“
I promise that this will be the last time you’ll see me. I won’t come back. I won’t put you through anything like this again. You can go on with your life without any more interference from me. It will be as if I’d never existed.
”
”
Stephenie Meyer (New Moon (The Twilight Saga, #2))
“
The most important thing to do in your life is to not interfere with somebody else's life.
”
”
Frank Zappa
“
Today is a new day. Don't let your history interfere with your destiny! Let today be the day you stop being a victim of your circumstances and start taking action towards the life you want. You have the power and the time to shape your life. Break free from the poisonous victim mentality and embrace the truth of your greatness. You were not meant for a mundane or mediocre life!
”
”
Steve Maraboli
“
I never approve, or disapprove, of anything now. It is an absurd attitude to take towards life. We are not sent into the world to air our moral prejudices. I never take any notice of what common people say, and I never interfere with what charming people do. If a personality fascinates me, whatever mode of expression that personality selects is absolutely delightful to me.
”
”
Oscar Wilde (The Picture of Dorian Gray)
“
How would your life be different if…You didn’t allow yourself to be defined by your past? Let today be the day…You stop letting your history interfere with your destiny and awaken to the opportunity to release your greatest self.
”
”
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
“
No man is greater than his prayer life. The pastor who is not praying is playing; the people who are not praying are straying. We have many organizers, but few agonizers; many players and payers, few pray-ers; many singers, few clingers; lots of pastors, few wrestlers; many fears, few tears; much fashion, little passion; many interferers, few intercessors; many writers, but few fighters. Failing here, we fail everywhere.
”
”
Leonard Ravenhill
“
Your dream is a reality that is waiting for you to materialize. Today is a new day! Don’t let your history interfere with your destiny! Learn from your past so that it can empower your present and propel you to greatness
”
”
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
“
You have to be grateful to existence that it has chosen you to be a passage for a few beautiful children. But you are not to interfere in their growth, in their potential. You are not to impose yourself upon them. They are not going to live in the same times, they are not going to face the same problems. They will be part of another world. Don´t prepare them for this world, this society, this time, because then you will be creating troubles for them. They will find themselves unfit, unqualified.
”
”
Osho
“
Never interfere in anybody´s life and don´t allow anybody to interfere in your life.
”
”
Osho
“
If you’re not seeing God move in your life right now, one of two possibilities must be considered. Either your requests are not God’s best and will probably not be answered the way you’d like or it must not be the right time. If God were to answer that prayer the way you are hoping, it could interfere with his ideal plan for you.
”
”
Joel Osteen (Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential)
“
While we may judge things as good or bad, karma doesn't. It's a simple case of like gets like, the ultimate balancing act, nothing more, nothing less. And if you're deteremined to fix every situation you deem as bad, or difficult, or somehow unsavory, then you rob the person of their own chance to fix it, learn from it, or even grow from it. Some things, no matter how painful, happen for a reason. A reason you or I may not be able to grasp at first sight, not without knowing a person's entire life story—their cumulative past. And to just barge in and interfere, no matter how well-intentioned, would be akin to robbing them of their journey. Something that's better not done.
”
”
Alyson Noel (Shadowland (The Immortals, #3))
“
Following Jesus isn’t something you can do at night where no one notices. It’s a twenty-four-hour-a-day commitment that will interfere with your life. That’s not the small print—that’s a guarantee.
”
”
Kyle Idleman
“
I dreamed I saw my maternal grandmother sitting by the bank of a swimming pool, that was also a river. In real life, she had been a victim of Alzheimer’s disease, and had regressed, before her death, to a semi-conscious state. In the dream, as well, she had lost her capacity for self-control. Her genital region was exposed, dimly; it had the appearance of a thick mat of hair. She was stroking herself, absent-mindedly. She walked over to me, with a handful of pubic hair, compacted into something resembling a large artist’s paint-brush. She pushed this at my face. I raised my arm, several times, to deflect her hand; finally, unwilling to hurt her, or interfere with her any farther, I let her have her way. She stroked my face with the brush, gently, and said, like a child, “isn’t it soft?” I looked at her ruined face and said, “yes, Grandma, it’s soft.
”
”
Jordan B. Peterson (Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Belief)
“
I don't want anything to happen to you. You being hurt...that thought fills me with dread. I can't promise not to interfere, not if I think you'll come to harm." He pauses and takes a deep breath. "I love you, Anastasia. I will do everything in my power to protect you. I cann't imagine my life without you.
”
”
E.L. James (Fifty Shades Darker (Fifty Shades, #2))
“
People who dream when they sleep at night know of a special kind of happiness which the world of the day holds not, a placid ecstasy, and ease of heart, that are like honey on the tongue. They also know that the real glory of dreams lies in their atmosphere of unlimited freedom. It is not the freedom of the dictator, who enforces his own will on the world, but the freedom of the artist, who has no will, who is free of will. The pleasure of the true dreamer does not lie in the substance of the dream, but in this: that there things happen without any interference from his side, and altogether outside his control. Great landscapes create themselves, long splendid views, rich and delicate colours, roads, houses, which he has never seen or heard of...
”
”
Karen Blixen (Out of Africa)
“
Emotions don’t interfere in my acting, nor in my life.
”
”
Simona Panova (Nightmarish Sacrifice (Cardew))
“
People like us, we think differently, don't we? We are different. We do all the things that others do. But when it comes down to it, we don't need anyone else. We're happy doing what we do and having obligation interferes with that. And sometimes I think we don't even need ourselves. What's most important is to find out whether we're right or not.
”
”
Simon Morden (Equations of Life (Samuil Petrovitch, #1))
“
This is where men and women are different, we can put aside petty competition for relationships - they can't. It interferes.
”
”
Adriana Trigiani (Viola in Reel Life (Viola #1))
“
Shoes would interfere with her conversation, for she constantly addresses the ground under her feet. Asking forgiveness. Owning, disowning, recanting, recharting a hateful course of events to make sense of her complicity. We all are, I suppose. Trying to invent our version of the story. All human odes are essentially one, "My life; what I stole from history, and how I live with it.
”
”
Barbara Kingsolver (The Poisonwood Bible)
“
Earn, consume, and enjoy life. Offend no one; don’t get offended. Don’t take sides; don’t take a stand. Don’t interfere; don’t get affected. Just earn, consume, and enjoy life. Mature people are disgusting.
”
”
Abhaidev (The Gods Are Not Dead)
“
The obstacles in our path are not blocking us-they are redirecting us. Their purpose is not to interfere with our happiness; it is to point us toward new routes to our happiness, new possibilities, new doorways.
”
”
Barbara De Angelis (How Did I Get Here?: Finding Your Way to Renewed Hope and Happiness When Life and Love Take Unexpected Turns)
“
Once one has survived something then survival itself interferes with understanding, and you don't even know which lives came before and which is your life of today, you even mix up your own lives.
”
”
Ingeborg Bachmann (Malina)
“
I'm swimming," Caspian announced. "Sort of. Do you think that will interfere with my mermaid search? If I fall into the ocean and I'm not drowning, do you think she'll bother to save me?"
"I think your mermaid probably has a life," Wills said..."You can't count on her to be waiting around for you every day. So drowning on purpose makes you an idiot.
”
”
Sarah Cross (Kill Me Softly (Beau Rivage, #1))
“
Emotions can override…the more powerful fundamental motives that drive our lives: hunger, sex, and the will to survive. People will not eat if they think the only food available is disgusting. They may even die, although other people might consider that same food palatable. Emotion triumphs over the hunger drive! A person may never attempt sexual contact because of the interference of fear or disgust, or may never be able to complete a sexual act. Emotion triumphs over the sex drive! And despair can overwhelm even the will to live, motivating a suicide. Emotions triumph over the will to live!
”
”
Paul Ekman (Emotions Revealed: Recognizing Faces and Feelings to Improve Communication and Emotional Life)
“
Life finds its balance. Children grow up. Second chances come along. In the meantime, I could choose to savor this moment. What good would it do to allow annoyance to interfere with gratitude?
”
”
Katrina Kenison (The Gift of an Ordinary Day: A Mother's Memoir)
“
The urge to grow and develop, present in all forms of life, becomes perverted in the Bisy Backson's mind into a constant struggle to change everything (the Bulldozer Backson) and everyone (the Bigoted Backson) else but himself, and interfere with things he has no business interfering with, including practically every form of life on earth.
”
”
Benjamin Hoff (The Tao of Pooh)
“
You may say you won’t interfere with another person’s soul, but you do—merely by existing. The snag about it is the practical difficulty, so to speak, of not existing.
”
”
Dorothy L. Sayers (Gaudy Night (Lord Peter Wimsey, #12))
“
People have nothing to do and therefore they interfere with the life of others. I dont want to interfere with the life of others.
”
”
Vaslav Nijinsky
“
Whether you are shivering with cold or too hot, sleepy or wide awake, spoken well of or badly, dying, or doing anything else, do not let it interfere with doing what is right. For whatever causes us to die is also one of life's processes. Even for this, nothing is required of us than to accomplish well the task at hand.
”
”
Marcus Aurelius (Meditations)
“
Great songs write themselves. You're just being led by the nose, or the ears. The skill is not to interfere with it too much. Ignore intelligence, ignore everything; just follow it where it takes you.
”
”
Keith Richards (Life)
“
The details of life have a tendency to interfere with the actual living of life.
”
”
Richard Diaz
“
--"And then I explained to him how naive we were, that the world did know and remained silent. And that is why I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must take sides. Neutrality helps the opppresso, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must interfere. When human lives are endangered, when human dignity is in jeopardy, national borders and sensitivities become irrelevant. Wherever men and women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must--at that moment--become the center of the universe."
"Human suffering anywhere concerns men and women everywhere."
"As long as one dissident is in prison, our freedom will not be true. As long as one child is hungry, our life will be filled with anguish and shame. What all these victims need above all is to know that they are not alone; that we are not forgetting them, that when their voices are stifled we shall lend them ours, that while their freedom depends on ours, the quality of our freedom depends on theirs."
" We know that every moment is a moment of grace, every hour an offering; not to share them would mean to betray them. Our lives no longer belong to us alone; they belong to all those who need us desperately.
”
”
Elie Wiesel (Night (The Night Trilogy, #1))
“
If you need time, take it. If you want to date other people, do it. I won’t interfere. I didn’t appreciate you when I had you, and that’s my cross to bear. But you’ll always be the love of my life, and I’ll always be here, whether it’s a month, a year, or a lifetime from now.” The sound of her sob dampened my cheek with something hot and wet. “There are probably hundreds of men who’d line up for the chance to be with you. I only ask that you let me be one of them.
”
”
Ana Huang (King of Greed (Kings of Sin, #3))
“
For an introvert, interacting in a group setting does mean missing out. Where there is too much input, the introvert misses his mind, his subjectivity, his freedom, his very potential. The high-stimulus social environment, the “where it’s at on a Friday night,” this apparent “more,” becomes a prison to the introvert. He can’t wait to be free—to get out and away from the noise, the talk, the interference with his inner process.
”
”
Laurie A. Helgoe (Introvert Power: Why Your Inner Life Is Your Hidden Strength)
“
In a werewolf pack, you cannot interfere with the mate choice of a clan fellow. You cannot intentionally harm that werewolf’s chosen mate. You are not, however, required to help that person should he find himself in a life - threatening situation.
Somehow, Zeb had managed to stumble into several such situations in the few months since he ’d been engaged to Jolene. He’d had several hunting “accidents” while visiting the McClaine farm, even though he didn’t hunt. The brakes on his car had failed while he was driving home from the farm—twice. Also, a running chainsaw mysteriously fell on him from a hayloft.
He would never get that pinkie toe back.
”
”
Molly Harper (Nice Girls Don't Date Dead Men (Jane Jameson, #2))
“
When the ultimate perfection is attained, the body and limbs perform by themselves what is assigned to them to do with no interference from the mind. The
”
”
Bruce Lee (Bruce Lee: Artist of Life)
“
I get furious at stairways, furious at doors, at
walls, furious at everyday life which interferes with the continuity of
ecstasy.
”
”
Anaïs Nin (House of Incest)
“
We don’t interfere with death. We can’t.” “Why not?” “Because it’s always there. No matter what you do, no matter what kind of life you live, good or bad or somewhere in between, it’s always going to be waiting for you. From the moment you’re born, you’re dying.
”
”
T.J. Klune (Under the Whispering Door)
“
You spend a whole life of non-interference with the wishes of others, including politicians and the rich, and nobody bothers you and you cut along and make it your own way.
”
”
Jack Kerouac (On the Road)
“
Because, if you stop to think of it, the three Rules of Robotics are the essential guiding principles of a good many of the world’s ethical systems. Of course, every human being is supposed to have the instinct of self-preservation. That’s Rule Three to a robot. Also every ‘good’ human being, with a social conscience and a sense of responsibility, is supposed to defer to proper authority; to listen to his doctor, his boss, his government, his psychiatrist, his fellow man; to obey laws, to follow rules, to conform to custom—even when they interfere with his comfort or his safety. That’s Rule Two to a robot. Also, every ‘good’ human being is supposed to love others as himself, protect his fellow man, risk his life to save another. That’s Rule One to a robot. To put it simply—if Byerley follows all the Rules of Robotics, he may be a robot, and may simply be a very good man.
”
”
Isaac Asimov (I, Robot (Robot, #0.1))
“
Are you born again?" he asked, as we taxied down the runway. He was rather prim and tense, maybe a little like David Eisenhower with a spastic colon. I did not know how to answer for a moment.
"Yes," I said. "I am."
My friends like to tell each other that I am not really a born-again Christian. They think of me more along the lines of that old Jonathan Miller routine, where he said, "I'm not really a Jew -- I'm Jew-ish." They think I am Christian-ish. But I'm not. I'm just a bad Christian. A bad born-again Christian. And certainly, like the apostle Peter, I am capable of denying it, of presenting myself as a sort of leftist liberation-theology enthusiast and maybe sort of a vaguely Jesusy bon vivant. But it's not true. And I believe that when you get on a plane, if you start lying you are totally doomed.
So I told the truth; that I am a believer, a convert. I'm probably about three months away from slapping an aluminum Jesus-fish on the back of my car, although I first want to see if the application or stickum in any way interferes with my lease agreement. And believe me, all this boggles even *my* mind. But it's true. I could go to a gathering of foot-wash Baptists and, except for my dreadlocks, fit right in. I would wash their feet; I would let them wash mine.
”
”
Anne Lamott
“
What is there to see if I go outside? Don't tell me. I know. I can see other people. I don't want to see other people. They look awful. The men look like slobs and the women look like men. The men have mush faces framed by long hair and the women have big noses, big jaws, big heads, and stick-like bodies. That depresses me. Its no fun to people-watch anymore because there's so little variety in types.
You say it's good to get a change of scenery. What scenery? New buildings? New cars? New freeways? New shopping malls? Go to the woods or a park? I saw a tree once. The new ones look the same, which is fine. I even remember what the old ones look like. My memory isn't that short. But it's not worth going to see a squirrel grab a nut, or fish swimming around in a big tank if I must put up with the ugly contemporary human pollution that accompanies each excursion. The squirrel may enliven me and remind me of better vistas but the price in social interaction isn't worth it. If, on my way to visit the squirrel, I encounter a single person who gains stimulation by seeing me, I feel like I have given more than I've received and I get sore.
If every time I go somewhere to see a fish swimming, I become someone else's stimulation, I feel shortchanged. I'll buy my own fish and watch it swim. Then, I can watch the fish, the fish can watch me, we can be friends, and nobody else interferes with the interaction, like trying to hear what the fish and I are talking about. I won't have to get dressed a certain way to visit the fish. I needn't dress the way my pride dictates, because who's going to see me? I needn't wear any pants. The fish doesn't care. He doesn't read the tabloids. But, if I go out to see a fish other than my own, I'm right back where I started: entertaining others, which is more depleting than visiting the new fish is entertaining.
Maybe I should go to a coffee house. I find no stimulation in watching ordinary people trying to put the make on other uninteresting people. I can fix my own cup of coffee and not have to look at or talk to other people. No matter where I go, I stimulate others, and have been doing so all my life. It used to be I'd sometimes get stimulated back.
”
”
Anton Szandor LaVey
“
Jesus doesn't hold back with Nicodemus.
Following Jesus would require a commitment that would cost Nicodemus a great deal....In fact, it's true throughout all of Scripture....Following Jesus isn't something you can do at night where no one notices. It's a twenty-four-hour-a-day commitment that will interfere with your life. That's not the small-print--that's a guarantee.
”
”
Kyle Idleman (Not a Fan: Becoming a Completely Committed Follower of Jesus)
“
It is a common belief that we breathe with our lungs alone, but in point of fact, the work of breathing is done by the whole body. The lungs play a passive role in the respiratory process. Their expansion is produced by an enlargement, mostly downward, of the thoracic cavity and they collapse when that cavity is reduced. Proper breathing involves the muscles of the head, neck, thorax, and abdomen. It can be shown that chronic tension in any part of the body's musculature interferes with the natural respiratory movements.
Breathing is a rhythmic activity. Normally a person at rest makes approximately 16 to 17 respiratory incursions a minute. The rate is higher in infants and in states of excitation. It is lower in sleep and in depressed persons. The depth of the respiratory wave is another factor which varies with emotional states. Breathing becomes shallow when we are frightened or anxious. It deepens with relaxation, pleasure and sleep. But above all, it is the quality of the respiratory movements that determines whether breathing is pleasurable or not. With each breath a wave can be seen to ascend and descend through the body. The inspiratory wave begins deep in the abdomen with a backward movement of the pelvis. This allows the belly to expand outward. The wave then moves upward as the rest of the body expands. The head moves very slightly forward to suck in the air while the nostrils dilate or the mouth opens. The expiratory wave begins in the upper part of the body and moves downward: the head drops back, the chest and abdomen collapse, and the pelvis rocks forward.
Breathing easily and fully is one of the basic pleasures of being alive. The pleasure is clearly experienced at the end of expiration when the descending wave fills the pelvis with a delicious sensation. In adults this sensation has a sexual quality, though it does not induce any genital feeling. The slight backward and forward movements of the pelvis, similar to the sexual movements, add to the pleasure. Though the rhythm of breathing is pronounced in the pelvic area, it is at the same time experienced by the total body as a feeling of fluidity, softness, lightness and excitement.
The importance of breathing need hardly be stressed. It provides the oxygen for the metabolic processes; literally it supports the fires of life. But breath as "pneuma" is also the spirit or soul. We live in an ocean of air like fish in a body of water. By our breathing we are attuned to our atmosphere. If we inhibit our breathing we isolate ourselves from the medium in which we exist. In all Oriental and mystic philosophies, the breath holds the secret to the highest bliss. That is why breathing is the dominant factor in the practice of Yoga.
”
”
Alexander Lowen (The Voice of the Body)
“
People’s lives are delicate; you cannot interfere with them without running the risk of changing them profoundly. A chance remark, a careless involvement, may make the difference between a life of happiness and one of sorrow
”
”
Alexander McCall Smith (The Kalahari Typing School for Men (No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, #4))
“
The kind of people I absolutely cannot tolerate are those who never let you forget they are religious. It seems to me that a truly religious person would let his life be example enough, would not let his religion interfere with being a human being, and would not be so insecure as to have to fawn publicly before his gods.
”
”
W.P. Kinsella
“
As a teenager, I always intended to do my homework. But when the supplicant dead come to you for justice and you also have occasional prophetic dreams, life tends to interfere with your studies.
”
”
Dean Koontz (Odd Hours (Odd Thomas, #4))
“
slaveholders have been cunning enough to enact that “the child shall follow the condition of the mother,” not of the father, thus taking care that licentiousness shall not interfere with avarice.
”
”
Harriet Ann Jacobs (Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl)
“
How could I know what we’d have, kitten? My beautiful, perfect, maddening friend who I fucking worship the ground she walks on. I was as surprised as you were. But I know this; I’ve been moving toward you my entire life. I just didn’t know it. And now I’m here, I’ll stop anyone who tries to interfere.
”
”
V. Theia (It Was Always Love (Taboo Love #2))
“
Why is music capable of inflicting such pain? Because it works on our feelings directly. No ideas interfere with its emotions. This is why "all art aspires to the condition of music." The symphony gives us the thrill of uncertainty--the pleasurable anxiety of searching for a pattern--but without the risks of real life. When we listen to music, we are moved by an abstraction. We feel, but we don't know why.
”
”
Jonah Lehrer (Proust Was a Neuroscientist)
“
And speaking of Terms, we need to set a few ground rules here with...this," he said, clearing his throat and gesturing at the two of them.
"With what?" Lex said.
"That," Uncle Mort replied, pointing to a suspicious-looking mark on her neck.
Lex's hand flew to her throat while Driggs shifted, uneasy.
"Why?" he asked.
"Don't 'why?' me, Romeo. You know I trust you, but Lex is still my niece. In the absence of her father, it's up to me to do everything in my power to complicate and interfere with her budding love life."
Lex frowned. "Hey-
”
”
Gina Damico (Scorch (Croak, #2))
“
It's bad enough when people I know fuck with my life, but when pretentious bass players interfere with my destiny, then I really get pissed.
”
”
Tiffanie DeBartolo (How to Kill a Rock Star)
“
...[T]he mechanics of life should never be allowed to interfere with living.
”
”
Jan Struther (Mrs. Miniver)
“
I'm really sorry for having interfered with the rest of your life." Fu Shen leaned back, relaxed ... Magnanimously, he said, "Come on, you can interfere back now
”
”
Cang Wu Bin Bai (Golden Terrace, Vol. 1)
“
This should be one of the basic attitudes—not to think about what the other is doing. That is his life. If he decides to live it that way, that is his business. Who are you even to have an opinion about it? Even to have an opinion means that you are ready to interfere, you have already interfered.
”
”
Osho (Tao: The Pathless Path: The Pathless Path)
“
Our five senses even interfere with sensible answers to stupid metaphysical questions like, “If a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around to hear it, does it make a sound?” My best answer is, “How do you know it fell?” But that just gets people angry. So I offer a senseless analogy, “Q: If you can’t smell the carbon monoxide, then how do you know it’s there? A: You drop dead.” In modern times, if the sole measure of what’s out there flows from your five senses then a precarious life awaits you.
”
”
Neil deGrasse Tyson (Death by Black Hole)
“
Hold childhood in reverence, and do not be in any hurry to judge it for good or ill. Leave exceptional cases to show themselves, let their qualities be tested and confirmed, before special methods are adopted. Give nature time to work before you take over her business, lest you interfere with her dealings. You assert that you know the value of time and are afraid to waste it. You fail to perceive that it is a greater waste of time to use it ill than to do nothing, and that a child ill taught is further from virtue than a child who has learnt nothing at all. You are afraid to see him spending his early years doing nothing. What! is it nothing to be happy, nothing to run and jump all day? He will never be so busy again all his life long. Plato, in his Republic, which is considered so stern, teaches the children only through festivals, games, songs, and amusements. It seems as if he had accomplished his purpose when he had taught them to be happy; and Seneca, speaking of the Roman lads in olden days, says, "They were always on their feet, they were never taught anything which kept them sitting." Were they any the worse for it in manhood? Do not be afraid, therefore, of this so-called idleness. What would you think of a man who refused to sleep lest he should waste part of his life? You would say, "He is mad; he is not enjoying his life, he is robbing himself of part of it; to avoid sleep he is hastening his death." Remember that these two cases are alike, and that childhood is the sleep of reason.
The apparent ease with which children learn is their ruin. You fail to see that this very facility proves that they are not learning. Their shining, polished brain reflects, as in a mirror, the things you show them, but nothing sinks in. The child remembers the words and the ideas are reflected back; his hearers understand them, but to him they are meaningless.
Although memory and reason are wholly different faculties, the one does not really develop apart from the other. Before the age of reason the child receives images, not ideas; and there is this difference between them: images are merely the pictures of external objects, while ideas are notions about those objects determined by their relations.
”
”
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (Emile, or On Education)
“
Life gets in the way of Creativity, but it's up to us not to let it interfere more than necessary.
”
”
Gabbo De La Parra
“
Creation, whether it's writing, painting or whatever, is essentially despotic and autocratic in nature, because it's the work of one mind and one mind alone which has absolute power of life or death over this sentence, or that phrase or whatever it is. It brooks no interference and can only work if it's the one mind doing it. Reading, on the other hand, interpretation, is inherently, intrinsically democratic, because it is fundamentally a process of negotiation between the mind and the text, between the expectations you bring to it and the satisfactions and disappointments you take away from it.
”
”
Philip Pullman
“
The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also. I would not interfere with any one's religion, either to strengthen it or to weaken it. I am not able to believe one's religion can affect his hereafter one way or the other, no matter what that religion may be. But it may easily be a great comfort to him in this life--hence it is a valuable possession to him.
”
”
Mark Twain (The Autobiography of Mark Twain)
“
t is important to the typical 'Star Trek' fan that there is a tomorrow. They pretty much share the 'Star Trek' philosophies about life: the fact that it is wrong to interfere in the evolvement of other peoples, that to be different is not necessarily to be wrong or ugly. Gene Roddenberry
”
”
Gene Roddenberry
“
I never drink coffee after 3.48 p.m. It interferes with sleep. Caffeine has a half-life of three to four hours, so it’s irresponsible serving coffee at 7.00 p.m. unless people are planning to stay awake until after midnight. Which doesn’t allow adequate sleep if they have a conventional job.
”
”
Graeme Simsion (The Rosie Project (Don Tillman, #1))
“
The Scientific Method is a wonderful tool as long as you don't care which way the outcome turns; however, this process fails the second one's perception interferes with the interpretation of data. This is why I don’t take anything in life as an absolute…even if someone can “prove” it “scientifically.
”
”
Kent Marrero
“
If Ayurveda were a religion Nature would be its Goddess, and overindulgence would be the sole sin She would punish. Ayurveda is meant to allow you to enjoy the pleasures of life up to the point that such enjoyment interferes with your health. Full-time gratification is in fact bondage, because the more we consume the more we become captives of our consumption.
”
”
Robert E. Svoboda (Prakriti: Your Ayurvedic Constitution (Your Ayurvedic Constitution Revised Enlarged Second Edition))
“
In Washington and Moscow they are saying, 'Man has finally come of age; he doesn't need paternalistic help.' Which is another way of saying, 'We have abolished that help, and in its place we will rule,' offering no help at all: taking but not giving, ruling but not obeying, telling but not listening, taking life and not giving it. The slayers govern now, without interference; the dreams of mankind have become empty.
”
”
Philip K. Dick
“
Whenever we talk about darkness and light, the terms seem so abstract that many consider the answers to be found in meditation and yoga, but I’m here to tell you that the answers are in the books you will never read, waiting all your life in the libraries you ignored and the bookstores you didn’t visit. I’m here to tell you as well that you are your own Satan and evil can’t possibly interfere more in your life than what you’re already doing to yourself by remaining ignorant. Until you choose the light, darkness is your personal choice, and there’s no reason to feel any empathy for you.
”
”
Robin Sacredfire
“
She wondered if the immortal's avoidance of life's ugliness was a matter of survival or bigotry. Lord Akeldama did so love to know all the gossip about the mundane world, but it was in the manner of a cat amusing himself among the butterflies without a need to interfere should their wings get torn off. They were only butterflies, after all.
”
”
Gail Carriger (Heartless (Parasol Protectorate, #4))
“
But, of course, what mattered most of all was my deep-seated hatred of authority, my monstrous individualism, my lawlessness. No word in my vocabulary expressed deeper hatred than the word INTERFERENCE. But Christianity placed at the centre what then seemed to me a transcendental Interferer. If its picture were true then no sort of 'treaty with reality' could ever be possible. There was no region even in the innermost depth of one's soul (nay, there least of all) which one could surround with a barbed wire fence and guard with a notice No Admittance. And that was what I wanted; some area, however small, of which I could say to all other beings, 'This is my business and mine only.
”
”
C.S. Lewis (Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life)
“
Anarchism alone stresses the importance of the individual, his possibilities and needs in a free society. Instead of telling him that he must fall down and worship before institutions, live and die for abstractions, break his heart and stunt his life for taboos, Anarchism insists that the center of gravity in society is the individual--that he must think for himself, act freely, and live fully. The aim of Anarchism is that every individual in the world shall be able to do so. If he is to develop freely and fully, he must be relieved from the interference and oppression of others. Freedom is, therefore, the cornerstone of the Anarchist philosophy. Of course, this has nothing in common with a much boasted "rugged individualism." Such predatory individualism is really flabby, not rugged. At the least danger to its safety it runs to cover of the state and wails for protection of armies, navies, or whatever devices for strangulation it has at its command. Their "rugged individualism" is simply one of the many pretenses the ruling class makes to unbridled business and political extortion.
”
”
Emma Goldman (Red Emma Speaks: An Emma Goldman Reader (Contemporary Studies in Philosophy and the Human Sciences))
“
1883. ...The teaching of the Church has elaborated the principle of subsidiarity, according to which "a community of a higher order should not interfere in the internal life of a community of a lower order, depriving the latter of its functions, but rather should support it in case of need and help to co-ordinate its activity with the activities of the rest of society, always with a view to the common good.
”
”
Catholic Church (Catechism of the Catholic Church: Complete and Updated)
“
When obsessives are given their object of desire, what do they feel? It was hard to say, really. In a sense their lives were ending; yet something else, some other life, had finally, finally begun…. Filled with so many emotions at once, it was impossible not to be confused; it was an interference pattern, some feelings cancelled, others reinforced.
”
”
Kim Stanley Robinson (Red Mars (Mars Trilogy, #1))
“
Some false representations contravene the law; some do not. The law does not pretend to punish everything that is dishonest. That would seriously interfere with business, and, besides, could not be done. The line between honesty and dishonesty is a narrow, shifting one and usually lets those get by that are the most subtle and already have more than they can use.
”
”
Clarence Darrow (The Story of My Life)
“
The human is a being created according to Nature's laws and is therefore dependent upon them. In the course of time our magnum
opus, our self-created pseudo-culture, has become a meaningless and incoherent monstrosity. Through the immense power of
technology it has reached such gargantuan proportions that it almost equals the power of Nature herself. At the very least it is already
able to interfere destructively with her great life-giving functions.
”
”
Viktor Schauberger
“
Ah, God, Lys" he breathed, and she opened her eyes to look up at him. She was the love of his heart, his true partner in both work and life, and the idea of losing her to the violence of the world they lived in scared the living shit out of him.
But her smile lit her eyes, her face, and he pushed the darkness away and let himself grin back at her like the damn fool that he was. This moment-now-was perfect, and he wasn't going to let his fears interfere.
”
”
Suzanne Brockmann (Hot Pursuit (Troubleshooters, #15))
“
Mister MacKeltar," Drustan corrected for the umpteenth time, with a this-is-really-wearing-thin-but-I'm-determined-to-be-patient smile. No matter how many times he told Farley that he was not a laird, that he was simply Mr. MacKeltar, that it was Christopher (his modern-day descendant who lived up the road in the oldest castle on the land) who was actually laird, Farley refused to hear it. The eighty-something-year-old butler, who insisted he was sixty-two and who had obviously never before buttled in his life until the day he'd arrived on their doorstep, was determined to be a butler to a lord. Period. And he wasn't about to let Drustan interfere with that aspiration.
”
”
Karen Marie Moning (The Immortal Highlander (Highlander, #6))
“
I became alive once more. At the dances I was one of the most untiring and gayest. One evening a cousin of Sasha, a young boy, took me aside. With a grave face, as if he were about to announce the death of a dear comrade, he whispered to me that it did not behoove an agitator to dance. Certainly not with such reckless abandon, anyway. It was undignified for one who was on the way to become a force in the anarchist movement. My frivolity would only hurt the Cause.
I grew furious at the impudent interference of the boy. I told him to mind his own business. I was tired of having the Cause constantly thrown into my face. I did not believe that a Cause which stood for a beautiful ideal, for anarchism, for release and freedom from convention and prejudice, should demand the denial of life and joy. I insisted that our Cause could not expect me to become a nun and that the movement would not be turned into a cloister. If it meant that, I did not want it. "I want freedom, the right to self-expression, everybody's right to beautiful, radiant things." Anarchism meant that to me, and I would live it in spite of the whole world — prisons, persecution, everything. Yes, even in spite of the condemnation of my own closest comrades I would live my beautiful ideal
”
”
Emma Goldman (Living My Life (Penguin Classics))
“
The Nobel Prize is the best thing that can happen to a writer in terms of how it affects your contracts, the publishers, and the seriousness with which your work is taken. On the other hand, it does interfere with your private life, or it can if you let it, and it has zero effect on the writing.It doesn't help you write better and if you let it, it will intimidate you about future projects.
”
”
Toni Morrison
“
Positivity is like harmonics and patterns. Create positivity in your life, and allow it to interfere with more positivity. Allow that positivity to vibrate alongside more paths. The end result, is a beautiful day. However, why stop there? There is a reason that positivity parallels harmonics and patterns, so keep it going towards dream's end. If you feel like there isn't enough positivity in your life to get your day started, don't worry, I have plenty, so you can take some of mine. Infinity minus 1 is still infinity, so take some positivity from me, bathe in it, sing with it, and know that today, there is success within your value -- for you were able to wake up and treasure another day.
”
”
Lionel Suggs
“
By refusing to admit that I was sick, I felt I could keep the sickness outside time and space, something only in my own head. If other people knew about it, the sickness would become real and I would have to spend my life being a sick person. This could only interfere with my other ambitions, such as achieving enlightenment and being a fun girl. I used internet forums to assess if this was a problem for anyone else. I searched ‘can’t tell people I’m’ and Google suggested: ‘gay’ and ‘pregnant’.
”
”
Sally Rooney (Conversations with Friends)
“
As soon as I decided I'd have to dig down still deeper to uncover the root of my listless withdrawal from life, I became aware of some interference from the past distracting and confusing my thoughts, causing me a sensation that was at the same time oppressive, expectant and empty. In these somewhat contradictory feelings, I came to recognize my childish sense of having run down like a clock that needed someone to wind it before it could go again; and saw that I was now no less helpless than in those far-off days when I waited for somebody to take me by the hand and tell me what to do. On my own initiative I could do nothing, take no responsibility, make no decisions only watch my existence unroll.
”
”
Anna Kavan (Guilty)
“
He ended his tour next to the small bed. Then, just like that, he jumped onto her lap and circled, his large white paws finding soft purchase on her thighs. Kya sat frozen, her arms slightly raised, so as not to interfere with his maneuvering. Finally, he settled as though he had nested here every night of his life. He looked at her. Gently she touched his head, then scratched his neck. A loud purr erupted like a current. She closed her eyes at such easy acceptance. A deep pause in a lifetime of longing.
”
”
Delia Owens (Where the Crawdads Sing)
“
...the priests of all these cults, the singers, shouters, prayers and exhorters of Bootstrap-lifting have as their distinguishing characteristic that they do very little lifting at their own bootstraps, and less at any other man's. Now and then you may see one bend and give a delicate tug, of a purely symbolical character: as when the Supreme Pontiff of the Roman Bootstrap-lifters comes once a year to wash the feet of the poor; or when the Sunday-school Superintendent of the Baptist Bootstrap-lifters shakes the hand of one of his Colorado mine-slaves. But for the most part the priests and preachers of Bootstrap-lifting walk haughtily erect, many of them being so swollen with prosperity that they could not reach their bootstraps if they wanted to. Their role in life is to exhort other men to more vigorous efforts at self-elevation, that the agents of the Wholesale Pickpockets' Association may ply their immemorial role with less chance of interference.
”
”
Upton Sinclair (The Profits of Religion (Great Minds Series))
“
Now my aim is clear: I must show that the house is one of the greatest powers of integration for the thoughts, memories and dreams of mankind. The binding principle in this integration is the daydream. Past, present and future give the house different dynamisms, which often interfere, at times opposing, at others, stimulating one another. In the life of a man, the house thrusts aside contingencies, its councils of continuity are unceasing. Without it, man would be a dispersed being. It maintains him through the storms of the heavens and through those of life. It is body and soul. It is the human being's first world. Before he is "cast into the world," as claimed by certain hasty meta-physics, man is laid in the cradle of the house. And always, in our daydreams, the house is a large cradle. A concrete metaphysics cannot neglect this fact, this simple fact, all the more, since this fact is a value, an important value, to which we return in our daydreaming. Being is already a value. Life begins well, it begins enclosed, protected, all warm in the bosom of the house.
”
”
Gaston Bachelard (The Poetics of Space)
“
WHO AM I?
I have seven heavenly panels
Leading up to a pointed sphere
I’m multidimensional like a crystal
And my center is never clear.
I’m an inventor and pioneer.
A mentor to my peers.
But I'm not as sound as my shell reveals,
Because I’m tormented by my fears -
That may appear to be grounded
But my insides are filled with tears.
And the sadness is well-founded,
From years and years
Of traumatic experiences
Compounded
In the most demented
Atmospheres.
I talk but feel like nobody hears.
Has reason disappeared?
And, God, are you near?
This is Giza’s 7th light force
And I'm asking you to interfere.
I can no longer walk amongst the blind and dead
With open eyes and ears.
I’m trying to maintain my sanity
And to straighten up my veneer
As I roll amongst the growing calamities
Flowing on Earth’s severely trashed
Frontier.
Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun (2010)
”
”
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
“
Someone knocked on the back door. He push back the chair and had to pause. The wolf was angry that someone had breached his sanctuary. Not even his pack had been brave enough the past few days to approch him in his home.
By the time he stalked into the kitchen, he had it mostly under control. He jerked open the back door and expect to see one of his wolves. But it was Mercy.
She didn't look cheerful—but then, she seldom did when she had to come over and talk to him. She was tough and independent and not at all happy to have him interfere in any way with that independence. It had been a long time since someone had bossed him around the way she did—and he liked it. More than a wolf who'd been Alpha for twenty years ought to like it.
She smelled of burnt car oil, Jasmine from the shampoo she'd been using that month, and chocolate. Or maybe that last was the cookies on the plate she handed him.
"Here," she said stiffly. And he realize it was shyness in the corner of her mouth. "Chocolate usually helps me regain my balance when life kicks me in the teeth."
She didn't wait for him to say anything, just turned around and walked back to her house.
He took the cookies back to the office with him. After a few minutes, he ate one. Chocolate, thick and dark, spread across his tongue, it's bitterness alleviated by a sinfull amount of brown sugar and vanilla. He'd forgotten to eat and hadn't realized it.
But it wasn't the chocolate or the food that made him feel better. It was Mercy's kindness to someone she viewed as her enemy. And right at that moment, he realized something. She would never love him for what she could do for her.
He ate another cookie before getting up to make himself dinner.
”
”
Patricia Briggs (Silver Borne (Mercy Thompson, #5))
“
What is it like to feel Tao? It is an effortless flowing, a sweeping momentum. It is like bird song soaring and gliding over a vast landscape. You can feel this in your life: Events will take on a perfect momentum, a glorious cadence. You can feel it in your body: The energy will rise up in you in a thrilling crescendo, setting your very nerves aglow. You can feel it in your spirit: You will enter a state of such perfect grace that you will resound over the landscape of reality like ephemeral bird song.
When Tao comes to you in this way, ride it for all that you are worth. Don't interfere. Don't stop - that brings failure, alienation, and regret. Don't try to direct it. Let it flow and follow it. When the Tao is with you, put aside all other concerns. As long as the song lasts, follow. Just follow.
”
”
Ming-Dao Deng (365 Tao: Daily Meditations)
“
Renunciation Suzuki Roshi said, “Renunciation is not giving up the things of this world, but accepting that they go away.” Everything is impermanent; sooner or later everything goes away. Renunciation is a state of nonattachment, acceptance of this going away. Impermanence is, in fact, just another name for perfection. Leaves fall; debris and garbage accumulate; out of the debris come flowers, greenery, things that we think are lovely. Destruction is necessary. A good forest fire is necessary. The way we interfere with forest fires may not be a good thing. Without destruction, there could be no new life; and the wonder of life, the constant change, could not be. We must live and die. And this process is perfection itself.
”
”
Charlotte Joko Beck (Everyday Zen)
“
When a parent interferes with a child's anger response in these heavy-handed ways [ridiculing, ignoring, isolating, goading, punishing, distracting, hitting, joking], the anger increases and is redirected at the parent: now the parent is the one who's violating the child's sense of well-being by interfering with a natural and necessary outlet of emotion. Most parents stifle this secondary outburst of anger, too, only this time with more force. [...] Instead of allowing the anger to flow through the child's system the first time it's expressed, the parent unwittingly fans the anger, then dams it up. The anger becomes trapped in the little girl's stomach, muscles, and jaw, and becomes an enduring wound.
”
”
Patricia Love (The Emotional Incest Syndrome: What to do When a Parent's Love Rules Your Life)
“
Love and marriage are about work and compromise. They're about seeing someone for what he is, being dissapointed , and deciding to stick around anyway. They're about commitment and comfort, not some kind of sudden, hysterical recognition'. 'That's not what I want. Disspointment and comfort is not what I want'. 'Why not? Because you expect it to be magical and mystical? Because you don't want to work?' 'Why can't it be magical? Why can't it be mystical?' 'Because if you count on magic and mysticism, then as soon as shit happens, as soon as life interferes, as soon as your stepson treats you badly, or your husband's ex-wife has a fit about something, or your baby dies, as soon as life happens, the magic will disappear and you'll be left with nothing. You can't count on magic. Trust me, I know. Sweetheart, little girl, you can't count on magic'.
”
”
Ayelet Waldman
“
He doesn’t like Emma and Rachel making plans together. Not because he thinks they’re being devious, but because he doesn’t like feeling left out. Not to mention that when Emma is making plans without him, they’re usually reckless. The only reason she’d keep a secret from him is if she was doing something he didn’t approve of, or didn’t want him to interfere with. After all, her motto is “Better to ask for forgiveness than permission.”
Galen despises that motto.
“I cleared out the sporting goods store this morning,” Rachel says. “I took what was on the shelf and made them cough up their stock in the back.”
Galen tenses up. Emma laughs. “Don’t be jealous, Highness. Rachel still loves you more than she loves me.”
“Aww! You guys are fighting over me?” Rachel says, pinching Galen’s cheek. “That’s so adorable.”
“I’m not jealous,” he says, trying not to sound pouty. “I just don’t know why we would need life jackets.”
“We don’t,” Emma says, wriggling around on his lap so she can face him. Secretly, he’s delighted. “But humans do. And if my job is keeping the humans safe, then I should be prepared, right?”
But Galen is too distracted by the close proximity of her mouth to be bothered with the words coming out of it. She must recognize it, because she leans forward as if giving him a chance to make good on his craving. It’s all the invitation he needs.
He captures her mouth with his. Life jackets, islands, and airports are forgotten. The only thing that exists is her lips on his, her body pressed into his. Suddenly the creaky office chair is transformed into their own little world.
“Uh, I’m just going to get more wine,” Rachel says. He didn’t mean to make her uncomfortable enough to leave. Not good. The last thing we need is privacy and free rein to do as we please. He tries to end it, to pull away, but Emma won’t have it. And it’s difficult for him not to indulge her.
”
”
Anna Banks (Of Triton (The Syrena Legacy, #2))
“
I remember: it happened yesterday, or eternities ago. A young Jewish boy discovered the Kingdom of Night. I remember his bewilderment, I remember his anguish. It all happened so fast. The ghetto. The deportation. The sealed cattle car. The fiery altar upon which the history of our people and the future of mankind were meant to be sacrificed. I remember he asked his father, “Can this be true? This is the twentieth century, not the Middle Ages. Who would allow such crimes to be committed? How could the world remain silent?” And now the boy is turning to me. “Tell me,” he asks, “what have you done with my future, what have you done with your life?” And I tell him that I have tried. That I have tried to keep memory alive, that I have tried to fight those who would forget. Because if we forget, we are guilty, we are accomplices. And then I explain to him how naïve we were, that the world did know and remained silent. And that is why I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must interfere. When human lives are endangered, when human dignity is in jeopardy, national borders and sensitivities become irrelevant. Wherever men and women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must—at that moment—become the center of the universe.
”
”
Elie Wiesel
“
do you love her" Wulfgar asked suddenly, and the drow was off his guard.
"Of course I do," Drizzt responded truthfully. "As I love you, and Bruenor, and Regis."
"I would not interfere-" Wulfgar started to say, but he was stopped by Drizzt's chuckle.
"The choice is neither mine nor yours," the drow explained, "but Catti-brie's. Remember, what you had, my friend, and remember what you, in your foolishness, nearly lost."
Wulfgar looked long and hard at his dear friend, determined to heed that wise advice. Catti-brie's life was Catti-brie's to decide and whatever, or whomever, she chose, Wulfgar would always be among friends.
The winter would be long and cold, thick with snow and mercifully uneventful. Things would not be the same between the friends, could never be after all they had experienced, but they would be together again, in heart and in soul. Let no man, and no fiend, ever try to separate them again!
”
”
R.A. Salvatore
“
Darwin, with his Origin of Species, his theories about Natural Selection, the Survival of the Fittest, and the influence of environment, shed a flood of light upon the great problems of plant and animal life.
These things had been guessed, prophesied, asserted, hinted by many others, but Darwin, with infinite patience, with perfect care and candor, found the facts, fulfilled the prophecies, and demonstrated the truth of the guesses, hints and assertions. He was, in my judgment, the keenest observer, the best judge of the meaning and value of a fact, the greatest Naturalist the world has produced.
The theological view began to look small and mean.
Spencer gave his theory of evolution and sustained it by countless facts. He stood at a great height, and with the eyes of a philosopher, a profound thinker, surveyed the world. He has influenced the thought of the wisest.
Theology looked more absurd than ever.
Huxley entered the lists for Darwin. No man ever had a sharper sword -- a better shield. He challenged the world. The great theologians and the small scientists -- those who had more courage than sense, accepted the challenge. Their poor bodies were carried away by their friends.
Huxley had intelligence, industry, genius, and the courage to express his thought. He was absolutely loyal to what he thought was truth. Without prejudice and without fear, he followed the footsteps of life from the lowest to the highest forms.
Theology looked smaller still.
Haeckel began at the simplest cell, went from change to change -- from form to form -- followed the line of development, the path of life, until he reached the human race. It was all natural. There had been no interference from without.
I read the works of these great men -- of many others – and became convinced that they were right, and that all the theologians -- all the believers in "special creation" were absolutely wrong.
The Garden of Eden faded away, Adam and Eve fell back to dust, the snake crawled into the grass, and Jehovah became a miserable myth.
”
”
Robert G. Ingersoll
“
Modern society is in a state of turbulence brought about, in large part, by political efforts to maintain static, equilibrium conditions; practices that interfere with the ceaseless processes of change that provide the fluctuating order upon which any creative system—such as the marketplace—depends. Institutions, being ends in themselves, have trained us to resist change and favor the status quo; to insist upon the certain and the concrete and to dismiss the uncertain and the fanciful; and to embrace security and fear risk. Life, on the other hand is change, is adaptation, creativity, and novelty. But creativity has always depended upon a fascination with the mysterious, and an appreciation for the kinds of questions that reveal more than answers can ever provide. When creative processes become subordinated to preserving established interests; when the glorification of systems takes priority over the sanctity of individual lives, societies begin to lose their life-sustaining vibrancy and may collapse.
”
”
Butler Shaffer (The Wizards of Ozymandias: Reflections on the Decline and Fall)
“
Nature’s ultimate goal is to foster the growth of the individual from absolute dependence to independence — or, more exactly, to the interdependence of mature adults living in community. Development is a process of moving from complete external regulation to self-regulation, as far as our genetic programming allows. Well-self-regulated people are the most capable of interacting fruitfully with others in a community and of nurturing children who will also grow into self-regulated adults. Anything that interferes with that natural agenda threatens the organism’s chances for long-term survival.
Almost from the beginning of life we see a tension between the complementary needs for security and for autonomy. Development requires a gradual and ageappropriate shift from security needs toward the drive for autonomy, from attachment to individuation. Neither is ever completely lost, and neither is meant to predominate at the expense of the other. With an increased capacity for self-regulation in adulthood comes also a heightened need for autonomy — for the freedom to make genuine choices. Whatever undermines autonomy will be experienced as a source of stress. Stress is magnified whenever the power to respond effectively to the social or physical environment is lacking or when the tested animal or human being feels helpless, without meaningful choices — in other words, when autonomy is undermined.
Autonomy, however, needs to be exercised in a way that does not disrupt the social relationships on which survival also depends, whether with emotional intimates or with important others—employers, fellow workers, social authority figures. The less the emotional capacity for self-regulation develops during infancy and childhood, the more the adult depends on relationships to maintain homeostasis. The greater the dependence, the greater the threat when those relationships are lost or become insecure. Thus, the vulnerability to subjective and physiological stress will be proportionate to the degree of emotional dependence. To minimize the stress from threatened relationships, a person may give up some part of his autonomy. However, this is not a formula for health, since the loss of autonomy is itself a cause of stress.
The surrender of autonomy raises the stress level, even if on the surface it appears to be necessary for the sake of “security” in a relationship, and even if we subjectively feel relief when we gain “security” in this manner. If I chronically repress my emotional needs in order to make myself “acceptable” to other people, I increase my risks of having to pay the price in the form of illness. The other way of protecting oneself from the stress of threatened relationships is emotional shutdown. To feel safe, the vulnerable person withdraws from others and closes against intimacy. This coping style
may avoid anxiety and block the subjective experience of stress but not the physiology of it. Emotional intimacy is a psychological and biological necessity. Those who build walls against intimacy are not self-regulated, just emotionally frozen. Their stress from having unmet needs will be high.
”
”
Gabor Maté (When the Body Says No: The Cost of Hidden Stress)
“
Myriad Genetics, which holds the patents on the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes responsible for most cases of hereditary breast and ovarian cancer, charges $3,000 to test for the genes. Myriad has been accused of creating a monopoly, since no one else can offer the test, and researchers can’t develop cheaper tests or new therapies without getting permission from Myriad and paying steep licensing fees. Scientists who’ve gone ahead with research involving the breast-cancer genes without Myriad’s permission have found themselves on the receiving end of cease-and-desist letters and threats of litigation. In May 2009 the American Civil Liberties Union, several breast-cancer survivors, and professional groups representing more than 150,000 scientists sued Myriad Genetics over its breast-cancer gene patents. Among other things, scientists involved in the case claim that the practice of gene patenting has inhibited their research, and they aim to stop it. The presence of so many scientists in the suit, many of them from top institutions, challenges the standard argument that ruling against biological patents would interfere with scientific progress
”
”
Rebecca Skloot (The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks)
“
It amused him sometimes to consider that his friends, because he had a face which did not express his feelings very vividly and a rather slow way of moving, looked upon him as strong-minded, deliberate and cool. They thought him reasonable and praised his common sense; but he knew that his placid expression was no more than a mask, assumed unconsciously, which acted like the protective colouring of butterflies; and himself was astonished at the weakness of his will. It seemed to him that he was swayed by every light emotion, as though he were a leaf in the wind, and when passion seized him he was powerless. He had no self-control. He merely seemed to possess it because he was indifferent to many of the things which moved other people.
He considered with some irony the philosophy which he had developed for himself, for it had not been of much use to him in the conjuncture he had passed through; and he wondered whether thought really helped a man in any of the critical affairs of life: it seemed to him rather that he was swayed by some power alien to and yet within himself, which urged him like that great wind of Hell which drove Paolo and Francesca ceaselessly on. He thought of what he was going to do and, when the time came to act, he was powerless in the grasp of instincts, emotions, he knew not what. He acted as though he were a machine driven by the two forces of his environment and personality; his reason was someone looking on, observing the facts but powerless to interfere: it was like those gods of Epicurus, who saw the doings of men from their empyrean heights and had no might to alter one smallest particle of what occurred.
”
”
W. Somerset Maugham (Of Human Bondage)
“
And all the while the four men lay beside me and watched and made no move. Nor did I move, and without shame I say it; though my reason was compelled to struggle hard against my natural impulse to rise up and interfere. I knew life. Of what use to the woman, or to me, would be my being beaten to death by five men there on the bank of the Susquehanna? I once saw a man hanged, and though my whole soul cried protest, my mouth cried not. Had it cried, I should most likely have had my skull crushed by the butt of a revolver, for it was the law that the man should hang. And here, in this gypsy group, it was the law that the woman should be whipped.
Even so, the reason in both cases that I did not interfere was not that it was the law, but that the law was stronger than I. Had it not been for those four men beside me in the grass, right gladly would I have waded into the man with the whip. And, barring the accident of the landing on me with a knife or a club in the hands of some of the various women of the camp, I am confident that I should have beaten him into a mess. But the four men were beside me in the grass. They made their law stronger than I.
”
”
Jack London (The Road)
“
(...) You Sophotechs are smarter than I am; why did you let me do such a foolish thing?”
“We answer every question our resources and instruction parameters allow; we are more than happy to advise you, when and if we are asked.”
“That’s not what I’m thinking of, and you know it.”
“You are thinking we should use force to defend you against yourself against your will? That is hardly a thought worth thinking, sir. Your life has exactly the value you yourself place on it. It is yours to damage or ruin as you wish.”
(...)
“Is that another hint? Are you saying I’m destroying my life? People at the party, twice now, have said or implied that I’m going to endanger the Oecumene itself. Who stopped me?”
“Not I. While life continues, it cannot be made to be without risk. The assessment of whether or not a certain risk is worth taking depends on subjective value-judgments. About such judgments even reasonable men can differ. We Sophotechs will not interfere with such decisions. (...) If we were to overrule your ownership of your own life, your life, would, in effect, become our property, and you, in effect, would become merely the custodian or trustee of that life. Do you think you would value it more in such a case, or less? And if you valued it less, would you not take greater risks and behave more self-destructively? If, on the other hand, each man’s life is his own, he may experiment freely, risking only what is his, till he find his best happiness.”
“I see the results of failed experiments all around us, in these cylinders. I see wasted lives, and people trapped in mind sets and life forms which lead nowhere.”
“While life continues, experimentation and evolution must also. The pain and risk of failure cannot be eliminated. The most we can do is maximize human freedom, so that no man is forced to pay for another man’s mistakes, so that the pain of failure falls only on he who risks it. And you do not know which ways of life lead nowhere. Even we Sophotechs do not know where all paths lead.”
“How benevolent of you! We will always be free to be stupid.”
“Cherish that freedom, young master; it is basic to all others.
”
”
John C. Wright (The Golden Age (Golden Age, #1))
“
Authority does not have to be a person or institution which says: you have to do this, or you are not allowed to do that. While this kind of authority may be called external authority, authority can appear as internal authority, under the name of duty, conscience, or super-ego. As a matter of fact, the development of modern thinking from Protestantism to Kant's philosophy, can be characterized as the substitution of internalized authority for an external one. With the political victories of the rising middle class, external authority lost prestige and man's own conscience assumed the place which external authority once had held. This change appeared to many as the victory of freedom. To submit to orders from the outside (at least in spiritual matters) appeared to be unworthy of a free man; but the conquest of his natural inclinations, and the establishment of the domination of one part of the individual, his nature, by another, his reason, will or conscience, seemed to be the very essence of freedom. Analysis shows that conscience rules with a harshness as great as external authorities, and furthermore that frequently the contents of the orders issued by man's conscience are ultimately not governed by demands of the individual self but by social demands which have assumed the dignity of ethical norms. The rulership of conscience can be even harsher than that of external authorities, since the individual feels its orders to be his own; how can he rebel against himself?
In recent decades "conscience" has lost much of its significance. It seems as though neither external nor internal authorities play any prominent role in the individual's life. Everybody is completely "free", if only he does not interfere with other people's legitimate claims. But what we find is rather that instead of disappearing, authority has made itself invisible. Instead of overt authority, "anonymous" authority reigns.It is disguised as common sense, science, psychic health, normality, public opinion. It does not demand anything except the self-evident. It seems to use no pressure but only mild persuasion. Whether a mother says to her daughter, "I know you will not like to go out with that boy", or an advertisement suggests, "Smoke
this brand of cigarettes--you will like their coolness", it is the same atmosphere of subtle suggestion which actually pervades our whole social life. Anonymous authority is more effective than overt authority, since one never suspects that there is any order which one is expected to follow. In external authority it is clear that there is an order and who gives it; one can fight against the authority, and in this fight personal independence and moral courage can develop.But whereas in internalized authority the command, though an internal one, remains visible, in anonymous authority both command and commander have become invisible.It is like being fired at by an invisible enemy. There is nobody and nothing to fight back against.
”
”
Erich Fromm (Escape from Freedom)