Presence Doesn't Matter Quotes

I-I've never seen anyone savor anything the way you do everything. You make me feel alive. Just being in your presence - it's addictive. You're addictive. It doesn't matter you're a witch. The way you see the world . . . I want to see it that way too. I want to be with you always, Lou. I never want to be parted from you again.

If your absence doesn't bother them then your presence never mattered to them in the first place

I love you, Lou.” His eyes welled with fresh tears. “I—I’ve never seen anyone savor anything the way you do everything. You make me feel alive. Just being in your presence—it’s addictive. You’re addictive. It doesn’t matter you’re a witch. The way you see the world . . . I want to see it that way too. I want to be with you always, Lou. I never want to be parted from you again.

A giant octopus living way down deep at the bottom of the ocean. It has this tremendously powerful life force, a bunch of long, undulating legs, and it's heading somewhere, moving through the darkness of the ocean… It takes on all kinds of different shapes—sometimes it's 'the nation,' and sometimes it's 'the law,' and sometimes it takes on shapes that are more difficult and dangerous than that. You can try cutting off its legs, but they just keep growing back. Nobody can kill it. It's too strong, and it lives too far down in the ocean. Nobody knows where its heart is. What I felt then was a deep terror. And a kind of hopelessness, a feeling that I could never run away from this thing, no matter how far I went. And this creature, this thing doesn't give a damn that I'm me or you're you. In its presence, all human beings lose their names and their faces. We all turn into signs, into numbers.

The best part about best friends is that you can maintain a relationship at any distance. In this day and age, we have Skype, FaceTime, text messages, audio messages, photo messages, and every social media site you can think of. With my friends, I send little photo updates almost daily and do a video call every week. It’s really not that difficult. We talk about anything and everything. I can confide my deepest, darkest secrets with my best friends and fear no judgment. It’s actually the best. And when we have the luxury of being in the same location, we pick things up like we were never separated. It really doesn’t matter where we go or what we do; it’s honestly just so nice to be in each other’s presence that the rest doesn’t matter.

Our lives become beautiful not because we are perfect. Our lives become beautiful because we put our heart into what we are doing. It doesn't matter what we are doing. Whether we are sweeping the floor, or managing the country, or whatever we are doing. If we are putting our heart into what we are doing, it is beautiful to be doing that activity. Living in an atmosphere where people are passionate about what they are doing itself is highly enriching.

Members of the Coyote Clan are not easily identified, but there are clues. You can see it in their eyes. They are joyful and they are fierce. They can cry louder and laugh harder than anyone on the planet. And they have an enormous range. The Coyote Clan is a raucous bunch: they have drunk from desert potholes and belched forth toads. They tell stories with such virtuosity that you'll swear you've been in the presence of preachers. The Coyote Clan is also serene. They can float on their backs down the length of any river or lose entire afternoons to the contemplation of stone. Members of the Clan court risk and will dance on slickrock as flash floods erode the ground beneath their feet. It doesn't matter. They understand the earth re-creates itself day after day.

If God allows you to wrestle with him, it is not so there will be a winner and a loser. He doesn’t need to prove he is stronger and you are weaker. No. The point of wrestling with God is to give you an opportunity to cling to him. God wants you to hang on to him no matter what — and the result will be blessing. You are blessed when you bring your hurts and questions to God and struggle with them in his presence. In that divine wrestling match, you may feel wounded, but you will also receive a blessing you couldn’t have received any other way.

just because society dictates certain norms and delivers them on a packhorse of guilt, it doesn’t mean we have to climb on. You deserve to be treated with respect by everyone you choose to have in your life. You deserve to be accepted for who you are. You have the right to be yourself because there is only one you. I think Dr. Seuss said it, didn’t he? Something about there is no one you-er than you?” She smiles. “My young friend, if someone does not grant you the respect you are due as a human being, no matter what their relationship to you, friend or blood, you have no obligation to suffer their presence in your life.

What I felt then was a deep terror. And a kind of hopelessness, a feeling that I could never run away from this thing, no matter how far I went. And this creature, this thing doesn't give a damn that I'm me or you're you. In its presence, all human beings lose their names and their faces. We all turn into signs, into numbers.

After several days, I had a pivotal interview with my teacher. When I described how I’d become so overwhelmed, she calmly asked, “How are you relating to the presence of desire?” I was startled into understanding. Her question pointed me back to the essence of mindfulness practice: It doesn’t matter what is happening. What matters is how we are relating to our experience. For me, desire had become the enemy, and I was losing the battle. She advised me to stop fighting my experience and instead investigate the nature of my wanting mind. Desire was just another passing phenomenon, she reminded me. It was attachment or aversion to it that was the problem.

Here we come to the central question of this book: What, precisely, does it mean to say that our sense of morality and justice is reduced to the language of a business deal? What does it mean when we reduce moral obligations to debts? What changes when the one turns into the other? And how do we speak about them when our language has been so shaped by the market? On one level the difference between an obligation and a debt is simple and obvious. A debt is the obligation to pay a certain sum of money. As a result, a debt, unlike any other form of obligation, can be precisely quantified. This allows debts to become simple, cold, and impersonal-which, in turn, allows them to be transferable. If one owes a favor, or one’s life, to another human being-it is owed to that person specifically. But if one owes forty thousand dollars at 12-percent interest, it doesn’t really matter who the creditor is; neither does either of the two parties have to think much about what the other party needs, wants, is capable of doing-as they certainly would if what was owed was a favor, or respect, or gratitude. One does not need to calculate the human effects; one need only calculate principal, balances, penalties, and rates of interest. If you end up having to abandon your home and wander in other provinces, if your daughter ends up in a mining camp working as a prostitute, well, that’s unfortunate, but incidental to the creditor. Money is money, and a deal’s a deal. From this perspective, the crucial factor, and a topic that will be explored at length in these pages, is money’s capacity to turn morality into a matter of impersonal arithmetic-and by doing so, to justify things that would otherwise seem outrageous or obscene. The factor of violence, which I have been emphasizing up until now, may appear secondary. The difference between a “debt” and a mere moral obligation is not the presence or absence of men with weapons who can enforce that obligation by seizing the debtor’s possessions or threatening to break his legs. It is simply that a creditor has the means to specify, numerically, exactly how much the debtor owes.

One day, you're in a physical landscape you share with this bizarre and fundamentally alien creature, not alien because she's female but alien because you're a fool in love and there's nothing not alien about that. And then when she's gone, you're alone and all the strangeness and wonder have gone out of the landscape and you're still a fool but now nobody notices how many days in a row you wear the same socks and cleaning the shower doesn't make the girl smile anymore so everything smells a little worse and doesn't get fixed when it breaks. I missed the feminine touch—not just hers, but mine. I missed being half-boy, half-girl, part of a whole. Now that I was male in a male environment, it was harder to manifest her physical chick presence, no matter how many of her MAC lipsticks I set out on the coffee table in a basket like so many M&Ms.

While learning others, respect demands that one never takes issue with another's freedom to choose their 'get down' - their way of living... and don't be mad. But carefully listen, observe, and compare mental notes before you open your heart's desire -- to make a clear determination what's in your best interest. If you already know how the story ends, and it doesn't fit you, keep [the] proper distance in perspective, in any form(s) of relationship, for the love of self. It may be disappointing, but you'll eventually discover the right one deserving of your full attention. Or, you may be surprised by their sudden awakening to your worthiness. Walk slowly, especially, when it comes to matters of the heart.

Because here’s another sneaky little truth about life. You can’t be an important and life-changing presence for some people without also being a joke and an embarrassment to others. You just can’t. Because there’s no such thing as a lack of adversity. It doesn’t exist. The old saying goes that no matter where you go, there you are. Well, the same is true for adversity and failure. No matter where you go, there’s a five-hundred-pound load of shit waiting for you. And that’s perfectly fine. The point isn’t to get away from the shit. The point is to find the shit you enjoy dealing with.

I plod sadly through the hours, preparing meals I don’t want, rinsing the dishes and putting them in the dishwasher, collecting the mail and paying the bills. Bao’s psychic presence still remains strong, as does my certainty that he is coming back to me. But as strange as it may sound, it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters. I am surrounded by pain, suffocated by pain, breathless with pain. I can’t imagine how it once felt, not to be in this constant, unrelenting pain.

People ought to be told of such things. Ought to be taught that immortality is mortal, that it can die, it's happened before and it happens still. It doesn't ever announce itself as such-it's duplicity itself. It doesn't exist in detail, only in principle. Certain people may harbor it, on condition they don't know that's what they're doing. Just as certain other people may detect its presence in them, on the same condition, that they don't know they can. It's while it's being lived that life is immortal, while it's still alive. Immortality is not a matter of more or less time, it's not really a question of immortality but of something else that remains unknown.

You can't be an important and life changing presence for some people without also being a joke an an embarrassment to others. You just can't. Because there's no such thing as lack of adversity. It doesn't exist. The old saying goes that no matter where you go, there you are. Well, the same is true for adversity and failure. No matter where you go, there's a five-hundred-pound load of shit waiting for you. And that's perfectly fine. The point isn't to get away from the shit. The point is to find the shit you enjoy dealing with.

When God looks at us, He doesn’t see lost opportunity. He doesn’t see failure. God looks at us through eyes of love. When someone loves you and you yield to that love, you feel comfortable in their presence. Your confidence mounts. You know you’re accepted.

What I felt then was a deep terror. And a kind of hopelessness, a feeling that I could never run away from this thing, no matter how far I went. And this creature, this thing doesn't give a damn that I'm me or you're you. In its presence, all human beings lose their names and their faces.

As for those who choose to remain outside the presence, it really doesn't matter whether you warn them or not. They are determined to stay apart (2:6). They are behind a curtain by our command and their choosing. The wall in front of them is made of their bodies. You cannot know who is behind the curtain. You can only stand out of sight and call to your friends. Those who respond do so according to eternal findings. But it is good for you to call and continue calling. You are like a diver who goes to the bottom and brings up sometimes a pure gem, sometimes an ordinary stone. Your diving does not change one into the other.

At the end of the day or week or month what really matters is that you & your loved ones are safe & well, you have done your best & are grateful for being who you are & touching the world with your presence. I wish to repeat that your ability to think & behave in a normal manner, your sound health, your safety, your feeling great, your family & the ability to start anew matters most in life. Darling listen – at the end, also remind yourself that it doesn’t matter what you’ve done so far, what you choose to do from here will matter most to you & your world in times to come. Keep Smiling, Keep Doing Something Meaningful & Stay Blessed!

This powerful presence of diversity, however, sometimes overwhelms people, and they begin thinking that diversity really doesn't matter or, worse, they overreact and become entrenched, angrily guarding what they perceive as their piece of the social turf. Why is it, after all, that in spite of the growing diversity in our culture, we see a rise in hate crimes, a rise in militia movements, a rise in heated, if not hateful, diatribes over the airwaves? Why the backlash of resentment? You would think that white supremacy groups would be a thing of the past. But, tragically, they continue to exist. Why has the world become more dangerous and not less?

You seem disappointed that I am not more responsive to your interest in "spiritual direction". Actually, I am more than a little ambivalent about the term, particularly in the ways it is being used so loosely without any sense of knowledge of the church's traditions in these matters. If by spiritual direction you mean entering into a friendship with another person in which an awareness and responsiveness to God's Spirit in the everydayness of your life is cultivated, fine. Then why call in an awkward term like "spiritual direction"? Why not just "friend"? Spiritual direction strikes me as pretentious in these circumstances, as if there were some expertise that can be acquired more or less on its own and then dispensed on demand. The other reason for my lack of enthusiasm is my well-founded fear of professionalism in any and all matters of the Christian life. Or maybe the right label for my fear is "functionalism". The moment an aspect of Christian living (human life, for that matter) is defined as a role, it is distorted, debased - and eventually destroyed. We are brothers and sisters with one another, friends and lovers, saints and sinners. The irony here is that the rise of interest in spiritual direction almost certainly comes from the proliferation of role-defined activism in our culture. We are sick and tired of being slotted into a function and then manipulated with Scripture and prayer to do what someone has decided (often with the help of some psychological testing) that we should be doing to bring glory to some religious enterprise or other. And so when people begin to show up who are interested in us just as we are - our souls - we are ready to be paid attention to in this prayerful, listening, non-manipulative, nonfunctional way. Spiritual direction. But then it begins to develop a culture and language and hierarchy all its own. It becomes first a special interest, and then a specialization. That is what seems to be happening in the circles you are frequenting. I seriously doubt that it is a healthy (holy) line to be pursuing. Instead, why don't you look over the congregation on Sundays and pick someone who appears to be mature and congenial. Ask her or him if you can meet together every month or so - you feel the need to talk about your life in the company of someone who believes that Jesus is present and active in everything you are doing. Reassure the person that he or she doesn't have to say anything "wise". You only want them to be there for you to listen and be prayerful in the listening. After three or four such meetings, write to me what has transpired, and we'll discuss it further. I've had a number of men and women who have served me in this way over the years - none carried the title "spiritual director", although that is what they have been. Some had never heard of such a term. When I moved to Canada a few years ago and had to leave a long-term relationship of this sort, I looked around for someone whom I could be with in this way. I picked a man whom I knew to be a person of integrity and prayer, with seasoned Christian wisdom in his bones. I anticipated that he would disqualify himself. So I pre-composed my rebuttal: "All I want you to do is two things: show up and shut up. Can you do that? Meet with me every six weeks or so, and just be there - an honest, prayerful presence with no responsibility to be anything other than what you have become in your obedient lifetime." And it worked. If that is what you mean by "spiritual director," okay. But I still prefer "friend". You can see now from my comments that my gut feeling is that the most mature and reliable Christian guidance and understanding comes out of the most immediate and local of settings. The ordinary way. We have to break this cultural habit of sending out for an expert every time we feel we need some assistance. Wisdom is not a matter of expertise. The peace of the Lord, Eugene

Arin glanced up as she approached. One tree shadowed the knoll, a laran tree, leaves broad and glossy. Their shadows dappled Arin’s face, made it a patchwork of sun and dark. It was hard to read his expression. She noticed for the first time the way he kept the scarred side of his face out of her line of sight. Or rather, what she noticed for the first time was how common this habit was for him in her presence--and what that meant. She stepped deliberately around him and sat so that he had to face her fully or shift into an awkward, neck-craned position. He faced her. His brow lifted, not so much in amusement as in his awareness of being studied and translated. “Just a habit,” he said, knowing what she’d seen. “You have that habit only with me.” He didn’t deny it. “Your scar doesn’t matter to me, Arin.” His expression turned sardonic and interior, as if he were listening to an unheard voice. She groped for the right words, worried that she’d get this wrong. She remembered mocking him in the music room of the imperial palace (I wonder what you believe could compel me to go to such epic lengths for your sake. Is it your charm? Your breeding? Not your looks, surely.). “It matters because it hurts you,” she said. “It doesn’t change how I see you. You’re beautiful. You always have been to me.” Even when she hadn’t realized it, even in the market nearly a year ago. Then later, when she understood his beauty. Again, when she saw his face torn, stitched, fevered. On the tundra, when his beauty terrified her. Now. Now, too. Her throat closed. The line of his jaw hardened. He didn’t believe her. “Arin--” “I’m sorry for what happened in the village.” She dropped her hand to her lap. She hadn’t been conscious of lifting it.

[Lena Lees describes from trance her experience of Kuan Yin]: “I see Kuan Yin. She is like Venus, statuesque and standing in front of a beautiful pink half-shell. Quickly, she walks in front of me, pointing the way. We are entering the mouth of a cave. It’s so interesting. I see stairs carved out of rock in the cave. We walk up the stairs to a door. I know somehow this is just another entrance, a doorway to another time, place. Perhaps at another historical time monks lived there. Now, I’m seeing a huge image, a beautiful statue of Kuan Yin right at the top of the mountain. There are stairs leading up to her and it is as if I’m right on location, standing alongside a group of worshipers. I feel the potency of her energy. In these places, perhaps China or Vietnam, there is a palpable sense of being immersed in and supported by her presence. There is a need by the people to know more, to pick up and accumulate wisdom. I’m suddenly feeling a need to be in that kind of energy. Suddenly it is Kuan Yin who is speaking: “Some believe I am in servitude to Buddha. However, Buddha doesn’t see it like that. We’re more like brother and sister. I’m showing, Lena, my abode, a place on earth where humans can visit me and be in my potency. Lena is looking at my statue and then at my form. There’s a difference. I come to people in many forms, forms constructed from people’s own perceptions of how I should come to them. And it is individual spiritual needs that create these unique perceptions. In the end, it does not matter what form I take.” “Kuan Yin wants me to know that I can have the most divine life imaginable,” whispers Lena, still very deep in trance. “She’ll be here until the last soul passes off the earth. She remains in deity form to assist people in transcending their materialistic nature, to help them attain their highest spiritual level.

Has he invited you to dinner, dear? Gifts, flowers, the usual?” I had to put my cup down, because my hand was shaking too much. When I stopped laughing, I said, “Curran? He isn’t exactly Mr. Smooth. He handed me a bowl of soup, that’s as far as we got.” “He fed you?” Raphael stopped rubbing Andrea. “How did this happen?” Aunt B stared at me. “Be very specific, this is important.” “He didn’t actually feed me. I was injured and he handed me a bowl of chicken soup. Actually I think he handed me two or three. And he called me an idiot.” “Did you accept?” Aunt B asked. “Yes, I was starving. Why are the three of you looking at me like that?” “For crying out loud.” Andrea set her cup down, spilling some tea. “The Beast Lord’s feeding you soup. Think about that for a second.” Raphael coughed. Aunt B leaned forward. “Was there anybody else in the room?” “No. He chased everyone out.” Raphael nodded. “At least he hasn’t gone public yet.” “He might never,” Andrea said. “It would jeopardize her position with the Order.” Aunt B’s face was grave. “It doesn’t go past this room. You hear me, Raphael? No gossip, no pillow talk, not a word. We don’t want any trouble with Curran.” “If you don’t explain it all to me, I will strangle somebody.” Of course, Raphael might like that . . . “Food has a special significance,” Aunt D said. I nodded. “Food indicates hierarchy. Nobody eats before the alpha, unless permission is given, and no alpha eats in Curran’s presence until Curran takes a bite.” “There is more,” Aunt B said. “Animals express love through food. When a cat loves you, he’ll leave dead mice on your porch, because you’re a lousy hunter and he wants to take care of you. When a shapeshifter boy likes a girl, he’ll bring her food and if she likes him back, she might make him lunch. When Curran wants to show interest in a woman, he buys her dinner.” “In public,” Raphael added, “the shapeshifter fathers always put the first bite on the plates of their wives and children. It signals that if someone wants to challenge the wife or the child, they would have to challenge the male first.” “If you put all of Curran’s girls together, you could have a parade,” Aunt B said. “But I’ve never seen him physically put food into a woman’s hands. He’s a very private man, so he might have done it in an intimate moment, but I would’ve found out eventually. Something like that doesn’t stay hidden in the Keep. Do you understand now? That’s a sign of a very serious interest, dear.” “But I didn’t know what it meant!” Aunt B frowned. “Doesn’t matter. You need to be very careful right now. When Curran wants something, he doesn’t become distracted. He goes after it and he doesn’t stop until he obtains his goal no matter what it takes. That tenacity is what makes him an alpha.” “You’re scaring me.” “Scared might be too strong a word, but in your place, I would definitely be concerned.” I wished I were back home, where I could get to my bottle of sangria. This clearly counted as a dire emergency. As if reading my thoughts, Aunt B rose, took a small bottle from a cabinet, and poured me a shot. I took it, and drained it in one gulp, letting tequila slide down my throat like liquid fire. “Feel better?” “It helped.” Curran had driven me to drinking. At least I wasn’t contemplating suicide.

So how, you might ask, do I exclude generously? This issue comes up a lot when I’m organizing large, complicated meetings for clients. These are some of the questions I ask them: Who not only fits but also helps fulfill the gathering’s purpose? Who threatens the purpose? Who, despite being irrelevant to the purpose, do you feel obliged to invite? When my clients answer the first two questions, they begin to grasp their gathering’s true purpose. Obviously people who fit and fulfill your gathering’s purpose need to be there. And, though this one is harder, people who manifestly threaten the purpose are easy to justify excluding. (That doesn’t mean they always end up being excluded. Politeness and habit often defeat the facilitator. But the hosts still know deep down who shouldn’t be there.) It is the third question where purpose begins to be tested. Someone threatens a gathering’s purpose? You can see why to keep him out. But what’s wrong with someone who’s irrelevant to the purpose? What’s wrong with inviting Bob? Every gathering has its Bobs. Bob in marketing. Bob your friend’s girlfriend’s brother. Bob your visiting aunt. Bob is perfectly pleasant and doesn’t actively sabotage your gathering. Most Bobs are grateful to be included. They sometimes bring extra effort or an extra bottle of wine. You’ve probably been a Bob. I certainly have. The crux of excluding thoughtfully and intentionally is mustering the courage to keep away your Bobs. It is to shift your perception so that you understand that people who aren’t fulfilling the purpose of your gathering are detracting from it, even if they do nothing to detract from it. This is because once they are actually in your presence, you (and other considerate guests) will want to welcome and include them, which takes time and attention away from what (and who) you’re actually there for. Particularly in smaller gatherings, every single person affects the dynamics of a group. Excluding well and purposefully is reframing who and what you are being generous to—your guests and your purpose.

After all, a kiss between real lovers is not some type of contract, a neatly defined moment of pleasure, something obtained by greedy conquest, or any kind of clear saying of how it is. It is a grief-drenched hatching of two hearts into some ecstatic never-before-seen bird whose new uncategorizable form, unrecognized by the status quo, gives the slip to Death's sure rational deal. For love is a delicious and always messy extension of life that unfrantically outgrows mortality's rigid insistence on precise and efficient definition. Having all the answers means you haven't really ecstatically kissed or lived, thereby declaring the world defined and already finished. Loving all the questions on the other hand is a vitality that makes any length of life worth living. Loving doesn't mean you know all the notes and that you have to play all the notes, it just means you have to play the few notes you have long and beautifully. Like the sight of a truly beautiful young woman, smooth and gliding, melting hearts at even a distant glimpse, that no words, no matter how capable, can truly describe; a woman whose beauty is only really known by those who take a perch on the vista of time to watch the years of life speak out their long ornate sentences of grooves as they slowly stretch into her smoothness, wrinkling her as she glides struggling, decade by decade, her gait mitigated by a long trail of heavy loads, joys, losses, and suffering whose joint-aching years of traveling into a mastery of her own artistry of living, becomes even more than beauty something about which though we are even now no more capable of addressing than before, our admiration as original Earth-loving human beings should nonetheless never remain silent. And for that beauty we should never sing about, but only sing directly to it. Straightforward, cold, and inornate description in the presence of such living evidence of the flowering speech of the Holy in the Seed would be death of both the beauty and the speaker. Even if we always fail when we speak, we must be willing to fail magnificently, for even an eloquent failure, if in the service of life, feeds the Divine. Is it not a magical thing, this life, when just a little ash, cinder, and unclear water can arrange themselves into a beautiful old woman who sways, lifts, kisses, loves, sickens, argues, loses, bears up under it all, and, wrinkling, still lives under all that and yet feeds the Holy in Nature by just the way she moves barefoot down a path? If we can find the hearts, tongues, and brightness of our original souls, broken or not, then no matter from what mess we might have sprung today, we would be like those old-time speakers of life; every one of us would have it in our nature to feel obligated by such true living beauty as to know we have to say something in its presence if only for our utter feeling of awe. For, finally learning to approach something respectfully with love, slowly with the courtesy of an ornate indirectness, not describing what we see but praising the magnificence of her half-smiles of grief and persistent radiance rolling up from the weight-bearing thumping of her fine, well-oiled dusty old feet shuffling toward the dawn reeds at the edge of her part of the lake to fetch a head-balanced little clay jar of water to cook the family breakfast, we would know why the powerful Father Sun himself hurries to get his daily glimpse of her, only rising early because she does.

Depression, that is,” I continue. “People who’ve never experienced it think it’s a mask, but it’s not. It’s a curtain. And when it falls, it shuts you off from your life, plunging you into complete darkness. There you stand, arms flailing around you, reaching for anything to find your way back. But after exhausting yourself, grasping at only more darkness, you give up and drop to the floor in resignation. “And so you sit. You and the blackness. You and the accusations. You and the self-hatred, the lies that become truth, the failure and pain and hopelessness and black thoughts that twist through you, impaling you to the floor. There you bleed, alone in your black hole, convinced the audience on the other side of the curtain has given up and gone home. The show is over. “Before you know it, you realize the curtain has turned into a cement wall, and you couldn’t escape the darkness even if you wanted to, but by now you don’t care anymore. What’s the point? There’s nothing waiting for you on the other side, and even if there was, you’re such a useless waste of space that you wouldn’t dare to contaminate the world outside with your cancer anyway.” I stop, my eyes burning, my voice heavy in my throat. “You feel like crying all the time but you rarely do. Depression isn’t sadness; it’s numbness. You don’t have the energy for sadness. You can’t sleep. You don’t eat. You have no desire for the things you used to love, but it doesn’t matter because you can’t love anyway. You feel nothing, just a dull, heavy ache that makes it hard to breathe sometimes, let alone get up to start the search again. You fantasize about disappearing, just erasing your pointless existence and sparing the Earth from your toxic presence. By now you’re so exhausted just from the effort of living that there’s nothing left to live it.” I

Spiritual autonomy is knowing who and what you are—knowing that you are divine being itself, knowing that the essence of you is divinity. You are moving in the world of time and space, appearing as a human being, but nonetheless you are eternal, divine being, the timeless breaking through and operating within the world of time. To Jesus, spirit is everything. Nothing matters more than spirit or, as I like to say, divine being. Divine being is what Jesus is here for; it is the vitality source from which he moves, from which he speaks, from which his critique arises. He is the living presence of divine being. He’s a human being too, but he’s here to convey divine being, and that comes out most clearly in the Gospel of Mark. This gospel uniquely conveys Jesus’ search for himself. Mark’s Jesus is a Jesus who is very much a searcher: he’s looking for his identity, he’s looking for his role, he’s experimenting, he’s finding out what works and what doesn’t. He’s on a journey, and he’s inviting all of us along for that journey with him as if we were also the disciples.

God Sees You Differently When we focus on our shortcomings and limitations, it doesn’t leave us with much of a reason to believe in ourselves. Under personal, honest scrutiny, we don’t look like winners. But God sees you differently than you see yourself. While we tend to focus on outward evidence, God focuses on the heart. We analyze the past and present, but God looks toward the future. As we make a list of our mistakes and failures, He identifies crevices where potential exists. “‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,’ declares the LORD. ‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts’” (Isaiah 55:8-9). When God looks at us, He doesn’t see lost opportunity. He doesn’t see failure. God looks at us through eyes of love. When someone loves you and you yield to that love, you feel comfortable in their presence. Your confidence mounts. You know you’re accepted. And where room for improvement exists, someone who loves us will encourage us to step out with boldness and make progress. If we feel unworthy or unqualified, if fear tries to cripple us, we can choose to move forward in spite of it.

McMaster said he had been completely in the dark about this. The secretary of state had not consulted or even informed him in advance. He had learned from press reports! In a news conference in Qatar, Tillerson had said the agreement “represents weeks of intensive discussions” between the two governments so it had been in the works for a while. Porter said Tillerson had not gone through the policy process at the White House and had not involved the president either. Clearly Tillerson was going off on his own. “It is more loyal to the president,” McMaster said, “to try to persuade rather the circumvent.” He said he carried out direct orders when the president was clear, and felt duty bound to do so as an Army officer. Tillerson in particular did not. “He’s such a prick,” McMaster said. “He thinks he’s smarter than anyone. So he thinks he can do his own thing.” In his long quest to bring order to the chaos, Priebus arranged for each of the key cabinet members to regularly check in. Tillerson came to his office at 5:15 p.m. on Tuesday, July 18. McMaster had not been invited but joined the meeting anyway. He took a seat at the conference table. The national security adviser’s silent presence was ominous and electric. Tell me, Priebus asked Tillerson, how are things going? Are you on track to achieve your primary objectives? How is the relationship between the State Department and the White House? Between you and the president? “You guys in the White House don’t have your act together,” Tillerson said, and the floodgates gushed open. “The president can’t make a decision. He doesn’t know how to make a decision. He won’t make a decision. He makes a decision and then changes his mind a couple of days later.” McMaster broke his silence and raged at the secretary of state. “You don’t work with the White House,” McMaster said. “You never consult me or anybody on the NSC staff. You blow us off constantly.” He cited examples when he tried to set up calls or meetings or breakfasts with Tillerson. “You are off doing your own thing” and communicate directly with the president, Mattis, Priebus or Porter. “But it’s never with the National Security Council,” and “that’s what we’re here to do.” Then he issued his most dramatic charge. “You’re affirmatively seeking to undermine the national security process.” “That’s not true,” Tillerson replied. “I’m available anytime. I talk to you all the time. We just had a conference call yesterday. We do these morning calls three times a week. What are you talking about, H.R.? I’ve worked with you. I’ll work with anybody.” Tillerson continued, “I’ve also got to be secretary of state. Sometimes I’m traveling. Sometimes I’m in a different time zone. I can’t always take your calls.” McMaster said he consulted with the relevant assistant secretaries of state if the positions were filled. “I don’t have assistant secretaries,” Tillerson said, coldly, “because I haven’t picked them, or the ones that I have, I don’t like and I don’t trust and I don’t work with. So you can check with whoever you want. That has no bearing on me.” The rest of the State Department didn’t matter; if you didn’t go through him, it didn’t count.

...he [Perry Hildebrandt] broached the subject of goodness and its relation to intelligence. He'd come to the reception for selfless reasons, but he now saw that he might get not only a free buzz but free advise from, as it were, two professionals. 'I suppose what I'm asking,' he said, 'is whether goodness can ever truly be its own reward, or whether, consciously or not, it always serves some personal instrumentality.' Reverend Walsh [Trinity Lutheran] and the rabbi [Meyer] exchanged glances in which Perry detected pleasant surprise. It gratified him to upset their expectations of a fifteen-year-old. 'Adam may have a different answer,' the rabbi said, but in the Jewish faith there is really only one measure of righteousness: Do you celebrate God and obey His commandments?' 'That would suggest,' Perry said, 'that goodness and God are essentially synonymous.' 'That's the idea,' the rabbi said. 'In biblical times, when God manifested Himself more directly. He could seem like quite the hard-ass--striking people blind for trivial offenses, telling Abraham to kill his son. But the essence of the Jewish faith is that God does what He does, and we obey Him.' 'So, in other words, it doesn't matter what a righteous person's private thoughts are, so long as he obeys the letter of God's commandments?' 'And worships Him, yes. Of course, at the level of folk wisdom, a man can be righteous without being a -mensch.- I'm sure you see this, too, Adam--the pious man who makes everyone around him miserable. That might be what Perry is asking about.' 'My question,' Perry said, 'is whether we can ever escape our selfishness. Even if you bring in God, and make him the measure of goodness, the person who worships and obeys Him still wants something for himself. He enjoys the feeling of being righteous, or he wants eternal life, or what have you. If you're smart enough to think about it, there's always some selfish angle.' The rabbi smiled. 'There may be no way around it, when you put it like that. But we "bring in God," as you say--for the believer, of course, it's God who brought -us- in--to establish a moral order in which your question becomes irrelevant. When obedience is the defining principle, we don't need to police every little private thought we might have.' 'I think there's more to Perry's question, though,' Reverend Walsh said. 'I think he is pointing to sinfulness, which is our fundamental condition. In Christian faith, only one man has ever exemplified perfect goodness, and he was the Son of God. The rest of us can only hope for glimmers of what it's like to be truly good. When we perform an act of charity, or forgive an enemy, we feel the goodness of Christ in our hearts. We all have an innate capability to recognize true goodness, but we're also full of sin, and those two parts of us are constantly at war.' 'Exactly,' Perry said. 'How do I know if I'm really being good or if I'm just pursuing a sinful advantage?' 'The answer, I would say, is by listening to your heart. Only your heart can tell you what your true motive is--whether it partakes of Christ. I think my position is similar to Rabbi Meyer's. The reason we need faith--in our case, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ--is that it gives us a rock-solid basis for evaluating our actions. Only through faith in the perfection of our Savior, only by comparing our actions to his example, only by experiencing his living presence in our hearts, can we hope to be forgiven for the more selfish thoughts we might have. Only faith in Christ redeems us. Without him, we're lost in a sea of second-guessing our motives.

WILLPOWER EXPERIMENT: FEEL WHAT YOU FEEL, BUT DON’T BELIEVE EVERYTHING YOU THINK When an upsetting thought comes to mind, try the technique that Goldin teaches his subjects. Instead of instantly trying to distract yourself from it, let yourself notice the thought. Oftentimes, our most disturbing thoughts are familiar—the same worry, the same self-criticism, the same memory. “What if something goes wrong?” “I can’t believe I did that. I’m so stupid.” “If only that hadn’t happened. What could I have done differently?” These thoughts pop up like a song that gets stuck in our heads, seemingly out of nowhere, but then is impossible to get rid of. Let yourself notice whether the upsetting thought is an old, familiar tune—that’s your first clue that it is not critically important information you need to believe. Then shift your attention to what you are feeling in your body. Notice if there is any tension present, or changes to your heart rate or breathing. Notice if you feel it in your gut, your chest, your throat, or anywhere else in your body. Once you’ve observed the thought and feelings, shift your attention to your breathing. Notice how it feels to breathe in and breathe out. Sometimes the upsetting thought and feelings naturally dissipate when you do this. Other times, they will keep interrupting your attention to your breath. If this happens, imagine the thought and feelings like clouds passing through your mind and body. Keep breathing, and imagine the clouds dissolving or floating by. Imagine your breath as a wind that dissolves and moves the clouds effortlessly. You don’t need to make the thought go away; just stay with the feeling of your breath. Notice that this technique is not the same thing as believing or ruminating over a thought. The opposite of thought suppression is accepting the presence of the thought—not believing it. You’re accepting that thoughts come and go, and that you can’t always control what thoughts come to mind. You don’t have to automatically accept the content of the thought. In other words, you might say to yourself, “Oh well, there’s that thought again—worries happen. That’s just the way the mind works, and it doesn’t necessarily mean anything.” You’re not saying to yourself, “Oh well, I guess it’s true. I am a terrible person and terrible things are going to happen to me, and I guess I need to accept it.” This same practice can be used for any distracting thought or upsetting emotion, including anger, jealousy, anxiety, or shame. After trying this technique a few times, compare it with the results you get from trying to push away upsetting thoughts and emotions. Which is more effective at giving you peace of mind? A

Archangel Raphael This is the realm of healing Love. As natural healers from the heart, you who carry this realm innately project blue healing rays through your hands. As a Raphaelite, the way your Soul emanates its gifts is through this healing energy. You don’t need to do anything outwardly for healing Love to be radiated to others. Raphaelites have a tendency to overexert this healing influence unnecessarily. It works on the level of being, not doing. In essence, healing naturally occurs wherever the frequency of Love is present. You Raphaelites can overextend yourselves based on your feeling that everything needs healing, feeling that it’s your job to bring that healing Love wherever it is lacking. That is an endless, exhausting, fruitless task. Love is the same energy as life force. You are here to help us to return to the natural state of wholeness through the power of healing Love. You are always present with understanding and care. You are loving individuals who have a tendency to deplete yourselves by attempting to fill the seemingly endless needs of others. Your challenge is to discern who is part of your Soul plan to extend your energy toward and how to do it in a way that does not leave you depleted. You are here to show people that Love is an infinite commodity universally available. It is not yours to personally give to others. When a Raphaelite feels the need to personally give the divine Love they inherently feel connected to, to another, as though it belongs solely to them, it can become a caretaking exchange, which is disempowering to both people. This caretaking level of love is different than the frequency of divine Love. Healing as Love is not meant to be at the level of caretaking. It is not for you to say, “I’ll give all I have to you, because it feels so natural to do so, and it doesn’t matter if I get anything in return.” This state can lead to the expectation for others that you are here to fill their needs for Love. The Raphaelite is here to remind us that divine Love is the healing force moving through everyone. You must visualize or feel an umbilical cord from your heart to the source of divine Love. This is how Love, in fact, feeds us all. The channel from our Creator to our heart is filled with divine Love. When we feel thanksgiving for the eternal presence of Love, it ignites the miracle of healing that hasn’t held a place for Love. We can co-create as Love with those around us freely and appropriately from this place and this place alone. Remember, healer, to heal yourself first in this way and you will have much to give and will be rewarded joyously in return for that gift. The Raphael realm can be tapped into any time by anyone requesting the healing balm of Love that is vital to our life nourishment. We are designed to know this healing Love as a natural flow of our heart’s expression.

Billy sipped the last of his coffee from the mug and shut down his laptop. 1,000 words wasn’t great but it also wasn’t as bad as no words at all. It hadn’t exactly been a great couple of years and the royalties from his first few books were only going to hold out so much longer. Even if he didn’t have anything else to worry about there was always Sara to consider. Sara with her big blue eyes so like her mother’s. He sat for a moment longer thinking about his daughter and all they’d been through since Wendy had passed. Then he picked up his mug with a long sigh and carried it to the kitchen to rinse it in the sink. When he came back into his little living room and the quiet of 1 AM he wasn’t surprised to find her there over to the side of the bookshelf hovering close to the floor just beyond the couch. Wendy. Her eyes were cold and intense in death, angry and spiteful in a way he’d never seen them when she was alive. What once had been beautiful was now a horror and a threat, one that he’d known far too well in the years since she’d died. He and Sara both. He stood where he was looking at her as she glared up at him. Part of her smaller vantage point was caused by kneeling next to the shelf but he knew from the many times she’d walked or run through a room that death had also reduced her, made her no higher than 4 or 4 and half feet when she’d been 6 in life. She was like a child trapped there on the cusp between youth and coming adulthood. Crushed and broken down into a husk, an entity with no more love for them than a snake. Familiar tears stung his eyes but he blinked them away letting his anger and frustration rise in place of his grief. “Fuck you! What right do you have to be here? Why won’t you let Sara and I be? We loved you! We still love you!” She doesn’t respond, she never does. It’s as if she used up all of her words before she died and now all that’s left is the pain and the anger of her death. The empty lack of true life in her eyes leaves him cold. He doesn’t say anything else to her. It’s all a waste and he knows it. She frightens him as much as she makes him angry. Spite lives in every corner of her body and he’s reached his limit on how long he can see this perversion, this nightmare of what once meant so much to him. He walks past the bookshelf and through the doorway there. He and Sara’s rooms are up above. With an effort he resists the urge to look back down the hall to see if she’s followed. He refuses to treat his wife like a boogeyman no matter how much she has come to fit that mold. He can feel her eyes burning into him from somewhere back at the edge of the living room. The sensation leaves a cold trail of fear up his back as he walks the last four feet to the stairs and then up. He can hear her feet rush across the floor behind him and the rustle of fabric as she darts up the stairs after him. His pulse and his feet speed up as she grows closer but he’s never as fast as she is. Soon she slips up the steps under his foot shoving him aside as she crawls on her hands and feet through his legs and up the last few stairs above. As she passes through his legs, her presence never more clear than when it’s shoving right against him, he smells the clean and medicinal smells of the operating room and the cloying stench of blood. For a moment he’s back in that room with her, listening to her grunt and keen as she works so hard at pushing Sara into the world and then he’s back looking up at her as she slowly considers the landing and where to go from there. His voice is a whisper, one that pleads. “Wendy?

In an odd way you can compare the social enviroment of any online game to that of a skate park or to a lesser degree sports avenue. I know, I know, it seems like an insane comparision to make, but similarities really do exist. The most prevalent of which is the equality presented. In the previously mentioned spaces age/social status/economic background, etc... have little to no effect (depending upon the sport you don't want a 20 year old lined up across a 10 year old). The determining factors regarding inclusion or friendship revolve around talent and social skills. In a skate park or pick up soccer game where you come from doesn't matter. What matters is how you perform and more importantly if it is fun playing on your team or rolling with you. Same rules apply to online gaming, but to an even more significant degree. In the wow user interface guidez online world other people have no idea what you look like. They have no idea what you do for a living or how old you are. All they know is whether or not you are worth playing with. And being a worthwhile teammate does not just correlate to level of skill. As mentioned previously, it correlates very strongly to your social presence. In short do you make the game more fun to play? Now, you certainly do not want to be on polar opposites of each spectrum. Even if you are the most charming individual to even grace the planet earth, if you think soccer is played with your hands guess who is not getting on the field. In the same token if you think the main goal of battlegrounds in World of Warcraft is to dance on the stump guess who is not getting invited to next week's Rated Battlegrounds. On the other side of the coin there have been gigantic jack asses that just so happen to be the best player I have ever seen. Unfortunately for them despite their abilities no one wants to play with someone who makes everyone around them worse via their poisonous attitude. It is both difficult and important to find a balance between the two. There are so many opportunities waiting for you. Whether it be through sports or online gaming. Do not think for a minute that because you are XX years old or XXX pounds or from a certain background you can't fit in somewhere. One of the most amazing aspects of online gaming is that you can truly present yourself to others as you want. Physical and economic factors are completely removed from the equation. It becomes you, your voice, and who you are as a person that shines through.

When We Want the Kind of Love That Pleases God Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. 1 CORINTHIANS 13:4-8 GOD MAKES IT CRYSTAL CLEAR in His Word about the kind of love He wants us to have. Sometimes we may wish it weren’t so clear, because what is also clear is that we can’t express this kind of love on a consistent basis without His help. He wants us to have love that is shown in patience and kindness and is not possessive. Love that is not arrogant, rude, demanding, or selfish. Love that does not become irritable or grumpy, and does not keep a list of injustices. Love that believes for the best in others and not the worst, and is happy for their success and not their failure. Love that never gives up on the other person and endures through whatever happens. God not only wants you to have that kind of love for others, but He also wants you to have it for your husband. And He wants your husband to always exhibit that kind of love for you. How in the world do you find love within you like that? Do you have the kind of love in your heart that is never selfish or impatient? Do you have the kind of love that can endure anything and never doubt or lose hope? Only the love of God in you can accomplish all that through you. The way you access the flow of God’s love is by being in His presence—in prayer, praise, and worship. It comes by inviting the Holy Spirit to fill you afresh each day with His love and allowing His love to transform you. My Prayer to God LORD, I pray You would pour Your amazing, unconditional love into my heart and into my husband’s heart as well. Help us to love each other the way You love us. I know we don’t have it in us to do that on our own, but I also know Your Holy Spirit can fill us with Your love so that it overflows to each other. Enable us to have the kind of love that shows patience with each other, love that is kind and does good, love that doesn’t become possessive or jealous, love that is not arrogant and always trying to steal attention away from the other, love that is never rude or selfish, love that is not hostile or easily irritable, love that believes for the best and not the worst in each other, love that is not resentful and doesn’t keep a record of every offense, love that stands strong no matter what happens and doesn’t lose hope and faith, love that never gives up. Enable us to have love for each other that will not fail. Lord, You know what we are made of and how imperfect we are. We recognize we can’t begin to do this without Your working a miracle in our hearts. I ask for a continual flow of Your presence and love in our lives today and every day. Help us to have the kind of love for each other that pleases You. In Jesus’ name I pray.

And as they came out, they found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name: him they compelled to bear his cross. —Matthew 27:32 (KJV) WEDNESDAY OF HOLY WEEK: GOD IS IN THE DETAILS Which cliché do you abide by: The devil is in the details or God is in the details? No matter; something extraordinary is in the details. Take for instance that single line about Simon of Cyrene. Maybe the Romans forced Simon to help; maybe he would’ve offered this small gift anyway. In either case, Jesus accepted. A cynic might note that Jesus didn’t have much choice, but that misses the point: Jesus had lots of choices. He could have wiggled out of the whole mess with Pilate. He could have chosen a quicker execution. He could have skipped the whole proceeding. He did not. Our youngest daughter, Grace, has talked about becoming a hospice worker when she grows up. She’s seen two grandparents die in hospices. She has seen the kind of people who work there: kind people. Maybe it’s a job; maybe economic circumstances compelled them to work there—does it matter? Fact is, they’re there, in someone’s time of need, to assist others on their journey, to make their passing less difficult. Are we compelled to help others or do we offer? I’m guessing that the person whose burden is suddenly lightened by our presence doesn’t really care what brought us to that moment. Those are just details…and I think God is, most assuredly, in the details. Lord, You said that what we do for the least of our brothers and sisters we do for You. Help us to see You in everything we do in our everyday lives, even in the tiniest details. —Mark Collins Digging Deeper: Ps 147:4–5; Lk 12:6–7

Jyothishmati pragnya means to see your whole mind as light, as a flame. Your consciousness is a flame. Your mind is a flame. You forget this! Your entire body is functioning because of this presence of the mind as a flame in you. Otherwise, you’ll be like an unlit candle. What is a flame? How does a flame work? A flame lives on oxygen, doesn’t it? What does it do? A flame uses some matter from the substance earth, and it uses oxygen and lives. And what is life? Life is also the same! It uses oxygen and lives on some matter. Just like a flame lives from the wax and wick, and uses oxygen, so too, your life, the mind, uses the body and food in the body as wax, and the air as oxygen. And it exhibits activities in the body like the flame (consciousness) exhibits life.

The absence of biblical morality is proof positive that I don’t know or follow Jesus.6 But the presence of biblical morality doesn’t necessarily validate that I have a genuine relationship with Jesus.

Becoming aware of her presence in the doorway, the men looked up. Westcliff rose from his half-seated position on the desk. “My lord,” Daisy said, “if I might have a word with you?” Although she spoke calmly, something in her expression must have alerted him. He didn’t waste a second in coming to her. “Yes, Daisy?” “It’s about my sister,” she whispered. “It seems her labor has started.” She had never seen the earl look so utterly taken aback. “It’s too early,” he said. “Apparently the baby doesn’t think so.” “But…this is off-schedule.” The earl seemed genuinely baffled that his child would have failed to consult the calendar before arriving. “Not necessarily,” Daisy replied reasonably. “It’s possible the doctor misjudged the date of the baby’s birth. Ultimately it’s only a matter of guesswork.” Westcliff scowled. “I expected far more accuracy than this! It’s nearly a month before the projected…” A new thought occurred to him, and he turned skull-white. “Is the baby premature?” Although Daisy had entertained a few private concerns about that, she shook her head immediately. “Some women show more than others, some less. And my sister is very slender. I’m sure the baby is fine.” She gave him a reassuring smile. “Lillian has had pains for the past four or five hours, and now they’re coming every ten minutes or so, which Annabelle says—” “She’s been in labor for hours and no one told me?” Westcliff demanded in outrage. “Well, it’s not technically labor unless the intervals between the pains are regular, and she said she didn’t want to bother you until—” Westcliff let out a curse that startled Daisy. He turned to point a commanding but unsteady finger at Simon Hunt. “Doctor,” he barked, and took off at a dead run. Simon Hunt appeared unsurprised by Westcliff’s primitive behavior. “Poor fellow,” he said with a slight smile, reaching over the desk to slide a pen back into its holder.

When I run, whether or not it is among other people, my pulse beats faster, and my breath flows deeper. Heat rises, pores open, and sweat pours. Breath steadies as each foot falls into the grasp of gravity for an instant, another instant, and another. Moments between footstrikes, moments between heartbeats, and moments between breaths, no matter how brief, merge and become one stillness. Consciousness surges through thousands of miles of synapses, both toward the sky and down to the dirt. Absence and presence are synonymous as they are stillness within movement, where distance doesn’t matter, because distance is infinite.

What, precisely, does it mean to say that our sense of morality and justice is reduced to the language of a business deal? What does it mean when we reduce moral obligations to debts? What changes when the one turns into the other? And how do we speak about them when our language has been so shaped by the market? On one level the difference between an obligation and a debt is simple and obvious. A debt is the obligation to pay a certain sum of money. As a result, a debt, unlike any other form of obligation, can be precisely quantified. This allows debts to become simple, cold, and impersonal—which, in turn, allows them to be transferable. If one owes a favor, or one’s life, to another human being, it is owed to that person specifically. But if one owes forty thousand dollars at 12-percent interest, it doesn’t really matter who the creditor is; neither does either of the two parties have to think much about what the other party needs, wants, is capable of doing—as they certainly would if what was owed was a favor, or respect, or gratitude. One does not need to calculate the human effects; one need only calculate principal, balances, penalties, and rates of interest. If you end up having to abandon your home and wander in other provinces, if your daughter ends up in a mining camp working as a prostitute, well, that’s unfortunate, but incidental to the creditor. Money is money, and a deal’s a deal. From this perspective, the crucial factor, and a topic that will be explored at length in these pages, is money’s capacity to turn morality into a matter of impersonal arithmetic—and by doing so, to justify things that would otherwise seem outrageous or obscene. The factor of violence, which I have been emphasizing up until now, may appear secondary. The difference between a “debt” and a mere moral obligation is not the presence or absence of men with weapons who can enforce that obligation by seizing the debtor’s possessions or threatening to break his legs. It is simply that a creditor has the means to specify, numerically, exactly how much the debtor owes.

If your absence doesn’t bother them, then your presence never mattered in the first place. I felt that!

Mister Omochi is very angry. You created the most appalling tension in the meeting this morning. How could our business partners have any feeling of trust in the presence of a white girl who understood their language? From now on you will no longer speak Japanese.” I was dumbfounded. “I beg your pardon?” “You no longer know how to speak Japanese. Is this clear?” “But – it was because of my knowledge of your language that I was hired by Yumitomo!” “That doesn’t matter. I am ordering you not to understand Japanese anymore.” “That’s impossible. No one could obey an order like that.” “There is always a means to obeying. That’s what Western brains need to understand.

The opposite of thought suppression is accepting the presence of the thought—not believing it. You’re accepting that thoughts come and go, and that you can’t always control what thoughts come to mind. You don’t have to automatically accept the content of the thought. In other words, you might say to yourself, “Oh well, there’s that thought again—worries happen. That’s just the way the mind works, and it doesn’t necessarily mean anything.” You’re not saying to yourself, “Oh well, I guess it’s true. I am a terrible person and terrible things are going to happen to me, and I guess I need to accept it.

When you are constantly in pursuit of security, you are in pursuit of death, because life is never secure. It doesn’t matter what you do,

I’m not telling you that God is simply nice and safe and will pat you on the back and tell you how wonderful you are and how all you have done that is evil, hateful, and sinful doesn’t matter. It does matter. It mattered enough for God to give us his Son to die on a cross, bearing our penalty for the rebellion. He is still holy and righteous, and justice is always exacted. But in the case of those who go to him, justice and mercy have met on a hill in Palestine in the shape of a skull—Golgotha. That’s where God’s Son died, between two thieves, that we might go boldly to a God whose face is love. The

If your absence doesn't affect them, your presence never mattered.

It doesn’t matter if you’re five years old, twenty-five, or fifty. Trauma is trauma, and no matter how much you tell yourself you’re over it, that you’re stronger than the ghosts that haunt you, you’re always going to be weakened in their presence.

If you want to co-operate in a group to solve a large problem, you need some amount of hierarchy, just so you know who is the expert on which subject. It really doesn't matter if the subject is computer support, roving the rivets in lapstrake ship planking, or washing the wort kettle; the point is that division of labour implies specialization implies hierarchy, because once you have specialization you have specialization in keeping track of things, and thus taxonomies, and telling a taxonomy from a hierarchy in the presence of a determined will to keep them separate requires good light and some squinting.

In the Catholic world, it is well established that modesty is more than just a hemline, but we cannot ignore the elephant in the room either. Few Catholics have yet to understand what it truly means to dress appropriately for Mass; many people dress as if they just came back from the beach or just rolled out of bed. Then we have the few, yet the loud, Catholics who seemed to have made it their life’s duty to remind others, regardless of time, place, or charity, that, according to them, their particular outfit is “of the devil.” While at the same time, many more Catholics, men and women, have come to believe that the amount of clothing that we wear doesn’t matter, as long as we have love in our hearts. But neither of these ideologies seem to coincide with Church Tradition. What we Catholics need to ask ourselves is, “If how we dress, most especially in the Presence of the Blessed Sacrament, is as vitally important as the Church has always said until lately, how then is it suddenly not an issue?

the Nines’ need to avoid conflict at all costs. Nines fear that expressing their preferences or asserting their agenda will put important relationships at risk and upset the calm surface of their inner sea. What if their priorities and wants compete with the agenda of someone they care about and this difference leads to conflict and relational disconnection? What if asserting their own opinions, needs and desires creates disharmony between them and the people they love? Nines so value feeling comfortable and tranquil, maintaining the status quo, and preserving connections with others that they set aside their own viewpoints and aspirations to merge with those of others. This doesn’t seem like a big deal for Peacemakers, who often grew up feeling like neither their presence nor priorities matter much to others.

Rabbi Sarah were here, she would say that we’ve been given a rare chance to do good. To save lives. Not everybody gets the chance to do something that might make an important difference. At the end of our days, whether we are successful or not, we won’t have to apologize for turning a blind eye. All things considered, Rabbi Sarah would say, the outcome doesn’t really matter. Yes, it would be nice for us to catch the creep who’s behind all this. Or creeps, plural. But Rabbi Sarah would tell us that we might never know if our presence at the school made a difference or not. She would stress that good deeds, mitzvahs, are like rocks tossed into the center of a pond. They create ripples, concentric circles reaching out.

The road of sin always ends in despair instead of delight and in anger in place of awe, because you and I make tremendous children, but terrible compasses! God alone is our anchor. It is only when His Name, His Word, His Promise, and His Presence are elevated as our treasure that we will ever experience hope. The system of sin is built to get us to shift our gaze and to lose our days playing the game of shame, or entitlement, or both. And our enemy doesn’t care which way we minimize the Cross. He will gladly take us focusing on the mirror to bury ourselves in shame and regret, or to spend our lives comparing to and blaming everyone else. As long as we remain on the throne of our lives, it doesn’t matter which way we flip the coin.

understood that God wasn’t a bronze statue or a painting of some religious deity or god, but was that deep, deep feeling inside that there is something far greater than man, and it is always there watching over us. Once you know this, it doesn’t really matter what God looks like. The deity may look different to different people, to people all over this world. It’s more than enough to know this Presence is ever there, and that it never, never goes away.

I want to practice presence, but not just for the sake of it, and not in some aimless way. No one can afford to sit around, waiting all day on the off chance that a moment worth our time will approach us. That won’t work; and besides, it feels like we’d be stripping those moments of their magic. Rather, I’m starting to see that presence doesn’t have anything to do with waiting at all.

You can sin by doing what you know to be wrong, but also by doing what you think is right. The latter is probably more deadly, for you do not have the help of your conscience to check you. To convince yourself that you are doing right, you need to bring your conscience into agreement. It is not hard to do. A man recently converted expressed shock that the Bible prohibits fornication. When asked if he always thought it was right, after reflection he said, “When I first did it I knew it was wrong, but I overruled my conscience and in a short while it seemed right.” Conscience has the power to condemn, but not absolve. A clear conscience gives confidence in the presence of God, but it does not absolve guilt. The Holy Spirit will assist your conscience in these matters, but even He may be grieved.1 Because you believe something to be right doesn’t mean that it is right. God may call it sin, as He did in the day of the judges. 1

Reread your notes, and take notes on them. And again. Take notes on your thoughts. Most of all, take notes on what interests you. Be certain you’ve marked out what interests you. Don’t make an outline from your notes. Don’t turn your notes into a road map for the sentences to come. Reread your notes. No matter how long or short they are. Then think. And think again. Learn to be patient in the presence of your thoughts. Learn to be equally patient in the presence of a new sentence or a phrase you like. Let yourself pause and work on that sentence. In your head. Don’t write it down. Be patient. Pay attention to everything you’re thinking. Notice your thoughts, See if you can feel your awareness illuminating them. If you’re paying attention, you’ll notice that some of your thoughts interest you and some don’t. How can you tell? You’ll stop and rethink the thought, Pause in its presence. Let the thoughts that interest you distract you. Ask yourself about them. Why do they interest you? What were you thinking about before they appeared? Then come back to the main sequence, Unless you’ve discovered a better main sequence By following a thought you’re interested in. Don’t try to distinguish between thinking and making sentences. Pretend they’re the same thing. Don’t rush your thinking. Don’t rush to make sentences. See what happens when you try to put words to a thought that interests you. See what words the thought itself is presenting and try making a sentence out of them, A sentence like the ones we’ve been talking about, with rhythm and clarity and balance. Not a volunteer sentence. See if the thought you’re interested in becomes sharper and clearer by making a sentence from it. It may become more obscure. What does that tell you? Don’t panic, keep working at it. If you make a sentence while thinking, It doesn’t mean you have to make more sentences immediately. You can go back to thinking and see what the business of making a sentence stirred up in you. It may have dislodged other thoughts, other connections. No one will teach you how to wait while you think or what to wait for while you’re thinking. You’ll have to teach yourself. Above all, you’ll have to teach yourself to be patient. Trying this once or twice won’t do.

I love you, bunny. My love doesn’t need you to tend to it. It exists no matter what you do. It is a love reliant on your presence, not your actions. Forgive me. You are helpless against it.

Otto captured this sacred sixth sense, at once subject and object, in a famous Latin sound bite: the sacred is the mysterium tremendum et fascinans, that is, the mystical (mysterium) as both fucking scary (tremendum) and utterly fascinating (fascinans).80 (page 9) With the sacred viewed within this gripping, emotionally charged sense, it is hardly surprising that these topics are too disturbing to be studied either by religious scholarship or by science. The presence of real siddhis, real psychic effects lurking in the dark boundaries between mind and matter, are so frightening and disorienting that defense mechanisms immediately snap into place to protect our psyches from these disturbing thoughts. We become blind to personal psychic episodes and to the supportive scientific evidence, we conveniently forget mind-shattering synchronicities, and if the intensity of the mysterium tremendum becomes too hot, we angrily deny any interest in the topic while backing away and vigorously making the sign of the cross. Within science this sort of behavior is understandable; science doesn’t like what it can’t explain because it makes scientists feel stupid. But the same resistance is also endemic in comparative religion scholarship, which is supposed to be the discipline that studies the sacred. As Kripal says, scholars of religion “simply ignore … or brush their data aside as ‘primitive,’ ‘mistaken,’ and so on. Now the dismissing word in vogue is ‘anecdotal’ ” (pp. 17–18).80 One reason for this odd state of affairs is that real psi and real siddhis powerfully refute Descartes’s dualism, the very idea that led to the split between science, which deals with matter, and the humanities, which deal with mind. This distinction has carved up the world so successfully that when phenomena appear that harshly illuminate the artificial nature of the split, the resulting glare, says Kripal, “can only violate and offend our present order of knowledge and possibility” (page 24).80 From this analysis, Kripal arrives at his central argument: Psychic phenomena may be thought of as symbols that indicate “the irruption [a bursting in] of meaning in the physical world via the radical collapse of the subject-object structure itself. They are not simply physical events. They are also meaning events” (page 25).80 In other words, where objective and subjective meet, the fabric of reality itself blurs. This is a place that is not quite physical, and not quite mental, but a limbo that somehow contains and creates both.

The IAT is more than just an abstract measure of attitudes. It’s also a powerful predictor of how we act in certain kinds of spontaneous situations. If you have a strongly pro-white pattern of associations, for example, there is evidence that that will affect the way you behave in the presence of a black person. It’s not going to affect what you’ll choose to say or feel or do. In all likelihood, you won’t be aware that you’re behaving any differently than you would around a white person. But chances are you’ll lean forward a little less, turn away slightly from him or her, close your body a bit, be a bit less expressive, maintain less eye contact, stand a little farther away, smile a lot less, hesitate and stumble over your words a bit more, laugh at jokes a bit less. Does that matter? Of course it does. Suppose the conversation is a job interview. And suppose the applicant is a black man. He’s going to pick up on that uncertainty and distance, and that may well make him a little less certain of himself, a little less confident, and a little less friendly. And what will you think then? You may well get a gut feeling that the applicant doesn’t really have what it takes, or maybe that he is a bit standoffish, or maybe that he doesn’t really want the job.

listening to the sound of a bell Bells are used in many cultures around the world to help people come together, to create harmony within oneself and harmony with others. In many Asian countries, every family has at least one small bell in their home. You can use any kind of bell that makes a sound you enjoy. Use the sound of that bell as a reminder to breathe, to quiet your mind, to come home to your body, and to take care of yourself. In Buddhism, the sound of the bell is considered to be the voice of the Buddha. Stop talking. Stop thinking. Come back to your breathing. Listen with all your being. This way of listening allows peace and joy to penetrate every cell of your body. You listen not only with your ears, not only with your intellect; you invite all the cells in your body to join in listening to the bell. A bell doesn’t take up much space. You could surely find room on a table or a shelf somewhere, no matter where you live, even if you share a small room. Before you invite the bell to come home with you, you must make sure that the sound of the bell is good. The bell doesn’t need to be big, but the sound should be pleasant. Prepare yourself each time to listen and to receive the sound of the bell. Instead of “striking” the bell, “invite” the bell to sound. Look at the bell as a friend, an enlightened being that helps you wake up and come home to yourself. If you wish, you can set the bell on a small cushion—just like any other bodhisattva doing sitting meditation. As you listen to the bell, practice breathing in and releasing all the tension that’s built up, releasing the habit of your body, and especially your mind, to run. Although you may be sitting down, very often you are still running within. The bell is a welcome opportunity for you to go back to yourself, enjoy your in-breath and out-breath in such a way that you can release the tension and come to a full stop. The bell, and your response to it, helps stop the runaway train of thoughts and emotions racing through you all throughout the day and night. In the morning, before you go to work or before the children go to school, everyone can sit down together and enjoy breathing for three sounds of the bell. That way you begin your day with peace and joy. It’s nice to sit there, to breathe, either on your own or with your family, and look at a meaningful object in your home or a tree outside your window and smile. This can become a regular practice, a reliable refuge right there in your house or apartment. It doesn’t take a long time, and it’s richly rewarding. It is a very beautiful practice, the practice of peace, presence, and harmony in the home. breathing room Dedicate a room or a portion of a room for meditation.

One of the epithets the Buddha acquired over the years was “the Doctor of the World.” A reason for this is that the central insight and framework that he taught, known as the Four Noble Truths, is cast in the formulation of a classical Indian medical diagnosis. The format begins with the nature of the symptom. In this particular kind of psychological or spiritual disease, the symptom is dukkha, the experience of dissatisfaction; this is the First Noble Truth. The second element in this diagnostic format is the cause of that symptom, which the Buddha outlined as being self-centered craving, greed, hatred, and delusion. These are the toxins that Matthieu referred to, the negative afflictive emotions, habits, and qualities that the mind gets caught up in and that poison the heart; this is the Second Noble Truth. The third element is the prognosis, and the good news is that it is curable. This is the Third Noble Truth, that the experience of dissatisfaction can end; we can be free from it. The fourth element—and the Fourth Noble Truth—is the methodology of treatment: what the Buddha laid out as the way to heal this wound. It’s known in some expressions as the Eightfold Path, but it can be outlined in three fundamental elements: first, responsible behavior or virtue, living a moral and ethical life; second, mental collectedness, meditation, and mind training; and third, the development of insightful understanding in accordance with reality, or wisdom. These three elements are the fundamental treatment for this psychological, spiritual ailment of dissatisfaction. I should underline that the Buddha didn’t make any claim to have a monopoly on truth. When somebody once asked him, “Is it the case that you’re the only one who really understands the way things are, and that all other spiritual teachings are incorrect, all other paths are erroneous?” He said, “No, by no means.” It’s not a matter of the way the teachings are framed, the language or symbolism that one uses. It is simply the presence or absence of these three central qualities: ethical behavior, mental collectedness, and wisdom. If any spiritual path contains those three elements, then it will certainly lead to the possibility and the actuality of freedom, peace, a harmony within oneself, and an easefulness in life. If it doesn’t contain those elements, then it cannot lead to easefulness, peace, and liberation.

in 90 percent of your daily life, the presence of a cell phone either doesn’t matter or makes things only slightly more convenient. They’re useful, but it’s hyperbolic to believe its ubiquitous presence is vital.

Why,” Jill asked. “What's in it for them?” “The Society for Human Enlightenment believes if they can get enough people going to Hell, God will blink,” Allison replied. “What?” “Like in a stare down,” Allison explained, “you know, who ever blinks first loses.” “Their goal is to have so many people go to Hell that God will give in. The idea is if God forgives everyone who didn’t accept Christ, then He has to forgive Satan as well,” Guzetti said. “Can that happened? Could Satan win somehow?” “No, it can’t happen. Satan should know this as well, but he doesn’t, not anymore. Remember, no matter how wise someone is, when the presence of God is withdrawn from them, they deteriorate. That’s what’s happening to Satan, his mind is going. Satan's plan can’t work, but he and The Society don’t know that. What’s in it for them? Power. Better to rule in Hell than serve in Heaven.

ADDICTED AMEN I’m drunk, stoned, and stuffed. It’s not enough. It’s not enough. And it never will be. There will never be enough to satisfy me. Because the problem is, I’m not hungry. My soul is thirsty. I’ve had the realization That my spirit suffers from dehydration. Thirsty for love. Thirsty for peace. My flesh won’t set me free. I need You, Lord. I’m starving. There’s only regret after the party. The hole in my heart just gets bigger. Even when he says I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be so careless with my body. I didn’t realize I was worthy. I cry myself to sleep. The absence of her presence cuts so deep. What can I take to escape the grief? It’s not enough. Take it. Take this from me. I’m so sorry. I know You love me. I believe it’s not just a story. I’ll give You the glory. Restore me. Make me new. Let me see myself from Your point of view. Fill me with Your Word. The way, the life, the truth. I’m addicted to You, Lord. Take my chains. Give me fruit. I’m sober. I’m satisfied. I’m full. I’m running to You, Lord. I can’t believe I’m running. It used to be a nur. But now I’m chasing after something. Something I can see. Something I can feel. You brought my pain up to the surface. I had to deal so I could heal. Now it has a purpose. Life is good. Despite the struggles. I can smile in the face of trouble. I got my laughter back. She laughs. I’m without fear when I’m attacked. I keep on moving. Forward motion. You have my full devotion. It doesn’t matter where I’ve been. Value isn’t found in the opinions of men. My worth left marks within your skin. You won’t let me stay hidden. It’s Your love, Lord. I’m addicted, amen.

That self-confidence only blossomed into full-blown delusion as I got older. Eventually, the braids were replaced by a bob cut with bangs that had the presence Tina Yothers’s bangs did at her peak during Family Ties. Wait till these white boys at my new school get a whiff of me, I’d tell myself as I got dressed in the morning. Oh, they definitely did. And if Calvin Klein were to bottle that odor, it would have been called: Eau de Weary Grandmother at Post Office Who Hums a Negro Spiritual Parfum. Rolls off the tongue, doesn’t it? To make matters worse, I often paired my asexual hairdo with lived-in black dress shoes, pleated khakis, and a primary-colored turtleneck from Eddie Bauer. At best, this outfit could be described as “Jehovah Witness Chic,” and at worst, “recent Heaven’s Gate defector.” This, my friends, was the milk shake that did not bring all the boys to the yard. It was the milk shake that made them go, “You know, I’m really not into dairy right now.

Love happens in all kinds of ways. He was right when he said that. Love does happen in all kinds of ways. But our kind happened like the dawn. The dawn doesn't question when to appear. It simply does. He walked into my life with the surety of his presence, and from that point on, the night began to wane. I was trapped in lonely darkness for so long that I couldn't recognize the way the world began to illuminate—not right away. I was blind for so many years that, when my horizon began to brighten, I tried to turn away. To squint and blink and shut my eyes against it because I thought, of course, I couldn't have that. Of course I'd stay in the dark. But I didn't. He showed me what it was to face the sun and not shy away. He let me approach it with my hesitations, let me ease into it without being blinded. Let me choose. I'm in this light with him, basking in its warmth, and even our distance can't take that away. Because no matter where we are, the sun always dawns. No matter where he is, I love him.