in the previous solar system had fixed its new course, on a fateful rendezvous. Though it was oblivious to its own destination and nothing in the universe with awareness had yet detected it . . . Its path was set.

No matter where you go, you’re destined to do great things. I know it.

Do you ever feel lost?” The question hangs between us, intimate, awkward only on my end. He doesn’t scoff as Tactus and Fitchner would, or scratch his balls like Sevro, or chuckle like Cassius might have, or purr as Victra would. I’m not sure what Mustang might have done. But Roque, despite his Color and all the things that make him different, slowly slides a marker into the book and sets it on the nightstand beside the four-poster, taking his time and allowing an answer to evolve between us. Movements thoughtful and organic, like Dancer’s were before he died. There’s a stillness in him, vast and majestic, the same stillness I remember in my father. “Quinn once told me a story.” He waits for me to moan a grievance at the mention of a story, and when I don’t, his tone sinks into deeper gravity. “Once, in the days of Old Earth, there were two pigeons who were greatly in love. In those days, they raised such animals to carry messages across great distances. These two were born in the same cage, raised by the same man, and sold on the same day to different men on the eve of a great war. “The pigeons suffered apart from each other, each incomplete without their lover. Far and wide their masters took them, and the pigeons feared they would never again find each other, for they began to see how vast the world was, and how terrible the things in it. For months and months, they carried messages for their masters, flying over battle lines, through the air over men who killed one another for land. When the war ended, the pigeons were set free by their masters. But neither knew where to go, neither knew what to do, so each flew home. And there they found each other again, as they were always destined to return home and find, instead of the past, their future.

Any dictionary, no matter how well made, was destined to go out of date. Words were living things.

Facts are but the Play-things of lawyers,-- Tops and Hoops, forever a-spin... Alas, the Historian may indulge no such idle Rotating. History is not Chronology, for that is left to Lawyers,-- nor is it Remembrance, for Remembrance belongs to the People. History can as little pretend to the Veracity of the one, as claim the Power of the other,-- her Practitioners, to survive, must soon learn the arts of the quidnunc, spy, and Taproom Wit,-- that there may ever continue more than one life-line back into a Past we risk, each day, losing our forebears in forever,-- not a Chain of single Links, for one broken Link could lose us All,-- rather, a great disorderly Tangle of Lines, long and short, weak and strong, vanishing into the Mnemonick Deep, with only their Destination in common.

But I have always been persuaded that someday, when I grow up, I am destined for great things. And then I wonder when, exactly, I expect that will be.

Pops gave him a cool stare that settled Tom down - a thing not always easy to do. "Son, do you know what history is?" "Uh...stuff that happened in the past?" "Nope," he said, trying on his canvas change-belt. "History is the collective and ancestral shit of the human race, a great big and ever growing pile of crap. Right now, we're standin at the top of it, but pretty soon we'll be buried under the doodoo of generations yet to come. That's why your folks' clothes look so funny in old photographs, to name but a single example. And, as someone who's destined to buried beneath the shit of your children and grandchildren, I think you should be just a leetle more forgiving.

There had been those back on Earth who claimed the universe cared, and that the survival of humanity was important, destined, meant . They had mostly stayed behind, holding to their corroding faith that some great power would weigh in on their behalf if only things became so very bad. Perhaps it had: those on the ark ship could never know for sure. Holsten had his own beliefs, though, and they did not encompass salvation by any means other than the hand of mankind itself.

You have a whole life ahead of you. There's so much to look forward to. And you're destined to do great things, I know it.

Wouldn’t you want to know so that you don’t make the same mistakes again?’ Realm laughs, sounding bitter. 'That’s the great thing, James Murphy. Some mistakes are destined to repeat themselves.

Travel is a search for the self . . . and sometimes just to search is enough. [. . .] Wander around long enough with your eyes open and soon enough you'll find things. Great journeys are never about the destination.

silly man. I know the man I am marrying is destined for great things, as the many remarkable things he has done thus far have brought himto such a high oint already. Mark my words, Alex. You are a man whose future lies before him for all to marvel at one day. And you, Colonel Hamilton, are mine, and I am yours always.

Quinn once told me a story.” He waits for me to moan a grievance at the mention of a story, and when I don’t, his tone sinks into deeper gravity. “Once, in the days of Old Earth, there were two pigeons who were greatly in love. In those days, they raised such animals to carry messages across great distances. These two were born in the same cage, raised by the same man, and sold on the same day to different men on the eve of a great war. “The pigeons suffered apart from each other, each incomplete without their lover. Far and wide their masters took them, and the pigeons feared they would never again find each other, for they began to see how vast the world was, and how terrible the things in it. For months and months, they carried messages for their masters, flying over battle lines, through the air over men who killed one another for land. When the war ended, the pigeons were set free by their masters. But neither knew where to go, neither knew what to do, so each flew home. And there they found each other again, as they were always destined to return home and find, instead of the past, their future.” He folds his hands gently, a teacher arriving at his point. “So do I feel lost? Always. When Lea died at the Institute …” His lips slip gently downward. “… I was in a dark woods, blind and lost as Dante before Virgil. But Quinn helped me. Her voice calling me out of misery. She became my home. As she puts it, ‘Home isn’t where you’re from, it’s where you find light when all grows dark.’ ” He grasps the top of my hand. “Find your home, Darrow. It may not be in the past. But find it, and you’ll never be lost again.

You humans always think you’re destined for things, for tragedy or for greatness. Destiny is a myth. Destiny is the only myth.

your fear of hearing the word ‘no’ is the only thing standing between you and greatness.

There are many rivers to cross to our successful destinations. Never fear the crocodiles. They may look frightful, but they will not harm you. You will get there! With the right attitude, you ignore the ugly face of the shore and you can paddle your boat to the right destination!

Money itself isn’t evil, but the love of it is the root of all kinds of evil. So these things helped me to stay grounded. I began realizing that people on yachts weren’t happier than people in rowboats. Bentleys break down just like Nissans. You can get a great night’s sleep at a Hampton Inn just like at a Ritz-Carlton. And flying in first class won’t get you to your destination any faster than riding in coach.

That was his senior year,” Jonah said. “He was such a handsome young man. Destined for greatness. It’s hard to live with all the sadness and anger that erupts when a tragic thing happens, like what took my Jacob.

I knew I was a winner back in the late sixties. I knew I was destined for great things. People will say that kind of thinking is totally immodest. I agree. Modesty is not a word that applies to me in any way. I hope it never will.

There is a kind of greatness which does not depend upon fortune;It is a certain manner that distinguishes us, and which seems to destine us for great things;It is the value we insensibly set upon ourselves;it is by this quality,that we gain the deference of other men,and it is this which commonly raises us more above them,than birth,rank,or even merit itself.

Still, sometimes, he thought back to their final conversations, mouthing them aloud. This was at night, when his roommates—in various configurations, depending on who was in the room at the time—slept above and next to him. “Don’t let this silence become a habit,” she’d warned him shortly before she died. And: “It’s all right to be angry, Jude; you don’t have to hide it.” She had been wrong about him, he always thought; he wasn’t what she thought he was. “You’re destined for greatness, kid,” she’d said once, and he wanted to believe her, even though he couldn’t. But she was right about one thing: it did get harder and harder. He did blame himself. And although he tried every day to remember the promise he’d made to her, every day it became more and more remote, until it was just a memory, and so was she, a beloved character from a book he’d read long ago.

Are some people destined for a great fate, or to do great things? Or is it only that they’re born somehow with that great passion—and if they find themselves in the right circumstances, then things happen? It’s the sort of thing you wonder, studying history … 

Perhaps, says the genius, music doesn’t change us that much, nor does great art change us. Instead, it reminds us of who, despite all our claims or denials, we’ve always known we were and are destined to remain. It reminds us of the mileposts we’ve buried and hidden and then lost, of the people and things that mattered despite our lies, despite the years. Music is no more than the sound of our regrets put to a cadence that stirs the illusion of pleasure and hope. It’s the surest reminder that we’re here for a very short while and that we’ve neglected or cheated or, worse yet, failed to live our lives. Music is the unlived life.

Believing in my great hurt, my literal cutting off from society's mainland, it seems to me that I took life in a sense too seriously, and the lives of others, for the same reason, too lightly. The murders were my own conception; my sex. The Factory was my attempt to construct life, to replace the involvement which otherwise I did not want. Well, it is always easier to succeed at death. Inside this greater machine, things are not quite so cut and dried (or cut and pickled) as they have appeared in my experience. Each of us, in our own personal Factory, may believe we have stumbled down one corridor, and that our fate is sealed and certain (dream or nightmare, humdrum or bizarre, good or bad), but a word, a glance, a slip - anything can change that, alter it entirely, and our marble hall becomes a gutter, or our rat-maze a golden path. Our destination is the same in the end, but our journey - part chosen, part determined- is different for us all, and changes even as we live and grow. I thought one door had snicked shut behind me years ago; in fact I was still crawling about the face. Now the door closes, and my journey begins.

Sometimes you have to do things you don’t like or want to do, in order to be the best you can be, do the things you were destined to do and to fulfill your Destiny.

Learning is like the fuel that moves the machinery of your body towards it's destination of success. Shortage is possible, hence spare supply is necessary!

You’re destined to do small great things,’ she told me. ‘Just like Dr King said.’ She was referring to one of her favorite quotes: If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way.

You’re destined to do small great things,” she told me. “Just like Dr. King said.” She was referring to one of her favorite quotes: If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way.

You're destined to do small great things,' she told me. 'Just like Dr. King said.'' She was referring to one of her favorite quotes: If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way.

Back out of all this now too much for us, Back in a time made simple by the loss Of detail, burned, dissolved, and broken off Like graveyard marble sculpture in the weather, There is a house that is no more a house Upon a farm that is no more a farm And in a town that is no more a town. The road there, if you’ll let a guide direct you Who only has at heart your getting lost, May seem as if it should have been a quarry— Great monolithic knees the former town Long since gave up pretense of keeping covered. And there’s a story in a book about it: Besides the wear of iron wagon wheels The ledges show lines ruled southeast-northwest, The chisel work of an enormous Glacier That braced his feet against the Arctic Pole. You must not mind a certain coolness from him Still said to haunt this side of Panther Mountain. Nor need you mind the serial ordeal Of being watched from forty cellar holes As if by eye pairs out of forty firkins. As for the woods’ excitement over you That sends light rustle rushes to their leaves, Charge that to upstart inexperience. Where were they all not twenty years ago? They think too much of having shaded out A few old pecker-fretted apple trees. Make yourself up a cheering song of how Someone’s road home from work this once was, Who may be just ahead of you on foot Or creaking with a buggy load of grain. The height of the adventure is the height Of country where two village cultures faded Into each other. Both of them are lost. And if you’re lost enough to find yourself By now, pull in your ladder road behind you And put a sign up CLOSED to all but me. Then make yourself at home. The only field Now left’s no bigger than a harness gall. First there’s the children’s house of make-believe, Some shattered dishes underneath a pine, The playthings in the playhouse of the children. Weep for what little things could make them glad. Then for the house that is no more a house, But only a belilaced cellar hole, Now slowly closing like a dent in dough. This was no playhouse but a house in earnest. Your destination and your destiny’s A brook that was the water of the house, Cold as a spring as yet so near its source, Too lofty and original to rage. (We know the valley streams that when aroused Will leave their tatters hung on barb and thorn.) I have kept hidden in the instep arch Of an old cedar at the waterside A broken drinking goblet like the Grail Under a spell so the wrong ones can’t find it, So can’t get saved, as Saint Mark says they mustn’t. (I stole the goblet from the children’s playhouse.) Here are your waters and your watering place. Drink and be whole again beyond confusion.

You fellows know there are those voyages that seem ordered for the illustration of life, that might stand for a symbol of existence. You fight, work, sweat, nearly kill yourself, sometimes do kill yourself, trying to accomplish something — and you can’t. Not from any fault of yours. You simply can do nothing, neither great nor little — not a thing in the world — not even marry an old maid, or get a wretched 600-ton cargo of coal to its port of destination.

Like everything else, words have their whys and wherefores. Some call to us solemnly, arrogantly, giving themselves airs, as if they were destined for great things, and then it turns out that they were nothing more than a breeze too light even to set the sail of a windmill moving, whereas other ordinary, habitual words, the sort you use every day, end up having consequences no one would have dared predict, they weren't born for that and yet they shook the world.

Perhaps, says the genius, music doesn’t change us that much, nor does great art change us. Instead, it reminds us of who, despite all our claims or denials, we’ve always known we were and are destined to remain. It reminds us of the mileposts we’ve buried and hidden and then lost, of the people and things that mattered despite our lies, despite the years. Music is no more than the sound of our regrets put to a cadence that stirs the illusion of pleasure and hope.

His existence had always been comfortable, he had always held a clear picture of himself, his duties, and his place in a world. He saw that world as a place so full of turning gears he had no hope of comprehending how things fit together, so why even try? Now things were different, however. Now he wasn’t just looking out from inside of the clockwork. Instead, he was actually seeing the final motion of the escapement—the ticking hands of the clock itself. And it was a doomsday clock. Both his feline and human instincts told him to let it be. It was not his problem, or his place to interfere. If the living world was destined to fall, let it happen, let it pass into history once and for all. Who was he to try to save it? But on the other hand, if the living world were lost, then there would never again be great cats to furjack . . . and couldn’t it be that hearing the actual ticking of the clock gave one the responsibility to stop it?

Believe in yourself. Believe in your capacity to do great and good things. Believe that no mountain is so high that you cannot climb it. Believe that no storm is so great that you cannot weather it. You are not destined to be a scrub. You are a child of God, of infinite capacity.

in time-wasting loops and diversions. Its changes of direction are frequently teasing: on its journey it heads at different times north, south, and west, as though it has forgotten its easterly destination—or put it aside for the while. At Ashton Keynes it splits into so many rivulets that every house in the village must have a bridge to its own front door; later, around Oxford, it takes a great unhurried detour around the city. It has other capricious tricks up its sleeve: in places it slows to drift lazily in wide pools before recovering its urgency and speeding on again. At Buscot it splits into twin streams to maroon a lengthy piece of territory, then regathers its water into a single channel. If this is hard to understand from a map, the rest is harder. For one thing, the river that flows ever onwards is also seeping sideways, irrigating the

California during the 1940s had Hollywood and the bright lights of Los Angeles, but on the other coast was Florida, land of sunshine and glamour, Miami and Miami Beach. If you weren't already near California's Pacific Coast you headed for Florida during the winter. One of the things which made Miami such a mix of glitter and sunshine was the plethora of movie stars who flocked there to play, rubbing shoulders with tycoons and gangsters. Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference between the latter two. Miami and everything that surrounded it hadn't happened by accident. Carl Fisher had set out to make Miami Beach a playground destination during the 1930s and had succeeded far beyond his dreams. The promenade behind the Roney Plaza Hotel was a block-long lovers' lane of palm trees and promise that began rather than ended in the blue waters of the Atlantic. Florida was more than simply Miami and Miami Beach, however. When George Merrick opened the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables papers across the country couldn't wait to gush about the growing aura of Florida. They tore down Collins Bridge in the Gables and replaced it with the beautiful Venetian Causeway. You could plop down a fiver if you had one and take your best girl — or the girl you wanted to score with — for a gondola ride there before the depression, or so I'd been told. You see, I'd never actually been to Florida before the war, much less Miami. I was a newspaper reporter from Chicago before the war and had never even seen the ocean until I was flying over the Pacific for the Air Corp. There wasn't much time for admiring the waves when Japanese Zeroes were trying to shoot you out of the sky and bury you at the bottom of that deep blue sea. It was because of my friend Pete that I knew so much about Miami. Florida was his home, so when we both got leave in '42 I followed him to the warm waters of Miami to see what all the fuss was about. It would be easy to say that I skipped Chicago for Miami after the war ended because Pete and I were such good pals and I'd had such a great time there on leave. But in truth I decided to stay on in Miami because of Veronica Lake. I'd better explain that. Veronica Lake never knew she was the reason I came back with Pete to Miami after the war. But she had been there in '42 while Pete and I were enjoying the sand, sun, and the sweet kisses of more than a few love-starved girls desperate to remember what it felt like to have a man's arm around them — not to mention a few other sensations. Lake had been there promoting war bonds on Florida's first radio station, WQAM. It was a big outdoor event and Pete and I were among those listening with relish to Lake's sultry voice as she urged everyone to pitch-in for our boys overseas. We were in those dark early days of the war at the time, and the outcome was very much in question. Lake's appearance at the event was a morale booster for civilians and servicemen alike. She was standing behind a microphone that sat on a table draped in the American flag. I'd never seen a Hollywood star up-close and though I liked the movies as much as any other guy, I had always attributed most of what I saw on-screen to smoke and mirrors. I doubted I'd be impressed seeing a star off-screen. A girl was a girl, after all, and there were loads of real dolls in Miami, as I'd already discovered. Boy, was I wrong." - Where Flamingos Fly

Yesterday, I went to see Gladwell, who is home for a few days. A terrible blow has struck them, his young sister, so full of life, with dark eyes and hair, had fallen from a horse at Blackheath; they found her unconscious and she died five hours later, without regaining consciousness. She was seventeen years old. As soon as I heard the news, I went to see them, knowing that Gladwell was home. I left at eleven o’clock; and had a long walk to Lewisham. I crossed London from one end to the other and didn’t arrive at my destination until almost five o’clock. They had all just come back from the funeral; the whole household was in mourning. I was happy to have come, but confused, truly upset by the spectacle of a pain so great and so venerable. “Blessed are they that mourn, blessed are they that sorrow, but always rejoice, blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God. Blessed are those that find love on their road, who are bound together by God, for to them all things will work together for their good.” I chatted for a long time, until evening, with Harry, about everything, the kingdom of God, the Bible; we chatted further, we walked up and down the station platform. Never will we forget the moments before we said goodbye.

Great loves were always destined to be together for some great reason...You were meant to be together, so you could be her guiding light through all of this. You were created perfectly for her, to make this time for my girl special. To make sure her remaining days were filled with things her mama ad I could never have given her.

If you were to tell the thing down at the bottom of that pit it had napped through forty-two presidential inaugurations, eight British coronations, sixteen popes and three number ones by the Danish pop group, Aqua, it would have told you to stop talking nonsense and shut the fuck up. It had slept, somewhat peacefully, through Emmet’s Insurrection, World War I and II, Vietnam, and even the Great War of Blur Vs. Oasis.

Life is but a stopping place, A pause in what's to be, A resting place along the road, to sweet eternity. We all have different journeys, Different paths along the way, We all were meant to learn some things, but never meant to stay... Our destination is a place, Far greater than we know. For some the journey's quicker, For some the journey's slow. And when the journey finally ends, We'll claim a great reward, And find an everlasting peace, Together with the lord

The origin and cause of human suffering – and the means of ending it- became the first great intellectual and spiritual preoccupation of our culture, beginning about four thousand years ago. The next three millennia would see the development of all those religions that were destined to be the major religions of our culture- Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam- and each had its own theory about the origin and cause and its own approach to ending it, transcending it, or putting up with it. But they were all united in a single, central vision. Whether its release from the endless rounds of death and rebirth or blissful union with God in heaven, salvation is the highest goal in human life, and each of us is utterly alone in the universe with it. There is not marketplace where you can buy nirvana, merit, grace; no parent, friend, teacher can obtain it for you. And because nothing remotely compares in value, salvation is the one thing about which you may be totally and blamelessly selfish.

God uses pressure, pain and difficulties to prepare us for Greater Things. Just like pressure is used to squeeze out oil from the olives, and pressure shapes diamonds, and fire refines gold. Just as the potter uses heat to shape clay into the form and shape He wants it to be, God does the same with us, to bring out our inner treasures and to make us use our potential to the fullest. God is not sending you difficult situations to hurt you; He is doing so to strengthen you, make you grow and to prepare you for your Destiny and Greatness.

Okay. He's not coming back. Is he? No. I thought back to biking that first day in Oregon. Weston and I weaving back and forth, taking up the whole street, loving the August air and ocean breeze. I remember him calling me his "neighbor" every night as we'd lie in our hammocks. "Oh, how's the family, neighbor?" he'd ask. "Oh, great." We'd started with such fire and magic. With a shared destiny and destination. The beginning of a grand adventure is pregnant with a thousand futures. Every possible best thing. But the end is often a fizzle. For us, Weston left for a wedding. And didn't come back. And just like that, a chapter was done.

The changing of the seasons, the cold slicing winds, the falling leaves, sunlight on green grass, snow on the land, London particular. Oh what it is and where it is and why it is, no one knows, but to have said: ‘I walked on Waterloo Bridge,’ ‘I rendezvoused at Charing Cross,’ ‘Piccadilly Circus is my playground,’ to say these things, to have lived these things, to have lived in the great city of London, centre of the world. To one day lean against the wind walking up the Bayswater Road (destination unknown), to see the leaves swirl and dance and spin on the pavement (sight unseeing), to write a casual letter home beginning: ‘Last night, in Trafalgar Square …

We that are bred up in learning, and destinated by our parents to this end, we suffer our childhood in the grammar-school, which Austin calls magnam tyrannidem, et grave malum, and compares it to the torments of martyrdom; when we come to the university, if we live of the college allowance, as Phalaris objected to the Leontines, [Greek: pan ton endeis plaen limou kai phobou] , needy of all things but hunger and fear, or if we be maintained but partly by our parents' cost, do expend in unnecessary maintenance, books and degrees, before we come to any perfection, five hundred pounds, or a thousand marks. If by this price of the expense of time, our bodies and spirits, our substance and patrimonies, we cannot purchase those small rewards, which are ours by law, and the right of inheritance, a poor parsonage, or a vicarage of 50 l. per annum, but we must pay to the patron for the lease of a life (a spent and out-worn life) either in annual pension, or above the rate of a copyhold, and that with the hazard and loss of our souls, by simony and perjury, and the forfeiture of all our spiritual preferments, in esse and posse, both present and to come. What father after a while will be so improvident to bring up his son to his great charge, to this necessary beggary? What Christian will be so irreligious, to bring up his son in that course of life, which by all probability and necessity, coget ad turpia, enforcing to sin, will entangle him in simony and perjury, when as the poet said, Invitatus ad hæc aliquis de ponte negabit: a beggar's brat taken from the bridge where he sits a begging, if he knew the inconvenience, had cause to refuse it." This being thus, have not we fished fair all this while, that are initiate divines, to find no better fruits of our labours, [2030] hoc est cur palles, cur quis non prandeat hoc est? do we macerate ourselves for this? Is it for this we rise so early all the year long? [2031] "Leaping" (as he saith) "out of our beds, when we hear the bell ring, as if we had heard a thunderclap." If this be all the respect, reward and honour we shall have, [2032] frange leves calamos, et scinde Thalia libellos: let us give over our books, and betake ourselves to some other course of life; to what end should we study?

Our Lord’s things they are, from whencesoever we may obtain them. And if we distribute to the needy we shall obtain for ourselves great abundance. And for this it is that God has permitted you to possess much,—not that you should spend it in fornication, in drunkenness, in gluttony, in rich clothing, or any other mode of luxury, but that you should distribute it to the needy. And just as if a receiver of taxes, having in charge the king’s property, should not distribute it to those for whom it is ordered, but should spend it for his own enjoyment, he would pay the penalty and come to ruin; thus also the rich man is, as it were, a receiver of goods which are destined to be dispensed to the poor—to those of his fellow-servants who are in want. If he then should spend upon himself more than he really needs, he will pay hereafter a heavy penalty. For the things he has are not his own, but are the things of his fellow-servants. 5. Let

All education begins with the exact opposite of what everyone praises so highly today as ‘academic freedom.’ It begins in obedience, subordination, discipline, servitude. And just as great leaders need followers, so too must the led have a leader. A certain reciprocal predisposition prevails in the hierarchy of the spirit: yes, a kind of pre-established harmony. The eternal hierarchy that all things naturally gravitate toward is just what the so-called culture now sitting on the throne of the present aims to overturn and destroy. This ‘culture’ wants to bring leaders down to the level of its compulsory servitude, or kill them off altogether; it waylays foreordained followers searching high and low for the one who is to lead them, while its intoxications deaden even their instinct to seek. If, though, wounded and battle-weary, the two sides destined for each other find a way to come together at last, the result is a deep, thrilling bliss that resounds like the strings of an eternal lyre.

To be sure,” continued Alec; “but, as you know, the most important reason for going from one place to another is to see what’s in between, and they took great pleasure in doing just that. Then one day someone discovered that if you walked as fast as possible and looked at nothing but your shoes you would arrive at your destination much more quickly. Soon everyone was doing it. They all rushed down the avenues and hurried along the boulevards seeing nothing of the wonders and beauties of their city as they went.” Milo remembered the many times he’d done the very same thing; and, as hard as he tried, there were even things on his own street that he couldn’t remember. “No one paid any attention to how things looked, and as they moved faster and faster everything grew uglier and dirtier, and as everything grew uglier and dirtier they moved faster and faster, and at last a very strange thing began to happen. Because nobody cared, the city slowly began to disappear. Day by day the buildings grew fainter and fainter, and the streets faded away, until at last it was entirely invisible. There was nothing to see at all.” “What did they do?” the Humbug inquired, suddenly taking an interest in things. “Nothing at all,” continued Alec. “They went right on living here just as they’d always done, in the houses they could no longer see and on the streets which had vanished, because nobody had noticed a thing. And that’s the way they have lived to this very day.” “Hasn’t anyone told them?” asked Milo. “It doesn’t do any good,” Alec replied, “for they can never see what they’re in too much of a hurry to look for.” “Why don’t they live in Illusions?” suggested the Humbug. “It’s much prettier.” “Many of them do,” he answered, walking in the direction of the forest once again, “but it’s just as bad to live in a place where what you do see isn’t there as it is to live in one where what you don’t see is.” “Perhaps someday you can have one city as easy to see as Illusions and as hard to forget as Reality,” Milo remarked.

... Music reminds me of what my life should have been. But it doesn't change me. Perhaps, says the genius, music doesn't change us that much, nor does great art change us. Instead, it reminds us of who, despite all our claims or denials, we've always known we were and are destined to remain. It reminds us of the mileposts we've buried and hidden and then lost, of the people and things that mattered despite our lies, despite the years. Music is no more than the sound of our regrets put to a cadence that stirs the illusion of pleasure and hope. It's the surest reminder that we're here for a very short while and that we've neglected or cheated or, worse yet, failed to live our lives. Music is the unlived life. You've lived the wrong life, my friend, and almost defaced the one you were given to live. What do I want? Do you know the answer, Herr Bach? Is there such a thing as a right or wrong life? I'm an artist, my friend, I don't do answers. Artists know questions only. And besides, you already know the answer.

Oh my God, Rayna…I think something almost happened with Ben and me in Rio.” “What? Wait, back up. When? You mean, ‘almost happened’ like…what? What exactly almost happened?” “I’m not sure,” I said. “It all went really fast. I was feeling all these things, and he was looking at me like…like he was in that picture, and then…” “Yeah??” “I saw Sage.” “Ooooh,” Rayna winced. “What did Ben do?” “Nothing. I mean, I ran after Sage and…you know everything that happened then. We haven’t even talked about it.” I looked at her plaintively. “What do I do?” “What do you want to do?” I thought about it. “I don’t know.” “Well…how do you feel? She asked. “I don’t know that either. I never even thought about Ben that way except for that split second in Rio, and even then I wasn’t thinking of it seriously. And Sage…with Sage it’s all I think about, but it’s all jumbled up with the most insane things: dreams, and other lives, and other people’s memories, and…I don’t even know what’s real.” Rayna took it all in. “I love Ben,” she said. “You know that. I think you guys could be great together. I also believe in soulmates. Not just as romantic flings, like the guys in Europe, but true soulmates, destined to be together forever because they’re perfect for each other. Are you and Sage true soulmates? I don’t know, but I do know you’re cheating yourself if you don’t at least try to find out.” “How do I find that out, Rayna?” “I want you to do me a favor. Promise on our friendship.” “Promise what?” “Asking first is cheating. Promise on our friendship.” It was an evil ploy. Rayna knew I wouldn’t say no, and she knew I wouldn’t go back on something if I promised on our friendship. Neither of us ever would-that was a rule we’d established when we were five. “Okay…I promise on our friendship,” I agreed, rolling my eyes. “What did I just promise to do?” “For the rest of the evening, don’t think. Just listen to how you feel and go with it, wherever it leads. And whether or not it makes any sense.” I nodded. “I’ll try.” “Not good enough. You promised on our friendship.” I smiled. “I’ll do it.

Despite such experiences Houdini never developed what we think of as a political consciousness. He could not reason from his own hurt feelings. To the end he would be almost totally unaware of the design of his career, the great map of revolution laid out by his life. He was a Jew. His real name was Erich Weiss. He was passionately in love with his ancient mother whom he had installed in his brownstone home on West 113th Street. In fact Sigmund Freud had just arrived in America to give a series of lectures at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts, and so Houdini was destined to be, with Al Jolson, the last of the great shameless mother lovers, a nineteenth-century movement that included such men as Poe, John Brown, Lincoln, and James McNeill Whistler. Of course Freud's immediate reception in America was not auspicious. A few professional alienists understood his importance, but to most of the public he appeared as some kind of German sexologist, an exponent of free love who used big words to talk about dirty things. At least a decade would have to pass before Freud would have his revenge and see his ideas begin to destroy sex in America for ever.

I was sure of myself once, I thought I knew things, knew myself, and people loved that I reached out to touch them when I blustered into their lives and didn’t even ask or doubt that I mightn’t be welcome. Music reminds me of what my life should have been. But it doesn’t change me. Perhaps, says the genius, music doesn’t change us that much, nor does great art change us. Instead, it reminds us of who, despite all our claims or denials, we’ve always known we were and are destined to remain. It reminds us of the mileposts we’ve buried and hidden and then lost, of the people and things that mattered despite our lies, despite the years. Music is no more than the sound of our regrets put to a cadence that stirs the illusion of pleasure and hope. It’s the surest reminder that we’re here for a very short while and that we’ve neglected or cheated or, worse yet, failed to live our lives. Music is the unlived life. You’ve lived the wrong life, my friend, and almost defaced the one you were given to live. What do I want? Do you know the answer, Herr Bach? Is there such a thing as a right or wrong life? I’m an artist, my friend, I don’t do answers. Artists know questions only. And besides, you already know the answer.

In any case, we should expect that in due time we will be moved into our eternal destiny of creative activity with Jesus and his friends and associates in the “many mansions” of “his Father’s house.” Thus, we should not think of ourselves as destined to be celestial bureaucrats, involved eternally in celestial “administrivia.” That would be only slightly better than being caught in an everlasting church service. No, we should think of our destiny as being absorbed in a tremendously creative team effort, with unimaginably splendid leadership, on an inconceivably vast plane of activity, with ever more comprehensive cycles of productivity and enjoyment. This is the “eye hath not seen, neither ear heard” that lies before us in the prophetic vision (Isa. 64:4). This Is Shalom When Saint Augustine comes to the very end of his book The City of God, he attempts to address the question of “how the saints shall be employed when they are clothed in immortal and spiritual bodies.”15 At first he confesses that he is “at a loss to understand the nature of that employment.” But then he settles upon the word peace to describe it, and develops the idea of peace by reference to the vision of God—utilizing, as we too have done, the rich passage from 1 Corinthians 13. Thus he speaks of our “employment” then as being “the beatific vision.” The eternal blessedness of the city of God is presented as a “perpetual Sabbath.” In words so beautiful that everyone should know them by heart, he says, “There we shall rest and see, see and love, love and praise. This is what shall be in the end without end. For what other end do we propose to ourselves than to attain to the kingdom of which there is no end?” And yet, for all their beauty and goodness, these words do not seem to me to capture the blessed condition of the restoration of all things—of the kingdom come in its utter fullness. Repose, yes. But not as quiescence, passivity, eternal fixity. It is, instead, peace as wholeness, as fullness of function, as the restful but unending creativity involved in a cosmoswide, cooperative pursuit of a created order that continuously approaches but never reaches the limitless goodness and greatness of the triune personality of God, its source. This, surely, is the word of Jesus when he says, “Those who overcome will be welcomed to sit with me on my throne, as I too overcame and sat down with my Father on his throne. Those capable of hearing should listen to what the Spirit is saying to my people” (Rev. 3:21

The biggest fear for homeschooled children is that they will be unable to relate to their peers, will not have friends, or that they will otherwise be unable to interact with people in a normal way. Consider this: How many of your daily interactions with people are solely with people of your own birth year?  We’re not considering interactions with people who are a year or two older or a year or two younger, but specifically people who were born within a few months of your birthday. In society, it would be very odd to section people at work by their birth year and allow you to interact only with persons your same age. This artificial constraint would limit your understanding of people and society across a broader range of ages. In traditional schools, children are placed in grades artificially constrained by the child’s birth date and an arbitrary cut-off day on a school calendar. Every student is taught the same thing as everyone else of the same age primarily because it is a convenient way to manage a large number of students. Students are not grouped that way because there is any inherent special socialization that occurs when grouping children in such a manner. Sectioning off children into narrow bands of same-age peers does not make them better able to interact with society at large. In fact, sectioning off children in this way does just the opposite—it restricts their ability to practice interacting with a wide variety of people. So why do we worry about homeschooled children’s socialization?  The erroneous assumption is that the child will be homeschooled and will be at home, schooling in the house, all day every day, with no interactions with other people. Unless a family is remotely located in a desolate place away from any form of civilization, social isolation is highly unlikely. Every homeschooling family I know involves their children in daily life—going to the grocery store or the bank, running errands, volunteering in the community, or participating in sports, arts, or community classes. Within the homeschooled community, sports, arts, drama, co-op classes, etc., are usually sectioned by elementary, pre-teen, and teen groupings. This allows students to interact with a wider range of children, and the interactions usually enhance a child’s ability to interact well with a wider age-range of students. Additionally, being out in the community provides many opportunities for children to interact with people of all ages. When homeschooling groups plan field trips, there are sometimes constraints on the age range, depending upon the destination, but many times the trip is open to children of all ages. As an example, when our group went on a field trip to the Federal Reserve Bank, all ages of children attended. The tour and information were of interest to all of the children in one way or another. After the tour, our group dined at a nearby food court. The parents sat together to chat and the children all sat with each other, with kids of all ages talking and having fun with each other. When interacting with society, exposure to a wider variety of people makes for better overall socialization. Many homeschooling groups also have park days, game days, or play days that allow all of the children in the homeschooled community to come together and play. Usually such social opportunities last for two, three, or four hours. Our group used to have Friday afternoon “Park Day.”  After our morning studies, we would pack a picnic lunch, drive to the park, and spend the rest of the afternoon letting the kids run and play. Older kids would organize games and play with younger kids, which let them practice great leadership skills. The younger kids truly looked up to and enjoyed being included in games with the older kids.

The human personality contains nothing which may not, in the twinkling of an eye, become altogether changed — nothing in which, before you can look round, there may not spring to birth some cankerous worm which is destined to suck thence the essential juice. Yes, it is a common thing to see not only an overmastering passion, but also a passion of the most petty order, arise in a man who was born to better things, and lead him both to forget his greatest and most sacred obligations, and to see only in the veriest trifles the Great and the Holy. For human passions are as numberless as is the sand of the seashore, and go on to become his most insistent of masters. Happy, therefore, the man who may choose from among the gamut of human passions one which is noble! Hour by hour will that instinct grow and multiply in its measureless beneficence; hour by hour will it sink deeper and deeper into the infinite paradise of his soul. But there are passions of which a man cannot rid himself, seeing that they are born with him at his birth, and he has no power to abjure them. Higher powers govern those passions, and in them is something which will call to him, and refuse to be silenced, to the end of his life. Yes, whether in a guise of darkness, or whether in a guise which will become converted into a light to lighten the world,

Music doesn’t give answers to questions I don’t know how to ask. It doesn’t tell me what I want. It reminds me that I may still be in love, though I’m no longer sure I know what that means, being in love. I think about people all the time, yet I’ve hurt many more than I’ve cared for. I can’t even tell what I feel, though feel something I still do, even if it’s more like a sense of absence and loss, maybe even failure, numbness, or total unknowing. I was sure of myself once, I thought I knew things, knew myself, and people loved that I reached out to touch them when I blustered into their lives and didn’t even ask or doubt that I mightn’t be welcome. Music reminds me of what my life should have been. But it doesn’t change me. Perhaps, says the genius, music doesn’t change us that much, nor does great art change us. Instead, it reminds us of who, despite all our claims or denials, we’ve always known we were and are destined to remain. It reminds us of the mileposts we’ve buried and hidden and then lost, of the people and things that mattered despite our lies, despite the years. Music is no more than the sound of our regrets put to a cadence that stirs the illusion of pleasure and hope. It’s the surest reminder that we’re here for a very short while and that we’ve neglected or cheated or, worse yet, failed to live our lives. Music is the unlived life. You’ve lived the wrong life, my friend, and almost defaced the one you were given to live. What

There are no silly or inferior people; or people whose destiny is to be poor or to barely survive. There are, though, many that have bought into the lies of this world, internalizing and accepting as truth the horrible “You can’t”. And as they believe they can’t, they transmit it to others and “manifest” it in their lives. But THE TRUTH, the only absolute truth is that every human being is special. Each and every one of us is a soul that is growing and evolving. A soul on a mission! To find and fulfill this mission, and not only to work tirelessly to accumulate material things, THAT IS SUCCESS! If you've ever doubted how special you are, and the immense value you have for the world, you just have to do a historical analysis, and think about the thousands of people who had to live before you, only for you to be born! Think of your ancestors: they survived a thousand tragedies so you could be here and read this book. Do not kid yourself: life in this world has been harsh! Your ancestors had to fight against enormous odds, and only the strongest, fittest and special survived. The weak perished... But not your grandparents, great-grandparents; great-great-grandparents and the ones before. You come from a bread of Champions! You descend from the greater ones! From those who crossed seas and conquered lands… From those who beat pest, hunger and war. From those who kept going ahead despite the persecutions… From those who weighed anchors to go on great adventures... And thanks to them, success runs in your blood… You are destined to success! You are called to live a meaningful life!

This, the profoundest of all mysteries, would be left for the living to ponder. Soldiers who survived also would struggle to reconcile the greatest catastrophe in human history with what the philosopher and Army officer J. Glenn Gray called “the one great lyric passage in their lives.” The war’s intensity, camaraderie, and sense of high purpose left many with “a deplorable nostalgia,” in the phrase of A. J. Liebling. “The times were full of certainty,” Liebling later wrote. “I have seldom been sure I was right since.” An AAF crewman who completed fifty bomber missions observed, “Never did I feel so much alive. Never did the earth and all of the surroundings look so bright and sharp.” And a combat engineer mused, “What we had together was something awfully damned good, something I don’t think we’ll ever have again as long as we live.” They had been annealed, touched with fire. “We are certainly no smaller men than our forefathers,” Gavin wrote his daughter. Alan Moorehead, who watched the scarlet calamity from beginning to end, believed that “here and there a man found greatness in himself.” The anti-aircraft gunner in a raid and the boy in a landing barge really did feel at moments that the thing they were doing was a clear and definite good, the best they could do. And at those moments there was a surpassing satisfaction, a sense of exactly and entirely fulfilling one’s life.… This thing, the brief ennoblement, kept recurring again and again up to the end, and it refreshed and lighted the whole heroic and sordid story. In Moorehead’s view, the soldier to whom this grace was granted became, “for a moment, a complete man, and he had his sublimity in him.” For those destined to outlive the

These are the doubts and motives whose solution involveth only so much doctrine as will suffice to lay bare the intimate and radical errors of the current philosophy, and the weight and force of our own. Here is the reason wherefore we must not fear that any object may disappear, or any particle veritably melt away or dissolve in space or suffer dismemberment by annihilation. Here too is the reason of the constant change of all things, so that there existeth no evil beyond escape, nor good which is unattainable, since throughout infinite space and throughout endless change all substance remaineth one and the same. From these reflections, if we apply ourselves attentively, we shall see that no strange happening can be dismissed by grief or by fear, and that no good fortune can be advanced by pleasure or hope. Whereby we find the true path to true morality; we will be high minded, despising that which is esteemed by childish minds; and we shall certainly become greater than those whom the blind public doth adore, for we shall attain to true contemplation of the story of nature which is inscribed within ourselves, and we shall follow the divine laws which are engraved upon our hearts. We shall recognize that there is no distinction between flight from here to heaven and from heaven hither, nor between ascent from there hither and from here to there; nor yet is there descent between one and the other. We are not more circumferential to those others than they to us; they are not more central to us than we to them. Just as we do tread our star and are contained in our heaven, so also are they. Behold us therefore beyond reach of jealousy, liberated from vain anxiety and from foolish concern to covet from afar that great good which we possess close by and at hand. Behold us moreover freed from panic lest others should fall upon us, rather than encouraged in the hope that we may fall upon them. Since the air which sustaineth our globe is as infinite as that which sustaineth theirs, and this animal [the earth] wandereth through her own space and reacheth her own destination as freely as do those others. When we have pondered and understood this, ah, how much further shall we be led to ponder and understand. Thus by means of this science we shall certainly attain to that good which by other sciences is sought in vain.

MT: Mimetic desire can only produce evil? RG: No, it can become bad if it stirs up rivalries but it isn't bad in itself, in fact it's very good, and, fortunately, people can no more give it up than they can give up food or sleep. It is to imitation that we owe not only our traditions, without which we would be helpless, but also, paradoxically, all the innovations about which so much is made today. Modern technology and science show this admirably. Study the history of the world economy and you'll see that since the nineteenth century all the countries that, at a given moment, seemed destined never to play anything but a subordinate role, for lack of “creativity,” because of their imitative or, as Montaigne would have said, their “apish” nature, always turned out later on to be more creative than their models. It began with Germany, which, in the nineteenth century, was thought to be at most capable of imitating the English, and this at the precise moment it surpassed them. It continued with the Americans in whom, for a long time, the Europeans saw mediocre gadget-makers who weren't theoretical or cerebral enough to take on a world leadership role. And it happened once more with the Japanese who, after World War II, were still seen as pathetic imitators of Western superiority. It's starting up again, it seems, with Korea, and soon, perhaps, it'll be the Chinese. All of these consecutive mistakes about the creative potential of imitation cannot be due to chance. To make an effective imitator, you have to openly admire the model you're imitating, you have to acknowledge your imitation. You have to explicitly recognize the superiority of those who succeed better than you and set about learning from them. If a businessman sees his competitor making money while he's losing money, he doesn't have time to reinvent his whole production process. He imitates his more fortunate rivals. In business, imitation remains possible today because mimetic vanity is less involved than in the arts, in literature, and in philosophy. In the most spiritual domains, the modern world rejects imitation in favor of originality at all costs. You should never say what others are saying, never paint what others are painting, never think what others are thinking, and so on. Since this is absolutely impossible, there soon emerges a negative imitation that sterilizes everything. Mimetic rivalry cannot flare up without becoming destructive in a great many ways. We can see it today in the so-called soft sciences (which fully deserve the name). More and more often they're obliged to turn their coats inside out and, with great fanfare, announce some new “epistemological rupture” that is supposed to revolutionize the field from top to bottom. This rage for originality has produced a few rare masterpieces and quite a few rather bizarre things in the style of Jacques Lacan's Écrits. Just a few years ago the mimetic escalation had become so insane that it drove everyone to make himself more incomprehensible than his peers. In American universities the imitation of those models has since produced some pretty comical results. But today that lemon has been squeezed completely dry. The principle of originality at all costs leads to paralysis. The more we celebrate “creative and enriching” innovations, the fewer of them there are. So-called postmodernism is even more sterile than modernism, and, as its name suggests, also totally dependent on it. For two thousand years the arts have been imitative, and it's only in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries that people started refusing to be mimetic. Why? Because we're more mimetic than ever. Rivalry plays a role such that we strive vainly to exorcise imitation. MT

Every special human being strives instinctively for his own castle and secrecy, where he is saved from the crowd, the many, the majority—where he can forget the rule-bound "people," for he is an exception to them;—but for the single case where he is pushed by an even stronger instinct straight against these rules, as a person who seeks knowledge in a great and exceptional sense. Anyone who, in his intercourse with human beings, does not, at one time or another, shimmer with all the colours of distress—green and gray with disgust, surfeit, sympathy, gloom, and loneliness—is certainly not a man of higher taste. But provided he does not take all this weight and lack of enthusiasm freely upon himself, always keeps away from it, and stays, as mentioned, hidden, quiet, and proud in his castle, well, one thing is certain: he is not made for, not destined for, knowledge. For if he were, he would one day have to say to himself, "The devil take my good taste! The rule-bound man is more interesting than the exception—than I am, the exception!"— and he would make his way down , above all, "inside." The study of the average man—long, serious, and requiring much disguise, self-control, familiarity, bad company - (all company is bad company except with one’s peers):—that constitutes a necessary part of the life story of every philosopher, perhaps the most unpleasant, foul-smelling part, the richest in disappointments. But if he’s lucky, as is appropriate for a fortunate child of knowledge, he encounters real shortcuts and ways of making his task easier; I’m referring to the so-called cynics, those who, as cynics, simply recognize the animal, the meanness, the "rule-bound man" in themselves and, in the process, still possess that degree of intellectual quality and urge to have to talk about themselves and people like them before witnesses;—now and then they even wallow in books, as if in their very own dung. Cynicism is the single form in which common souls touch upon what honesty is, and the higher man should open his ears to every cruder and more refined cynicism and think himself lucky every time a shameless clown or a scientific satyr announces himself directly in front of him. There are even cases where enchantment gets mixed into the disgust—for example, in those places where, by some vagary of nature, genius is bound up with such an indiscreet billy-goat and ape; as in the Abbé Galiani, the most profound, sharp-sighted, and perhaps also the foulest man of his century—he was much deeper than Voltaire and consequently a good deal quieter. More frequently it happens that, as I’ve intimated, the scientific head is set on an ape’s body, a refined and exceptional understanding in a common soul; among doctors and moral physiologists, for example, that’s not an uncommon occurrence. And where anyone speaks without bitterness and quite harmlessly of men as a belly with two different needs and a head with one, everywhere someone constantly sees, looks for, and wants to see only hunger, sexual desires, and vanity, as if these were the real and only motivating forces in human actions, in short, wherever people speak "badly" of human beings—not even in a nasty way—there the lover of knowledge should pay fine and diligent attention; he should, in general, direct his ears to wherever people talk without indignation. For the indignant man and whoever is always using his own teeth to tear himself apart or lacerate himself (or, as a substitute for that, the world, or God, or society) may indeed, speaking morally, stand higher than the laughing and self-satisfied satyr, but in every other sense he is the more ordinary, the more trivial, the more uninstructive case. And no one lies as much as the indignant man.

Mason, son. Never be ashamed of who you are. Never long to be anyone but yourself. The mark of a great wolf, of a leader, is not the color of his fur, but the integrity of his heart, his soul. It’s who you are here.” He’d paused and placed his large calloused hand over my chest. “That matters. Something tells me you are destined for great things. You will bring honor to your family.

The Western leaders serve the state and protect law and the constitution that makes them great and famous while the East, especially leaders of the subcontinent plunder the nation and state and violate the constitution and law that, makes them disgrace and dishonour, even such things do not make them any shame. The distinction is clear, nations how to reach their destination.

while we observe how God has destined all things for our good and salvation, we at the same time feel his power and grace, both in ourselves and in the great blessings which he has bestowed upon us; thence stirring up ourselves to confidence in him, to invocation, praise, and love. Moreover, as I lately observed, the Lord himself, by the very order of creation, has demonstrated that he created all things for the sake of man. Nor is it unimportant to observe, that he divided the formation of the world into six days, though it had been in no respect more difficult to complete the whole work, in all its parts, in one moment than by a gradual progression. But he was pleased to display his providence and paternal care towards us in this, that before he formed man, he provided whatever he foresaw would be useful and salutary to him. How ungrateful, then, were it to doubt whether we are cared for by this most excellent Parent, who we see cared for us even before we were born! How impious were it to tremble in distrust, lest we should one day be abandoned in our necessity by that kindness which, antecedent to our existence, displayed itself in a complete supply of all good things!

Where to?” Max asked as she climbed in. “I assume that you had some destination in mind when you cooked up that nonsense about needing your bags.” “I want to join Dom.” She stared him down, daring him to gainsay her. She’d take a hackney if she had to. “He’s probably still at Manton’s Investigations, so let’s start there.” Though a smile tugged at the duke’s lips, he merely gave the order to the coachman. As soon as they set off, however, he said, “You do realize that Dom is going to throttle me for helping you.” “I don’t see why,” she said lightly. “You are head of the Duke’s Men, aren’t you? Surely you can go wherever you please and involve yourself as much as you like.” As Lisette burst into laughter, Max shook his head. “My brother-in-law doesn’t exactly like having his agency called ‘the Duke’s Men.’ I’d keep that appellation under your hat, if I were you.” “Oh, that sounds so much like Dom,” Jane muttered, “not to appreciate a fellow who showed faith in him and was willing to use him to find his own cousin, not to mention invest in his business concern.” Lisette laughed even harder now, which only made Max wince. “What?” Jane asked. “What is it?” A flush spread over Max’s face. “Let’s just say that my part in…er…’the Duke’s Men’ has been greatly exaggerated by the papers. Rather tangential, really.” “In other words,” Lisette teased, “he pretty much did nothing. He didn’t even come up with the name, and he certainly didn’t hire Dom to find Victor. Tristan stumbled across Victor himself, and then…” Lisette spun out the story of how she had met Max and how Dom had become involved. How Max had made a grand gesture for the press to protect Tristan from George. “Oh, Lord,” Jane breathed. “That’s why you were all at George’s house that day.” The day she’d first seen Dom after nearly eleven years apart. “Exactly. I mean, Max does what he can to recommend the agency, and certainly Dom benefits from the excellent press he received as a result of Tristan’s finding Victor. But beyond that, Max has nothing to do with it. He has tried to invest in it, but Dom gets all hot under the collar every time he suggests it.” “What a shock,” Jane said sarcastically. She thought of Dom the Almighty, having his hard work and keen investigative sense attributed to some duke who’d simply taken up with his sister, and began to laugh. Then Lisette joined her, and eventually, Max. They laughed until tears rolled down Jane’s cheeks and Lisette was holding her sides. “Poor Dom,” Jane gasped, when she’d finally gained control of herself. “No matter how carefully he plans, someone always comes along to muck things up. We must all be quite a trial to him.” “Oh, indeed, we are,” Lisette said, sobering. “But honestly, he takes himself far too seriously, so it’s good for him.” She smiled at Jane. “You’re good for him. He needs a woman who stands firm when he tries to dictate how the world must be, a woman who will teach him that it’s all right if plans go awry. He needs to learn that he can pick up the pieces and still be happy, as long as he does it with the right person.” “I only hope he agrees with you,” Jane said. “I really do.” Because if she could be that woman for Dom--if he could let her be that woman for him--then they might have a chance, after all.

We're all destined for greater things in life. How you execute your plans to achieve that greatness lies solely in your hands.

23. Honour The Journey, Not the Destination As a team, when we came back from Everest, so often the first question someone would ask us was: ‘Did you make it to the summit?’ I was lucky - unbelievably lucky - to have reached that elusive summit, which also allowed me to reply to that summit question with a ‘yes’. My best buddy Mick found the question much harder, as a ‘no’ didn’t tell even part of his incredible story. He might not have made it to the very top of Everest, but he was as near as damn it. For three months we had climbed alongside each other, day and night. Mick had been involved in some real heroics up high when things had gone wrong, he had climbed with courage, dignity and strength, and he had reached within 300 feet (90 metres) of the summit. Yet somehow that didn’t count in the eyes of those who asked that ironically unimportant question: ‘Did you reach the top?’ For both of us, the journey was never about the summit. It was a journey we lived through together; we held each other’s lives in our hands every day, and it was an incredible journey of growth. The summit I only ever saw as a bonus. When we got that question on our return, I often got more frustrated for Mick than he did. He was smart and never saw it as a failure. He’d tell you that he was actually lucky - for the simple reason that he survived where four others that season had died. You see, Mick ran out of oxygen high up on the final face of Everest at some 28,000 feet (8,500 metres). Barely able to move, he crawled on all fours. Yet at that height, at the limit of exhaustion, he slipped and started to tumble down the sheer ice face. He told me he was certain he would die. By some miracle he landed on a small ledge and was finally rescued when two other climbers found him. Four other climbers hadn’t been so lucky. Two had died of the cold and two had fallen. Everest is unforgiving, especially when the weather turns. By the time I was back with Mick, down at Camp Two a couple of days later, he was a changed man. Humbled, grateful for life, and I had never loved him so much. So when everyone at home was asking him about the summit, or sympathizing with him for narrowly missing out, Mick knew better. He should have died up there. He knew he was plain lucky to be alive. ‘Failure had become his blessing, and life had become a great gift to him. And those are great lessons that many never learn - because you can only learn them through a life-changing journey, regardless of the destination. Consider the billionaire who flies into the South Pole for an hour to ‘experience’ it, compared to the man who has toiled, sweated and struggled across hundreds and hundreds of miles of ice, dragging a humble sledge. You see, it is the journey that makes the man. And life is all about our growth, not our trophies.

You may feel as though you’re at a disadvantage. It’s causing you to shrink back, to not pursue your dreams. Like Gideon, you may not be able to see it, but even the enemy knows you’re royalty. Even the enemy knows you are destined to do great things.

Keep giving. Don’t stop planting. Whatever grows, then great. Whatever dies, take little notice. If you plant enough, then the things that die or are stunted pale into insignificance next to everything else which has flourished. Use failures and flops as learning devices. Keep moving forwards. Keep investing yourself, your money, your time, and everything else you have to offer. Trust your own destiny, but don’t imagine that your destiny will destine on its own. Without you and your effort, your destiny won’t lift a finger.

I believe that Mormon would have us understand that the path to the Savior is more circuitous and scenic than one might expect. In 3–4 Nephi, coming to Christ is what happens when the disciple focuses on other things. We make progress on the road not by speeding as quickly and efficiently as we can to our destination but by stopping to help others who have broken down along the way and by taking detours to search for those who are lost or stranded...Mormon’s focus on other-centeredness and outward-orientation invites the disciple to see salvation less as a goal that can be sought out for its own sake and more as a byproduct of trying to love and serve others. It is the accumulation of small and simple things made great by God.

reward system But there’s a reward system you can use to keep yourself motivated. Here are some suggestions: Buy yourself an advent calendar, and for each day you don’t look at his profile or engage with him in any capacity, enjoy the treat for that day. If you can’t afford an advent calendar or can’t find one in the shops, make yourself a journal – on each successful day, write something amazing about yourself, and on a day where you did trip up, write something that reminds you of why you started doing this thirty-day challenge. Getting into the habit of saying nice things about yourself prepares you to become so used to compliments that you aren’t dangerously swooned when others recognise your greatness. Every ten days that pass without you breaking the rule, take yourself on a really nice solo date to an upscale bar, or your favourite club or restaurant, and imagine the room is full of men who are all waiting to be picked by you, the goddess. For even spicier results, wear something red so you feel even sexier. Getting into the habit of going out to bars and social environments alone will not just put you in a position of meeting new people, it will also quell your fear of being alone. There’s nothing more powerful than a woman who knows how to hold her own in a room full of strangers. Or, if you feel ready, each time you make it to the ten-day mark, why don’t you try practising your new confidence on your dating apps and let yourself be taken out? By the time the thirty-day window ends, you will have gone on three different dates with three new guys, which will significantly lower the hype around the man you’ve been thinking of. You never know: one of these guys could end up being far more interesting, way hotter and maybe even richer. As you get closer to the end of the thirty-day period, why not have a spa booked to mark the last day? It will be a period of reflection, relaxation, and remembering how far you’ve come within just a month of leaving a situation that could have dragged your life in a completely different direction. You deserve to meet the woman you’re destined to become: take the time to do so. Set a reminder on your phone every couple of days that says ‘It’s time to finally choose yourself for once. Don’t let him win!’ When it gets hard, ask yourself: At what point will I be the victor here? When will I finally walk away with my head held high? This must end at some point – why not now?

In ancient times, many great leaders, such as Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar, felt that they were descended from gods and part divine. Such self-belief would translate into high levels of confidence [... thus,] a self-fulling prophecy. You do not need to indulge in such grandiose thoughts, but feeling that you are destined for something great or important will give you a degree of resilience when people oppose or resist you. [...] You will continually try new things, even taking risks, confident in your ability to bounce back from failures and feeling destined to succeed.

Most people are happy with 90 percent good. Most leaders will take pity on their teams and just let it slide. But going from 90 to 95 percent is halfway to perfect. Getting the last part of the journey right is the only way to reach your destination. So you push. Yourself. The team. You push people to discover how great they can be. You push until they start pushing back. In these moments, always err on the side of almost-too-much. Keep pushing until you find out if what you’re asking for is actually impossible or just a whole lot of work. Get to the point of pain so you start to see when the pain is becoming real. That’s when you back down and find a new middle ground.

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it is a fruitless quest to try to blend in when you are created to stand out. You will do great things, go to interesting places, meet fascinating people. You are destined for something other than this.

The most effective people concentrate on their “areas of excellence,” that is, on the things they do best and on those high-impact activities that will advance their life-work. In being so consumed by the important things, they find it easy to say no to the less-than-worthy distractions that clamor for their attention. Michael Jordan, the best basketball player in the game’s history, did not negotiate his contracts, design his uniforms and prepare his travel schedules. He focused his time and energies on what he did best: playing basketball, and delegated everything else to his handlers. Jazz great Louis Armstrong did not spend his time selling tickets to his shows and setting up chairs for the audience. He concentrated on his point of brilliance: playing the trumpet. Learning to say no to the non-essentials will give you more time to devote to the things that have the power to truly improve the way you live and help you leave the legacy you know in your heart you are destined to leave.

In On Christian Doctrine, one of the great classics of Christian literature, Augustine draws a careful distinction between using things and enjoying things. He pictures us as exiles longing to return from a foreign land to our own country, where our true happiness lies. We are therefore pilgrims: travelers on the journey home. As with all travelers, we need certain things to help us arrive at our destination, including refreshment along the way. But there’s a problem, says Augustine, if we become so delighted with the pleasures of the journey that we’re unwilling to finish it quickly. If we’re not careful, we will lose interest in our home country, the place where true happiness awaits. When this happens, we’ve started to unduly enjoy the things that God intended to be used in helping us in our progress. And so as Augustine says, “If we wish to return to our home country, where alone we can be truly happy, we have to use this world, not enjoy it.”109

A flat drab mountain could produce its own light, no one in this whole world knows why, and if that was possible then of course there must be other things that seemed impossible but weren't, and so anything—great and terrible—felt possible to me now. I wondered what else there was out in the world that I had never seen through my lenses. I had speculated about the destination of a nonexistent desert road, I'd kept going. What other magic had I wrongly explained away? I felt like I'd lost something I hadn't ever had. A thousand things I didn't even know existed had to exist.

Morning, Vex. Forget something?” She almost asked him what until she saw the way his gaze smoldered and caressed her almost naked body. Oops. Had she jumped out of bed in only her panties? Nudity wasn’t something that Meena usually noted or cared about. Mother, on the other hand, was always yelling at her to put clothes on. She and Leo had a lot in common. “You should get dressed.” “Why? I’m perfectly comfortable.” So comfortable she brought her shoulders back and made sure to give her boobs a little jiggle. He noticed. He stared. Oh my. Was it getting hot in here? Funny how the heat in her body, though, didn’t stop her nipples from hardening as if struck by a cold breeze. Except, in this case, it was more of an ardent perusal. Did Leo imagine his mouth latched onto a sensitive peak just like she was? “While I am sure you are comfortable, if we’re to go out, then in order to avoid a possible arrest for indecent exposure, you might want to cover your assets.” “We’re going out? Together?” He nodded. “Where?” “It’s a surprise.” She clapped her hands and squealed, “Yay,” only to frown a second later. Leo was acting awfully strange. “Wait a second, this isn’t one of those things where you blindfold me and tell me you’ve got a great surprise, only to dump me on a twelve-hour train to Kansas, is it? Or a plane to Newfoundland, Canada?” His lips twitched. “No. I promise we have a destination, and I am going with you.” “And will I be back here tonight?” “Perhaps. Unless you choose to sleep elsewhere.” Those enigmatic words weren’t his last. “Be downstairs and ready in twenty minutes, Vex. I really want you to come.” Did he purr that last word? Was that even possible? Could he tease her any harder? Please. “How should I dress? Fancy, casual, slutty, or prim and proper?” She eyed him in his khaki shorts and collared short-sleeved shirt. Casual with a hint of elegance. He looked ready for a day at a gentleman’s golf club. And she wanted to be his corrupting caddy, who ruined his shot and dragged him in the woods to show him her version of a tee off. “Your clothes won’t matter. You won’t wear them for long.” Good thing she was close to a wall. Her knees weakened to the point that she almost buckled to the floor. Leaning against it, she wondered if he purposely teased her. Did her serious Pookie even realize how his words could be taken? He approached her until he stood right in front of her. Close enough she could have reached out and hugged him. She didn’t, but only because he drew her close. His essence surrounded her. His hands splayed over the flesh of her lower back, branding her. She leaned into him, totally relying on him to hold her up on wobbly legs. “What about breakfast?” she asked. “I’ve got pastries and coffee in my truck. Lots of yummy treats with lickable icing.” Staring at his mouth, she knew of only one treat she wanted to lick. Alas, she didn’t get a chance. With a slap on her ass, he walked off toward the condo door. Leo. Slapped. My. Ass. She gaped at his retreating broad back. “Don’t make me wait. I’d hate to start without you.” With a wink— yes, a real freaking wink— Leo shut the door behind him. He was waiting for her. Why the hell was she standing there? She sprinted for the shower.

I have now to ask, whether you can consent to part with your daughter early next spring, to see her no more in this world; whether you can consent to her departure, and her subjection to the hardships and sufferings of a missionary life; whether you can consent to her exposure to the dangers of the ocean; to the fatal influence of the southern climate of India [Judson’s first destination]; to every kind of want and distress; to degradation, insult, persecution, and perhaps a violent death.153

Everyone knew Sonja was destined for great things, but no one knew what to do with her until then. Even in academia, her natural habitat, she was an exotic species. Though her Russianness gave her certain dispensations, the idea that a young woman of any ethnicity could so excel in the hard sciences was a far-fetched fantasy. Their parents encouraged her at a distance. Neither understood the molecular formulas, electromagnetic fields, or anatomical minutiae that so captivated her, and so their support came by way of well-intentioned, inadequate generalities. Even after Sonja graduated secondary school at the top of her class and matriculated to the city university biology department, their parents found more to love in Natasha. Sonja’s gifts were too complex to be understood, and therefore less desirable. Natasha was beautiful and charming. They didn’t need MDs to know how to be proud of her.

THE CHARM OF THE STONES CONSECRATED TO DIANA To find a stone with a hole in it is a special sign of the favour of Diana, He who does so shall take it in his hand and repeat the following, having observed the ceremony as enjoined: — Scongiurazione della pietra bucata. Una pietra bucata U ho trovato; Ne ringrazio il destin, E k) spirito che su questa via Mi ha portata, Che passa essere il mio bene, E la mia buona fortuna! Mi alzo la mattina al alba, E a passegio me ne vo Nelle valli, monti e campi, La fortuna cercarvo Della ruta e la verbena, Quello so porta fortuna Me lo tengo in senno chiuso £ saperlo nessuno no le deve, £ cosi cio che commendo, " La verbena far ben per me ! Benedica quella strege! Quella fata che mi segna!" Diana fu quella Che mi venne la notte in sogno E mi disse : " Se tu voir tener Le cattive persone da te lontano, Devi tenere sempre ruta con te, Sempre ruta con te e verbena!" Diana, tu che siei la regina Del cielo e della terra e dell* inferno, E siei la prottetrice degli infelici, Dei ladri, degli assassini, e anche Di donne di mali afifari se hai conosciuto, Che non sia stato V indole cattivo Delle persone, tu Diana, Diana li hai fatti tutti felici! Una altra volta ti scongiuro Che tu non abbia ne pace ne bene, Tu possa essere sempre in mezzo alle pene^ Fino che la grazia che io ti chiedo Non mi farai! THE CHARM OF THE STONES Invocation to the Holy-Stone} I have found A holy-stone upon the ground. O Fate! I thank thee for the happy find, Also the spirit who upon this road Hath given it to me; And may it prove to be for my true good And my good fortune I I rise in the morning by the earliest dawn, And I go forth to walk through (pleasant) vales. All in the mountains or the meadows fair, Seeking for luck while onward still I roam, Seeking for rue and vervain scented sweet, Because they bring good fortune unto all. I keep them safely guarded in my bosom, That none may know it—'tis a secret thing. And sacred too, and thus I speak the spell: " O vervain ! ever be a benefit, And may thy blessing be upon the witch Or on the fairy who did give thee to me ! " It was Diana who did come to me, All in the night in a dream, and said to me: " If thou would'st keep all evil folk afar, Then ever keep the vervain and the rue Safely beside thee I" I hole ii . But such a slone is IS really a claim to the ARADIA Great Diana I thou Who art the queen of heaven and of earth, And of the inferna! lands—yea, thou who art Protectress of all men unfortunate, Of thieves and murderers, and c Who lead an evil life, and yet hast known That their nature was not evil, thou, Diana, Hast still conferred on them some joy in life.' Or I may truly at another time So conjure thee that thou shalt have no peace Or happiness, for thou shalt ever be In suffering until thou grantest that Which 1 require in strictest faith from thee! [Here

Vacchogata asked Buddha, “What is the reason Master ,that we should not ponder over them?” “We should not ponder over them because ,such brooding has nothing to do with genuine pure conduct, does not lead to aversion, detachment, extinction, nor to peace, nor to full comprehension, enlightenment and  Nirvana. People those who are accustomed to thinking in these terms, will remain entangled and not attain liberation.  Neither of these views corresponds to the way things really are.   The world does not exist absolutely or does not exist absolutely in time. The world is dependent on causes and conditions i.e. ignorance, craving, and clinging of living beings. Hence the question of the absolute existence or nonexistence of the world is unanswerable. Enlightened person understands that the view which is true in all respects cannot be given any particular description.” Vacchogata was filled with joy, but he still had some more questions left unanswered. “Is it true Master Gautama, that enlightened person like you, ‘exists’ after death?” Buddha remained silent. “Is it true Master Gautama, that enlightened person like you, ‘doesn’t exist’ after death?” “Is it true Master Gautama, that enlightened person like you, both ‘exists’ and ‘does not exist’ after death?” Buddha still, remained silent. “Then it must be true Master Gautama, that people like you, neither ‘exists’ nor ‘doesn’t exist’ after death? Buddha smiled and asked Vacchogata, “Suppose someone was to ask you, 'A fire that has gone out in front of you, in which direction from here has it gone? Is it East, West, North or South?' Thus asked, how would you reply?"   "That doesn't apply, Master Gautama. Any fire burning dependent on a sustenance of grass and timber, being undernourished — from having consumed that sustenance and not being offered any other — is classified simply as 'out'”, replied Vacchogata. The Buddha further continued: "Even so, Vaccha, any physical form by which one describing the Buddha would describe him: That form the Buddha has abandoned, its root destroyed, made like a Palmyra stump, deprived of the conditions of development, not destined for future arising. Freed from the classification of form, Vaccha, the Buddha is deep, boundless, hard to fathom, like the sea. 'Reappears or exists' doesn't apply. 'Does not exist' doesn't apply. 'Both does & does not exist' doesn't apply. 'Neither exists nor does not exist' doesn't apply.