Prisoner Of Your Past Quotes

We are all here for some special reason. Stop being a prisoner of your past. Become the architect of your future.

The past does not have to be your prison. You have a voice in your destiny. You have a say in your life. You have a choice in the path you take.

Never be a prisoner of your past. Become the architect of you future. You will never be the same.

Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write. This most of all: ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write? Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple “I must,” then build your life in accordance with this necessity; your whole life, even into its humblest and most indifferent hour, must become a sign and witness to this impulse. Then come close to Nature. Then, as if no one had ever tried before, try to say what you see and feel and love and lose... ...Describe your sorrows and desires, the thoughts that pass through your mind and your belief in some kind of beauty - describe all these with heartfelt, silent, humble sincerity and, when you express yourself, use the Things around you, the images from your dreams, and the objects that you remember. If your everyday life seems poor, don’t blame it; blame yourself; admit to yourself that you are not enough of a poet to call forth its riches; because for the creator there is not poverty and no poor, indifferent place. And even if you found yourself in some prison, whose walls let in none of the world’s sounds – wouldn’t you still have your childhood, that jewel beyond all price, that treasure house of memories? Turn your attentions to it. Try to raise up the sunken feelings of this enormous past; your personality will grow stronger, your solitude will expand and become a place where you can live in the twilight, where the noise of other people passes by, far in the distance. - And if out of this turning-within, out of this immersion in your own world, poems come, then you will not think of asking anyone whether they are good or not. Nor will you try to interest magazines in these works: for you will see them as your dear natural possession, a piece of your life, a voice from it. A work of art is good if it has arisen out of necessity. That is the only way one can judge it.

Identity is a prison you can never escape, but the way to redeem your past is not to run from it, but to try to understand it, and use it as a foundation to grow.

You cannot be a prisoner of your past against your will. Because you can only live in the past inside your mind.

Sometimes your belief system is really your fears attached to rules.

When you forgive those that hurt you, they no longer have control over your future happiness. Their anger keeps them a prisoner to your past, while you enjoy the present.

Time moves only forward, never back. We look forward to a moment and then it arrives and an instant later it is gone. Like something on the surface of a river that we reached for but did not touch in time and it carried on, away. You cannot be a prisoner of your past against your will. Because you can only live in the past inside your mind.

Well, I think home spat me out, the blackouts and curfews like tongue against loose tooth. God, do you know how difficult it is, to talk about the day your own city dragged you by the hair, past the old prison, past the school gates, past the burning torsos erected on poles like flags? When I meet others like me I recognise the longing, the missing, the memory of ash on their faces. No one leaves home unless home is the mouth of a shark. I’ve been carrying the old anthem in my mouth for so long that there’s no space for another song, another tongue or another language. I know a shame that shrouds, totally engulfs. I tore up and ate my own passport in an airport hotel. I’m bloated with language I can’t afford to forget.

A mind that dwells in the past builds a prison it cannot escape. Control your mind, or it will control you, and you will never break through the walls it builds.

You might come here Sunday on a whim. Say your life broke down. The last good kiss you had was years ago. You walk these streets laid out by the insane, past hotels that didn't last, bars that did, the tortured try of local drivers to accelerate their lives. Only churches are kept up. The jail turned 70 this year. The only prisoner is always in, not knowing what he's done.

Occupation, curfew, settlements, closed military zone, administrative detention, siege, preventive strike, terrorist infrastructure, transfer. Their WAR destroys language. Speaks genocide with the words of a quiet technician. Occupation means that you cannot trust the OPEN SKY, or any open street near to the gates of snipers tower. It means that you cannot trust the future or have faith that the past will always be there. Occupation means you live out your live under military rule, and the constant threat of death, a quick death from a snipers bullet or a rocket attack from an M16. A crushing, suffocating death, a slow bleeding death in an ambulance stopped for hours at a checkpoint. A dark death, at a torture table in an Israeli prison: just a random arbitrary death. A cold calculated death: from a curable disease. A thousand small deaths while you watch your family dying around you. Occupation means that every day you die, and the world watches in silence. As if your death was nothing, as if you were a stone falling in the earth, water falling over water. And if you face all of this death and indifference and keep your humanity, and your love and your dignity and YOU refuse to surrender to their terror, then you know something of the courage that is Palestine.

Thora is so much simpler. She is a hollow thing with no past no future. No desires. No anger. Only fear. Only obedience

You're back where you swore yourself you wouldn't be The familiar shackles you can't tell from your own skin Your head's under water when you learned to swim On a road to hell, congratulations, you're free...

Free your mind from the prison of your past. Time has allowed you to grow and develop into the person you're meant to be. Now, you are living a purposed filled life.

Hollow slogans like "Making your country great again" only lead to one result, collapse.

You are locked in a prison of your own nostalgia. You need to let go of the past.

If you lack the humility to go back and tie up the loose ends in your past, then be prepared to forever be haunted by her ghosts, all of whom will come into your present and your future— staining everything and everyone with their leftover emotional and mental garbage. Humility is the master key that can get you out of all your cages; why do you choose your ego and stay in your prisons?

I want all of you,” he tells me, a newfound hunger in the depths of his green eyes that stirs heat beneath my skin. “Every piece, every memory, every minute, every inch. This isn’t going to be some casual dalliance. This isn’t going to be temporary. I want you soul, mind, and body. I want your trust and your thoughts. I want your past, your present, your future. So make very certain that you want me for the right reasons. Be certain that you’re choosing this, because once you do, there’s no turning back.

Well, I think home spat me out, the blackouts and curfews like tongue against loose tooth. God, do you know how difficult it is, to talk about the day your own city dragged you by the hair, past the old prison, past the school gates, past the burning torsos erected on poles like flags? When I meet others like me I recognise the longing, the missing, the memory of ash on their faces.

I realize that we are often wary of making these kinds of broad generalizations about different cultural groups--and with good reason. This is the form that racial and ethnic stereotypes take. We want to believe that we are not prisoners of our ethnic histories. But the simple truth is that if you want to understand ... you have to go back to the past ... it matters where you're from, not just in terms of where you grew up or where your parents grew up, but in terms of where you great-grandparents and great-great-grandparents grew up and even where your great-great-grandparents grew up. That is a strange and powerful fact.

Live a life abundant in love and rich in spirit, these are the seeds of a fulfilling existence. Be the safe harbor you seek in the world. Follow your dreams, not your fear. Go into the New Year with an open mind and hopeful heart. Don't let the chains of unforgiveness weigh you down. Life is too short to live in a prison of past hurts. The futures is yours for the taking and creating. Life is bittersweet, when we can let darkness and light co-exist as illumination, we can live in true happiness. When we live life at its best, it is a symphony of feelings, of high and low notes, of tragedy and comedy, love and loss, magic and the sublime. It can be quite a spectacular journey when we fully embrace and accept it.

The dementors affect you worse than the others because there are horrors in your past that others don't have.

If you're anything like me, You bite your nails, And laugh when you're nervous. You promise people the world, because that's what they want from you. You like giving them what they want... But darling, you need to stop, If you're anything like me, You knock on wood every time you make plans. You cross your fingers, hold your breath, Wish on lucky numbers and eyelashes Your superstitions were the lone survivors of the shipwreck. Rest In Peace, to your naive bravado... If life gets too good now, Darling, it scares you. If you're anything like me, You never wanted to lock your door, Your secret garden gate or your diary drawer Didn't want to face the you you don't know anymore For fear she was much better before... But Darling, now you have to. If you're anything like me, There's a justice system in your head For names you'll never speak again, And you make your ruthless rulings. Each new enemy turns to steel They become the bars that confine you, In your own little golden prison cell... But Darling, there is where you meet yourself. If you're anything like me You've grown to hate your pride To love your thighs And no amount of friends at 25 Will fill the empty seats At the lunch tables of your past The teams that picked you last... But Darling, you keep trying. If you're anything like me, You couldn't recognize the face of your love Until they stripped you of your shiny paint Threw your victory flag away And you saw the ones who wanted you anyway... Darling, later on you will thank your stars for that frightful day. If you're anything like me, I'm sorry. But Darling, it's going to be okay.

Awakenings are always terrifying as they force you to realize your past has been lived in confinement, the most disturbing part is when you recognize that the shackle holding you down are largely once you have placed upon yourself, the prison is self constructed

THE ROBIN O Robin, sing! for the secret of eternity is in song. I wish I were as you, free from prisons and chains. I wish I were as you; a soul flying over the valleys, Sipping the light as wine is sipped from ethereal cups. I wish I were asyou, innocent, contented and happy Ignoring the future and forgetting the past. I wish I were as you in beauty, grace and elegance With the wind spreading my wings for adornment by the dew. I wish I were as you in beauty, a thought floating above the land Pouring out my songs between the forest and the sky. O Robin, sing! and disperse my anxiety. I listen to the voice within your voice that whispers in my inner ear;

You might not see it now, but you are stronger than you can ever imagine. You cannot become comfortable in your pain. You have to let the pain that you feel turn you into a rose without thorns. There are sixteen pieces on the chess board. The king is the most important piece, but the difference is that the queen is the most powerful piece! You are a queen, you can maneuver around your opponents; they do not have the power over your life, your mind or soul. You might think you’ve been a prisoner, but that is your past’ Look in the now and work your way to how you want your future to be. Exercise your thoughts into a pattern of letting go, and think positively about more of what you want than what you do not want. Queen! You are a queen! As a matter of fact, you are the queen! Act as if you know it! You are powerful, determined, strong, and you can make the biggest and most extravagant move and put it into action. Lights, camera, strike a pose and own it! It is yours to own!

Broaden your minds, my dears, and allow your eyes to see past the mundane!” Professor Trelawney cried through the gloom.

Be brave, and set no limits on the workings of your imagination. Never be a prisoner of your past. Become the architect of your future.

The idea that we could have avoided many of life’s difficulties if we had taken things more cautiously is too foolish to be entertained for a moment. As I look back on your past I am so convinced that what has happened hitherto has been right, that I feel that what is happening now is right too. To renounce a full life and its real joys in order to avoid pain is neither Christian nor human.

When we reach the wall, we can discuss your future,” Elian says. I clench my fists, appalled at his audacity and the fact that I’m being forced to tolerate it. Never the queen, always the minion. “Discuss it?” I repeat. “You said you wanted to come with us, and I want to make sure you’re useful. You can’t just be a prisoner taking up space on my deck.” “I was belowdecks,” I remind him. “In a cage.” “That was this morning,” he says, as though it’s far enough in the past to be forgotten. “Try not to hold a grudge.” The grin he gives me is beyond taunting and I sneer, not deigning to reply. Instead I breeze past and make sure to knock my shoulder as hard as I can into his. The sooner I have his heart, the better.

Forgiveness isn’t something we do for the person who’s hurt us. It’s something we do for ourselves, so we’re no longer victims or prisoners of the past, so we can stop carrying a burden that harbors nothing but pain.

He refused to think about it. Qian’s words echoed to him: “A mind that dwells in the past builds a prison it cannot escape. Control your mind, or it will control you, and you will never break through the walls it builds.” Milo

Freedom is a lifetime practice—a choice we get to make again and again each day. Ultimately, freedom requires hope, which I define in two ways: the awareness that suffering, however terrible, is temporary; and the curiosity to discover what happens next. Hope allows us to live in the present instead of the past, and to unlock the doors of our mental prisons.

It's time to get healed. It's time to confess. Falling for the bait doesn't make you the worst person in the world. You were snared. You were hooked. But you don't have to stay that way. Now is the time to deal with the shackles that keep you enslaved. Today you can leave the prison that sexual immorality has created from your past mistakes. Hear your Father's voice call out to you above the noisy clamor of our culture. He says, "I love you. You're free to go now. Sexual sin has no hold on you.

Quite often Wrong Planet people have a chequered past with periods of, how shall we say, fluctuating fortunes. Feast or famine, that’s always been our lifestyle, with maybe spells of what some people would term ‘reprehensible conduct.’ A number of Carefree Scamps have served time in prison. And if you’re reading this now and thinking, “Well, I must admit I’ve been a bit of a scoundrel at times, but I like to think my heart’s in the right place now,” then that’s further evidence that you ‘get’ it.

It's one small mercy that here in prison we don't see anyone we don't choose to see. In this way, prison is beautifully unlike real life. In real life, people from your past litter your life like cockroaches, popping out of crevices and scuttling across the dark.

How can we expect to be happy when we have no peace of mind, when our mind is constantly jumping from the present to the past? When your mind is constantly running and filled with anxiety and fear, where is the freedom? You are stuck in the prison of your mind, stuck in thoughts and feelings from yesterday, from five years ago. There comes a time when everyone has to stop, look deep, breathe and let go.

It even reached a point of such confusion that men and women were imprisoned in the same cells and used the latrine bucket in each other's presence—who cared about those niceties? Give up your gold, vipers! The interrogators did not write up charge sheets because no one needed their papers. And whether or not a sentence would be pasted on was of very little interest. Only one thing was important: Give up your gold, viper! The state needs gold and you don't. The interrogators had neither voice nor strength left to threaten and torture; they had one universal method: feed the prisoners nothing but salty food and give them no water. Whoever coughed up gold got water! One gold piece for a cup of fresh water! People perish for cold metal.

Life is too short, we are here for a reason to meet someone new to be part of our new life chapter/adventure. Stop being the prisoner of your past but be the builder of the future and or the present. Time to unlock the door and let the new one to enter. It is time to close the door of the past forever.

Sparks come from the very source of light and are made of the purest brightness—so say the oldest legends. When a human Being is to be born, a spark begins to fall. First it flies through the darkness of outer space, then through galaxies, and finally, before it falls here, to Earth, the poor thing bumps into the orbits of planets. Each of them contaminates the spark with some Properties, while it darkens and fades. First Pluto draws the frame for this cosmic experiment and reveals its basic principles—life is a fleeting incident, followed by death, which will one day let the spark escape from the trap; there’s no other way out. Life is like an extremely demanding testing ground. From now on everything you do will count, every thought and every deed, but not for you to be punished or rewarded afterward, but because it is they that build your world. This is how the machine works. As it continues to fall, the spark crosses Neptune’s belt and is lost in its foggy vapors. As consolation Neptune gives it all sorts of illusions, a sleepy memory of its exodus, dreams about flying, fantasy, narcotics and books. Uranus equips it with the capacity for rebellion; from now on that will be proof of the memory of where the spark is from. As the spark passes the rings of Saturn, it becomes clear that waiting for it at the bottom is a prison. A labor camp, a hospital, rules and forms, a sickly body, fatal illness, the death of a loved one. But Jupiter gives it consolation, dignity and optimism, a splendid gift: things-will-work-out. Mars adds strength and aggression, which are sure to be of use. As it flies past the Sun, it is blinded, and all that it has left of its former, far-reaching consciousness is a small, stunted Self, separated from the rest, and so it will remain. I imagine it like this: a small torso, a crippled being with its wings torn off, a Fly tormented by cruel children; who knows how it will survive in the Gloom. Praise the Goddesses, now Venus stands in the way of its Fall. From her the spark gains the gift of love, the purest sympathy, the only thing that can save it and other sparks; thanks to the gifts of Venus they will be able to unite and support each other. Just before the Fall it catches on a small, strange planet that resembles a hypnotized Rabbit, and doesn’t turn on its own axis, but moves rapidly, staring at the Sun. This is Mercury, who gives it language, the capacity to communicate. As it passes the Moon, it gains something as intangible as the soul. Only then does it fall to Earth, and is immediately clothed in a body. Human, animal or vegetable. That’s the way it is. —

Act as if failure is impossible, and your success will be assured. Wipe out every thought of not achieving your objectives, whether they are material or spiritual. Be brave, and set no limits on the workings of your imagination. Never be a prisoner of your past. Become the architect of your future. You will never be the same.

In detachment lies the wisdom of uncertainty … in the wisdom of uncertainty lies the freedom from our past, from the known, which is the prison of past conditioning. And in our willingness to step into the unknown, the field of all possibilities, we surrender ourselves to the creative mind that orchestrates the dance of the universe.

That’s why I’m asking you to envision a world where men and women aren’t held hostage for their pasts, where misdeeds and mistakes don’t define you for the rest of your life. In an era of record incarcerations and a culture of violence, we can learn to love those who no longer love themselves. Together, we can begin to make things right.

Time moves only forward, never back. We look forward to a moment and then it arrives and an instant later it is gone. Like something on the surface of a river that we reached for but did not touch in time and it carried on, away. You cannot be a prisoner of your past against your will. Because you can only live in the past inside your mind.

It has nothing to do with weakness...the dementors affect you worse than the others because there are horrors in your past that the others don't have.

Learn from the past, but don't be a prisoner of it.

Freedom is a lifetime practice- a choice we get to make again and again each day. Hope allows us to live in the present instead of the past, and to unlock the doors of our mental prisons.

In The Garret Four little chests all in a row, Dim with dust, and worn by time, All fashioned and filled, long ago, By children now in their prime. Four little keys hung side by side, With faded ribbons, brave and gay When fastened there, with childish pride, Long ago, on a rainy day. Four little names, one on each lid, Carved out by a boyish hand, And underneath there lieth hid Histories of the happy band Once playing here, and pausing oft To hear the sweet refrain, That came and went on the roof aloft, In the falling summer rain. 'Meg' on the first lid, smooth and fair. I look in with loving eyes, For folded here, with well-known care, A goodly gathering lies, The record of a peaceful life-- Gifts to gentle child and girl, A bridal gown, lines to a wife, A tiny shoe, a baby curl. No toys in this first chest remain, For all are carried away, In their old age, to join again In another small Meg's play. Ah, happy mother! Well I know You hear, like a sweet refrain, Lullabies ever soft and low In the falling summer rain. 'Jo' on the next lid, scratched and worn, And within a motley store Of headless dolls, of schoolbooks torn, Birds and beasts that speak no more, Spoils brought home from the fairy ground Only trod by youthful feet, Dreams of a future never found, Memories of a past still sweet, Half-writ poems, stories wild, April letters, warm and cold, Diaries of a wilful child, Hints of a woman early old, A woman in a lonely home, Hearing, like a sad refrain-- 'Be worthy, love, and love will come,' In the falling summer rain. My Beth! the dust is always swept From the lid that bears your name, As if by loving eyes that wept, By careful hands that often came. Death canonized for us one saint, Ever less human than divine, And still we lay, with tender plaint, Relics in this household shrine-- The silver bell, so seldom rung, The little cap which last she wore, The fair, dead Catherine that hung By angels borne above her door. The songs she sang, without lament, In her prison-house of pain, Forever are they sweetly blent With the falling summer rain. Upon the last lid's polished field-- Legend now both fair and true A gallant knight bears on his shield, 'Amy' in letters gold and blue. Within lie snoods that bound her hair, Slippers that have danced their last, Faded flowers laid by with care, Fans whose airy toils are past, Gay valentines, all ardent flames, Trifles that have borne their part In girlish hopes and fears and shames, The record of a maiden heart Now learning fairer, truer spells, Hearing, like a blithe refrain, The silver sound of bridal bells In the falling summer rain. Four little chests all in a row, Dim with dust, and worn by time, Four women, taught by weal and woe To love and labor in their prime. Four sisters, parted for an hour, None lost, one only gone before, Made by love's immortal power, Nearest and dearest evermore. Oh, when these hidden stores of ours Lie open to the Father's sight, May they be rich in golden hours, Deeds that show fairer for the light, Lives whose brave music long shall ring, Like a spirit-stirring strain, Souls that shall gladly soar and sing In the long sunshine after rain

This means that the search for security and certainty is actually an attachment to the known. And what’s the known? The known is our past. The known is nothing other than the prison of past conditioning. There’s no evolution in that — absolutely none at all. And when there is no evolution, there is stagnation, entropy, disorder, and decay. Uncertainty, on the other hand, is the fertile ground of pure creativity and freedom

Wandering, ever wandering, Because life holds not anything so good As to be free of yesterday, and bound Towards a new to-morrow ; and they wend Into a world of unknown faces, where It may be there are faces waiting them, Faces of friendly strangers, not the long Intolerable monotony of friends. The joy of earth is yours, O wanderers, The only joy of the old earth, to wake, As each new dawn is patiently renewed, With foreheads fresh against a fresh young sky. To be a little further on the road, A little nearer somewhere, some few steps Advanced into the future, and removed By some few counted milestones from the past; God gives you this good gift, the only gift That God, being repentant, has to give. Wanderers, you have the sunrise and the stars; And we, beneath our comfortable roofs, Lamplight, and daily fire upon the hearth, And four walls of a prison, and sure food. But God has given you freedom, wanderers.

If you walk out now, I’m done. I will never forgive you. For any of it.” My voice is hard, enraged, pushed past the brink. He hesitates a moment and then says, “I love you, but I don’t need your forgiveness, Precious. I just need your power.

He paused. Perhaps he had a son. He intoned their names, and then he said, "I sentence you to death. The sentence shall be carried out by firing squad, at the customary time, in the execution yard of this prison, one week from today." Then Fabio asked, "Why a week?" as coolly and with as much detachment as a customer in a bank wanting to know why his funds had not cleared. The court president did not object to this unceremonious interruption, for the sentence was severe enough to cover any and all offenses, past, present, future, and imagined. His tone was friendly and somehow reassuring. "We need a little extra time for your friend Grigi." At this, the soldiers of the 19th River Guard, now condemned, began to laugh, and the gavel struck.

This is an unpopular yet essential truth. All ships that land at the shore of grace weigh anchor from the port of sin. We must start where God starts. We won’t appreciate what grace does until we understand who we are. We are rebels. We are Barabbas. Like him, we deserve to die. Four prison walls, thickened with fear, hurt, and hate, surround us. We are incarcerated by our past, our low-road choices, and our high-minded pride. We have been found guilty. We sit on the floor of the dusty cell, awaiting the final moment. Our executioner’s footsteps echo against stone walls. Head between knees, we don’t look up as he opens the door; we don’t lift our eyes as he begins to speak. We know what he is going to say. “Time to pay for your sins.” But we hear something else. “You’re free to go. They took Jesus instead of you.” The door swings open, the guard barks, “Get out,” and we find ourselves in the light of the morning sun, shackles gone, crimes pardoned, wondering, What just happened? Grace happened.

The screws are just as bad as us, maybe not now but certainly in the past they used to beat you with their riot batons, strip you naked, cuff your hands behind your backs and then take shots of kicking you in the head and body until you were knocked out.

And even if you were in some prison the walls of which let none of the sounds of the world come to your senses would you not then still have your childhood, that precious, kingly possession, that treasure-house of memories? turn your attention thither.try to raise the submerged sensations of the ample past; your personality will grow more firm, your solitude will widen and will become a dusky dwelling past which the noise of others goes by far away. And if out of this turning inward, out of this absorption into your own world verses come, then it will not occur to you to ask anyone whether they are good verses. nor will you try to interest magazines in your poems; for you will see in them your fond natural possessions, a fragment and a voice of your life.

Milo pushed the scene from his mind. He refused to think about it. Qian’s words echoed to him: “A mind that dwells in the past builds a prison it cannot escape. Control your mind, or it will control you, and you will never break through the walls it builds.

Grandma took a deep breath. “For the past couple of months, I’ve helped Zoe send letters to Marcus. Now, before you—” “You what?” Mom yelled, looking back and forth between Grandma and me. I kept my mouth shut. “You had no right!” Mom said to Grandma. Grandma crossed her arms. “A daughter should be able to know her father, even if he is in prison.” “Father.” Mom laughed. “You’re kidding, right?” “Now, listen. You never gave him a chance to be a dad to Zoe.” “As if you don’t know why!” Mom said, lifting her hands in the air. “I mean, seriously, Mom.

Oh, Mercédès, I have uttered your name with the sigh of melancholy, with the groan of sorrow, with the last effort of despair; I have uttered it when frozen with cold, crouched on the straw in my dungeon; I have uttered it, consumed with heat, rolling on the stone floor of my prison.

BOWLS OF FOOD Moon and evening star do their slow tambourine dance to praise this universe. The purpose of every gathering is discovered: to recognize beauty and love what’s beautiful. “Once it was like that, now it’s like this,” the saying goes around town, and serious consequences too. Men and women turn their faces to the wall in grief. They lose appetite. Then they start eating the fire of pleasure, as camels chew pungent grass for the sake of their souls. Winter blocks the road. Flowers are taken prisoner underground. Then green justice tenders a spear. Go outside to the orchard. These visitors came a long way, past all the houses of the zodiac, learning Something new at each stop. And they’re here for such a short time, sitting at these tables set on the prow of the wind. Bowls of food are brought out as answers, but still no one knows the answer. Food for the soul stays secret. Body food gets put out in the open like us. Those who work at a bakery don’t know the taste of bread like the hungry beggars do. Because the beloved wants to know, unseen things become manifest. Hiding is the hidden purpose of creation: bury your seed and wait. After you die, All the thoughts you had will throng around like children. The heart is the secret inside the secret. Call the secret language, and never be sure what you conceal. It’s unsure people who get the blessing. Climbing cypress, opening rose, Nightingale song, fruit, these are inside the chill November wind. They are its secret. We climb and fall so often. Plants have an inner Being, and separate ways of talking and feeling. An ear of corn bends in thought. Tulip, so embarrassed. Pink rose deciding to open a competing store. A bunch of grapes sits with its feet stuck out. Narcissus gossiping about iris. Willow, what do you learn from running water? Humility. Red apple, what has the Friend taught you? To be sour. Peach tree, why so low? To let you reach. Look at the poplar, tall but without fruit or flower. Yes, if I had those, I’d be self-absorbed like you. I gave up self to watch the enlightened ones. Pomegranate questions quince, Why so pale? For the pearl you hid inside me. How did you discover my secret? Your laugh. The core of the seen and unseen universes smiles, but remember, smiles come best from those who weep. Lightning, then the rain-laughter. Dark earth receives that clear and grows a trunk. Melon and cucumber come dragging along on pilgrimage. You have to be to be blessed! Pumpkin begins climbing a rope! Where did he learn that? Grass, thorns, a hundred thousand ants and snakes, everything is looking for food. Don’t you hear the noise? Every herb cures some illness. Camels delight to eat thorns. We prefer the inside of a walnut, not the shell. The inside of an egg, the outside of a date. What about your inside and outside? The same way a branch draws water up many feet, God is pulling your soul along. Wind carries pollen from blossom to ground. Wings and Arabian stallions gallop toward the warmth of spring. They visit; they sing and tell what they think they know: so-and-so will travel to such-and-such. The hoopoe carries a letter to Solomon. The wise stork says lek-lek. Please translate. It’s time to go to the high plain, to leave the winter house. Be your own watchman as birds are. Let the remembering beads encircle you. I make promises to myself and break them. Words are coins: the vein of ore and the mine shaft, what they speak of. Now consider the sun. It’s neither oriental nor occidental. Only the soul knows what love is. This moment in time and space is an eggshell with an embryo crumpled inside, soaked in belief-yolk, under the wing of grace, until it breaks free of mind to become the song of an actual bird, and God.

If you in fact had no gold, then your situation was hopeless. You would be beaten, burned, tortured, and steamed to the point of death or until they finally came to believe you. But if you had gold, you could determine the extent of your torture, the limits of your endurance, and your own fate. Psychologically, this situation was, incidentally, not easier but more difficult, because if you made an error you would always be ridden by a guilty conscience. Of course, anyone who had already mastered the rules of the institution would yield and give up his gold—that was easier. But it was a mistake to give it up too readily. They would refuse to believe you had coughed it all up, and they would continue to hold you. But you'd be wrong, too, to wait too long before yielding: you'd end up kicking the bucket or they'd paste a term on you out of meanness. One of the Tatar draymen endured all the tortures: he had no gold! They imprisoned his wife, too, and tortured her, but the Tatar stuck to his story: no gold! Then they arrested his daughter: the Tatar couldn't take it any more. He coughed up 100,000 rubles. At this point they let his family go, but slapped a prison term on him.

You’ll never be able to move forward until you conquer the past,” Zofia said softly. “One way or another, you’ll have to face him eventually.” She leaned forward and whispered, “Don’t be afraid to share your heart, dear one. Only then will you be able to truly heal.” Quieter, she added. “Both of you.

There was a time with his wife on this river or a river just like it, it can't be this river, but in his memory it is this one. A time on a wash just like this where he lay shirtless with her shivering in the August night, jeans pasted dark and wet to his knocking legs, his torso white to glowing in the moonlight. Her hair tendriled and framed about her face like an outlandish black tattoo. Her wet dress like a sleeve of molting skin, which of a sort it had been that whole night in their dancing. Her heart in its red and white cage knocking just inches from his own, like two young prisoners tapping out simpleton Morse I am here I am here I am here. Here I am for your pleasure for you forever. On a river like this where he impregnated her. A river promise too, he said I love you I love you. Seventeen years old. A pleasure so total that even then he knew he had mortgaged years to her and he did not care.

Kanye’s message was that focusing on the past creates a sort of mental prison that limits your options. In the simplest form, if a white male in America has ten ways to succeed and an African-American only has eight, it isn’t productive to focus on the difference. It is more productive to pick a path to success and take it.

People who are detained (held in prison) are locked up by their past, and because you are locked up by your past you are held hostage by your yesterdays. And if you are held hostage by your yesterdays, you cannot see your tomorrows. -- Rev. Earl Smith, author, Death Row Chaplain, creator of IMPACT (Incarcerated Men Putting Away Childish Things)

Most of us walk without chains, yet we aren’t free. We’re tethered to regret and sorrow from the past. We return to the past and continue to suffer. The past is a prison. But now you have the key to unlock the door and arrive in the present moment. You breathe in, you bring your mind home to your body, you make a step, and you arrive in the here and the

I want all of you,” he tells me, a newfound hunger in the depths of his green eyes that stirs heat beneath my skin. “Every piece, every memory, every minute, every inch. This isn’t going to be some casual dalliance. This isn’t going to be temporary. I want you soul, mind, and body. I want your trust and your thoughts. I want your past, your present, your future.

Ms.Mutou- I was told to write a last will, but… But even if I had possessions that were worth passing on, I have no family to give them to, So I wrote a letter to you, like always.. I never could have imagined how shocked I’d been… When I first saw you at the prison. The truth is, I’d been looking for you. On that day that my brother died and I was left alone, Even you disappeared from the television screens… I looked for you… I looked and looked… But I couldn’t find you… I’d forgotten about it… So when I saw you here at the prison… I thought that perhaps… God truly did exist… Thanks to the Thursday that I spent with you, I knew for the first time how it felt to be happy. It was something I couldn’t obtain living by myself… It felt like I understood why people live their lives mingling with others… I won’t put a brave front… And tell you to forget about me, and live your life without letting your past hold you back… I want you to remember me. Just you-… That there was a little person like me… You told me once that even though there was someone you hated enough to want to kill, you were afraid to do it and stopped. I don’t think that you stopped because you were afraid, but rather that you were brave. If I had also done so… Perhaps I could have said to you the word that I could never say… Words… That I haven’t said once… Not since I was born… Probably… Ever since then… Ever since then… I’ve loved you… Live. Even if it’s only for a day… And please find a way… To be happier than anyone else…

I believe in carpe diem (seize the day). Learn how to live in the moment. Do not become a prisoner of the past or a hostage to the future. Who you are is rooted in the past; it shapes the way you think and act. But that cannot define your future. Be ready to move on, to abandon strategies that haven’t worked, and never allow the ‘sunk cost fallacy’ to influence business decisions.

What do you mean?” “I want all of you,” he tells me, a newfound hunger in the depths of his green eyes that stirs heat beneath my skin. “Every piece, every memory, every minute, every inch. This isn’t going to be some casual dalliance. This isn’t going to be temporary. I want you soul, mind, and body. I want your trust and your thoughts. I want your past, your present, your future.

Fasting allows the Holy Spirit to reshape you into your true self by dealing with your wounds from the past that have distorted, stagnated, and stunted your essence. Negative actions and reactions are often the outcry of a hurting soul. You become the hurting that hurts and the disappointed that disappoints. Your soul becomes incarcerated in prisons of offense, resentment, and unforgiveness.

Be honest with yourself. You were at your lowest and broken down. You were unsure and lost hope. You were hiding your fears until you showed them on your sleeve. You felt like everything and everyone was the hammer and you were the nail as they were beating down on you, and it was never-ending. Their empty threats had you scared and you were always running because your weakness was exposed. You were their prey. You didn’t know who to believe because of their mixed signals. You might not see it now, but you are stronger than you can ever imagine. You cannot become comfortable in your pain. You have to let the pain that you feel turn you into a rose without thorns. There are sixteen pieces on the chessboard. The king is the most important piece, but the difference is that the queen is the most powerful piece! You are a queen, you can maneuver around your opponents; they do not have the power over your life, your mind or soul. You might think you’ve been a prisoner, but that is your past’. Look in the now and work your way to how you want your future to be. Exercise your thoughts into a pattern of letting go, and think positively about more of what you want than what you do not want. Queen! You are a queen! As a matter of fact, you are the queen! Act as if you know it! You are powerful, determined, strong, and you can make the biggest and most extravagant move and put it into action. Lights, camera, strike a pose and own it! It is yours to own! Yes, you loved and loved so much. You also lost as well, but you lost hurt, pain, agony, and confusion. You’ve lost interest in wanting to know answers to unanswered questions. You’ve lost the willingness to give a shit about what others think. You’ve surrendered to being fine, that you cannot change the things you have no control over. You’ve lost a lot, but you’ve gained closure. You are now balanced, centered, focused, and filled with peace surrounding you in your heart, mind, body, and soul. Your pride was hurt, but you would rather walk alone and be more willing to give and learn more about the queen you are. You lost yourself in the process, but the more you learn about the new you, the more you will be so much in love with yourself. The more you learn about the new you, the more you will know your worth. The more you learn about the new you, the happier you are going to be, and this time around you will be smiling inside and out! The dots are now connecting. You feel alive! You know now that all is not lost. Now that you’ve cut the cord it is time to give your heart a second chance at loving yourself. Silence your mind. Take a deep breath and close your eyes. As you open your eyes, look at your reflection in the mirror. Aren’t you beautiful, Queen? Embrace who you are. Smile, laugh, welcome the new you and say, “My world is just now beginning.

Forgiveness isn’t something we do for the person who’s hurt us. It’s something we do for ourselves, so we’re no longer victims or prisoners of the past, so we can stop carrying a burden that harbors nothing but pain. Another misconception about forgiveness is that the way to make peace with someone who has harmed us is to say, “I’m done with her.” It doesn’t work that way. It’s not about cutting someone out. It’s about letting go.

And if you were in some prison the walls of which let none of the sounds of the world come to your senses—would you not then still have your childhood, that precious, kingly possession, that treasure-house of memories? Turn your attention thither. Try to raise the submerged sensations of that ample past; your personality will grow more firm, your solitude will widen and will become a dusky dwelling past which the noise of others goes by far away.

And even if you were in some prison the walls of which let none of the sounds of the world come to your senses—would you not then still have your childhood, that precious, kingly possession, that treasure-house of memories? Turn your attention thither. Try to raise the submerged sensations of that ample past; your personality will grow more firm, your solitude will widen and will become a dusky dwelling past which the noise of others goes by far away.

So what is the answer? How can you stand your ground when you are weak and sensitive to pain, when people you love are still alive, when you are unprepared? What do you need to make you stronger than the Interrogator and the whole trap? From the moment you go to prison you must put your cozy past firmly behind you. At the very threshold, you must say to yourself: "My life is over, a little early to be sure, but there's nothing to be done about it. I shall never return to freedom. I am condemned to die—now or a little later. But later on, in truth, it will be even harder, and so the sooner the better. I no longer have any property whatsoever. For me those I love have died, and for them I have died. From today on, my body is useless and alien to me. Only my spirit and my conscience remain precious and important to me." Confronted by such a prisoner, the Interrogation will tremble. Only the man who has renounced everything can win that victory.

He was stricken anew by her, overcome with the knowledge that in the morning he would have to relinquish her. In Prison 33, little by little, you relinquished everything, starting with your tomorrows and all that might be. Next went your past, and suddenly it was inconceivable that your head had ever touched a pillow, that you'd once used a spoon or a toilet, that your mouth had once known flavors and your eyes had beheld colors beyond gray and brown and the shade of black that blood took on. Before you relinquished yourself--Ga had felt it starting, like the numb of cold limbs--you let go of all the others, each person you'd once known. They became ideas and then notions and then impressions, and then they were as ghostly as projections against a prison infirmary. Sun Moon appeared to him now like this, not as a woman, vital and beautiful, making an instrument speak her sorrow, but as the flicker of someone once known, a photo of a person long gone.

We are products of our past, but we don’t have to be prisoners of it. God’s purpose is not limited by your past. He turned a murderer named Moses into a leader and a coward named Gideon into a courageous hero, and he can do amazing things with the rest of your life, too. God specializes in giving people a fresh start. The Bible says, “What happiness for those whose guilt has been forgiven! … What relief for those who have confessed their sins and God has cleared their record.”2

These hours before first light were merciless. You could not go back to sleep and it was too early to get up and the things you had done or not done lay in your mind immovable as misshapen things you’d erected from stone. There was no give to these hours. They took no prisoners, made no compromises, and the things you had done could not be rationalized into anything save things you had done. The past was bitter and dry and ashes in his mouth, its bone arms clasped him like some old desiccated lover he could not be shut of.

I feel some nostalgia for the old red buses of the past that you could hop on and off at will. Nowadays the only way out of a bus is a door you can't open with your own hands. How smugly proud we are of our new-found freedoms in the West - always bragging about them and trying to export them further afield - and yet every year some sly little technological theft of our autonomy is surreptitiously introduced into everyday life. I mean, what better definition of prison is there than an enclosed space whose door you can't open with your own hands?

YOU WISH TO KNOW ME? POSIT YOURSELF AS THE PINPOINT CENTER OF ONE OF YOUR KALEIDOSCOPES, AND GRASP TIME AS THE COLORFUL FRAGMENTS ERUPTING FROM YOU IN A MULTITUDE OF DIMENSIONS THAT CONSTANTLY EXPAND OUTWARD IN AN EVER-WIDENING, EVER-SHIFTING, INFINITE ARRAY. SEE THAT YOU CAN CHOOSE AND EXPAND FROM ANY OF THOSE UNCOUNTABLE DIMENSIONS AND THAT, WITH EACH CHOICE, THOSE DIMENSIONS WIDEN AND SHIFT AGAIN. INFINITY COMPOUNDED EXPONENTIALLY. UNDERSTAND THAT THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS REALITY: THE FALSE GOD YOUR RACE WORSHIPS WITH SUCH BLIND DEVOTION. REALITY IMPLIES A SINGLE POSSIBLE. YOU ACCUSE ME OF ILLUSION. YOU—WITH YOUR ABSURD CONSTRUCT OF LINEAR TIME. YOU FASHION FOR YOURSELF A PRISON OF WATCHES, CLOCKS, AND CALENDARS. YOU RATTLE BARS FORGED OF HOURS AND DAYS, BUT YOU’VE PADLOCKED THE DOOR WITH PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE. PUNY MINDS NEED PUNY CAVES. YOU CANNOT GAZE UPON TIME’S TRUE FACE ANY MORE THAN YOU CAN BEHOLD MINE. TO APPREHEND YOURSELF AS THE CENTER, TO SIMULTANEOUSLY PERCEIVE ALL COMBINATIONS OF ALL POSSIBLES, SHOULD YOU CHOOSE TO MOVE IN ANY DIRECTION—“DIRECTION” BEING A VERY LIMITED METHOD OF ATTEMPTING TO CONVEY A CONCEPT FOR WHICH YOUR RACE HAS NO WORD—THAT IS WHAT IT IS TO BE ME.

There were setbacks, but over the next century Russia would push past the Urals and edge into Siberia, eventually incorporating all the land to the Pacific coast far to the east. Now the Russians had a partial buffer zone and a hinterland – strategic depth – somewhere to fall back to in the case of invasion. No one was going to attack them in force from the Arctic Sea, nor fight their way over the Urals to get to them. Their land was becoming what we know now as Russia, and to get to it from the south or south-east you had to have a huge army, a very long supply line, and fight your way past defensive positions.

From the moment you go to prison you must put your cozy past firmly behind you. At the very threshold, you must say to yourself: “My life is over, a little early to be sure, but there’s nothing to be done about it. I shall never return to freedom. I am condemned to die—now or a little later. But later on, in truth, it will be even harder, and so the sooner the better. I no longer have any property whatsoever. For me those I love have died, and for them I have died. From today on, my body is useless and alien to me. Only my spirit and my conscience remain precious and important to me.” Confronted by such a prisoner, the interrogation will tremble.

Sun Dance makes me strong. Sun Dance takes place inside of me, not outside of me. I pierce the flesh of my being. I offer my flesh to the Great Spirit, the Great Mystery, Wakan Tanka. To give your flesh to Spirit is to give your life. And what you have given you can no longer lose. Sun Dance is our religion, our strength. We take great pride in that strength, which enables us to resist pain, torture, any trial rather than betray the People. That's why, in the past, when the enemy tortured us with knives, bullwhips, even fire, we were able to withstand the pain. That strength still exists among us. When you give your flesh, when you're pierced in Sun Dance, you feel every bit of that pain, every iota. Not one jot is spared you. And yet there is a separation, a detachment, a greater mind that you become part of, so that you both feel the pain and see yourself feeling the pain. And then, somehow, the pain becomes contained, limited. As the white-hot sun pours molten through your eyes into your inner being, as the skewers implanted in your chest pull and yank and rip at your screaming flesh, a strange and powerful lucidity gradually expands within your mind. The pain explodes into a bright white light, into revelation. You are given a wordless vision of what it is to be in touch with all Being and all beings. And for the rest of your life, once you have made that sacrifice of your flesh to the Great Mystery, you will never forget that greater reality of which we are each an intimate and essential part and which holds each of us in an embrace as loving as mother's arms. Every time a pin pricks your finger from then on, that little pain will be but a tiny reminder of that larger pain and of the still greater reality that exists within each of us, an infinite realm beyond reach of all pain. There even the most pitiable prisoner can find solace. So Sun Dance made even prison life sustainable for me. I am undestroyed. My life is my Sun Dance.

All this is happening right next to you; you can almost touch it, but it's invisible ... At the big stations the loading and unloading of the dirty faces takes place far, far from the passenger platform and is seen only by switchmen and roadbed inspectors ... And you, hurrying along the platform with your children, your suitcases, and your string bags, are too busy to look closely ... The train starts - and a hundred crowded prisoner destinies, tormented hearts, are borne along the same snaky rails, behind the same smoke, past the same fields, posts, and haystacks as you ...You are dissatisfied because there are four of you in your compartment and it is crowded. And could you possibly believe ... that in the same size compartment as yours, but up ahead in that zak car, there are fourteen people? ... And if there are thirty? And ... why should a Soviet soldier have to carry water ... for enemies of the people? It isn't done especially to torture people. A sentenced prisoner is a laboring soldier of socialism, so why should he be tortured? They need him for construction work. But ... there is no reason in the world to treat him so well that people out in freedom would envy him ... Look around you ... Thin strands of human lives stretch from island to island of the Archipelago. They intertwine, touch one another for one night only in just such a clickety-clacking half-dark car as this ...

If your everyday life appears to be unworthy subject matter, do not complain to life. Complain to yourself. Lament that you are not poet enough to call up its wealth. For the creative artist there is no poverty—nothing is insignificant or unimportant. Even if you were in a prison whose walls would shut out from your senses the sounds of the outer world, would you not then still have your childhood, this precious wealth, this treasure house of memories? Direct your attention to that. Attempt to resurrect these sunken sensations of a distant past. You will gain assuredness. Your aloneness will expand and will become your home, greeting you like the quiet dawn. Outer tumult will pass it by from afar.

I beg your earnest attention, mademoiselle, for what I say concerning THE RARE FEW WITH WHOM THE SOUL IS EVERYTHING. YOU are one of those few, unless I am greatly in error. And you have sacrificed your body so utterly to your spirit that the flesh rebels and suffers. This will not do. You have work before you in the world, and you cannot perform it unless you have bodily health as well as spiritual desire. And why? Because you are a prisoner here on earth, and you must obey the laws of the prison, however unpleasant they may be to you. Were you free as you have been in ages past and as you will be in ages to come, things would be different; but at present you must comply with the orders of your gaolers — the Lords of Life and Death.

The errors of a lifetime can be corrected today…Every strong resolution you make with great determination can become a habit at once…Away with all your faults! Review your actions of the past year. See what troublesome habits you may have displayed…Make up your minds today and know that you are not going to do these things again. God has given you the power to dynamite all your troubles. “Beware O ye mountains, stand not in my way! Your ribs will be shattered and tattered today!” A great swami Ram Tirtha wrote those words. “I hitch to my chariot the fates and the Gods!” …we can hitch to the chariot of our will the prisoners of habits and drive them, instead of letting them drive us. To be able to do the things that we know we should do, not merely the things we whimsically want to do, is to be really free.

Describe all these with heartfelt, silent, humble sincerity and, when you express yourself, use the Things around you, the images from your dreams, and the objects that you remember. If your everyday life seems poor, don't blame it; blame yourself; admit to yourself that you are not enough of a poet to call forth its riches; because for the creator there is no poverty and no poor, indifferent place. And even if you found yourself in some prison, whose walls let in none of the world's sound - wouldn't you still have your childhood, that jewel beyond all price, that treasure house of memories? Turn your attention to it. Try to raise up the sunken feelings of this enormous past; your personality will grow stronger, your solitude will expand and become a place where you can live in the twilight, where the noise of other people passes by, far in the distance. And if out of , this turning within, out of this immersion in your own world, poems come, then you will not think of asking anyone whether they are good or not. Nor will you try to interest magazines in these works: for you will see them as your dear natural possession, a piece of your life, a voice from it. A work of art is good if it has arisen out of necessity. That is the only way one can judge it. So, dear Sir, I can't give you any advice but this: to go into yourself and see how deep the place is from which your life flows; at its source you will find the answer to, the question of whether you must create. Accept that answer, just as it is given to you, without trying to interpret it. Perhaps you will discover that you are called to be an artist. Then take that destiny upon yourself, and bear it, its burden and its greatness, without ever asking what reward might come from outside. For the creator must be a world for himself and must find everything in himself and in Nature, to whom his whole life is devoted.

...the more of us who understand the game and see through the lie and forge ahead in support of every other woman's right to a passionate response to life, the more we will hasten the end of our jail term. Women have been imprisoned for ages, and in our cells, our hearts, we have carried our true feelings like sleeping children, our spiritual issuance, our love. The prison walls are melting. We're almost out. And when we fly free, we will carry with us such gifts to the outside world. Our gifts haven't atrophied; they have grown in power. They have been waiting for centuries, and so have we. Let's keep our eyes on the sky. They'll throw tomatoes; they'll lie about us and try to discredit us. When we rise, they'll try to undermine us. But when they do, we'll remember the truth and bless our enemies and find strength in God. The regime of oppression is almost over; its life force is waning, and only its ghost remains. Don't tarry too long to mourn its effects; celebrate and rejoice in the new. The past is over. Wipe the dirt off your feet.

Sometimes a sanctuary, sometimes a prison, that house on the hill has always been my home. I've spent my life yearning toward it, wanting to escapt it, paralyzed by its hold on me. (There are many ways to be crippled, I've learned over the years, many forms of paralysis.) Some sense memories fade as soon as they're past. Others are etched in your mind for the rest of your life. We should've sold this house when we had the chance. You're the inmate and I'm the warden. The words hand in the air between us. But as long as neither of us mentions them, we can pretend they were never said. The older I get, the more I believe that the greatest kindness is acceptance. There are many ways to love and be loved. Too bad it's taken most of a lifetime for me to understand what that means. Wyeth: Christina's World--The painting is more a psychological landscape than a portrait, a portrayal of a state of mind rather than a place. Like the house, like the landscape, she perseveres. As an embodiment of the strength of the American character, she is vibrant, pulsating, immortal.

Matthias was in the dark. And it wasn’t the kind of dark that came with a room that didn’t have any lights on or when you were walking around at night in the country. This was not even the kind you got when you shut your eyes and wrapped your head in a blanket. This was the one that seeped in through your skin and filled the spaces between your molecules, the one that polluted your flesh into a permanent state of rotting, the one that wiped clean your past and your future, suspending you in a choking, adhesive solution of sorrow and despair. He was not alone in this horrible prison. As he writhed in the weightless void, others did the same, their voices mixing with his own as pleas escaped from cracked lips and the endless begging for mercy rose and fell like the breathing of a great beast. From time to time, he was chosen for special attention, clawed monsters with fanged maws latching on, yanking and pulling. The wounds they imparted always healed as quickly as they were wrought, providing an ever-fresh canvas for their masticating artwork. Time had no meaning; nor did age. And he knew he was never getting out. This was his due. This was his eternal payment for the way he had lived his life: He had earned this place in Hell through his sins upon the earth, and yet still, he argued the unfairness to the others he was trapped with. Tough debate, though. There was little on the good side to support his bid for freedom; more to the point, nobody was listening.

At first I didn’t think I was going to be able to make it on the outside at all. I’ve described prison society as a scaled-down model of your outside world, but I had no idea of how fast things moved on the outside; the raw speed people move at. They even talk faster. And louder. It was the toughest adjustment I’ve ever had to make, and I haven’t finished making it yet . . . not by a long way. Women, for instance. After hardly knowing that they were half of the human race for forty years, I was suddenly working in a store filled with them. Old women, pregnant women wearing tee-shirts with arrows pointing downward and a printed motto reading BABY HERE, skinny women with their nipples poking out at their shirts—a woman wearing something like that when I went in would have gotten arrested and then had a sanity hearing—women of every shape and size. I found myself going around with a semi-hard almost all the time and cursing myself for being a dirty old man. Going to the bathroom, that was another thing. When I had to go (and the urge always came on me at twenty-five past the hour), I had to fight the almost overwhelming need to check it with my boss. Knowing that was something I could just go and do in this too-bright outside world was one thing; adjusting my inner self to that knowledge after all those years of checking it with the nearest screwhead or facing two days in solitary for the oversight . . . that was something else. My boss didn’t like me. He was a young guy, twenty-six or -seven, and I could see that I sort of disgusted him,

admit to yourself that you are not enough of a poet to call forth its riches; because for the creator there is no poverty and no poor, indifferent place. And even if you found yourself in some prison, whose walls let in none of the world's sound - wouldn't you still have your childhood, that jewel beyond all price, that treasure house of memories? Turn your attention to it. Try to raise up the sunken feelings of this enormous past; your personality will grow stronger, your solitude will expand and become a place where you can live in the twilight, where the noise of other people passes by, far in the distance. And if out of , this turning within, out of this immersion in your own world, poems come, then you will not think of asking anyone whether they are good or not. Nor will you try to interest magazines in these works: for you will see them as your dear natural possession, a piece of your life, a voice from it. A work of art is good if it has arisen out of necessity. That is the only way one can judge it. So, dear Sir, I can't give you any advice but this: to go into yourself and see how deep the place is from which your life flows; at its source you will find the answer to, the question of whether you must create. Accept that answer, just as it is given to you, without trying to interpret it. Perhaps you will discover that you are called to be an artist. Then take that destiny upon yourself, and bear it, its burden and its greatness, without ever asking what reward might come from outside. For the creator must be a world for himself and must find everything in himself and in Nature, to whom his whole life is devoted.

Expansion or Extinction Identity is selfishness, heritage is selfishness, culture is selfishness, that is, the way these constructs have been sustained in society all this time. All this time things have been going on like this - my identity versus all others - my heritage versus all others - my culture versus all others. And such behavior has only fostered a paradigm of division. This must change - from division to unison. And how will it happen? We gotta perform a complete overhaul of notions of identity, heritage and culture. We gotta turn each of them from a prison into a path. In simple terms, we gotta humanize them all - we gotta make them more about people than anything else - more about the people of the present and future than those of the past. We gotta make them about life, not habits, beliefs and rituals. One may wonder, aren't habits, beliefs and rituals also life! No they ain't - they are part of life, a microscopic part at that, but not life itself. So first and foremost, feel, think and walk past habits, beliefs and rituals, of your ancestors as well as your own. Expansion, expansion, expansion - only way forward is expansion. If you are afraid that your ancestors would be offended at your expansion, then let me tell you this. It's better to have no ancestor than to have one offended at your expansion. All our ancestors made this mistake. They were all against expansion. Make not the same mistake my friend. Expand yourself, and encourage the children towards further expansion. Encourage them to surpass you, instead of sentencing them to the prison of your own beliefs and notions. Without expansion there ain't gonna be no earth left, that is, one fit for human existence. And to be honest, the day is not far when planet earth will be absolutely unfit for human existence, both psychologically and physically.

No one can advise or help you- no one. There is only one thing you should do. Go into yourself. Find out the reasons that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depth of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write. This most of all: ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write? Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple “I must,” then build your life in accordance with this necessity; your whole life, even into its humblest and most indifferent hour, must become a sign and witness to this impulse. Then come close to Nature. Then, as if no one had ever tried before, try to say what you see and feel and love and lose. Don’t write love poems; avoid those forms that are too facile and ordinary: they are the hardest to work with, and it takes a great, fully ripened power to create something individual where good, even glorious, traditions exist in abundance. So rescue yourself from these general themes and write about what your everyday life offers you; describe your sorrows and desires, the thoughts that pass through your mind and your belief in some kind of beauty- describe all these with heartfelt silent, humble sincerity and, when you express yourself, use the Things around you, the images from your dreams, and the objects that you remember. If your everyday life seems poor, don’t blame it; blame yourself; admit to yourself that you are not enough of a poet to call forth its riches; because for the creator there is no poverty and no poor, indifferent place. And even if you found yourself in some prison, whose walls let in none of the world’s sounds- wouldn’t you still have your childhood, that jewel beyond all price, that treasure home of memories? Turn your attention to it. Try to raise up the sunken feelings of this enormous past; your personality will grow stronger, your solitude will expand and become a place where you can live in the twilight, where the noise of other people passes by, far in the distance.

On many occasions in our nearly thirty years of marriage my wife and I have had a disagreement—sometimes a deep disagreement. Our unity appeared to be broken, at some unknowably profound level, and we were not able to easily resolve the rupture by talking. We became trapped, instead, in emotional, angry and anxious argument. We agreed that when such circumstances arose we would separate, briefly: she to one room, me to another. This was often quite difficult, because it is hard to disengage in the heat of an argument, when anger generates the desire to defeat and win. But it seemed better than risking the consequences of a dispute that threatened to spiral out of control. Alone, trying to calm down, we would each ask ourselves the same single question: What had we each done to contribute to the situation we were arguing about? However small, however distant…we had each made some error. Then we would reunite, and share the results of our questioning: Here’s how I was wrong…. The problem with asking yourself such a question is that you must truly want the answer. And the problem with doing that is that you won’t like the answer. When you are arguing with someone, you want to be right, and you want the other person to be wrong. Then it’s them that has to sacrifice something and change, not you, and that’s much preferable. If it’s you that’s wrong and you that must change, then you have to reconsider yourself—your memories of the past, your manner of being in the present, and your plans for the future. Then you must resolve to improve and figure out how to do that. Then you actually have to do it. That’s exhausting. It takes repeated practice, to instantiate the new perceptions and make the new actions habitual. It’s much easier just not to realize, admit and engage. It’s much easier to turn your attention away from the truth and remain wilfully blind. But it’s at such a point that you must decide whether you want to be right or you want to have peace.216 You must decide whether to insist upon the absolute correctness of your view, or to listen and negotiate. You don’t get peace by being right. You just get to be right, while your partner gets to be wrong—defeated and wrong. Do that ten thousand times and your marriage will be over (or you will wish it was). To choose the alternative—to seek peace—you have to decide that you want the answer, more than you want to be right. That’s the way out of the prison of your stubborn preconceptions. That’s the prerequisite for negotiation. That’s to truly abide by the principle of Rule 2 (Treat yourself like someone you are responsible for helping).

Then he was striding toward me. His mesmerizing gaze pinned me in place as he cupped my face. When his lips covered mine, I gasped. He took the opportunity to deepen the kiss, groaning into the contact. His hands tightened on my face. His sexy groans made my toes curl, muddling my thoughts. Block that out! I was Aric’s wife. I’d wronged him in the past, had consigned him to misery for hundreds—no, thousands—of years. I needed to make this right. Like penance. There was something vaguely threatening about his words. Misgivings about this arose. Too fast. “If you have feelings for him, fight them,” Aric commanded me. “By going to him, you’d be stoking them once more. Don’t you understand? He can find another woman—I cannot. If you choose him, you’ll be consigning me to a hellish fate. As you’ve done again and again. No, this will be even worse, because I’ve had a greater glimpse of what I’ll be missing.” “I just want to talk to him. I’m leaving this weekend,” I said in an unwavering voice. “No, you will not.” His arrogant demeanor back in place, he said, “Understand me, I’m not surrendering the one woman who was born for me alone. Not to a human, not to anyone.” “You can’t keep me here against my will any longer. What are you going to do? Put that cuff back on me?” I held up my hand to stop him. “I understand why you did it. But I won’t be a prisoner anymore.” He snatched up his shirt, threading his arms into the sleeves. “You say you keep your promises now? You made a vow before gods to be my wife. In this life, you will keep your promises to me—before you ever honor one to him!” “You can’t stop me from leaving. I have my powers back. I earned my powers back.” With a cruel curve of his lips, he said, “You promised never to harm me, Empress. Know that you’ll have to kill me before I would ever let you go.” As he strode out the door, I said, “And know that you’ll have to put that cilice on me to keep me prisoner again.” He whirled around, fury in his expression. “You refused—twice—to beg me for your own life, but you’d beg for his?” I whispered, “Yes.” With a calculating gleam in his eyes, he said, “This isn’t an impossible task you ask of me. I could call in ancient favors, contact old allies. They could be here in mere hours. We’d ride out as one.” “T-truly?” “On one condition: you’ll become my wife in truth, mine in every way. Beginning tonight. Comply, and I’ll take on an army for you.” My lips parted with shock. “How can you do this to me?” “Deveaux is lost to you in one way or another. He’ll either be slaughtered by the Lovers—or saved by my female, by her sacrifice.” He offered his hand. “Come with me, and begin this.” “Don’t, Aric! Don’t destroy what I do feel for you.” “I’ll take”—he seized my hand, yanking me close—“what I can get.” Despite myself, I shivered from the contact, from his husky voice. His hold on me was firm, proprietary. Because he believed I was about to become his. The red witch in me whispered, Death thinks he has you at his mercy. But the Empress doesn’t get collared or caged—or controlled. Take his head and pay the Tower. Shut up! “Please, Aric. I’ll grow to hate you for this. I don’t want to feel that way about you. Never again. Don’t force me to do this.” “Force?” Unmoved, he led me toward his bedroom. “I’m not forcing you to do anything. Just as you can’t force me to save your lover’s life. We each make sacrifices to get what we want.” With my heart pounding, I crossed the threshold into his dark world. Black walls, black ceiling, black night beyond his windows. Yet outside I thought I saw . . . a single fluttering snowflake. Like a sign.

Deprive a cat of sleep and it would die in two weeks. Deprive a human and he would become psychotic. His work was killing people. How was he supposed to frighten these guys? Run up behind them in a halloween mask and shout boo? He never saw the point of views -- what did it matter if it was an ocean or a brick wall you were looking at? People travelled hundreds, sometimes thousands of miles to commit suicide someplace with a beautiful view. Did a view matter when oblivion beckoned? They could put him in a garbage bin after he was gone, for all he cared. That's all the human race was anyway. Garbage with attitude. A cutting word is worse than a bowstring. A cut may heal but a cut of the tongue does not. The Sakawa students were all from poor, underprivileged backgrounds. Sakawa was a mix of religious juju and modern internet technology. They were taught, in structured classes, the art of online fraud as well as arcane African rituals -- which included animal sacrifice -- to have a voodoo effect on their victims, ensuring the success of each fraud. of which there was a wide variety. The British Empire spend five hundred years plundering the world. The word is 'thanks'. 'That's what it is, Roy! He won't come out, he has locked the doors! What if he self-harms, Roy! I mean -- what if he kills himself?' 'I will have to take him off my Christmas list.' "Any chance you can recover any of it?' 'You sitting near a window, Gerry?' 'Near a window? Sure, right by a window?' 'Can you see the sky?' 'Uh-huh. Got a clear view.' 'See any pigs flying past?' To dream of death is good for those in fear, for the death have no more fears. '...Cleo took me to the opera once. I spent the whole time praying for a fat lady to come on stage and start singing. Or a heart attack --whichever come sooner.' '..there is something strongly powerful -- almost magnetic -- about internet romances. A connection that is far stronger than a traditional meeting of two people. Maybe because on the internet you can lie all the time, each person gives the other their good side. It's intoxicating. That's one of the things which makes it so dangerous -- and such easy pickings for fraudsters.' He was more than a little pleased that he was about to ruin his boss's morning -- and, with a bit of luck, his entire day. ..a guy who had been born angry and had just got even angrier with each passing year. '...Then at some point in the future, I'll probably die in an overcrowded hospital corridor with some bloody hung-over medical student jumping up and down on my chest because they couldn't find a defibrillator. 'Give me your hand, bro,' the shorter one said. 'That one, the right one, yeah.' On the screen the MasterChef contestant said, 'Now with a sharp knife...' Jules de Copland drove away from Gatwick Airport in.a new car, a small Kia, hired under a different name and card, from a different rental firm, Avis. 'I was talking about her attitude. But I'll tell you this, Roy. The day I can't say a woman -- or a man -- is plug ugly, that's the day I want to be taken out and shot.' It seems to me the world is in a strange place where everyone chooses to be offended all the time. 'But not too much in the way of brains,' GlennBranson chipped in. 'Would have needed the old Specialist Search Unite to find any trace of them.' 'Ever heard of knocking on a door?' 'Dunno that film -- was it on Netflix?' 'One word, four letters. Begins with an S for Sierra, ends with a T for Tango. Or if you'd like the longest version, we've been one word, six letters, begins with F for Foxtrot, ends with D for Delta.' No Cop liked entering a prison. In general there was a deep cultural dislike of all police officers by the inmates. And every officer entering.a prison, for whatever purposes, was always aware that if a riot kicked off while they were there, they could be both an instant hostage and a prime target for violence.

Every once in a while, you experience a rough night like this: In the dead of night you rise from deep sleep, not jolted awake by a terrifying nightmare, but rather emerging softly from the mist of your dreams. Straddling the fault line between reality and the subconscious world, you wander space and time, reconnecting with people and places of your past. When you least suspect it, a magical door opens on a treacherous landing that lures you down a trail best left unexplored—one that trespasses on secret dead ends strewn with pieces of your own broken heart and shattered dreams from days gone by. Trapped in this time warp, an unwitting prisoner of the past, you find yourself sinking in the quicksand of nostalgia and regret, reliving heartaches and disenchantments of younger years.

You are not a prisoner of your past; you are the architect of your future.

Milo pushed the scene from his mind. He refused to think about it. Qian’s words echoed to him: “A mind that dwells in the past builds a prison it cannot escape. Control your mind, or it will control you, and you will never

If you guys only knew how horny most females are on the daily, you’d cover your dicks and run, screaming out, ‘Save yourself!’ to every male you scurried past.

But the point Sartre wanted his audience to get was that each of them was as free as the student, even if their predicaments were less dramatic. You might think you are guided by moral laws, he was saying to them, or that you act in certain ways because of your psychological make-up or past experiences, or because of what is happening around you. These factors can play a role, but the whole mixture merely adds up to the ‘situation’ out of which you must act. Even if the situation is unbearable — perhaps you are facing execution, or sitting in a Gestapo prison, or about to fall off a cliff — you are still free to decide what to make of it in mind and deed. Starting from where you are now, you choose. And in choosing, you also choose who you will be. If this sounds difficult and unnerving, it’s because it is. Sartre does not deny that the need to keep making decisions brings constant anxiety. He heightens this anxiety by pointing out that what you do really matters. You should make your choices as though you were choosing on behalf of the whole of humanity, taking the entire burden of responsibility for how the human race behaves. If you avoid this responsibility by fooling yourself that you are the victim of circumstance or of someone else’s bad advice, you are failing to meet the demands of human life and choosing a fake existence, cut off from your own ‘authenticity’.

Being offended, upset, and frustrated over what didn’t work out will only keep you in mediocrity. It’s time to drop it and move forward. You may be a product of your past, but you don’t have to be a prisoner of your past.

When you live in a world that is unsupportive and outright threatening—in the education system, prison system, health care system, and most workplaces—you are existing in an almost constant state of trauma.

There is not one question in the ACEs test about overt racism—such as discrimination and abuse, which are obvious forms of racial trauma—let alone any reference to the subtler, more pervasive and harmful forms of bigotry and bias that exist in the infrastructure of society. When you live in a world that is unsupportive and outright threatening—in the education system, prison system, health care system, and most workplaces—you are existing in an almost constant state of trauma. Marginalized groups, especially BIPOC, are navigating systemic oppression, discriminatory laws, and a prejudicial framework that may place them squarely into “a state of relative helplessness,” the essence of Scaer’s definition of trauma.

Start being an imaginationalist—one of those rare individuals who leads from the nobility of your future versus via the prison bars of your past.

The third couple stepped forward for ministry, and again the word of knowledge was present. The prophet spoke to the husband, revealing his past, present, and insight into his future. Then the man of God turned to this third minister’s wife. As he began to speak of her past, suddenly he stopped. “There was a very serious sin in your past.” The woman, with her worst fear upon her, turned pale and closed her eyes. The congregation hushed and moved to the edge of their seats. The prophet continued, “And I asked the Lord, ‘What was this sin that she committed?’ And the Lord answered, ‘I do not remember!’” The Lord had been faithful to His promise: “I will not remember your sins” (Isa. 43:25). Although many times this minister’s wife had asked for cleansing, still she could not believe the depth of God’s forgiveness. Christ had placed her sin in the sea of His forgetfulness. He removed it “as far as the east is from the west” (Ps. 103:12). From everywhere but the prison of her own mind, her sin had been paid for and removed. And now, in His great mercy, He removed it from there as well!

The third couple stepped forward for ministry, and again the word of knowledge was present. The prophet spoke to the husband, revealing his past, present, and insight into his future. Then the man of God turned to this third minister’s wife. As he began to speak of her past, suddenly he stopped. “There was a very serious sin in your past.” The woman, with her worst fear upon her, turned pale and closed her eyes. The congregation hushed and moved to the edge of their seats. The prophet continued, “And I asked the Lord, ‘What was this sin that she committed?’ And the Lord answered, ‘I do not remember!’” The Lord had been faithful to His promise: “I will not remember your sins” (Isa. 43:25). Although many times this minister’s wife had asked for cleansing, still she could not believe the depth of God’s forgiveness. Christ had placed her sin in the sea of His forgetfulness. He removed it “as far as the east is from the west” (Ps. 103:12). From everywhere but the prison of her own mind, her sin had been paid for and removed. And now, in His great mercy, He removed it from there as well! Oh, what burdens we carry; what guilt and limitations surround us because we do not accept God’s total and perfect forgiveness. In Isaiah we read, “I, even I, am the one who wipes out your transgressions for My own sake, and I will not remember your sins” (Isa. 43:25).

The third couple stepped forward for ministry, and again the word of knowledge was present. The prophet spoke to the husband, revealing his past, present, and insight into his future. Then the man of God turned to this third minister’s wife. As he began to speak of her past, suddenly he stopped. “There was a very serious sin in your past.” The woman, with her worst fear upon her, turned pale and closed her eyes. The congregation hushed and moved to the edge of their seats. The prophet continued, “And I asked the Lord, ‘What was this sin that she committed?’ And the Lord answered, ‘I do not remember!’” The Lord had been faithful to His promise: “I will not remember your sins” (Isa. 43:25). Although many times this minister’s wife had asked for cleansing, still she could not believe the depth of God’s forgiveness. Christ had placed her sin in the sea of His forgetfulness. He removed it “as far as the east is from the west” (Ps. 103:12). From everywhere but the prison of her own mind, her sin had been paid for and removed. And now, in His great mercy, He removed it from there as well! Oh, what burdens we carry; what guilt and limitations surround us because we do not accept God’s total and perfect forgiveness. In Isaiah we read, “I, even I, am the one who wipes out your transgressions for My own sake, and I will not remember your sins” (Isa. 43:25). How great is the God we serve. How wonderful is His love toward us. He is our Redeemer, our Savior! If you are willing to forgive others and will but ask Him to forgive you, He will pardon your debts as often as you contritely turn to Him. He promises He will remember your sins no more.

Don't be a prisoner of your past, it was a lesson not a life sentence.

When faced with a problem in a relationship, it will never be solved if you begin by asking, “Why can’t he understand me?” or “Why won’t he just do what I say?” It is because this approach begins with a demand. Instead, begin by asking, “What is it that makes him unhappy and feel misunderstood?” or “What past experience is making him respond in this way?” When you begin with the intention of understanding him, your heart is released from the prison of your views and opens up to feel his pain. People who easily ignore others do so because they are afraid of being ignored.

Never be a prisoner of your past. It was just a lesson, not a life sentence.” And later: “It’s not all sunshine & rainbows but a good amount of it actually is.

heat beneath my skin. “Every piece, every memory, every minute, every inch. This isn’t going to be some casual dalliance. This isn’t going to be temporary. I want you soul, mind, and body. I want your trust and your thoughts. I want your past, your present, your future. So make very certain that you want me for the right reasons. Be certain that you’re choosing this, because once you do, there’s no turning back.

Faceless... Without any origin point, And yet thou hast given me a radius, Thou hast given me boundaries and a centre, Thou hast given a certain Gamut of expressions, Ratio and extremes, Thou hast given me a familiar magnitude, Thou hast given me spirit And a Hybrid visage, Thou hast given me amoeba-like traits, Thou hast given me genders, Thou hast given me everything Ye deemed imaginable! Yhou hast even given me a Name... Several through the AEons, actually. Many aspects ye wear as lustrous ornaments; same is Flesh a garment. Where are thou going, son of man? There is no escaping me, Yet I am no prison. Art thou free, son of man? From me, nobody is safe, Yet I am true freedom. Aim high, and I will be down below. Lay low, and I will hover high above. Stand still, and I shall circle around thee. Breathe, and I shall coil around your neck. Seek me out, and dissolve back to Sleep. What art thou, son of man? This bliss I give. But bliss I do not share; In this sense I am fair. My words may be Wisdom, But forever shall raise more questions... In this respect - I am perfect

We all live in the past. Your parents have given you a certain conditioning. The society has given you a certain conditioning, and to live in that conditioning is to live your life in a prison. The religions have forced you to be a Christian, a Hindu, a Mohammedan or a Buddhist, which are all conditionings.  Meditation is a freedom from all these conditionings that parents, the society and the religions have forced on you. Unless you are free you will never be able to hear your own authentic inner voice.  Your parents will tell you "do this and don't do this." The priests will goon creating guilt and shame in you. They will not allow you to be yourself.  Nobody in the world is really interested in anybody else being given the freedom to be himself or herself. Everybody is trying to impose their ideas and ideologies on others.  That is why humanity is in such misery and chaos.  We have created an ugly world, where we have not allowed children to be themselves.  We have created a prison made of ideas, theologies and ideologies. You can think that you are free, but you are not free. We have to get rid of this prison. We have to uncondition ourselves, sothat we become free. It is first when the whole sky is ours that the whole existence is ours. When one realizes this, one just wants freedom, joy, silence,  awareness, truth and love. In that inner silence and freedom,the whole heritage of humanity becomes ours. Then we know that truth is within ourselves.  My first book in English, The Silent Whisperings of the Heart, is dedicated to my parents, Essy and Sven, with the dedication: "My parents, who taught me what love and freedom are.” My whole childhood was an atmosphere and climate of love and freedom. An American astrologer said in an astrology  session in the United States that my mother seemed to be a very special  woman. She was so rebellious that the boys in elementary school held herdown and shot her in the foot with an air rifle.  Once when I was in high school, I wanted to  have a little parental conflict, and said to my mother that I would never go back to school again. My mother replied: I would never do that either. This atmosphere and climate of love and freedom made me always feel that I could be who I am. It also taught me early to listen to my inner true voice, which early began to guide me in life.

If you don’t think past your own thoughts, you will live a prisoner to your experience. And that can be a very small cell to live in.

Honor He Wrote Sonnet 40 To learn from yesterday is growth, To be stuck in yesterday is decay. To look for a better future is vision, To be stuck there only causes dismay. Glance at the past, aim for the future, But keep your feet grounded in present. Learn from history, envision the destiny, 'N dive in today with your sweat valiant. Memory is meant to give you ground, Not to impede in your prosperity. Vision is to embolden your footsteps, Not to disconnect you from reality. Some make history their prison, some future. Bid goodbye to those inmates, 'n be a timemaster.

Whatever happened, happened. Holding on will not change this fact, it will just keep the negative feelings from the past alive, keep you a prisoner to your pain and lower your frequency.

Deprive a cat of sleep and it would die in two weeks. Deprive a human and he would become psychotic. His work was killing people. How was he supposed to frighten these guys? Run up behind them in a halloween mask and shout boo? He never saw the point of views -- what did it matter if it was an ocean or a brick wall you were looking at? People travelled hundreds, sometimes thousands of miles to commit suicide someplace with a beautiful view. Did a view matter when oblivion beckoned? They could put him in a garbage bin after he was gone, for all he cared. That's all the human race was anyway. Garbage with attitude. A cutting word is worse than a bowstring. A cut may heal but a cut of the tongue does not. The Sakawa students were all from poor, underprivileged backgrounds. Sakawa was a mix of religious juju and modern internet technology. They were taught, in structured classes, the art of online fraud as well as arcane African rituals -- which included animal sacrifice -- to have a voodoo effect on their victims, ensuring the success of each fraud. of which there was a wide variety. The British Empire spend five hundred years plundering the world. The word is 'thanks'. 'That's what it is, Roy! He won't come out, he has locked the doors! What if he self-harms, Roy! I mean -- what if he kills himself?' 'I will have to take him off my Christmas list.' "Any chance you can recover any of it?' 'You sitting near a window, Gerry?' 'Near a window? Sure, right by a window?' 'Can you see the sky?' 'Uh-huh. Got a clear view.' 'See any pigs flying past?' To dream of death is good for those in fear, for the death have no more fears. '...Cleo took me to the opera once. I spent the whole time praying for a fat lady to come on stage and start singing. Or a heart attack --whichever come sooner.' '..there is something strongly powerful -- almost magnetic -- about internet romances. A connection that is far stronger than a traditional meeting of two people. Maybe because on the internet you can lie all the time, each person gives the other their good side. It's intoxicating. That's one of the things which makes it so dangerous -- and such easy pickings for fraudsters.' He was more than a little pleased that he was about to ruin his boss's morning -- and, with a bit of luck, his entire day. ..a guy who had been born angry and had just got even angrier with each passing year. '...Then at some point in the future, I'll probably die in an overcrowded hospital corridor with some bloody hung-over medical student jumping up and down on my chest because they couldn't find a defibrillator. 'Give me your hand, bro,' the shorter one said. 'That one, the right one, yeah.' On the screen the MasterChef contestant said, 'Now with a sharp knife...' Jules de Copland drove away from Gatwick Airport in.a new car, a small Kia, hired under a different name and card, from a different rental firm, Avis. 'I was talking about her attitude. But I'll tell you this, Roy. The day I can't say a woman -- or a man -- is plug ugly, that's the day I want to be taken out and shot.' It seems to me the world is in a strange place where everyone chooses to be offended all the time. 'But not too much in the way of brains,' GlennBranson chipped in. 'Would have needed the old Specialist Search Unite to find any trace of them.' 'Ever heard of knocking on a door?' 'Dunno that film -- was it on Netflix?' 'One word, four letters. Begins with an S for Sierra, ends with a T for Tango. Or if you'd like the longest version, we've been one word, six letters, begins with F for Foxtrot, ends with D for Delta.' No Cop liked entering a prison. In general there was a deep cultural dislike of all police officers by the inmates. And every officer entering.a prison, for whatever purposes, was always aware that if a riot kicked off while they were there, they could be both an instant hostage and a prime target for violence.

The Peacock & The Eagle: Cleopatra's Entry Into Tarsus by Stewart Stafford Cleopatra arrives, regal and mighty, From ocean spray as Aphrodite, Wealthy and waif, yearning for her, Dared all to defy her possessive aura. Mark Antony, struck by her sultry gaze, Lepidus, prisoner in a bureaucrat's maze, Sees power slipping from a friend’s hand, Ensnared by a siren from a scorched land. Lepidus was Caesar's trusted right hand; A granule falling through hourglass sand, Antony, headstrong military provocateur; Funeral orator from bloody crown auteur. Bargain's scorpion pincers; no longer twain: Cleopatra was Ceres, promising Rome grain, Antony was Mars' armed emissary, Business and pleasure's flood tributary. Antony: "Barge of emerald, Elysium's onyx! Beyond counsel words of sage sardonic, Gliding the Cydnus's silken seam, This Nile Helen shall be my queen." Lepidus: "Pleasure vessel of a floating whore, Yours for a sesterce on the Tiber's shore, Honour your oath, noble Roman creed, Lest passion’s shipwreck sets out to sea.” "This Venus virago on her mirage barge; Serpent prow, silver oars, rhythmic charge! What hubris to think she can equal, The bloody talons of our Roman eagle!" Antony: "Feast your eyes past peacock's bower, She speaks Rome's tongue of naked power. Mark it, that obsidian Sphinx stings - Human head, lion's body, eagle wings! "That is the form she takes to the public: I smell a perfumed alliance for the Republic! With Plebeians as her tickled cats, they hum, I crave her beauty and company. Come!" © 2024, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.

The court had a question. Why had Captain Piller kept Van Meegeren as a kind of private prisoner when he could immediately have turned him over to the Department of Justice? “Because it took me quite a while to find out who at Justice had been correct or incorrect in the years past,” Piller said, in a deliberately unsubtle allusion to Holland’s many collaborators and German sympathizers. “Your Honor, I can assure you, that was not an easy task.” No further questions.

The runaway popularity of Body Worlds, Gunther von Hagens’s traveling exhibit of plastinated human bodies, shows us that the human urge to file past corpses on display is indeed as strong as ever. In spite of the ongoing controversy that von Hagens obtained some of his bodies from Chinese political prisoners, Body Worlds is the most popular touring attraction in the world (having drawn 38 million people by the start of 2014).

Please, Madame Bowden. You’re right. I’ve never known or understood what it really means to love or be loved. I’m not going to blame my past, but we all have one and it follows us around like a prison, always keeping us from the person we truly wish to be. Martha is the bravest person I’ve ever met and she’s inspired what little bravery I have inside to listen to my heart for once. I don’t just love her for how she makes me feel, I love her because when she came into my life it was like the lights came on. Everything suddenly had meaning and I think, I hope, it was the same for her. We all have crap parts and good parts inside, but when you meet someone who makes you realise that it’s all okay, you think, what in God’s name did I do to deserve it? All of my life I’ve been searching for hidden treasure, fortunes outside of myself. But Martha, she found them in me. I’m not perfect, by any means, but I know I want to spend the rest of my life making her smile. So I’m damned if I will let her go without a fight.

A mind that dwells in the past builds a prison it cannot escape. Control your mind, or it will control you, and you will never break through the walls it builds.” Milo

It’s because you enjoy it. Immensely. I see it all the time. You’re good at it, and it suits you perfectly,” Jon said softly, his words made plain by the rum in his blood. “I think it’s past time that you fixed the windows and gave this ship a name. Cut your ties with its history.” He watched as Baltsaros’s eyes went flat for a moment, his features smooth. Jon shook his head, understanding the crux of the problem. “You’re not trapped, Baltsaros. This is not your prison… This is your home.

Never be a prisoner of your past. Become the architect of your future.

Peer-oriented young people thus face two grave psychological risks that more than suffice to make vulnerability unbearable and provoke their brains into defensive action: having lost the parental attachment shield, and having the powerful attachment sword wielded by careless and irresponsible children. A third blow against feeling deeply and openly — and the third reason for the emotional shutdown of the peer-oriented child — is that any sign of vulnerability in a child tends to be attacked by those who are already shut down against vulnerability. To give an example from the extreme end of the spectrum, in my work with violent young offenders, one of my primary objectives was to melt their defenses against vulnerability so they could begin to feel their wounds. If a session was successful and I was able to help them get past the defenses to some of the underlying pain, their faces and voices would soften and their eyes would water. For most of these kids, these tears were the first in many years. Especially when someone isn't used to crying, it can markedly affect the face and eyes. When I first began, I was naive enough to send kids back into the prison population after their sessions. It is not difficult to guess what happened. Because the vulnerability was still written on their faces, it attracted the attention of the other inmates. Those who were defended against their own vulnerability felt compelled to attack. They assaulted vulnerability as if it was the enemy. I soon learned to take defensive measures and help my clients make sure their vulnerability wasn't showing. Fortunately, I had a washroom next to my office in the prison. Sometimes kids spent up to an hour pouring cold water over their faces, attempting to wipe out any vestiges of emotion that would give them away. Even if their defenses had softened a bit, they still had to wear a mask of invulnerability to keep from being wounded even further. Part of my job was to help them differentiate between the mask of invulnerability that they had to wear in such a place to keep from being victimized and, on the other hand, the internalized defenses against vulnerability that would keep them from feeling deeply and profoundly. The same dynamic, obviously not to this extreme, operates in the world dominated by peer-oriented children.

If you’re living under the weight of guilt, of shame, of condemnation, you’re not flourishing. You’re not ruling and reigning. Scripture tells us the righteous can reign in life. You can rule and have dominion, but if you’re living in shame, you’re not ruling, but instead being ruled. Instead of having dominion, you’re being dominated—dominated by things that have no power or value in your life whatsoever. You can live thinking that you owe it to yourself to feel bad about things that have gone on before. And I’m not saying you should ever take your past sins lightly. What I am saying is that there’s real hope in Jesus. Your focus should be on following Christ, not on looking over your shoulder and regretting what you can’t change. Shame is a prison, but the door to your cell is open. Jesus calls you to follow him in the freedom of grace. Wise

You need a burning desire for the future, the kind of desire that overcomes past fear and inhibitions. You will remain chained to your past and all the secrets therein until you decide: enough is enough! I am telling you that when your desire for the future peaks, you can break out of prison. I challenge you to sit down and write 30 things you would like to do with your life and scratch them off, one by one, as you accomplish them. There is no way you can plan for the future and dwell in the past at the same time. I feel an earthquake coming into your prison! It is midnight—the turning point of days! It is your time for a change. Praise God and escape out of the dungeons of your past.

Seriously. What’s with the face?” Jordan asked. “You’re scaring my cabernets with that scowl.” “I’m just working through some stuff,” he said vaguely. Jordan raised an eyebrow, studying him. “Prison stuff?” “More like post-prison stuff. Nothing we need to talk about.” The last thing he needed his super-perfect twin sister with her super-perfect FBI boyfriend knowing was that he was in another dispute, of sorts, with the U.S. Attorney’s Office. He was cranky enough about the situation without Jordan laying into him about it. He’d left prison several weeks ago and was supposed to be moving on with his life, yet the vestiges of the place still clung to him. Like bad BO. He picked up four of the wine bottles Jordan had unpacked. “Where do you want these?” She pointed. “In the empty bin over there, with the other cabernets.” She looked over when Kyle came back to the bar. “So what kind of post-prison stuff?” Now he was getting suspicious. “What’s with the twenty questions?” “Sue me for trying to open a dialogue here. Geez. I’ve just been a little worried about you, since I’ve heard that it can sometimes be difficult for ex-inmates to reenter normal life.” Kyle shot her a look as he grabbed more wine bottles. “Where, exactly, did you hear that? Siblings of Ex-Cons Anonymous?” Jordan glared. “Yes, we have weekly meetings at the YMCA,” she retorted. Then she waved her hand vaguely. “I don’t know, it’s just…something I saw on TV this past weekend.” Ah. Kyle suddenly had a sneaking suspicion about the cause of his sister’s concern. “Jordo…by any chance were you watching The Shawshank Redemption again?” “Pfft. No.” She saw his knowing expression and caved. “Fine. I was flipping through the channels and it was on TNT. You try turning that movie off.” She looked at him matter-of-factly. “It’s very compelling.

The current spirit of our country inclines us to be troubled. It’s a sensible temptation. How can any one person or small group of people make a difference? How can we change and renew things so that our children grow up in a better world? We come back to a question suggested at the start of this book: How can we live in joy, and serve the common good as leaven, in a culture that no longer shares what we believe? The answer to that question springs from a simple historical fact: On a quiet Sunday morning two thousand years ago, God raised Jesus of Nazareth from the dead. This small moment, unseen by any human eye, turned the world upside down and changed history forever. It confirmed Jesus’ victory over death and evil. It liberated those living and dead who lay in bondage to their sins. An anonymous ancient homily for Holy Saturday, speaking in the voice of Jesus Christ, reminds us of the full import of his resurrection: I am your God, who for your sake [has] become your son. Out of love for you and for your descendants, I now by my own authority command all who are held in bondage to come forth, all who are in darkness to be enlightened, all who are sleeping to arise. I order you, O sleeper, to awake. I did not create you to be held a prisoner in hell. Rise from the dead, for I am the life of the dead. Rise up, work of my hands, you who were created in my image. Rise, let us leave this place, for you are in me and I am in you; together we form only one person and we cannot be separated. Jesus rose from the dead so that we could be joined to him and his victory. Believers know that Jesus was not only victorious then, in Jerusalem. He’ll also come in royal glory at the end of time, when he will judge the living and the dead. At Christ’s second coming, his kingdom will fully arrive. His reign will be complete. The time in which we find ourselves is an interim one. We may struggle as we seek to follow Jesus, but we also remember the great victories of our King: the victory in the past and the victory certain to come. And those victories give us hope. Hope

But Jesus didn’t stop at claiming to be eternal and omniscient. In Matthew 28:18, we find this additional claim: 18b“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” In the theological and cultural milieu of first-century Israel, Jesus is claiming to be omnipotent. Furthermore, he tells his followers in the very next two verses that his claim to be omnipotent is the reason why his followers are to spend the rest of the church age telling the world about him: 19“Therefore, as you go, disciple people in all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, 20teaching them to obey everything that I’ve commanded you. And remember, I am with you each and every day until the end of the age.” Of course, the last sentence of that statement is a reiteration of Jesus’ claims in Matthew 18:20 to be omnipresent. For Jesus to be able to be present with everyone whoever believes in him throughout the centuries to come until the end of human history requires him to be omnipresent, omniscient, and eternal. There can be no escape from the claim: Jesus claimed to be God, and this truth was the foundation stone upon which he would build his Church. In Luke 10:22, Jesus claims that his divine attributes had been granted by God his Father in eternity past. By this claim, Jesus is saying that God his Father has given him all authority in the Universe: 22“All things have been entrusted to me by my Father. No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and no one knows who the Father is except the Son and the person to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.” It is apparent from what Jesus has to say about how things are going to go with respect to his followers throughout the centuries to come that Jesus’ claim to possess divine attributes isn’t going to be some mere theoretical exercise. In Luke 21:12b-15, Jesus warns his followers about persecution that will happen to them in years to come: 12“They will hand you over to synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors for my name’s sake, 13in order to give you an opportunity to testify. 14So purpose in your hearts not to prepare your defense ahead of time, 15because I will give you the ability to speak, along with wisdom, that none of your opponents will be able to resist or refute.” Besides reiterating Christ’s claims that he possesses the divine attributes of omnipresence, eternal existence, and omniscience, this remarkable statement also demonstrates that Jesus claimed to be able to bring a practical, real-life application of those divine attributes to his persecuted followers: he claims that he will communicate—what today we might call “in real time”—his wisdom right at the very moment that wisdom will be needed most. As a result, Jesus claims, those who oppose his followers will not be able to refute the arguments raised by those followers, whom Jesus claims will have received their wisdom directly from him. But only God himself can provide wisdom such as described by this claim. And so this passage also requires us to conclude that Jesus is claiming to himself attributes that only God can possess. CLAIM 4 |   JESUS DEMANDED LOYALTIES OF LOVE AND DEVOTION THAT IN THE JEWISH THEOLOGICAL UNDERSTANDING RIGHTLY MAY BE GIVEN ONLY TO GOD, SINCE TO GIVE THEM TO CREATED BEINGS WOULD VIOLATE THE FIRST AND SECOND COMMANDMENTS.

I claimed that originally Afghanistan knew the freedom of the caravan, but that willfully the people put themselves in these village prisons under the rule of the mullahs…. Miller claimed that we can never go back to the caravan. That we will know freedom only when the villages have books and roads and electricity.’ ‘Your right about the past… He’s right about the future… Some day all of us will live in villages like this. But they will be better villages.’ And he was gone.” pg 244-245 Caravans, Michener, 1963.

each other. No words were needed, they both felt the same. What a load of bollocks. They’d known each other two minutes. How could they be in love? Joan was just going over the top. The four glasses clinked together. “Tuck in guys. This is one of my better dishes. My mam helped with it too so I know it’s going to be top notch.” Trevor rubbed his hands together and grabbed his fork. There were no flies on him he was tucking in. Food was his comfort and now Joan was off the market he needed it more than ever. Mabel picked at the food on her plate, nibbling, watching everyone else around her. Patrick sat next to Joan and every chance he got he kissed her, held her hand. He knew he was on show here tonight and he was making sure he ticked all the boxes. * Cath and Katrina were chatting in the yard. The winds were blowing with force. They both looked freezing as they marched around the concrete yard. There were high steel fences with barbed wire on the top of it. There was no way out. Katrina needed a friendly ear, some advice, someone to ease her heavy heart. Once she’d filled Cath in on everything that had happened they both sat on a bench not far from the fence.  The screws watched them with caution and never took their eyes from them. They were high-risk prisoners. Cath let out a laboured breath and bit down hard on her bottom lip. “For crying out loud didn’t I tell you to keep away from that prick. Look what’s happened now. You’ve fucking blown it. You were getting out of this shit-hole in a few more months and you’ve gone and fucked it all. Where is your head at woman, you should of steered well clear of any trouble?” Katrina snivelled, her eyes flooding with tears. “I know, I just wanted to hurt him like he’s hurt me. I loved that man with all my heart and he just fucked off and left me. I’ve lost it all Cath. My kids, my home, everything I ever loved. How can I tell my kids I’m not coming home? It will break their hearts. I’ve made promises to them. A better life, no more trouble. Their mother home for good.” “They’ve not charged you yet. Wait until it’s set in stone and then you know what you’re dealing with.” Cath held her in her arms and squeezed her tight. She knew as much as the other person that she wasn’t getting out of jail anytime soon. The crime she’d committed would be all over the news soon and the public would know who she was. She’d seen it so many times before. Once an offender was named, the nation would be all over it. No doubt Norman would be made out to be the hero too. There would be no story about the way he treated this woman, no mention of all the women he’d abused in the past. Maybe someone should have grassed him up. Katrina had warned him if he she got her collar felt there would be repercussions. Why hadn’t she put his name in the picture yet? Now was the time to put her cards on the table and look after number one. Maybe if she turned Queen’s evidence she could get a deal with the prosecution. A lesser sentence, a few years knocked off. Cath was aware of this but to be a Judas was another matter. Katrina would have to

never be the prisoner of your past.......become a architect of your future.....

You're right," he said, jerking open the portal. "There is one place she's sure to go." "Yes." "And you.You should take your own advice and leave this place," Daniel said grimly. "You're rotting in here." "At least this body's pain distracts me from the pain in my soul," his past self said. "No.I wish you luck, but I won't leave these walls now.Not until she's settled in her next incarnation." Daniel's wings bristled at his neck. He tried to sort out time and lives and memories in his head, but he kept circling around the same irksome thought. "She-she should be settled now. In conception. Can't you feel it?" "Oh," his imprisoned past self said softly. He closed his eyes. "I don't know that I can feel anything anymore." The prisoner sighed heavily. "Life's a nightmare." "No,it's not. Not anymore. I'll find her.I'll redeem us both," Daniel shouted, desperate to get out of there, desperately taking another leap of faith through time.

Nothing should be worth more to you than its value in helping you live your life. If you are willing to slough off the past, even at a loss, you are keeping yourself free, and your world continues to grow. If you insist on holding to some abstract valuation, you are being held hostage by that possession, and you are trapped in a prison of your own devising.

We are all here for some special reason. Stop being a prisoner of your past. Become the architect of your future. The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari

-§ But just because we grew up in that kind of a culture does not mean we need to keep creating it in our present relationship. I recommend we ask different questions, like, “How could I make your life more wonderful?” and “Would you like to know how you could make my life more wonderful?” and “What are your needs right now?” and “Would you like to know what I need right now?” Now if none of this appeals to you because you prefer a relation-dinghy to a relationship, here are some suggestion to help you prevent your relation-dinghy from growing into a relationship: 1. Keep your attention focused at all times on who is right or wrong in a discussion, fair or unfair in a negotiation, selfish or unselfish in giving (it helps to keep a list of who has done what for whom), kind or cruel in their tone of voice, rude or polite in their mannerisms, sloppy or neat in their dress, and so on. Be careful not to realize that your attempt to be right is really an attempt to protect yourself from thinking you are wrong and then feeling shame. 2. If you need some support for this I recommend certain selfhelp groups who can give you the latest scoops on the most powerful, politically correct labels with which to overpower and confuse your partner. Members of these groups will collude with you in validating that your partner really is a man or woman who is commitment-phobic, emotionally unavailable, counterdependant, needy, spiritually unevolved, dysfunctional, immature, judgmental, sinful, bi-polar, OCD, clinically depressed, or adult-onset ADD. It is important to keep your consciousness filled with such terminology to prevent any fondness from developing. This also helps in keeping you caught in the “paralysis of analysis” and clueless about what you or your partner are needing from each other. 3. Adopt this test for love: If your partner really loves you, he or she will always know what you want even before you know—and then give it to you without your having to go through the humiliation of actually asking for it. And your partner will do this regardless of the sacrifice it requires. If your partner does not give you what you want, choose to believe it means he or she does not love you. 4. Ask for what you do not want instead of what you do want. I heard of a man who asked his wife to stop spending so much money shopping. She took up gambling on the internet. 5. In case your relationdinghy starts to grow, here are a few torpedoes guaranteed to sink it again: “It hurts me when you say that.” “I feel sad because you…fill in the blank (won’t say ‘I love you,’ or ‘I’m sorry,’ or won’t have sex, or won’t marry me, etc.)” If you really want to choke the life out of any relationship meditate on “I need you.” Then you will know how I felt for about thirtyfive years of my life. I felt like a drowning swimmer and I would grab hold of anyone who came near me and try to use them as a life raft. Now I want relationships to be flowers for my table instead of air for my lungs. When I Come Gently To You by Ruth Bebermeyer When I come gently to you I want you to see It’s not to get myself from you, it’s just to give you me. I know that you can’t give me me, no matter what you do. All I ever want from you is you. I know your fear of fences, your pain from prisons past. I’m not the first to sense it and I’m plainly not the last. The hawk within your heart’s not bound to earth by fence of mine, Unless you aren’t aware that you can fly. When I come gently to you I’d like you to know I come not to trespass your space, I want to touch and grow. When your space and my space meet, each is not less but more. We make our space that wasn’t space before. Chapter HEALING THE BLAME THAT BLINDS

You may need to forgive yourself for something in your past. God has already forgiven you if you've confessed & asked for His forgiveness. It's harder to forgive yourself, isn't it? You've been locked in this prison of anger & bitterness far too long.

The prison of the past is one you must escape in order to pivot. Our job now is to find out where your attachments to the past lie.

One of the ways to grow older without growing old is to become a beneficiary of your past rather than its victim or its prisoner.

Do you know what it was like in that goddamn hellhole of a prison?” The words were torn from his throat. Caleb shook his head. “I wouldn’t presume to say I did.” “There were rats the size of house cats. Toward the end we ate them just to stay alive.” Caleb closed his eyes against an image that would never leave him. “I’m not sorry that I let you live,” he said after a brief silence. Joss glared at him in rage. “You’d put me through that hell all over again, wouldn’t you?” he demanded. “Damn you, you would!” “If it meant your life? You’re damned right I would. I’d put you through it a thousand times.” He paused and drew a deep, tremulous breath. “Joss, step into my boots for a minute. Go back to that day. Remember the screaming, and the cannon fire, and the sound of bullets whistling past your head. This time you’re the one that’s on your feet, and I’m lying on the ground with my arm gone. I ask you to shoot me—hell, I beg you to shoot me. What are you going to do?” Joss’s throat worked as he swallowed. He hesitated for a long time as a variety of emotions moved in his face. Then he said, “I’d shoot you.” “You’re a liar,” Caleb answered. The giant, the man he’d loved and admired from the first day he’d known what it meant to have a brother, glared at him. “God damn you, Caleb—” “You wouldn’t have been able to kill me, because I’m your brother. Because you taught me to ride and shoot, because the blood in your veins is the same blood that runs in mine. You would have done exactly what I did, Joss, and somewhere inside yourself you know it.” Joss shook his head as if to fling off an image. “You listen to me,” he yelled, waggling a finger in his brother’s face. “I hate you. Do you hear me? I hate your miserable Yankee guts, and I plan to go right on hating you from now until they put me in a box and throw dirt on top of me!” The

We have to understand that the closer you get to the corridors of power, to the Oval Office and Congress, the more you become a prisoner of the past .The closer you get to the marginalized, the grassroots and the groundlings, the greater your incentive to think imaginatively and 'outside the box.

We are products of our past, but we don’t have to be prisoners of it. God’s purpose is not limited by your past.

But it’s not about dwelling on the past, it’s about fighting for my father’s future. In my heart, I know he is innocent… and as long as he rots in prison for her murder, I owe it to him to keep searching for the real killer. I’m not looking back. It’s about setting things right. And although sometimes when you try to set things right… you risk letting other people down. You must not let that keep you from moving forward. If you’re not moving, you’re not living. My mom taught me that. I love her for that. And so I run. For her. For everybody. ‘Cause no matter what happened in the past… no matter how bad it gets, or how many hits I take… I will always keep trying.

It has nothing to do with weakness,” said Professor Lupin sharply, as though he had read Harry’s mind. “The dementors affect you worse than the others because there are horrors in your past that the others don’t have.

mind that dwells in the past builds a prison it cannot escape. Control your mind, or it will control you, and you will never break through the walls it builds.

In Your Thoughts Irma! I was lost in your thoughts Irma, your hopes and in your imagination, When the breeze whispered “follow me and feel the new celebration!” And I replied, “no matter where I may tarry I am never away from her sensation, That has dissolved in my every emotion!” I seek you in every corner of light, In the morning hope, in the flowers., in the stars and in the moonlight, Then I look into the mirror and investigate my own sight, To find you in my own eyes and what a delight! I often remember our moments of togetherness from the past, The kiss that is still fresh and warm, but was the last, Always together even in the shadows that we cast, Everything feels like yesterday, but in every today, yesterday is always the past! My heart loves being a prisoner of your thoughts and your imaginings, And my mind seems to have got used to my heart’s longings, Leaving me marooned in love’s beautiful trappings, Where your smiling face is a part of all my mental surroundings! You are like the moon of my night, Where you shine on the shore of my life with love’s light, And I let you be my fate, my destiny and my joy’s every scalable height, So it is you and only you I dream of every night. Sometimes you are a palpable dream passing through my closed eyes, Often you are a beautiful embrace the warmth of which never dies, Until I wake up and seek you with my open eyes, It shall be the same every day and night until we meet again under these open skies! For now let me seek you within me and outside my own existence, I miss you deeply because I love you without any pretence, And I wish sometimes if I could bear wings like Gabriel to overcome every distance, But I am sure, I will either find you or bear wings to be kissed by your magnificence. Someday we both shall be reduced to nothing, just an impalpable feeling, But even then my soul shall find your thoughts healing, And when all shall before the God be kneeling, I shall be the only one still seeking myself in your omnipresent feeling!

There comes a point at which you have to let go and forgive. You can start your prayer with, 'Help me to forgive because I don't want to forgive. I feel entitled to be angry even though the anger is killing me, not them. And no one really cares that I'm angry. It's destroying my life, not theirs. I want to punish someone, so I punish my kids or I punish other innocent people who have never harmed me because it is my way of punishing them. So I really don't want to forgive because then I think all my hurt will be forgotten and that feels so unfair. But what is fair? No one's hurt is fair. I just think that justice should revolve around me. So, help me to forgive, one person at a time, beginning with _______.' That's your beginning. You take it from there until you have emptied your dungeon. Whenever you add new prisoners, you will have to revisit your dungeon.

I drop my head, shaking it. “I was so damn terrified, so hurt. I don’t know if I can get past that.” “Like I said, I didn’t think,” he tells me, a stroke against my cheek before he drops his hand. “You killed a king, Midas. Used him to attack another. What are you going to do?” I ask, the worry gnawing at my insides as my teeth gnaw on my lip. “Don’t worry about that,” he tells me. “I have a plan.” I can’t help the bitter snort that escapes me. “I suppose you’re not going to tell me it, just like you didn’t tell me that you were tricking Fulke about giving me to him.

The search for security is an illusion. In ancient wisdom traditions, the solution to this whole dilemma lies in the wisdom of insecurity, or the wisdom of uncertainty. This means that the search for security and certainty is actually an attachment to the known. And what’s the known? The known is our past. The known is nothing other than the prison of past conditioning. There’s no evolution in that — absolutely none at all. And when there is no evolution, there is stagnation, entropy, disorder, and decay. Uncertainty, on the other hand, is the fertile ground of pure creativity and freedom. Uncertainty means stepping into the unknown in every moment of our existence. The unknown is the field of all possibilities, ever fresh, ever new, always open to the creation of new manifestations. Without uncertainty and the unknown, life is just the stale repetition of outworn memories. You become the victim of the past, and your tormentor today is your self left over from yesterday. Relinquish your attachment to the known, step into the unknown, and you will step into the field of all possibilities. In your willingness to step into the unknown, you will have the wisdom of uncertainty factored in. This means that in every moment of your life, you will have excitement, adventure, mystery. You will experience the fun of life — the magic, the celebration, the exhilaration, and the exultation of your own spirit. Every day you can look for the excitement of what may occur in the field of all possibilities. When you experience uncertainty, you are on the right path — so don’t give it up. You don’t need to have a complete and rigid idea of what you’ll be doing next week or next year, because if you have a very clear idea of what’s going to happen and you get rigidly attached to it, then you shut out a whole range of possibilities.

He refused to think about it. Qian’s words echoed to him: “A mind that dwells in the past builds a prison it cannot escape. Control your mind, or it will control you, and you will never break through the walls it builds.

Darius drained his wine and stood, leaving the half-finished bottle behind. “Well, I’m off.”   Shea looked up, a little surprised at the abrupt departure. Fallon, with his typical granite facade, didn’t even twitch. He took a slow sip of the wine and acknowledged Darius’s departure with a nod.   “Before I go, I suggest you take a look at your personal chambers.” With that last remark, Darius made his departure.   Fallon’s head tilted as he stared into his wine. Suspicion dawned on his face and he stood, making his way to their personal quarters without a word. Shea let him go as she calmly sipped her wine.   Three, two, one.   There was a crash in the other room and a stream of curses reached her ears. She trained her eyes on the front entrance and was only mildly surprised when no one ventured in to see if they were in any danger. Darius must have warned them. Smart man.   “Would you like to explain why there is a new entrance to our bedchamber?” Fallon’s silky voice came from behind Shea.   “You’re smart. I’m sure you can figure it out.” Shea took another sip of her wine.   He prowled closer, his movements containing a lethal edge.   “You were going to leave me.” He sounded like the very idea that she would contemplate such an action enraged him.   She raised an eyebrow. “Now why would I want to do that?” She gave him a long minute to answer. His eyes narrowed, taking on a dangerous glint “Ah, yes. Perhaps that’s because you treated me like a prisoner, having your guards keep me here whether I wanted to or not.”   He looked away. She felt a spurt of grim satisfaction. He knew he was in the wrong.   “That was for your own safety.”   “Bullshit. That was because you were angry and wanted to take it out on me.” She waited for him to correct her. When he didn’t, she continued, “I’m here because I want to be here. The next time you do something like that, expect me to be gone.”   She set her glass down and stood. Shea walked past an unmoving Fallon to their chamber, saying over her shoulder, “I suggest you station one of your men at our new entrance so that we’re not murdered in our sleep by one of your many enemies.

It was a vast, low-ceilinged room in the lower levels of the basement. The ceiling was supported by pillars at regular intervals. The room was almost impossible to navigate, being crammed with sixty years’ worth of electronic flotsam and jetsam. He slowly worked his way backward, deeper into the room and further into the past. Toward the back, he came across a large cabinet that he mistook at first for an antique computer. It contained over a hundred vacuum tubes, each with its own set of inductors and capacitors. Then he uncovered the piano-style keyboard with the name HAMMOND above it. “Oh, that must be the Novachord,” said the Teleplay Director. “It’s like an organ, except not. It was used on various radio dramas for a few years, but when we got the Hammond B3’s it went into storage.” Philo told Viridios about it. “They have a Novachord?” Viridios said in surprise. “I’ve heard of it, but I’ve never played one. It was so far ahead of its time that nobody really knew what to do with it. It’s not an organ at all. It’s more like a polyphonic synthesizer.” “That’s not all,” said Philo. “I found some of your old equipment. It’s marked ‘Valence Sound Laboratory.’ It doesn’t look like musical equipment at all, more like scientific equipment. There’s an eight-foot metal cabinet full of circuitry like nothing I’ve ever seen before. The front panel is full of knobs and jacks labeled with mathematical symbols.” Viridios was astonished. “It still exists!” he exclaimed. “I thought it was dismantled and sold for scrap.” “What is it?” “That’s the instrument we used to create the soundtrack for Prisoners of the Iron Star. It’s called a Magneto-Thermion.

What I say is my business. How you react to it is your business To ascertain someone’s true character, don't listen to what they say, look at what they do The more intelligent you are, the more of an individual you are (same with creativity). Memory is the prison and imagination the key that frees us from our prejudice and preconceptions Attention addiction is the most pernicious of addictions. People will destroy themselves and the lives of others around them, just to get or keep attention focused on them and their need for its drug like dependency Sensitive people are more present than the insensitive, which is why the former jump at the sound of a pin dropping and the latter, not even to a ton weight falling beside them What you admire you mourn the passing of. What you despise, you are glad to see the back of Memory and perception depends upon silence and stillness as forgetting depends upon noise and motion (concentration / dispersal of energy and attention) Reality is not open to discussion. It is not something that changes with your opinion. It works how it works because that is how it works. The laws of reality are the laws of reality and that is it. If seeing is believing, is hearing deceiving (Being told the Emperor has got new clothes, versus seeing he hasn’t)? Stillness and silence is about staying present in the present. Noise and motion is abandonment (moving away from your position in time and space). Discovery is live, that is of the present. Memory is of the dead past (a recording). The first is always a surprise to you, the second is not. People mistake where consciousness is directed as being consciousness itself, which it isn’t If we think that we can't solve a problem, we want to eradicate it instead (stop it dead). If we can find a solution, we want to pat ourselves on the back for our creativity or understanding (keeping life / existence moving on, instead of it grinding to a halt). Culture, habit is that which reinforces our sense of identity Concentration is control because you are being present Thinking is an individual task, it is not a discussion with others, which is an exchange of ideas (other people’s thoughts) You will never understand a problem and resolve it, without exploring it and in depth. To some, yesterday is the nightmare and tomorrow the dream, to others it is the reverse Everything seems crazy until you understand it, when it instantly makes sense, even if you you still don’t think it’s sensible

People with scars, we know. We see. We understand.” He taps his wilted eye next. “There is hurt past this, yes?” My mouth goes dry. “Yes.” He nods, hand dropping down to hang at his side. “I can heal your body, my lady. But my tonics and salves won’t heal your mind, I’m afraid. It’s up to you to do that.

I want all of you, [...] [e]very piece, every memory, every minute, every inch. This isn’t going to be some casual dalliance. This isn’t going to be temporary. I want you soul, mind, and body. I want your trust and your thoughts. I want your past, your present, your future. So make very certain that you want me for the right reasons. Be certain that you’re choosing this, because once you do, there’s no turning back.

The Living Years" "Every generation Blames the one before And all of their frustrations Come beating on your door I know that I'm a prisoner To all my father held so dear I know that I'm a hostage To all his hopes and fears I just wish I could have told him in the living years Oh, crumpled bits of paper Filled with imperfect thought Stilted conversations I'm afraid that's all we've got You say you just don't see it He says it's perfect sense You just can't get agreement In this present tense We all talk a different language Talking in defense (Say it loud) Say it loud (Say it clear) oh, say it clear (You can listen as well as you hear) (It's too late) It's too late (when we die) Oh, when we die (To admit we don't see eye to eye) So we open up a quarrel Between the present and the past We only sacrifice the future It's the bitterness that lasts So don't yield to the fortunes You sometimes see as fate It may have a new perspective On a different date And if you don't give up, and don't give in You may just be O.K. So say it, say it, say it loud (Say it loud) (Say it clear) Oh, say it clear (You can listen as well as you hear) Because it's too late (It's too late) It's too late (When we die) oh, when we die To admit we don't see eye to eye I wasn't there that morning When my Father passed away I didn't get to tell him All the things I had to say Think I caught his spirit Later that same year I'm sure I heard his echo In my baby's new born tears I just wish I could have told him in the living years So say it, say it, say it loud (Say it loud) (Say it clear) Oh, say it clear (You can listen as well as you hear) (It's too late) It's too late (When we die) It's too late when we die (To admit we don't see eye to eye) Hey, so say it, say it, say it loud (Say it loud) Say it loud (Say it clear) Oh no, say it clear

Do you see where we are?” asked Wanda. “Do you know what was standing here before they started hanging people behind closed doors? Do you know the real name of this place?” “Tyburn,” said Guleed, who’d obviously been paying more attention to me than I thought. Because back in the days of yore, when Oxford Street was the Tyburn Road and the city had only just started its mad rush to cover all the west in desirable redbrick and stucco terraces, it was the main route out of London to the little village of Tyburn that sat just beyond where the road crossed the river. Condemned prisoners were loaded onto tumbrils at Newgate Jail, and would wind their way through the streets of London, past the rookeries at St. Giles, before hitting the long straight road into the open countryside and the Tyburn Tree. And it was a busy place, the Tyburn Tree. Because markets were laissez-faire, every Englishman’s home was his castle and what passed for law and order was largely privately run. Back then the gentry lived in fear of the London mob and, to keep the masses in check, made sure that stealing bread or your employer’s linen was a topping offense. So they came in numbers, the tragic lads and lasses, the local boys and the immigrants from Yorkshire, Cornwall and Berkshire, from Strathclyde and County Clare. Some weeping, some defiant, and most of them pissed out of their box because the whole sad procession from Newgate Jail would make periodic pauses for refreshments. “This was the last stop,” said Wanda. A last drink under the spreading chestnut tree, perhaps a chance to unburden yourself of any secrets or things you might not be able to take into the next world. And so The Chestnut Tree became the repository of final bequests. Or a final offering, a tradition from back when the river ran free and its god walked among men.

did what I thought was best for you, and you don’t get to tell me that’s wrong. I was the one in prison, not you. I did what I had to, to get through it, and I can’t change the past. You’re mad I never gave you a choice?

I want you soul, mind, and body. I want your trust and your thoughts. I want your past, your present, your future. So make very certain that you want me for the right reasons.

The men are ready to ride,” Ioan said as he came up the stairs behind him. Christian nodded. “Knowing Adara, I’m sure we’re already packed as well. I just need to don my armor and I, too, will be ready.” Ioan was about to leave him when they heard something shatter inside Christian’s room. A heartbeat later, Adara screamed. Terror, panic, and anger descended on Christian as he swung open the door to find her in the room with two other men who were trying to hold her down. “I’ll make you pay for that, bitch,” the one holding her said as he tore open her gown. Christian flew across the room, ready to kill them both. He grabbed the one holding his wife and knocked him against the wall, then turned to knock the other one back. But when the one who had touched her came back to swing at him, he lost all control. All he could see was the man ripping Adara’s gown, the terror on her face. He slugged her assailant repeatedly, then grabbed his head and banged it against the floor until he felt Ioan pulling him back. “Christian, stop! You’re going to kill him.” Enraged beyond reason, he slammed the man’s head against the floor one last time, then turned on the other, who was pushing himself up from the floor. His lip was busted as he stared at Christian in disbelief. “Go see to Adara,” Ioan snapped, pulling him away from the other attacker. Needing to make sure she was all right, Christian went to her. She was huddled on the floor, weeping. “Shhh,” he said soothingly as he pulled her into his arms. She looked up at him, her lips quivering, to show him her battered face. It was more than he could stand. Rising, he went after her attackers again, only to find Ioan blocking his way. “Get out of my way, Ioan, or I’ll thrash you, too. I mean it.” Ioan refused to budge. “Let the sheriff handle this.” “Why are you so angry?” the taller attacker asked. “You are one of us. ’Tis only fair we take a Saracen whore—” Christian shoved Ioan away from him as he lunged for the man and cut his words off with a vicious backhand. “That is my wife you speak of, you bastard. My wife you attacked.” The color faded from the man’s face. Suddenly Phantom was there, pulling him back as Ioan came forward. “Let go of me!” Christian shouted. “I want justice.” “I can’t let you hurt them, Christian,” Ioan said apologetically. “They are the ones who have just come back with Agbert and Dagger. They spent the past seven years in a Saracen prison.” Still, he fought against Phantom’s hold. “It doesn’t give them the right to attack an innocent woman, and most especially not mine.” “Nay, it doesn’t,” Ioan agreed. “I will see them into the sheriff’s custody.” Far from appeased, Christian finally succeeded in shoving Phantom away from him to return to Adara’s side.

Stop being a prisoner of your past - become the architect of your future.

One should not forget the sins of their forebears, but nor can one advance by paying witness only to the failings of the past. To bury the past is to progress, and only in breaking the chains that bind can you escape the prison your predecessors have laid.

Run for Governor Stop being a prisoner of your past. Become the Governor and get a reprieve.

book The World Beyond Your Head: On Becoming an Individual in an Age of Distraction as a jumping off point, he takes care to unpack the various cultural mandates  that have infected the way we think and feel about distraction. I found his ruminations not only enlightening but surprisingly emancipating: There are two big theories about why [distraction is] on the rise. The first is material: it holds that our urbanized, high-tech society is designed to distract us… The second big theory is spiritual—it’s that we’re distracted because our souls are troubled. The comedian Louis C.K. may be the most famous contemporary exponent of this way of thinking. A few years ago, on “Late Night” with Conan O’Brien, he argued that people are addicted to their phones because “they don’t want to be alone for a second because it’s so hard.” (David Foster Wallace also saw distraction this way.) The spiritual theory is even older than the material one: in 1887, Nietzsche wrote that “haste is universal because everyone is in flight from himself”; in the seventeenth century, Pascal said that “all men’s miseries derive from not being able to sit in a quiet room alone.”… Crawford argues that our increased distractibility is the result of technological changes that, in turn, have their roots in our civilization’s spiritual commitments. Ever since the Enlightenment, he writes, Western societies have been obsessed with autonomy, and in the past few hundred years we have put autonomy at the center of our lives, economically, politically, and technologically; often, when we think about what it means to be happy, we think of freedom from our circumstances. Unfortunately, we’ve taken things too far: we’re now addicted to liberation, and we regard any situation—a movie, a conversation, a one-block walk down a city street—as a kind of prison. Distraction is a way of asserting control; it’s autonomy run amok. Technologies of escape, like the smartphone, tap into our habits of secession. The way we talk about distraction has always been a little self-serving—we say, in the passive voice, that we’re “distracted by” the Internet or our cats, and this makes us seem like the victims of our own decisions. But Crawford shows that this way of talking mischaracterizes the whole phenomenon. It’s not just that we choose our own distractions; it’s that the pleasure we get from being distracted is the pleasure of taking action and being free. There’s a glee that comes from making choices, a contentment that settles after we’ve asserted our autonomy. When

We all have the ability to walk out of the gloomy prison of self-limiting, uncritical existence into the bright daylight of a boundless, deeply meaningful, and tremendously satisfying existence, with its attendant playful, exuberant, joyous wisdom. The infinite life is life unbound by time or space. Deaths are only doorways, transitions from one life-form to the next, just as sleep is only a passage from evening to a new day. Your every movement of body, speech, and mind arises from a beginningless past and resonates into an endless future. You are free and boundless in dimension, and also very real and unique. You are lost in oneness with the awesome infinite, yet you have infinite importance due to your total interconnectedness with all other beings. When self-centered and unhappy, you are a big problem for them, often engaged in life-and-death struggles. When enlightened, self-transcendent, boundlessly open, and truly happy, you can be the living solution to all their problems. Open your eyes and look at yourself carefully. Expand the concept of reality that you live by – your awareness of, and responsibility for, your own personal continuity. Everything you do now, your very breathing, flows from your sense of yourself as a living continuum and your drive to improve your state of being. You are a dynamic evolutionary process. There is no limit to how far you can develop positively into higher states of spirituality, understanding, love, happiness, and creativity. (p. 29)

To set the scene: Madzy Brender à Brandis was a young mother with two small children, trying to survive through years of hardship and danger – and some unexpected pleasures. In May 1942, after her husband was suddenly taken prisoner and sent to a German camp, she began writing a diary to record the details of her life – for her husband to read when he returned, if he returned. She called it “this faithful book.” Here are some passages: 28 October 1944 [when the electricity was cut off because of lack of fuel for the generating plants]: “We have to use the daylight to its utmost, and we figure this out already in the morning. [At the end of the afternoon] We flew faster and faster to use the last bits of daylight, lay the table, lay everything ready so that at 5:30 we could eat in the dusk until we couldn’t find our mouths any more. Blackout and one candle, finished eating and washed the dishes. Read to children in pyjamas and then they to bed. Then unraveled a knitted baby blanket [so that the yarn could be used to knit other things] and at 9:00 blew out the candle and continued by moonlight. But now I’m going to bed, tired but satisfied with my efforts, though very sad about all the misery.” 1 November 1944 [after a threat of having the house demolished]: “Well, our house is still standing. I filled a laundry bag with many things, and everything is standing ready [in case there was a need to evacuate]. Because there is much flying again. At one moment an Allied fighter plane flew over very low; just then three German soldiers were walking past our house and one, “as a joke,” shot his gun at the plane. Tje! What a scare we had!” 24 December 1944 [addressing her husband, still in the camp]: “The whole house is in wonderful peace and I’m sitting by the fire, which gives me just enough light to write this. [The upper door of the small heater, when opened, gave a bit of light.] My Dicks, I don’t have to tell you how very much I miss you on this evening. It is a gnawing sense of longing. But beyond that there is a sorrow in me, a despair about everything, that pervades my whole being. Besides that, however, I’ve already for days seen the light of Christ coming closer and in these days that gives me hope. So does the waxing moon, the hard frost, the bright sun – in a word, all the light in nature after that endless series of misty, rainy, dark days. And so I sit close to my unsteady little light, that constantly abandons me, and think of you. It’s as though you are very close to me. I’m so grateful for everything that I have: your love, the two children, and everything around me.” 12 February 1945 [during the “Hunger Winter” of 1944-45, after one of her trips to forage for food]: “Today I went to Rika in Renswoude: 1¼ hours cycling there, 2½ hours walking back pushing a broken-down bicycle and with 25 pounds of rye [the whole grain, not flour] through streaming rain, while there was constant booming of artillery and bombing in the distance.

If you let your circumstances define the way you see God, you are a prisoner of perspective. Or worse, a prisoner of your past mistakes! But if you let God define the way you see your circumstances, you are a prisoner of hope.

YOU ACCUSE ME OF ILLUSION. YOU—WITH YOUR ABSURD CONSTRUCT OF LINEAR TIME. YOU FASHION FOR YOURSELF A PRISON OF WATCHES, CLOCKS, AND CALENDARS. YOU RATTLE BARS FORGED OF HOURS AND DAYS, BUT YOU’VE PADLOCKED THE DOOR WITH PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE. PUNY MINDS NEED PUNY CAVES.

Lugging around guilt, shame, resentment and self-loathing is The Big Snooze running the show, pitching a fit, demanding to be right and to be seen. Your higher self, on the other hand, could give a crap about what anybody else thinks or does because your higher self is madly in love with you and that’s all that matters. Whatever happened, happened. Holding on will not change this fact, it will just keep the negative feeling from the past alive, keep you a prisoner to your pain and lower your frequency.

The past lives in you as memories, but memories in themselves are not a problem. In fact, it is through memory that we learn from the past and from past mistakes. It is only when memories, that is to say, thoughts about the past, take you over completely that they turn into a burden, turn problematic, and become part of your sense of self. Your personality, which is conditioned by the past, then becomes your prison.

Every piece, every memory, every minute, every inch. This isn’t going to be some casual dalliance. This isn’t going to be temporary. I want you soul, mind, and body. I want your trust and your thoughts. I want your past, your present, your future. So make very certain that you want me for the right reasons. Be certain that you’re choosing this, because once you do, there’s no turning back.

Please, Madame Bowden. You’re right. I’ve never known or understood what it really means to love or be loved. I’m not going to blame my past, but we all have one and it follows us around like a prison, always keeping us from the person we truly wish to be. Martha is the bravest person

The world has a way of blowing past your bubble, poking and prodding until evaded reality pops its way in.

i thought healing would feel like forgetting like erasing your name from every corner of my mind there were days when your ghost sat beside me and i almost let it stay but healing is learning to live without inviting the past to the table

You never talk about your past with anyone. Talking just releases memories into the air, and they aren't really yours anymore, or they become changed or other people capture them and hold them prisoner. You want to keep them. The bad ones might infect someone.

Every piece, every memory, every minute, every inch. This isn’t going to be some casual dalliance. This isn’t going to be temporary. I want you soul, mind, and body. I want your trust and your thoughts. I want your past, your present, your future.

Never be a prisoner of your past. It was just a lesson, not a life sentence.

You’ll realize, just as I did when I was in prison, that if you’re just brushing your teeth, not caught in your thoughts of past or future, joy is possible while brushing your teeth at any time, no matter what is happening in your life outside of that moment. Since roughly 95 percent of your life consists of simple, mundane moments, like brushing your teeth, this means that you can be happy during at least 95 percent of your life!

The Underminer tries to undermine your self-confidence and self-esteem so you won’t take risks that might end in failure. It tells you that you are worthless and inadequate and that you’ll never amount to anything. It may also try to prevent you from getting too big, powerful, or visible in order to avoid the threat of attack and rejection. (Remember Jeannette, Bonnie’s client described in the introduction? Her Inner Critic was an Underminer.) The experience of being undermined can feel like a rug has been pulled out from under you or like you’re walking on a treadmill where you work and sweat but go nowhere. It can also feel like you have a rope tied to your middle so you can’t go forward or like you’ve come up against a glass wall. The Destroyer attacks your fundamental self-worth. It is deeply shaming and tells you that you shouldn’t exist. You might experience the Destroyer as a crushing force that wipes out your vitality or a pervasive negative energy that stamps out any sign of creativity, spontaneity, or desire. It might look like Darth Vader, a giant spider, a leech on the back of the neck, or an elephant crushing you underfoot. The Guilt Tripper attacks you for a specific action you took (or didn’t take) in the past that was harmful to someone, especially someone you care about. This Critic might also attack you for violating a deeply held value. It constantly makes you feel bad and will never forgive you. It might also make you feel guilty for repeated behaviors that it considers unacceptable in an attempt to get you to stop. Images of the Guilt Tripper from our clients include a nun, a judge, a despot exiling someone, a black cloud descending, and a weight on the shoulders. It can make you feel oozy and icky, heavy in the chest, or as if you are being smashed with a huge hammer. The Molder tries to get you to fit a certain societal mold or act in a certain way that is based on your family or cultural mores. This mold can be any kind: caring, aggressive, outgoing, intellectual, or polite. This Critic attacks you when you don’t fit into that mold and praises you when you do. Images for the Molder include a prison guard, a cage, a straightjacket, and a large rulebook, like a holy text, that determines what you should do at every moment.

It’s all or nothing, Auren.” “What do you mean?” “I want all of you,” he tells me, a newfound hunger in the depths of his green eyes that stirs heat beneath my skin. “Every piece, every memory, every minute, every inch. This isn’t going to be some casual dalliance. This isn’t going to be temporary. I want you soul, mind, and body. I want your trust and your thoughts. I want your past, your present, your future. So make very certain that you want me for the right reasons. Be certain that you’re choosing this, because once you do, there’s no turning back.

I flip through the envelopes and pause at a postcard-nothing written on it apart from my address here in the prison. The postmark is from Derby, up past Broome, far north. It can´t be you, it's not your writing.

They say, “We’re here to help.” You don’t know what help is. Try walking a mile in my shoes. Fuck walking a mile— why not wear my shoes, throw on my hair, wear this tight-ass dress, tuck my dick and balls into a gaff, child, and then run in front of police, jump over cars, and then snatch off your hair, put on different clothes, change your shoes and then walk down that same street past the motherfucker that was looking for you in the first place. Then you can give me some shit about who the fuck I am.

Please, Madame Bowden. You’re right. I’ve never known or understood what it really means to love or be loved. I’m not going to blame my past, but we all have one and it follows us around like a prison, always keeping us from the person we truly wish to be. Martha is the bravest person I’ve ever met and she’s inspired what little bravery I have inside to listen to my heart for once. I don’t just love her for how she makes me feel, I love her because when she came into my life it was like the lights came on. Everything suddenly had meaning and I think, I hope, it was the same for her. We all have crap parts and good parts inside, but when you meet someone who makes you realise that it’s all okay, you think, what in God’s name did I do to deserve

Today holds its own power. It’s a fresh page in your story. YOU are the author. Of course, Yesterday plays a part, but let it play the role of a teacher, not a prison. Learn from it… Take what can help enrich your life and enhance your vision and let the rest go. Focus on Today… This day, these hours, this energy, this moment… That is where your POWER is. The power to change, the power to heal, the power to grow, the power to choose… These are all waiting for you NOW… They are not waiting for you in the past, and they're not hiding in the future. They are here… TODAY. Snap out of the dazed cycle of focusing on the days that have passed and days that are not yet here. Make conscious contact with the only day that holds your power… TODAY.

We have spent several months undertaking a huge research project on Putin's palace in Gelendzhik on the Black Sea, which we use to give a detailed insight into how he finances his family, his amusements, his hobbies, and his mistresses. . . . The project was codenamed Psycho because, when we first looked at the plans of the site, with all its theaters, golden eagles, and sofas that cost as much as an apartment, our constant refrain was, "This man is sick. He is obsessed with luxury." We agreed that we would release the video the day after I returned to Russia, and today it has become obvious we are running out of time. There is an immense amount of computer graphics. Vast diagrams detailing corrupt linkages cannot be omitted, because otherwise our accusations will appear mere hearsay. But these are a turnoff for the average viewer. It is our eternal quandary: how to strike a balance between entertainment and boring journalistic and legal matters. . . . You can make a good product but then mess everything up by failing to promote it properly. That's a lesson about new media I learned long ago. . . . I need to write a stack of emails, because I very well may get jailed and I'll be kicking myself if I don't get them done. Past experience suggests the biggest problems arise from things you haven't thought about-internet access to your bank, authorizations and passwords for the various applications and devices you use every day. Knowing that your family is okay accounts for 99 percent of your peace of mind in prison. I don't want to be there worrying that my wife can't withdraw money from my account because of an idiotic bank requirement that I have to give written permission from my email address. A hundred newspapers around the world can report that I'm arrested and in jail, but the bank manager will still respond, "Sorry, there is nothing we can do to help. He must send us an email, or use our very convenient phone application.

Oftentimes we journey through life aspiring to desire more, but past traumas, self-unforgiveness, and self-sabotage can hinder our progress! Hopefully this prayer will initiate the healing process, freeing you to receive all the blessings God has in store for you. Let’s pray: Prayer for Self-Forgiveness “God of mercy and restoration, I come not to hide, but to heal. I lay down every regret, every harsh word I’ve spoken to myself, every moment I’ve replayed in shame. You are not the voice of condemnation—you are the whisper of redemption.Today, I choose to agree with heaven. I release myself from the weight of perfection and receive the gift of grace. I am not defined by my past—I am refined by Your presence. Teach me to see myself through Your eyes: loved, chosen, and still becoming. I forgive myself, not because I deserve it, but because You declared it. And Your word is final. Amen.” Affirmations for Self-Forgiveness You can speak these aloud or write them in your journal. “I am not my mistake—I am God’s masterpiece in motion.” “I release the need to punish myself. Grace is my portion.” “My past is a classroom, not a prison.” “I forgive myself because heaven already has.” “I am worthy of love, even from me.” “I walk in divine compassion, starting with myself.” “I am becoming, and that is holy.” I pray this helps you. You deserve so much more than you’ve been through. Don’t miss your moment. God loves you!

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Eminescu represented an isolated voice crying in the wilderness, protesting the amorality of politics, the perfidy of politicians, the faithlessness of diplomats, the crass materialism and iconoclasm of the literary men who took in vain the name of heroes of the past. Like Hamlet, he felt that times were out of joint. In despair, in a great historic ballad called The Third Letter, he appealed to the giants of old to rise from the dust under which they had been laid to rest in order to regenerate Romanian society and political life. They alone, he said, understood the true meaning of patriotism and had shown genuine love of the fatherland. The poem opens by recalling the manly virtues and military valor of Wallachia's early medieval princes, notably Prince Mircea the Old, Dracula's grandfather, who, when summoned to surrender his country to the great Sultan Bayezid, then at the height of his power, defied him at the Battle of Rovine (1394) with the following proud words: “Oh, But the man you see here stand Is no common mortal; he is Prince of the Romanian land.” Eminescu immortalized Vlad with an often quoted stanza. He recalls the great Dracula from the grave to save the Romanian nation and asks him to do away with the Philistines in the land: You must come, O dread Impaler, confound them to your care. Split them in two partitions, here the fools, the rascals there; Shove them into two enclosures from the broad daylight enisle 'em, Then set fire to the prison and the lunatic asylum.