Morning Without Alarm Quotes

This morning I woke up before the alarm clock went off and the sky outside was a big red ocean. You're beautiful when you're sleeping so I spent an hour observing the way you breathe. Inhale, exhale, without a thought of tomorrow. The window was open and the air was so crisp and I couldn't imagine how to ever ask for more than this.

It is five in the morning. I have woken up without any alarm. I have woken up because the thoughts are so loud, and none of them mean me well.

I am alarmed when it happens that I have walked a mile into the woods bodily, without getting there in spirit. In my afternoon walk I would fain forget all my morning occupations and my obligations to Society. But it sometimes happens that I cannot easily shake off the village. The thought of some work will run in my head and I am not where my body is — I am out of my senses. In my walks I would fain return to my senses. What business have I in the woods, if I am thinking of something out of the woods?

I never thought people actually woke up the way I did that morning. I always figured it was hyperbole and massive overcompensation to say that you woke up grinning, woke up in a state of contentment and excitement for the smallest things. Even while I was in love formerly, it seemed more like a comfortable thing rather than a giddy, overwhelming happiness. Realize, then, that I had never been joined in a mutual state of infatuation with someone else. My infatuations tended to be unrequited, accompanied by a sense of muted sadness. I sat up at 7:00a.m. without even waiting for the alarm, and kept still there, smiling, looking at nothing and going over yesterday’s conversations, the fevered symphony of emotion ringing forever in my ears. I fell back and actually laughed to myself, reaching for my glasses to slide them on as I stretched out my back comfortably in a lazy, half-waking state. You are in love.

Dear New Orleans, What a big, beautiful mess you are. A giant flashing yellow light—proceed with caution, but proceed. Not overly ambitious, you have a strong identity, and don’t look outside yourself for intrigue, evolution, or monikers of progress. Proud of who you are, you know your flavor, it’s your very own, and if people want to come taste it, you welcome them without solicitation. Your hours trickle by, Tuesdays and Saturdays more similar than anywhere else. Your seasons slide into one another. You’re the Big Easy…home of the shortest hangover on the planet, where a libation greets you on a Monday morning with the same smile as it did on Saturday night. Home of the front porch, not the back. This engineering feat provides so much of your sense of community and fellowship as you relax facing the street and your neighbors across it. Rather than retreating into the seclusion of the backyard, you engage with the goings-on of the world around you, on your front porch. Private properties hospitably trespass on each other and lend across borders where a 9:00 A.M. alarm clock is church bells, sirens, and a slow-moving eight-buck-an-hour carpenter nailing a windowpane two doors down. You don’t sweat details or misdemeanors, and since everybody’s getting away with something anyway, the rest just wanna be on the winning side. And if you can swing the swindle, good for you, because you love to gamble and rules are made to be broken, so don’t preach about them, abide. Peddlin worship and litigation, where else do the dead rest eye to eye with the livin? You’re a right-brain city. Don’t show up wearing your morals on your sleeve ’less you wanna get your arm burned. The humidity suppresses most reason so if you’re crossing a one-way street, it’s best to look both ways. Mother Nature rules, the natural law capital “Q” Queen reigns supreme, a science to the animals, an overbearing and inconsiderate bitch to us bipeds. But you forgive her, and quickly, cus you know any disdain with her wrath will reap more: bad luck, voodoo, karma. So you roll with it, meander rather, slowly forward, takin it all in stride, never sweating the details. Your art is in your overgrowth. Mother Nature wears the crown around here, her royalty rules, and unlike in England, she has both influence and power. You don’t use vacuum cleaners, no, you use brooms and rakes to manicure. Where it falls is where it lays, the swerve around the pothole, the duck beneath the branch, the poverty and the murder rate, all of it, just how it is and how it turned out. Like a gumbo, your medley’s in the mix. —June 7, 2013, New Orleans, La.

Anything Bunny wrote was bound to be alarmingly original, since he began with such odd working materials and managed to alter them further by his befuddled scrutiny, but the John Donne paper must have been the worst of all the bad papers he ever wrote (ironic, given that it was the only thing he ever wrote that saw print. After he disappeared, a journalist asked for an excerpt from the missing young scholar's work and Marion gave him a copy of it, a laboriously edited paragraph of which eventually found its way into People magazine). Somewhere, Bunny had heard that John Donne had been acquainted with Izaak Walton, and in some dim corridor of his mind this friendship grew larger and larger, until in his mind the two men were practically interchangeable. We never understood how this fatal connection had established itself: Henry blamed it on Men of Thought and Deed, but no one knew for sure. A week or two before the paper was due, he had started showing up in my room about two or three in the morning, looking as if he had just narrowly escaped some natural disaster, his tie askew and his eyes wild and rolling. 'Hello, hello,' he would say, stepping in, running both hands through his disordered hair. 'Hope I didn't wake you, don't mind if I cut on the lights, do you, ah, here we go, yes, yes…' He would turn on the lights and then pace back and forth for a while without taking off his coat, hands clasped behind his back, shaking his head. Finally he would stop dead in his tracks and say, with a desperate look in his eye: 'Metahemeralism. Tell me about it. Everything you know. I gotta know something about metahemeralism.' 'I'm sorry. I don't know what that is.' 'I don't either,' Bunny would say brokenly. 'Got to do with art or pastoralism or something. That's how I gotta tie together John Donne and Izaak Walton, see.' He would resume pacing. 'Donne. Walton. Metahemeralism. That's the problem as I see it.' 'Bunny, I don't think "metahemeralism" is even a word.' 'Sure it is. Comes from the Latin. Has to do with irony and the pastoral. Yeah. That's it. Painting or sculpture or something, maybe.' 'Is it in the dictionary?' 'Dunno. Don't know how to spell it. I mean' – he made a picture frame with his hands – 'the poet and the fisherman. Parfait. Boon companions. Out in the open spaces. Living the good life. Metahemeralism's gotta be the glue here, see?' And so it would go, for sometimes half an hour or more, with Bunny raving about fishing, and sonnets, and heaven knew what, until in the middle of his monologue he would be struck by a brilliant thought and bluster off as suddenly as he had descended. He finished the paper four days before the deadline and ran around showing it to everyone before he turned it in. 'This is a nice paper, Bun -,' Charles said cautiously. 'Thanks, thanks.' 'But don't you think you ought to mention John Donne more often? Wasn't that your assignment?' 'Oh, Donne,' Bunny had said scoffingly. 'I don't want to drag him into this.' Henry refused to read it. 'I'm sure it's over my head, Bunny, really,' he said, glancing over the first page. 'Say, what's wrong with this type?' 'Triple-spaced it,' said Bunny proudly. 'These lines are about an inch apart.' 'Looks kind of like free verse, doesn't it?' Henry made a funny little snorting noise through his nose. 'Looks kind of like a menu,' he said. All I remember about the paper was that it ended with the sentence 'And as we leave Donne and Walton on the shores of Metahemeralism, we wave a fond farewell to those famous chums of yore.' We wondered if he would fail.

A Day Away We often think that our affairs, great or small, must be tended continuously and in detail, or our world will disintegrate, and we will lose our places in the universe. That is not true, or if it is true, then our situations were so temporary that they would have collapsed anyway. Once a year or so I give myself a day away. On the eve of my day of absence, I begin to unwrap the bonds which hold me in harness. I inform housemates, my family and close friends that I will not be reachable for twenty-four hours; then I disengage the telephone. I turn the radio dial to an all-music station, preferably one which plays the soothing golden oldies. I sit for at least an hour in a very hot tub; then I lay out my clothes in preparation for my morning escape, and knowing that nothing will disturb me, I sleep the sleep of the just. On the morning I wake naturally, for I will have set no clock, nor informed my body timepiece when it should alarm. I dress in comfortable shoes and casual clothes and leave my house going no place. If I am living in a city, I wander streets, window-shop, or gaze at buildings. I enter and leave public parks, libraries, the lobbies of skyscrapers, and movie houses. I stay in no place for very long. On the getaway day I try for amnesia. I do not want to know my name, where I live, or how many dire responsibilities rest on my shoulders. I detest encountering even the closest friend, for then I am reminded of who I am, and the circumstances of my life, which I want to forget for a while. Every person needs to take one day away. A day in which one consciously separates the past from the future. Jobs, lovers, family, employers, and friends can exist one day without any one of us, and if our egos permit us to confess, they could exist eternally in our absence. Each person deserves a day away in which no problems are confronted, no solutions searched for. Each of us needs to withdraw from the cares which will not withdraw from us. We need hours of aimless wandering or spates of time sitting on park benches, observing the mysterious world of ants and the canopy of treetops. If we step away for a time, we are not, as many may think and some will accuse, being irresponsible, but rather we are preparing ourselves to more ably perform our duties and discharge our obligations. When I return home, I am always surprised to find some questions I sought to evade had been answered and some entanglements I had hoped to flee had become unraveled in my absence. A day away acts as a spring tonic. It can dispel rancor, transform indecision, and renew the spirit.

There was never a revival of religion without a revival of his opposition. As soon as Ezra and Nehemiah begin to labor, Sanballat and Tobiah are stirred up to hinder them. What then? We are not alarmed because Satan hindereth us, for it is a proof that we are on the Lord's side, and are doing the Lord's work, and in his strength we shall win the victory, and triumph over our adversary.

He woke each dawn at 5:30, without need for an alarm, though he set one anyway just to be sure. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, he lifted. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, he jogged. Down along the Charles. Beneath the sagging boughs of honey locusts fat with fruit. Following his workout, he prepared a shake. After, he showered beneath the rainwater showerhead in the third-story bath-room, water beating down his back, the radio blaring classical music from its place on the marble vanity. Classical, not rock or country or top forty, because he'd been raised on Handel and Tchaikovsky and because sometimes, when he was very tightly wound, the instrumentals were the only things that eased the tension in his chest. When that was done, he dressed, made his bed--tucking his corners in with the militaristic precision his nanny had demanded of him when he was still small and belligerent and went downstairs to make eggs. Over easy, paired with whole-grain toast and a glass of orange juice. He had his routine down to a science, and he did the same thing every morning.

Solitary Swedish Houses" A mix-max of black spruce and smoking moonbeams. Here’s the croft lying low and not a sign of life. Till the morning dew murmurs and an old man opens – with a shaky hand – his window and lets out an owl. Further off, the new building stands steaming with the laundry butterfly fluttering at the corner in the middle of a dying wood where the mouldering reads through spectacles of sap the proceedings of the bark-drillers. Summer with flaxen-haired rain or one solitary thunder-cloud above a barking dog. The seed is kicking inside the earth. Agitated voices, faces fly in the telephone wires on stunted rapid wings across the moorland miles. The house on an island in the river brooding on its stony foundations. Perpetual smoke – they’re burning the forest’s secret papers. The rain wheels in the sky. The light coils in the river. Houses on the slope supervise the waterfall’s white oxen. Autumn with a gang of starlings holding dawn in check. The people move stiffly in the lamplight’s theatre. Let them feel without alarm the camouflaged wings and God’s energy coiled up in the dark.

Mental toughness is the ability to focus on and execute solutions, especially in the face of adversity. Greatness rarely happens on accident. If you want to achieve excellence, you will have to act like you really want it. How? Quite simply: by dedicating time and energy into consistently doing what needs to be done. Excuses are the antithesis of accountability. Important decisions aren’t supposed to be easy, but don’t let that stop you from making them. When it comes to decisions, decide to always decide. The second we stop growing, we start dying. Stagnation easily morphs into laziness, and once a person stops trying to grow and improve, he or she is nothing more than mediocre. Develop the no-excuse mentality. Do not let anything interrupt those tasks that are most critical for growth in the important areas of your life. Find a way, no matter what, to prioritize your daily process goals, even when you have a viable excuse to justify not doing it. “If you don’t evaluate yourself, how in the heck are you ever going to know what you are doing well and what you need to improve? Those who are most successful evaluate themselves daily. Daily evaluation is the key to daily success, and daily success is the key to success in life. If you want to achieve greatness, push yourself to the limits of your potential by continuously looking for improvements. Within 60 seconds, replace all problem-focused thought with solution-focused thinking. When people focus on problems, their problems actually grow and reproduce. When you train your mind to focus on solutions, guess what expands? Talking about your problems will lead to more problems, not to solutions. If you want solutions, start thinking and talking about your solutions. Believe that every problem, no matter how large, has at the very least a +1 solution, you will find it easier to stay on the solution side of the chalkboard. When you set your mind to do something, find a way to get it done…no matter what! If you come up short on your discipline, keep fighting, kicking, and scratching to improve. Find the nearest mirror and look yourself in the eye while you tell yourself, “There is no excuse, and this will not happen again.” Get outside help if needed, but never, ever give up on being disciplined. Greatness will not magically appear in your life without significant accountability, focus, and optimism on your part. Are you ready to commit fully to turning your potential into a leadership performance that will propel you to greatness. Mental toughness is understanding that the only true obstacles in life are self-imposed. You always have the choice to stay down or rise above. In truth, the only real obstacles to your ultimate success will come from within yourself and fall into one of the following three categories: apathy, laziness and fear. Laziness breeds more laziness. When you start the day by sleeping past the alarm or cutting corners in the morning, you’re more likely to continue that slothful attitude later in the day.

Cash was running low, so I'd applied for a job as an administrative assistant for a nonprofit arts group. Without question, my organizational skills were as sharp as my vision, and I had no office experience to speak of. Luckily for me, none of this surfaced during the interview. 'Ryan, pretend it's a rough morning for a sec. Handle this situation for me. When you arrive at work to open the arts resource centre, several people are already at the door. Two clients want immediate help with grant applications - you know those artists, they just can't wait! - and a third wants to use our library, which isn't open till noon. Entering the office, you hear the phone is ringing and see the message light is blinking. The fax machine looks jammed again, and we're expecting an important document. Among the people waiting is a courier with a package you need to sign for. Think about it, though. The lights haven't been turned on yet, and the sign put out front. The alarm needs the code within a minute, too. So, wow, rough morning. I'd like to know what you'd do first.' 'First I'd tell everybody how weird this is. I'm in the same test situation from my job interview. What are the chances?' I started the next day.

Now that I know how birth works-now that I've been talked through labor by that quiet-voiced woman-I feel I've finally been told what my task is. It's simple-so simple I'm amazed I didn't know it before. One morning I am going to wake up, and before I sleep again, I will have to tick off a long list of contractions, one by one. And when I get to the last one, I will have my girl. Each one of these will be a job in itself-a minute-long experience that would alarm anyone suddenly struck by it, without warning-but I know the one fact that makes it easy: there is nothing awry. Everything is as it should be. Unlike some pains, these don't signal something going wrong but something going right. This is what I did not realize the first time, when I prayed wildly for these pains to stop. I didn't know then that these pains were actually the answer, and that their every alternative was much, much worse. Now I know what they are, and what they're for, I greet each one with calm cheer: 60 seconds to breathe through, as limp as a sleeping child, so that there is nowhere for this wash of sensation to snag-no tensed muscle it can get caught on. I am a clear glass of water, leaf-smoke blown sideways in the wind; empty space, for a moon to sail through.

Foolproof Get Outta Bed Plan First, figure out the thing you would love to do first each morning. Is it pet your dog, eat a piece of dark chocolate, have your neck massaged, have your back scratched? Whatever will keep those eyes popped open is what you are going to do for yourself the instant you wake up. Next, you are going to keep a journal and pen beside your bed. Write down your intention and reward for the instant your eyes open. “I am going to wake up at [6:00 am]. As soon as I wake up, I am going to [drink an ice-cold glass of water] and then get in my shower.” Modify the parts in brackets with your time and your eye-opener. Finally, this third part only applies if you are a “tough case.” If you know yourself to be truly resistant to waking up, then you need a specialty app. Download an app like Alarmy. It is going to force you to wake up and take a picture of something specific (like your shower) before the alarm will shut off. I know, extreme alarms for extreme snoozers. This three-part process—note something to look forward to, set intention in writing, and use an app/alarm if needed—will work if you have identified a truly rewarding experience for yourself. This is all about your knowledge of yourself and your ability to design a three-part process that will feel like a luxurious reward to you. Maybe I should change mine to fresh-squeezed orange juice. That sounds amazing!

gee i like to think of dead" gee i like to think of dead it means nearer because deeper firmer since darker than little round water at one end of the well       it's too cool to be crooked and it's too firm to be hard but it's sharp and it's thick and it loves,      every old thing falls in rosebugs and jackknives and kittens and pennies they all sit there looking at each other having the fastest time because they've never met before dead's more even than how many ways of sitting on your head your unnatural hair has in the morning dead's clever too like POF goes the alarm off and the little striker having the best time tickling away every- body's brain so everybody just puts out their finger and they stuff the poor thing all full of fingers dead has a smile like the nicest man you've never met who maybe winks at you in a streetcar and you pretend you don't but really you do see and you are My how glad he winked and hope he'll do it again or if it talks about you somewhere behind your back it makes your neck feel all pleasant and stoopid      and if dead says may i have this one and was never intro- duced you say Yes because you know you want it to dance with you and it wants to and it can dance and Whocares dead's fine like hands do you see that water flowerpots in windows but they live higher in their house than you so that's all you see but you don't want to dead's happy like the way underclothes All so differ- ently solemn and inti and sitting on one string dead never says my dear,Time for your musiclesson and you like music and to have somebody play who can but you know you never can and why have to? dead's nice like a dance where you danced simple hours and you take all your prickley-clothes off and squeeze- into-largeness without one word      and you lie still as anything      in largeness and this largeness begins to give you,the dance all over again and you,feel all again all over the way men you liked made you feel when they touched you(but that's not all)because largeness tells you so you can feel what you made,men feel when,you touched,them dead's sorry like a thistlefluff-thing which goes land- ing away all by himself on somebody's roof or some- thing where who-ever-heard-of-growing and nobody expects you to anyway dead says come with me he says(and why ever not)into the round well and see the kitten and the penny and the jackknife and the rosebug                                 and you say Sure you say  (like that)  sure i'll come with you you say for i like kittens i do and jackknives i do and pennies i do and rosebugs i do E.E. Cummings, 100 Selected Poems. (Grove Press, January 10, 1994) Originally published 1954.

The temple was in a field of graves suddenly a pitiful-looking skeleton appeared and said: A melancholy autumn wind Blows through the world; the pampas grass waves As we drift to the moor, Drift to the sea. What can be done With the mind of a man That should be clear But though he is dressed up in a monk's robe, Just lets life pass him by? Such deep musings Made me uneasy, I could not sleep. Towards dawn I dozed off... I found myself surrounded by a group of skeletons, acting as they had when they were still alive. One skeleton came over to me and said: Memories Flee and Are no more. All are empty dreams Devoid of meaning. Violate the reality of things And babble about 'God' and 'the Buddha' And you will never find the true Way. Still breathing, You feel animated, So a corpse in a field Seems to be something Apart from you. If chunks of rock Can serve as a memento To the dead A better headstone Would be a simple tea-mortar. Humans are indeed frightful things. A single moon Bright and clear In an unclouded sky; Yet we still stumble In the world's darkness. This world Is but A fleeting dream So why be alarmed At its evanescence? The vagaries of life, Though painful, Teach us Not to cling To this floating world. Why do people Lavish decoration On this set of bones, Destined to disappear Without a trace? The original body Must return to Its original place. Do not search For what cannot be found. No one really knows The nature of birth Nor the true dwelling place. We return to the source And turn to dust. Many paths lead from The foot of the mountain, But at the peak We all gaze at the Single bright moon. If at the end of our journey There is no final Resting place, Then we need not fear Losing our Way. No beginning. No end. Our mind Is born and dies; The emptiness of emptiness! Relax, And the mind Runs wild; Control the world And you can cast it aside. Rain, hail, snow, and ice: All are different But when they fall They become to same water As the valley stream. The ways of proclaiming The Mind all vary, But the same heavenly truth Can be seen In each and every one. Cover your path With fallen pine needles So no one will be able To locate your True dwelling place. How vain, The endless funderals at the Cremation grounds of Mount Toribe! Don't the mourner realize That they will be next? 'Life is fleeeting!' We think at the sight Of smoke drifting from Mount Toribe, But when will we realize That we are in the same boat? All is in vain! This morning, A healthy friend; This evening, A wisp of cremation smoke. What a pity! Evening smoke from Mount Toribe Blown violently To and fro By the wind. When burned We become ashes, and earth when buried. Is it only our sins That remain behind? All the sins Committed In the Three Worlds Will fade away Together with me.

The P.I. states that if something x has happened in certain particular circumstances n times in the past, we are justified in believing that the same circumstances will produce x on the (n + 1)th occasion. The P.I. is wholly respectable and authoritative, and it seems like a well-lit exit out of the whole problem. Until, that is, it happens to strike you (as can occur only in very abstract moods or when there’s an unusual amount of time before the alarm goes off) that the P.I. is itself merely an abstraction from experience … and so now what exactly is it that justifies our confidence in the P.I.? This latest thought may or may not be accompanied by a concrete memory of several weeks spent on a relative’s farm in childhood (long story). There were four chickens in a wire coop off the garage, the brightest of whom was called Mr. Chicken. Every morning, the farm’s hired man’s appearance in the coop area with a certain burlap sack caused Mr. Chicken to get excited and start doing warmup-pecks at the ground, because he knew it was feeding time. It was always around the same time t every morning, and Mr. Chicken had figured out that t(man + sack) = food, and thus was confidently doing his warmup-pecks on that last Sunday morning when the hired man suddenly reached out and grabbed Mr. Chicken and in one smooth motion wrung his neck and put him in the burlap sack and bore him off to the kitchen. Memories like this tend to remain quite vivid, if you have any. But with the thrust, lying here, being that Mr. Chicken appears now actually to have been correct—according to the Principle of Induction—in expecting nothing but breakfast from that (n + 1)th appearance of man + sack at t. Something about the fact that Mr. Chicken not only didn’t suspect a thing but appears to have been wholly justified in not suspecting a thing—this seems concretely creepy and upsetting. Finding some higher-level justification for your confidence in the P.I. seems much more urgent when you realize that, without this justification, our own situation is basically indistinguishable from that of Mr. Chicken. But the conclusion, abstract as it is, seems inescapable: what justifies our confidence in the Principle of Induction is that it has always worked so well in the past, at least up to now. Meaning that our only real justification for the Principle of Induction is the Principle of Induction, which seems shaky and question-begging in the extreme. The only way out of the potentially bedridden-for-life paralysis of this last conclusion is to pursue further abstract side-inquiries into what exactly ‘justification’ means and whether it’s true that the only valid justifications for certain beliefs and principles are rational and noncircular. For instance, we know that in a certain number of cases every year cars suddenly veer across the centerline into oncoming traffic and crash head-on into people who were driving along not expecting to get killed; and thus we also know, on some level, that whatever confidence lets us drive on two-way roads is not 100% rationally justified by the laws of statistical probability. And yet ‘rational justification’ might not apply here. It might be more the fact that, if you cannot believe your car won’t suddenly get crashed into out of nowhere, you just can’t drive, and thus that your need/desire to be able to drive functions as a kind of ‘justification’ of your confidence.* It would be better not to then start analyzing the various putative ‘justifications’ for your need/desire to be able to drive a car—at some point you realize that the process of abstract justification can, at least in principle, go on forever. The ability to halt a line of abstract thinking once you see it has no end is part of what usually distinguishes sane, functional people—people who when the alarm finally goes off can hit the floor without trepidation and plunge into the concrete business of the real workaday world—from the unhinged.

After I hear my alarm in the morning, I will get up without hitting snooze. After I put on my shoes in the morning, I will go outside to soak in the natural light. After I finish eating lunch, I will get outside into the natural light of the sun. After I decide to take a nap, I will set an alarm so I don’t sleep for more than thirty minutes. After I see it’s past three p.m., I will drink water instead of coffee. After I arrive home from work, I will charge my phone in the kitchen, not in the bedroom. After I put dinner in the oven, I will take a magnesium supplement. After I turn on the dishwasher in the evening, I will dim the lights around the house. After I turn on the first light in the evening, I will put on glasses that block blue light. After I turn on the TV at night, I will take a melatonin supplement. After I finish watching Jeopardy! on TV, I will start my bedtime ritual. After I see it’s past eight p.m., I will stop using electronics and staring at screens. After I lock the doors at night, I will turn down the thermostat to seventy degrees. After I floss my teeth at night, I will turn on my white-noise machine. After I turn on my white-noise machine, I will close my curtains so the room is entirely dark. After I close the curtains, I will spray a little lavender scent in my bedroom. After I get into bed and I’m not sleepy, I will open a relaxing book to read in a dimly lit room. After I want to get up in the middle of the night, I will lie back down for about fifteen seconds. After I keep looking at my clock at night, I will turn the clock around so I can’t see it. After I start to worry about a problem at night, I will say, “That can wait until tomorrow.

She is going to be the death of me. “Lucien! You’re not even listening to me, are you? I’m in desperate need of a new valet and you’ve been woolgathering rather than offering suggestions. I daresay you have enough for a decent coat and a pair of mittens by now.” Lucien Russell, the Marquess of Rochester, looked to his friend Charles. They were walking down Bond Street, Lucien keeping careful watch over one particular lady without her knowledge and Charles simply enjoying the chance for an outing. The street was surprisingly crowded for so early in the day and during such foul wintry weather. “Admit it,” Charles prodded. Lucien fought to focus on his friend. “Sorry?” The Earl of Lonsdale fixed him with a stern glare which, given that his usual manner tended towards jovial, was a little alarming. “Where is your head? You’ve been out of sorts all morning.” Lucien grunted. He had no intention of explaining himself. His thoughts were sinful ones, ones that would lead him straight to a fiery spot in Hell, assuming one wasn’t already reserved for him. All because of one woman: Horatia Sheridan. -Charles & Lucien

BUILDING RENEWAL INTO YOUR WORKDAY – Tony Schwartz Zeke is a creative director at a large agency. The workday he described when we first met was typical of the managers and leaders I meet in my travels. After six or six and a half hours of sleep—which never felt like enough—Zeke’s alarm went off at 5:30 a.m. each morning. His first move was to take his iPhone off the night table and check his e-mail. He told himself he did this in case something urgent had come in overnight, but the truth was he just couldn’t resist. Zeke tried to get to the gym at least two times a week, but he traveled frequently, and at home he was often just too tired to work out. Once he got to work—around 7:30 a.m. most days—Zeke grabbed a cup of coffee, sat down at his desk, and checked his e-mail again. By then, twenty-five or more new messages were typically waiting in his in-box. If he didn’t have an early meeting, he might be online for an hour or more without once looking up. Zeke’s days were mostly about meetings. They were usually scheduled one after the other with no time in between. As a result, he would race off to the next meeting without digesting what he’d just taken in at the last one. Lunch was something Zeke squeezed in. He usually brought food back to his desk from the cafeteria and worked while he ate. Around two or three in the afternoon, depending on how much sleep he’d gotten the previous night, Zeke began to feel himself fading. Given his company’s culture, taking even a short nap wasn’t an option. Instead, for a quick hit of energy, he found himself succumbing to a piece of someone’s leftover birthday cake, or running to the vending machine for a Snickers bar. With so many urgent demands, Zeke tended to put off any intensive, challenging work for later. By the end of the day, however, he rarely had the energy to get to it. Even so, he found it difficult to leave work with so much unfinished business. By the time he finally did, usually around 7:30 or 8 p.m., he was pretty much running on empty. After dinner, Zeke tried to get to some of the work he had put off earlier in the day. Much of the time, he simply ended up returning to e-mail or playing games online. Either way, he typically stayed up later than he knew he should. How closely does this match your experience? To the extent that it does resonate, how did this happen? Most important, can you imagine working the way you do now for the next ten or twenty years? YOUR CAPACITY IS LIMITED The challenge is that the demand in our lives increasingly exceeds our capacity.

Do you also follow this routine on weekends? I don’t want a routine on the weekend. That’s my relaxing time. I let my body conquer me; I sleep when I am tired and wake up without an alarm.

We don't usually notice how little control we have over the mind, because habits channel psychic energy so well that thoughts seem to follow each other by themselves without a hitch. After sleeping we regain consciousness in the morning when the alarm rings, and then walk to the bathroom and brush our teeth. The social roles culture prescribes then take care of shaping our minds for us, and we generally place ourselves on automatic pilot till the end of the day, when it is time again to lose consciousness in sleep. But when we are left alone, with no demands on attention, the basic disorder of the mind reveals itself. With nothing to do, it begins to follow random patterns, usually stopping to consider something painful or disturbing. Unless a person knows how to give order to his or her thoughts, attention will be attracted to whatever is most problematic at the moment: it will focus on some real or imaginary pain, on recent grudges or long-term frustrations. Entropy is the normal state of consciousness-a condition that is neither useful nor enjoyable.

Do you know these days? These days when the alarm rings, and there's no energy left to get up because you think that today nothing will change and nothing good will happen anyway? I had that feeling when I woke up this morning. The dream I had dreamt passed into the next day without any transition, and I cried myself awake. The alarm rang. I felt horrible, and I didn't know where I was. My dreams have always been very vivid, very real – it can be a blessing and a curse. Today it had been a curse. Usually, you cry yourself to sleep – but on particular days, you cry yourself awake. Years ago, which I can count on the fingers of both of my hands, I would have felt very much at home in this feeling. I would have wallowed in it. Melancholy had been my very best friend for oh so many years. But it's not like that anymore. Life is radiant and colourful. Even though there are days that seem dull and grey. But even those days will pass. Joy is an active choice. Sometimes you have to even fight for it. But one day, you will be richly gifted. Then you will gain something that weighs more than all the loneliness, the guilt, the sadness: pure life. Some time ago, I consciously decided against surrendering to the grey within me. And I promised myself to leave my bed every day, even on the days that seemed dull and grey, and to throw myself into the day the same way I wanted to throw myself into life. Life is the only thing we can call our very own. And if the grey appears to be too grey, one has to show one's true colours. Inside and out. And that's why I wear red because a pop of colour can frighten away the grey.

Anna returned to supper preparations, wondering what on earth she had managed to fill her time with before having children. ‘BC’, they jokingly described it. She loved all of them to bits. But there were times when she longed to escape from the bedlam of family life. Lately she felt constantly tired. Some mornings she forced herself to put one foot in front of the other to confront the day. And she was putting on weight despite being careful with her diet. She worried there might be something seriously wrong, but it was easier to push nagging thoughts to the back of her mind. She craved one week on her own: one week of blissful quiet without the confusion and togetherness Italians craved. To go to bed late if she wanted without a 6 a.m. alarm call. Time to read a whole book in one sitting or drink wine in the middle of the day, without the responsibility of being the afternoon chauffeur to one of her children: for swimming lessons, music clubs, gymnastics and now regional tennis coaching, for which Davide had been selected. And a week of sleeping in a bed on her own might be good, she thought – without having to get up to soothe a child’s nightmares or being kept awake by Francesco’s snores or his hand stroking her thigh, when sex was the very last thing on her mind… ‘Penny for them?’ Francesco had crept up behind her, folding her in a hug, nuzzling the back of her neck as she tried to concentrate on chopping parsley and celery for a meat sauce. ‘You wouldn’t want to know,’ she said, thinking that he really wouldn’t and that she was an ungrateful cow to fantasise about a life without them. ‘Mamma, Babbo, stop it!’ Rosanna and Emilia were trying to insinuate themselves between their parents to break up their embrace. ‘Is supper nearly ready?’ Emilia, always hungry, asked.

As he had indicated, Hunter left early the next day. He came to Lara's room just as she began to awaken, the morning sun slipping through a space between the closed drapes and stealing across her pillow. She started as she realized that she wasn't alone in the room, and jerked the covers high under her chin. "Hunter," she said, her voice raspy from sleep. She shrank deep into her pillow as he sat on the edge of the bed. A smile touched his dark face. "I couldn't leave without seeing you one last time." "How long will you be gone?" She blinked uneasily, not daring to move as Hunter reached for the sable length of her braid. "No more than a week, I expect." He pulled the braid across his palm as if enjoying the texture against his skin, and laid it back on the pillow with care. "You look so snug and warm," he murmured. "I wish I could join you." The thought of him climbing under the covers with her made her heart contract in alarm. "I wish you a safe trip," she said breathlessly. "Good-bye." Hunter grinned at her eagerness for him to leave. "Aren't you going to give me a farewell kiss?" He leaned over her, smiling into her startled face, and waited for a reply. When she remained silent, he laughed softly, his coffee-scented breath fanning over her chin. "All right. We'll put it on account. Goodbye, sweet.

The Morning Ritual: Planning for It PLAN AHEAD The first thing you can do is plan your morning the night before. This means making sure you have lemons for your hot lemon water, getting the coffee ready to brew, and setting your alarm to allow ten to fifteen minutes to center yourself. You can go a step further by making any decisions you might need to make the next morning, like choosing an outfit, looking at your calendar to mentally construct what lies ahead so you can adjust for it, or picking which guided meditation you are going to use. COMMIT TO YOUR ROUTINE Stick with the plan. Make a commitment for the next thirty to forty days that no matter how shitty you feel, you’ll carry out your morning routine. When I set out to train myself to brush my teeth every night, it took some brain power. I had to make the decision to do it and debate myself almost every single time. But without fail, I made myself brush my teeth until it became automatic, something I did without much fuss. You don’t have to keep up this practice forever, and chances are it will fall off at some point, but right now you’re in training to not drink. DESIGNATE A PLACE TO MEDITATE This might sound frivolous but it is terribly important: create a place where you will meditate every morning. You don’t have to build an altar or buy a meditation cushion, although you can. It might even just be your bed (I meditate mostly in my bed, though I have a space set up in my basement). Remember you are investing in your healing, and understand that the more intention you put into something or the more special you make it, the more likely you are to do it. You can, if you want, go

file to my right is Brian Gant’s. I open the package, remove the thick sheaf of papers, and begin to read them carefully. Gaines was born in 1966. He was first convicted of aggravated rape at the age of nineteen. He served ten years and was paroled in February of 1995, just two months before Brian Gant’s mother-in-law was murdered. I find the section that contains Gaines’s parole records. They show that in February of 1995, he moved in with a woman named Clara Stoots. As I look at Clara Stoots’s address, an alarm bell goes off inside my head. I grab Brian Gant’s file and quickly locate a copy of the original police report of the murder. I’m looking for the mother-in-law’s address. When I find it, I begin to slowly shake my head. “No,” I say out loud. “No.” Clara Stoots’s address in April of 1995 was 136 Old Oak Road, Jonesborough, Tennessee. Shirley LaGuardia, Brian Gant’s mother-in-law, lived at 134 Old Oak Road, Jonesborough, Tennessee. At the time of her murder, Earl Gaines was living right next door. I dig back through Gaines’s file, curious about one thing. At the bottom of the stack are several booking photos of Gaines. I fold my arms on the desk in front of me, drop my head onto them, and start slamming my fist onto the desk in anger and frustration. As little Natalie first told the police—Gaines looked very much like Uncle Brian. Chapter Fifty-Nine Anita White walks unannounced into my office an hour and a half later wearing a smart, navy blue pant suit but looking a bit frazzled. She sits down across the desk from me without saying a word. I’ve called her a couple times since our conversation at the restaurant the morning they arrested Tommy Miller, but she hasn’t answered and hasn’t returned the calls. I wonder whether she’s looking for another apology from me. “I’ve been trying to get a hold of you,” I say. “I’ve been out of the country.” “Vacation?” “I took a few personal days, but I worked the entire time I was gone.” “Really? On what?” “It started with the forensic analysis of Judge Green’s computer. Our analyst found out that someone had hacked into the judge’s computer not long before he was killed. He investigated, like all good TBI agents do, and found that the computer the hacker used was located in another country.” “And what country was that?” “Canada.” The look on her face is almost, but not quite, smug. There’s a gleam in her eye that tells me she knows something that I don’t. I can tell she’s dying to spit it out, but first she wants to enjoy her little game. “Canada’s a big country,” I say. “Yes, and Vancouver’s a big city.” The thought germinates in my mind and begins to grow quickly. Vancouver. Canada. Judge Green. Computer hacker. What do they have in common? It dawns on me suddenly, but I’m afraid to be too optimistic. What has she learned? How far has she taken it? “Talk to me,” I say. “When I saw the Vancouver address, I remembered the case against the pedophile that Judge Green threw out on a technicality. So I got online and looked it up. David Dillinger was the witness that the judge held in contempt that day. So I started doing my job. I checked with airlines at the Tri-Cities airport and found out that David Dillinger flew back here three days before Judge Green was murdered.

As an architect, every design I create is a mark of trust, trust in materials, trust in my team, and trust in the earth beneath our feet. But nothing could have readied me for the collapse I experienced when that trust was broken from within. I had laboriously built up a $400,000 Bitcoin hoard over several years, a monetary safety net for my business to weather financial tempests and fund future projects. I entrusted its defense to a long-time business partner, a man who I once considered my right arm. That trust fell apart when he betrayed me. It started subtly. I noticed minor discrepancies, delayed logins, emails not returned. Then one morning, I was locked out altogether. He was gone. The phones weren't answered, his office cleared overnight, and my heart pounded in alarm. The electronic safe haven of our hard-won savings was now a fortress without a key, hostage to a ghost. Rage and panic warred within me. I envisioned telling my employees that our future was doubtful because I had trusted the wrong person. Sleepless nights were spent searching the web for miracles. That was when, at an architectural design expo in Milan, I overheard two colleagues discussing FUNDS RECLIAMER COMPANY. Their stories of miraculous crypto recoveries caught my attention like a ray of light piercing a room darkened by shadows. With nothing to lose, I reached out to FUNDS RECLIAMER COMPANY. Their staff handled my case from the very first consultation with the same discretion and precision that I bring to my own cases. They did not handle my case like a transaction but like a delicate form that had to be painstakingly restored. Their cybersecurity experts meticulously tracked my partner's digital footprints, unraveling his complex attempt to hide his trail. Through cutting-edge blockchain tracing and legal action, they slowly dismantled his blockade. I was updated daily, step by step, like progress reports on a skyscraper rising from the earth. Fifteen tense days later, the call came. They had succeeded. The money was back in our firm's possession, intact and secure. Relief washed over me like the unveiling of a completed work of art. FUNDS RECLIAMER COMPANY not only got back money; they got back my hope. They made me realize that even when trust is lost, there are still able hands ready to rebuild. For that, I will forever be grateful. WhatsApp:+13612504110 Email: fundsreclaimercompany@zohomail.com

As an architect, every design I create is a mark of trust, trust in materials, trust in my team, and trust in the earth beneath our feet. But nothing could have readied me for the collapse I experienced when that trust was broken from within. I had laboriously built up a $400,000 Bitcoin hoard over several years, a monetary safety net for my business to weather financial tempests and fund future projects. I entrusted its defense to a long-time business partner, a man who I once considered my right arm. That trust fell apart when he betrayed me. It started subtly. I noticed minor discrepancies, delayed logins, emails not returned. Then one morning, I was locked out altogether. He was gone. The phones weren't answered, his office cleared overnight, and my heart pounded in alarm. The electronic safe haven of our hard-won savings was now a fortress without a key, hostage to a ghost. Rage and panic warred within me. I envisioned telling my employees that our future was doubtful because I had trusted the wrong person. Sleepless nights were spent searching the web for miracles. That was when, at an architectural design expo in Milan, I overheard two colleagues discussing FUNDS RECLIAMER COMPANY. Their stories of miraculous crypto recoveries caught my attention like a ray of light piercing a room darkened by shadows. With nothing to lose, I reached out to FUNDS RECLIAMER COMPANY. Their staff handled my case from the very first consultation with the same discretion and precision that I bring to my own cases. They did not handle my case like a transaction but like a delicate form that had to be painstakingly restored. Their cybersecurity experts meticulously tracked my partner's digital footprints, unraveling his complex attempt to hide his trail. Through cutting-edge blockchain tracing and legal action, they slowly dismantled his blockade. I was updated daily, step by step, like progress reports on a skyscraper rising from the earth. Fifteen tense days later, the call came. They had succeeded. The money was back in our firm's possession, intact and secure. Relief washed over me like the unveiling of a completed work of art. FUNDS RECLIAMER COMPANY not only got back money; they got back my hope. They made me realize that even when trust is lost, there are still able hands ready to rebuild. For that, I will forever be grateful. WhatsApp:+13612504110 Email: fundsreclaimercompany@zohomail.com