Sahara Of Life Quotes

Individually, every grain of sand brushing against my hands represents a story, an experience, and a block for me to build upon for the next generation.

Sahara dug her fingers into his arms. “You do not do this,” she said, and it was an order. “You do not let that monster destroy the life we are going to have together. You are mine, not his. You have always been mine.” The claiming was so absolute, it dared him to fight. Kaleb had no intention of doing so. Shuddering, he crushed her to him. “Yes,” he said, battling the rage because if he gave in to it, he would lose Sahara. “I’m yours. I will always be yours.

Live your life, Sahara. Live it as big and with as much color as you can stand to bear. Don't let anyone or anything - the family, Silence, the wight of your ability, even my need to keep you close - confine you again.

We will bring humanity across the vast Saharas of emptiness between the stars and create a dynamic, perpetually advancing empire that spans galaxies, universes, and realities. Just as our ancestors wove fabric from organic matter, our descendants will weave the fabric of reality. Humanity’s descendants will be entities beyond our wildest conceptions of the divine. Omnipotence and the ability to create universes will be the least of their powers. Whether they are good or evil—whether they even come to be at all—is up to us. In that sense, we have even more power than they do.

I wanted a taste of many different lives, sophisticated or simple, highbrow or low. Only then would this journey be worthwhile. (Although perhaps a life plain as porridge would never be an option for me.)

I read the first chapter of A Brief History of Time when Dad was still alive, and I got incredibly heavy boots about how relatively insignificant life is, and how compared to the universe and compared to time, it didn't even matter if I existed at all. When Dad was tucking me in that night and we were talking about the book, I asked if he could think of a solution to that problem. "Which problem?" "The problem of how relatively insignificant we are." He said, "Well, what would happen if a plane dropped you in the middle of the Sahara Desert and you picked up a single grain of sand with tweezers and moved it one millimeter?" I said, "I'd probably die of dehydration." He said, "I just mean right then, when you moved that single grain of sand. What would that mean?" I said, "I dunno, what?" He said, "Think about it." I thought about it. "I guess I would have moved one grain of sand." "Which would mean?" "Which would mean I moved a grain of sand?" "Which would mean you changed the Sahara." "So?" "So? So the Sahara is a vast desert. And it has existed for millions of years. And you changed it!" "That's true!" I said, sitting up. "I changed the Sahara!" "Which means?" he said. "What? Tell me." "Well I'm not talking about painting the Mona Lisa or curing cancer. I'm just talking about moving that one grain of sand one millimeter." "Yeah? If you hadn't done it, human history would have been one way..." "Uh-huh?" "But you did do it, so...?" I stood on the bed, pointing one of my fingers at the fake stars, and screamed: "I changed the course of human history!" "That's right." "I changed the universe!" "You did." "I'm God!" "You're an atheist." "I don't exist!" I fell back onto the bed, into his arms, and we cracked up together.

By the time I make my way to the border of Mauritania, to the edge of the Sahara, I see no end to being lost. You can spend your entire life simply falling in that direction. It isn't a station you reach but just the general state of going down. Once you make it back, if you make it back, you will stand before your long-lost friends but in some essential way they will no longer know you.

More than anything, this place feels familiar. I bury my hands in the hot sand and think about the embodiment of memory or, more specifically, our natural ability to carry the past in our bodies and minds. Individually, every grain of sand brushing against my hands represents a story, an experience, and a block for me to build upon for the next generation. I quietly thank this ancestor of mine for surviving the trip so that I could one day return.

Is a rope around the neck and a drop from the gallows all that we can do for a guy who lived his life without ever smiling? ~ Inoue

The Lord must have created coffee to reward humans for those bad times they sometimes have on Earth. Having charged your heart and brain with a cup of coffee, you’re ready to face the challenges of life. A good cup of coffee makes life seem better.

Integrity is the very core of our being. It is who we really are. When all the scaffolding is removed, it is our integrity that both defines us and identifies us. Men of integrity are like the Rock of Gibraltar—steadfast and immovable. Men without it are like the shifting sands on the Sahara Desert—tossed to and fro by every variant wind of life.

Some days are just unlucky, whatever you try to do. It’s not a point to feel disappointed too much as it only means some other days will be very, very lucky!

One of the main secrets of success is the ability to foresee the situation a few steps forward.

If one of the most interesting places to be is your inner world, you will never be bored when you are alone.

In the tribe of Tuareg, men instead of women cover their faces with a blue veil. The tourists who come there call them the ‘Blue Men of the Sahara’.

Life IS a competition. ALWAYS. No matter whether any of us want it to be or not!

Sahara dug her fingers into his arms. “You do not do this,” she said, and it was an order. “You do not let that monster destroy the life we are going to have together. You are mine, not his. You have always been mine.” The claiming was so absolute, it dared him to fight. Kaleb had no intention of doing so. Shuddering, he crushed her to him. “Yes,” he said, battling the rage because if he gave in to it, he would lose Sahara. “I’m yours. I will always be yours.” Her lips on his jaw, on his cheek, her love fierce. “Remember that. Each action, every action you take, it has my name on it.

A good cup of coffee makes life feel better.

Being the Novelist-in-Residence at a riad hotel in the kasbah of an Arabic North African city is a lot like trying to write one’s memoirs on shreds of napkins in a nuthouse.

Climbing your personal Everest, do your best to make sure it won’t end up being your Calvary.

The shadowy edge between normal and paranormal is more than ILLUSORY...

ALWAYS BE CAREFUL, AWARE AND WATCHFUL—BUT NEVER CHEAP AND SELFISH.

But drunkenly, or secretly, we swore, Disciples of that astigmatic saint, That we would never leave the island Until we had put down, in paint, in words, As palmists learn the network of a hand, All of its sunken, leaf-choked ravines, Every neglected, self-pitying inlet Muttering in brackish dialect, the ropes of mangroves From which old soldier crabs slipped Surrendering to slush, Each ochre track seeking some hilltop and Losing itself in an unfinished phrase, Under sand shipyards where the burnt-out palms Inverted the design of unrigged schooners, Entering forests, boiling with life, Goyave, corrosol, bois-canot, sapotille. Days! The sun drumming, drumming, Past the defeated pennons of the palms, Roads limp from sunstroke, Past green flutes of the grass The ocean cannonading, come! Wonder that opened like the fan Of the dividing fronds On some noon-struck sahara, Where my heart from its rib cage yelped like a pup After clouds of sanderlings rustily wheeling The world on its ancient, Invisible axis, The breakers slow-dolphining over more breakers, To swivel our easels down, as firm As conquerors who had discovered home.

Food of Love Eating is touch carried to the bitter end. -Samuel Butler II I'm going to murder you with love; I'm going to suffocate you with embraces; I'm going to hug you, bone by bone, Till you're dead all over. Then I will dine on your delectable marrow. You will become my personal Sahara; I'll sun myself in you, then with one swallow Drain you remaining brackish well. With my female blade I'll carve my name In your most aspiring palm Before I chop it down. Then I'll inhale your last oasis whole. But in the total desert you become You'll see me stretch, horizon to horizon, Opulent mirage! Wisteria balconies dripping cyclamen. Vistas ablaze with crystal, laced in gold. So you will summon each dry grain of sand And move towards me in undulating dunes Till you arrive at sudden ultramarine: A Mediterranean to stroke your dusty shores; Obstinate verdue, creeping inland, fast renudes Your barrens; succulents spring up everywhere, Surprising life! And I will be that green. When you are fed and watered, flourishing With shoots entwining trellis, dome and spire, Till you are resurrected field in bloom, I will devour you, my natural food, My host, my final supper on the earth, And you'll begin to die again.

It’s not possible to ever forget the life moments where, in the morning ocean breeze, you can walk along the beach and pick colorful shells and corals… pity you are not allowed to take them home, but you can always take a picture or video.

For most people, their family is the source of inner power and protection; mine is a killing collapsar. Communication with my parents is always such a stress; it’s like a heavy burden I have to carry over my life… I never felt I really had a family: instead, there was a kind of a coalition of enemies unfriendly to me. The worst thing is that everlasting negativity in the environment constantly sucks the live energy out.

Along with people willing to disappoint you for being beyond ordinary, there also are many individuals who adore you immensely.

Generate happy moments. . . make miracles happen. Love is a miracle too.

I believe an ideal breakup is one ending in friendship with the words, “I will always love you for being part of my life.

For the desert is not where one thinks where it is. The Sahara is more alive than a metropolis, and the most teeming city is emptied of life if the essential poles of existence are demagnetized.

उद्यत्भानुसहस्राभा चतुर्बाहुसमन्विता रागस्वरूपपाशाढ्या क्रोधाकाराङ्कुशोज्ज्वला ॥२ Udyath-bhaanu-sahara-aabhaa Chatu-r-baahu-sama-anwithaa Raga-swa-roopa-paasha-aadhya Kroedha-aakaara-angusha-o-ujjwalaa 2. Who enlightens and destroys evil of devotee, With four arms in all directions destroys evil fully, She the cause of love and attachment in life be, She carries stick of anger to destroy all surely. - 4 -

I had travelled from Spain into Morocco and from there south to the Atlas Mountains, at the edge of the Sahara Desert…one night, in a youth hostel that was more like a stable, I woke and walked out into a snowstorm. But it wasn’t the snow I was used to in Minnesota, or anywhere else I had been. Standing bare chest to cool night, wearing flip-flops and shorts, I let a storm of stars swirl around me. I remember no light pollution, heck, I remember no lights. But I remember the light around me-the sense of being lit by starlight- and that I could see the ground to which the stars seemed to be floating down. I saw the sky that night in three dimensions- the sky had depth, some stars seemingly close and some much farther away, the Milky Way so well defined it had what astronomers call “structure”, that sense of its twisting depths. I remember stars from one horizon to another, making a night sky so plush it still seems like a dream. It was a time in my life when I was every day experiencing something new. I felt open to everything, as though I was made of clay, and the world was imprinting on me its breathtaking beauty (and terrible reality.) Standing nearly naked under that Moroccan sky, skin against the air, the dark, the stars, the night pressed its impression, and my lifelong connection was sealed.

There are oceans of things to discover, to explore, to learn, to invent, to create in this world; especially with its modern possibilities offered. So, I don't understand when people complain they’re bored and have nothing to do.

I’m not gonna end my life on that! I’m not gonna be a fugitive! I’m not gonna let whoever cross over myself! I’m not going let the circumstances destroy me!” Emma promised in front of the heavens, feeling stronger than ever before.

I did not reach thee, But my feet slip nearer every day; Three Rivers and a Hill to cross, One Desert and a Sea— I shall not count the journey one When I am telling thee. Two deserts—but the year is cold So that will help the sand— One desert crossed, the second one Will feel as cool as land. Sahara is too little price To pay for thy Right hand! The sea comes last. Step merry, feet! So short have we to go To play together we are prone, But we must labor now, The last shall be the lightest load That we have had to draw. The Sun goes crooked—that is night— Before he makes the bend We must have passed the middle sea, Almost we wish the end Were further off—too great it seems So near the Whole to stand. We step like plush, we stand like snow— The waters murmur now, Three rivers and the hill are passed, Two deserts and the sea! Now Death usurps my premium And gets the look at Thee.

I've only ever met two people who sensed the true nature of my soul and, at least a little bit, were able to understand who I really am. They’re both extraordinary individuals, and their emotional support at particular times of my life played major roles in my ability to survive those hard times. That’s why they are undoubtedly special to me, and always will be.

Create your own “LUCK” in your personal life—instead of relying on “fate” and hoping that your happiness will spontaneously materialize sometime and somehow, as if by magic. Be the “magician” of your own destiny. Take control of your own fate.

My life had been characterized by emptiness the size of the Sahara but there, in that moment, in the back of that truck in the armpit of Nicaragua, I wondered—for the first time—if there wasn’t a river flowing down deep inside me. If so, the water that would cleanse me was not water from my head—where I’d learned to rationalize my indifference. But water from my heart.

Proper nutrition is one of the most fundamental things on which anyone’s healthy and happy life can be based. If you want to radically change your being for the better, to feel satisfied about who you are, or to look slim and attractive no matter what age is stated in your passport, start with changing unhealthy eating habits to healthy ones —and make them your favorites.

[…] I began to see Algiers as one of the most fascinating and dramatic places on earth. In the small space of this beautiful but congested city intersected two great conflicts of the contemporary world. The first was the one between Christianity and Islam (expressed here in the clash between colonizing France and colonized Algeria). The second, which acquired a sharpness of focus immediately after the independence and departure of the French, was a conflict at the very heart of Islam, between its open, dialectical — I would even say “Mediterranean” — current and its other, inward-looking one, born of a sense of uncertainty and confusion vis-à-vis the contemporary world, guided by fundamentalists who take advantage of modern technology and organizational principles yet at the same time deem the defense of faith and custom against modernity as the condition of their own existence, their sole identity. […] In Algiers one speaks simply of the existence of two varieties of Islam — one, which is called the Islam of the desert, and a second, which is defined as the Islam of the river (or of the sea). The first is the religion practiced by warlike nomadic tribes struggling to survive in one of the world's most hostile environments, the Sahara. The second Islam is the faith of merchants, itinerant peddlers, people of the road and of the bazaar, for whom openness, compromise, and exchange are not only beneficial to trade, but necessary to life itself.

Create your own “LUCK” in your personal life—instead of relying on “fate” and hoping that your happiness will spontaneously materialize sometime and somehow, as if by magic. Be the “magician” of your own destiny. Take control of your own fate. Be aware. Instead of following the crowd of complainers and repeating their common mistakes, use the Smart Dating Strategies, which are clearly described in the chapters of our exclusive eBooks. Be successful in your personal life and genuinely loved by the woman of your dreams. Read how to do it; learn the secrets to use and master them. Get the keys to the door of your own happiness. Make things happen. Choose to be a WINNER!

Let's make our existence more joyous, fulfilled and full of positive adventures... Let's add more vivid colors to life in the world around us: making it happier, merrier, easier, healthier, tastier and brighter! Our project is a constant source of inspiration to support these ideas.

If something unusual is what you really see and really feel, and if that’s what does happen to you in your real life, how is THAT called FICTION? One simple reason... that it’s the only way the society would agree to call it “normal,” based on the current level of development of their mentality.

Restaurant, bar, night club. . . Eat, drink, walk. . . YAWN. . . For some people, this is ALL they can think of when getting ready for a date. Isn’t a “shortlist” like this enough to make you and your girlfriend want to yawn? Why not fill your love story with truly wondrous and exciting activities, or surprise your date with something unusual and adventurous? Infuse your personal life with miracles and astonishment—not monotony. Isn’t this what everyone dreams of on our little planet? At the same time, who holds us back from fulfilling our own dreams, other than ourselves? Fill the life around you with joy. It will be returned to you tenfold. CREATE happy moments. . . MAKE miracles happen! LOVE is a miracle.

Treating people genuinely nice often leads to disappointment when they just don’t bother to treat you back the same way.

Having charged your brain with a cup of coffee, you’re ready to face some more challenges of life.

Whether living like a “normal” appear to be not the most unworthy way to invest the time of your being?

When I tested decisions made up by intellect and the ones when followed intuition, the latter always won.

The guy belonged to the team of those toads who hated anyone who outranked him in any sphere of life.

I always wished the Lord had created a humanity that doesn't have to waste so much of their precious time sleeping… and fighting different types of software bugs.

An absolutely perfect world would be a deadly boring place. There’s some kind of perfection in slight imperfection.

Mediocre individuals often try to mold you into an ordinary person like themselves. But it’s not possible, just as it’s impossible to fit the entire Universe into a pocket.

Angels do not survive on the Earth…

I will always love you as a person who was part of my life.

I believe humanity would develop their way forward quicker if a human didn't have to waste so much time on sleep and fighting countless software and device bugs.

Mengerjakan sesuatu tanpa tahu tujuannya membuatmu seperti orang bodoh di gurun sahara

Emily mostly perceived her habit to write down notes as being one of the ways she could use to preserve moments of life.

Often, exactly big complexes force an individual to achieve their big goals and massive success.

Modern formulaic society will try to make you "normal," rushing to call pseudoscientific anything you can do that they can’t.

No reprimand in the mirror Slow walk to Liberia Slow dance across the Sahara Slow unraveling of gray matter

Humans are really strange. when no one validates you, you often can't perceive your own value.

The most powerful enemies influence and defeat you in your mind.

Dreams come true… sometimes…

Having charged your heart and brain with a cup of coffee, you’re ready to face the challenges of life.

A good cup of coffee makes life seem better.

The Lord must have created coffee to reward humans for those bad times they sometimes have on Earth.

Having authored numerous and pretty versatile write-ups, I can’t say that anything other than my soul, heart and life experience can be called a prominent part of every book I ever wrote

I believe the best reviews are any of those wherein readers share their true opinion, no matter how many stars they rate my work. When I receive responses from appreciative people thanking for useful and amusing reading, it feels like my wings stretch up and blood carries the highest happiness circulating in my veins. I think many writers will understand what I mean by that.

With so many book projects filling mind and heart, it feels similar to pregnancy. Your own books are like your children—you have to give birth to them, raise them, and do your best to make sure they live happily. You know, you just HAVE TO put into writing all of those thoughts, words and ideas appearing and growing in your head. Otherwise, life will make no sense without it.

With great hope in their hearts and wholehearted belief in their eyes during each new attempt, they keep on using the same approach over and over again, and always FAIL... Yet every time they expect that somehow a totally different result will magically occur! They are “stepping on to the same rake,” and each time they’re surprised and angry when the rake handle hits them on the forehead again. But they keep seeing the reasons for their failures as just another hurtful kick from life—not a result of their own actions, which cause these setbacks. They just keep on blaming the rakes!

If you harbor preferred principles and ways of behaving that have never brought you ANY happiness, or even much luck in your personal relationships over a number of years—this should not be taken as a sign that all women are bad or that none of them are serious, but A SIGN THAT YOUR OWN ATTITUDE AND DATING STRATEGIES ARE FLAWED AND NOT REALLY SUCCESSFUL—and can only bring you further disappointments with women! It seems like an elementary, easy thing to accept. Strangely, thousands of people seem, for some reason, to be unable, or stubbornly refuse, to see the truth and draw such a logical conclusion.

Sometimes, even those whom we consider as our close friends may betray us so easily, in a moment when we do not even expect it. Such is the truth of life, despite so many eloquent odes humanity dedicated to friendship.

People feeling strong at some stage of their life sometimes easily allow themselves to offend the weak, being more than sure they will stay unpunished for their behavior. But in due time, the reckoning comes for everything.

When I was a schoolgirl my safe haven was a place at the uninhabited part of my parents’ house. I used to climb up to the large windowsill that was facing a spreading plum-tree in the garden. Reading books, or penning my own stories, diaries and poems, it was especially fun to rest there during the warmer seasons of the year with an open window, when the tree was all covered with tender, odorous blossom in spring, and with rich purple fruitage in summer.

Humans can be truly cruel sometimes, even so-called friends, relatives, and family. Moreover, I found out that treating people genuinely nice often leads to disappointment when they just don’t bother to treat you back the same way.

If you think that any road to massive success takes loads, and loads, and loads of work, you are wrong. The truth is, it takes even more effort, dedication, guts, sacrifices, resourcefulness, and patience than you can ever foresee.

What do we actually consider to be “normal?" It’s only about what our conventional mentality is or isn’t able to understand, and agree to accept as “real.” In fact, the shadowy edge between normal and paranormal is more than ILLUSORY… The exact same can be stated about the border between calling your novel non-fiction or fiction. What if you could close your eyes and see different worlds and planets? What if you could see them with some kind of different vision, even with your eyes open? Would that make you a paranoid… a freak, a genius, a crazy? Or, maybe, an Indigo, if that’s what’s been happening to you since you can remember? If something unusual is what you really see and really feel, and if that’s what does happen to you in your real life, how is THAT called FICTION? One simple reason... that it’s the only way the society would agree to call it “normal,” based on the current level of development of their mentality.

To be successful, any business requires a concentrated investment of time and energy; wherein each stage of the development has its tactics and priorities, in regards to which activities and when it makes sense to invest the efforts in.

Twenty seven years ago, during my first romantic relationship with a boy, I started keeping a diary about my thoughts and experiences. That diary formed the basis of my novel “A Dream of Two Moons,” the title of which comes from some paranormal occurrences from real life.

Could Miss Smith be truly considered as a nerd or freak? Other than the reasons she brought to Billy, there were a few more aspects of life where Emily, for some reason, differed from the majority of students. She just didn’t ever fit to match the crowd, no matter how hard she tried.

Lately, I usually write at the desk in my living-room or bedroom. From time to time, our red and stripy cat named Foxy decides to be my companion, poking his curious caramel-colored nose to the screen, watching me typing, and making attempts to put his paws on the keyboard despite the fact that he knows he is not allowed to; he also loves to arrange “sunbathing sessions for himself, purring joyfully while lying with his belly up under the lamp placed to the left of my computer; and, of course, the cat can’t wait for when I happen to have a snack, to beg for some treats that seem to him tastiest if eaten from a caring human’s hand.

This is the true story of my life, as told by a complete liar (me). While that sounds like an honest statement, it’s also a lie. I just can’t help myself. Unless I’m helping myself to seconds at dinner. You see, I can’t possibly be a complete liar, because I’m a rather incomplete person. I look complete on the outside—two arms, legs, ears, eyes, etc—but on the inside I feel half empty at times. If I were a glass of water, I’d make myself thirstier for more than I could supply. I thirst for love like a straw in the Sahara. I hunger for your body like a cannibal in the mountains. Wait, that last bit wasn’t true. I should have said cannibal on a deserted island.

In many cases, traditional education systems and methods lead to wasting a vast amount of your invaluable resources, including time, energy, and money. If you need to study something, at any moment of your life, you can start learning it purposefully, without spending years of your being memorizing heaps of quite useless information.

There are souls innumerable in the world, as dry as the Sahara desert—souls which, when they look most gay and summer-like, are only flaunting the flowers gathered from other people's gardens, stuck without roots into their own unproducing soil. Oh, the dreariness, the sandy sadness of such poor arid souls! They are hungry, and eat husks; they are thirsty, and drink hot wine; their sleep is a stupor, and their life, if not an unrest, then a yielded decay. Only when praised or admired do they feel as if they lived! But Joan was not yet of such. She had had too much discomfort to have entered yet into their number. There was water not yet far from the surface of her consciousness.

Just don't eat all of it," Ram fusses. "It could be tampered with. You should show it to your dad first, he'll know--" "Ram has Seahorse Syndrome," Sahara tells me wisely. "What's that?" I ask. "In seahorses the dad's the one who gets pregnant and has babies. We learned about it in life science class. Ram thinks he's a mother hen. So he must be a seahorse.

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…

Especially her father was watching with much attention to ensure that Emma didn’t have “too much” of leisure time (or even happy emotions) in her life; that’s why she was sometimes truly missing it and didn’t have much of anything interesting going on, being surrounded mostly by depressing boredom of everlasting routine duties she was fulfilling daily, being a responsible and hardworking person since early ages.

Emily crawled down to the floor, sliding along the wall, in the corner of the room. The girl did not show anyone that her heart was crying; therefore, everyone thought that she just did not care. After encountering reluctance to understand her from the side of her family members and their typical prejudiced judgment for too many times, her pride would not let her show the storm of emotions taking place inside of her soul.

The worst reviews, by my mind, are those from individuals who enjoy entertaining themselves by writing something bad about books they actually never read, which is as clear as day from what they’re saying. It’s even more puzzling for an author to check some of these “honest” reviewers’ pages and see that they created their profile with one goal in mind; to post you a bad review, as there’s nothing else they wanted to rate.

If you don’t do anything to capture and draw your memories—no matter whether you choose words, pencil, photography, or filming—the only place where they have a chance to exist is in your head, which can’t be called the most reliable place to store them; soon, they’d be lost forever… leaving no trace, like they never existed… like YOU never existed… same as those billions and billions of lives that had already disappeared from the world.

Have you ever pondered of the following: Space is a home for the Universe. The Universe is a home for its Galaxies. The Milky Way Galaxy is a home for the Solar System. The Solar System is a home for our planet. The Earth is a home for organic life forms. Your house or apartment is your home. Your body is a home for your soul; and yet for trillions of cells your organism consists of. A cell is a home for its molecules. A molecule is a home for its atoms. An atom is a home for its components, such as protons, electrons, and neutrons. Etc. The world is all about homes!

The Dragon of Bad Emotions: … One of the most difficult (but utterly important) things to manage in life is to “KILL THE DRAGON” inside of ourselves—a strong, aggressive, negative “dragon” of nasty emotions that lives inside of you, me. . . everybody! Probably this type of negativity can sometimes even be helpful in business, but it can also destroy any love or closeness, if you let it reach into your private life. You have to kill this “dragon” every day, because it comes back again and again, trying to destroy your happiness and the good, close relationships you have with your partner, and with other people.

Another feature distinguishing Emily from the multitude was a kind of special sensitivity that couldn’t be explained from a stereotypical point of view. It was natural for her to make decisions based on so-called sixth feeling instead of logic. Sometimes, she simply felt and knew that it was right to act in a certain way, or that something particular was going to happen in the closest future. It’s interesting that, when she tested decisions made up by intellect and the ones when followed intuition, the latter always won. But how could she explain it to an average person, like those surrounding her in everyday life?

You’re lovely. I’m crazy about you. All these words I’m using, don’t you see, they’ve never been said before. Can’t you see? I’m crazy about you. It’s a whirlwind. Have you ever been to the Sahara Desert? Listen to me. It’s true. Listen. You overwhelm me. You’re so lovely. You’re so beautiful. Look at the way you’re looking at me. Look at the way you’re looking at me. I can’t wait for you. I’m bowled over, I’m totally knocked out, you dazzle me, you jewel, my jewel, I can’t ever sleep again, no, listen, it’s the truth, I won’t walk, I’ll be a cripple, I’ll descend, I’ll diminish, into total paralysis, my life is in your hands, that’s what you’re banishing me to, a state of catatonia, do you know the state of catatonia? Do you? Do you? The state of … where the reigning prince is the prince of emptiness, the prince of absence, the prince of desolation. I love you. Everyone knows. The world knows. It knows. But they’ll never know, they’ll never know, they’re in a different world. I adore you. I’m madly in love with you. I can’t believe that what anyone is at this moment saying has ever happened has ever happened. Nothing has ever happened. Nothing. This is the only thing that has ever happened. Your eyes kill me. I’m lost. You’re wonderful.

I’ve lived near here at several different stretches across time, but once, when I lived here a few hundred years ago, I had a camel I named Oded. He was just about the laziest creature ever to talk the Earth. He would pass out when I was in the middle of feeding him, and making it to the closest Bedouin camp for tea was a minor miracle. But when I first met you in that lifetime-“ “Oded broke into a run,” Luce said without thinking. “I screamed because I thought he was going to trample me. You said you’d never seen him move like that.” “Yeah, well,” Daniel said. “He liked you.” They paused and looked at each other, and Daniel started laughing when Luce’s jaw dropped. “I did it!” she cried out. “It was just there, in my memory, a part of me. Like it happened yesterday. I came to me without thinking!” It was miraculous. All those memories from all those lives that had been lost each time Lucinda died in Daniel’s arms were somehow finding their way back to her, the way Luce always found her way back to Daniel. No. She was finding her way to them. It was like a gate had been left open after Luce’s quest through the Announcers. Those memories stayed with her, from Moscow to Helston to Egypt. Now more were becoming available. She had a sudden, keen sense of who she was-and she wasn’t just Luce Price from Thunderbolt, Georgia. She was every girl she’d ever been, an amalgamation of experience, mistakes, achievements, and, above all, love. She was Lucinda. “Quick,” she said to Daniel. “Can we do another?” “Okay, how about another desert life? You were living in the Sahara when I found you. Tall and gangly and the fastest runner in your village. I was passing through one day, on my way to visit Roland, and I stopped for the night at the closest spring. All the other men were very distrustful of me, but-“ “But my father paid you three zebra skins for the knife you had in your satchel!” Daniel grinned. “He drove a hard bargain.” “This is amazing,” she said, nearly breathless. How much more did she have in her that she didn’t know about? How far back could she go? She pivoted to face him, drawing her knees against her chest and leaning in so that their foreheads were almost touching. “Can you remember everything about our pasts?” Daniel’s eyes softened at the corners. “Sometimes the order of things gets mixed up in my head. I’ll admit, I don’t remember long stretches of time I’ve spent alone, but I can remember every first glimpse of your face, every kiss of your lips, every memory I’ve ever made with you.

What are we, people, living for? You know, what I can observe in our life is that all adults are mostly living for the reason to earn funds for being able to feed themselves and raise their kids; and then those kids grow up and living for the goal to feed themselves and their children… So this feels like an everlasting circle, isn’t it? I mean, shouldn’t each of us, humans, have some kinds of more interesting and important sense of life, except for just living for eating and feeding? Isn’t it sensless and way too primitive to live that way? I believe… I feel I am living for some greater reason, than just eating to grow up to feed the kids to grow up… How could it be right or “normal” that Lord, or the Universe, gave a human the precious gift of life for most of us just to live to eat and to raise kids, for them to only eat and grow their children, and nothing more than that? Could that way really be our gift back to God, in appreciation for what we got? Doesn’t such an existence seem useless and worthless without having some missions and goals of a higher level? Whether living like a “normal” appear to be not the most unworthy way to invest the time of your being?

However, in making the assertion that a certain service—in this case, raising children—can in fact be prayer, I am bolstered by the testimony of contemplatives themselves. Carlo Carretto, one of the twentieth century’s best spiritual writers, spent many years in the Sahara Desert by himself praying. Yet he once confessed that he felt that his mother, who spent nearly thirty years raising children, was much more contemplative than he was, and less selfish. If that is true, and Carretto suggests that it is, the conclusion we should draw is not that there was anything wrong with his long hours of solitude in the desert, but that there was something very right about the years his mother lived an interrupted life amid the noise and demands of small children. ... For years, while she is raising small children, her time is not her own, her own needs have to be put into second place, and every time she turns around some hand is reaching out demanding something. Years of this will mature most anyone. It is because of this that she does not need, during this time, to pray for an hour a day. And it is precisely because of this that the rest of us, who do not have constant contact with small children, need to pray privately daily.

When you asked me, breathless, breathing the same air I was breathing, 'And what now?' I didn't know what to to say. Three months later and I still don't know the answer. I've been a nomad my whole life. I've crossed half the world, from Chicago to Palestine, Iceland to the Sahara, and I've never known what name to give this anxious wandering. Now I know that I was looking for you. I know now that you are my destiny, my country, my church. I know that it became December when I left Luanda, and that ever since then Winter has been prowling like a ravenous wolf all around me.

A dry belt located along the fringes of the Sahara is called Sahel (Sahil) by the Mande people who live there. Sahel means “shore” in Arabic, and the region is like the shoreline of the desert sea.

The divide ran through Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, and the Dakotas, and stretches south into Mexico and north into Manitoba, Canada, separating more densely populated communities full of large farms from sparser, open land that was never truly made valuable by agriculture. Since just 1980, that boundary has moved fully 140 miles east, almost to the 98th parallel, drying up hundreds of thousands of square miles of farmland in the process. The planet’s only other similar boundary is the one separating the Sahara desert from the rest of Africa. That desert has expanded by 10 percent, too; in the winter, the figure is 18 percent.