Fluid Movement Quotes

He has eyes like vast pools and a jaw made from shipwrecks and broken coral. Every movement he makes is as quick and fluid as a tidal wave. He belongs to the ocean. He is made from it, as much as I am.

His movements were so graceful that I wondered if he had been a dancer, but his words betrayed to me that his fluid gestures were those of a trained killer.

Maybe I owe you something too, human," she said, drawing her pistol. Butler almost reacted, but decided to give Holly the benefit of the doubt. Captain Short plucked a gold coin from her belt, flicking it fifty feet into the moonlit sky. With one fluid movement, she brought her weapon up and loosed a single blast. The coin rose another fifty feet, then spun earthward. Artemis somehow managed to snatch it from the air. The first cool movement of his young life. "Nice shot," he said. The previously solid disk now had a tiny hole in the center. Holly held out her hand, revealing the still raw scar on her finger. "If it wasn't for you, I would have missed altogether. No mech-digit can replicate that kind of accuracy. So, thank you too, I suppose." Artemis held out the coin. "No," said Holly. "You keep it, to remind you." "To remind me?" Holly stared at him frankly. "To remind you that deep beneath the layers of deviousness, you have a spark of decency. Perhaps you could blow on that spark occasionally." Artemis closed his fingers around the coin. It was warm against his palm. "Yes, perhaps.

I watch her as she leaves. Everything about her is fluid as a river. Her messy hair, her xylophone voice, the strokes of her paintbrush. Even her camouflage army jacket hangs loose, flowing like ribbons.

With its mysterious, fluid movement, the snail was the quintessential tai chi master.

One becomes vulnerable when one stops to think about winning, losing, taking advantage, impressing or disregarding the opponent. When the mind stops, even for a single instant, the body freezes, and free, fluid movement is lost.

Out of absolutely nowhere I felt a sudden, sweet shot of joy, piercing and distilled as the jolt I imagine heroin users get when the fix hits the vein. It was my partner bracing herself on her hands as she slid fluidly off the desk, it was the neat practiced movement of flipping my notebook shut one-handed, it was my superintendent wriggling into his suit jacket and covertly checking his shoulders for dandruff, it was the garishly lit office with a stack of marker-labeled case files sagging in the corner and evening rubbing up against the window. It was the realization, all over again, that this was real and it was my life. Maybe Katy Devlin, if she had made it that far, would have felt this way about blisters on her toes, the pungent smell of sweat and floor wax in the dance studios, the early-morning breakfast bells raced down echoing corridors. Maybe she, like me, would have loved the tiny details and the inconveniences even more dearly than the wonders, because they are the things that prove you belong.

In its rational form [dialectic] is a scandal and abomination to bourgeoisdom and its doctrinaire professors, because it includes in its comprehension and affirmative recognition of the existing state of things, at the same time also, the recognition of the negation of that state, of its inevitable breaking up; because it regards every historically developed social form as in fluid movement, and therefore takes into account its transient nature not less than its momentary existence because it lets nothing impose upon it, and is in its essence critical and revolutionary.

In a single, fluid movement, I sank down, burying him inside me.

The belt slid down her thin hips, and she nervously gripped at it, pulling it up. Short sleeves showed her very thin arms and big delicate elbow joints. Her body was all concave and jerkily fluid lines; it moved with sensitive looseness, loosely threaded together: each movement had a touch of exaggeration , as though some secret power kept springing out.

I know you,” he continued. “Wantin’ everything, gettin’ none of it. I get that. Hell, I feel that too. You don’t know shit about me, but I know you. Fuck, I know you better than you know yourself.” He released me and all at once began backing away. Stopping in the center of his room, he gripped the hem of his black T-shirt, pulled the threadbare material up over his head, and tossed it aside. Then he kicked off his boots, sending them flying across the room where they hit the wall with a loud thud. Then in one fluid movement, Hawk had removed both his leathers and boxers. “What are you doing?” I whispered, suddenly breathless. “Givin’ you somethin’,” he said.

I’m training tuna fish to land travel using slices of tomatoes as wheels. You wouldn't believe how many swimming creatures are jealous of ducks' versatility of movement.

God, in eternity, exists in a dynamic mutuality co-equally and co-eternally - three "modes of being" or "persons" and yet one essence. It is a dynamic, fluid movement that does not change in essence.

The distribution of wealth and income is primarily the role and responsibility and freedom of individual people and businesses through their voluntary economic interaction with other people and businesses. And their voluntary exchange of economic value through products, services, and ideas. In this way, social mobility is maximized and a fluid class structure allows for both upward and downward economic movements; this is social justice.

The idea that the stars literally influence men (by a falling fluid, an influenza) is plainly untenable. But that the movements of the constellations are a clock by which earthly changes can be measured is less easy to dismiss.

Sweet bleedin’ Jesus,” Faolan exploded, snatching up the shirt and yanking it back down over her head in one fluid movement. “Do ye think to display yerself for every man on the beach? Ye doona allow me to look and I’m bloody livin’ with ye.

Would that it were possible for you to grow wings, and soar into the air! Poised between earth and heaven, you might see the solid earth, the fluid sea and the streaming rivers, the wandering air, the penetrating fire, the courses of the stars, and the swiftness of the movement with which heaven encompasses all. What happiness were that, my son, to see all these borne along with one impulse, and to behold Him who is unmoved moving in all that moves, and Him who is hidden made manifest through his works!

Xuan’s movements were fluid and effortless, and I followed his lead with ease. The world around us faded away, and for a few precious moments, it was just the two of us, lost in the music in a peaceful quiet. I prayed that God would look down on us and see the beauty of our existence, and the trueness of our love. I prayed that He would decide to spare Xuan and leave us alone for many years. I prayed for a miracle.

Her hair, once pale, now shone red, a shock of color against her still porcelain skin, bold as blood. It skimmed her shoulders as she twirled, and bowed, a bright streak at the center of a deadly circle. Ojka danced, and the metal kept pace, the perfect partner to her fluid movements, and the entire time, she kept her eyes closed.

Yesterday you were riding on my shoulders," he murmured. "The house was full of noise. Clomping up and down the steps,doors slamming. Scattered toys. I don't know how many times I stepped on one of those damned little cars of Brady's/" Turning back, he ran a hand over her hair. "I miss that.I miss all of you." "Daddy." In one fluid movement she rose and slid her arms around him. "It's the way it's supposed to work. Three of you off at college, Brendon moving around to get a handle on the busines of things.It's what he wants. And you, building your own.But..I miss the crowd of you." "I promise to slam the door the very first chance I get." "That might help." "Sentimental softie.I love that about you." "Lucky for me.

So the question is, what can I do to motivate you, Polly?” She eyes me salaciously and I drop my gaze, unable to return the intensity. Gently, she uses one finger to lift my chin and make my eyes meet her own. They are a vivid blue and alive with desire for me. The air around us is charged and the tension is palpable. My soaking pussy is a testament to how much I already want her… “Well?” she asks, breaking my train of thought. I gaze at her face; just a few inches from mine. “I – I’ve never done this before…” “Done what Polly?” Rachel chides, removing her finger. I miss the contact immediately and am rueful to have upset her. She raises one eyebrow at me. “Thought about what motivates you?” she asks, sardonically. “I’ve never been like this… with a woman, I mean…” She rises from the sofa in one fluid movement and stands above me. “Kneel Polly.” Surprised by the order, I blink at her before I respond. “Excuse me?” Rachel smiles at me. “Get. On. Your. Knees,” she says, articulating each word, and pointing to the floor in front of her. “I am going to find a way to motivate you.

We are all many things. Sometimes people get used to us being the one thing they most expect from us, and they don't know how to handle the other many things we are and have to offer. This is not our limitation to own. Let's be whatever many things our heart calls us to be. There's not a lot of consistency in freedom, aside from fluid movement among the many things we are. And that's a mighty beautiful thing.

Nala pushed her lithe body from the desk and swept across the room, her stilettos clicking against the tiled floor. Her movements were as fluid and elegant as the gazelles that inhabited the grassy savannas in Africa. She stood silently in front of the open window, the chiffon curtains floating in the breeze around her. She presented an ethereal vision, which held Abayomi spellbound. Beautiful on the outside. Lethal on the inside, he thought to himself.

Unfortunately, repentance is commonly viewed as something we do to get on God’s good side. We think to ourselves, “If I feel sorry enough, get angry enough at my sin, then God will forgive me.” This view splits the coin of repentance. It assumes that turning from sin is our work, and returning to Christ is God’s work. But, remember, repentance is one movement, one coin. To turn from sin is to turn to Christ, a fluid movement of grace, which is a gift from God (Rom. 2:4).

Are my friends dead?” Kestrel demanded. “Tell me.” “I will tell you after I have set you on that horse and you haven’t fought me, and after I am seated behind you and you don’t have any clever ideas to shove me off or throw us both. I’ll tell you when we’ve made it to the harbor.” He came close. She didn’t say anything, and he must have decided that she agreed, or maybe he didn’t want to hear her voice any more than she wanted to speak, because he didn’t wait for an answer. He lifted Kestrel onto Javelin, then settled behind her in a swift, fluid movement. Kestrel felt the lines of his body fit along hers. His closeness was a shock. Kestrel decided, however, to agree to the bargain. She didn’t signal Javelin to rear. She didn’t drive her head back into Arin’s jaw. She decided to behave. She focused on what mattered. That kiss had meant nothing. Nothing. What remained was the hand she had drawn, and how she would play it. The horses burst from the stables.

Because the quadriceps group is dramatically stronger, the hamstrings must be able to work at their optimal capacity in order for the movement to be fluid. If the hamstrings group is weakened or inflexible, the resulting imbalance will lead to injury.

She had such an interesting way of moving. Not fluid and graceful like a young lady who had studied the social arts, but rather each move was brisk, efficient. As if she calculated the most effectual order of movements and performed them accordingly as she did the simple tasks of meal preparation.

There is no greater wonder than to range The starry heights, to leave the earth’s dull regions, To ride the clouds, to stand on Atlas’ shoulders, And see, far off, far down, the little figures Wandering here and there, devoid of reason, Anxious, in fear of death, and so advise them, And so make fate an open book… …Full sail, I voyage Over the boundless ocean, and I tell you Nothing is permanent in all the world. All things are fluid; every image forms, Wandering through change. Time is itself a river In constant movement, and the hours flow by Like water, wave on wave, pursued, pursuing, Forever fugitive, forever new. That which has been, is not; that which was not, Begins to be; motion and moment always In process of renewal… Not even the so-called elements are constant… Nothing remains the same: the great renewer, Nature, makes form from form, and, oh, believe me That nothing ever dies….

Around 6:30, I fire up one of the playlists that my husband, Phil, has made. Nina Simone starts to sing and my movements become more fluid. I love to dance. Guests might see me on the line and think I’m cooking, but I’m really feeling the music, feeling the timing—dancing and cooking at the same time.

I'd better light the charcoal," Gennie said after a moment. "I didn't ask before," Grant began as they started down the pier. "But do you know how to cook on one of those things?" "My dear Mr. Campbell," Gennie said in a fluid drawl, "you appear to have several misconceptions about southern women.I can cook on a hot rock." "And wash shirts in a fast stream." "Every bit as well as you could," Gennie tossed back. "You might have some advantage on me in mechanical areas, but I'd say we're about even otherwise." "A strike for the women's movement." Gennie narrowed her eyes. "Are you about to say something snide and unintelligent?

Callie rises up inside me, wearing my skin like a loose robe. She sticks her little hands into the baggy sleeves of my arms. She inserts her chimp’s feet through the trousers of my legs. On the sidewalk I’ll feel her girlish walk take over, and the movement brings back a kind of emotion, a desolate and gossipy sympathy for the girls I see coming home from school. This continues for a few more steps. Calliope’s hair tickles the back of my throat. I feel her press tentatively on my chest—that old nervous habit of hers—to see if anything is happening there. The sick fluid of adolescent despair that runs through her veins overflows again into mine.

The smart voter is politically-fluid in that they don't rigidly believe that the same viewpoint, party manifesto or individual is the poultice for all maladies in every election. They attune themselves to the zeitgeist, search for potentially-reputable parties and candidates with suitable policies and cast their vote accordingly.

The third dream was hard to put into words. It was a rambling, incoherent dream without any setting. All that was there was a feeling of being in motion. Aomame was ceaselessly moving through time and space It didn't matter when or where this was All that mattered was this movement. Everything was fluid, and a specific meaning was born of that fluidity. But as she gave herself up to it, she found her body growing transparent. She could see through her hands to the other side. Her bones, organs, and womb became visible. At this rate she might very well no longer exist. After she could no longer see herself, Aomame wondered what could possibly come then. She had no answer.

Each ribosome had more than fifty different components. If you broke down a slew of them into their separate parts and thoroughly mixed them up in a suspending fluid, then Brownian movement—caused by encounters with molecules of the suspending medium—kept knocking them against one another until the fifty-some parts assembled into whole ribosomes.

It’s a strange irony that most people who are truly creative don’t really know where their ideas come from. To be a writer, just like all crafts, is an art form. You can take evening classes in writing at the local library, where you go along every Tuesday night and read out your weekly piece, and that can serve to improve your expertise a little, but to be a Wrong Planet writer you have to first of all be an artist. The art of searching for words radiates from deep inside the writer, and I truly feel that when a true writer is sitting quietly at his desk his movements are beautifully interwoven. His breathing will even come with an effortless grace. The ability to move fluidly in his study in this manner begins with a truly intuitive knowledge, although if the truth were known, there’s a little bit of insanity in the writer that does everyone an awful lot of good.

Meditation is a state of mind which looks at everything with complete attention, totally, not just parts of it. And no one can teach you how to be attentive. If any system teaches you how to be attentive, then you are attentive to the system and that is not attention. Meditation is one of the greatest arts in life – perhaps the greatest, and one cannot possibly learn it from anybody, that is the beauty of it. It has no technique and therefore no authority. When you learn about yourself, watch yourself, watch the way you walk, how you eat, what you say, the gossip, the hate, the jealousy – if you are aware of all that in yourself, without any choice, that is part of meditation. So meditation can take place when you are sitting in a bus or walking in the woods full of light and shadows, or listening to the singing of birds or looking at the face of your wife or child. In the understanding of meditation there is love, and love is not the product of systems, of habits, of following a method. Love cannot be cultivated by thought. Love can perhaps come into being when there is complete silence, a silence in which the meditator is entirely absent; and the mind can be silent only when it understands its own movement as thought and feeling. To understand this movement of thought and feeling there can be no condemnation in observing it. To observe in such a way is the discipline, and that kind of discipline is fluid, free, not the discipline of conformity.

Strategy is often expected to start with a description of a desired end state, but in practice there is rarely an orderly movement to goals set in advance. Instead, the process evolves through a series of states, each one not quite what was anticipated or hoped for, requiring a reappraisal and modification of the original strategy, including ultimate objectives. The picture of strategy that should emerge from this book is one that is fluid and flexible, governed by the starting point and not the end point.

Desegregating the activity of civil society in the West, as well as inside Israel, illustrates the very essence of a one-state solution when the one-state movement is still in its embryonic stage. An activity around themes, and not according to national, religious, or ethnic identity, can be the unique contribution of the one-state movement. But again themes can sound too abstract and fluid for a movement that seeks desperately to change the public mind after years of being conditioned by a distorted historical narrative, manipulated media coverage, and a lethal futuristic vision.

An “infinite number”? For Leonardo, that was not just a figure of speech. When he spoke of the infinite variety in nature, and especially of phenomena such as flowing water, he was making a distinction based on his preference for analog over digital systems. In an analog system, there are infinite gradations. That applies to most of the things that fascinated him: sfumato shadows, colors, movement, waves, the passage of time, the flow of fluids. That is why he believed that geometry was better than arithmetic at describing nature, and even though calculus had not yet been invented, he seemed to sense the need for such a mathematics of continuous quantities.

You are a fertile God. Many seeds are dropped into the soil. Many do not sprout. Yet beneath the appearance of waste nothing is wasted, nothing lost. Giant trees crash to the forest floor, decompose, and become the soil out of which the saplings arise. Similarly, in human affairs, movements are created, rise, do Your work in the world, decline, go back into the soil, and provide the rich humus out of which new life springs. Generations come and go. Sun and rain, winter and summer, seed time and harvest. Always Your Word remains constant. Your people are called over and over, generation after generation, back into this constancy, back to this mysterious fluid stability—the only security worth having. Can You not waste a little more time on us?

The first movements of the fetus produce this sense of the splitting subject; the fetus's movements are wholly mine, completely within me, condition my experience and space. Only I have access to these movements from their origin, as it were. For months only I can witness this life within me, and it is only under my direction of where to put their hands that others can feel these movements. I have a privileged relation to this other life, not unlike that which I have to my dreams and thoughts, which I can tell someone but which cannot be an object for both of us in the same way... Pregnancy challenges the integration of my body experience by rendering fluid the boundary between what is within, myself, and what is outside, separate. I experience my insides as the space of another, yet my own body.

When Pribram encountered Bernstein's work he immediately recognized its implications. Maybe the reason hidden patterns surfaced after Bernstein Fourier-analyzed his subject's movements was because that was how movements are stored in the brain. This was an exciting possibility, for if the brain analyzed movements by breaking them down into their frequency components, it explained the rapidity with which we learn many complex physical tasks. For instance, we do not learn to ride a bicycle by painstakingly memorizing every tiny feature of the process. We learn by grasping the whole flowing movement. The fluid wholeness that typifies how we learn so many physical activities is difficult to explain if our brains are storing information in a bit-by-bit manner. But it becomes much easier to understand if the brain is Fourier-analyzing such tasks and absorbing them as a whole.

His expression was perturbed, as if he’d been reminded of something he had wanted to forget. But as his gaze slid over her bewildered face, his mouth curved a little, and he settled into the cradle of her body with an insolent familiarity that temporarily robbed her of breath. “Mr. Rohan … how … why … what are you doing here?” He replied without moving, as if he were planning to lie there and converse all day. His infinitely polite tone was an unsettling contrast to the intimacy of their position. “Miss Hathaway. What a pleasant surprise. As it happens, I’m visiting friends. And you?” “I live here.” “I don’t think so. This is Lord Westcliff’s estate.” Her heart thundered in her breast as her body absorbed the details of him. “I didn’t mean precisely here, I meant over there, on the other side of the woods. The Ramsay estate. We’ve just taken up residence.” She couldn’t seem to stop herself from chattering in the aftermath of nerves and fright. “What was that noise? What were you doing? Why do you have that tattoo on your arm? It’s a pooka—an Irish creature—isn’t it?” That last question earned her an arrested stare. Before Rohan could reply, the other two men approached. From her prone position, Amelia had an upside-down view of them. Like Rohan, they were in their shirtsleeves, with waistcoats left unbuttoned. One of them was a portly old gentleman with a shock of silver hair. He held a small wood-and-metal sextant, which had been strung around his neck on a lanyard. The other, black-haired man looked to be in his late thirties. He wasn’t as tall as Rohan, but he had an air of authority tempered with aristocratic arrogance. Amelia made a helpless movement, and Rohan lifted away from her with fluid ease. He helped her stand, his arm steadying her. “How far did it go?” he asked the men. “Devil take the rocket,” came a gravelly reply. “What is the woman’s condition?” “Unharmed.” The silver-haired gentleman remarked, “Impressive, Rohan. You covered a distance of fifty yards in no more than five or six seconds.” “I would hardly miss a chance to leap on a beautiful woman,” Rohan said, causing the older man to chuckle.

The same force that moves the tides, opens a flower, or creates lightning in a storm animates our bodies. This life force moves the breath, the fluids, and the current flowing through our nerves as well as the inner workings of each and every cell. This animating principle is the force behind all the organs of perception: hearing, touch, taste, smell, and sight. Although not itself a solid substance, this life force infuses the body and manifests as the light shining from our eyes, the glow of the skin, and the timbre of the voice. As this force moves through the body, it influences the shape and form of our structure, creating our posture, the rhythm of our walk, and the character of our faces. Everything that has ever happened to us—our birth, the fall from a tree at the age of six, our thoughts and feelings, what we eat, the climate in which we live—is inscribed upon our body, creating a living archaeological record. When we develop an awareness of the interior movement that permeates the body, we gain access to the movement of our minds. Yoga is a means of reviving our connection to this natural wisdom.

LIGHT AS AN EXCITATION OF SPACE Let's try and understand light in terms of an excitation of empty space-even if that makes no immediate sense. We might alternatively understand light in terms of a field, as we introduced that term in chapter 2. But light differs from the fields of temperature distributions, of sound, or of water in fluid motion described there: Whereas those phenomena are due to the composite action or motion of molecules at a more elementary level, light has its own reality at that level. It cannot be understood in terms of an oscillation of some matter that also exists in the dark-no, light is nothing but just that, light. It is an oscillation of an abstract nature, equivalent to a set of numbers that are assigned to each point in space. True, these abstract numbers have implications-most notably, they imply energy. But while a water wave transports energy by the movement of water molecules, the passing of a light wave does not mean that anything material oscillates. The energy of the liquid wave is the energy associated with gravitation and motion of its molecules; the energy of light is energy pure and simple, associated with every illuminated point in space.

Our approach and method of presentation is also radically different from traditional fare. For example, the complex series of decisions, movements, and fighting on July 2 are always—always—broken apart and tendered to readers in separate chunks. The fighting around Devil’s Den and Little Round Top is usually handled in one chapter, the Peach Orchard salient in another section, Cemetery Ridge in yet another chapter, and so on. The consequence of this customary method of presentation compartmentalizes these phases of the engagement into mini-battles comprising separate actions. And that is how most students of Gettysburg have come to view them. But they were not unrelated sequestered endeavors. Rather, they were part of one overall interlocking strategy of attack that came much closer to breaking apart and decisively defeating Meade’s army than anyone heretofore has fully explained. Thus, Chapter 7—all 137 pages of it—is presented as a single fluid event so that readers may fully comprehend what Lee intended to accomplish with his echelon attack, how the attack was progressing, where it broke down, and who was responsible—and just how close Lee came to realizing his bid for victory on Northern soil.

She did not answer. Or, rather, she answered by sliding long fingers across Kassad’s chest, ripping away the leather thongs which bound the rough vest. Her hands found his shirt. It was soaked with blood and ripped halfway down the front. The woman ripped it open the rest of the way. She moved against him now, her fingers and lips on his chest, hips already beginning to move. Her right hand found the cords to his trouser front, ripped them free. Kassad helped her pull off the rest of his clothes, removed hers with three fluid movements. She wore nothing under her shirt and coarse-cloth trousers. Kassad’s hand slid between her thighs, behind her, cupped her moving buttocks, pulled her closer, and slid to the moist roughness in front. She opened to him, her mouth closing on his. Somehow, with all of their motion and disrobing, their skin never lost contact. Kassad felt his own excitement rubbing against the cusp of her belly. She rolled above him then, her thighs astride his hips, her gaze still locked with his. Kassad had never been so excited. He gasped as her right hand went behind her, found him, guided him into her. When he opened his eyes again she was moving slowly, her head back, eyes closed. Kassad’s hands moved up her sides to cup her perfect breasts. Nipples hardened against his palms. They made love then. Kassad, at twenty-three standard years, had been in love once and had enjoyed sex many times. He thought he knew the way and the why of it. There was nothing in his experience to that moment which he could not have described with a phrase and a laugh to his squadmates in the hold of a troop transport With the calm, sure cynicism of a twenty-three-year-old veteran he was sure that he would never experience anything that could not be so described, so dismissed. He was wrong. He could never adequately share the sense of the next few minutes with anyone else. He would never try. They made love in a sudden shaft of late October light with a carpet of leaves and clothes beneath them and a film of blood and sweat oiling the sweet friction between them. Her green eyes stared down at Kassad, widening slightly when he began moving quickly, closing at the same second he closed his. They moved together then in the sudden tide of sensation as old and inevitable as the movement of worlds: pulses racing, flesh quickening with its own moist purposes, a further, final rising together, the world receding to nothing at all—and then, still joined by touch and heartbeat and the fading thrill of passion, allowing consciousness to slide back to separate flesh while the world flowed in through forgotten senses. They lay next to each other.

FASCIA: THE TIES THAT BIND Imagine a collagen-rich, stretchy slipcover for every organ, nerve, bone, and muscle in our bodies, and you start to get a sense of how fundamental connective tissue—specifically fascia—is to the entire body. Suspending our organs inside our torso, connecting our head to our back to our feet, fascia protects, supports, and literally binds our body together. Fascia can be gossamer-thin and translucent, like a spider web, or thick and tough like rope. Ounce for ounce, fascia is stronger than steel. Other specialized types of connective tissue include bones, ligaments, tendons, cartilage, and fat (adipose) tissue. Even blood, strictly speaking, is considered connective tissue. But to me, the most exciting aspect of the latest research on connective tissue relates to fascia. Fascia is the stretchy tissue that forms an uninterrupted, three-dimensional web within our body. Our body has sheets, bags, and strings of fascia of varying thickness and size, some superficial and some deep. Fascia envelops both individual microscopic muscle filaments as well as whole muscle groups, such as the trapezius, pectorals, and quadriceps. For example, one of the largest fascia configurations in the body is known as the “trousers,” a massive sheet of fascia that crosses over the knees and ends near the waist, giving the appearance of short leggings. This fascia trouser is thicker around the knees and thinner as it continues up the legs and over the hips, thickening again near the waist. When the fascia trouser is healthy, supple, and resilient, it acts like a girdle, giving the body a firm shape. Fascia helps muscles transmit their force so we can convert that force into movement. The system of fascia is bound by tensile links (think of the structure of a geodesic dome, like the one at Epcot in Disney World), with space and fluid between the links that can help absorb external pressure and more evenly distribute force across the fascial structure. This allows our bodies to withstand tremendous force instead of absorbing it in one local area, which would lead to increased pain and injury. Fascia is also a second nervous system in and of itself, with almost 10 times the number of sensory nerve endings as muscle. Helene Langevin, director of the Osher Center for Integrative Medicine at Harvard Medical School, has done landmark studies on the function and importance of connective tissue and its impact on pain. One of the leading researchers in the field today, Langevin describes fascia as a “living matrix” whose health is essential to our well-being.

You!’ the first guard yelled. ‘Hands on your head, don’t move.’ Wing slowly put his hands on his head, showing no hint of emotion. ‘What the hell?’ the other guard said. ‘He’s just a kid.’ He pulled a pair of handcuffs from his belt and slowly moved behind Wing and grasped one of his wrists. In one fluid motion, Wing grabbed the guard’s own wrist with his free hand and twisted hard. There was a sickening crunch, the guard howling in pain as Wing stepped backwards, too close for the man to bring his gun to bear. He pulled the guard’s wounded arm further over his own shoulder, dragging the man closer, and jerked his head backwards, his skull connecting with the man’s nose with a crunch. Wing rotated around the guard, pressing the wounded arm up into the small of the man’s back and ducking behind him, giving the other guard no clean shot without hitting his associate. He pushed hard, sending the stunned guard staggering towards his partner, and delivered a sharp kick to the base of his spine. The wounded guard’s momentum sent him careering into the other man, yowling with pain and confusion. Wing took two short steps and in a blur of movement pulled the handcuffs from the wounded man’s belt and snapped them closed around both his broken wrist and the wrist of the unwounded guard’s gun hand. Wing pressed his fingers into the pressure point behind the wounded guard’s ear and he collapsed, instantly unconscious, pulling the other guard down with him and pinning his gun to the ground. The conscious guard snatched for the gun with his free hand, but Wing dropped on to him, his knee pressing into his throat hard enough to choke him but without crushing his windpipe. Wing delivered a sharp knuckle jab to the guard’s shoulder and his free arm was instantly disabled too. Wing could hear the sound of at least half a dozen more guards racing up the stairs from below. He knew there would be more than he could handle. He reached down and took a smoke grenade from the webbing on the pinned guard’s chest and pulled the pin with his teeth, tossing it through the doorway into the stairwell. There were cries of confusion from just below as the confined space filled with impenetrable clouds of white smoke. Wing pulled a flashbang stun grenade from the other side of the pinned guard’s webbing and waited a couple of seconds before tossing it into the stairwell too. He closed his eyes, the flash of the grenade clear even through his eyelids. ‘Who the hell are you?’ the guard pinned beneath Wing gasped. ‘Just a kid,’ Wing said with a slight smile and punched him unconscious.

Fascism rested not upon the truth of its doctrine but upon the leader’s mystical union with the historic destiny of his people, a notion related to romanticist ideas of national historic flowering and of individual artistic or spiritual genius, though fascism otherwise denied romanticism’s exaltation of unfettered personal creativity. The fascist leader wanted to bring his people into a higher realm of politics that they would experience sensually: the warmth of belonging to a race now fully aware of its identity, historic destiny, and power; the excitement of participating in a vast collective enterprise; the gratification of submerging oneself in a wave of shared feelings, and of sacrificing one’s petty concerns for the group’s good; and the thrill of domination. Fascism’s deliberate replacement of reasoned debate with immediate sensual experience transformed politics, as the exiled German cultural critic Walter Benjamin was the first to point out, into aesthetics. And the ultimate fascist aesthetic experience, Benjamin warned in 1936, was war. Fascist leaders made no secret of having no program. Mussolini exulted in that absence. “The Fasci di Combattimento,” Mussolini wrote in the “Postulates of the Fascist Program” of May 1920, “. . . do not feel tied to any particular doctrinal form.” A few months before he became prime minister of Italy, he replied truculently to a critic who demanded to know what his program was: “The democrats of Il Mondo want to know our program? It is to break the bones of the democrats of Il Mondo. And the sooner the better.” “The fist,” asserted a Fascist militant in 1920, “is the synthesis of our theory.” Mussolini liked to declare that he himself was the definition of Fascism. The will and leadership of a Duce was what a modern people needed, not a doctrine. Only in 1932, after he had been in power for ten years, and when he wanted to “normalize” his regime, did Mussolini expound Fascist doctrine, in an article (partly ghostwritten by the philosopher Giovanni Gentile) for the new Enciclopedia italiana. Power came first, then doctrine. Hannah Arendt observed that Mussolini “was probably the first party leader who consciously rejected a formal program and replaced it with inspired leadership and action alone.” Hitler did present a program (the 25 Points of February 1920), but he pronounced it immutable while ignoring many of its provisions. Though its anniversaries were celebrated, it was less a guide to action than a signal that debate had ceased within the party. In his first public address as chancellor, Hitler ridiculed those who say “show us the details of your program. I have refused ever to step before this Volk and make cheap promises.” Several consequences flowed from fascism’s special relationship to doctrine. It was the unquestioning zeal of the faithful that counted, more than his or her reasoned assent. Programs were casually fluid. The relationship between intellectuals and a movement that despised thought was even more awkward than the notoriously prickly relationship of intellectual fellow travelers with communism. Many intellectuals associated with fascism’s early days dropped away or even went into opposition as successful fascist movements made the compromises necessary to gain allies and power, or, alternatively, revealed its brutal anti-intellectualism. We will meet some of these intellectual dropouts as we go along. Fascism’s radical instrumentalization of truth explains why fascists never bothered to write any casuistical literature when they changed their program, as they did often and without compunction. Stalin was forever writing to prove that his policies accorded somehow with the principles of Marx and Lenin; Hitler and Mussolini never bothered with any such theoretical justification. Das Blut or la razza would determine who was right.

He was amazing. He was addicting. At that moment I knew...Owen Mycroft wasn't just a male. This music was of another world, his fluid movements were unlike any human on Earth and sparks flew from his eyes. Couldn't anyone else in the room see those fireworks? Was I the only one? I didn't care what he was. I was in his world now.

I’ve told Miss Teeta a thousand times, it’s no good to keep fixing this ole piece of junk. Everything’s gotta die sometime.” The young man seemed to be talking more to himself than to her. As Miranda watched, he wrestled the air conditioner off the sill and set it carefully on the floor. The prospect of spending even one more minute in this heat was unthinkable. “You mean you can’t fix it?” “I can fix anything, cher.” “That’s not my name,” she corrected him. And aren’t you just pretty impressed with yourself, Mr. Repair Guy. For a split second he looked almost amused, but then his features went unreadable once more. While he knelt down to resume his work, she gave him another curious appraisal. She hadn’t noticed those scars on his arms before--faint impressions, some straight, some jagged, some strangely crisscrossed. She wondered briefly if he’d been in an accident when he was younger. Her eyes moved over the rest of his body. He was busy unscrewing the back off the air conditioner, his movements quick and fluid. She saw him glance at her, and she quickly looked away.

our thing run has made to address the issues of the market and remain mindful of everything regarding the most recent change. Chiller Manufacturer in Delhi have been showing up, making and appropriating high bore and influencing things that are utilized more than a couple of sets out to cool water or fluid for both mechanical and business applications, making us a director among the most kept up chiller makers India. The thing run contains air and water-cooled scroll chillers, air and water-cooled screw chillers. Within excess of three diverse expansive stretches of experience added to our accumulation, we are hailed as one of the genuine chiller makers in the nation. As chiller creators we consider the solace cooling/cooling division and we other than consider mechanical cooling process applications over a system of undertakings including: sustenance, drink, plastic, substance, pharmaceutical, atomic power, repairing and fresh sparing. All through the most recent three decades, we have gotten from our experience and got quality in both solace cooling and mechanical cooling spaces. Chiller Manufacturer in Delhi for the most part repair our things to keep up to the most recent change to give the most strong, solid and competent things to our watching purchasers. Picking the best and most confided in Chiller Manufacturer in Delhi is fundamental as this will pick the cut off that your unit accomplishes. Since there are such a fundamental number of in the nation, it is dejected upon you to pull back the best from the rest and see your call. At chiller creator in Delhi, the consideration is on buyer unflinching quality and building machines that are outrageous, solid and offer noteworthy association. You can rely on us for the best levels of relationship, until the moment that the minute that your technique is made, and after, when you need help, absolutely at whatever point. Every single one of our machines have been spread out and made, holding fast to client necessities and utilizing the most recent movement, with the target that you can get the best quality for your business. We recognize that our obligation in this little way, can take your business to exceptional statures. Consequently, turn around picking the plain best, and you won't be astounded.

The recognition of the crucial roles played by these synaptic secretions drives us even further away from our electrical model and its reassuring familiarity. It is not a “spark” which jumps the gaps from neuron to neuron, it is a fluid, a chemical agent, a kind of enzyme or hormone. And when the gap is jumped, it is not a stream of electrons that is initiated on the surface of the membrane, it is a liquid solution containing sodium ions which surges back and forth through the membrane. Now these functional particulars are nothing at all like those of electrical wire; they remind us more of the secretion, circulation, and diffusion of all of the rest of our body’s fluids. A nerve is not a wire; it is more accurate to think of it as a tiny gland, with the axon serving as the duct. From the tip of this duct, secretions are released in small quantities and circulate to contact the target tissue—the next nerve in line. So neural activity has really as much to do with the laws of hydraulics as it does with the laws of electricity. The action potential is the movement of fluids. It is only like an electrical signal in certain respects.

Its face appeared through the mist, the mouth torn and the left side of its skull shattered. Ragged and bloodstained shreds of clothing, hanging from the gaunt frame, grew visible as it advanced. Congealed black fluid leaked out of sores that burned red with infection, and its bones cracked in defiance with every movement as it staggered into sight. And

Be an opportunist: Keep your eyes open for gaps in time and place where you can move your body. Seize the moment. Make stuff up: You don’t need to know specific routines, traditional postures or biomechanically-correct exercises. Start with some reaches, some pushes, pulls and steps. The right way is the way that feels good. Bend your knees: Your legs are powerful pumps. Use them to promote circulation of fluid throughout your body. Do some squats, take the stairs. Bending your knees helps to integrate the entire system. Reverse gravity: Many hours at a desk and in the car will deform your posture and pull your upper body towards the earth. This wreaks havoc on your upper back and neck. Counteract this tendency with intentional anti-gravity movements: stretch, reach and move toward the sky. Extend your back and adopt a posture of exuberance and vitality.

What super-sure looks like A multitude of fascinating factors come under the ‘looking confident ‘umbrella. There isn’t space here to explore the thousands of subtle signs that signal confidence. I cover them in my book How to Talk to Anyone. However, here are a few hints to tide you over. Self-assureds do the following things instinctively. You can do them consciously until they become second nature. 1. When you are at a gathering, do not stand close to the wall or by the snacks. Walk directly to the dead-centre of the room. That’s where all the important people instinctively stand. 2. When you are going through a large door or open double doors, don’t walk on one side. Walk straight through the middle. It signifies confidence. 3. At a restaurant, unless there is an established hierarchy, go for the seat at the end of the table facing the door. That is the power position. 4. Sit in the highest chair in a meeting or on the arm of the couch – but not higher than the boss! 5. Make larger, more fluid movements. Confident people’s bodies occupy more space. Shys take as little as possible, as if to say, ‘Excuse me for taking up this much of the earth.’ 6. Keep your hands away from your face and never fidget. 7. When you agree with someone, nod your head up from neutral (jaw parallel to the floor), not down. 8. When walking towards someone and passing, be the last person to break eye-contact. 9. For men: Don’t strut like a bantam rooster. But to look like a leader, swing your arms more significantly when you walk. When you are seated, put one arm up on the back of a chair. Occasionally lean back with your arms up and your hands behind your head. 10. For women: To seem self-assured, square your body towards the person you’re talking to and stand a tad closer. Naturally, give a big smile but let it come ever so slightly so it looks sincere, not nervous.

When he got out of the car to do his business, my mother stared straight ahead. But I turned to watch. There was always something wild and charismatically uncaring about my father’s demeanor in these moments, some mysterious abandonment of his frowning and cogitative state that already meant a lot to me, even though at that age I understood almost nothing about him. Paulie had long ago stopped whispering 'perv' to me for observing him as he relieved himself. She of course, kept her head n her novels. I remember that it was cold that day, and windy but that the sky had been cut from the crackling blue gem field of a late midwestern April. Outside the car, as other families sped past my father stepped to the leeward side of the open door then leaning back from the waist and at the same time forward the ankles. His penis poked out from his zipper for this part, Bernie always stood up at the rear window. My father paused fo a moment rocking slightly while a few indistinct words played on his lips. Then just before his stream stared he tiled back his head as if there were a code written in the sky that allowed the event to begin. This was the moment I waited for, the movement seemed to be a marker of his own private devotion as though despite his unshakable atheism and despite his sour, entirely analytic approach to every affair of life, he nonetheless felt the need to acknowledge the heavens in the regard to this particular function of the body. I don't know perhaps I sensed that he simply enjoyed it in a deep way that I did. It was possible I already recognized that the eye narrowing depth of his physical delight in that moment was relative to that paucity of other delights in his life. But in any case the prayerful uplifting of his cranium always seemed to democratize him for me, to make him for a few minutes at least, a regular man. Bernie let out a bark. ‘’Is he done?’’ asked my mother. I opened my window. ‘’Almost.’’ In fact he was still in the midst. My father peed like a horse. His urine lowed in one great sweeping dream that started suddenly and stopped just as suddenly, a single, winking arc of shimmering clarity that endured for a prodigious interval and then disappeared in an instant, as though the outflow were a solid object—and arch of glittering ice or a thick band of silver—and not (as it actually approximated) a parabolic, dynamically averaged graph of the interesting functions of gravity, air resistance, and initial velocity on a non-viscous fluid, produced and exhibited by a man who’d just consumed more than a gallon of midwestern beer. The flow was as clear as water. When it struck the edge of the gravel shoulder, the sound was like a bed-sheet being ripped. Beneath this high reverberation, he let out a protracted appreciative whistle that culminated in a tunneled gasp, his lips flapping at the close like a trumpeters. In the tiny topsoil, a gap appeared, a wisp entirely unashamed. Bernie bumped about in the cargo bay. My father moved up close to peer through the windshield, zipping his trousers and smiling through the glass at my mother. I realized that the yellow that should have been in his urine was unmistakable now in his eyes. ‘’Thank goodness,’’ my mother said when the car door closed again. ‘’I was getting a little bored in here.

She heard a crash, and before she even had time to feel bad for the waitress getting docked, another crash and then another followed. She tilted her head in curiosity—just as a table umbrella across the walk shot fifteen feet up to be batted high in the sky, fluttering all the way to the Seine. A cruise boat honked and Gallic curses erupted. Half-lit by the walk’s torchlights, a towering man turned over café tables, artists’ easels, and book stands selling century-old pornography. Tourists screamed and fled in the wake of destruction. Emma shot to her feet with a gasp, looping her satchel over her shoulder. He was cutting a path directly to her, his black French coat trailing behind him. His size and his unnaturally fluid movements made her wonder if he could possibly be human. His hair was thick and long, concealing half his face, and several days’ growth of beard shadowed his jaw. He pointed a shaking hand at her. “You,” he growled. She jerked glances over both of her shoulders looking for the unfortunate you he was addressing. Her. Holy shite, this madman had settled on her.

He gave us music that reached into the ear like a lover's tongue and changed the color of our feelings. He presented movement so exquisite and fluid it coaxed our souls out of our bodies to dance with him, weightless in the perfume of divinity.

He glanced at the thick scar across her palm—proof of the vow she’d made to Nehemia to free Eyllwe. Arobynn clicked his tongue. “It hurts my heart to see so many new scars on you.” “I rather like them.” It was the truth. Arobynn shifted in his seat—a deliberate movement, as all his movements were—and the light fell on a wicked scar stretching from his ear to his collarbone. “I rather like that scar, too,” she said with a midnight smile. That explained why he’d left the tunic unbuttoned, then. Arobynn waved a hand with fluid grace. “Courtesy of Wesley.

It's one of those winter nights when the darkness is so thick it's as if the whole area has been dipped head first in a bucket of blackness, and The Monster steals out of the door and crosses the half-circle of light around the last light in the street so quickly that if Elsa had blinked a little too hard she would have thought she was imagining it. But as it is she knows what she saw, and she hits the floor and makes her way down the stairs in one fluid movement.

The plasticity of the motor cortex might even underlie something so common, unremarkable, and seemingly inevitable as the tentative gait that many elderly people adopt. With age, walking becomes more fraught with the risk of a spill, so many people begin to walk in an ever-more constrained way. Old people become erect and stiff, or stooped, using shorter steps and a slower pace. As a result, they get less “practice” at confident striding—bad idea. Because they no longer walk normally and instead “overpractice” a rigid and shuffling gait, the motor-cortex representation of fluid movement degrades, just as in monkeys that stop practicing retrieving little pellets from wells. The result: we burn a trace of the old-folks’ walk into our brain, eventually losing the ability to walk as we once did. It is the sadder facet of the neural traces burned into our brain at the beginning of life. There is, though, a bright side: there is every reason to believe that practicing normal movements with careful guided exercise may help prevent, or even reverse, the maladaptive changes.

The Five Prana Vayus 1.Udana Vayu – The upward and outward movement of energy. This vayu governs enthusiasm, inspiration, expansion, and ascension. As prana enters the body, udana moves it upward toward the throat and face. With pranayama, udana vayu is affected by controlling the inhalation side of the breath and any retention of the breath after inhalation. 2.Prana Vayu – (Sometimes called “Pran” Vayu): The inward and upward movement of energy. This vayu governs the intake of prana into the body, as well as inhalation, eating, drinking, sensory impression, and mental experiences, and it is energizing and vitalizing. Prana vayu controls prana as it enters the body through the region of the chest and then ascends. With pranayama, prana vayu is affected by controlling the inhalation side of the breath and its capacity in the body. 3.Samana Vayu – The assimilating, inward-spiraling movement of energy. This vayu governs the assimilation of food, oxygen, and all experiences into the system. As prana enters the body, samana spirals it inward to coalesce around the navel center. With pranayama, samana vayu is affected by balancing the lengths and capacity of both the inhalation and exhalation. 4.Apana Vayu – The downward and outward movement of energy. This vayu governs the elimination of waste, as well as exhalation, energetic grounding, childbirth, and the removal of negative emotional and psychological experiences. Apana vayu moves prana downward toward the reproductive organs and out of the body, aiding with letting go. With pranayama, apana vayu is affected by controlling the exhalation side of the breath. 5.Vyana Vayu – The expanding and circulating movement of energy. This vayu governs the circulation of nutrients in the blood and bodily fluids, emotions and thoughts, and engagement in the wider world. Vyana vayu spirals from the center of the body and expands outward, integrating prana into the body and world. With pranayama, vyana vayu is affected by controlling the capacity of both the inhalation and exhalation.

In 1947, Kennan wrote, “The men of the Kremlin would suddenly discover that this fluid and subtle oriental movement which they thought they held in the palm of their hand had quietly oozed away between their fingers and there was nothing left there but a ceremonial Chinese bow and a polite giggle.

The Moon's magnetic gravitational power, combined with the movement of the Earth influences the flow of sap in trees and plants and of body fluids, including the rhythm of the blood, the female menstrual cycle and gestation cycles, and the brain itself.

The reason why we can’t see our eyes moving with our own eyes is because our brains edit out the bits between the saccades—a process called saccadic suppression. Without it, we’d look at an object and it would be a blurry mess. What we perceive as vision is the director’s cut of a film, with your brain as the director, seamlessly stitching together the raw footage to make a coherent reality. Perception is the brain’s best guess at what the world actually looks like. Immense though the computing power of that fleshy mass sitting in the darkness of our skulls is, if we were to take in all the information in front of our eyes, our brains would surely explode.** Instead, our eyes sample bits and pieces of the world, and we fill in the blanks in our heads. This fact is fundamental to the way that cinema works. A film is typically 24 static images run together every second, which our brain sees as continuous fluid movement—that’s why it’s called a movie. The illusion of movement actually happens at more like 16 frames per second. At that speed, a film projection is indistinguishable from the real world, at least to us. It was the introduction of sound that set the standard of 24 frames per second with The Jazz Singer in 1927, the first film to have synchronized dialogue. The company

And would could Amarantha possibly have to test me about?' I didn't balk from that violet stare. Amarantha's whore, Lucien had once called him. 'You lied to her. About Clare. You knew very well what I looked like.' Rhysand sat up in a fluid movement and braced his forearms on his thighs. Such grace contained in such a powerful form. I was slaughtering in the battlefield before you were even born, he'd once said to Lucien. I didn't doubt it. 'Amarantha plays her games,' he said simply, 'and I play mine. It gets rather boring down here, day after day.

My breathing stopped. Stuntman lost his ever-loving shit. He dove off the sofa and went right for Tyler’s ankles. In one fluid movement, Josh scooped him up before he attacked.

Small particles succeed in uniting, and their ordering is not regulated by smaller or bigger masses because, in the primordial state, there are no bigger or smaller masses. The mover puts everything in motion or creates an illusion of movement. The mover produced enough vibration to cause the formation of quarks, electrons, and possibly “other particles” from the primordial foggy fluid and fire in trillions of degrees.

placed her hand on his upper arm. It was an innocent gesture, but the sensation was like a jolt of lightning, even through the fabric of his shirt. His body reacted instantly. He swallowed hard and cleared his throat. Right now, his emotions spiraled out of control. “Aw, hell!” In one fluid movement he pulled her to him, one hand at the back of her head, his other arm coiled around her waist. He tilted her head and claimed her mouth with the hunger born of weeks of pent-up desire for this woman. Kissing her like a starved man who’d finally been given a morsel of food, Daniel savored the feel of her soft body pressed to his. It’s what he’d longed to do since he first laid eyes on her.

Kaleidoscope Yoga: The universal heart and the individual self. We, as humanity, make up together a mosaic of beautiful colors and shapes that can harmoniously play together in endless combinations. We are an ever-changing play of shape and form. A kaleidoscope consists of a tube (or container), mirrors, pieces of glass (or beads or precious stones), sunlight, and someone to turn it and observe and enjoy the forms. Metaphorically, perhaps the sun represents the divine light, or spark of life, within all of us. The mirrors represent our ability to serve as mirrors for one another and each other’s alignment, reflecting sides of ourselves that we may not have been aware of. The tube (or container) is the practice of community yoga. We, as human beings, are the glass, the beads, the precious stones. The facilitator is the person turning the Kaleidoscope, initiating the changing patterns. And the resulting beauty of the shapes? Well, that’s for everyone to enjoy... Coming into a practice and an energy field of community yoga over and over, is a practice of returning, again and again, to the present moment, to the person in front of you, to the people around you, to your body, to others’ bodies, to your energy, to others’ energy, to your breath, to others’ breath. [...] community yoga practice can help us, in a very real, practical, grounded, felt, somatic way, to identify and be in harmony with all that is around us, which includes all of our fellow human beings.
 We are all multiple selves. We are all infinite. We are all universal selves. We are all unique expressions of the universal heart and universal energy. We are all the universal self. We are all one another. And we are all also unique specific individuals. And to the extent that we practice this, somatically, we become more and more comfortable and fluid with this larger, more cosmic, more inter-related reality. We see and feel and breathe ourselves, more and more, as the open movement of energy, as open somatic possibility. As energy and breath. This is one of the many benefits of a community yoga practice. Kaleidoscope shows us, in a very practical way, how to allow universal patterns of wisdom and interconnectedness to filter through us. [...] One of the most interesting paradoxes I have encountered during my involvement with the community yoga project (and it is one that I have felt again and again, too many times to count) is the paradox that many of the most infinite, universal forms have come to me in a place of absolute solitude, silence, deep aloneness or meditation. And, similarly, conversely and complimentarily, (best not to get stuck on the words) I have often found myself in the midst of a huge crowd or group of people of seamlessly flowing forms, and felt simultaneously, in addition to the group energy, the group shape, and the group awareness, myself as a very cleanly and clearly defined, very particular, individual self. These moments and discoveries and journeys of group awareness, in addition to the sense of cosmic expansion, have also clarified more strongly my sense of a very specific, rooted, personal self. The more deeply I dive into the universal heart, the more clearly I see my own place in it. And the more deeply I tune in and connect with my own true personal self, the more open and available I am to a larger, more universal self. We are both, universal heart and universal self. Individual heart and individual self. We are, or have the capacity for, or however you choose to put it, simultaneous layers of awareness. Learning to feel and navigate and mediate between these different kinds and layers of awareness is one of the great joys of Kaleidoscope Community Yoga, and of life in general. Come join us, and see what that feels like, in your body, again and again. From the Preface of Kaleidoscope Community Yoga: The Art of Connecting: The First 108 Poses

ANXIOUS CONTRACTIONS Life is movement. It’s dynamic and pulsating like a swift moving river. To be in a contented and happy state is to be in a state of flow where your thoughts and feelings follow a natural current and there is no inner friction or need to check in on your anxiety every five minutes. When you feel in flow, your body feels light and your mind becomes spontaneous and joyful. Anxiety and fear are the total opposite. They’re the contractions of life. When we get scared, we contract in fear. Our bodies become stiff and our minds become fearful and rigid. If we hold that contracted state, we eventually cut ourselves off from life. We lose flexibility. We lose our flow. We can think of this a bit like pulling a muscle. When a muscle is overused and tired, its cells run out of energy and fluid. This can lead to a sudden and forceful contraction, such as a cramp. This contraction is painful and scary as it comes without warning. In the same way, we can be living our lives with a lot of stress and exhaustion, similar to holding a muscle in an unusual position for too long. If we fail to notice and take care of this situation, we can experience an intense and sudden moment of anxiety or even panic. I call this an “anxious contraction,” and it can feel quite painful. Learning how to respond correctly to this anxious contraction is crucial and determines how quickly we release it. Anxious contractions happen to almost everyone at some point in their lives. We suddenly feel overwhelmed with anxiety as our body experiences all manner of intense sensations, such as a pounding heart or a tight chest or a dizzy sensation. Our anxiety level then is maybe an 8 or 9 out of 10. We recoil in fear and spiral into a downward loop of more fear and anxiety. Some might say they had a spontaneous panic attack while others might describe the feeling as being very “on edge.”   THE ANXIETY LOOP It’s at this point in time where people get split into those that develop an anxiety disorder and those that don’t. The real deciding factor is whether a person gets caught in the “anxiety loop” or not. The anxiety loop is a mental trap, a vicious cycle of fearing fear. Instead of ignoring anxious thoughts or bodily sensations, the person becomes acutely aware and paranoid of them. “What if I lose control and do something crazy?” “What if those sensations come back again while I’m in a meeting?” “What if it’s a sign of a serious health problem?” This trap is akin to quicksand. Our immediate response is to struggle hard to free ourselves, but it’s the wrong response. The more we struggle, the deeper we sink. Anxiety is such a simple but costly trap to fall into. All your additional worry and stress make the problem worse, fueling more anxiety and creating a vicious cycle or loop. It’s like spilling gasoline onto a bonfire: the more you fear the bodily sensations, the more intense they feel. I’ve seen so many carefree people go from feeling fine one day to becoming fearful of everyday situations simply because they had one bad panic attack and then got stuck in this anxious loop of fearing fear. But there is great hope. As strange as it sounds, the greatest obstacle to healing your anxiety is you. You’re the cure. Your body wants to heal your anxiety as much as you do.

Unlike basketball, baseball, or football, games that reset after each play, soccer unfolds fluidly and continuously. To understand how a goal was scored, you have to work back through the action - the sequences of passes and decisions, the movement of the players away from the action who reappear unexpectedly in empty space to create or waste opportunities - all the way back to the first touch. If that goal was scored by a young refugee from Liberia, off an assist from a boy from southern Sudan, who was set up by a player from Burundi or a Kurd from Iraq - on a field in Georgia, U.S.A., no less - understanding its origins would mean following the thread of causation back in time to events that long preceded the first whistle.

Poised Positioning • Be mindful of how you use your body to communicate. • Be fully present in the moment. • Be thoughtful and gracious in your actions. • Be fluid and elegant in your movements. • Express flow—walk in freedom and spontaneity. • Develop an unshakeable sense of authentic inner confidence and certainty. • Develop a deep respect for others. • Move slower and more deliberately. • Walk in integrity, class, and modesty. • Smile kindly and laugh softly. • Become a student of manners and etiquette.

As a professional speaker, Susanne travels all over the country and practically lives on airplanes. One day as she entered security to board yet another flight, she was struck by the poise, posture, and gestures of the man in front of her in line. As a communications expert, she observed his excellent presentation with appreciation and awe. The gentleman was dressed impeccably in a crisp white shirt and well-fitted suit and he sported a new haircut. She watched him as he removed his flawless leather belt, his gold money clip, and well-polished shoes. (And of course, he had Listerine in a baggie to ensure fresh breath!) The care with which he dismantled was impressive. His poised and fluid movements were deliberate and respectful of his personal possessions. As he regrouped and proceeded down the concourse, she was struck by how his stance and carriage intrigued and impressed her. His projection of elegance created a presence of pride and dignity. He left a remarkable impression.

t o improve the physical capacity of the horse, a trainer must learn to value its qualities and to compensate for its flaws. Physical training of an athlete, particularly a human athlete, requires a deep understanding of the sporting discipline in question. It is in this same spirit that the chapters in this book describing the biomechanics and physical training of the horse as an athlete have been developed. The presentation of these concepts begins with a series of simplified and educational reminders on the biomechanics of the muscles underlying overall movement. The primary body system involved in active physical exercise is the muscular system and the first three chapters focus on the muscular groups and actions of the forelimb, the hindlimb and the neck and trunk, and this leads to a chapter discussing the biomechanics of lowering of the neck. To evaluate the usefulness of an exercise and to understand its mode of action, including its advantages and disadvantages, it is essential to have a basic understanding of musculotendinous functional anatomy. An understanding of these fundamental ideas is directly applicable to the later chapters, which focus on training and the core exercises for a horse. Training a horse for every discipline brings together two specific but complementary areas, which are often worked on at the same time: conditioning and strengthening. The aim of conditioning is to develop respiratory capacity and to improve cardiovascular function. This results in a greater ability to perform with prolonged effort, while also improving the recovery time after this effort. Strengthening of the horse has two main goals: (1) to improve the flexibility of joints secondary to the action of ligaments and muscles (these structures have an intrinsic role in the control and stability of joints) and (2) to develop effective muscular contraction and coordination, making movements more fluid, lighter and confident (1, 2).

In an instant I was in her arms, her lips against my cheek. I cupped her face in my hands and stared into those eyes, dancing eyes, warm and smiling, filled with tears and love, a combination I couldn’t lose, couldn’t walk away from again. She pulled me inside and closed the door behind me, locking it. I tried to speak, but words wouldn’t come, and she put her finger to my lips to calm me. She turned with her shoulder blades against my chest and drew my arms around her, holding the backs of my hands in her palms. Placing my palms just under her collarbone, she ran my hands down her body. As they passed over her breasts, I could tell they were larger, full and tight, swollen with fluid, and she gasped slightly as I touched her nipples. I closed my eyes, resting my chin on her shoulder, and she continued downward. They moved under her breasts, and I lifted up slightly, feeling their weight, the heaviness, wondering how tired her shoulders were at the end of the day, reminding myself to give her a good backrub. She turned my wrists and drew my hands downward. They immediately began to move forward, over the place where her slim waist used to be, out farther and farther, until they stopped even with her navel. Her skin under the cotton dress was tight, and I spread my fingers wide, taking in the size of her tummy, the width, the depth, moving around it like gripping a basketball. And then it happened. It kicked, a good, hard kick. I could feel it rolling around inside her, stretching and moving, moving deep in her as I had just a few months before on that first night, asking her how it felt to carry a child inside her. I remembered, and she was right. It did feel the very same. My moving inside her had created this movement, and I bit my lip to keep from crying out, from shouting, from wailing in joy as I’d heard her wail in sorrow. She pivoted in my arms and stared into my face, her eyes sad, pain an inch thick over her expression. “Steve, I wanted to tell you, really I did. I wanted to tell you about the baby. And I wanted to tell you about . . .” I put my hand up to quiet her. “I knew, Diana. I already knew.” She looked at me, puzzled. I drew her over to the sofa and sat down beside her. “Remember when we first met?” She nodded. “Well, I lied. The real reason we were here was to look for Nick Roberts.” She was still, quiet, waiting for the rest of the explanation. “When I first came here, I was looking for Nick Roberts. Before I left here the first time, I knew you’d written that book. But I didn’t say anything because by that time I didn’t care. I came to find Nick Roberts. What I found was a beautiful woman, the love of my life. Nick Roberts and anything associated with Nick Roberts just didn’t matter anymore.” “Why didn’t you tell me you knew?” she asked, looking down at her hands, unable to meet my eyes. “Because. Because it didn’t matter. Because I knew I’d have to explain to you why I was here in the first place. Because I was afraid you’d be afraid, afraid I was just playing you, afraid I’d expose you and give you up to the media. But I didn’t, I swear to god. It wasn’t me.

He has a rather fluid style,” says Hirsch, who was already cutting together scenes. “Not that he moves the camera all that much; he moves the camera at a certain moment through a scene and his staging of the action is fluid. Kersh doesn’t cover a scene in a simplistic way. He doesn’t shoot a master and then go in for close-ups. He will shoot mini masters that overlap at certain key points. It’s a subtle thing. He really knows what he’s doing.” “I stage differently from George; I use the camera differently,” says Kershner. “I use the actors in a different way. I certainly love his work but mine is just different. The photography is totally different, the lighting, the movement.

Regular stretching makes your movements more sensuous and fluid.

The wise leader is like water. Consider water: water cleanses and refreshes all creatures without distinction and without judgment; water freely and fearlessly goes deep beneath the surface of things; water is fluid and responsive; water follows the law freely. Consider the leader: the leader works in any setting without complaint, with any person or issue that comes on the floor; the leader acts so that all will benefit and serves well regardless of the rate of pay; the leader speaks simply and honestly and intervenes in order to shed light and create harmony. From watching the movements of water, the leader has learned that in action, timing is everything. Like water, the leader is yielding. Because the leader does not push, the group does not resent or resist.

The Holistic Life Foundation’s program combines yoga postures, fluid movement exercises, breathing techniques, and guided mindfulness practices. The movement activities are designed to enhance muscle tone and flexibility, and students learn breathing techniques designed to help them calm themselves. Each class includes a didactic component where instructors talk to students about identifying stressors and using mindfulness and breathing to reduce stress. At the end of each class, students lie on their backs and close their eyes while the instructors guide them through a mindful awareness practice. The program has been offered in a variety of settings in school and outside school.

TWO HEARTS   She looks into my eyes with a joy that no earthly being can honestly describe as I look right back into hers, assuring her of how much I truly love her. As she again seeks me out, her lips form a precious mold over top of mine, now reaching deep down into my place of content to reconfirm with me that she too knows who I am and why I had reached out to her. I embrace her as I have before, gradually applying my lips to her most tender outlets, admitting her entire body to fusillade with excitement and pleasure. Penetrating the layers of her consciousness as my hands slip down her arcuate back our bodies now build upon the afterquaking that now intensifies with each turn of the limbs as our bodies move together in one fluid formation. Her lips slowly imitate my every decisive movement. I can feel her using all of me as a vessel to cure her own weakness as she reconstructs herself from inside of that delicate place within her heart. Her lips find me again as the two of us lie comforted in each other’s arms behind the greatest force on earth. With our bodies sprawled out against the slippery stone that supports our growing urge to love and be loved, we lay hidden from the rest of the world at the center of the earth. We are where two hearts become one, again surprising our merciful king who resides in the stars as the beauty of our love emerges from all that was once mysterious.

How did you live? asked the being on the right. Tell it truthfully, the other said, as, from either side, they gently touched their heads to his. They recoiled, then withdrew to two gray stone pots set down on either side of that grand hall, into which they vomited twin streams of brightly colored fluid. The small versions of themselves rushed to bring towels, upon which they wiped their mouths. May we confirm? said the one on the right. Wait, what did you see, he said. Is there some— But it was too late. The being on the right sang a single ominous note and out came the several smaller versions of himself, but crippled and grimacing, bearing between them a feces-encrusted mirror. The being on the left sang his (somber, jarring) note, and several smaller versions of himself tumbled out, rolling forth via a series of spastic clumsy gymnastic movements that were somehow accusatory, bearing the scale. Quick check, the Christ-prince said sternly. I’m not sure I completely understood the instructions, the funeral-suited man said. If I might be allowed to— The being on the right held the mirror up before the funeral-suited man, and the being on the left reached into the funeral-suited man’s chest with a deft and aggressive movement, extracted the man’s heart, and placed it on the scale. Oh dear, said the Christ-emissary. A sound of horrific opprobrium and mourning echoed all across that kingdom.

he chopped the blade down onto the crown of Mark Rothstein’s head in one fluid movement and let it go planted to the bridge of the lieutenant’s nose.

Making brief eye contact with Tristan, Gabriel casually marched around the gazebo and yanked the Ashman back further into the shadowy cover of the dark trees. The Ashman struggled, but Tristan came up beside Gabriel and caught the Ashman’s hands behind his back. Another Ashman appeared in the darkness beyond Tristan. “Watch your back,” Gabriel said, and Tristan whipped around. In one fluid movement, Tristan pulled a dagger from his coat—because, apparently, Tristan carted bloody weapons around in his coat—and cut through the Ashman’s skull with forceful movement. Without missing a beat, Tristan turned back around and helped Gabriel pin the Ashman that was struggling beneath Gabriel’s grasp.Gabriel punched the Ashman in the face, giving Tristan an opportunity to restrain the Ashman’s hands behind his back. Gabriel pulled Scarlet’s butcher knife from his coat—okay, so maybe they both carted weapons around in their jackets—and with silent movement, he thrust the blade directly into the Ashman’s heart and twisted. Stiffness, cracking, crumbling…then ash. Murder accomplished. Gabriel tucked the blade back into his coat and dusted off his hands as he looked at the two piles of ash on the forest floor. “See how simple that was?” He looked at Tristan. “You hold him down, I stab him, end of threat. With Nate it’s all weird battle cries and plastic hammers.” Gabriel shook his head. “Fighting with you is much less dramatic.” “Yeah, well.” Tristan stretched his neck. “We make a good killing team.” Gabriel rolled his eyes as they headed out of the trees and back to the fair. “What is with everyone wanting to be on teams?

Briony dips out from beneath Saint’s stance, grabbing another blade from inside her high-heeled boot, sending it directly into the skull of one of Cal’s bodyguards approaching her from behind. He shuffles on his feet before falling back onto the concrete beneath him like a collapsing wall as she quickly and effortlessly props one knee up and grabs another knife from under her skirt. With the precision of a skilled assassin, she sends the knife into the chest of the other bodyguard. Her training shines through her fluid movements. He cries out, gripping the blade that’s stuck directly in the center of his chest. Pulling it out, he tosses it to the floor with an echoed clang, stalking forward on heavy feet, his deadly gaze set on her as he pulls a gun from his side. She stands straight before him, her chin lifted, staring at him defiantly. He raises the gun at her, and she closes her eyes. I pull violently against my cuffs, needing to be freed before he can hurt her, no matter if that means ripping my arms off at the shoulders. But before I get ahead of myself, the guard takes two more steps, stumbling slightly before a shot from across the room earns him a bullet to the back of his head. The man’s blood splatters across Briony’s face and neck as she flinches. Callum looks entirely stunned while Nox’s barrel remains set on him, both of them with arms outstretched, guns ready to fire. Bishop Caldwell gasps in horror when Baret steps out from behind the stage area, his own smoking weapon aimed directly at him and his attempt to escape. His decrepit old hands shake before him as he surrenders on his knees like the fucking coward he is. Alastor grabs a gun from within his suit jacket and rushes towards me, placing it against my temple. “Now, now, now...” he says calmly, looking around the room. “Let’s just all take a nice deep breath before someone important gets hurt, huh?

I wanted to reach for her, kiss her, tell her…all the things that words could never encompass. But there was something I needed to do for her before I could attempt any of that. I drew the glimmering sword from my hip in a fluid movement before placing its tip against the ground between us and dropping to one knee in front of her. A tremor rumbled through the Veil as my knee hit the ground and I clasped the pommel of my sword as I bowed my head before her, my limbs trembling with the magnitude of this action, of what I had known and should have admitted for a long time now. “I pledge myself and all that I am to you, my Queen,” I breathed, emotion wracking my core as those words tumbled from me at last, my place in this world somehow fixing there as if I had found the truth of my own destiny, and all that I had ever needed to be. “I would be your sword to fight your enemies, your shield to protect your people, your monster to own and to wield. I would be yours in any and all of the ways I could be, and I should have told you that a long, long time ago. I am your creature, your servant…yours.

Pashevel’s movements were fluid and graceful, while Dakkas’s were shorter and more compact-and yet, somehow, the two complemented each other until the sword fight seemed more like a dance as their movements flowed in a perfect harmony of give and take, advance and retreated.

Well, with every pirouette, we entrust the weight of our bodies on the tips of our toes, with the promise of them delivering us in cyclones. Our arms, always elegant it may appear, struggle beneath the heaviness our muscles battle to stay fluid. It looks effortless--- every allongé, every piqué as simple as the natural flow of water. But every dance, every move our bodies make, is a war against itself. It's magnificently dangerous. Like... blooming into an ocean. That's what it feels like. An ocean. Deep and rich all-encompassing, drowning out everyone in our presence. They sink into the moment, succumb to every movement, and simply just admire.

However, second, all of our policies relating to the monitoring and movement of and restrictions on returning health-care workers should be based on sound scientific principles and scientific evidence. A person who was without symptoms did not transmit Ebola, and one must come into direct contact with the body fluids of an acutely ill person to become infected. Returning health-care workers were well instructed to report symptoms and self-isolate the way Craig Spencer correctly did. Importantly, if a twenty-one-day quarantine was implemented across the board for all health-care workers who volunteered to care for Ebola patients, then I was certain, as were Tom Frieden and several of my colleagues who had volunteered or who were considering volunteering, that we would soon run out of people willing to care for these patients. A quarantine would mean that those of us, including myself, who were caring for Ebola patients in the United States would automatically be putting ourselves out of action for twenty-one days after taking care of even a single person.

The broader project of “social justice” thus advances the “rights” of minorities of many kinds to remove inequality—or even difference itself—from our world. Men must be removed from positions of authority, and boys must be trained to see strong manhood as akin to “toxic masculinity.” Income must be taken and redistributed. Capitalism should be strenuously resisted, for it was built on the back of racism. Reason must be opposed by “personal narratives” driven by a belief in “standpoint epistemology,” the view that one’s minority status gives one a unique ability to see truth that privileged peoples necessarily cannot comprehend.31 Public spaces must be redone to accommodate the fluid “gender identities” of individuals. And more broadly, all forms of personal identity (and “orientation”) must be affirmed without question and accepted as a positive reality. (As I have noted, a thorough critique of these views comes in Chapters 3 and 4; we’re seeking, in all fairness, to describe the system in a compact way here.)

Human history is replete with the fluid movement of people, and tribes and countries and cultures and empires are never, ever permanent. Over a long enough time-scale, not one of these descriptions of historical people holds steadfast, and only a thousand years ago your DNA began being threaded from millions from every culture, tribe, and country. If you want to spend your cash on someone in a white coat telling you that you’re from a tribe of wandering Germanic topless warriors, or descended from Vikings, Saracens, Saxons, or Drogo of Metz, or even the Great Emperor Charlemagne, help yourself. I, or hundreds of geneticists around the world, will shrug and do it for free: You are. And you don’t even need to spit in a tube—your majesty.

Music is a universe of sound, constantly expanding and dividing. Compositions are carved into movements and passages. A half note branches off into quarter notes, sixteenth notes—the same tone, yet held for a different duration, a different effect. A harmony of multiple notes, a counterpoint of multiple melodies, an orchestra of multiple instruments: separate spheres, playing in parallel. “A composer must make order out of this hopeless profusion of noise. To play every note at once—one big, all-encompassing dot—would produce chaos. To play none would produce silence. But to space them out artfully on a staff of time: that would produce a masterpiece. “And so the composer splits the piece into measures and meter. The notes are held tight within bar lines, told when to ring out and when to die out, when to attack and when to decay. They are given finite boundaries. *You will last for eight breaths, and no more.* To them, time is fixed; to the composer, it is fluid. She could speed it up, slow it down, change duple meter to triple meter or a march to a waltz. She knows that the beauty lies not in how long the note lasts, but in the sound that it makes while it does. “Maybe, the woman thinks, our composer has done the same with us. Lest eternity seem too long and infinity too loud, she imposes measures on our existence, divides it into years, generations, incarnations. We count beats and birthdays. We emerge from the silence, and we fade back into it. This is not a punishment or a curse, any more than it is to assign a time signature to a song. After all, if there is no beat, how can there be a dance? “She does not do this to make us suffer. She does this to make us music.

There is a fear of catching AIDS , but a fear also of simply catching sex. There is a fear of catching anything whatever which might seem like a passion, a seduction, a responsibility. And, in this sense, it is once again the male who has most deeply fallen victim to the negative obsession with sex. To the point of withdrawing from the sexual game, exhausted by having to bear such a risk, and no doubt also wearied by having historically assumed the role of sexual power for so long. Of which feminism and female liberation have divested him, at least dejure (and, to a large extent, de facto). But things are more complicated than this, because th e male who has been emasculated in this way and stripped of his power, has taken advantage of this situation to fade from the scene, to disappear — doffing th e phallic mask of a power which has, in any event, become increasingly dangerous. This is the paradoxical victory of the movement for feminine emancipation. That movement has succeeded too well and now leaves the female faced with the (more or less tactical and defensive) defaulting of the male. A strange situation ensues, in which women no longer protest against male power, but are resentful of the 'powerlessness' of the male . The defaulting of the male now fuels a deep dissatisfaction generated by disappointment with a sexual liberation which is going wrong for everyone. And this dissatisfaction finds expression, contradictorily, in the phantasm of sexual harassment. This is, then, a very different scenario from traditional feminism. Women are no longer alienated by men, but dispossessed of the masculine, dispossessed of the vital illusion of the other and hence also of their own illusion, their desire and privilege as women. It is this same effect which causes children secretly to hate their parents, who no longer wish to assume the role of parent and seize the opportunity of children's emancipation to liberate themselves as parents and relinquish their role. What we have, then, is no longer violence on the part of children in rebellion against the parental order, but hatred on the part of children dispossessed of their status and illusion as children. The person who liberates himself is never who you though the was. This defaulting o f the male has knock-on effects which extend into the biological order. Recent studies have found a fall in the rate of sperm in the seminal fluid, but, most importantly, a decline of their will to power: they no longer compete to go and fertilize the ovum. There is no competition any more. Are they, too , afraid of responsibility? Should we see this as a phenomenon analogous to what is going on in the visible sexual world, where a reticence to fulfil roles and a dissuasive terror exerted by the female sex currently prevail? Is this an unintended side-effect of the battle against harassment - the assault of sperm being the most elementary form of sexual harassment?

to get out of the cold wind, lining their dens with grass and twigs to prevent sleeping on the cold ground. Animals taught him how to survive in the bad weather, and they taught him how to stay hidden, even in winter. After the long, cold winter passed, the sun returned and warmed the land, then rains came, and life sprang forth. In summer, violent storms passed through the area, and at times the wind would be so strong that it would knock down even the largest trees. The creek would flood and wipe out all traces of anyone ever having been there. ☐❖☐ Six years passed. Michael became a full-grown man. His hair was the color of sand. He had wide-set blue-green eyes, and he was more than six feet tall, with a strong, muscular body, wide shoulders, narrow hip and waist. He moved with the fluid movements of a cat.

You can't recapture people who are gone, not exactly, not entirely. You can imagine their faces, or their bodies, or their hands, but those images are like stills, or paintings in frames. The other times, when they crossed their arms, made sudden or tender gestures, flattened down the crease in their trousers, lowered their gaze, smoothed away a bang. Those images of movement, of animation, are gone. I don't know where. The past. ... It's harder to remember their voice when the asked a waiter for some lemon, or complimented your blouse, or noticed how late it was getting. Recapturing fluid images of people as they were in life, while they keep morphing and resisting you is nearly impossible. But you can remember how they made you feel.

The kid burst through the front door, with a stainless-steel bottle looped through one finger and what looked like two granola bars in his other hand. “You don’t care if he goes?” was the quiet question that came at me. “Not at all,” I confirmed. “If you’re okay with it.” “You’re only going for a hike?” “Yes.” I saw him hesitate before letting out another one of his deep breaths. Then he murmured, “I need a minute,” just as Amos stopped in front of me and said, “I’m ready.” Was… was Mr. Rhodes coming too? He disappeared into the house even faster than his son had, his movements and strides long and fluid considering how muscular he was. I needed to stop thinking about his muscles. Like yesterday. I knew better already, didn’t I? Subtle, I was not. “Where’s he going?” Amos asked, watching his dad too. “I don’t know. He said to give him a minute. He might be coming too…?” The kid let out a frustrated sigh that made me side-eye him. “Change your mind?” He seemed to think about it for a second before shaking his head. “No. As long as I get out of the house, I don’t care.” “Thank you for making me feel so special,” I joked. The teenager looked at me, his quiet voice back, “Sorry.” “It’s okay. I’m just messing with you,” I told him with a grin. “He said I couldn’t go out with my friends so….” “You’re hanging out with chopped liver?” I could only imagine the kind of relationship he had with his dad if he wasn’t used to being picked on. “I’m messing with you, Amos. I promise.” I even nudged him with my elbow quickly.

There is a Life-Principle of the world, a universal agent, wherein are two natures and a double current, of love and wrath. This ambient fluid penetrates everything. It is a ray detached from the glory of the sun, and fixed by the weight of the atmosphere and the central attraction. It is the body of the Holy Spirit, the universal Agent, the Serpent devouring his own tail. With this electro-magnetic ether, this vital and luminous caloric, the ancients and the alchemists were familiar. Of this agent, that phase of modern ignorance termed physical science talks incoherently, knowing naught of it save its effects; and theology might apply to it all its pretended definitions of spirit. Quiescent, it is appreciable by no human sense; disturbed or in movement, none can explain its mode of action; and to term it "fluid," and speak of its "currents," is but to veil a profound ignorance under a cloud of words.

By their very nature, returnees seek a reconnection to a past life, a former identity marked more often than not by a single language or a single cultural frame of reference. We go back to what we know, including our native tongues. This process of reclaiming a homogenous existence runs counter to multi-culturalism on a societal level and hybridity on an individual level. Aren't we supposed to be complex, hybrid creatures containing multitudes? What about the concept of multiple belongings promoted by such internationally successful authors as Elif Shafak and Zadie Smith? On paper, where it mostly lives, this concept sounds ideal. "Multiple belongings are nurtured by cultural encounters but they are not only the preserve of people who travel", writes Shafak. "It is an attitude, a way of thinking, rather than the number of stamps on your passport. It is about thinking of yourself, and your fellow human beings, in more fluid terms than solid categories". I wouldn't go as far as to suggest that returns imply a repudiation of a complex view of identity or of globalization - it's globalization that has allowed the many people you'll meet in this book, me included, to come and go, to cross borders and cultures - but they force us to think of movement in multi-directional ways. Some returnees find that the life they thoughts they would have back home is a fantasy, so they make their way back to the host country. Homeland returns remain unpredictable, in part because despite their historical contexts, they don't have the clear road maps and narratives that outward migrations enjoy.