Praying Mantis Quotes

Think of me as the praying mantis of the supernatural world. Aren't those the bugs that bite the heads off the males? Link looked skeptical. Yes. Then they eat them

At the moment, he kinda knew how the male praying mantis felt when he was approaching Ms. Mantis, knowing the sex was going to be great but he was going to gethis head bitten off. Ah, well. Some things were worth losing your head.

Ava is like a praying mantis on crack. She will not only chew off his head after she has sex with him, she will have sex with his headless body afterwards and then light it on fire.

Don't you know about the praying mantis that waved its arms angrily in front of an approaching carriage, unaware that they were incapable of stopping it? Such was the high opinion it had of its talents.

Anything can be a weapon in imaginative hands.

I hadn’t gone to one dance in my entire high school career. I was six foot tall and a hundred and twenty pounds. When I danced, I looked like a praying mantis on fire.

I feel like saying something back to her. Something like, 'Eat hanger, bitch.' Except that Skeletor here doesn't look like she's eaten anything at all since last October. But I don't say anything, of course. Instead I stand there and take shit from someone who looks like a praying mantis in drag. - Cat

When all else fails, when you hit a brick wall, let the enemy reveal themselves by giving them what they're looking for.

He was as nervous as a praying mantis at an atheists' picnic...

A large praying mantis was performing ablutions on the springy stem of the kid's cowlick. The gunslinger snorted laughter-the first in gods knew how long-and set the fire and went after water.

Think about Praying Mantis. The deadliest ninja predator. Why isn't his animus a lion or a polar bear - two of the most successful killing machines in the animal kingdom? The answer is that these animals would not be right for him. Think how a praying mantis is invisible on a leaf, how they are carnivores who will devour their own species. The female will even eat her own partner once they've mated and, as hatchlings, their first meal is often one of their own siblings. These are the things that matter to Praying Mantis - and if you study his attributes, they are elements that will help you defeat him.

Nexus I wrote stubbornly into the evening. At the window, a giant praying mantis rubbed his monkey wrench head against the glass, begging vacantly with pale eyes; and the commas leapt at me like worms or miniature scythes blackened with age. the praying mantis screeched louder, his ragged jaws opening into formlessness. I walked outside; the grass hissed at my heels. Up ahead in the lapping darkness he wobbled, magnified and absurdly green, a brontosaurus, a poet.

Knowing when to leave requires training.

Even the mantis has stopped praying

He was as nervous as a praying mantis at an atheists' picnic, but he bore down gently, intensifying his concentration, letting go of his attachment to gravity.

In the morning sun with eyes closed a praying mantis

He suspected that her lovers had a life expectancy approximately that of the mate to a female praying mantis.

Readers of history may decide that joking while two guys are driving around through a town that has recently been slaughtered by six-foot-tall praying mantis beasts with shark-tooth-studded arms is in poor taste. It is. But that is exactly what real boys have always done when confronted with the brutal aftermath of warfare.

Mama used to tell us a story about a cicada sitting high in a tree. It chirps and drinks in dew, oblivious to the praying mantis behind it. The mantis arches up its front leg to stab the cicada, but it doesn't know an oriole perches behind it. The bird stretches out its neck to snap up the mantis for a midday meal, but its unaware of the boy who's come into the garden with a net. Three creatures—the cicada, the mantis and the oriole—all coveted gains without being aware of the greater and inescapable danger that was coming.

Being nearly four years old, she was certainly a child: and children are human (if one allows the term "human" a wide sense): but she had not altogether ceased to be a baby: and babies are of course not human--they are animals, and have a very ancient and ramified culture, as cats have, and fishes, and even snakes: the same in kind as these, but much more complicated and vivid, since babies are, after all, one of the most developed species of the lower vertebrates. In short, babies have minds which work in terms and categories of their own which cannot be translated into the terms and categories of the human mind. It is true that they look human--but not so human, to be quite fair, as many monkeys. Subconsciously, too, every one recognizes they are animals--why else do people always laugh when a baby does some action resembling the human, as they would at a praying mantis? If the baby was only a less-developed man, there would be nothing funny in it, surely.

Just as I was thinking I would never find my animus, I caught sight of my shadow and laughed out loud. I'd thrown myself onto the floor in frustration - my head resting on one arm and waving the other to cool myself down. There on the wall was the perfectly formed shadow of a cat, curled up - with a swishing tail! ...I even heard myself purr!

The tequila was light, like flower juice. I closed my eyes and saw a green train with an M in a circle; a faded green like the back of a praying mantis.

If you like pray like a praying mantis or fast like a faxing machine, if you have no faith, you are just wasting your time and energy.

It unsettles the women as they have dropped their disguise and are now giant praying mantis with blonde and auburn wigs, lipstick smeared on those deadly pincher-like insect jaws.

I first used LSD in my freshman year of high school at a homecoming football game. A friend had taken it too, knew more about it than me, and when asked, told me to just stare at certain things. The friend pointed at a rail that had some paint chipped off it and said "Just look at that... it's trippy." I looked at the rail with some paint chipped off. Nothing happened. I was in front of the school after the game was over and must have been high because two friends were in front of me crying. I asked them why they were crying and they said because I had taken acid. "Are you going to tell my parents?" I asked. "I don't know," they said. I was afraid. On the way home someone in the car started screaming. We found an albino praying mantis in the car, stopped and let it out. In a friend's room, later, I was lying on the bed and seeing in the corners nets of colors beating. A Nirvana poster was surrounded by color and moving slightly. After this incident there are no memories of taking LSD until senior year of high school. No one paid enough attention to notice I wasn't getting dressed in the morning, just taking acid and going to school in my pajamas. I would walk in the hallways staring forward with a neutral facial expression. I was terribly depressed. My mom eventually found out.

What’s an “Animus”?’ asked Mad Dog. Literally, it means “animating spirit” – that’s the essence of your core being, the spirit that defines you as a person,' answered Yazuki. 'But it can also mean “animosity” which is why the animal shadows only usually come out in confrontational situations. For centuries, Ninja have looked to the earth for inspiration in ways to live and fight. This is why you see us all giving off animal shadows. We each study the species that mean most to us. We each have an “Animus” that is unique...

Then set out after repeated warning the grizzly Afghan Duryodhan in blazing sun removed sandal-wood blooded stone-attired guards spearing gloom brought out a substitute of dawn crude hell’s profuse experience Huh a night-waken drug addict beside head of feeble earth from the cruciform The Clapper could not descend due to lockdown wet-eyed babies were smiling . in a bouquet of darkness in forced dreams The Clapper wept when learnt about red-linen boat’s drowned passengers in famished yellow winter white lilies bloomed in hot coal tar when in chiseled breeze nickel glazed seed-kernel moss layered skull which had moon on its shoulder scolded whole night non-weeping male praying mantis in grass bronze muscled he-men of Barbadoz pressed their fevered forehead on her furry navel . in comb-flowing rain floated on frowning waves diesel sheet shadow whipped oceans all wings had been removed from the sky funeral procession of newspaperman’s freshly printed dawn lifelong jailed convict’s eye in the keyhole outside in autumnal rice pounding pink ankle Lalung ladies

The term ‘female’ is derogatory not because it emphasises woman’s animality, but because it imprisons her in her sex; and if this sex seems to man to be contemptible and inimical even in harmless dumb animals, it is evidently because of the uneasy hostility stirred up in him by woman. Nevertheless he wishes to find in biology a justification for this sentiment. The word female brings up in his mind a saraband of imagery – a vast, round ovum engulfs and castrates the agile spermatozoan; the monstrous and swollen termite queen rules over the enslaved males; the female praying mantis and the spider, satiated with love, crush and devour their partners; the bitch in heat runs through the alleys, trailing behind her a wake of depraved odours; the she-monkey presents posterior immodestly and then steals away with hypocritical coquetry; and the most superb wild beasts – the tigress, the lioness, the panther – bed down slavishly under the imperial embrace of the male. Females sluggish, eager, artful, stupid, callous, lustful, ferocious, abased – man projects them all at once upon woman.

He felt her there, he saw her without opening his eyes, her hair burnt by chemicals to a brittle straw, her eyes with a kind of cataract unseen but suspect far behind the pupils, the reddened pouting lips, the body as thin as a praying mantis from dieting, and her flesh like white bacon.

an enormous round egg snatching and castrating the agile sperm; monstorous and stuffed, the queen termite reigning over the servile males; the praying mantis and the spider, gorged on love, crushing their partners and gobbling them up; the dog in heat running through back alleys, leaving perverse smells in her wake; the monkey showing herself off brazenly, sneaking away with flirtatious hypocrisy. And the most splendid wildcats, the tigress, lioness, and panther, lie down slavishly under the male’s imperial embrace, inert, impatient, shrewd, stupid, insensitive, lewd, fierce, and humiliated

I won’t even try to pretend to know what bugs think about during sex, but right about the time the male praying mantis is probably thinking that he’s quite the stud, the female does something pretty surprising. Yes, even for horny, bat-shit-crazy, homicidal copulating bugs. Once she has had enough of copulating, she moves on to the next phase, which is masticating. No, not masturbating... masticating. This is a fancy-schmancy word for chewing. She chews his head off. And no, I don’t mean like, “Why didn’t you bring me flowers and chocolate?” Oh, no. She literally bites his head off... and here’s where it gets really interesting: She eats it.

butterfly flyin’ after dark is an omen, means your death is maybe comin’ soon. Don’t look at me like that, smart ass. I never stepped on no eggshells.

But you didn’t need to have struck a deathblow against someone to be in part responsible for her

White cats are good luck, but I can’t tolerate them quick and restless. Lots of Benadryl keeps them content.

Denial endures because it soothes.

Just yesterday, I saw a butterfly flyin’ after dark.” “A butterfly . . . ?” “A butterfly flyin’ after dark is an omen, means your death is maybe comin’ soon.

In movies and real-world accounts, people stay in haunted houses until there is no escaping, which is stupid. Lucia is not stupid.

The trouble is that we are seldom aware of the protection afforded by natural enemies until it fails. Most of us walk unseeing through the world, unaware alike of its beauties, its wonders, and the strange and sometimes terrible intensity of the lives that are being lived about us. So it is that the activities of the insect predators and parasites are known to few. Perhaps we may have noticed an oddly shaped insect of ferocious mien on a bush in the garden and been dimly aware that the praying mantis lives at the expense of other insects. But we see with understanding eye only if we have walked in the garden at night and here and there with a flashlight have glimpsed the mantis stealthily creeping upon her prey. Then we sense something of the drama of the hunter and the hunted. Then we begin to feel something of the relentlessly pressing force by which nature controls her own.

The fat moon is past the apex of its arc, rolling westward like a coin following a groove toward a slot, and when it drops, perhaps the vending machine that is this mysterious world will dispense an item so rich in truth that humanity can begin to be cured by it.

meaning is everywhere contested. Each of their missions is instead meant to bring truth and its consequences into the life of someone who has woven a persona of lies, thereby putting an end to his or her crimes. There’s no doubt that Lucia deserves to be terrified

Not every case requires him to kill, but when he does, he kills known murderers whom the law will not touch or the courts acquit for one reason or another. Even though he is supported by a formidable organization with deep resources, which remains a mystery to him, his fingerprints have been removed to protect him. It’s better to leave no prints behind.

And under the cicadas, deeper down that the longest taproot, between and beneath the rounded black rocks and slanting slabs of sandstone in the earth, ground water is creeping. Ground water seeps and slides, across and down, across and down, leaking from here to there, minutely at a rate of a mile a year. What a tug of waters goes on! There are flings and pulls in every direction at every moment. The world is a wild wrestle under the grass; earth shall be moved. What else is going on right this minute while ground water creeps under my feet? The galaxy is careening in a slow, muffled widening. If a million solar systems are born every hour, then surely hundreds burst into being as I shift my weight to the other elbow. The sun’s surface is now exploding; other stars implode and vanish, heavy and black, out of sight. Meteorites are arcing to earth invisibly all day long. On the planet, the winds are blowing: the polar easterlies, the westerlies, the northeast and southeast trades. Somewhere, someone under full sail is becalmed, in the horse latitudes, in the doldrums; in the northland, a trapper is maddened, crazed, by the eerie scent of the chinook, the sweater, a wind that can melt two feet of snow in a day. The pampero blows, and the tramontane, and the Boro, sirocco, levanter, mistral. Lick a finger; feel the now. Spring is seeping north, towards me and away from me, at sixteen miles a day. Along estuary banks of tidal rivers all over the world, snails in black clusters like currants are gliding up and down the stems of reed and sedge, migrating every moment with the dip and swing of tides. Behind me, Tinker Mountain is eroding one thousandth of an inch a year. The sharks I saw are roving up and down the coast. If the sharks cease roving, if they still their twist and rest for a moment, they die. They need new water pushed into their gills; they need dance. Somewhere east of me, on another continent, it is sunset, and starlings in breathtaking bands are winding high in the sky to their evening roost. The mantis egg cases are tied to the mock-orange hedge; within each case, within each egg, cells elongate, narrow, and split; cells bubble and curve inward, align, harden or hollow or stretch. And where are you now?

Do you know, all this time you preached at me? You told me that even Grendel's mother was actuated by maternal love. You told me ghouls were male. Rodan is male—and asinine. King Kong is male. I could have been a witch, but the Devil is male. Faust is male. The man who dropped the bomb on Hiroshima was male. I was never on the moon. Then there are the birds, with (as Shaw so nobly puts it) the touching poetry of their loves and nestings in which the males sing so well and beautifully and the females sit on the nest, and the baboons who get torn in half (female) by the others (male), and the chimpanzees with their hierarchy (male) written about by professors (male) with their hierarchy, who accept (male) the (male) view of (female) (male). You can see what's happening. At heart I must be gentle, for I never even thought of the praying mantis or the female wasp; but I guess I am just loyal to my own phylum. One might as well dream of being an oak tree. Chestnut tree, great-rooted hermaphrodite.

The Praying Mantis Visits A Penthouse The praying Mantis with its length of straw Out of nowhere's forehead born full armed Engaged the century at my terrace door. Focused at inches the dinosaur insect sends Broadsides of epic stillness at my eye, Above the deafening projects of the age. My love, who fears the thunder of its poise, Has seen it and cries out. The clouds like curls Fall in my faith as I seize a stick to stop This Martian raid distilled to a straw with legs, To wisps of prowess. Bristling with motionlessness The Mantis prays to the Stick twice armed with Man. I strike, the stick whistles, shearing off two legs Which run off by themselves beneath some boards. The Mantis spreads out tints of batlike wing, The many colored pennants of its blood, And hugs my weapon; the frantic greens come out, the reds and yellows blurt out from the straw, All sinews doubtless screaming insect death. Against the railing's edge I knock the stick Sending that gay mad body into the gulf. Such noisy trappings in defeat wake doubts. I search my mind for possible wounds and feel The victim's body heavy on the victor's heart.

Christ, I’m tired. I need sleep. I need peace. I need for my balls to not be so blue they’re practically purple. As purple as Sarah Von Titebottum’s— My mind comes to a screeching halt with the unexpected thought. And the image that accompanies it—the odd, blushing lass with her glasses and her books and very tight bottom. Sarah’s not a contestant on the show, so I’m willing to bet both my indigo balls that there’s not a camera in her room. And, I can’t believe I’m fucking thinking this, but, even better—none of the other girls will know where to find me—including Elizabeth. I let the cameras noisily track me to the lavatory, but then, like an elite operative of the Secret Intelligence Service, I plaster myself to the wall beneath their range and slide my way out the door. Less than five minutes later, I’m in my sleeping pants and a white T-shirt, barefoot with my guitar in hand, knocking on Sarah’s bedroom door. I checked the map Vanessa gave me earlier. Her room is on the third floor, in the corner of the east wing, removed from the main part of the castle. The door opens just a crack and dark brown eyes peer out. “Sanctuary,” I plead. Her brow crinkles and the door opens just a bit wider. “I beg your pardon?” “I haven’t slept in almost forty-eight hours. My best friend’s girlfriend is trying to praying-mantis me and the sound of the cameras following me around my room is literally driving me mad. I’m asking you to take me in.” And she blushes. Great. “You want to sleep in here? With me?” I scoff. “No, not with you—just in your room, love.” I don’t think about how callous the words sound—insulting—until they’re out of my mouth. Could I be any more of a dick? Thankfully, Sarah doesn’t look offended. “Why here?” she asks. “Back in the day, the religious orders used to give sanctuary to anyone who asked. And since you dress like a nun, it seemed like the logical choice.” I don’t know why I said that. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Somebody just fucking shoot me and be done with it. Sarah’s lips tighten, her head tilts, and her eyes take on a dangerous glint. I think Scooby-Doo put it best when he said, Ruh-roh. “Let me make sure I’ve got this right—you need my help?” “Correct.” “You need shelter, protection, sanctuary that only I can give?” “Yes.” “And you think teasing me about my clothes is a wise strategy?” I hold up my palms. “I never said I was wise. Exhausted, defenseless, and desperate.” I pout . . . but in a manly kind of way. “Pity me.” A smile tugs at her lips. And that’s when I know she’s done for. With a sigh, she opens the door wide. “Well, it is your castle. Come in.” Huh. She’s right—it is my castle. I really need to start remembering that

Shadow is the blue patch where the light doesn’t hit. It is mystery itself, and mystery is the ancients’ ultima Thule, the modern explorer’s Point of Relative Inaccessibility, that boreal point most distant from all known lands. There the twin oceans of beauty and horror meet. The great glaciers are calving. Ice that sifted to earth as snow in the time of Christ shears from the pack with a roar and crumbles to water. It could be that our instruments have not looked deeply enough. The RNA deep in the mantis’s jaw is a beautiful ribbon. Did the crawling Polyphemus moth have in its watery heart one cell, and in that cell one special molecule, and that molecule one hydrogen atom, and round that atom’s nucleus one wild, distant electron that split showed a forest, swaying?

All at once, something wonderful happened, although at first, it seemed perfectly ordinary. A female goldfinch suddenly hove into view. She lighted weightlessly on the head of a bankside purple thistle and began emptying the seedcase, sowing the air with down. The lighted frame of my window filled. The down rose and spread in all directions, wafting over the dam’s waterfall and wavering between the tulip trunks and into the meadow. It vaulted towards the orchard in a puff; it hovered over the ripening pawpaw fruit and staggered up the steep faced terrace. It jerked, floated, rolled, veered, swayed. The thistle down faltered down toward the cottage and gusted clear to the woods; it rose and entered the shaggy arms of pecans. At last it strayed like snow, blind and sweet, into the pool of the creek upstream, and into the race of the creek over rocks down. It shuddered onto the tips of growing grasses, where it poised, light, still wracked by errant quivers. I was holding my breath. Is this where we live, I thought, in this place in this moment, with the air so light and wild? The same fixity that collapses stars and drives the mantis to devour her mate eased these creatures together before my eyes: the thick adept bill of the goldfinch, and the feathery coded down. How could anything be amiss? If I myself were lighter and frayed, I could ride these small winds, too, taking my chances, for the pleasure of being so purely played. The thistle is part of Adam’s curse. “Cursed is the ground for thy sake, in sorrow shalt thou eat of it; thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee.” A terrible curse: But does the goldfinch eat thorny sorrow with the thistle or do I? If this furling air is fallen, then the fall was happy indeed. If this creekside garden is sorrow, then I seek martyrdom. I was weightless; my bones were taut skins blown with buoyant gas; it seemed that if I inhaled too deeply, my shoulders and head would waft off. Alleluia.

How do you know there aren't such things as dragons?... What do you think you know about animals and things? I've lived with snakes and things since I was a child. Alone. Have you ever seen a praying mantis eat her husband after they've made love? Have you ever seen the mongoose dance? Or an octopus dance? How long is a hummingbird's tongue? Have you ever had a pet snake that wore a bell round its neck and rang it to wake you? Have you seen a scorpion get sunstroke and kill itself with its own sting Have you seen the carpet of flowers under the sea at night? Do you know that a John Crow can smell a dead lizard a mile away? Oh, you're just city folk like all the rest." -Honeychile Rider

Easy, son. You took quite a whack on the noggin," a voice said. At the foot of the bed was an insectile-looking doctor with a pervert's grin on his face and a stethoscope around his neck. The doctor was a praying mantis for a moment, until Daniel blinked himself back to reality.

Most things we learn are easier to apply in a material form, as when following a certain decision or task, when thinking rationally about ourselves and our life. Everything becomes messed up when are trying to understand what makes us who we are, and that's why love exists, to pushes us there. Emotions are very powerful, I believe up to five thousand times more than the mind - there are actual scientific studies on the topic. In other words, our brain is nothing compared to the heart. The heart has an intelligence of its own. But it is indeed connected to the rest of us, including our mind. So what this means is that our emotions are far more powerful than our reason. You know, like when a praying mantis gets his head chopped off by a female after sex - he knows he is going to die, but he sill can't help himself. A large majority of us is like that. We think we are superior to animals, but only in the amount of problems. Nonetheless, when you look at someone very smart doing something very stupid, you wonder what the hell is happening, and that's when we enter the fields of spirituality and psychology. Psychology can answer pretty much most of our behaviors - as we either move towards pleasure or pain, to avoid one and obtain more of the other. When both get mixed it all becomes complicated, but it does happen, in families, relationships, and so on. The extreme of this is altruism, when a person literally sacrifices his life to save another. You can start by Jesus, but you don't need to go so far. There are many examples everywhere, like the fireman that tries to save a guy that attempted to commit suicide by setting his house on fire. The fireman may know the other man did it on purpose, but he still risks his life to save him. The same with the exorcist, who faces the devil to save someone who actually accepted to be possessed or did some crazy ritual to get more knowledge, power, sex, and whatsoever; the exorcist knows he is risking his life and mental health to save an ignorant soul, and yet he still does it. The same with the father who runs after the son who is consuming drugs. He knows that his son or one of his companions may kill him out of anger but he still can't help himself. The same occurs with the police officer, when risking getting a bullet from the person to whom he is pointing a gun with no desire to shoot it. So what about love? It's a similar relation. Many times we are programmed to behave in a certain way and we can't help ourselves. Life, however, is more complex than that, which can be a good thing, like when we are cheated by someone who was already no good in our life. He or she did us a very good favor, even if we can't see it right then. The same when someone dies. Well, yeah, this one sounds bad, but people don't just die for no reason, even though it may seem so, not when they are texting while driving or drunk or high on weed. And what about when we lose our job and our partner starts fighting about money? That's also a blessing, as otherwise we would never know that that's all he or she cared about. There are countless ways to look at it. And yet, many times we have strong feelings for someone who is simply mentally sick. Is this love or insanity? I don't really know. I know as much as the praying mantis that gets his head chopped by a female for thousands of years and is not yet extinct by reason.

Weekend Wildlife by Stewart Stafford Praying mantis tapped out code, On waste ground down the road, Legs, wings and antennae spread, A walrus mugged a pensioner in bed. A chameleon joined in the mêlée, Effortlessly cool, a saurian Pelé, Mimicking every backdrop around, Eyeballs akimbo, tongue on ground. Then a herd of Ibex from Iberia, A yak stampede from frigid Siberia, Bomber squadrons of high Cockatoos, As the rest liberated the nearest zoos. © Stewart Stafford, 2023. All rights reserved.

I tried to imagine J.C. rolling up the sleeves of one of her expensive silk blouses to take up a paintbrush with the crew already at work in the ballroom, exposing her too-long, too-thin, insectile arms. A female praying mantis towering over the workers, biting the heads off of each one after—Oh, God, what was I thinking?

We could find as many other examples as we liked. Who has not heard of the “praying mantis”, the female of which eats the male alive, during sexual coupling? Where is “intelligent design” there? Where is the kind and loving Creator who can say of his creation that it is good?

praying mantis Extraterrestrials? Also you have said you went to other locations, did they

I am your praying mantis – you better start praying, darlin’…

I’m like a praying mantis, except not so devout. And I make love like a monk in meditation, which can often be confused with being asleep.

I feel like you’re trying to convince me that we don’t need condoms, but fuck that. If you impregnate me, I’m going to devour “ you like a praying mantis.” I pin Zeph against the wall and kiss her hard, because her threatening to kill or mutilate me is always so hot.

Press evenly,” the praying mantis said, chewing off the wings of a fly.

Claire’s mug shot was taken against a white background with a ruler that was clearly off by an inch. She wondered aloud why she wasn’t asked to hold a sign with her name and inmate number. “Photoshop template,” the praying mantis said in a bored tone that indicated the question was not a new one.

Remove all the books from your bookcases. You cannot judge whether or not a book really grabs you when it’s still on the shelf. Like clothes or any other belongings, books that have been left untouched on the shelf for a long time are dormant. Or perhaps I should say they’re “invisible.” Although in plain sight, they remain unseen, just like a praying mantis still in the grass, merging with its surroundings. (Have you ever experienced that jolt of surprise when you suddenly notice it there?) If you ask yourself, “Does this spark joy?” when you are just looking at the things on your shelves or in your drawers, the question won’t mean much to you. To truly decide whether you want to keep something or to dispose of it, you must take your things out of hibernation. Even the piles of books already on the floor will be easier to assess if you move them to a different part of the floor or restack them. Just like the gentle shake we use to wake someone up, we can stimulate our belongings by physically moving them, exposing them to fresh air and making them “conscious.” While helping my clients tidy their homes or offices, I stand in front of the mound of books they have piled on the floor and clap my hands, or I gently stroke the book covers. Although my clients look at me strangely at first, they are inevitably surprised at how quickly and precisely they are able to choose after this. They can see exactly what they need and don’t need. It is much harder to choose books when they are still on the shelf, which means you will have to repeat the process later. If there are too many books to arrange on the floor all at one time, I ask my clients to divide them into four broad categories: General (books you read for pleasure) Practical (references, cookbooks, etc.) Visual (photograph collections, etc.) Magazines Once you have piled your books, take

May the next girl you meet have the qualities of a praying mantis.

There is literally nothing that kills romance quicker than being told that a praying mantis is molting in your house. Enzo and I exchange looks.

Through the array of wireless cameras, they watch this widow-maker widow as she quickly changes from yoga pants into slacks and pulls on a sport coat over her T-shirt and carries clothes from the closet to the suitcase on the bed.

The black widow spider and the praying mantis have found a way to have their males and eat them, too.

Those of you helping us test the repulsion gel today, just follow the blue line on the floor. Those of you who volunteered to be injected with praying mantis DNA, I've got some good news and some bad news. Bad news is we're postponing those tests indefinitely. Good news is we've got a much better test for you: fighting an army of mantis men. Pick up a rifle and follow the yellow line. You'll know when the test starts.

How’s a woman to bear me children with hips like those? Was your father a stick insect? Was your mother a praying mantis?

Hey, Mal, why don’t you try sexually harassing men on your own time?” Ally piped up, leaning over her wall. “Some of us are trying to eat here, and your praying mantis routine is nauseating.

And then I just studied the praying mantis for a while. I watched her move her head around and rub her hands together like she was a villain with an evil plan to take over the universe. I decided to name her Melissa.

Sometimes I thought she genuinely was part praying mantis. “Well, thank you for this little talk. I hope you consider yourself to be emotionally supported.” In a funny way, I did. Yes, I was pretty sure that Dr. Fairclough believed that human feelings were an evolutionary dead end caused by a misguided lack of exoskeleton, but she was trying, and I could give her points for that.

Praying mantis cuts off the male's head. Guillotine: the erection of crowds. (Mante religieuse coupe la tête du mâle. Guillotine: l'érection des foules)

ON HIS KNEES, and with his chin level with the top of the table, Stephen watched the male mantis step cautiously towards the female mantis. She was a fine strapping green specimen, and she stood upright on her four back legs, her front pair dangling devoutly; from time to time a tremor caused her heavy body to oscillate over the thin suspending limbs, and each time the brown male shot back. He advanced lengthways, with his body parallel to the table-top, his long, toothed, predatory front legs stretching out tentatively and his antennae trained forwards: even in this strong light Stephen could see the curious inner glow of his big oval eyes. The female deliberately turned her head through forty-five degrees, as though looking at him. ‘Is this recognition?’ asked Stephen, raising his magnifying glass to detect some possible movement in her feelers. ‘Consent?’ The brown male certainly thought it was, and in three strides he was upon her; his legs gripped her wing-covers; his antennae found hers and began to stroke them. Apart from a vibratory, well-sprung quiver at the additional weight, she made no apparent response, no resistance; and in a little while the strong orthopterous copulation began. Stephen set his watch and noted down the time in a book, open upon the floor. Minutes passed. The male shifted his hold a little. The female moved her triangular head, pivoting it slightly from left to right. Through his glass Stephen could see her sideways jaws open and close; then there was a blur of movements so rapid that for all his care and extreme attention he could not follow them, and the male’s head was off, clamped there, a detached lemon, under the crook of her green praying arms. She bit into it, and the eye’s glow went out; on her back the headless male continued to copulate rather more strongly than before, all his inhibitions having been removed. ‘Ah,’ said Stephen with intense satisfaction, and noted down the time again. Ten minutes later the female took off three pieces of her mate’s long thorax, above the upper coxal joint, and ate them with every appearance of appetite, dropping crumbs of chitinous shell in front of her. The male copulated on, still firmly anchored by his back legs.

Here lies Jesse Rigsby of Middlefield, Ohio. He was tragically taken from us by a giant praying mantis while trying to save a video game world from fake aliens. He bravely led the resistance, which lasted for all of 10 seconds.

Emotions are very powerful, and our brain is nothing when compared to the heart. The heart has an intelligence of its own. But it is indeed connected to the rest of us, including our mind. So what this means is that our emotions are far more powerful than our reasoning. You know, like when a praying mantis gets his head chopped off by a female after sex; he knows he is going to die, but he still can't help himself and stop it. A large majority of us are like that. We think we are superior to animals, but that only applies to the amount of complexity of our problems. For a large portion of society, self-destruction is inevitable in the process of spiritual self-discovery guided by emotional impulses.

the ability of, say, a male praying mantis to continue coitus even as his mate chews off his head makes the point.

When Yan He was appointed tutor to the crown prince of Wei, son of Duke Ling, he went to consult with Qu Boyu. “Here is a man who is just naturally no good. If I find no way to contain him, he will endanger my state, but if I do try to contain him, he will endanger my life. His cleverness allows him to understand the crimes people commit, but not why they were driven to commit these crimes.10 What should I do?” Peng Boyu said, “Good question! Be careful and cautious and rectify yourself! Be compromising in appearance and harmonious in mind. But even these measures can present problems. Don’t let the external compromise get inside you, and don’t let your inner harmony show itself externally. If you let the external compromise get inside you, it will topple you, destroy you, collapse you, cripple you. If the harmony in your heart shows itself externally, it will lead to reputation and renown, until you are haunted and plagued by them. If he’s playing the baby, play baby with him. If he’s being lawless and unrestrained, be lawless and unrestrained with him. If his behavior is unbounded and shapeless, be unbounded and shapeless with him. You must master this skill to the point of flawlessness. Don’t you know the story of the praying mantis? It flailed its pincers around to stop an oncoming chariot wheel, not realizing the task was beyond its powers. This is how it is for those with ‘great talents.’ Be careful, be cautious! If you irritate him by flaunting your talents, you will be in more or less the same position. Don’t you know how the tiger trainer handles it? He doesn’t feed the beast live animals for fear of arousing its lust for killing. He doesn’t feed it uncut sides of meat for fear of arousing its lust for dismemberment. He carefully times out the feedings and comprehends the creature’s propensity for rage. The tiger is a different species from man but can be tamed through affection for its feeder. The ones it kills are the ones who cross it. However, a man who loves horses even to the point of gathering their shit and piss in jeweled boxes may still get his skull or chest kicked in if he smacks away a mosquito on the unbridled animal at the wrong time. Despite the best intentions, (4:17) his solicitousness backfires on him. Can you afford to be careless?