Seeking Refuge Quotes

look at the painting again. Despite the obvious differences, this girl is deeply, achingly familiar. In her I see myself at twelve years old, on a rare afternoon away from my chores. In my twenties, seeking refuge from a broken heart. Only a few days ago, visiting my parents' graves in the family cemetery, halfway between the dory in the haymow and the wheelchair in the sea. From the recesses of my brain a word floats up: synecdoche. A part that stands in for the whole. Christina's World. The ~ Christina Baker Kline

He felt a little queasy, and more than a little light-headed. More and more, he felt the disorientation, the fragmenting of himself between day and night. By day, he was a creature of the mind alone, as he escaped his damp immobility by a stubborn, disciplined retreat into the avenues of thought and meditation, seeking refuge in the pages of books. But with the rising of the moon, all sense fled, succumbing at once to sensation, as he emerged into the fresh air like a beast from its lair, to run the dark hills beneath the stars, and hunt, driven by hunger, drunk with blood and moonlight. ~ Diana Gabaldon

If he surrendered the advantage of the gun he would find himself floating in the gutters of an inhuman world, a part of the daily flotsam and jetsam of a hundred thousand abortions whooshing down the wormhole drain, drowning in a sea of pus-streaked semen and warm piss and menstrual juice and dead fetuses and radiator fluid and bloody diarrhea, seeking refuge inside the cathedral ruins of an embryonic sac, curling up to say his prayers then whispering goodnight, God speed, good riddance, gadzooks, the sac shrinking, disappearing into the frigid, humpbacked void of sodomized angels, wingless now, lecherous gargoyles sporting skeletal appendages without feathers, it would be a birth in reverse, the collapse of the universal soul. He wasn't sure how to save himself. ~ Javier Pedro Zabala

WE ARE

We are the lost ones

Seeking refuge in dark alleys

Told we are not forgotten

We are a past generation's hope

Asking daily for forgiveness

Viewed as misbegotten

We are restorers of humanity

Who punished betrayers of justice

Now the hangman in his own noose

We are the select few

Wandering parks and streets

Lost in a sea of endless faces

We are the faded photographs

Stored in an attic

Yearning to finish our missions

We are both the young and the old

Poised on the cliff's edge

Thinking of a last goodnight

We are our nation's warriors

Destined to become

Line-items in a county's budget ~ Jose N Harris

The Home Office informs us that there are around 400 ex-offenders from overseas currently seeking refuge in this country. One geezer, who has 78 offences to his name, managed to escape deportation on the grounds that he's an alcoholic! Drinking alcohol, it seems, is illegal in his homeland, so because he claims he'll be persecuted and tortured we've said, "Oh, bad show, old chap. Tough call that. Enjoy a spot of scotch myself from time to time. Quite understandable. Well why don't you stay here at our expense? You'll be able to fondle and grope any woman you like. We'd never deport you for that, I can assure you. You'll be perfectly safe here. ~ Karl Wiggins

If you want the naked beauty of my vulnerability, you have to have the strength to share the burden of, the private pain, that makes me feel so tender and fragile. For i am as strong, as i am, weak. If you want me to come home to you, be the safe harbor, in which, i can seek refuge. ~ Jaeda DeWalt

Seeking refuge from a world in which huge and mysterious forces were let loose to destruction. ~ Diana Gabaldon

Sometimes he remembered how he had heard that soldiers in war when entrenched under the enemy's fire, if they have nothing to do, try hard to find some occupation the more easily to bear the danger. To Pierre all men seemed like those soldiers, seeking refuge from life: some in ambition, some in cards, some in framing laws, some in women, some in toys, some in horses, some in politics, some in sport, some in wine, and some in governmental affairs. "Nothing is trivial, and nothing is important, it's all the same - only to save oneself from it as best one can," thought Pierre. "Only not to see it, that dreadful it! ~ Leo Tolstoy

Have the people living here under untroubled circumstances and at so great a distance from the wars of others been afflicted with a poverty of experience, a sort of emotional anemia? Must living in peace - so fervently wished for throughout human history and yet enjoyed in only a few parts of the world - inevitably result in refusing to share it with those seeking refuge, defending it instead so aggressively that it almost looks like war? ~ Jenny Erpenbeck

Today, we realize there are those actively seeking to harm us, to destroy our infrastructure and take lives. ~ Dave Reichert

Original sin is my only refuge, I was born bad and I never have recovered ~ Alice James

When you really understand who you are, you will experience unalloyed happiness. Happiness that you only dreamed about, happiness in the Silence, when nothing is happening but you're happy. Always happy, always at peace. All of the Gods that you have been praying to all your life, all of the Buddha's you've taken refuge in, the Krishnas, the Kalmias, the Shivahs, the Christ, Allah, they're all within you. You are that. There is only the one Self and you are That. Ponder this.

The knowledge of this brings you eternally infinite happiness instantly. When you begin to understand who you are, your Divine nature, that you are not the body, you're not the mind, once you understand your Infinite nature, who you really are and there's nothing else, you immediately become instantly happy. For happiness is your very nature. Happiness, the Self are synonymous. Consciousness, Absolute Reality, Pure Awareness, are all synonymous. There is only One. It has many names, but the One pervades all of space and time. And it is the only existence and you are That. There is no other existence. Awaken to this truth. You are the only One that does exist. And you are Consciousness. ~ Robert Adams

So they will pursue their questions from cause to cause, till at last you take refuge in the will of God - in other words, the sanctuary of ignorance. ~ Baruch Spinoza

We must dare to travel on unexplored path. ~ Lailah Gifty Akita

Dignity is not located in seeking equality with the white man and his civilization: it is not about assuming the attitudes of the master who has allowed his slaves to eat at his table. It is about being oneself with all the multiplicities, systems and contradictions of one's way of being, doing and knowing. It is about being true to one's Self. ~ Ziauddin Sardar

They maintain he wrote The Art of War. Personally, I believe it was a woman. On the surface, The Art of War is a manual about tactics on the battlefield, but at its deepest level it describes how to win conflicts. Or to be more precise, the art of getting what you want at the lowest possible price. The winner of a war is not necessarily the victor. Many have won the crown, but lost so much of their army that they can only rule on their ostensibly defeated enemies' terms. With regard to power, women don't have the vanity men have. They don't need to make power visible, they only want the power to give them the other things they want. Security. Food. Enjoyment. Revenge. Peace. They are rational, power-seeking planners, who think beyond the battle, beyond the victory celebrations. And because they have an inborn capacity to see weakness in their victims, they know instinctively when and how to strike. And when to stop. You can't learn that, Spiuni. ~ Jo Nesbo

Your breaking point will be a bloody refuge, not a clean slate. ~ Christina Hopp

It's true that a child belongs to its father. But when a father beats his child, it seeks sympathy in its mother's hut. A man belongs to his fatherland when things are good and life is sweet. But when there is sorrow and bitterness he finds refuge in his motherland. Your mother is there to protect you. She is buried there. And that is why we say that mother is supreme. ~ Chinua Achebe

it was like trying to see a shadow in the dark. ~ Melissa Andrea

The first time I saw her had been an accident. I was racing through the woods, attempting to run away from what I am, from the life I lived. Before I even heard her I caught her scent and I was lost. I stopped running and turned, seeking out what called to me. When I found her my life changed. ~ Cambria Hebert

In my very limited experience I've already found that people seeking power are not to be trusted. ~ Tahereh Mafi

Travel is seeking the lost paradise. It is the supreme illusion of love. ~ Anais Nin

True love is it such a word called true love. We all believe it, but who knows if we ever have true love for someone. Do your mind every wonder elsewhere. You mate is right beside you and you are thinking who is this man/female. I do know what I feel but deep inside where does it lead too. I am still lonely seeking for something that I do not know what it is. How far does the sky goes. No man knows in this world only GOD. How far does true love goes? ~ S. Chamberlain

With ancient history writers most immediately in view, the author indicates tendency to look to the virtues and vices of individuals when seeking causes. ~ Peter Heather

Let all your thoughts be with the Most High, and direct your humble prayers unceasingly to Christ. If you cannot contemplate high and heavenly things, take refuge in the Passion of Christ, and love to dwell within His Sacred Wounds. For if you devoutly seek the Wounds of Jesus and the precious marks of His Passion, you will find great strength in all troubles. ~ Thomas A Kempis

Is there something in trade that desiccates and flattens out, that turns men into dried leaves at the age of forty? Certainly there is. It is not due to trade but to intensity of self-seeking, combined with narrowness of occupation. Business has destroyed the very knowledge in us of all other natural forces except business. ~ John Jay Chapman

When you know someone close to you who are quiet or smaller or missing, seek them out, they may need to be found again. It is most beautiful to turn off our ego and feel true empathy for others. Compassion, sympathy, kindness, empathy, selflessness, etc. are the biggest signs of a person with a good soul and a big heart! ~ Angie Karan

Modern man does not love, but seeks refuge in love; does not hope, but seeks refuge in hope; does not believe, but seeks refuge in a dogma. ~ Nicolas Gomez Davila

Crime, once exposed, has no refuge but in audacity. ~ Tacitus

Father, I am seeking: I am hesitant and uncertain, but will you, O God, watch over each step of mine and guide me. ~ Saint Augustine

Health is being in harmony with the world view. Health is an intuitive perception of the universe and all its inhabitants as being of one fabric. Health is maintaining communication with the animals and plants and minerals and stars. It is knowing death and life and seeing no difference. It is blending and melding, seeking solitude and seeking companionship to understand one's many levels. Unlike the more "modern" notions, in shamanic society health is not the absence of feeling; no more so is it the absence of pain. Health is seeking out all of the experiences of Creation and turning them over and over, feeling their texture and multiple meanings. Health is expanding beyond one's singular state of consciousness to experience the ripples and waves of the universe. ~ Jeanne Achterberg

If I am all the time measuring myself against you, struggling to be like you, then I am denying what I am myself. Therefore I am creating an illusion. When I have understood that comparison in any form leads only to greater illusion and greater misery, just as when I analyse myself, add to my knowledge of myself bit by bit, or identify myself with something outside myself, whether it be the State, a saviour or an ideology - when I understand that all such processes lead only to greater conformity and therefore greater conflict - when I see all this I put it completely away. Then my mind is no longer seeking. It is very important to understand this. Then my mind is no longer groping, searching, questioning. This does not mean that my mind is satisfied with things as they are, but such a mind has no illusion. Such a mind can then move in a totally different dimension. The dimension in which we usually live, the life of every day which is pain, pleasure and fear, has conditioned the mind, limited the nature of the mind, and when that pain, pleasure and fear have gone (which does not mean that you no longer have joy: joy is something entirely different from pleasure) - then the mind functions in a different dimension in which there is no conflict, no sense of `otherness'. ~ Jiddu Krishnamurti

The main problem for women trying to emulate male sexuality is that as a ruling-class sexuality, it is constructed around the fact that they have a subordinate class on whom to act sexually. Women are that subordinate class. The elements that constitute male sexuality depend upon the possession of ruling-class status such as objectification, aggression, and the separation of sex from loving emotion. Women are bound to be unsuccessful in seeking to acquire a form of sexuality which depends upon the possession of ruling-class power. It might be possible for some lesbians to seek a close emulation of ruling-class sexuality because they are able to practise on other women. Heterosexual women cannot practise ruling-class sexuality on men because they are not the ruling class. All that heterosexual women are in a position to do is to accommodate male sexual interests... In male supremacy men's sexual access to women gives them power and status. It does not make much difference who initiates the act, the men still gain the advantage. ~ Sheila Jeffreys

She was one of those exceptional children who do still spend time outside, in solitude. In her case nature represented beauty - and refuge. "It's so peaceful out there and the air smells so good. I mean, it's polluted, but not as much as the city air. For me, it's completely different there," she said. "It's like you're free when you go out there. It's your own time. Sometimes I go there when I'm mad - and then, just with the peacefulness, I'm better. I can come back home happy, and my mom doesn't even know why."
The she described her special part of the woods.
"I had a place. There was a big waterfall and a creek on one side of it. I'd dug a big hole there, and sometimes I'd take a tent back there, or a blanket, and just lie down in the hole, and look up at the trees and sky. Sometimes I'd fall asleep back there. I just felt free; it was like my place, and I could do what I wanted, with nobody to stop me. I used to go down there almost every day."
The young poet's face flushed. Her voice thickened.
"And then they just cut the woods down. It was like they cut down part of me. ~ Richard Louv

If you don't know the question, you are not ready for the answer. ~ Vivian Amis

Pleasure is a by-product of doing something that is worth doing. Therefore, do not seek pleasure as such. Pleasure comes of seeking something else, and comes by the way. ~ Abbott Lawrence Lowell

Only, this was the thing: you'd provided me with the possibility of getting away from myself and making myself at home in another world. You were like a messenger from that world. With you, I could give my real self a rest. You were part and parcel of that dissolving of reality - myself included - that I'd been working on for seven or eight years through writing. For me, you were the herald out in front who showed me how to put the menacing world on hold. In that world I was a refugee whose existence was not legitimate, whose future never went beyond the three months of a temporary visa. I had no desire to come back to earth. I'd found a refuge in a magical experience and I wasn't about to let it get dragged down into reality. As far back as I can remember, I'd always sought not to exist. You've had to work for years on end to get me to accept the fact that I do exist. And I really don't think your work is over yet. ~ Andre Gorz

If the life-supporting ecosystems of the planet are to survive for future generations, the consumer society will have to dramatically curtail its use of resources - partly by shifting to high-quality, low-input durable goods and partly by seeking fulfillment through leisure, human relationships, and other nonmaterial avenues. We in the consumer society will have to live a technologically sophisticated version of the life-style currently practiced lower on the economic ladder. ~ Alan Thein Durning

We need God's great-grace in all spheres of life. ~ Lailah Gifty Akita

Who we are is not a question we can ask without seeking to understand the context in which we live. Biblical counselors seek to understand the influences that shape the responses of the human heart. ~ James MacDonald

seeking completeness when we can only ever make each other better, more joyful, more grateful - but never complete. ~ Peter Troy

Disease, and most specially opprobrious, suppressed, secret disease, creates a certain critical opposition to the world, to mediocre life, disposes a man to be obstinate and ironical toward civil order, so that he seeks refuge in free thought, in books, in study. ~ Thomas Mann

Trace is cooking Nonna's lasagna."
"Wow. I must see this."
"He was wearing her little apron and everything."
"Got a camera? ~ Joss Stirling

We need a home in the psychological sense as much as we need one in the physical: to compensate for a vulnerability. We need a refuge to shore up our states of mind, because so much of the world is opposed to our allegiances. We need our rooms to align us to desirable versions of ourselves and to keep alive the important, evanescent sides of us. ~ Alain De Botton

The professional gives an ear to criticism, seeking to learn and grow. But she never forgets that Resistance is using criticism against her on a far more diabolical level. Resistance enlists criticism to reinforce the fifth column of fear already at work inside the artist's head, seeking to break her will and crack her dedication. The professional does not fall for this. Her resolution, before all others, remains: No matter what, I will never let Resistance beat me. ~ Steven Pressfield