Guiding Youth Quotes

THE FOUR HEAVENLY FOUNTAINS Laugh, I tell you And you will turn back The hands of time. Smile, I tell you And you will reflect The face of the divine. Sing, I tell you And all the angels will sing with you! Cry, I tell you And the reflections found in your pool of tears - Will remind you of the lessons of today and yesterday To guide you through the fears of tomorrow.

We naturally like what we have been accustomed to, and are attracted towards it. [...] The same is the case with those opinions of man to which he has been accustomed from his youth; he likes them, defends them, and shuns the opposite views.

In the same way, teenagers imagine dying young because death is more imaginable than the person that all the decisions and burdens of adulthood may make of you.

Slender Youth. A tour companion who may be either a lost prince or a girl/princess in disguise. In the latter case it is tactful to pretend you think she is a boy. She/he will be ignorant, hasty and shy, and will need hauling out of trouble quite a lot. But she/he will grow up in the course of the Tour. In fact she/he will be the only Companion who will change in any way. Quite often, she/he will soon exhibit a very useful talent for magic and end up by hauling everyone else out of trouble. But this will not be until midway through your second brochure.

They got drunk and high on a regular basis, but this is a vestige of youth that you either quit while you're young or you become an addict if you don't die. If you are the Old Guy In The Punk House, move out. You have a substance abuse problem.

When her blue-black eyes lifted to his, everything disappeared. Their bodies dematerialized. The room they were in ceased to exist. Time became nothing. And in the void, in the wormhold, Wrath's chest opened up sure as if he'd been shot, a piercing pain licking over his nerve endings. He knew then that there are many ways for a heart to break. Sometimes it's from the crowding of life, the compression of responsibility and birthright and burden that just squeezed you until you couldn't breathe anymore. Even though your lungs were working just fine. And sometimes it's from the casual cruelty of a fate that took you far from where you had thought you would end up. And sometimes it's age in the face of youth. Or sickness in the face of health. But sometimes it's just because you're looking into the eyes of your lover, and your gratitude for having them in your life overflows...because you showed them what was on the inside and they didn't run scared or turn away: they accepted you and loved you and held you in the midst of your passion or your fear...or your combination of both. Wrath closed his eyes and focused on the soft pulls at his wrist. God, they were just like the beat of his heart. Which made sense. Because she was the center of his chest. And the center of his world.

In youth, our blood rises and becomes volatile. Desire, worry, and anxiety increase. External circumstances now direct the rise and fall of emotions. Will and intention become constrained by social conventions. Competition, conflict, and scheming are the norm in interactions with people. The approval and disapproval of others become important, and the honest and sincere expression of thoughts and feelings is lost.

First came bright Spirits, not the Spirits of men, who danced and scattered flowers. Then, on the left and right, at each side of the forest avenue, came youthful shapes, boys upon one hand, and girls upon the other. If I could remember their singing and write down the notes, no man who read that score would ever grow sick or old. Between them went musicians: and after these a lady in whose honour all this was being done. I cannot now remember whether she was naked or clothed. If she were naked, then it must have been the almost visible penumbra of her courtesy and joy which produces in my memory the illusion of a great and shining train that followed her across the happy grass. If she were clothed, then the illusion of nakedness is doubtless due to the clarity with which her inmost spirit shone through the clothes. For clothes in that country are not a disguise: the spiritual body lives along each thread and turns them into living organs. A robe or a crown is there as much one of the wearer's features as a lip or an eye. But I have forgotten. And only partly do I remember the unbearable beauty of her face. “Is it?...is it?” I whispered to my guide. “Not at all,” said he. “It's someone ye'll never have heard of. Her name on earth was Sarah Smith and she lived at Golders Green.” “She seems to be...well, a person of particular importance?” “Aye. She is one of the great ones. Ye have heard that fame in this country and fame on Earth are two quite different things.” “And who are these gigantic people...look! They're like emeralds...who are dancing and throwing flowers before here?” “Haven't ye read your Milton? A thousand liveried angels lackey her.” “And who are all these young men and women on each side?” “They are her sons and daughters.” “She must have had a very large family, Sir.” “Every young man or boy that met her became her son – even if it was only the boy that brought the meat to her back door. Every girl that met her was her daughter.” “Isn't that a bit hard on their own parents?” “No. There are those that steal other people's children. But her motherhood was of a different kind. Those on whom it fell went back to their natural parents loving them more. Few men looked on her without becoming, in a certain fashion, her lovers. But it was the kind of love that made them not less true, but truer, to their own wives.” “And how...but hullo! What are all these animals? A cat-two cats-dozens of cats. And all those dogs...why, I can't count them. And the birds. And the horses.” “They are her beasts.” “Did she keep a sort of zoo? I mean, this is a bit too much.” “Every beast and bird that came near her had its place in her love. In her they became themselves. And now the abundance of life she has in Christ from the Father flows over into them.” I looked at my Teacher in amazement. “Yes,” he said. “It is like when you throw a stone into a pool, and the concentric waves spread out further and further. Who knows where it will end? Redeemed humanity is still young, it has hardly come to its full strength. But already there is joy enough int the little finger of a great saint such as yonder lady to waken all the dead things of the universe into life.

An honest man here lies at rest, The friend of man, the friend of truth, The friend of age, and guide of youth: Few hearts like his, with virtue warm'd, Few heads with knowledge so inform'd; If there's another world, he lives in bliss; If there is none, he made the best of this.

Maybe it's the fact the most of the arts here are produced by world-weary and sophisticated older people and then consumed by younger people who not only consume art but study it for clues on how to be cool, hip - and keep in mind that, for kids and younger people, to be hip and cool is the same as to be admired and accepted and included and so Unalone. Forget so-called peer-pressure. It's more like peer-hunger. No? We enter a spiritual puberty where we snap to the fact that the great transcendant horror is loneliness, excluded encagement in the self. Once we've hit this age, we will now give or take anything, wear any mask, to fit, be part-of, not be Alone, we young. The U.S. arts are our guide to inclusion. A how-to. We are shown how to fashion masks of ennui and jaded irony at a young age where the face is fictile enough to assume the shape of whatever it wears. And then it's stuck there, the weary cynicism that saves us from gooey sentiment and unsophisticated naivete.

...rather than assuming that education is primarily about preparing for jobs and careers, what would it mean to think of education as a process of guiding kids' participation in public life more generally, a public life that includes social, recreational, and civic engagement.

I have since often observed, how incongruous and irrational the common temper of mankind is, especially of youth, to that reason which ought to guide them in such cases, viz. that they are not ashamed to sin, and yet are ashamed to repent; nor ashamed of the action for which they ought justly to be esteemed fools, but are ashamed of the returning, which only can make them be esteemed wise men.

But too often does youth think that age knows only the wisdom of days that are gone, and therefore profits not. But remember this; the sun that shines today is the sun that shone when thy father was born, and will still be shining when thy last grandchild shall pass into the darkness.

They were all growing so fast. In just a few short years they would be all young men and women...youth tiptoe...expectant...a-star with its sweet wild dreams...little ships sailing out of safe harbor to unknown ports. The boys would go away to their life work and the girls...ah, the mist-veiled forms of beautiful brides might be seen coming down the old stairs at Ingleside. But they would still be hers for a few years yet...hers to love and guide...to sing the songs that so many mothers had sung...Hers...and Gilbert's.

Japhy,' I said out loud, 'I don't know when we'll meet again or what'll happen in the future, but Desolation, Desolation, I owe so much to Desolation, thank you forever for guiding me to the place where I learned it all. Now comes the sadness of coming back to cities and I've grown two months older and there's all that humanity of bars and burlesque shows and gritty love, all upsidedown in the void God bless them, but Japhy you and me forever we know, O ever youthful, O ever weeping.' Down on the lake rosy reflections of celestial vapor appeared, and I said 'God I love you' and looked up to the sky and really meant it. 'I have fallen in love with you, God. Take care of us all, one way or the other.' To the children and the innocent it's all the same. And in keeping with Japhy's habit of always getting down on one knee and delivering a little prayer to the camp we left, to the one in the Sierra, and the others in Marin, and the little prayer of gratitude he had delivered to Sean's shack the day he sailed away, as I was hiking down the mountain with my pack I turned and knelt on the trail and said 'Thank you, shack.' Then I hadded 'Blah,' with a little grin, because I knew that shack and that mountain would understand what that meant, and turned and went on down the trail back to this world.

Though experience should be our guide . . . and we see mistakes are common at the age of twenty-three, it must be acknowledged that not every youthful feeling begins unworthily and ends in error. If this were the case, mankind would have perished long ago.

In idyllic small towns I sometimes see teenagers looking out of place in their garb of desperation, the leftover tatters and stains and slashes of the fashion of my youth. For this phase of their life, the underworld is their true home, and in the grit and underbelly of a city they could find something that approximates it. Even the internal clock of adolescents changes, making them nocturnal creatures for at least a few years. All through childhood you grow toward life and then in adolescence, at the height of life, you begin to grow toward death. This fatality is felt as an enlargement to be welcomed and embraced, for the young in this culture enter adulthood as a prison, and death reassures them that there are exits. “I have been half in love with easeful death,” said Keats who died at twenty-six and so were we, though the death we were in love with was only an idea then.

The lesser mysteries of love For he who would proceed aright in this matter should begin in youth to visit beautiful form; and first, if he be guided by his instructor aright, to love one such form only--out of that he should create fair thoughts; and soon he will of himself perceive that the beauty of one form is akin to the beauty of another; and then if beauty of form in general is his pursuit, how foolish would he be not to recognize that the beauty in every form is one and the same! And when he perceives this he will abate his violent love of the one, which he will despise and deem a small thing, and will become a lover of all beautiful forms; in the next stage he will consider that the beauty of the mind is more honorable than the beauty of the outward form.

For I have learned To look on nature, not as in the hour Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes The still, sad music of humanity, Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power To chasten and subdue. And I have felt A presence that disturbs me with the joy Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime Of something far more deeply interfused, Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, And the round ocean and the living air, And the blue sky, and in the mind of man; A motion and a spirit, that impels All thinking things, all objects of all thought, And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still A lover of the meadows and the woods, And mountains; and of all that we behold From this green earth; of all the mighty world Of eye, and ear,—both what they half create, And what perceive; well pleased to recognise In nature and the language of the sense, The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul Of all my moral being.

the blood in my body drives me insane

A person in her twenties has been a child for most of her life, but as time goes by that portion that is childhood becomes smaller and smaller, more and more distant, more and more faded, though they say at the end of life the beginning returns with renewed vividness, as though you had sailed all the way around the world and were going back into the darkness from which you came.

Nothing in life is yours to keep—not your children, not your friends and family, not your lover, not your material possessions, not your youth and vitality, not your struggles (which is great news) or successes, not your body and not even your life. Everything in life is given to you for a short period of time, to enjoy, to learn from, to appreciate and to love, but never to keep.

I have since often observed, how incongruous and irrational the common temper of mankind is, especially of youth, to that reason which ought to guide them in such cases—viz. that they are not ashamed to sin, and yet are ashamed to repent; not ashamed of the action for which they ought justly to be esteemed fools, but are ashamed of the returning, which only can make them be esteemed wise men.

Muse When at night I wait for her to come, Life, it seems, hangs by a single strand. What are glory, youth, freedom, in comparison with the dear welcome guest, a flute in hand? She enters now. Pushing her veil aside, she stares through me with her attentiveness. I question her: 'And were you Dante's guide, dictating the Inferno?' She answers: 'Yes.

Save his own soul’s light overhead, None leads him, and none ever led, Across birth’s hidden harbour-bar, Past youth where shoreward shallows are, Through age that drives on toward the red Vast void of sunset hailed from far, To the equal waters of the dead; Save his own soul he hath no star, And sinks, except his own soul guide, Helmless in middle turn of tide.

The intensity of her religious disposition, the coercion it exercised over her life, was but one aspect of a nature altogether ardent, theoretic, and intellectually consequent: and with such a nature struggling in the bands of a narrow teaching, hemmed in by a social life which seemed nothing but a labyrinth of petty courses, a walled-in maze of small paths that led no whither, the outcome was sure to strike others as at once exaggeration and inconsistency. The thing which seemed to her best, she wanted to justify by the completest knowledge; and not to live in a pretended admission of rules which were never acted on. Into this soul-hunger as yet all her youthful passion was poured; the union which attracted her was one that would deliver her from her girlish subjection to her own ignorance, and give her the freedom of voluntary submission to a guide who would take her along the grandest path.

People who have never canoed a wild river, or who have done so only with a guide in the stern, are apt to assume that novelty, plus healthful exercise, account for the value of the trip. I thought so too, until I met the two college boys on the Flambeau. Supper dishes washed, we sat on the bank watching a buck dunking for water plants on the far shore. Soon the buck raised his head, cocked his ears upstream, and then bounded for cover. Around the bend now came the cause of his alarm: two boys in a canoe. Spying us, they edged in to pass the time of day. ‘What time is it?’ was their first question. They explained that their watches had run down, and for the first time in their lives there was no clock, whistle, or radio to set watches by. For two days they had lived by ‘sun-time,’ and were getting a thrill out of it. No servant brought them meals: they got their meat out of the river, or went without. No traffic cop whistled them off the hidden rock in the next rapids. No friendly roof kept them dry when they misguessed whether or not to pitch the tent. No guide showed them which camping spots offered a nightlong breeze, and which a nightlong misery of mosquitoes; which firewood made clean coals, and which only smoke. Before our young adventurers pushed off downstream, we learned that both were slated for the Army upon the conclusion of their trip. Now the motif was clear. This trip was their first and last taste of freedom, an interlude between two regimentations: the campus and the barracks. The elemental simplicities of wilderness travel were thrills not only because of their novelty, but because they represented complete freedom to make mistakes. The wilderness gave them their first taste of those rewards and penalties for wise and foolish acts which every woodsman faces daily, but against which civilization has built a thousand buffers. These boys were ‘on their own’ in this particular sense. Perhaps every youth needs an occasional wilderness trip, in order to learn the meaning of this particular freedom.

The inspiration for Moaning Myrtle was the frequent presence of a crying girl in communal bathrooms, especially at the parties and discos of my youth. This does not seem to happen in male bathrooms, so I enjoyed placing Harry and Ron in such uncomfortable and unfamiliar territory.

Mother! what a world of affection is comprised in that single word; how little do we in the giddy round of youthful pleasure and folly heed her wise counsels. How lightly do we look upon that zealous care with which she guides our otherwise erring feet, watches with feelings which none but a mother can know the gradual expansion of our youth to the riper yours of discretion. We may not think of it then, but it will be recalled to our minds in after years, when the gloomy grave or a fearful living separation has placed her far beyond our reach, and her sweet voice of sympathy and consolation for the various ills attendant upon us sounds in our ears no more. How deeply then we regret a thousand deeds that we have done contrary to her gentle admonitions! How we sign for those days once more, that we may retrieve what we have done amiss and make her kind heart glad with happiness! Alas! once gone they can never be recalled, and we grow mournfully sad with the bitter reflection.

For us lads of eighteen they ought to have been mediators and guides to the world of maturity, the world of work, of duty, of culture, of progress - to the future. We often made fun of them and played jokes on them, but in our hearts we trusted them. The idea of authority, which they represented, was associated in our minds with a greater insight and a more humane wisdom. But the first death we saw shattered this belief. We had to recognize that our generation was more to be trusted than theirs. They surpassed us only in phrases and in cleverness. The first bombardment showed us our mistake, and under it the world as they had taught it to us broke in pieces. While they continued to write and talk, we saw the wounded and dying. While they taught that duty to one's country is the greatest thing, we already knew that death-throes are stronger. But for all that we were no mutineers, no deserters, no cowards - they were very free with all these expressions. We loved our country as much as they; we went courageously into every action; but also we distinguished the false from true, we had suddenly learned to see. And we saw that there was nothing of their world left. We were all at once terribly alone; and alone we must see it through.

How she wished she were back at home with her family, strumming her banjo on the porch while Grampa Cornpone played the fiddle. Oh, the steamy bayou nights of her youth! Ma would cook up a huge pan of Creole innards, whilst Pa sat in the corner smoking his pipe of tabaccy with the hound dogs snoozing at his feet.

two spears have glided, and our souls collided in mine, you confided and my blackened mind was enlightened

take me to your mountain, and let us fly past the sky

the sides of the road turned into wet paint. the colors were no longer so faint. his words a brush and we were in no rush.

youth in love, even when your ears ring, tie your shoes under the moon before the sun can touch the strings.

in here/ everyone must be / something other than human

The monkeys sit on soft rocks Until a scream is released from their clocks They stare into an abyss Post photos of a lunar eclipse Soul-filling moments Consistently missed

the human in me doesn’t belong to this society

role models are only role models when they’re not your friend.

his eyes stare at her lips like they're the only source of water

we aren't even real and neither are the drugs so before this world ends lets go have some fun

born into this black universe a rare phenomenon here you are, what have you seen? is this all that life can be?

love is a broken boomerang

your tongue touches me and a sharpened knife twists my insides sideways

You are not truly yourself until you no longer define yourself in others’ terms.

Young people will always need mentors to guide and support them.

Of all persons living, he who does not remember that he has once been young, is the most completely disqualified for giving youthful counsel.

If age is denied, soul becomes lost in an inappropriate clinging to youth.

79) Inspiration of Moaning Myrtle The idea of this character came from the frequently crying girls in the communal bathrooms Rowling would hear at parties and discos in her youth.

Its story line is that modern societies identify the brightest youths with ever increasing efficiency and then guide them into fairly narrow educational and occupational channels.

As Arsène Wenger famously said – “To achieve great things you have first to believe it.

Caroline, or Sister Carrie, as she had been half affectionately termed by the family, was possessed of a mind rudimentary in its power of observation and analysis. Self-interest with her was high, but not strong. It was, nevertheless, her guiding characteristic. Warm with the fancies of youth, pretty with the insipid prettiness of the formative period, possessed of a figure promising eventual shapeliness and an eye alight with certain native intelligence, she was a fair example of the middle American class—two generations removed from the emigrant. Books were beyond her interest—knowledge a sealed book. In the intuitive graces she was still crude. She could scarcely toss her head gracefully. Her hands were almost ineffectual. The feet, though small, were set flatly. And yet she was interested in her charms, quick to understand the keener pleasures of life, ambitious to gain in material things. A half-equipped little knight she was, venturing to reconnoitre the mysterious city and dreaming wild dreams of some vague, far-off supremacy, which should make it prey and subject—the proper penitent, grovelling at a woman's slipper.

On Virtue O thou bright jewel in my aim I strive To comprehend thee. Thine own words declare Wisdom is higher than a fool can reach. I cease to wonder, and no more attempt Thine height t’explore, or fathom thy profound. But, O my soul, sink not into despair, Virtue is near thee, and with gentle hand Would now embrace thee, hovers o’er thine head. Fain would the heaven-born soul with her converse, Then seek, then court her for her promised bliss. Auspicious queen, thine heavenly pinions spread, And lead celestial Chastity along; Lo! now her sacred retinue descends, Arrayed in glory from the orbs above. Attend me, Virtue, thro’ my youthful years! O leave me not to the false joys of time! But guide my steps to endless life and bliss. Greatness, or Goodness, say what I shall call thee, To give an higher appellation still, Teach me a better strain, a nobler lay, O Thou, enthroned with Cherubs in the realms of day!

I thought of Thee, my partner and my guide, As being past away.—Vain sympathies! For, backward, Duddon! as I cast my eyes, I see what was, and is, and will abide; Still glides the Stream, and shall for ever glide; The Form remains, the Function never dies; While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise, We Men, who in our morn of youth defied The elements, must vanish;—be it so! Enough, if something from our hands have power To live, and act, and serve the future hour; And if, as toward the silent tomb we go, Through love, through hope, and faith's transcendent dower, We feel that we are greater than we know.

A fever, a mutilation, a cruel disappointment, a loss of wealth, a loss of friends, seems at the moment unpaid loss, and unpayable. But the sure years reveal the deep remedial force that underlies all facts. The death of a dear friend, wife, brother, lover, which seemed nothing but privation, somewhat later assumes the aspect of a guide or genius; for it commonly operates revolutions in our way of life, terminates an epoch of infancy or of youth which was waiting to be closed, breaks up a wonted occupation, or a household, or style of living, and allows the formation of new ones more friendly to the growth of character.

It is not a question of 4-4-2 or 4-2-1-3, it is a question of having a team which is ordered, in which the players are connected to one another, which moves together, as if it was a single player.” (Arrigo Sacchi)

Nearly all marriages, even happy ones, are mistakes: in the sense that almost certainly (in a more perfect world, or even with a little more care in this very imperfect one) both partners might have found more suitable mates. But the 'real soul-mate' is the one you are actually married to. You really do very little choosing: life and circumstance do most of it (though if there is a God these must be His instruments, or His appearances). It is notorious that in fact happy marriages are more common where the 'choosing' by the young persons is even more limited, by parental or family authority, as long as there is a social ethic of plain unromantic responsibility and conjugal fidelity. … In this fallen world we have as our only guides, prudence, wisdom (rare in youth, too late in age), a clean heart, and fidelity of will. Letter 43 From a letter to Michael Tolkien

Men like the opinions to which they have been accustomed from their youth; they defend them, and shun contrary views: and this is one of the things that prevents men from finding truth, for they cling to the opinions of habit.

Your mind can’t go forward if it’s constantly looking back, mired in youth worship and constantly referring to when “I used to be able to.” That’s why I ask everyone to start with mobilizing mindset and creating a vision for the future.

Love is not only the cardinal fact in the individual life, but the most important concern of the community; after all, the way in which the young people of this generation pair off determines the fate of the nation; all the other affairs of the state are subsidiary to that. And we leave it to flushed and blundering youth to stumble on its own significance, with nothing to guide it but shocked looks and sentimental twaddle and base whisperings and cant-smeared examples.

Its never too early to give children the guidance and to create or make your relationship with them a safer space. When your child has questions or in some cases can articulate their sexuality/gender experiences, handle them with respect and affirmations.

I watch the figure reach the peak Head in clouds, no room to think He gave the world a blissful wink Took a drink, destroyed the peace We watched the ships explode then sink On cardboard screens, the blood-shed pink. This is the way we choose to run things.

Don't you want to preserve old things? But you can't, Anthony. Beautiful things grow to a certain height and then they fail and fade off, breathing out memories as they decay. And just as any period decays in our minds, the things of that period should decay too, and in that way they're preserved for a while in the few hearts like mine that react to them. That graveyard at Tarrytown, for instance. The asses who give money to preserve things have spoiled that too. Sleepy Hollow's gone; Washington Irving's dead and his books are rotting in our estimation year by year - then let the graveyard rot too, as it should, as all things should. Trying to preserve a century by keeping its relics up to date is like keeping a dying man alive by stimulants. So you think that just as time goes to pieces its houses ought to go too? Of course! Would you value your Keats letter if the signature was traced over to make it last longer? It's just because I love the past that I want this house to look back on its glamorous moment of youth and beauty, and I want its stars to creak as if to the footsteps of women with hoop-skirts and men in boots and spurs. But they've made it into a blondined, rouged-up old woman of sixty. It hasn't any right to look so prosperous. It might care enough for Lee to drop a brick now and then. How many of these - these animals - get anything from this, for all the histories and guide-books and restorations in existence? How many of them who think that, at best, appreciation is talking in undertones and walking on tiptoes would even come here if it was any trouble? I want it to smell of magnolias instead of peanuts and I want my shoes to crunch on the same gravel that Lee's boots crunched on. There's no beauty without poignancy and there's no poignancy without the feeling that it's going, men, names, books, houses - bound for dust - mortal-

some seem to get trapped in the compulsion to succeed, others take a rebellious stance. Pointing to the blatant cruelties and limitations involved in a cultural pattern which tends to value only the winner and ignore even the positive qualities of the mediocre, they vehemently criticize competition. Among the most vocal are youth who have suffered under competitive pressures imposed on them by parents or society. Teaching these young people, I often observe in them a desire to fail. They seem to seek failure by making no effort to win

When you consider that societies with youthful populations are more violent, tend to be supportive of slavery, and see nothing wrong in holding brutal combats in which men fight to the death for the sake of entertainment, you realize that society has changed fundamentally.

No one really just wakes up one day and decides to love themselves. It’s also rare for someone to be taught how to have self-love (unless you have a very self-aware parent, guardian or teacher in your youth). The choice is usually only made right after a significant moment. This is the moment I call the “Breakdown to Breakthrough.” There are typically tears, yelling, screaming (probably mostly to the air, or God, or the Universe—whatever you like to call it), or sometimes it can be a very deep and serious, “I’ve had enough, I can no longer live like this” moment.

For Woman, in her weakness, is yet the strongest force upon the earth. She is the helm of all things human; she comes in many shapes and knocks at many doors; she is quick and patient, and her passion is not ungovernable like that of man, but as a gentle steed that she can guide e'en where she will, and as occasion offers can now bit up and now give rein. She has a captain's eye, and stout must be that fortress of the heart in which she finds no place of vantage. Does thy blood beat fast in youth? She will outrun it, nor will her kisses tire. Art thou set toward ambition? She will unlock thy inner heart, and show thee roads that lead to glory. Art thou worn and weary? She has comfort in her breast. Art thou fallen? She can lift thee up, and to the illusion of thy sense gild defeat with triumph. Ay, Harmachis, she can do these things, for Nature ever fights upon her side; and while she does them she can deceive and shape a secret end in which thou hast no part. And thus Woman rules the world. For her are wars; for her men spend their strength in gathering gains; for her they do well and ill, and seek for greatness, to find oblivion. But still she sits like yonder Sphinx, and smiles; and no man has ever read all the riddle of her smile, or known all the mystery of her heart. Mock not! mock not! Harmachis; for he must be great indeed who can defy the power of Woman, which, pressing round him like the invisible air, is often strongest when the senses least discover it.

What cords seem almost unbreakable? In the case of mortals of a choice and lofty nature they will be those of duty: that reverence, which in youth is most typical, that timidity and tenderness in the presence of the traditionally honored and the worthy, that gratitude to the soil from which we sprung, for the hand that guided us, for the relic before which we were taught to pray—their sublimest moments will themselves bind these souls most strongly. The great liberation comes suddenly to such prisoners, like an earthquake: the young soul is all at once shaken, torn apart, cast forth—it comprehends not itself what is taking place.

But with the judge it is otherwise; since he governs mind by mind; he ought not therefore to have been trained among vicious minds, and to have associated with them from youth upwards, and to have gone through the whole calendar of crime, only in order that he may quickly infer the crimes of others as he might their bodily diseases from his own self-consciousness; the honourable mind which is to form a healthy judgment should have had no experience or contamination of evil habits when young. And this is the reason why in youth good men often appear to be simple, and are easily practised upon by the dishonest, because they have no examples of what evil is in their own souls. Yes, he said, they are far too apt to be deceived. Therefore, I said, the judge should not be young; he should have learned to know evil, not from his own soul, but from late and long observation of the nature of evil in others: knowledge should be his guide, not personal experience. Yes, he said, that is the ideal of a judge. Yes,

Every fool must learn,” he growled, ‘but why trust the knowledge of a brick maker about jewels? Would you go to the bread maker to inquire about the stars? No, by my tunic, you would go to the astrologer, if you had power to think. Your savings are gone, youth, you have jerked your wealth-tree up by the roots. But plant another. Try again.

The Gypsy’S Song* Come, cross my hand! My art surpasses All that did ever Mortal know; Come, Maidens, come! My magic glasses* Your future Husband’s form can show: For ’tis to me the power is given Unclosed the book of Fate to see; To read the fixed resolves of heaven, And dive into futurity. I guide the pale Moon’s silver waggon; The winds in magic bonds I hold; I charm to sleep the crimson Dragon, Who loves to watch o’er buried gold: Fenced round with spells, unhurt I venture Their sabbath strange where Witches keep; Fearless the Sorcerer’s circle enter, And woundless tread on snakes asleep. Lo! Here are charms of mighty power! This makes secure an Husband’s truth; And this composed at midnight hour Will force to love the coldest Youth: If any Maid too much has granted, Her loss this Philtre* will repair; This blooms a cheek where red is wanted, And this will make a brown girl fair! Then silent hear, while I discover What I in Fortune’s mirror view; And each, when many a year is over, Shall own the Gypsy’s sayings true.

He who will not work shall not eat.' Yet, so strong is the propensity to be thought 'gentlemen;' so general is this desire amongst the youth of this proud money making nation, that thousands upon thousands of them are, at this moment, in a state which may end in starvation; not so much because they are too lazy to earn their bread, as because they are too proud!

how incongruous and irrational the common temper of mankind is, especially of youth, to that reason which ought to guide them in such cases—viz. that they are not ashamed to sin, and yet are ashamed to repent; not ashamed of the action for which they ought justly to be esteemed fools, but are ashamed of the returning, which only can make them be esteemed wise men.

To try is to risk failure. But risks need to be taken, because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing. The person who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing and is nothing. They may avoid suffering and sorrow, but they cannot learn, feel change, grow, love and live. Chained by their certitudes, they are a slave; they have forfeited their freedom. Only a person who risks is free. —Leo Buscaglia

To base one's rejection of what exists--and hence one's prescription for a better world--upon the petty frustrations of one's youth, as surely many middle-class radicals have done, is profoundly egotistical. Unless consciously rejected, this impulse leads to a tendency throughout life to judge the rightness or wrongness of policies by one's personal emotional response to them, as if emotion were an infallible guide.

Let us be bold and proclaim the truth to the elders of these young men, to their moral guides, to their religious and secular leaders, to the Churches, the great thinkers, the leaders of socialism; these living riches, these treasures of heroism you held in your hands; for what are you squandering them? What ideal have you held up to the devotion of these youths so eager to sacrifice themselves? Their mutual slaughter!

Let's put our money where our mouth is; let's invest in the future by investing in the education of our youth and the re-education of those who need it and aren't so young anymore. It's not charity; it's an investment in the mental, intellectual, and social infrastructure of our country and our planet. Charity is something you give to corporations when they commit crimes of fraud and plunge the world into economic turmoil.

Everything from self-help guides to teen magazines regularly feature tips on 'being your own best friend' and 'reaffirming your self-worth'. Advice includes such gems as writing down 'amazing things about yourself every morning'. So if we wonder where Generation Snowflake gets its sense of self-regard from, the self-esteem movement must take some of the credit (or blame). It is an industry dedicated to creating ego-boosting, self-oriented youth.

I don't know when we'll meet again or what'll happen in the future, but Desolation, Desolation, I owe so much to Desolation, thank you forever for guiding me to the place where I learned all. Now comes the sadness of coming back to cities and I've grown two months older and there's all that humanity of bars and burlesque shows and gritty love, all upsidedown in the void God bless them, but Japhy you and me forever we know, O ever youthful, O ever weeping.

A Prayer for Joy” Help me, O God, To listen to what it is that makes my heart glad And to follow where it leads. May joy, not guilt, Your voice, not the voices of others, Your will, not my willfulness, Be the guides that lead me to my vocation. Help me to unearth the passions of my heart That lay buried in my youth. And help me to go over that ground again and again Until I can hold in my hands, Hold and treasure, Your calling on my life. —Ken Gire, Windows of the Soul

By December 1975, a year had passed since Mr. Harvey had packed his bags, but there was still no sign of him. For a while, until the tape dirtied or the paper tore, store owners kept a scratchy sketch of him taped to their windows. Lindsey and Samuel walked in the neighboorhood or hung out at Hal's bike shop. She wouldn't go to the diner where the other kids went. The owner of the diner was a law and order man. He had blown up the sketch of George Harvey to twice its size and taped it to the front door. He willingly gave the grisly details to any customer who asked- young girl, cornfield, found only an elbow. Finallly Lindsey asked Hal to give her a ride to the police station. She wanted to know what exactly they were doing. They bid farewell to Samuel at the bike shop and Hal gave Lindsey a ride through a wet December snow. From the start, Lindsey's youth and purpose had caught the police off guard. As more and more of them realized who she was, they gave her a wider and wider berth. Here was this girl, focused, mad, fifteen... When Lindsey and Hal waited outside the captain's office on a wooden bench, she thought she saw something across the room that she recognized. It was on Detective Fenerman's desk and it stood out in the room because of its color. What her mother had always distinguished as Chinese red, a harsher red than rose red, it was the red of classic red lipsticks, rarely found in nature. Our mother was proud of her ability fo wear Chinese red, noting each time she tied a particular scarf around her neck that it was a color even Grandma Lynn dared not wear. Hal,' she said, every muscle tense as she stared at the increasingly familiar object on Fenerman's desk. Yes.' Do you see that red cloth?' Yes.' Can you go and get it for me?' When Hal looked at her, she said: 'I think it's my mother's.' As Hal stood to retrieve it, Len entered the squad room from behind where Lindsey sat. He tapped her on the shoulder just as he realized what Hal was doing. Lindsey and Detective Ferman stared at each other. Why do you have my mother's scarf?' He stumbled. 'She might have left it in my car one day.' Lindsey stood and faced him. She was clear-eyed and driving fast towards the worst news yet. 'What was she doing in your car?' Hello, Hal,' Len said. Hal held the scarf in his head. Lindsey grabbed it away, her voice growing angry. 'Why do you have m mother's scarf?' And though Len was the detective, Hal saw it first- it arched over her like a rainbow- Prismacolor understanding. The way it happened in algebra class or English when my sister was the first person to figure out the sum of x or point out the double entendres to her peers. Hal put his hand on Lindsey's shoulder to guide her. 'We should go,' he said. And later she cried out her disbelief to Samuel in the backroom of the bike shop.

I have found, though, that all the evidence shows that Douglas's conduct at the time, however impulsive and ill-advised, was honourable and courageous in a degree scarcely to be expected of a young man of twenty-four, faced with a tragic and dangerous situation and having only his own initiative, his own sense of loyalty, his own idea of right and wrong, to guide him. The selfish youth who goaded Wilde to his doom, and afterwards abandoned him is an artfully created myth.

What is now happening to the people of the East as of the West is like what happens to every individual when he passes from childhood to adolescence and from youth to manhood. He loses what had hitherto guided his life and lives without direction, not having found a new standard suitable to his age, and so he invents all sorts of occupations, cares, distractions, and stupefactions to divert his attention from the misery and senselessness of his life. Such a condition may last a long time.

in persons entrenched in serious sin the enemy ordinarily works on the imagination. He fills such persons’ imagination with images of “sensual delights and pleasures” awakening, consequently, an attraction toward these “delights and pleasures” which confirms them all the more in their “vices and sins.” This is the action of the enemy in the young Augustine: “In my youth I burned to get my fill of evil things.” A great energy is stirred in Augustine, an energy that leads him away from God and toward “sensual delights and pleasures.

We are hardwired to hear and make music. Yes, we will sigh with pleasure when we hear a favorite theme played by an orchestra, and who hasn’t felt a stab of nostalgia, or even brushed away a tear, when hearing a song reminiscent of youth or a lost love? However, such exquisite moments notwithstanding, the musical experience represents something far deeper. Broadly defined, music is sound in time. Sound is nothing less than our perception of the vibrations, the movement, of the universe around us. Music is an intensification, a crystallization, a celebration, a glorification, of that movement and those vibrations. Pretty heady stuff. Far beyond spoken language—which, with its sounds in time, might rightly be considered a low-end sort of music—music is a universal language; one need not speak Ashanti in order to groove to West African drumming; or German in order to be emotionally flayed by Beethoven; or English to totally freak when listening to Bruce Springsteen. Say it with flowers? Nah. If you really want to get your expressive point across, say it with music. No human activity

One of the first books of travel, giving European readers some insight into the unfamiliar world of the Orient, was published in 1356-67 in Anglo-Norman French. Called simply Travels, it was said to be by Sir John Mandeville, but a French historian, Jean d'Outremeuse, may well have written the book. It is a highly entertaining guide for pilgrims to the Holy Land, but goes beyond, taking the reader as far as Tartary, Persia, India and Egypt, recounting more fantasy than fact, but containing geographical details to give the work credence. Mandeville's book whetted the Western European reader's appetite for the travel book as a journal of marvels: dry scientific detail was not what these readers wanted. Rather it was imagination plus information. Thus, myths of 'the fountain of youth' and of gold-dust lying around 'like ant-hills' caught the Western imagination, and, when the voyagers of the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries found 'new worlds' in the Americas, these myths were enlarged and expanded, as Eldorado joined the Golden Road to Samarkand in the imagination of readers concerning distant lands.

In truth it was not whisky that had ruined him; he was ruined long before for all good human purposes but conversation.  His eyes were sealed by a cheap, school-book materialism.  He could see nothing in the world but money and steam-engines.  He did not know what you meant by the word happiness.  He had forgotten the simple emotions of childhood, and perhaps never encountered the delights of youth.  He believed in production, that useful figment of economy, as if it had been real like laughter; and production, without prejudice to liquor, was his god and guide.

Smallpox is almost certainly the most devastating disease in the history of humankind. It infected nearly everyone who was exposed to it and killed about 30 percent of victims. The death toll in the twentieth century alone is thought to have been around 500 million. Smallpox’s astounding infectiousness was vividly demonstrated in Germany in 1970 after a youthful tourist developed it upon returning home from a trip to Pakistan. He was placed in hospital quarantine but opened his window one day to sneak a cigarette. This, it has been reported, was enough to infect seventeen others, some two floors away.

DURING MY childhood and youth, I saw my mother as a victim, and decided early on that I didn’t want to follow in her footsteps. I was a feminist long before I’d heard the word; my need to be independent and not to be controlled by anyone is so old that I can’t remember a single moment when it didn’t guide my decisions. When I look back at the past, I realize that my mother was dealt a difficult destiny and in fact confronted it with great bravery, but at the time I judged her as being weak because she was dependent on the men around her, like her father and her brother Pablo, who controlled the money and gave the orders.

I believe every single man, woman, and child—including the pre-born—is created in the image of God. I believe in the sanctity and dignity of life from womb to tomb. Not only babies’ lives, but also the lives of their mothers. Not just our lives, but their lives. Not just American lives, but Syrian lives. Not just Christian lives, but Muslim lives. To be pro-all-life is to acknowledge the systemic injustice that operates against indigenous and black and brown people in our culture. To be pro-all-life is to be broken by the fact that LGBTQ youth are three to six times more likely to attempt suicide. 16 And the list goes on …

To the enduring seas - ; There cast my anchor of desire Deep in unknown eternity; Nor ever let my spirit tire, With looking for what is to be! It is hope's spell that glorifies, Like youth, to my maturer eyes, All Nature's million mysteries, The fearful and the fair - Hope soothes me in the griefs I know; She lulls my pain for others' woe, And makes me strong to undergo What I am born to bear. Glad comforter! will I not brave, Unawed, the darkness of the grave? Nay, smile to hear Death's billows rave - Sustained, my guide, by thee? The more unjust seems present fate, The more my spirit swells elate, Strong, in thy strength, to anticipate Rewarding destiny !

Take one child, limitless dreams, unlimited potential, pure innocence and a sponge-like brain. Force them by law to spend at least ten years of their precious youth being force-fed the most useless information. Constantly reminding them that they’re only as good as their grades in a system that teaches useless mind-numbing subjects and claims to confirm our intellect with repetition and random memory tests. I didn’t give a flying fuck about the square route of the number nine or the speed of sound; I just so desperately wanted to know the basics. Happiness, love, the things that we need in our lives; the things that help us to find confidence in ourselves, our ability and our dreams.

was spring but it was summer I wanted; the warm days and the great outdoors. It was summer but it was fall I wanted; the colorful leaves and the cool dry air. It was fall but it was winter I wanted; the beautiful snow and the joy of the holiday season. It was now winter but it was spring I wanted; the warmth and the blossoming of nature. I was a child but it was adulthood I wanted; the freedom and the respect. I was twenty but it was thirty I wanted; to be mature and sophisticated. I was middle-aged but it was twenty I wanted; the youth and the free spirit. I was retired but it was middle-age that I wanted; the presence of mind without limitations. My life was over but I never got what I wanted.3

But Paradise would not be a bore for Muslims with different proclivities. Allah also promised his blessed that in Paradise, “round about them will serve, devoted to them, young male servants handsome as pearls well-guarded” (Qur’an 52:24), “youths of perpetual freshness” (Qur’an 56:17): “if thou seest them, thou wouldst think them scattered pearls” (Qur’an 76:19). But surely the Qur’an isn’t condoning homosexuality, is it? After all, it depicts Lot telling the people of Sodom: “For ye practise your lusts on men in preference to women: ye are indeed a people transgressing beyond bounds” (7:81) and “of all the creatures in the world, will ye approach males, and leave those whom Allah has created for you to be your mates? Nay, ye are a people transgressing all limits!” (26:165). A hadith commands that “if a man who is not married is seized committing sodomy, he will be stoned to death.”6 Another hadith has Muhammad saying: “Kill the one who sodomizes and the one who lets it be done to him.”7 These strictures have worked their way into Islamic legal codes, such that two Saudis were so anxious to avoid a flogging or prison term that they murdered a Pakistani who witnessed their “shameful acts” by running over him with a car, smashing his head in with a rock, and setting him on fire.8 But the pearl-like youths of Paradise have given rise to a strange double-mindedness about homosexuality in Islam. The great poet Abu Nuwas openly glorified homosexuality in his notorious poem the Perfumed Garden:

We attach to most of our chapels a cultural hall so that our youth may have a place to dance, to perform their talents in musicals and other uplifting entertainment, and we hope our youth leaders as trustees of the building will see to it that only wholesome, uplifting activities are performed in this building. Should you have any reservations whether or not an activity, a style of dancing or tempo of music is in accord with Church standards, may I suggest this guide: Does it uplift and inspire one to higher ideals? Does it develop wholesome relationships between young men and women, or appeal to and arouse their baser instincts? Will it cause one to be a better Latter-day Saint and lead one closer to the Savior? Avoid all activities and dances which bring the world's demoralizing standards into this sacred meeting place.

The first of us who were set free weren’t the worst of the lot, though we were some of the most powerful. More than anything, I think we valued freedom and adventure over society’s regulations. Perhaps, in another time, we’d have been cowboys, or pirates, or settlers. Sadly, when you pair the kind of power we had with that spirit and youth, you often end up with criminals. But after being chained down, we saw that our kind needed some rules, even if they were only bare-bones, so that we could have that freedom we craved so dearly. In the course of it, we also realized that some metas would never be cowed by the threats of those chained by law. They would only respond to the thing they respected: power. In that way, the guild was founded to guide those of us who sought freedom and to contain those of us who sought destruction.” Tori

Patience outfits faith, guides peace, assists love, equips humility, waits for penitence, seals confession, keeps the flesh in check, preserves the spirit, bridles the tongue, restrains the hands, tramples temptation underfoot, removes what causes us to stumble, brings martyrdom to perfection; it lightens the care of the poor, teaches moderation to the rich, lifts the burdens of the sick, delights the believer, welcomes the unbeliever, commends the servant to his master and his master to God, adorns women and gives grace to men; patience is loved in children, praised in youth, admired in the elderly. It is beautiful in either sex and at every age of life.... Her countenance is tranquil and peaceful, her brow serene.... Patience sits on the throne of the most gentle and peaceful Spirit.... For where God is there is his progeny, patience. When God's Spirit descends patience is always at his side.3o

In these moments, I acted not, as I most often did, as death’s enemy, but as its ambassador. I had to help those families understand that the person they knew—the full, vital independent human—now lived only in the past and that I needed their input to understand what sort of future he or she would want: an easy death or to be strung between bags of fluids going in, others coming out, to persist despite being unable to struggle. Had I been more religious in my youth, I might have become a pastor, for it was the pastoral role I’d sought. — With my renewed focus, informed consent—the ritual by which a patient signs a piece of paper, authorizing surgery—became not a juridical exercise in naming all the risks as quickly as possible, like the voiceover in an ad for a new pharmaceutical, but an opportunity to forge a covenant with a suffering compatriot: Here we are together, and here are the ways through—I promise to guide you, as best as I can, to the other side.

I want to end here with the most common and least understood sexual problem. So ordinary is this problem, so likely are you to suffer from it, that it usually goes unnoticed. It doesn't even have a name. The writer Robertson Davies dubs it acedia. “Acedia” used to be reckoned a sin, one of the seven deadly sins, in fact. Medieval theologians translated it as “sloth,” but it is not physical torpor that makes acedia so deadly. It is the torpor of the soul, the indifference that creeps up on us as we age and grow accustomed to those we love, that poisons so much of adult life. As we fight our way out of the problems of adolescence and early adulthood, we often notice that the defeats and setbacks that troubled us in our youth are no longer as agonizing. This comes as welcome relief, but it has a cost. Whatever buffers us from the turmoil and pain of loss also buffers us from feeling joy. It is easy to mistake the indifference that creeps over us with age and experience for the growth of wisdom. Indifference is not wisdom. It is acedia. The symptom of this condition that concerns me is the waning of sexual attraction that so commonly comes between lovers once they settle down with each other. The sad fact is that the passionate attraction that so consumed them when they first courted dies down as they get to know each other well. In time, it becomes an ember; often, an ash. Within a few years, the sexual passion goes out of most marriages, and many partners start to look elsewhere to rekindle this joyous side of life. This is easy to do with a new lover, but acedia will not be denied, and the whole cycle happens again. This is the stuff of much of modern divorce, and this is the sexual disorder you are most likely to experience call it a disorder because it meets the defining criterion of a disorder: like transsexuality or S-M or impotence, it grossly impairs sexual, affectionate relations between two people who used to have them. Researchers and therapists have not seen fit to mount an attack on acedia. You will find it in no one’s nosology, on no foundation's priority list of problems to solve, in no government mental health budget. It is consigned to the innards of women's magazines and to trashy “how to keep your man” paperbacks. Acedia is looked upon with acceptance and indifference by those who might actually discover how it works and how to cure it. It is acedia I wish to single out as the most painful, the most costly, the most mysterious, and the least understood of the sexual disorders. And therefore the most urgent.

Priesthood, Ratzinger stressed, meant getting out of a bourgeois lifestyle. It had to ‘guide people towards becoming reconciled, forgiving and forgetting, being tolerant and generous’. It was to help them ‘put up with other people in their otherness, and have patience with one another’. A priest must ‘above all, be able to support people in pain – in bodily suffering, as well as in all the disappointments, humiliations and fears, which no one is spared.’ For ‘the ability to accept and stand suffering’ is ‘a fundamental condition for successful human living. If that is not learned, then failure is inevitable.’16 The ‘right definition of what a priest should be and do’ was still Paul’s message in his letter to the Corinthians: ‘We are ambassadors for Christ.’ A priest is required ‘to know Jesus intimately; he has met him and learned to love him’. It was only by being a man of prayer that he was also a truly ‘spiritual’ person – a priest. When priests were overworked and felt tired and frustrated, it was often caused by a tense straining for performance. Then faith became a heavy burden, ‘when it should be wings to carry us’. Whoever works for Christ knows that ‘it is always someone else who sows and someone else who reaps. He does not have to continually question himself; he leaves the outcome to the Lord and does what he can without worrying, freely and happily, secure as part of the whole.’17

In the face of the calamity, the Modi government froze. In the seven months from March to September 2020, Modi made 82 public appearances—physical as well as virtual. In the next four months, he made 111 such appearances. From February to 25 April 2021, he clocked 92 public appearances. From 25 April, after he called off the Kumbh and his Bengal rallies, Modi disappeared. He made no public appearance for 20 days.147 The prime minister of India fled the field when his people needed the government most. Through all of April and much of May, upper class Indians flooded Twitter with calls for help to find hospital beds, oxygen cylinders, drugs like Remdesivir and ventilators.148 The Union did not think to set up a helpline to guide those who needed this help. Into this space strode the youth Congress leader B.V. Srinivas (@srinivasiyc) who, with a team of volunteers, began to help people reaching out for aid on Twitter. He was so effective in the absence of the State and any government presence that even the embassies of New Zealand and the Philippines contacted him for help when staffers fell ill with Covid.149 Focussed on the government’s image, Jaishankar tweeted: ‘This was an unsolicited supply as they had no Covid cases. Clearly for cheap publicity by you know who. Giving away cylinders like this when there are people in desperate need of oxygen is simply appalling.’ The New Zealand embassy staffer who had received oxygen from Srinivas on 2 May died 18 days later.

Astonishment: these women’s military professions—medical assistant, sniper, machine gunner, commander of an antiaircraft gun, sapper—and now they are accountants, lab technicians, museum guides, teachers…Discrepancy of the roles—here and there. Their memories are as if not about themselves, but some other girls. Now they are surprised at themselves. Before my eyes history “humanizes” itself, becomes like ordinary life. Acquires a different lighting. I’ve happened upon extraordinary storytellers. There are pages in their lives that can rival the best pages of the classics. The person sees herself so clearly from above—from heaven, and from below—from the ground. Before her is the whole path—up and down—from angel to beast. Remembering is not a passionate or dispassionate retelling of a reality that is no more, but a new birth of the past, when time goes in reverse. Above all it is creativity. As they narrate, people create, they “write” their life. Sometimes they also “write up” or “rewrite.” Here you have to be vigilant. On your guard. At the same time pain melts and destroys any falsehood. The temperature is too high! Simple people—nurses, cooks, laundresses—behave more sincerely, I became convinced of that…They, how shall I put it exactly, draw the words out of themselves and not from newspapers and books they have read—not from others. But only from their own sufferings and experiences. The feelings and language of educated people, strange as it may be, are often more subject to the working of time. Its general encrypting. They are infected by secondary knowledge. By myths. Often I have to go for a long time, by various roundabout ways, in order to hear a story of a “woman’s,” not a “man’s” war: not about how we retreated, how we advanced, at which sector of the front…It takes not one meeting, but many sessions. Like a persistent portrait painter. I sit for a long time, sometimes a whole day, in an unknown house or apartment. We drink tea, try on the recently bought blouses, discuss hairstyles and recipes. Look at photos of the grandchildren together. And then…After a certain time, you never know when or why, suddenly comes this long-awaited moment, when the person departs from the canon—plaster and reinforced concrete, like our monuments—and goes on to herself. Into herself. Begins to remember not the war but her youth. A piece of her life…I must seize that moment. Not miss it! But often, after a long day, filled with words, facts, tears, only one phrase remains in my memory (but what a phrase!): “I was so young when I left for the front, I even grew during the war.” I keep it in my notebook, although I have dozens of yards of tape in my tape recorder. Four or five cassettes… What helps me? That we are used to living together. Communally. We are communal people. With us everything is in common—both happiness and tears. We know how to suffer and how to tell about our suffering. Suffering justifies our hard and ungainly life.

To this day when I inhale a light scent of Wrangler—its sweet sharpness—or the stronger, darker scent of Musk, I return to those hours and it ceases to be just cologne that I take in but the very scent of age, of youth at its most beautiful peak. It bears the memory of possibility, of unknown forests, unchartered territories, and a heart light and skipping, hell-bent as the captain of any of the three ships, determined at all costs to prevail to the new world. Turning back was no option. Whatever the gales, whatever the emaciation, whatever the casualty to self, onward I kept my course. My heart felt the magnetism of its own compass guiding me on—its direction constant and sure. There was no other way through. I feel it again as once it had been, before it was broken-in; its strength and resolute ardency. The years of solitude were nothing compared to what lay ahead. In sailing for the horizon that part of my life had been sealed up, a gentle eddy, a trough of gentle waves diminishing further, receding away. Whatever loneliness and pain went with the years between the ages of 14 and 20, was closed, irretrievable—I was already cast in form and direction in a certain course. When I open the little bottle of eau de toilette five hundred different days unfold within me, conversations so strained, breaking slowly, so painstakingly, to a comfortable place. A place so warm and inviting after the years of silence and introspect, of hiding. A place in the sun that would burn me alive before I let it cast a shadow on me. Until that time I had not known, I had not been conscious of my loneliness. Yes, I had been taciturn in school, alone, I had set myself apart when others tried to engage. But though I was alone, I had not felt the pangs of loneliness. It had not burdened or tormented as such when I first felt the clear tang of its opposite in the form of another’s company. Of Regn’s company. We came, each in our own way, in our own need—listening, wanting, tentatively, as though we came upon each other from the side in spite of having seen each other head on for two years. It was a gradual advance, much again like a vessel waiting for its sails to catch wind, grasping hold of the ropes and learning much too quickly, all at once, how to move in a certain direction. There was no practicing. It was everything and all—for the first and last time. Everything had to be right, whether it was or not. The waters were beautiful, the work harder than anything in my life, but the very glimpse of any tempest of defeat was never in my line of vision. I’d never failed at anything. And though this may sound quite an exaggeration, I tell you earnestly, it is true. Everything to this point I’d ever set my mind to, I’d achieved. But this wasn’t about conquering some land, nor had any of my other desires ever been about proving something. It just had to be—I could not break, could not turn or retract once I’d committed myself to my course. You cannot force a clock to run backwards when it is made to persevere always, and ever, forward. Had I not been so young I’d never have had the courage to love her.

It may be conjectured that a soul in which the type of 'free spirit' can attain maturity and completeness had its decisive and deciding event in the form of a great emancipation or unbinding, and that prior to that event it seemed only the more firmly and forever chained to its place and pillar. What binds strongest? What cords seem almost unbreakable? In the case of mortals of a choice and lofty nature they will be those of duty: that reverence, which in youth is most typical, that timidity and tenderness in the presence of the traditionally honored and the worthy, that gratitude to the soil from which we sprung, for the hand that guided us, for the relic before which we were taught to pray — their sublimest moments will themselves bind these souls most strongly. The great liberation comes suddenly to such prisoners, like an earthquake: the young soul is all at once shaken, torn apart, cast forth — it comprehends not itself what is taking place. An involuntary onward impulse rules them with the mastery of command; a will, a wish are developed to go forward, anywhere, at any price; a strong, dangerous curiosity regarding an undiscovered world flames and flashes in all their being. 'Better to die than live here'— so sounds the tempting voice: and this 'here,' this 'at home' constitutes all they have hitherto loved. A sudden dread and distrust of that which they loved, a flash of contempt for that which is called their 'duty,' a mutinous, wilful, volcanic-like longing for a far away journey, strange scenes and people, annihilation, petrifaction, a hatred surmounting love, perhaps a sacrilegious impulse and look backwards, to where they so long prayed and loved, perhaps a flush of shame for what they did and at the same time an exultation at having done it, an inner, intoxicating, delightful tremor in which is betrayed the sense of victory—

These beauteous forms, Through a long absence, have not been to me As is a landscape to a blind man's eye: But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid the din Of towns and cities, I have owed to them, In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart; And passing even into my purer mind With tranquil restoration:—feelings too Of unremembered pleasure: such, perhaps, As have no slight or trivial influence On that best portion of a good man's life, His little, nameless, unremembered, acts Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust, To them I may have owed another gift, Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood, In which the burthen of the mystery, In which the heavy and the weary weight Of all this unintelligible world, Is lightened:—that serene and blessed mood, In which the affections gently lead us on,— Until, the breath of this corporeal frame And even the motion of our human blood Almost suspended, we are laid asleep In body, and become a living soul: While with an eye made quiet by the power Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, We see into the life of things. If this Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! how oft— In darkness and amid the many shapes Of joyless daylight; when the fretful stir Unprofitable, and the fever of the world, Have hung upon the beatings of my heart— How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee, O sylvan Wye! thou wanderer thro' the woods, How often has my spirit turned to thee! And now, with gleams of half-extinguished thought, With many recognitions dim and faint, And somewhat of a sad perplexity, The picture of the mind revives again: While here I stand, not only with the sense Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts That in this moment there is life and food For future years. And so I dare to hope, Though changed, no doubt, from what I was when first I came among these hills; when like a roe I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams, Wherever nature led: more like a man Flying from something that he dreads, than one Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then (The coarser pleasures of my boyish days And their glad animal movements all gone by) To me was all in all.—I cannot paint What then I was. The sounding cataract Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock, The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood, Their colours and their forms, were then to me An appetite; a feeling and a love, That had no need of a remoter charm, By thought supplied, not any interest Unborrowed from the eye.—That time is past, And all its aching joys are now no more, And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur; other gifts Have followed; for such loss, I would believe, Abundant recompense. For I have learned To look on nature, not as in the hour Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes The still sad music of humanity, Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power To chasten and subdue. And I have felt A presence that disturbs me with the joy Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime Of something far more deeply interfused, Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, And the round ocean and the living air, And the blue sky, and in the mind of man: A motion and a spirit, that impels All thinking things, all objects of all thought, And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still A lover of the meadows and the woods And mountains; and of all that we behold From this green earth; of all the mighty world Of eye, and ear,—both what they half create, And what perceive; well pleased to recognise In nature and the language of the sense The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul Of all my moral being.

The two works I allude to, sir, will in particular give a noble rule and example of self-education. School and other education constantly proceed upon false principles, and show a clumsy apparatus pointed at a false mark; but your apparatus is simple, and the mark a true one; and while parents and young persons are left destitute of other just means of estimating and becoming prepared for a reasonable course in life, your discovery that the thing is in many a man's private power, will be invaluable! Influence upon the private character, late in life, is not only an influence late in life, but a weak influence. It is in youth that we plant our chief habits and prejudices; it is in youth that we take our party as to profession, pursuits and matrimony. In youth, therefore, the turn is given; in youth the education even of the next generation is given; in youth the private and public character is determined; and the term of life extending but from youth to age, life ought to begin well from youth, and more especially before we take our party as to our principal objects. But your biography will not merely teach self-education, but the education of a wise man; and the wisest man will receive lights and improve his progress, by seeing detailed the conduct of another wise man. And why are weaker men to be deprived of such helps, when we see our race has been blundering on in the dark, almost without a guide in this particular, from the farthest trace of time? Show then, sir, how much is to be done, both to sons and fathers; and invite all wise men to become like yourself, and other men to become wise. When we see how cruel statesmen and warriors can be to the human race, and how absurd distinguished men can be to their acquaintance, it will be instructive to observe the instances multiply of pacific, acquiescing manners; and to find how compatible it is to be great and domestic, enviable and yet good-humored.

Taking control of the situation There are a great many parents—as I’ve learned by attending endless parent support group meetings— who had the same high hopes for their families as I. If you’re such a parent, then you probably know that it isn’t just the child who can be out of control, but also the parent. Possibly you are also aware that continuous reacting on your part is useless as well as extremely hazardous to your health and well-being. The most ruinous thing you can do is to allow the situation to continue on its present destructive course. Here are some simple steps you can take to deactivate the negativity so rampant in your family dynamics. Please note that it takes courage and determination to carry this off successfully. Cut off all funds to the addict. Holding onto the purse strings with an iron fist will have immediate results, as well as repercussions. (Keep an eye on family valuables. In fact, lock them away.) Cut off all privileges accorded to your addicts— such as use of the family car or having their friends in your house. Carry out all threats you make. The fastest way to lose credibility with addicted children is to become a “softie” at the last minute. Refuse to rescue your addicts when they get into legal jams. Don’t pay their fines or their bail. Get yourself into a support group such as Al-Anon, Nar-Anon, Parents Anonymous, or Tough Love as fast as you can. Attempt to get your addicted kids into rehabs. If they’re underage you can sign them in. Adult admission is done on a voluntary basis, so you may be out of luck. Drugs erase any trace of conscience. Be aware that many of today’s drugged youths will think nothing of injuring or even murdering their parents for money. If you suspect that your child could resort to this level of violence, get in touch with the police. If you’re a single parent there will be one voice, but if you’re married there’ll be two. It’s important to merge those two voices so that a single, clear message reaches the addict. If you can work with your partner as a team to institute these simple steps when dealing with the addict, you’ll have done yourself and your family a great service. If, however, you entertain the notion that you were responsible for your child’s addictions in the first place, chances are you won’t be effective in enforcing these guidelines. That’s what the next chapter is all about. Note 1. Drug abuse and alcoholism are officially listed in The International Classification of Diseases, 4th edition, 9th revision, the World Health Organization’s directory on diseases.

Intentions precede our deeds, and then are left lying in the wake of those deeds. I am not the voice of posterity, Anomander Rake. Nor are you.’ ‘Rake?’ ‘Purake is an Azathanai word,’ Brood said. ‘You did not know? It was an honorific granted to your family, to your father in his youth.’ ‘Why? How did he earn it?’ The Azathanai shrugged. ‘K’rul gave it. He did not share his reasons. Or, rather, “she”, as K’rul is wont to change his mind’s way of thinking, and so assumes a woman’s guise every few centuries. He is now a man, but back then he was a woman.’ ‘Do you know its meaning, Caladan?’ ‘Pur Rakess Calas ne A’nom. Roughly, Strength in Standing Still.’ ‘A’nom,’ said the Son of Darkness, frowning. ‘Perhaps,’ the Azathanai said, ‘as a babe, you were quick to stand.’ ‘And Rakess? Or Rake, as you would call me?’ ‘Only what I see in you, and what all others see in you. Strength.’ ‘I feel no such thing.’ ‘No one who is strong does.’ They had conversed as if Endest was not there, as if he was deaf to their words. The two men, Tiste and Azathanai, had begun forging something between them, and whatever it was, it was unafraid of truths. ‘My father died because he would not retreat from battle.’ ‘Your father was bound in the chains of his family name.’ ‘As I will be, Caladan? You give me hope.’ ‘Forgive me, Rake, but strength is not always a virtue. I will raise no monument to you.’ The Son of Darkness had smiled, then. ‘At last, you say something that wholly pleases me.’ ‘Yet still you are worshipped. Many by nature would hide in strength’s shadow.’ ‘I will defy them.’ ‘Such principles are rarely appreciated,’ Caladan said. ‘Expect excoriation. Condemnation. Those who are not your equals will claim for their own that equality, and yet will meet your eyes with expectation, with profound presumption. Every kindness you yield they will take as deserved, but such appetites are unending, and your denial is the crime they but await. Commit it and witness their subsequent vilification.’ Anomander shrugged at that, as if the expectations of others meant nothing to him, and whatever would come from his standing upon the principles he espoused, he would bear it. ‘You promised peace, Caladan. I vowed to hold you to that, and nothing we have said now has changed my mind.’ ‘Yes, I said I would guide you, and I will. And in so doing, I will rely upon your strength, and hope it robust enough to bear each and every burden I place upon it. So I remind myself, and you, with the new name I give you. Will you accept it, Anomander Rake? Will you stand in strength?’ ‘My father’s name proved a curse. Indeed, it proved the death of him.’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Very well, Caladan Brood, I will take this first burden.’ Of course. The Son of Darkness could do no less.

These beauteous forms, Through a long absence, have not been to me As is a landscape to a blind man's eye: But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid the din Of towns and cities, I have owed to them In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart; And passing even into my purer mind, With tranquil restoration:—feelings too Of unremembered pleasure: such, perhaps, As have no slight or trivial influence On that best portion of a good man's life, His little, nameless, unremembered, acts Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust, To them I may have owed another gift, Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood, In which the burthen of the mystery, In which the heavy and the weary weight Of all this unintelligible world, Is lightened:—that serene and blessed mood, In which the affections gently lead us on,— Until, the breath of this corporeal frame And even the motion of our human blood Almost suspended, we are laid asleep In body, and become a living soul: While with an eye made quiet by the power Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, We see into the life of things. If this Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! how oft— In darkness and amid the many shapes Of joyless daylight; when the fretful stir Unprofitable, and the fever of the world, Have hung upon the beatings of my heart— How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee, O sylvan Wye! thou wanderer thro' the woods, How often has my spirit turned to thee! And now, with gleams of half-extinguished thought, With many recognitions dim and faint, And somewhat of a sad perplexity, The picture of the mind revives again: While here I stand, not only with the sense Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts That in this moment there is life and food For future years. And so I dare to hope, Though changed, no doubt, from what I was when first I came among these hills; when like a roe I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams, Wherever nature led: more like a man Flying from something that he dreads, than one Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then (The coarser pleasures of my boyish days, And their glad animal movements all gone by) To me was all in all.—I cannot paint What then I was. The sounding cataract Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock, The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood, Their colours and their forms, were then to me An appetite; a feeling and a love, That had no need of a remoter charm, By thought supplied, nor any interest Unborrowed from the eye.—That time is past, And all its aching joys are now no more, And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur, other gifts Have followed; for such loss, I would believe, Abundant recompence. For I have learned To look on nature, not as in the hour Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes The still, sad music of humanity, Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power To chasten and subdue. And I have felt A presence that disturbs me with the joy Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime Of something far more deeply interfused, Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, And the round ocean and the living air, And the blue sky, and in the mind of man; A motion and a spirit, that impels All thinking things, all objects of all thought, And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still A lover of the meadows and the woods, And mountains; and of all that we behold From this green earth; of all the mighty world Of eye, and ear,—both what they half create, And what perceive; well pleased to recognise In nature and the language of the sense, The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul Of all my moral being.

If he is going to treat her as the moral idea demands, he must try to see in her the concept of mankind and endeavour to respect her. [...] Thus this book may be considered as the greatest honour ever paid to women. Nothing but the most moral relation towards women should be possible for men; there should be neither sexuality nor love, for both make woman the means to an end, but only the attempt to understand her. Most men theoretically respect women, but practically they thoroughly despise them; according to my ideas this method should be reversed. It is impossible to think highly of women, but it does not follow that we are to despise them for ever. [...] Even technically the problem of humanity is not soluble for man alone; he has to consider woman even if he only wishes to redeem himself; he must endeavour to get her to abandon her immoral designs on him. Women must really and truly and spontaneously relinquish coitus. That undoubtedly means that woman, as woman, must disappear, and until that has come to pass there is no possibility of establishing the kingdom of God on earth. Pythagoras, Plato, Christianity (as opposed to Judaism), Tertullian, Swift, Wagner, Ibsen, all these have urged the freedom of woman, not the emancipation of woman from man, but rather the emancipation of woman from herself. [...] This is the way, and no other, to solve the woman question, and this comes from comprehending it. The solution may appear impossible, its tone exaggerated, its claims overstated, its requirements too exacting. Undoubtedly there has been little said about the woman question, as women talk of it; we have been dealing with a subject on which women are silent, and must always remain silent—the bondage which sexuality implies. This woman question is as old as sex itself, and as young as mankind. And the answer to it? Man must free himself of sex, for in that way, and that way alone, can he free woman. In his purity, not, as she believes, in his impurity, lies her salvation. She must certainly be destroyed, as woman; but only to be raised again from the ashes—new, restored to youth—as a real human being. [...] Sexual union has no place in the idea of mankind, not because ascetism is a duty, but because in it woman becomes the object, the cause, and man does what he will with her, looks upon her merely as a "thing," not as a living human being with an inner, psychic, existence. And so man despises woman the moment coitus is over, and the woman knows that she is despised, even although a few minutes before she thought herself adored. The only thing to be respected in man is the idea of mankind; this disparagement of woman (and himself), induced by coitus, is the surest proof that it is opposed to that idea of mankind. Any one who is ignorant of what this Kantian "idea of mankind" means, may perhaps understand it when he thinks of his sisters, his mother, his female relatives; it concerns them all: for our own sakes, then, woman ought to treated as human, respected and not degraded, all sexuality implying degradation. But man can only respect woman when she herself ceases to wish to be object and material for man; if there is any question of emancipation it should be the emancipation from the prostitute element. [...] The question is not merely if it be possible for woman to become moral. It is this: is it possible for woman really to wish to realise the problem of existence, the conception of guilt? Can she really desire freedom? This can happen only by her being penetrated by an ideal, brought to the guiding star. It can happen only if the categorical imperative were to become active in woman; only if woman can place herself in relation to the moral idea, the idea of humanity. In that way only can there be an emancipation of woman.

We spend so much time and effort trying to change the external world, other people, and our own bodies—all while accepting ourselves the way we were programmed in our youths.

Wisdom should be cherished as a means of traveling from youth to old age, for it is more lasting than any other possession. —Bias of Priene (c. 570 B.C., one of the Seven Sages of ancient Greece)

It suddenly struck him that life was very unfair. You had to decide your whole life before you had any experience to guide you. Youth makes the bed, and middle age has, perforce, to lie upon it. The experience of others, however wise, is of no use to youth. Each soul must adventure of itself blindly into the dark. Perhaps, however, it is as well that youth does not know or reck of the dangers and sorrows with which the path of life is beset.

Rule 1. Have Fun Rule 2. Stay Healthy

Positive Attitudes, Negative Splits

When the storm rages in the dark night, a voice on the wind will ask, “Who are you?”, and the quality and depth of your answer will determine whether you stand firm or flounder.

When you don’t know who you are, do something, something that seems worth doing, and keep doing that until you figure out who you are, or at least who you would like to be.

Learn to recognize useless guides without getting sanctimonious about it. There are good reasons there are bad adults; be thankful you are ignorant of a great many of them.

An honest life starts with an honest assessment of self. You are neither worthless nor preeminent but somewhere in between.

Success and failure are derived not from anything you possess but rather by the things you do. Your successes and failures rest on your actions and your actions alone.

You may not have the power to do anything or everything you would like, but you do have the power to do something.

In the lives of young people, democracy is a living, breathing function that can constantly guide their lives, inform their thinking, and drive their actions. While that is not the reality for most young people today, it is the possibility of that reality that drives so many children and youth today to take action to change the world.

That was a strange custom in India, but not a useless one; a custom through which people were taught, guided, and awakened to the realization that they will not be on this earth forever. This lesson was an effective one for the whole population, to remind everyone that he is but a passenger on a caravan passing through this life. In particular, this custom was designed to remind young people of the transitory nature of life on this earth, as young people in the heat of their youthful power can easily forget this. They were alerted to the fact that youth, that treasure which they temporarily possess, is a fading treasure. When people look at their own lives in perspective, they may see that youthful period as being the most precious and wonderful time of their lives. Once they have wasted that treasure there is no way of regaining it, and along their lives they will feel regret and sorrow for how they have squandered that treasure and have nothing to show for it. Had they but used that treasure wisely, and not let their possession of it drive them mad, then they might have found they can recall their youthful days with happiness and not severe remorse, and also that they may even carry something of that treasure with them throughout their lives, having resources of physical and spiritual energy at their disposal.

According to an article, Sibling Abuse and Bullying: The Hidden Epidemic on Psychology Today by Darlene Lancer, “Often labeled rivalry and ignored, sibling bullying and abuse cause real trauma. Sibling abuse is the most common, but least reported abuse in the family. Prevalence is higher than spousal or child abuse combined with consequences well into adulthood similar to parent-child abuse. Up to 80% of youth experience some form of sibling maltreatment; yet it’s been called the forgotten abuse.

Whether we are aware of it or not, there is a good likelihood that any preferences for how your body looks are shaped by media-influenced ideals.8 If you are surrounded by highly air-brushed photos in magazines, heavily filtered images on social media and TV programmes featuring wealthy celebrities who can afford cosmetic surgery procedures to keep them looking as slim and youthful as possible, it can make you feel a bit shit about yourself by comparison, you know?

He was old, so old that the deeds of his youth are not now remembered, even in legend, and yet they must have been high deeds and many. For he had seen the earlier ages and the world moving upward out of the mists of the Great Beginning. He knew the laws of the cycles, the courses of the earth, and the movements of the stars. Even the stranger yet more mysterious movements in the minds of men. He had been the avatar who saw it as the duty of his kingship to guide his people upward upon the foredestined path of evolution. And he knew how life had been in the beginning, and it may be that he knew dimly how it will be in the end.

Plus, far more than toys or lessons, your child needs you—the authentic you underneath all of the stress and reactivity—with less tension and more presence and ease. Your ability to be fully present will naturally start to soothe your child, helping him feel seen, heard, and accepted. Thich Nhat Hanh (2003) sums this up wisely: “When you love someone, the best thing you can offer is your presence. How can you love if you are not there?

tone, healthy skin, and youthful appearance. Acidic conditions are caused by stagnation. Overeating is one of the most common causes of stagnation and acidity in our body. Contrast the freshness of a walk outside with one in a shopping mall or sitting in front of a computer all day. Common symptoms of acidity are fatigue, negativity, irritability, weak bones and muscles, and a weak resistance to illness.

Here we are told that the Druids learn by heart a great number of verses, that to become a Druid requires twenty years of training, that they believe “souls do not become extinct, but pass after death from one body to another, and they think that men by this tenet are in a great degree excited to valor, the fear of death being disregarded” and that they “impart to the youth many things respecting the stars and their motion, respecting the extent of the world and of our earth, respecting the nature of things.” They worship as their divinity, Mercury in particular, and have many images of him, and regard him as the inventor of all arts, they consider him the guide of their journeys and marches, and believe him to have great influence over the acquisition of gain and mercantile transactions. Next to him they worship Apollo, and Mars, and Jupiter, and Minerva.

stalled career, fading youth, and listless marriage.

For men, turning forty meant saying goodbye to impossible dreams, taming and rechanneling the ambition of youth. Whatever

The Bright Lights of Sarajevo After the hours that Sarajevans pass queuing with empty canisters of gas to get the refills they wheel home in prams, or queuing for the precious meagre grams of bread they’re rationed to each day, and often dodging snipers on the way, or struggling up sometimes eleven flights of stairs with water, then you’d think the nights of Sarajevo would be totally devoid of people walking streets Serb shells destroyed, but tonight in Sarajevo that’s just not the case The young go walking at stroller’s pace, black shapes impossible to mark as Muslim, Serb or Croat in such dark, in unlit streets you can’t distinguish who calls bread hjleb or hleb or calls it kruh. All take the evening air with stroller’s stride no torches guide them, but they don’t collide except as one of the flirtatious ploys when a girl’s dark shape is fancied by a boy’s. Then the tender radar of the tone of voice shows by its signals she approves his choice. Then match or lighter to a cigarette to check in her eyes if he’s made progress yet. And I see a pair who’ve certainly progressed beyond the tone of voice and match-flare test and he’s about, I think, to take her hand and lead her away from where they stand on two shell scars, where, in ‘92 Serb mortars massacred the breadshop queue and blood-dunked crusts of shredded bread lay on this pavement with the broken dead. And at their feet in holes made by the mortar that caused the massacre, now full of water from the rain that’s poured down half the day, though now even the smallest clouds have cleared away leaving the Sarajevo star-filled evening sky ideally bright and clear for bomber’s eye in those two rain-full shell-holes the boy sees fragments of the splintered Pleiades, sprinkled on those death-deep, death-dark wells splashed on the pavement by Serb mortar shells. The dark boy-shape leads dark girl-shape away to share one coffee in a candlelit café until the curfew, and he holds her hand behind AID flour-sacks refilled with sand

The Bright Lights of Sarajevo After the hours that Sarajevans pass queuing with empty canisters of gas to get the refills they wheel home in prams or queuing for the precious meagre grams of bread they’re rationed to each day, and often dodging snipers on the way, or struggling up sometimes eleven flights of stairs with water, then you’d think the nights of Sarajevo would be totally devoid of people walking streets Serb shells destroyed, but tonight in Sarajevo that’s just not the case – The young go walking at stroller’s pace black shapes impossible to mark as Muslim, Serb or Croat in such dark in unlit streets you can’t distinguish who calls bread hjleb or hleb or calls it kruh. All take the evening air with stroller’s stride no torches guide them, but they don’t collide except as one of the flirtatious ploys when a girl’s dark shape is fancied by a boy’s. Then the tender radar of the tone of voice shows by its signals she approves his choice. Then match or lighter to a cigarette to check in her eyes if he’s made progress yet. And I see a pair who’ve certainly progressed beyond the tone of voice and match-flare test and he’s about, I think, to take her hand and lead her away from where they stand on two shell scars, where, in 1992 Serb mortars massacred the breadshop queue and blood-dunked crusts of shredded bread lay on this pavement with the broken dead. And at their feet in holes made by the mortar that caused the massacre, now full of water from the rain that’s poured down half the day, though now even the smallest clouds have cleared away leaving the Sarajevo star-filled evening sky ideally bright and clear for bomber’s eye in those two rain-full shell-holes the boy sees fragments of the splintered Pleiades, sprinkled on those death-deep, death-dark wells splashed on the pavement by Serb mortar shells. The dark boy-shape leads dark girl-shape away to share one coffee in a candlelit café until the curfew, and he holds her hand behind AID flour-sacks refilled with sand.

The death of a dear friend, wife, brother, lover, which seemed nothing but privation, somewhat later assumes the aspect of a guide or genius; for it commonly operates revolutions in our way of life, terminates an epoch of infancy or of youth which was waiting to be closed, breaks up a wonted occupation, or a household, or style of living, and allows the formation of new ones more friendly to the growth of character.

Giving while shopping seems to reduce overall giving. Most of the research on these relationships focus on the benefits to the companies that sell the product, not on how these partnerships affect either you—the consumer/giver—or the cause itself. There are a few academic studies of cause marketing that focus on the end result for the nonprofit partner or on how people’s behavior changes after they’ve purchased one of these branded products. The most generous read of the research on cause marketing is that it is good for the marketer, not so much for the cause.

Skip table Area Description Desirable features Key benefits eg Youth Services Organization Purpose ​–​Why do we exist beyond financial gain? ​–​Emotional appeal ​–​The emphasis shouldn’t change over time ​–​Calls for a togetherness ​–​Grabs attention ​–​Memorable ​–​Benefits selected stakeholders (eg employees, customers, society) ​–​Heart then head appeal ​–​Inspires selflessness ​–​Creates belonging ​–​Catalyst for collaboration ​–​Helps people find meaning ​–​Attracts followers ​–​Creates advocates ​–​To give hope to vulnerable young people Vision ​–​What would success look, feel and sound like? ​–​Brings purpose to life ​–​Evokes imagery ​–​Takes a long-term view ​–​Increases clarity ​–​Has uniqueness ​–​Presents a challenge ​–​Commercial reference ​–​Provides an impetus for and inspires action ​–​Creates focus beyond the day-to-day activities ​–​Provides a benchmark to measure progress against ​–​To become the most respected, innovative and sustainably funded youth services provider in xx countries

You should look for opportunities to turn your child into a social leader. Brownies, Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, Indian Guides, National Outdoor Leadership Schools, church and synagogue youth groups, and almost any type of community service opportunities are extraordinarily helpful to popular children. These opportunities allow them to turn their attractive traits into concrete acts of generosity toward others. Good leaders show respect toward other people; good leaders use win-win strategies. It is not enough for children to be smart or to be able to reflect on moral problems. Children need to be put into situations where they can practice moral acts - and that is true of the socially gifted as it is of kids who veer toward the antisocial. We have to give our naturally popular children the moral guidance to make them into true leaders.

Each of us is like Dorian Gray. We seek to present a beautiful, innocent face to the world; a kind, courteous demeanor; a youthful, intelligent image. And so, unknowingly but inevitably, we push away those qualities that do not fit the image, that do not enhance our self-esteem and make us stand proud but, instead, bring us shame and make us feel small.

You will understand some day, what you perhaps fail to perceive now, what an unspeakable advantage it is to consecrate the bright days of youth to God

My attraction to wild places is, in part, an attempt to relive the innocence and imagination lost after youth. To be submersed in the innocence of a forest, the ungoverned landscape, to exist by my own laws and no one else’s, even if only briefly — this is one of the primary beacons that guides me back into wild places.

In Buddhism, there are said to be four "divine" states of mind: kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity. The "divine" properties are present to various degrees in all people, but they emerge in accentuated form in meditation, almost as a by-product, as people learn to relate to their egos in a new way. It is here that we can apply the analogy to athletes finding "the flow" when they learn to get out of their own way. When self-centered preoccupations quiet down, these more "selfless" feelings come to the fore. Ancient texts compare kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity to the feelings a mother has for four sons: "a child, an invalid, one in the flush of youth, and one busy with his own affairs." Kindness is what a mother naturally feels for her young child, compassion is what she feels when her child is ill, sympathetic joy arises when she sees him thriving in the glory of his youth, and equanimity is what she knows when her child is grown and taking care of him- or herself.

His aversion to National Geographic extends back to his youth. When Knight was in high school, he was reading a copy and came across a photo of a young Peruvian shepherd standing beside a road, crying. Behind him were several dead sheep, struck by a car as the boy had been trying to guide them. The photograph was later reprinted in a book of National Geographic’s all-time greatest portraits. It incensed Knight. “They published a photo of the boy’s humiliation. He had failed his family, who had entrusted him with the herd. It’s disgusting that everybody can see a little boy’s failure.” Knight, still furious about the image thirty years later,

A Christian, according to the teaching of God Himself, can be guided in his relations to men by peace only, and so there cannot be such an authority as would compel a Christian to act contrary to God's teaching and contrary to the chief property of a Christian in relation to those who are near to him. "The

a story’s plot has a beginning, middle, and end consisting of a sequence of events developed around a particular conflict or gradual unveiling. As far as worship-as-story is concerned, this guiding story arc has already been provided for us in the church calendar or liturgical year. It’s not a plot we’re creating from scratch.

for the next week we endured what can only be described as verbal abuse from anti-equality Christians. Truly, not all of those opposing marriage equality were mean spirited. Some were nice enough, and went so far as to offer us water and snacks. Too many others, though, were just plain unkind, and too few of the good Christians who stood nearby did anything to rein them in. The most harrowing moment for me came when a prominent ex-gay activist pointed at my clergy collar and yelled, “You’re not fooling anyone with that thing!” He yelled that I was not a real pastor, and that I had simply bought a clergy shirt to try to deceive others. When I replied that I was an ordained minister he looked incredulous and told me to read the Bible. (I let him know that I’d read it cover to cover, in English and the original Hebrew and Greek.) Fuming, he told me I was going to hell. Before I could respond Heidi grabbed my shoulder and guided me away. The incident left me shaken, not so much for me, but for Christians everywhere. Too often progressive Christians have ceded the public proclamation of Christian values to conservatives and fundamentalists. If you asked the youth and young adults who were with us in that hallway that week what Christians thought of them, they would likely have believed that the vast majority of Christians hated them. That was true, even with Heidi, myself, and a moderate number of other supportive clergy visible and engaged. This is probably not all that surprising to you if you are a progressive Christian. If you’re anything like me, you roll your eyes in frustration every time a right-wing extremist clergy person claims to offer the “Christian perspective” on an issue. Or,

Christian families and churches must see what they do as more than offering wholesome youth programs and teaching moralistic therapeutic Sunday school lessons. Our agenda for the next generation must be whole-life formation, intentionally countering the dominant cultural vision of what life is about. We must make sure our kids understand Christian faith as more than a set of beliefs and behaviors. Instead, they need to know that a competing vision of life demands their deepest allegiance and grounds their identity.

1 My son, if thou wilt receive my words, and hide my commandments within thee, 2 And cause thine ears to hearken unto wisdom, and incline thine heart to understanding, 3 (For if thou callest after knowledge, and cryest for understanding: 4 If thou seekest her as silver, and searchest for her as for treasures, 5 Then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord, and find the knowledge of God. 6 For the Lord giveth wisdom, out of his mouth cometh knowledge and understanding. 7 He preserveth the state of the righteous: he is a shield to them that walk uprightly, 8 That they may keep the ways of judgment: and he preserveth the way of his Saints) 9 Then shalt thou understand righteousness, and judgment, and equity, and every good path. 10 When wisdom entereth into thine heart, and knowledge delighteth thy soul, 11 Then shall counsel preserve thee, and understanding shall keep thee, 12 And deliver thee from the evil way, and from the man that speaketh froward things, 13 And from them that leave the ways of righteousness to walk in the ways of darkness: 14 Which rejoice in doing evil, and delight in the frowardness of the wicked, 15 Whose ways are crooked and they are lewd in their paths. 16 And it shall deliver thee from the strange woman, even from the stranger, which flattereth with her words. 17 Which forsaketh the guide of her youth, and forgetteth the covenant of her God. 18 Surely her house tendeth to death, and her paths unto the dead. 19 All they that go unto her, return not again, neither take they hold of the ways of life. 20 Therefore walk thou in the way of good men, and keep the ways of the righteous. 21 For the just shall dwell in the land, and the upright men shall remain in it. 22 But the wicked shall be cut off from ye earth, and the transgressors shall be rooted out of it.

Youth and adult suicide rates have doubled or tripled over the past forty years. The biggest-selling drugs are those treating depression, anxiety and stress. The onset of depression now occurs at age fourteen, anxiety at age eleven. Obesity and diabetes have reached epidemic proportions.

major argument of this book is that Americans are not just exceptionally religious but that our dominant religion has become exceptionally literal and fantastical—childlike—during the last fifty years in particular. The fantasies of perpetual youth, Kids “R” Us Syndrome, also appeared fifty years ago, when American adults started becoming more than ever like adolescents and children in our tastes and ways of thinking. These simultaneous spikes could be a coincidence, but they look to me like another case of cultural symbiosis. And childlike magical thinking synergy isn’t limited to Christian kinds. “How do you get yourself to a point of believing?” Rhonda Byrne asks in The Secret, the Oprah-endorsed New Age guide to success-by-wishing-and-pretending. “Start make-believing. Be like a child, and make-believe. Act as if you have it already. As you make believe you will begin to believe you have received….Your belief that you have it, that undying faith, is your greatest power. When you believe you are receiving, get ready, and watch the magic begin!

Certainly prevents some believers from being compassionate, sympathetic, or even tolerant of others who are not as certain in their faith. Their arrogance turns them into the "frozen chosen," consciously or unconsciously excluding others from their cozy, believing world. This is the crabbed, joyless, and ungenerous religiosity that Jesus spoke against: spiritual blindness. There is a more subtle danger for this group: a complacency that makes one's relationship with God stagnate. Some people cling to ways of understanding their faith learned in childhood that might not work for an adult. For example, you might cling to a childhood notion of a God who will never let anything bad happen. When tragedy strikes, since your youthful image of God is not reflected in reality, you may abandon the God of your youth. Or you may abandon God completely. An adult life requires an adult faith. Think of it this way: you wouldn't consider yourself equipped to face life with a third-grader's understanding of math. Yet people often expect the religious instruction they had in grammar school to sustain them in the adult world. In his book A Friendship Like No Other, the Jesuit spiritual writer William A. Barry invites adults to relate to God in an adult way. Just as an adult child needs to relate to his or her parent in a new way, he suggest, so adult believers need to relate t God in new ways as they mature. Otherwise, one remains stuck in a childlike view of God that prevents fully embracing a mature faith.

Fundamentals of Esperanto The grammatical rules of this language can be learned in one sitting. Nouns have no gender & end in -o; the plural terminates in -oj & the accusative, -on Amiko, friend; amikoj, friends; amikon & amikojn, accusative friend & friends. Ma amiko is my friend. A new book appears in Esperanto every week. Radio stations in Europe, the United States, China, Russia & Brazil broadcast in Esperanto, as does Vatican Radio. In 1959, UNESCO declared the International Federation of Esperanto Speakers to be in accord with its mission & granted this body consultative status. The youth branch of the International Federation of Esperanto Speakers, UTA, has offices in 80 different countries & organizes social events where young people curious about the movement may dance to recordings by Esperanto artists, enjoy complimentary soft drinks & take home Esperanto versions of major literary works including the Old Testament & A Midsummer Night’s Dream. William Shatner’s first feature-length vehicle was a horror film shot entirely in Esperanto. Esperanto is among the languages currently sailing into deep space on board the Voyager spacecraft. - Esperanto is an artificial language constructed in 1887 by L. L. Zamenhof, a polish oculist. following a somewhat difficult period in my life. It was twilight & snowing on the railway platform just outside Warsaw where I had missed my connection. A man in a crumpled track suit & dark glasses pushed a cart piled high with ripped & weathered volumes— sex manuals, detective stories, yellowing musical scores & outdated physics textbooks, old copies of Life, new smut, an atlas translated, a grammar, The Mirror, Soviet-bloc comics, a guide to the rivers & mountains, thesauri, inscrutable musical scores & mimeographed physics books, defective stories, obsolete sex manuals— one of which caught my notice (Dr. Esperanto since I had time, I traded my used Leaves of Grass for a copy. I’m afraid I will never be lonely enough. There’s a man from Quebec in my head, a friend to the purple martins. Purple martins are the Cadillac of swallows. All purple martins are dying or dead. Brainscans of grown purple martins suggest these creatures feel the same levels of doubt & bliss as an eight-year-old girl in captivity. While driving home from the brewery one night this man from Quebec heard a radio program about purple martins & the next day he set out to build them a house in his own back yard. I’ve never built anything, let alone a house, not to mention a home for somebody else. Never put in aluminum floors to smooth over the waiting. Never piped sugar water through colored tubes to each empty nest lined with newspaper shredded with strong, tired hands. Never dismantled the entire affair & put it back together again. Still no swallows. I never installed the big light that stays on through the night to keep owls away. Never installed lesser lights, never rested on Sunday with a beer on the deck surveying what I had done & what yet remained to be done, listening to Styx while the neighbor kids ran through my sprinklers. I have never collapsed in abandon. Never prayed. But enough about the purple martins. Every line of the work is a first & a last line & this is the spring of its action. Of course, there’s a journey & inside that journey, an implicit voyage through the underworld. There’s a bridge made of boats; a carp stuffed with flowers; a comic dispute among sweetmeat vendors; a digression on shadows; That’s how we finally learn who the hero was all along. Weary & old, he sits on a rock & watches his friends fly by one by one out of the song, then turns back to the journey they all began long ago, keeping the river to his right.

This faulty model places the professional minister at the center and makes gaining and retaining students the goal. In the case of student ministry, it turns youth group into a holding pattern for the church’s future instead of calling students to live as servants of the gospel in their community of faith here and now.

We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future.” -Franklin D.  Roosevelt

The Rebel, Within the Rubble From the rubble, arises the rebel, Embarking on the freedom struggle. Lost and frustrated, survival is slim Yet the fire of the cause burns from within Our people melt, our people burn Our people shelled, our stomachs churn The world is cold, the world is grim Our people hang, on their last limb Billions more, from the IMF Don’t hear our cries, cos they claim deaf Rape, torture, and abusive camps Thamils die in government clamps 1400 now die in a camp each week All because of the language we speak Each day I wake up, more havoc they wreak Each day I wake up, the situation looks bleak The Phoenix arises, from the ashes This Phoenix surmises, previous clashes Beware of our youth, they burn with the truth Merciless, and furious, you will get the boot The Eelam pride, I will never hide, The Thamil side, is forever my guide The Tigers died, with cyanide They collide, for us to reside, In the land where we were denied Forevermore, they have cried, Forevermore, we’ll bring this worldwide! Thamilarin Thaagam, Thamileela Thayagam!

On some level, with its carrousels and castle and cowboys, its mysterious jungle and its animated characters, Disneyland is a highly idealized elaboration of our childhoods. It can be seen as a portal through which we revisit (maybe even heal) our youth.

[I had a very surreal experience with a coach ‘justifying’ his methods. He set up a shooting practice for under-12s that contained a long queue of players, something in itself that is thoroughly frowned upon. When challenged, the coach insisted that his aim was to “identify technique in each individual player and work to rectify it”. The first shot taken went high and wide and the coach told him to “go fetch his own s**t”. That was not the technical detail I was expecting!]

To the Teachers in Our Schools My Dear Brethren and Sisters: The Lord will work in behalf of all who will walk humbly with Him. He has placed you in a position of trust. Walk carefully before Him. God’s hand is on the wheel. He will guide the ship past the rocks into the haven. He will take the weak things of this world to confound the things that are mighty. I pray that you will make God your Counselor. You are not amenable to any man, but are under God’s direction. Keep close to Him. Do not take worldly ideas as your criterion. Let there be no departure from the Lord’s methods of working. Use not common fire, but the sacred fire of the Lord’s kindling. Be of good courage in your work. For many years I have kept before our people the need, in the education of the youth, of an equal taxation of the physical and mental powers. But for those who have never proved the value of the instruction given to combine manual training with the study of books, it is hard to understand and carry out the directions given. Do your best to impart to your students the blessings God has given you. With a deep, earnest desire to help them, carry them over the ground of knowledge. Come close to them. Unless teachers have the love and gentleness of Christ abounding in their hearts, they will manifest too much of the spirit of a harsh, domineering master. The Lord wishes you to learn how to use the gospel net. That you may be successful in your work, the meshes of your net must be close. The application of the Scriptures must be such that the meaning shall be easily discerned. Then make the most of drawing in [268] the net. Come right to the point. However great a man’s knowledge, it is of no avail unless he is able to communicate it to others. Let the pathos of your voice, its deep feeling, make an impression on hearts. Urge your students to surrender themselves to God. “Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. And of some have compassion, making a difference: and others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire; hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.” Jude 1:21-23. As you follow Christ’s example you will have the precious reward of seeing your students won to Him.

In Ephesians 4, Paul writes, “Some of you—the apostles, prophets and pastors among you—have been given special gifts to be like Jesus and continue His ministry on earth. The rest of you, your job is just to concentrate on being nice.” Actually, come to think of it, that’s not what Paul says at all. He writes that the whole role of leadership is to help equip and empower every believer to walk in the fullness of Christ’s ministry. He defines leaders this way: Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ. This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ. Ephesians 4:11–13 NLT, emphasis added

With Martyn, I hold forth some of the philosophies I've been honing since beginning my travels in Ireland almost two years ago, about universal health care and the travel practices of American youth, about my country and the way I was indoctrinated to believe that America was number one in everything, but actually people in other countries have what we have--and sometimes better--about my obligations as a daughter, about the ways that I have put my faith in all the wrong things and now I am hopelessly lost but at the same time realizing that's okay so maybe that means I'm not lost at all, just searching.

Earth’s not so bad—” “How would you know?” Tan’elKoth said acidly. “It is only in these past few days that you have had contact with the actual realities of Earth. Are you having fun?” He waved toward the window, where Kollberg now had one hand openly kneading his groin while he leaned one cheek and the side of his open mouth against the glass. Avery flinched and looked away. She hugged herself more tightly. “I don’t understand. If you hate what they’re going to do, why are you helping them?” “I am not helping them!” Suddenly he was on his feet, towering over her, shaking an enormous fist. “I am helping you. I am helping Faith. I am . . .” The passion drained out of him as swiftly as it had arisen. He let his fist open and fall limp against his thigh. “I am trying to go home.” Outside the window, Kollberg panted like an overheated dog. “Well,” Avery said finally. “I’m afraid you’re out of luck.” “How do you mean?” She shook her head. “You’re such a man, Professional. That’s why you can’t find this link of yours.” “I do not understand.” “Of course you don’t. That’s what I mean: You’re a man. You think this link is with the river. It wasn’t. Faith spoke of it, in the car on our way back to Boston when I first picked her up. She was quite clear about it. Her link was never with the river. It was with her mother.” “Her mother—?” “Her dead mother, now.” Tan’elKoth’s eyes narrowed. “I have been a fool,” he said. He spun and seated himself once again at Faith’s side, bending over her with redoubled energy. “Power,” he murmured. “All that is required is a usable source of power—” “What are you doing? She’s dead, Tan’elKoth. There is no link.” “Dead, yes—but the pattern of her consciousness persists, even as your son’s does within me. It was trapped at the instant of her passing. It is powerless, yes—having no body to inform it with will. It is analogous to a computer program stored on disk, you might say: a structure of information that requires only a computer on which to run, and the necessary power to activate.” “What kind of power?” From the doorway behind her, the soulless rasp of Arturo Kollberg said, “My kind of power.” DURING HIS YEARS of walking the world, the crooked knight came to find himself bemazed within a dark and trackless wood. In this wood, all paths led equally to death. The crooked knight did not lose hope; he turned to various guides for help and direction. His first guide was Youthful Dream. Later, he turned to Friendship, then Duty, and finally Reason, but each left him more lost than had the one before. So the crooked knight gave himself up for dead, and simply sat. He would be sitting there still, but for a breeze that came upon him then: a breeze that smelled of wide-open spaces, of limitless skies and bright sun, of ice and high mountains. It was the wind from the dark angel’s wings.

Peter Allison is a safari guide who has spent much of the last twelve years leading wildlife-viewing and ecotourism trips in Africa, mostly Botswana. His love of animals led him to train as a safari guide in the early 1990s and soon thereafter he was hired by southern Africa’s largest operator to train all of their safari experts. Safaris he has led have been featured in magazines such as Vogue and Condé Nast Traveler. He has assisted National Geographic photographers and appeared on television shows such as Jack Hanna’s Animal Adventures. Peter is also active with the Athena Foundation, a nonprofit conservation group. He is on the board of the Athena Foundation’s youth program, whose mission is to inspire young people to develop their interest in conservation. Originally born and raised in Sydney, Australia, he currently divides his time between Australia, California, and Botswana.

Your power of thought is the only thing that you have complete, unchallengeable control over. You do this through the power of will.” Napoleon Hill, Author

In a recent UCLA study of 25,000 youth over 12 years of age, James Caterall found that when young people are engaged in creating art at an early age, they outperform their peers in every category, including academics as well as life skills.8 Studies of US schools that integrate the arts into learning also paint a powerful picture. Schools, teachers and communities that use arts-based learning methods have consistently positive outcomes. The social and emotional climate in schools and classrooms improves, and students become better learners. Students typically:   •  participate more in class   •  become more interested in learning   •  are more creative and self-directed   •  develop communication and complex thinking skills   •  have better relationships with teachers and other students   •  are more likely to develop connections with community members Teachers who use arts-based approaches are more creative and enthusiastic and develop higher-level thinking skills. They are more innovative, flexible, and more willing to improve their skills through professional development training.

Furthermore, we had witnessed over and over again that making opportunities for creative expression within a context of care and connection is a seemingly magical key for unlocking that hope and resilience. And it doesn’t require the work of experts. We can all do this.

St. Jerome says that wine and youth are two incentives to impurity. (Ad Eustoch, de Cust. Virg.). Wine is to youth what fuel is to fire. As oil poured upon the flames only increases their intensity, so wine, like a violent conflagration, heats the blood, enkindling and exciting the passions to the highest pitch of folly and madness. Witness the excesses into which man is led by hatred, love, revenge, and other passions, when stimulated by intoxicating liquors. The natural effect of this fatal indulgence is to counteract all the results of the moral virtues. These subdue and control the baser passions, but wine excites and urges them to the wildest licentiousness. Judge, therefore, with what vigilance you should guard against the attacks of such an enemy.

In 1991, a college sophomore studying music in the American Midwest made the mistake of selling some drugs to the wrong person. Until then, he hadn’t done much more than smoke pot and sell some of it to his friends. Petty vandalism at his high school was as high stakes as his criminal career had been. Then, as these things tend to go when you’re just 18 years old, he tried to push the envelope and test his boundaries. He started experimenting with hard drugs like LSD. But he was naive, and the brashness of youth got the best of him. He sold some of that LSD outside his circle—to an undercover policeman. And as if his luck couldn’t get worse, like a scene out of a TV movie of the week, the judge, under pressure to make an example out of this young man, sentenced him to 6 to 25 years in prison. It’s a faceless, timeless story that transcends race, class, and region. A young kid makes a mistake that forever changes their lives and their family’s lives as well. We are all too familiar with how stories like this usually end: The kid spends their most impressionable years behind bars and comes out worse than when they went in. Life on the outside is too difficult to contend with; habits learned on the inside are too difficult to shed. They reoffend; their crimes escalate. The cycle continues. This story, however, is a little different. Because this young man didn’t go back to jail. In fact, after being released in less than 5 years on good behavior, he went on to become one of the best jazz violinists in the world. He left prison with a fire lit underneath him—to practice, to repent, to humble himself, to hustle, and to do whatever it took to make something of his life. No task was too small, no gig was too tiny, no potential fan was too disinterested for him not to give it everything he had. And he did. The story is a little different for another reason, too. That young man’s name is Christian Howes. He is my older brother.

What study after study show is that meditation and mindfulness training profoundly affects every aspect of our lives—our bodies, minds, physical health, and our emotional and spiritual well-being. It’s not quite the fountain of youth, but it’s pretty close. When you consider all the benefits of meditation—and more are being found every day—it’s not an exaggeration to call meditation a miracle drug… —Arianna Huffington, Thrive

Sociologist Robert Wuthnow argues that churches (and American institutions in general) have abandoned this age group, who must consequently make the most important decisions of their lives-decisions with long-lasting consequences about love, work and ideology-without the benefit of traditions or elders to guide them.22

If you perform asanas regularly, you will feel more flexible physically and emotionally. Flexibility is the essential difference between the vitality of youth and the lassitude of old age. Here is a yogic expression that we find inspiring: "Infinite flexibility is the secret to immortality.

You train dogs… I like to educate players.” (Brendan Rodgers)

The sexual map we acquire in youth includes body image, masturbatory guilt, sexual preferences and more. From what turns us on to what turns us off. From attitudes about menstruation to the right of women to wear certain clothing. But using this guilt- and shame-ridden map as a guide to sexuality is like using a map of an ancient city sewer system to locate the fiber optic network. What if the only map we had of a city was made 2,000 years ago? How useful would it be today? My city was an open prairie 2,000 years ago with no roads and maybe a few animal paths. A map of that reality would be of little use today.

Ne'er Fade Away by Stewart Stafford The hillside piper's requiem, Guides old soldier's bones, To slain brothers of his youth, No longer a marching memory. His scars, Valhalla's roadmap, His medals, coins for Charon, His conquests, the beacon fire, His blood scours the path ahead. This churned earth is now home, Weeping craters, foxholes beatified, Barbed wire hands joined in praying, The minefield of life cleared for us all. © Stewart Stafford, 2022. All rights reserved.

These elusive memories, appear out of nowhere like a portal to our past, from deep within the passages of our minds. They rise to the surface, stretching out their hands to guide us back to another time.....and we are young again, and it is Christmas.

The old ways of rearing kids won’t work anymore,” he says, explaining why new efforts at guiding youth are essential. “This age group has enormous energy, and it can either be constructive or destructive, but you can’t suppress it. And they are a thousand times more exposed to the world than their parents.

There is a fundamental conviction which some people never acquire, some hold only in their youth, and a few hold to the end of their days—the conviction that ideas matter.... That ideas matter means that knowledge matters, that truth matters, that one’s mind matters.... Its consequence is the inability to believe in the power or the triumph of evil. No matter what corruption one observes in one’s immediate background, one is unable to accept it as normal, permanent, or metaphysically right. One feels: “This injustice (or terror or falsehood or frustration or pain or agony) is the exception in life, not the rule.” One feels certain that somewhere on earth—even if not anywhere in one’s surroundings or within one’s reach—a proper, human way of life is possible to human beings, and justice matters.

As a venture-capital investor, I see a particularly strong role for a new kind of impact investing. I foresee a venture ecosystem emerging that views the creation of humanistic service-sector jobs as a good in and of itself. It will steer money into human-focused service projects that can scale up and hire large numbers of people: lactation consultants for postnatal care, trained coaches for youth sports, gatherers of family oral histories, nature guides at national parks, or conversation partners for the elderly. Jobs like these can be meaningful on both a societal and personal level, and many of them have the potential to generate real revenue—just not the 10,000 percent returns that come from investing in a unicorn technology startup.

the youth movements could not separate religious formation from political formation

School and other education constantly proceed upon false principles, and show a clumsy apparatus pointed at a false mark; but your apparatus is simple, and the mark a true one; and while parents and young persons are left destitute of other just means of estimating and becoming prepared for a reasonable course in life, your discovery that the thing is in many a man's private power, will be invaluable! Influence upon the private character, late in life, is not only an influence late in life, but a weak influence. It is in youth that we plant our chief habits and prejudices; it is in youth that we take our party as to profession, pursuits and matrimony. In youth, therefore, the turn is given; in youth the education even of the next generation is given; in youth the private and public character is determined; and the term of life extending but from youth to age, life ought to begin well from youth, and more especially before we take our party as to our principal objects. But your biography will not merely teach self-education, but the education of a wise man; and the wisest man will receive lights and improve his progress, by seeing detailed the conduct of another wise man. And why are weaker men to be deprived of such helps, when we see our race has been blundering on in the dark, almost without a guide in this particular, from the farthest trace of time? Show then, sir, how much is to be done, both to sons and fathers; and invite all wise men to become like yourself, and other men to become wise. When we see how cruel statesmen and warriors can be to the human race, and how absurd distinguished men can be to their acquaintance, it will be instructive to observe the instances multiply of pacific, acquiescing manners; and to find how compatible it is to be great and domestic, enviable and yet good-humored.

PRAYER This is the day that the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it! I thank You, O God, for the countless blessings You have showered on me today. On a Sunday, Jesus, my Savior, rose from the grave. On a Sunday, the Holy Spirit was poured out on the apostles. So it is proper that on this day I call to mind my redemption through Jesus Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit, who was poured on me abundantly in Holy Baptism. I thank You for Your holy and pure Word, which was preached to me this day as You have ordained for the salvation of my soul. I thank You for all the bodily and spiritual blessings received from Your fatherly hand throughout my life. I thank You because You have guided, led, preserved me from my youth, and shown me so many favors in body and soul. Who could ever recount all Your blessings? However, this day will be not only a day of thanksgiving but also a day of prayer. I beg You, my God and Father, grant me to spend this day in Your fear. Keep me from temptations, vain thoughts, and evil company. How I wish that every artery in me were a tongue and every drop of blood a voice to praise and glorify You, O Blessed Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit! I pray that not a single hour would go by in which I do not show forth Your praise! Seal the Word that I have heard in my heart. Grant that I may diligently ponder it, let it govern my life, and that I may walk accordingly. As I have now grown to be a week older, grant that I may increase in Your knowledge, in love and piety, and that I may grow in the inward self. I pray for the gift of Your Holy Spirit. May He put me in mind of Your Word during this week and throughout my life. May He guide, govern, and lead me. Bless my labor and employment, and grant me to continue to live in Your grace for the rest of my days and years, until at last I reach heaven, where I may, with thanksgiving, keep the eternal Sabbath. This is the day the Lord has made; He calls the hours His own. Let heav’n rejoice, let earth be glad And praise surround the throne. Amen.

Running a marathon is a fitting picture of youth ministry. It’s not an easy task within the church. If it were, we’d have more youth workers than ushers. Youth ministry is filled with long, tiring, often unrewarding, complex, unique, intense, humorous, joy-filled, and painful experiences. Many within the body of Christ have entered the youth ministry marathon, but many quit before long, having lost joy and satisfaction. They're wounded and weary.

Bigger isn’t better; healthier is better. Steer clear of churches and youth workers who are driven by numbers, and surround yourself with those who are motivated by serving God faithfully and pursuing health.

27 YOUNG WOMEN OFFER YOU A SPECIAL ENERGY In general, youth in a woman bespeaks radiant, unobstructed, and refreshing feminine energy. A young woman tends to be less compromised by masculine layers of functional protection built up over years of need. Traditionally, young women were understood to offer a man a particularly rejuvenative quality of energy. Older women may maintain, or even increase, the freshness and radiance of their energy, but it is rare.

You can’t minister to everyone on your own. You must help others become ministers. Encourage your leaders to develop relationships with students.

First fervor is false fervor in marriage as in religion. The earliest ecstasy is not the true lasting love we seek to find and hold. That may come to us, but only after many purging trials, fidelities under stress, perseverance through discouragement and steady pursuit of our divine destiny past all the allurements of this earth. The deep, ecstatic love of some Christian fathers and mothers is a beautiful thing to see, but they have won it after passing through their Calvaries. Theirs is the true ecstasy which belongs less to youth than to old age. The first ecstasy of love is a thrill, but a somewhat of a selfish thrill. In it, the lover seeks to get from the beloved all that he will give. In the second ecstasy he tries to receive from God all that both of them can give. If love is identified with the early ecstasy alone, it will seek its prolongation in another person's presence. If it is identified with a unifying, enduring, and eternal love, it will seek the deepening of its mystery in the divine, Who puts all loves into our hearts.

The age-old youthful impulse to reimagine the world was now often molded and guided by one of the reigning ideas of the age: that if you really want to change the world, you must rely on the techniques, resources, and personnel of capitalism.

When the cathedrals were white, spirit was triumphant. But today the cathedrals of France are black and the spirit is bruised. The works of the new civilization are coming together in a symphonic crescendo. The guiding spirit is faltering. The young act, but they do not know. The old cling to their accumulated treasures, but are unable to accomplish anything further.

Ridiculous claims are everywhere in skincare, but we find them most eye-roll-worthy in cleansers. Assuming for a second that they did infuse their cleanser with a Fountain of Youth distillate, cleansers are just not really a good way to deliver all that anti-aging goodness into your skin. Remember, a cleanser's job is to take things off, not to add on. Regular priced cleansers with normal ingredients will do the job just fine.

Despite the relative youth of venture capital, many cryptoasset firms are now turning the model on its head. The disruptors are in danger of being disrupted. For the innovative investor, it’s key to realize that cryptoassets are not only making it easier for driven entrepreneurs to raise money, they’re also creating opportunities for the average investor to get into the earliest rounds of what could be the next Facebook or Uber. Welcome to the colliding worlds of crowdfunding and cryptoassets.

Futuwwah is the way of the fata. In Arabic, fata literally means a handsome, brave youth. After the enlightenment of Islam, following the use of the word in the Holy Koran, fata (plural: fityan) came to mean the ideal, noble, and perfect man whose hospitality and generosity would extend until he had nothing left for himself; a man who would give all, including his life, for the sake of his friends. According to the Sufis, Futuwwah is a code of honorable conduct that follows the example of the prophets, saints, sages, and the intimate friends and lovers of Allah. The traditional example of generosity is the prophet Abraham, peace be upon him, who readily accepted the command to sacrifice his son for Allah's sake. He is also a model of hospitality who shared his meals with guests all his life and never ate alone. The prophet Joseph, peace be upon him, is an example of mercy, for he pardoned his brothers, who tried to kill him, and a model of honor, for he resisted the advances of a married woman, Zulaykha, who was feminine beauty personified. The principles of character of the four divinely guided caliphes, the successors of the Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, also served as guides to Futuwwah; the loyalty of Abu Bakr, the justice of 'Umar, the reserve and modesty of 'Uthman, and the bravery of 'Ali, may Allah be pleased with them all. The all-encompassing symbol of the way of Futuwwah is the divinely guided life and character of the final prophet, Muhammad Mustafa, may Allah's peace and blessings be upon him, whose perfection is the goal of Sufism. The Sufi aims to abandon all improper behavior and to acquire and exercise, always and under all circumstances, the best behavior proper to human beings; for God created man "for Himself" as His "supreme creation," "in the fairest form." As He declares in His Holy Koran, "We have indeed honored the children of Adam.

I would be guided by the wisdom of age and not by the inexperience of youth.

The fetishisation of youth in our culture has given us the false idea that it is young people who are best placed to provide moral guidance to their elders, despite their obvious lack of experience.

Solon and Pisistratus were very fond of one another. We are told they entered into a love affair when Pisistratus was a good-looking lad in his teens. Despite a wide gap of thirty years between them, this is not implausible. Solon was highly sexed, if we may judge from his poetry, where he writes of the delights of falling in love “with a boy in the lovely flower of youth,/Desiring his thighs and sweet mouth.” However, it would be wrong to believe that either man was necessarily, in our modern sense, gay. This is because from the eighth century onwards the Greek upper classes established and maintained a system of pederasty as a form of higher education. A fully grown adult male, usually in his twenties, would look out for a boy in his mid-teens and become his protector and guide. His task was to see him through from adolescence into adulthood and to act as a kind of moral tutor. Sex was not compulsory, but it was under certain strictly defined conditions allowed. The older man was the active lover/partner or erastes and the teenager was the loved one, or eromenos. Buggery was absolutely out of bounds and brought shame on any boy who allowed it to be done to him. It could have the most serious consequences, as the fate of Periander showed. This famous tyrant of Corinth in the seventh century unwisely teased his eromenos in the presence of other people with the question: “Aren’t you pregnant yet?” The boy was so upset by the insult that he killed Periander. A popular and acceptable technique for achieving orgasm was intercrural sex: both participants stood up and the erastes inserted his erect penis between the thighs of the eromenos and rubbed it to and fro. The youth was not meant to enjoy his lover’s attentions or show signs of arousal; rather, he was making a disinterested gift of himself to someone he admired. The great Athenian writer of tragic dramas, Aeschylus, wrote a play about the love between the two Greek heroes, Achilles and Patroclus. It was called The Myrmidons, after the warriors whom Achilles commanded during the Trojan War. Achilles is presented as the erastes, and reproaches his lover, in rather roundabout terms, for declining an intercrural proposition.

around four main reasons for hope: the amazing human intellect, the resilience of nature, the power of youth, and the indomitable human spirit.

When a teenager has a sound faith, which is firmly rooted in both the church and the home, he or she will be exponentially more likely to continue in the faith long after high school.

There is a story in your data. But your tools don’t know what that story is. That’s where it takes you—the analyst or communicator of the information—to bring that story visually and contextually to life.

Women desperate for youth and beauty were willing to try most anything to keep their skin looking young. Montez relates stories of ladies who flocked to drink the water at arsenic springs, a practice which is said to have imparted ‘a transparent whiteness’ to their skin.

What discouraged me most from the goals of my youth were not my failures but my successes, that they proved so hollow.

Your identity is formed in part by your past, but only in part, and not the most important part. Your past is merely a starting point.

Another magnificent healing mechanism that fasting triggers is the process of autophagy. Auto in Greek means “self,” and phagy means “to eat,” so autophagy refers to your body digesting its own damaged cells. It is a vital cleanout process—the equivalent of taking out the trash—that detoxifies your cells and recycles the parts of the organelles within them that are no longer needed, so that your cells behave more youthfully. Autophagy also destroys foreign invaders such as viruses, bacteria, and other pathogens. A similar process, apoptosis, is when the entire cell is recycled. When apoptosis is impaired, your risk for cancer increases dramatically because your ability to remove damaged cells is impaired. That is why fasting is so useful as an adjunctive strategy to not only prevent cancer, but also help treat it.

Growing up outside of Philadelphia, I never wanted for diner food, whether it was from Bob's Diner in Roxborough or the Trolley Car Diner in Mount Airy. The food wasn't anything special- eggs and toast, meat loaf and gravy, the omnipresent glass case of pies- but I always found the food comforting and satisfying, served as it was in those old-fashioned, prefabricated stainless steel trolley cars. Whenever we would visit my mom's parents in Canterbury, New Jersey, we'd stop at the Claremont Diner in East Windsor on the way home, and I'd order a fat, fluffy slice of coconut cream pie, which I'd nibble on the whole car ride back to Philly. I'm not sure why I've always found diner food so comforting. Maybe it's the abundance of grease or the utter lack of pretense. Diner food is basic, stick-to-your-ribs fare- carbs, eggs, and meat, all cooked up in plenty of hot fat- served up in an environment dripping with kitsch and nostalgia. Where else are a jug of syrup and a bottomless cup of coffee de rigueur? The point of diner cuisine isn't to astound or impress; it's to fill you up cheaply with basic, down-home food. My menu, however, should astound and impress, which is why I've decided to take up some of the diner foods I remember from my youth and put my own twist on them. So far, this is what I've come up with: Sloe gin fizz cocktails/chocolate egg creams Grilled cheese squares: grappa-soaked grapes and Taleggio/ Asian pears and smoked Gouda "Eggs, Bacon, and Toast": crostini topped with wilted spinach, pancetta, poached egg, and chive pesto Smoky meat loaf with slow-roasted onions and prune ketchup Whipped celery root puree Braised green beans with fire-roasted tomatoes Mini root beer floats Triple coconut cream pie