Path Quotes

In this world some people will always throw stones in your path. It depends on you what you make from them... a wall or a bridge. ~ John Reyes

Shine the light of awareness on your disempowering beliefs and choose to substitute them with empowering beliefs. This way you will choose love over fear and your path to purpose becomes clear. ~ Sharon Kirstin

Love can't mature in one room. It has to come out of the full sharing of everything: joys, aspirations, downfalls, all of it. That's the only real path to love. ~ Leon Uris

CHARACTER of the HAPPY WARRIOR. Who is the happy Warrior? Who is he Whom every Man in arms should wish to be? - It is the generous Spirit, who, when brought Among the tasks of real life, hath wrought Upon the plan that pleased his childish thought: Whose high endeavours are an inward light That make the path before him always bright: Who, with a natural instinct to discern What knowledge can perform, is diligent to learn; Abides by this resolve, and stops not there, 10 But makes his moral being his prime care; Who, doom'd to go in company with Pain, And Fear, and Bloodshed, miserable train! ~ William Wordsworth

Don't hate on someone whose hard work placed them on the road to success, while your envy and ill-intent put you on a path toward failure. ~ Carlos Wallace

The sexiest thing about a women is her health. When you feel good, everyone is attracted to you. But if you look sick, they'll steer a wild path around you. ~ Carol Alt

Its authors meant it to be ... a stumbling block to those who in after times might seek to turn a free people back into the hateful paths of despotism. They knew the proneness of prosperity to breed tyrants, and they meant when such should re-appear in this fair land and commence their vocation they should find left for them at least one hard nut to crack. ~ Abraham Lincoln

You've got to find it (the path to wealth) on your own ... No one else can find it for you. ~ Ziad K. Abdelnour

Ours has been an expansionist society, but that narrative must change as we run out of places to expand into. But our culture is like a cart stuck in the same old rut that has been leading us in one direction. The longer we've been using a path, the deeper the ruts get, the harder it is to escape them. We've been moving ever Westward, but there's only so far we can go in that direction before we fall into the ocean. It's a direction that we cannot continue on forever, but the breaking of those ruts will require a major rupture. The old narrative is dying, and it will be quite a crushing of gears before things are re-adjusted. A shared story is needed for a civilization to endure. ~ James Rozoff

I'm a follower of the Christ path, and that opens a huge discussion about what we even mean by words like "Christian." ~ Barbara Brown Taylor

You are on a soulful path that asks you to step into the greatest version of yourself. It is a sacred gift to shine your brightest light, not just in your moments of glory, but each day. ~ Debbie Ford

Padmé insists: "There's always a choice." Does Anakin hear the echo of her voice decades later, when he decides to save their son from the Emperor? I like to think so.

"YOU GET MANY OPPORTUNITIES TO KEEP YOUR EYES OPEN"

Here's Leia, speaking of Han's apparent desertion of the rebellion in A New Hope: "A man must follow his own path. No one can choose it for him." Here's Obi-Wan to Luke, again in A New Hope: "Then you must do what you think is right, of course." Here are Lucas's own words: "Life sends you down funny paths. And you get many opportunities to keep your eyes open." He was talking about his own life, but he might as well have been talking about Star Wars and the characters who populate it. ~ Cass R. Sunstein

People that encounter me cannot understand why I refuse to worship, either it is a religion, a prophet or a writer. They don't understand that I was born to be worshipped, and not worship, As me, many others have been here before and face the same. People disdain, ignore and ridicule the living while worshipping the dead. And once I'm gone, the cycle will repeat, with someone better than me facing what I face now. I'm great now, not 300 years from now, when everyone will agree with this statement but I won't be here to disagree wit it and show a better path. ~ Robin Sacredfire

Know you can direct a path around them and be your best life if you want to. ~ Lee Vickers

Love's Prayer If Heaven would hear my prayer, My dearest wish would be, Thy sorrows not to share But take them all on me; If Heaven would hear my prayer. I'd beg with prayers and sighs That never a tear might flow From out thy lovely eyes, If Heaven might grant it so; Mine be the tears and sighs. No cloud thy brow should cover, But smiles each other chase From lips to eyes all over Thy sweet and sunny face; The clouds my heart should cover. That all thy path be light Let darkness fall on me; If all thy days be bright, Mine black as night could be; My love would light my night. For thou art more than life, And if our fate should set Life and my love at strife, How could I then forget I love thee more than life? ~ John Hay

And perhaps this is what Tukten knows - that the journey to Dolpo, step by step and day by day, is the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus, the Tao, the Way, the Path, but no more so than small events of days at home. ~ Peter Matthiessen

Do not blindly believe what others say. See for yourself what brings contentment, clarity and peace. That is the path for you to follow. ~ Gautama Buddha

If we want greater clarity in our purpose or deeper and more meaningful spiritual lives, vulnerability is the path. ~ Brene Brown

Fear breeds repression; that repression breeds hate; that hate menaces stable government; that the path of safety lies in the opportunity to discuss freely supposed grievances and proposed remedies; and that the fitting remedy for evil counsels is good ones. ~ Louis D. Brandeis

It isn't enough to pick a path - you must go down it. By doing so, you see things you couldn't possibly see when you started out; you may not like what you see, some of it may be confusing, but at least you will have, as we like to say, "explored the neighborhood." The key point here is that even if you decide you're in the wrong place, there is still time to head toward the right place. ~ Ed Catmull

Dream-travelers, there is no path, paths are made by dreaming. ~ Antonio Machado

What you are, and who you are should provide greater clarity about where you have been and where you are headed. Although one distinguishes spiritual from physical nature, the ultimate unification of the two is the consequence of the struggle for internal, external and eternal – peace. ~ T.F. Hodge

The quickest path to self-destruction is to push away the people you love. ~ Cassia Leo

We ought to walk in the bright light. ~ Lailah Gifty Akita

Listening to him tell the story now, it was clear to Adam that Glendower was more than a historical figure to Gansey. He was everything Gansey wished he could be: wise and brave, sure of his path, touched by the supernatural, respected by all, survived by his legacy. ~ Maggie Stiefvater

Thus hand in hand through life we 'll go; Its checker'd paths of joy and woe With cautious steps we 'll tread. ~ Nathaniel Cotton

A brick could be placed down on the first step on the path to enlightenment. ~ Jarod Kintz

Lapin breaks away from Broadway and picks a path toward Telegraph Hill. Her velocity is steady, even as the landscape rises underneath her; she's the little eccentric that could. ~ Robin Sloan

My goal is to correct evil. I have to instruct these people on the right path. ~ Viktor Shel

As a nation, we are on a path of rapid and deep systemic change to our health system, and it's going to unfold for some time to come. It is already transforming the fundamental nature of the U.S. medical care delivery system. ~ John E. McDonough

So I think the Guru can be a delusion. But everything can be deluding. The thing central about the Guru in the West is that he represents an alien principle of the spirit, namely, that you don't follow your own path; you follow a given path. And that's totaly contrary to the Western Spirit! Our spirituality is of the individual quest, individual realization- authenticity in your life out of your own center. So you must take the message of the East, assimilate it to your own dimension and to your own thrust of life, and not get pulled off track. ~ Joseph Campbell

No, a true seeker, one who truly wished to find, could accept no doctrine. But the man who has found what he sought, such a man could approve of every doctrine, each and every one, every path, every goal; nothing separated him any longer from all those thousands of others who lived in the eternal, who breathed the Divine. ~ Hermann Hesse

Life is the path you beat while you walk it. ~ Antonio Machado

That last night," she said quietly. "Why did you say you hoped you'd never see me again?"
He hadn't said it; it had been his last thought when he'd turned to leave. But he didn't seem to notice the discrepancy as he looked at her now.
"Because," he began before faltering, his voice leaving on a sigh. His left hand reached to rake a path through his hair, scattering the inky thickness in all directions. "The more I learn of you, the more difficult it is to stay away. ~ Angela B. Wade

Do not, as some ungracious pastors do,
Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven;
Whilst, like a puff'd and reckless libertine,
Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads
And recks not his own read. ~ William Shakespeare

The moment I began to understand what was going on with the treatment of animals, it led me more and more in the way of the path I am [on] now, which is a complete vegan.' ~ Bryan Adams

But by reading them again and again finally I was able to grasp the essential part. What emotion, enthusiasm, enlightenment and confidence they communicated to me! I wept for joy. ~ Ho Chi Minh

You know you're on the right road, when the right and necessary people cross your path ~ Jeff Hodges

if you really want to live, it's imperative that you go back down the path and claim it. You've got to be there then before you can be here now. The mystery begins with our history. ~ Jeff Brown

I believe in signs ... what we need to learn is always there before us, we just have to look around us with respect & attention to discover where God is leading us and which step we should take. When we are on the right path, we follow the signs, and if we occasionally stumble, the Divine comes to our aid, preventing us from making mistakes. ~ Paulo Coelho

I was hoping to get to the NBA, but the Lord took me on a different path. ~ Robbie Jones

Every successful artist comes from a family - parents or siblings or both - who, although equally gifted, chose not to pursue the treacherous and difficult path of the artist. ~ Chris Abani

Her soul was a country he longed to explore and know as well as he did every stone that pocked that creek path. ~ Lori Benton

Use a screwdriver instead of a hammer. Try to untighten the nut with your hand. Utilize the path of least resistance first. ~ Tim Allen

Our perceptions shape whether challenges are obstacles that block our path to success or important arrows that steer us in the direction we want to go. ~ Julie Connor

The Gentle Gardener
I'd like to leave but daffodils to mark my little way,
To leave but tulips red and white behind me as I stray;
I'd like to pass away from earth and feel I'd left behind
But roses and forget-me-nots for all who come to find.
I'd like to sow the barren spots with all the flowers of earth,
To leave a path where those who come should find but gentle mirth;
And when at last I'm called upon to join the heavenly throng
I'd like to feel along my way I'd left no sign of wrong.
And yet the cares are many and the hours of toil are few;
There is not time enough on earth for all I'd like to do;
But, having lived and having toiled, I'd like the world to find
Some little touch of beauty that my soul had left behind. ~ Edgar A. Guest

There do exist enquiring minds, which long for the truth of the heart, seek it, strive to solve the problems set by life, try to penetrate to the essence of things and phenomena and to penetrate into themselves. If a man reasons and thinks soundly, no matter which path he follows in solving these problems, he must inevitably arrive back at himself, and begin with the solution of the problem of what he is himself and what his place is in the world around him. ~ G.I. Gurdjieff

Pay attention to the people God puts in your path if you want to discern what God is up to in your life. ~ Henri Nouwen

I think falling in love should come with a warning label: CAUTION - side effects may include breaking up, accompanied by heartache, severe mood swings, withdrawal from people and life itself, wasted hours obsessing over bitter reflections, a need to destroy something (preferably something expensive that shatters), uncontrollable tear ducts, stress, a loss of appetite (Cheetos and Dr. Pepper exempt), a bleak and narrow outlook on the future, and an overall hatred of everyone and everything (especially all the happy couples you see strolling hand-in-hand, placed on your path only to exacerbate your isolation and misery). All above reactions will be intensified with the consumption of one or more alcoholic beverages. ~ Katie Kacvinsky

Fate can only get you so far. It can put you down the right path or introduce you to a particular person, but the rest is up to you. Even the strongest storm need a wind to carry them in. ~ Katie Kacvinsky

When I was young, I believed that life might unfold in an orderly way, according to my hopes and expectations. But now I understand that the Way winds like a river, always changing, ever onward.. My journeys revealed that the Way itself creates the warrior; that every path leads to peace, every choice to wisdom. And that life has always been, and will always be, arising in Mystery. ~ Socrates

I chose the hardest path and I am choosing the easiest right path. I am choosing nothing, and , for once, nothing is exactly right. ~ Kiersten White

What a vicious circle we can put ourselves in: we have come to accept the notion of "fix me first," when part of the essential fixing we all need is to be compassionately involved with others. ~ Bo Lozoff

I think of my father growing up in South Jersey, the son of second-generation German immigrant glassblowers. The opportunities for him of feeling that aspiration, that yearning, get out of the small town, connect to a larger world, get yourself to New York, wanting to play the piano at every opportunity, bonding with people who were on a similar path, ending up in Provincetown, which was kind of nexus for nonconformity, and artistic dropout reality. ~ Anne Waldman

This is about putting education absolutely in the centre of enterprise and then using the traditions of Birmingham to inspire and grow. If you have knowledge and business linked together you will grow well, you go further down the innovative path and actually you create more and more jobs. Those jobs will only be available for people with skills but they will be real sustainable employments. That is how important innovation is. ~ Digby Jones, Baron Jones Of Birmingham

We can no longer afford to worship the God of hate or bow before the altar of retaliation. The oceans of history are made turbulent by the ever-rising tides of hate. History is cluttered with the wreckage of nations and individuals that pursued this self-defeating path of hate. Love is the key to the solution of the problems of the world. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

A flock isn't such a bad thing if you belong, but a few hundred starlings will tear an unlucky martin to feathers if it crosses their path. ~ Joe Hill

Oh, no you don't. You're not heading down to that dock, young man," Babette declares as she clears my plate.
"But Babette, Dr. Felix said I only had to rest yesterday!"
"Yes he did, and I won't make you stay in bed today. But you're going to stay here while I go. I don't think your crutches are able to make it down the path. It's too rough. You'll end up tripping over something."
I scoff. She doesn't know that I'm the guy who not only made it down to the dock, but also did it in the dark WITHOUT falling flat on his back.
"But Babette - "
"No buts, Rylan. You're staying here and that's final"
"Fine," I grumble. ~ Colleen Boyd

He was an artist of rare ability, a self-taught artist, without teachers or schools, principles and rules, carried away only by the thirst for perfection, and treading a path indicated by his own instincts, for reasons unknown, perchance, even to himself. Through some lofty and secret instinct he perceived the presence of a soul in every object. ~ Nikolai Gogol

Ten years ago a book appeared in France called D'Une foi l'autre, les conversions a l'Islam en Occident. The authors, both career journalists, carried out extensive interviews with new Muslims in Europe and America. Their conclusions are clear. Almost all educated converts to Islam come in through the door of Islamic spirituality. In the middle ages, the Sufi tariqas were the only effective engine of Islamisation in Muslim minority areas like Central Asia, India, black Africa and Java; and that pattern is maintained today.

Why should this be the case? Well, any new Muslim can tell you the answer. Westerners are in the first instance seeking not a moral path, or a political ideology, or a sense of special identity - these being the three commodities on offer among the established Islamic movements. They lack one thing, and they know it - the spiritual life. Thus, handing the average educated Westerner a book by Sayyid Qutb, for instance, or Mawdudi, is likely to have no effect, and may even provoke a revulsion. But hand him or her a collection of Islamic spiritual poetry, and the reaction will be immediately more positive. It is an extraordinary fact that the best-selling religious poet in modern America is our very own Jalal al-Din Rumi. Despite the immeasurably different time and place of his origin, he outsells every Christian religious poet.

Islam and the New Millennium ~ Abdal Hakim Murad

As our life is our main provisional value, 'taking the time' to interpret our experiences is a momentous choice. Time, life and choice outline a trilogy that can solve and unite so as to vanquish the powerlessness which we might face on our path. (Could time be patient?) ~ Erik Pevernagie

[Our] first and foremost duty [is] to seek the Lord until we open the path of communication from God to our own soul. ~ Brigham Young

You want to know what I believe? I believe in fate, but I also believe in free will. Meaning, there's a path, but we're free to veer away from it. The only problem is that there's no way to know whose path we're following on any given moment. Our own? Our fate's? Other people are on their on paths, too. What happens when we intersect? What happens when someone else wipes our path clean, and we're left with no road to follow? Is that fate? Is that when free will kicks in? Is the path there, but invisible?
Who the hell knows? ~ Brigid Kemmerer

The perilous path to progress has never been successfully detached from sacrifice, Mr. Sheppard. The altars of advancement have rarely been bloodless, but we can hope, we can pray, that our lambs have not, and will not, die in vain. ~ Randy McWilson

What number path does cricket need to follow to get to circle B? ~ Shane Alex Lee

Thirty years ago, if you said the country was living beyond its means, people would have thought about economics. Now, if you talk about the country, or the planet living beyond its means, you think about the environment. We are taking out more than we are giving back. We are consuming energy, water, and other natural resources in a way that is leading to huge and often irreversible damage to the planet. So too are most other developed nations. And so too will China and India if they follow the same path of economic development as us ~ David Miliband

I imagine God to be like my father. My father was always the voice of certainty in my life. Certainty in the wisdom, certainty in the path, certainty always in God. For me God is certainty in everything. Certainty that everything is good and everything is God. ~ Yehuda Berg

When I look round to see how we can win the war I see that there is only one sure path ... and that is absolutely devastating, exterminating attack by very heavy bombers from this country upon the Nazi homeland. We must be able to overwhelm them by this means, without which I do not see a way through. ~ Winston Churchill

I tried to just do things like make some money, be responsible, help out other artists who I see have had a similar path. ~ Ariel Pink

Take one famous example: arguments about property destruction after Seattle. Most of these, I think, were really arguments about capitalism. Those who decried window-breaking did so mainly because they wished to appeal to middle-class consumers to move towards global exchange-style green consumerism, and to ally with labor bureaucracies and social democrats abroad. This was not a path designed to provoke a direct confrontation with capitalism, and most of those who urged us to take this route were at least skeptical about the possibility that capitalism could ever really be defeated. Many were in fact in favor of capitalism, if in a significantly humanized form. Those who did break windows, on the other hand, didn't care if they offended suburban homeowners, because they did not figure that suburban homeowners were likely to ever become a significant element in any future revolutionary anticapitalist coalition. They were trying, in effect, to hijack the media to send a message that the system was vulnerable -- hoping to inspire similar insurrectionary acts on the part of those who might be considering entering a genuinely revolutionary alliance; alienated teenagers, oppressed people of color, undocumented workers, rank-and-file laborers impatient with union bureaucrats, the homeless, the unemployed, the criminalized, the radically discontent. If a militant anticapitalist movement was to begin, in America, it would have to start with people like these: people who don't need to ~ David Graeber

Surrounding myself with women of different backgrounds and on different paths and in different stages of their lives has become so valuable to me. ~ Brie Larson

There's an old Celtic proverb that I follow: See much, study much, suffer much is the path to wisdom. ~ Greg Jackson

Life has taught you many things, and the people close to you want you to have a good future, but it isn't their future in the end ... its your choice you pick the path and lead the way. All your family will do is follow you while you are on that path and support you when you find the light at the end of your road. ~ Julia Serano

If men and women were equal, everybody would have the same values.Because at this point in time, many women feel compelled to care for the children, feel empathetically into another person's reality, more so than many men who often are on more of a straight-shooting path towards achievement come what may. ~ Elizabeth Lesser

[No] matter what a waste one has made of one's life, it is ever possible to find some path to redemption, however partial. ~ Charles Frazier

Deliberately, as if committing himself to something, he stepped forward and walked down the path to the porch and knocked on the front door. ~ John Edward Williams

By applauding Robinson, a man did not feel that he was taking a stand on school integration, or on open housing. But for an instant he had accepted Robinson simply as a hometown ball player. To disregard color, even for an instant, is to step away from the old prejudices, the old hatred. That is not a path on which many double back. ~ Roger Kahn

Who provides the love and a path to reconciliation? It's not Planned Parenthood; it's the Catholic Church, the other Christian churches, and the ministries they have created. ~ Chris Smith

And yet to possess a young soul that has barely developed is a source of very deep delight. It is like a flower whose richest perfume goes out to meet the first ray of the sun. One must pluck it at that very moment and, after inhaling its perfume to one's heart's content, discard it along the wayside on the chance that someone will pick it up. I sense in myself that insatiable avidity that devours everything in its path. And I regard the sufferings and joys of others merely in relation to myself, as food to sustain my spiritual strength. Passion is no longer capable of robbing me of my sanity. My ambition has been crushed by circumstances, but it has manifested itself in a new form, for ambition is nothing but lust for power, and my greatest pleasure I derive from subordinating everything around me to my will. Is it not both the first token of power and its supreme triumph to inspire in others the emotions of love, devotion and fear? Is it not the sweetest fare for our vanity to be the cause of pain or joy for someone without the least claim thereto? And what is happiness? Pride gratified. Could I consider myself better and more powerful than anyone else in the world, I would be happy. Were everybody to love me, I'd find in myself unending wellsprings of love. Evil begets evil; one's first suffering awakens a realization of the pleasure of tormenting another. The idea of evil cannot take root in the mind of man without his desiring to apply it in practice. Someone has said th ~ Mikhail Lermontov

I release ribbons of gratitude to flow back upon the path I have walked as it stretches out behind me, so they brush past everyone whose path crossed my own. May they feel the brief kiss of remembrance within their hearts, there and then gone again, passing like a spring breeze, so that they suddenly know the things they have done for others, in so many ways big and small, seen and unseen alike, somewhere are known and treasured. ~ Cristen Rodgers

Life is an individual race. ~ Lailah Gifty Akita

There was someone in his little attic room. Geralt knew it before he even reached the door, sensing it through the barely perceptible vibration of his medallion. He blew out the oil lamp which had lit his path up the stairs, pulled the dagger from his boot, slipped it into the back of his belt and pressed the door handle. The room was dark. But not for a witcher. He was deliberately slow in crossing the threshold; he closed the door behind him carefully. The next second he dived at the person sitting on his bed, crushed them into the linen, forced his forearm under their chin and reached for his dagger. He didn't pull it out. Something wasn't right. "Not a bad start," she said in a muffled voice, lying motionless beneath him. "I expected something like this, but I didn't think we'd both be in bed so quickly. Take your hand from my throat please." "It's ~ Andrzej Sapkowski

They walked off on the earthy path, laughing not quite naturally, for they could hardly help being pleased by the momentary attention of descending passengers and by their own almost meritorious youth. ~ Shirley Hazzard

To follow the path look to the master follow the master walk with the master see through the master become the master. ~ Sengcan

For those of us with introverted tendencies, many think that hard work and good results is what matters most. It would be great if that were the case, but it's wrong to believe that to be true. Superb performance on the job is important, but if you don't have a supportive network, you're in for some big disappointments. We speak to people continuously who suffer from the missing component of good networking in their career path. Those people find that their missed opportunities or promotions are demoralizing and certainly frustrating. ~ Dorothy Tannahill-Moran

If mankind were to continue in other than the present barbarism, a new path must be found, a new civilization based on some other method than technology. ~ Clifford D. Simak

When your life is not the primrose path, you still have to walk your road. You have to be a judge, pry right from wrong, figure out what ugly things the good can perch in, too. ~ Moira Crone

For how long will you keep on wandering around for infinite lifetimes? Your own light is not there. For how long will you keep on wandering in the dark? One has walked for billions and billions of miles and yet he has not seen the light. He has not found the right path. The truth will have to be known, will it not? ~ Dada Bhagwan

From where we lived, to practise in St Louis was an hour-and-a-half drive each way, so that took a lot of the time. So really, our lives just took different paths. ~ Jimmy Connors

The enormous vermilion sun was dropping toward the sea, its reflected glow making a blazing path across the water to the very beach, where the last ripple was spangled with garnets. Otherwise, the sea was periwinkle purple, spilling and whispering and sidling with an easy going prattle of foam round the steeper rocks. ~ L.M. Boston

It will require you to forsake nearly everything that it means to be a Jedi. But you have already begun down that path, I think. Your grief over the deaths of the Krim family does not speak of nonattachment. ~ Christie Golden

The unique thing about my life is the extent to which it took me on a path-business-I had no desire to walk. ~ Norio Ohga

Who seeks for heaven alone to save his soul,
May keep the path, but will not reach the goal;
While he who walks in love may wander far,
Yet God will bring him where the blessed are. ~ Henry Van Dyke

Achieve the success they truly desire because they get impatient. They want easy success or none at all. They see the path to success as a frustration, an impediment. Each day spent short of the ultimate goal is viewed as a time of failure and as an annoyance. As such, they get distracted by hundreds of little things that each day try to get us off our course. Yet the successful among us know the truth: ~ Earl Nightingale

Do not let a leader lead you on a bad path. ~ Confucius

TO THE LADY JESSICA-
May this place give you as much pleasure as it has given me. Please permit the room to convey a lesson we learned from the same teachers: the proximity of a desirable thing tempts one to overindulgence. On that path lies danger.
My kindest wishes,
MARGOT LADY FENRING ~ Frank Herbert

Krupa (divine grace) means 'every time sincere'. Without becoming suitable for naimitik krupa (apparent grace), one cannot attain the nischay (Realization that I am Pure Soul). Even in the Kramic (step by step) path, there is naimitk krupa. 'We' shower down special grace. 'Our' grace descends upon one due to ultimate humility. Only thing required is 'complete sincerity'. ~ Dada Bhagwan

Somewhere in his heart he had recognized who she was. His dominant wish, however, was to go a little longer without recognizing her. The woman's face floating in its dark seclusion, no name yet attached to it, had the character of a mysterious, lovely apparition. It was like the scent of the fragrant olive which, as one walks along a path at night, tells of the blossoms before one sees them. Isao wanted to keep things just as they were, if only for an instant more. At this moment a woman was a woman, not someone with a name attached to her.

And that was not all. Because of her hidden name, because of the agreement not to speak that name, she was transmuted into a marvelous essence, like a moonflower, its supporting vine invisible, floating high up in the darkness. This essence which preceded existence, this phantasm which preceded reality, this portent which preceded the event conveyed with unmistakable force the presence of a substance yet more powerful. This presence which showed itself as gliding through air - this was woman.

Isao had yet to embrace a woman. Still, never so strongly at this moment, when he keenly sensed this "womanliness that preceded woman," had he felt that he too knew what ecstasy meant. For this was a presence that he could even now embrace. In time, that is, it had drawn near with an exquisite subtlety, and in space it was only a little distant. The affectionate emotion that filled his breast was like a vapor that could envelop h ~ Yukio Mishima

You'll have more visions and thoughts to prepare you. Your heart's desire shows you the future. We put Angels in the sky to show you that we are in your life, and you are on path. ~ Paul Stefaniak

Dauntless traitors crowded the hallway; the Erudite crowd the execution room, but there, they have made a path for me already. Silently they study me as I walk to the metal table in the center of the room. Jeanine stands a few steps away. The scratches on her face show through hastily applied makeup. She doesn't look at me.

Four cameras dangle from the ceiling, one at each corner of the table. I sit down first, wipe my hands off on my pants, and then lie down.

The table is cold. Frigid, seeping into my skin, into my bones. Appropriate, perhaps, because that is what will happen to my body when all the life leaves it; it will become cold and heavy, heavier than I have ever been. As for the rest of me, I am not sure. Some people believe that I will go nowhere, and maybe they're right, but maybe they're not. Such speculations are no longer useful to me anyway.

Peter slips an electrode beneath the collar of my shirt and presses it to my chest, right over my heart. He then attaches a wire to the electrode and switches on the heart monitor. I hear my heartbeat, fast and strong. Soon, where that steady rhythm was, there will be nothing.

And then rising from within me is a single thought:

I don't want to die.

All those times Tobias scolded me for risking my life, I never took him seriously. I believed that I wanted to be with my parents and for all of this to be over. I was sure I wanted to emulate their self-sacrifice. ~ Veronica Roth