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hello-everyfandom · 4 years ago

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“How do you know that you won’t fall out of love with me?”

Warnings: N/A

Pairing: Draco Malfoy x Reader

Words: 2.5k

Summary: Your love language is Words of Affirmation

(This is a continuation from my series “Love Languages”)

Growing up in Malfoy Manor was less than loving. Although the Malfoy’s had the extremely upheld ideal of family, loyalty, and honor, Draco’s upbringing was not so much about comfort and love but the constant pressures of being perfect. Perfect. Always perfect. From his young ages, he was expected to always be pristine, polite and most of all: quiet. A young Draco spent a lot of time outdoors, trying to hide from the pressures of his family, climbing trees, and touching the breeze, enjoying the small moments of being alone. He basked in the safety of being outside in the open until one day when he accidentally got dirt on his trousers. That afternoon, his father berated him, yelling and harshly reprimanding him. How dare he decide to dirty himself, to look less than ideal. As his father scolded him, his mother stood in the background, arms crossed to hold herself. By the end of Draco’s familial slaughter, his father decided Draco needed something more than verbal punishment. That was the first time Draco had been hit by his father. He could still feel the sting, even as a teenager, and the bruises from his father’s hand, gripping his wrist tightly, seemed to stay forever. From then on, Draco suffered, molding himself, hurting himself to become the Malfoy definition of “perfect.”

When Draco fell in love with you, part of him was ecstatic. He had you. The kindest and flawless human there ever was. He was merely enchanted with your sweet nature. He would question, every morning, how such an amazing creature, like yourself, could be any type of enamored with him. But part of him was terrified. More than terrified. There was a deep seeded insecurity that lied within his chest. You, the light in the dark, was his one happiness, his one source of love. Draco Malfoy knew he wasn’t good enough, not for someone like you. He could not handle the idea of you seeing him as anything less than perfect. The moment you whispered those three words, the words that would make him swoon, he vowed to be the perfect boyfriend. He vowed to become the man you absolutely deserved.

Draco’s insecurities, his faults and fears did not need to be said out loud. You knew of his childhood and had heard through the grapevine of the Malfoy’s ferocity and less than ideal traits. Even before you met him, you knew Draco Malfoy was deserving of love. Most students in Hogwarts, besides the ones in the Slytherin House, seemed to despise Malfoy for his bullying and constant insults. However, you saw him as who he was, a boy who has been nothing but hurt.

Therefore, it was your own duty to compliment every aspect of him. Your words of love were endless and you loved to see the way Draco’s neck blushed while he attempted to keep himself cool. You loved to surprise him by finding different ways and different things to compliment him on. While Draco would roll his eyes or scoff, you knew he thrived off of it. Other times, you’d comment on his nice penmanship or his ability to cast difficult spells. It came naturally to you as you were raised in the most loving, passionate and encouraging family. You wanted nothing more than to spread that compassion to your boyfriend.

If Draco was honest with himself, he couldn’t help but stand, anxiously, on his toes. He was constantly worried about disappointing you, hurting you, being anything less than perfect. Insecurities in the shape of heart murmurs kept him up at night. There was an ache, a hurt, a fear that nearly rendered Draco breathless.You were, by far, the most radiant person Draco knew. Equal parts funny and sweet, sarcastic and kind. And, much to Draco’s exasperation, many of the other boys at Hogwarts knew this as well. And, to make his insecurities and self doubt even worse, you were Draco’s first relationship. Draco was not yours. Many boys, since first year, had fancied you and you had even dated a few. This was always a sore spot for your boyfriend who seemed to be jealous of any past relationships you had. The jealousy and insecurities made Draco more fearful, worried even, that you’d slip away.

You sat in the empty classroom Draco had found for the two of you. While other couples took to the Common Rooms, corridors, courtyards, and even sometimes the Great Hall to inflict PDA, Draco preferred utter privacy. He felt that wherever he went, people gawked. Instead, he much preferred being alone with you. He wasn’t sure if it was because in private rooms he could kiss you whenever he wanted or if it was because when you were alone he did not have to worry about other blokes staring at you.

The afternoon sun streamed through the class windows, casting streaks of light onto the table in front of you. You were perched on the wooden bench, sitting on your crossed legs, a book held leisurely in your hand. Draco sat next to you, leaned over his Alchemy essay on antidotes and blended potions. Though the essay was difficult, Draco felt relaxed, resting his hand on your bare thigh and rubbing shapes on the skin. He listened to your steady breathing and the crinkling of the paper as you turned the pages.

He only turned to look at you when you let out a long sigh and snapped the book shut.“Good book?” Draco asked, looking at you from the corner of your eye.

“Oh yes, I think it has to be one of my favorites.”

“Is that why you look so grumpy?” he leaned to dip his quill in more ink, his hand never leaving your thigh.

You laughed and shook your head, “No no, I’m not grumpy. But, there is so much drama in it and it renders me rather exhausted sometimes.”

Draco hummed, “How does a silly little thing like you become tired from books?”

“If you knew me,” you ticked your tongue, “you’d know I become tired from nearly everything.”

Draco let out a chuckle and put down his quill. “I do know you, well enough to know you become grumpy when tired.”

You opened your mouth to protest but paused to realize that your boyfriend was annoyingly correct. “Damn you,” you huffed and leaned back before picking up your book again.

“Exactly.” Draco’s smile was small but still prominent. It was silent again as you began flipping through the pages once more, easily letting yourself fall into the plot and dramatics of the story.

“Love,” Draco shook your leg lightly, “Do you have any extra parchment paper?”

You raised your hand to shoo him away, “In my bag, help yourself and let me read, I think they are finally about to kiss.” Draco shook his head, clearly amused.

Entranced in your book, you didn’t notice Draco’s hands shaking. A piece of parchment held tightly in his fingers.

“What is this?” Draco’s voice was strained.

Peeking up from your book, your eyes moved from Draco’s hand to his distraught and angered face. “It’s,” you stuttered and quickly sat up. “Draco,”

“What. Is. It. Y/N.” Now, Draco was standing. Eyes skimming through the words over and over again.

“Honey,” you swallowed. “It’s really nothing.”

“It doesn’t look like nothing, Y/N.” Draco said, his voice a painful mixture of hurt and outrage.

“Truly, it really is nothing. I was going to tell you about it-”

“But you didn’t.” Draco seemed to snap.

“But I forgot.” You shook your head.

You knew exactly why Draco was upset. By your parchment, crumpled up in the corner of your book bag, was an old love letter.

Before, as you were walking to Care of Magical Creatures, an old boyfriend, William Franklin, of yours had stopped you. Your fourth year boyfriend greeted you with a smile and you smiled back as your break up was neither malicious nor horrid. The two of you had split up merely because you fell out of love and decided to remain friends instead. William was exactly that, just a friend. And when he approached you, he teased you, handing you the old love letter you had written him in fourth year. It was a pathetic letter, one a lovesick little school girl would have written, but it was enough for Draco.

William and you laughed it off, you called him a “Nasty bastard,”

And he returned the insult as well as whistling and said “Malfoy’s got his hands full, poor bloke.”

However, Draco did not see this as two friends reminiscing on cringey memories, he saw it as the girl he loved, effortlessly, proclaiming her love for someone who wasn’t him.

“Darling,” you sighed, standing and brushing off your skirt, “Please, don’t be upset.”

“Don’t be upset?” Draco asked incredulously.

“Yes.”

You moved slowly around the table, knowing Draco needs both space and company when the two of you fight. Everyone in the world knows, couples fight. All healthy couples, all loving relationships are not without some mode of arguments, bickering or debates. However, you wouldn’t really call your arguments with Draco even arguments but rather heavily emotional conversations. It took a while to understand Draco’s argument style, sometimes he was harsh and critical, others he was quiet and sarcastic. But you knew Draco’s defensiveness stemmed from the demons of fear and self-doubt.

“This is ridiculous, what the fuck is this, Y/N?” Draco shouted. The veins in his neck began to bulge and you could see his eyes narrow, his heart pumping. You didn’t flinch.

“Let me explain, yeah?” your voice steady. Your arm raised slowly to take the letter from him, but Draco pulled back harshly. “It is an old love letter.”

“I can see that it is a love letter.”

“No,” you shook your head again, “It is an old love letter. Old.”

“And yet you still have it?”

“Yes-”

“So you’re off just dreaming about some other fucking wanker then? You keep this to remember your old better boyfriends?”

You took a deep breath, “No. I don’t. William-”

“Don’t say his bloody name.” Draco groaned. You stopped to hold in laughter, although it seemed rather insensitive, you couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity.

“Draco,” you clenched your jaw to stop yourself from laughing, “he gave me it during class. I had wrote it back in fourth year. Darling, have you read it? It’s mortifying, not romantic.”

“But-”

“But nothing. There is nothing to it. No secrets, no affair, no sneaking around. Nothing. Just two old, old, old friends laughing about something extremely embarrassing.”

As you said that, you slipped in the small space between the table and him. You gingerly took the parchment out of his hands and placed it on the table. Draco watched as you put your hand on his chest and another on the side of his abdomen and sighed.

“Really?”

“Really.” you confirmed. “I am, solely, without a single doubt, yours.”

“Are you sure?” Draco’s voice was timid, quiet.

“Draco,” you looked up at him. His pale eyes looked into yours, no longer narrowed or angry but looked almost in defeat.

“You are my one and my only. No one else has made me laugh like you do or made me feel loved like you do. You are, and I say this with nothing but honesty, the love of my life. Nothing will change that.” You stood there for a while in silence, feeling the slowing heart beat of your boyfriend.

“I’m sorry.” Draco whispered, eyes closed.

“Don’t be,” you smiled, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “If I were to find an old love letter from one of your ex-girlfriends, I’m sure I’d go mad.”

“May I ask you something?” Draco mumbled, he leaned forward so his chin was on the crown of your head.

“Anything.”

“Do... do you... does it bother you that I haven’t had any girlfriends before you?”

“No,” you replied, “Does it bother you that I’ve had boyfriends before you?”

Draco stayed silent as his response. You bit your lip and shuffled closer to Draco, not wanting to upset him more.

“My love, look at me,” you said quietly. “There is no one else but you. All the past boyfriends were... childish crushes, nothing more, nothing less.”

“Then why did you and William break up?”

“William and I fell out of love, simple as that.”

Anxiety. Draco felt anxiety. He attempted to push it down, to swallow it, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t decide whether to leave or to stay and bask in his insecurities.

“Then,” Draco’s eyes flickered to yours, “How do you know that you won’t fall out of love with me?”

You were taken aback by his bluntness. Nearly speechless and fighting to find words.

“What?”

“You wrote him a love letter-”

“It was when I was fourteen!”

“If you were that in love with him, who's to say you won’t wake up and realize that you-”

“Stop.” you said firmly. “Draco, why are you doing this?”

Your eyes looked into his, searching for anything, hoping to find the answer in the grey of his eyes. The helpless look he omitted hurt. Your body ached in sync with his. What were the words you could say? What could help him? Aid him? What simple words, complex words could you speak that would ensure Draco of your love and affections.

Your hand shifted to softly hold his. With a kiss on each of the knuckles, you answered, “On my last dying breath, on every child we have and every memory we will experience, I will love you. I am,” you paused, “So lucky to have you. So utterly happy and content. My silly boy.”

“Y/N...”

“And, I am so, so proud of you.”

“You don’t have to say that if you don’t mean it,”

You rolled your eyes jokingly, “Must you always argue with me?”

“Still-”

“Of course I am proud of you. If I could shout it from the Astronomy Tower, I would in a heartbeat.”

Draco laughed along with you. The idea of your small body chanting and screaming to the wind that you were proud of him made him feel both embarrassed and loved.

“I would write you a thousand, a million, a billion soppy love letters. I will gladly tell you everyday how in love I am with you. If not for you, for myself.” you finished and pressed a kiss to the corner of his lips, “I find it quite amusing to see you flush when I compliment you.” “

Are you-”

“Please do not ask me if I am sure,” you laughed, “I am most sure.”

“Real-”

You interrupted Draco’s question, silencing his insecurities and pressing a long kiss to his lips. His lips were wet and nervous between yours, but he felt the way you pushed and pulled, the way your fingers gripped his shirt tightly, the way your smile imprinted onto his. He simply could not describe it. He could search every dictionary and learn every language, but he would not be able to find any definition that could explain your love.

The only thing that could even come close to describing how you made him feel is the feeling he got when he was young, high in a tree, and touching the comforting breeze.

#draco malfoy #draco malfoy imagines #draco malfoy imagine #harry potter #harry potter imagines #harry potter imagine #harry potter masterlist #draco malfoy x reader #draco malfoy fanfic #harry potter fanfic

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lioninsunheart · 5 years ago

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I feel sorry for white Evangelicals and fundamentalist Christians.

It must be awful to go through life terrified; to believe that you are perpetually in danger, to always be threatened by encroaching predators lurking in the shadows, around corners, beneath the bed, and at the border.

What a draining experience it has to be, walking through every day looking over your shoulder, certain that attack is inevitable and that you are soon to be overtaken.

I feel sorry for these people, because I know they can’t understand or reflect the compassionate, expansive love of Jesus, having been weaned since birth on a tiny, fragile faith made entirely out of fear:

fear of an angry god dispensing damnation, fear of Mexicans stealing their jobs, fear of immigrants overrunning their borders, fear of refugees families bringing terrorism in a Trojan Horse, fear of Muslims smuggling in Sharia Law, fear of Transgender people lurking in bathrooms, fear of Atheists assailing their freedoms, fear of brown people brandishing violence, fear of Hollywood perverting their children, fear of a Gay Agenda converting their children, fear of Science disproving their Bible, fear of Democrats coming for their guns. fear of the Media fooling them with fake news. fear of the Devil coming in the form of reporters, professors, lesbians, and Liberals.

Their accumulated terrors have turned them into what they are now: perpetually petrified human beings whose disfigured, Frankensteined faith has now turned on them.

Their religion is a heartless, fearful monster.

Somehow, what should be a hope-giving, life-breathing, joy-inducing lens for seeing and understanding the world and their humane place in it—has been reduced to a sanctified burglar alarm; forever forecasting doom, forever inciting panic, forever triggering outrage, forever putting their finger on the trigger, forever building fortified walls.

And as a Christian, this makes me so very sad because it’s a million miles from the heart of the story: the one of a Maker who says: “Do not fear.”

It is the most common command in the Bible; the continuous golden tether running throughout the Scriptures: the assurance that faith is the antidote to all that terrifies us, the solid bedrock when threats shake us. Faith is the steady declaration that if god is indeed god, we are safe and loved and that all will be well.

The poet of the Psalms writes in his 27th song of praise: The Lord is my light and my salvation—whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life—of whom shall I be afraid?

(Apparently no one’s read that over at the White House or at FoxNews or in a large portion of Evangelical pulpits in America—because they’re all shaking like dogs before a coming storm and trying to convince us all that we need to tremble too.)

That so many who claim this same fearless religious tradition and profess adherence to this same text, spend so much of their days as if the sky is imminently falling—is something that as a pastor I grieve deeply. I mourn people who can simultaneously say they trust a god of love who supposedly spoke the entire Universe into being—and yet can’t handle a Starbucks cup, an Evolution class, a gay couple in their church, or a distraught refugee families in their neighborhood.

It’s the very pinnacle of cognitive dissonance to say In God We Trustwhile proving with every frantic, desperate move that they trust no one but foul-mouthed reality TV star who represents everything Jesus warned us against becoming.

The Gospel biographer Mark tells the story of Jesus in a boat with his disciples, when a furious storm engulfs them. Panic-stricken, they rush to find Jesus in the back of the boat sleeping on a cushion and questioning his concern for them. Just before calming the wind and the waves, he asks them,

“Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?”

I wonder how those who profess faith in that same Jesus, yet preach a Gospel of terror—would honestly respond to such an inquiry? I wonder how their hearts might be renovated if their religion became a source of security rather than fuel for generating enmity toward already vulnerable people. I wonder how differently they might respond to the real pain and despair around them if they saw disparate humanity with compassion and not contempt.

I don’t believe enough white Evangelicals have heard the voice of Jesus who promises presence and peace in the turbulent journey. I don’t believe they truly rest in this truth—because those who’ve heard that voice and who rest in that truth wouldn’t be so damn terrified all the time. They wouldn’t be so obsessed with protection and insulation and damnation, they wouldn’t have so much contempt for the diversity around them—and they wouldn’t be so damn angry and so continually terrified.

Fearless Christians don’t legislate rights away from other human beings, don’t see someone else’s gain as their loss, aren’t fixated on the perceived dangers of those who don’t look, talk, think, believe, worship and love the way that they do.

Fear is a powerful drug. It’s a fantastic political tactic. It’s a wonderful manipulator. It’s an effective motivator. It’s a great rally speech or Sunday sermon. But it’s a really lousy religion.

Yes, I feel sorry for white Evangelicals—but more than that, I feel sorry for the rest of us.

I keep waiting for so many of these professed people of god to act as if they believe that god is bigger than their fears.

May more white Christians in America come to believe that the sky is not falling, because they know the One who holds up the sky.

And may they stop being so very afraid, for their sake—and the sake of the disparate, vulnerable, hurting human beings that they are becoming monsters to.

-john pavlovitz-

#john pavlovitz #christianity #evangelicals

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theinkcast · 6 years ago

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Crossroads - Refugee Run

I've been to a few refugee camps and each encounter has been different. The people are different, the customs are different, the infrastructure is different, and the history behind the camps and narratives of displacement are often different. Even the air is different. One element that finds itself in every camp, however, is the sense of uncertainty. Sometimes, the atmosphere at the camps is turbulent and explosive. At other times, the violence is concealed but simmers just beneath the surface. Either way, that hum of apprehension never quite goes away. The refugee run captured this tension. For a short while, it opened a portal to 'that other place' and allowed us to feel (very viscerally) a little of the chaos, confusion, and desperation that refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) experience. That's pretty special. During the refugee run, some of us were ordered to leave our shoes behind. This was fairly alarming seeing as we could neither predict nor control what the next hour would bring – what if we needed to make a quick getaway, what if we were herded outdoors, what if, what if…? A million what ifs. The bread we bartered for was thrown at us onto the ground. Denigrating as that was though, we were secretly relieved just to have passed this ‘trial’, and so we scrambled to pick up the food: surprising ourselves, along the way, with how readily we could compromise (if not entirely surrender) our dignity. When the soldiers began arbitrarily to single people out, we averted our eyes and sheepishly hoped that they would pick 'someone else'. Even in make-pretend, these uncharitable thoughts of self-preservation raise raw questions. What would I risk to stand up for someone else? How far would I go to protect myself? Would I beg? How badly? Would I spy? Could I hurt another person? How might my choices be different with a gun pressed against my cheek? Or if I had lost people I love? If I had seen their bodies buried under the debris of a fallen building and couldn't help them? If I heard them cry? What does it mean to be a coward or a hero, a traitor or a believer; which am I? In reality, the flood of shame, defeat, and self-contempt that follows any of these lose-lose decisions can be staggering, in that bring you to your knees sort of way, and forever change how you see yourself and your place in the world. Extraordinarily, the refugee run managed to draw out these piercing dilemmas and replicate some of the callous cruelties that confront refugees and IDPs. David, you asked us about hope and how to hold on to it. I think hope takes roots in the simple things. Hope is a smile from a stranger who looks as frightened as you feel, who in spite of all the atrocities he has witnessed, still remembers compassion and fights to find forgiveness in his heart – it’s an affirmation that within all of us is a shared humanity and that even in the most desolate of times and places, we are not alone; and it's a reminder that so long as we don't give up, tomorrow has a chance to be better, and the world gets another chance to be better. The question is - is that enough?

I don't think so. That's why the Refugee Run simulation is important. It evokes a sense of moral outrage in those of us who have the privilege and potential to dismantle these cycles of oppression and abuse. The refugee run instils disquiet - which is an antidote to apathy, rousing us to challenge the status quo, investigate honestly into humanitarian issues, and dare to demand wiser solutions from ourselves and from each other. I believe that everyone should understand intimately the devastation of war, live (if briefly) in extreme poverty, and listen to those on the margins of society speak about a lifetime of tyranny and powerlessness. These exposures drive home the cost of our indifference and move us to respond with humility. They add a more nuanced dimension to our worldviews, attune us to injustices and inequalities, and prompt us to reconsider the relationship between power and responsibility. With that as a starting point, how can we possibly fail to disentangle today's crises?

#Crossroads Hong Kong #refugee #human rights

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unfamiliarize · 4 years ago

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Professor Ross thinks call-out culture has taken conversations that could have once been learning opportunities and turned them into mud wrestling on message boards, YouTube comments, Twitter and at colleges like Smith, where proving one’s commitment to social justice has become something of a varsity sport.

“I think this is also related to something I just discovered called doom scrolling,” Professor Ross told the students. “I think we actually sabotage our own happiness with this unrestrained anger. And I have to honestly ask: Why are you making choices to make the world crueler than it needs to be and calling that being ‘woke’?”

The antidote to that outrage cycle, Professor Ross believes, is “calling in.” Calling in is like calling out, but done privately and with respect. “It’s a call out done with love,” she said. That may mean simply sending someone a private message, or even ringing them on the telephone (!) to discuss the matter, or simply taking a breath before commenting, screen-shotting or demanding one “do better” without explaining how.

Calling out assumes the worst. Calling in involves conversation, compassion and context. It doesn’t mean a person should ignore harm, slight or damage, but nor should she, he or they exaggerate it. “Every time somebody disagrees with me it’s not ‘verbal violence.’” Professor Ross said. “I’m not getting ‘re-raped.’ Overstatement of harm is not helpful when you’re trying to create a culture of compassion.”

There was call-out culture when Professor Ross was young. “We called it ‘trashing,’” she said, referring to a term used by Jo Freeman, in an essay in Ms., to describe infighting within the women’s movement.

“It used to be you’d be calling someone out to a duel. This is how Alexander Hamilton got shot!” Professor Ross said. “What’s new is the virality and the speed and the anonymity.”

Civil conversation between parties who disagree has also been part of activism, including her own, for quite some time.

#this #outrage culture #attention economy #self righteousness #tolerance #conversation #sensationalism

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chaplainsway · 4 years ago

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“What I’m really impatient with is calling people out for something they said when they were a teenager when they’re now 55. I mean, we all at some point did some unbelievably stupid stuff as teenagers, right?” Professor Loretta J. Ross, a visiting professor at Smith College, thinks call-out culture has taken conversations that could have once been learning opportunities and turned them into mud wrestling on message boards, YouTube comments, Twitter and at colleges like Smith, where proving one’s commitment to social justice has become something of a varsity sport. DOOM SCROLLING “I think this is also related to something I just discovered called doom scrolling,” Professor Ross told the students. “I think we actually sabotage our own happiness with this unrestrained anger. And I have to honestly ask: Why are you making choices to make the world crueler than it needs to be and calling that being ‘woke’?” The antidote to that outrage cycle, Professor Ross believes, is “calling in.” Calling in is like calling out, but done privately and with respect. “It’s a call out done with love,” she said. It’s an approach she now teaches to students via Zoom. That may mean simply sending someone a private message, or even ringing them on the telephone (!) to discuss the matter, or simply taking a breath before commenting, screen-shotting or demanding one “do better” without explaining how. * Calling out assumes the worst. * Calling in involves conversation, compassion and context. It doesn’t mean a person should ignore harm, slight or damage, but nor should she, he or they exaggerate it. “ Every time somebody disagrees with me it’s not ‘verbal violence.’” Professor Ross said. “I’m not getting ‘re-raped.’ Overstatement of harm is not helpful when you’re trying to create a culture of compassion.”

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newstechreviews · 4 years ago

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The car horns blared as Joe Biden took the stage just before 1 a.m.—not to proclaim victory, but to urge his supporters not to lose hope, no matter what President Donald Trump might say. “We believe we are on track to win this election,” the former Vice President told the crowd in Wilmington, Del., on Nov. 4. “It ain’t over until every vote is counted. Keep the faith, guys.”

As the new day dawned and dragged on, it increasingly looked as though Biden was right. Having flipped Michigan, Arizona and Wisconsin, Biden appeared to be inching toward victory. Pennsylvania, Georgia, Nevada and North Carolina remained too close to call as of the evening of Nov. 4. Independent forecasters believed Biden was likely to eke out the requisite 270 electoral votes when all the votes were counted, over the President’s noisy objections.

Even with the White House nearing their grasp, Biden’s supporters could be forgiven if they found it hard to keep the faith. The 2020 election did not go according to plan for the Democrats. It was a far cry from the sweeping repudiation of Trump that the polls had forecast and liberals craved. After all the outrage and activism, a projected $14 billion spent and millions more votes this time than last, Trump’s term is ending the way it began: with an election once again teetering on a knife’s edge, and a nation entrenched in stalemate, torn between two realities, two cultural tribes, two sets of facts.

TIME illustration

Even if he has lost, a President who trampled the rule of law for four years was on pace to collect millions more votes this time. And though they braced for a bloodbath, the congressional Republicans who enabled him instead notched gains across the board. The GOP appeared poised to retain the majority in the Senate and cut into the Democratic House majority, defying the polls and fundraising deficits. Republicans held onto states such as Florida, South Carolina, Ohio and Iowa that Democrats had hoped to flip. They cut into Democrats’ margins with nonwhite voters, made gains with Latinos in South Florida and the Rio Grande Valley, and racked up huge turnout among non-college-educated white people, while halting what many conservatives feared was an inexorable slide in the suburbs.

Amid record turnout, Biden seemed sure to win the popular vote, possibly with an outright majority—a resounding statement by any standard. But many Democrats expected more. They believed that voters had soured on Trump and his party, that his mishandling of the pandemic and divisive style had alienated a wide swath of voters, that a new political era was about to be born and Trumpism banished to history’s dustbin. Instead, they awoke to a different reality. “Democrats always argued, ‘If more people voted, we would win,’” says GOP strategist Brad Todd, co-author of The Great Revolt: Inside the Populist Coalition Reshaping American Politics. “Well, guess what? Everybody voted, and it didn’t help the Democrats. There is a multi-racial, working-class ethos that is animating the new Republican coalition.”

As the votes were tallied into the following day, the candidates’ positions fell along predictable lines. The challenger encouraged the core exercise of democracy to continue, while the President tried to stop it. Biden’s camp urged patience; Trump voiced unfounded suspicions about fraud and cast unwarranted doubt on still incoming returns. Despite widespread fears of chaos, the vote was mostly peaceful and devoid of major irregularities. The President’s baseless declaration of victory was a sign that the test he has posed to American institutions isn’t over yet.

Biden’s campaign was predicated on a return to the pre-Trump political order, a “normal” that may always have been a figment of the collective imagination. If he emerges as the winner, his achievement—toppling an incumbent who manipulated the levers of government to try to gain an advantage, and made voter suppression a core campaign strategy—shouldn’t be discounted. But even if he becomes the next President, it seems clear that he will be governing Trump’s America: a nation unpersuaded by kumbaya calls for unity and compassion, determined instead to burrow ever deeper into its hermetic bubbles. Win or lose, Trump has engineered a lasting tectonic shift in the American political landscape, fomenting a level of anger, resentment and suspicion that will not be easy for his successor to surmount.

Whoever takes the oath of office on Jan. 20 will be tested by a historic set of challenges. The COVID-19 pandemic has just entered its worst phase yet, rampaging across the country virtually unchecked. The economic fallout from the virus continues to worsen without new federal aid. Trump has given few hints of what his next months in office may hold, but few expect them to be smooth. An urgent set of policy problems, from climate change to health care to the nation’s crumbling infrastructure, may run into the wall of divided government. America’s democratic institutions will continue to teeter. “If in fact Biden wins, it’s still the case that an openly bigoted aspiring authoritarian not only won the presidency but captured the complete loyalty of one of two major political parties, and—but for a once-in-a-century pandemic—he might have been re-elected,” says Ian Bassin, co-founder of Protect Democracy, a non-partisan legal group. “If that doesn’t tell you that something is completely rotten in the foundations of our democracy, I don’t know what would.”

The story of American politics in the 21st century has been one of escalating polarization and gridlock, a nihilistic feedback loop that has made the country all but impossible to lead. For years, a chaos-ridden nation has waited to deliver its verdict on Trump’s unorthodox presidency. But this is 2020—the year when up was down and real was fake, the year of the plague, the year of the unexpected: of course it would not be that easy. Both sides hoped for a knockout blow, a landslide that would forever settle the question of which version of America is the true one. Instead, our identity crisis continues.

The campaign unfolded over a year so convulsive that the third presidential impeachment in history now seems a distant memory. COVID-19 upended Americans’ lives and drained their bank accounts. Millions of people, from all walks of life, took to the streets to protest police violence. The West Coast’s sky was blotted by fire for weeks, while the East was battered by a record hurricane season. And yet, against this backdrop of chaos there was an odd political stasis: Trump’s standing in polls remained about where it had been when Biden first entered the race—a sign, Democrats believed, that Trump had little chance of persuading an electorate that had long since rejected him.

Not that he particularly tried. Strategists of both parties believe the campaign was winnable for the incumbent if he had embraced a more traditional strategy and style—something his entire presidency has shown him to be uninterested in doing. Discarding the advice of the political professionals, Trump insisted on rerunning the 2016 election, down to the leaked emails and antiestablishment rhetoric. He made little alteration to his bull-in-a-china-shop attitude, even though the hellscape he raged against was now one that unfolded on his watch. “COVID certainly didn’t help, but this election was about the President’s performance over the last four years, not just the last nine months,” says Brendan Buck, a former top adviser to the GOP ex–House Speaker Paul Ryan. “It was four years of bumbling his way through every issue, alienating everyone who didn’t agree with him, and never being able to use the tools he had for any particular good.”

As Trump careened from one outrage to another, Biden limited his campaign to theatrically cautious appearances: masked speeches to small, distanced groups; “drive-in” rallies where attendees sat in their cars. The longtime pol known for his garrulousness and gaffes stuck unerringly to the script. Many lines in his final TV ads were identical to what he said when he launched his campaign a year and a half before. Unusually for a general-election candidate, Biden actually saw his standing with the public improve over the course of the campaign. Only about 10% of the ads aired by Biden’s campaign and allies were attacks on Trump, according to the Wesleyan Media Project. His campaign believed that his themes of unity, compassion and expertise were an implicit rebuke to the incumbent. “The message has been incredibly consistent: an implicit contrast between Trump’s character flaws and their consequences for real people,” says Democratic strategist Jesse Ferguson, a veteran of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign. “Trump is self-absorbed and chaotic; Biden is the opposite: in it for others, stable, the antidote to everything Trump represents.” But Democrats now wonder if Biden, like Clinton before him, put too much emphasis on character and not enough on kitchen-table issues, and whether his decision not to campaign more in person was a missed opportunity.

Biden was buoyed by a vast grassroots movement: the Trump era has seen a frenzy of political action, with thousands of newly motivated activists leading local political groups. Middle-class women gathered their Facebook friends to drink wine and make canvassing phone calls; disaffected Republicans waged a multimillion-dollar campaign to mobilize their peers. A weak fundraiser who ended the primary essentially broke, Biden shattered general-election fundraising records—his campaign hauled in $952 million, dwarfing the incumbent by more than $300 million—as liberals showered donations on him and the party’s congressional candidates.

Angela Weiss—AFP/Getty Images“It’s not my place or Donald Trump’s place to declare who’s won this election. That’s the decision of the American people.” — Joe Biden, at the Chase Center in Wilmington, Del., just after midnight on Nov. 4.

Peter van Agtmael—Magnum Photos for TIME“We’ll be going to the U.S. Supreme Court.” — Donald Trump, in the East Room of the White House early on the morning of Nov. 4.

But Trump had his own army of enthusiastic supporters. His massive rallies—held at cavernous airport hangars and sports arenas with no social distancing and limited mask wearing—were not just aimed at flattering Trump’s ego or creating images of enthusiastic throngs for local and national media. Republican National Committee (RNC) teams perched outside each event, registering new voters and creating a database of supporters. “People sometimes pooh-pooh the rallies and say there’s really no campaign structural benefit to them,” says Brian Ballard, a Republican lobbyist with close ties to Trump. But they allowed the campaign to “utilize the crowds that not only go, but the crowds that registered to go, and sometimes that number is five times the amount of folks that actually show up.”

Trump’s campaign also kept up its field-organizing program through the summer, while Biden’s team hung back out of safety concerns. The joint field program between the RNC and the Trump campaign boasted 2.6 million volunteers, according to figures provided by the RNC. They made more than 182 million voter contacts—more than five times what they did in 2016—and added nearly 174,000 new GOP voters to the rolls. Early voter-registration figures in Florida, North Carolina and other states showed that Republicans had “essentially neutralized what had been a Democrat advantage” by mobilizing new voters, says John Podesta, who ran Clinton’s failed 2016 presidential bid.

Democrats underestimated the Trump tribe’s breadth to their detriment. “I think you miss some of the Trump quotient [in polls] because these folks come out of the woodwork, and they’re out of the woods and waters of South Carolina,” says former GOP Representative Mark Sanford, a Trump critic whose Charleston-area district Republicans took back on Nov. 3. Despite putting more than $100 million behind Senate candidate Jaime Harrison, Democrats fell short of defeating Senator Lindsey Graham by double digits. “These Trump rallies and Trump parades and all those kinds of things, they don’t strike me as the type that would be answering a polling call,” Sanford says.

Having made the decision to forgo traditional field organizing, Biden’s campaign manager, Jen O’Malley Dillon instead turned the Biden campaign into what may be the largest digital-organizing machine in American political history. “Jen O’Malley Dillon took a risk in investing as much in digital acquisition as she did,” says Patrick Stevenson, chief mobilization officer at the Democratic National Committee. “You’re putting down $1 million in April that you’re expecting to show back up as $5 million in August.” By September, the digital operation was printing money. Digital organizers recruited more than 200,000 volunteers and deployed them on hundreds of millions of text messages and phone calls. But the result raises questions about whether this virtual juggernaut could really substitute for old-fashioned face-to-face campaigning.

Lorenzo Meloni—Magnum Photos for TIMEThe different style of the campaigns— and of their supporters—was echoed in their Pennsylvania offices.

Lorenzo Meloni—Magnum Photos for TIMEDavid Lawrence, a Republican supporter, in Erie on Nov. 3.

What comes next is anybody’s guess. There are 2½ months until the next Inauguration. A lame-duck President with the world’s biggest platform, an even larger ego, and millions of supporters who internalized his rhetoric about election “rigging” could stir a lot of trouble on his way out of town. So much, including the odds of violence erupting, depends on Trump’s rhetoric in the days and weeks to come. Then there is the question of tapping the federal treasury on the way out—his companies and family have pocketed millions in government funds during his time in office—and whether he might seek to pardon himself and his allies. “His impulse might be to abuse executive authority, and my hope and prayer is that those around him would restrain him, though they haven’t been very successful so far,” says Tom Ridge, the GOP former Pennsylvania governor and Homeland Security Secretary who endorsed Biden. “I have never felt that this President has ever truly respected the Constitution, the rule of law and the freedoms embodied in our democratic process.”

If Biden does take office, he will confront a set of challenges like few Presidents before him. He has laid out a comprehensive—and expensive—federal plan to combat the COVID-19 pandemic that includes promoting mask wearing, ramping up testing and the production of protective equipment, improving information transparency and scientific reopening guidance, and creating and distributing a vaccine. Democrats have previously proposed trillions in new spending to help individuals, businesses and local governments and shore up the health care system needs that will only grow in the coming months.

The coronavirus is far from the only problem Biden and the Democrats have promised to solve. A former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Biden would likely devote great attention to restoring America’s traditional trade and security alliances. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi recently said the congressional agenda for 2021 would include a major infrastructure bill and an expansion of health care. Liberals will be pushing for fast action on police reform, climate and immigration. Democrats have been remarkably unified since Biden effectively sewed up the nomination in March, but the party’s left wing has signaled it will not be so deferential once victory is in hand. Progressive groups have been circulating lists of potential Biden nominees they would (and would not) accept for key Administration posts.

John Locher—APReflecting the exhaustion on both sides of the aisle, a Trump fan rests on a table at an election-night party in Las Vegas.

Four years of Trump have left Democrats with few worries about overreading their mandate. “If we win the election, we have a mandate to make change, period,” says Guy Cecil, president of the Democratic super PAC Priorities USA. But if Republicans retain their hold on the Senate, prospects for major legislation will be dim. Republicans had won 48 seats as of the evening of Nov. 4, with at least one January runoff in Georgia that could decide the balance of power in the chamber.

Whatever the ultimate result, the election exposed the shaky edifice of U.S. democracy. From the antiquated governing institutions that increasingly reward minoritarian rule, to the badly wounded norms surrounding the independent administration of justice, to the flimsy protections of supposedly universal suffrage, to the nation’s balky and underfunded election infrastructure, Trump’s presidency has laid bare the weaknesses in our system. But initiatives to reform campaign finance, government ethics and voting rights seem fated to run aground in a divided Washington.

A round of harsh recriminations seems certain for the Democrats, who had assumed that their coalition of minorities, college-educated white people and young voters was destined only to grow as a share of the electorate, while the post-Trump GOP would be doomed to rely on a dwindling population of older, white, non-college-educated voters. Instead, Republicans appeared to have increased their share of the Black and Latino vote. Democrats failed to topple any GOP incumbents in Texas and lost a congressional seat in New Mexico. Their hopes for a surge of college-educated suburban voters also fell short, suggesting that the GOP’s attacks on liberal ideology proved effective in places like Oklahoma City and Cedar Rapids, Iowa. “Democrats need to ask themselves why someone like Joe Biden is an endangered species in the party,” says Justin Gest, a political scientist at George Mason University and author of The New Minority: White Working Class Politics in an Age of Immigration and Inequality. “Why is the party of experts, urban intellectuals and woke social-movement activists not producing candidates who can mobilize people in Montana, Ohio, North Carolina? It just doesn’t look like a national party.”

Republicans, even if they lose the presidency, are likely to feel emboldened to continue pursuing Trump’s themes. “Donald Trump isn’t going away,” says Buck, the former Ryan adviser. “He’s still going to be the leader of the party and the biggest voice, and he’ll at least flirt with the idea of running again. It’s going to continue to be a populist, grievance-fueled party.”

Some elections mark a breakthrough—the emergence of a new American majority after years of conflict and gridlock. A landslide like Franklin D. Roosevelt’s in 1932 or Ronald Reagan’s in 1980 would have signaled a nation ready to move on from its cultural and ideological cleavages and seek some way forward together. Instead it looks more bitterly split than ever. “There was a substantial political divide in this country before Donald Trump was elected,” Ridge says. “His presidency has exacerbated that divide to an almost unimaginable degree. But that did not begin with Donald Trump, and it will not end with him, either.” —With reporting by Charlotte Alter, Brian Bennett and Tessa Berenson/Washington; Anna Purna Kambhampaty/Honolulu; and Mariah Espada, Alejandro de la Garza and Simmone Shah/New York

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cutsliceddiced · 4 years ago

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New top story from Time: Even If Joe Biden Wins, He Will Govern in Donald Trump’s America

TIME illustration

Peter van Agtmael—Magnum Photos for TIME“We’ll be going to the U.S. Supreme Court.” — Donald Trump, in the East Room of the White House early on the morning of Nov. 4.

Lorenzo Meloni—Magnum Photos for TIMEThe different style of the campaigns—and of their supporters—was echoed in their Pennsylvania offices.

Lorenzo Meloni—Magnum Photos for TIMEDavid Lawrence, a Republican supporter, in Erie on Nov. 3.

John Locher—APReflecting the exhaustion on both sides of the aisle, a Trump fan rests on a table at an election-night party in Las Vegas.

This appears in the November 16, 2020 issue of TIME.

via https://cutslicedanddiced.wordpress.com/2018/01/24/how-to-prevent-food-from-going-to-waste

#Time #top stories #IFTTT #news

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francescamaxime · 5 years ago

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Compassion teachings with translator for His Holiness the Dalai Lama Thupten Jinpa at @unionseminary. Compassion dimensions: attentiveness, listening, encountering/confronting/leaning forward, involvement/engagement, helping/behavior, presence/fully showing up, understanding. Cultivating compassion includes attention, awareness, and regular practice/training. Training helps make compassion more intentional, conscious and deliberate. “In most cases we reserve our empathy for a small group of people, but we can shift our default, with practice, to compassion for all based on our common humanity.” With training and practice, we can turn practice from a felt emotional response to a default way of life. As we practice, our compassion shifts from being effortful and conscious to becoming second nature. We can change our emotions through intention-setting: “what is it I wish to see more of in this encounter and how can I show up differently? (i.e. courage, understanding, joy, etc.). Emotions can only be changed by our intention-setting: we get motivated through our outrage or sadness but with a morning practice of intention setting we cultivate our ability to regulate our emotions. Compassion is an antidote to suffering. Loving kindness is an acceptance and allowance of things as they actually are: a creating space not to necessarily like, but to be with, and accept (which is different from approval or co-signing). With loving kindness we are not imposing “how they should be.” Through the allowing of lovingkindness, we are not so self-oriented: we can agree to disagree. We can become nonviolent and stand in compassionate “carefrontation” with those we stand in opposition to or disagree with because my circle of awareness and love extends to everyone. I can still resist and stand up for my own views for the sake of all beings. We can shift to an unconditionality, acceptance and open-heartedness. With lovingkindness, we can wish for others to feel happiness themselves. Compassion practice as a courage practice: sometimes it is a strong NO, compassion includes my own self, and opening the heart takes courage and vulnerability. #compassion #mindfulness #nyc #meditation https://www.instagram.com/p/B84Kuu1g-XO/?igshid=1ldric89cqzmb

#compassion #mindfulness #nyc #meditation

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chocolate-brownies · 6 years ago

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As the pace of our lives continues to accelerate, driven by a host of forces seemingly beyond our control, more and more of us are finding ourselves drawn to engage in meditation, in this radical act of being. We are moving in the direction of meditative awareness for many reasons, not the least of which may be to maintain our individual and collective sanity, or recover our perspective and sense of meaning, or simply to deal with the outrageous stress and insecurity of this age.

By stopping and intentionally falling awake to how things are in this moment, purposefully, without succumbing to our own reactions and judgments, and by working wisely with such occurrences with a healthy dose of self-compassion when we do succumb, and by our willingness to take up residency for a time in the present moment in spite of all our plans and activities aimed at getting somewhere else, completing a project or pursuing desired objects or goals, we discover that such an act is both immensely, discouragingly difficult and yet utterly simple, profound, hugely possible after all, and restorative of mind and body, soul and spirit right in that moment. It is indeed a radical act of love just to sit down and be quiet for a time by yourself.

It is indeed a radical act of love just to sit down and be quiet for a time by yourself.

Loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy and equanimity are rigorous meditation practices, used for the most part to cultivate one-pointed concentrated attention, out of which the powers of these evoked qualities emerge, transfiguring the heart. Just naming these qualities of heart explicitly and making their role explicit in our practice may help us to recognize them when they arise spontaneously during mindfulness practice. As well as to incline the heart and mind in that direction more frequently, especially in difficult times.

These practices, and in particular loving kindness, can often serve very practically as a necessary and skillful antidote to mindstates such as ferocious rage, which may, at the time of their arising, be simply too strong to attend to via direct observation unless ones practice is very developed. At such times formal loving-kindness practice can function to soften one’s relationship to such overwhelmingly afflictive mind states, so that we can avoid succumbing completely to their energies. It makes them more approachable and it makes them less intractable.

But with practice direct observation itself, on its own, becomes the embodiment of loving-kindness and compassion all by itself, and is capable of embracing any mindstate, however afflictive are toxic. And in the seeing of it and the knowing of it—in open-hearted non-reactive, non-judgemental presence—we can see into the nature of the anger or grief for whatever it is. And in the seeing, in the embracing of it, in the knowing of it, as we have seen, it attenuates, weakens, evaporates, very much like touching a soap bubble or like writing on water. What emerges in such moments is nothing less than loving-kindness itself arising naturally from extended silence, without any invitation because it’s never not already here.

A Loving-Kindness Mediation For Deep Healing of Ourselves and Others

Loving-Kindness Heartscape Meditation

47:00

In a dignified sitting posture or lying down whatever you prefer, as you feel ready, bringing your awareness to the breath and the body as a whole breathing and resting here for a period of time, establishing a relatively stable platform of moment-to-moment awareness, riding on the waves of the breath.

And when you feel comfortable resting with the flowing of your breathing in this way picturing in your mind’s eye, to whatever degree you find it possible, someone in your life who loves you, or who loved you unconditionally. Evoking and giving yourself over to feeling the qualities of the selfless love and kindness they accord you, or accorded you, and the whole aura or field of their love for you—right here right now breathing with these feelings, bathing in them, resting in the warmth and radiance of their heartfelt embracing of you just as you are. Or drinking in the experience that you are unequivocally and unconditionally loved and accepted as you are—without having to be different, without having to be worthy of their love, without having to be particularly deserving.

In fact, you may not feel particularly worthy or deserving. That does not matter. It is in fact irrelevant. The relevant fact is that you were or are loved. Their love is for you, just as you are. For who you are now, already, and perhaps always have been. Allowing your own heart to bask in these feelings, to be cradled in them, entrained into them. To be rocked moment by moment in the swinging rhythmic beating of the loving heart of another. And in the cadences of your own breathing, allowing your heart to be held and bathed in this way, by the warmth of this radiant pulsing field of loving-kindness.

And if you encounter some difficulty in bringing to mind or conjuring up such a person from memory in this moment, then seeing if you can imagine someone treating you in that way. And imagining with great vividness the feelings of love and kindness and regard. And that can actually serve equally well in this practice.

As you feel ready, and whenever you feel ready, seeing if you can become the source as well as the object of these same feelings. In other words, taking on these feelings for yourself as if they were your own rather than those of another. Lingering as best you can with the rhythmic beating of your own heart. Cradling in your own heart these feelings of love and acceptance and kindness for yourself beyond judgment of any kind. Just basking in feelings of loving kindness akin to the all-loving embrace of a mother for her child—Where you are simultaneously both the mother and the child. Resting here in these feelings as best you can. From moment to moment. Bathing in your own kind regard. Your own complete acceptance of yourself as you are right here in this very moment. Letting this feeling be self-sustaining, natural, in no way forced or coerced. Even tiny tastes of it are balm and sucker for all the negativity and self-criticism and self-loathing that can lie beneath the surface of our psyches.

In resting here in this field of loving-kindness, this embrace of loving kindness, you may find it useful to whisper to yourself inwardly the following phrases, or hear them being whispered to you by the wind, by the air, by that breath, by the world, or even asserted more strongly with great feeling: May I be safe and protected and free from inner and outer harm. May I be happy and contented. May I be healthy and whole to whatever degree possible. May I experience ease of well-being.

Gently at your own pace, over and over, inwardly whispering, inwardly hearing, feeling, sensing, affirming: May I be safe and protected and free from inner and outer harm. May I be happy and contented. May I be healthy in the whole to whatever degree possible. May I experience ease of well-being.

May I be safe and protected and free from inner and outer harm. May I be happy and contented. May I be healthy and whole to whatever degree possible. May I experience ease of well-being.

At first, it may feel artificial to be saying such things to yourself or even thinking them. After all, who is this “I” who is wishing this? And who is the “I” who’s receiving these wishes? Ultimately, both vanish into the feeling of being safe and free from harm in this moment, into the feeling of being contented and happy in this moment, the feeling of being whole in this moment, since you already are whole. The feeling of resting in ease of well-being far from the dis-ease and fragmentation we endure so much of the time. This feeling, this very feeling, is the essence of loving-kindness.

But, you might object, if this is a selfless practice, why am I focusing on myself? On my own feelings of safety and well-being? On my own happiness?

But, you might object, if this is a selfless practice, why am I focusing on myself? On my own feelings of safety and well-being? On my own happiness? One response would be: because you are not separate from the universe that gave rise to you and so are as worthy an object of loving-kindness as anything else or anyone else. Your loving-kindness cannot be either loving or kind if it does not include yourself. But at the same time you don’t need to worry. It’s not limited to yourself. Because the field of loving-kindness is limitless. If you like, you can think of the loving-kindness practice, as we’ve been engaging it up to this point, on a relative level at least, as tuning your instrument before you play it out in the world. In this case, tuning the instrument is itself a huge act of love and kindness not a means to an end.

Once you have established a fairly stable field of loving-kindness around yourself and have lingered here for a time in the feeling of being held and cradled and rocked in its embrace, you can intentionally expand the field of the heart just as we sometimes expand the field of awareness in the mindfulness practice. We can expand the field of loving-kindness around our own heart and our own being, inviting other beings either singly or en masse into this growing embrace. This is not always so easy to do. And so it’s helpful to start with one person for whom you naturally harbor feelings of loving-kindness, and only if you care to explore it. Otherwise, you can simply keep embracing yourself as the recipient of your own love and kindness, either using the phrases we are already using or modifying them to suit yourself.

So, if you are open to expanding the field of loving-kindness out from your own heart and your own body and your own being, in your mind’s eye and in your heart, evoking for now the feeling or image of an individual, a person for whom you have great affection, someone you were close to emotionally. Can you hold this person in your heart with the same quality of loving-kindness that you have been directing towards yourself? Whether it is a child or a parent, a brother or a sister, a grandparent or other relative near or distant, a close friend or a cherished neighbor, singly or together. Breathing with them or him or her in your heart. Holding them in your heart. Imagining them in your heart as best you can. Because, just to let you know, this practice is so intrinsically powerful that none of the imaging of yourself or others needs to be very vivid for it to be hugely effective. And wishing them well: May she, he, they be safe and protected and free from inner and outer harm. May she, he, they be happy and contented. May she, he, they be healthy and whole to whatever degree possible. May she, he, they experience ease of well-being.

Lingering, moment by moment, in the field of loving-kindness within your own heart. With these phrases as you voice them silently to yourself, and even more with the feeling behind them. Repeating them in order over and over, not mechanically, not like a mantra, but mindfully with full awareness, knowing what you’re saying. Feeling the intention behind the feeling, the intention and feeling behind each phrase. May she, he, they be safe and protected and free from inner and outer harm. May she, he, they be happy and contented. May she, he, or they be healthy and whole to whatever degree possible. May she, he, or they experience ease of well-being.

Here, whenever you’re ready, if you care to, you can invite into the field of the loving heart, those for whom your relationship is more neutral, or even people you don’t know at all, or who you have only heard of secondhand friends of your friends for instance. And again, cradling him, her, or them in your heart, wishing them well: May she, he, or they be safe and protected and free from inner and outer harm. May she, he, or they be happy and contented. May she, he, or they be healthy and whole to whatever degree possible. May she, he, or they experience ease of well-being.

If you find the mind wandering or you find yourself struggling at a certain point, just as in the cultivation of mindfulness, just notice what’s going on in the mind.

If you find the mind wandering or you find yourself struggling at a certain point, just as in the cultivation of mindfulness, just notice what’s going on in the mind. Perhaps feeling the sense of struggling in maybe even maintaining your focus or your concentration. And simply, over and over again, including yourself in the field of loving-kindness and coming back to the phrases whispered, spoken inwardly to yourself, resting in the feeling radiating out of those phrases, and underneath that, out of your heart. Moment by moment by moment, with whoever it is, singly or together, to whom you’re sending loving-kindness.

And from here, if you care to, you can once again expand the field of awareness to include one or more individuals who are actually problematic for you in one way or another, with whom you share a difficult past, perhaps. Who may have harmed you in one way or another who for whatever reason you consider to be more of an adversary or an obstacle than a friend. This does not mean that you are being asked to forgive them for what they may have done to hurt you, or to cause you or others harm. You are simply recognizing that they too are human beings, that they too have aspirations, that they too, in all likelihood, desire to be happy and safe.

So, as best you can, and only to the degree that you feel ready for it, or at least open to experimenting with it, extending loving-kindness to them as well, for all the difficulties and problems lying between you: may she, he, or they be safe and protected and free from inner and outer harm. May she, he, or they be happy and contented. May she, he or they be healthy and whole to whatever degree possible. May she, he or they experience ease of well-being.

Just as with the cultivation of mindfulness, where we can rest with one object of attention or expand the field to include varying levels of objects of attention, so in this loving-kindness practice we can linger for days, weeks, months, or years at differing levels of the practice, all of which are equally valid and equally healing, and all of which ultimately include each other.

So, if you wish to cultivate loving-kindness and direct it only toward yourself now, in this period of practice, or for many, many periods of practice, that is perfectly fine and you can just keep and sustain that dimension of the loving-kindness practice underneath my voice and what I’m saying. Or if you care to direct loving-kindness only toward those who you know and love, or even one person over and over again, that is just fine too. Any level at all at which you care to cultivate and direct loving-kindness is fine, is perfect. And ultimately embodies all the others anyway. For, over time, it’s likely (since your own capacity for loving, whether you know it or not, is infinite; that is simply the nature of love, that it’s limitless and therefore actually an infinite supply) that you may find yourself naturally drawn to invite more and more beings into the field of loving-kindness radiating from your own heart and your own being in all directions, inwardly and outwardly. Or you may find that at times they just slip in, unbidden somehow. This is interesting to note. If you are not consciously inviting them in, how come they are showing up anyway? And how are they getting in? Hmmmm… Maybe your heart is bigger and wiser than you think?

In the spirit of the boundlessness of the heart and of love itself, we can expand the field of loving-kindness even further to include our neighbors and neighborhood, our community, our state, our country, the entire world if you will. You can include your pets, all animal life, all plant life, all life, the entire biosphere, all sentient beings. You can also get very specific and include specific people, even political leaders in the field of your loving-kindness. Difficult as that may be if you differ strongly with them and find yourself judging them and even their basic humanity harshly. All the more reason for including them. Being human, they are worthy of loving-kindness and perhaps will respond to it by softening in ways your mind cannot possibly imagine. And perhaps the same goes for you as well.

You can also specifically include in the field of loving-kindness of those less fortunate than yourself who are exploited at work or at home. All those who are imprisoned justly or unjustly. All those who are at the mercy of their enemies. All those who are hospitalized or sick or dying. All those who are caught up in chaos, who are living in fear, who are suffering in any way shape or form. Whatever brought them to this point in their lives, just as we do, they all want to experience ease of well-being rather than dis-ease and fragmentation, just as we do. They all want to be happy and contented. They all desire to be whole and healthy. They all desire to be safe and free from harm.

So we recognize this way in which we are all united in our common aspiration to be happy and not to suffer and we wish them well: May all beings, near and far, be safe and protected and free from inner and outer harm. May all beings, near and far, be happy and contented. May all beings, near and far, be healthy and whole to whatever degree possible. May all beings, near and far, experience ease of well-being.

May all beings, near and far, be safe and protected and free from inner and outer harm. May all beings, near and far, be happy and contented. May all beings, near and far, be healthy and whole to whatever degree possible. And man all beings, near and far, experience ease of well-being.

And it need not stop here. Why not include the entire Earth in the field of loving-kindness? Why not embrace the very earth that is our home? That is an organism in its own right, that is in a sense one body, a body that can be thrown off balance by her own actions, conscious and unconscious, in ways that create huge threats to the life it nurtures and to the intelligences embedded within all aspects of that life, animal and plant and mineral that interacts so seamlessly in the natural world. And so we can expand the field of the loving heart even further the field of our loving kindness.

Once again, to include this time the planet as a whole and out beyond that the entirety of the universe in which our Earth is merely an atom and we, not even a quark. May our planet and the whole universe be safe and protected and free from inner and outer harm. May our planet and the whole universe be happy and contented. May this planet and the universe be healthy and whole. May our planet and the whole universe experience ease of well-being. May our planet and the whole universe be safe and protected and free from inner and outer harm. May our planet and the whole universe be happy and content. Make our planet and the whole universe be healthy and whole. May our planet and the whole universe experience ease of well-being.

It may seem a little silly, even animistic, to wish for the happiness of the planet or the whole universe. But why not?

It may seem a little silly, even animistic, to wish for the happiness of the planet or the whole universe. But why not? In the end whether we are talking about individual people who are problematic for us, or the entire universe, what is most important is that we incline our own heart toward inclusion rather than towards separation. In the end, whatever the consequences for others or for the planet or the universe or any levels in between, the willingness on our part to extend ourselves in this way, literally and metaphorically, to extend the reach of our own heart, has profound consequences for our own life and for our own capacity to live in the world in ways that embody wisdom and compassion, loving-kindness and equanimity, and ultimately that express the joy inherent in being alive and the boundless joy inherent in freeing ourselves from all our conditioning of mind and heart and the suffering it brings with it. To do so in the loving-kindness meditation, is to practice the heart’s liberation, here and now. Here and now. And now and always.

No doubt the world benefits and is purified from even one individual’s offering of such intentions. The relationships within the lattice structure of reality and the web of all life slightly shifted through our openness and through our willingness to let go of any rancor and ill will we might have been harboring, however justified we may think it is. At the same time, by our faithfulness to such a practice and to the deepest nature of our own hearts we who have arisen out of the earth, out of the lifestream, out of the universe, out of mystery, really, are somehow blessed and purified and made whole by the generosity of the gesture of loving-kindness practice in and of itself, and its effects on the heart that for a moment, at least, is no longer willing to harbor rancor and ill will without at least holding that to in awareness with compassion. We who choose to practice loving-kindness formally and informally, even if just a little bit are always its first, but by no means it’s only beneficiaries.

So, in the final moments of our time together, resting here in the radiance and luminosity of your own intrinsic beauty, your own intrinsic love, your own intrinsic kindness. Whether you are using words or not, at whatever level you choose or intuitively you are drawn to. Radiating loving-kindness inwardly and outwardly near and far. Yourself whole and part of larger and larger levels of homeless, fully-embedded in all life and in your own life. And as this formal period of practicing together comes to an end with the sound of the bells, affirming inwardly that this practice can be nourished on a regular basis if you are drawn to keep it alive and vibrant. Just as can all the other practices we have been engaging in together and affirming for yourself and for others, if you like, the old Navajo saying, which I extend to you now: May you walk in beauty. May you and all beings near and far walk in beauty.

The above is adapted from Jon Kabat-Zinn’s Guided Mindfulness Meditation Series 3, available here. These guided meditations are designed to accompany Jon Kabat-Zinn’s book The Healing Power of Mindfulness and the other three volumes based on Coming to Our Senses.

The post This Loving-Kindness Meditation is a Radical Act of Love appeared first on Mindful.

#sleep sounds #sleep music #white noise app #nature sounds #relaxing sounds #rain sounds for sleeping

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battybat-boss · 7 years ago

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Let's Discard The 'Right' To Be Insulted By Free Speech

“Sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me.” As a child, this well-worn phrase was the perfect antidote to whatever insulting name-calling I had to endure from other children. Those times I did remember to use it, it seemed to give me back some strength and made me feel good. For all of us, the perspective behind this phrase can turn an 'insult' into what it truly is: mere words, a string of vocal utterances without innate meaning or power, unless the recipient were to interpret them as such by taking them personally.

The very phrase 'She insulted me,' is at best a relative and not an absolute truth. More accurate would be the phrase 'She said something and I took it personally,' because these two things are always required for someone to be insulted. It is not a matter of whether or not she intended to demean, offend, or humiliate me; if indeed she did, though, the truth about it is simply that 'She said this with an intention to insult me.' In the end, this never proves the insult to be true; it just proves that she is a person who tries to insult others.

If personal frailty makes us take offending statements personally–and many of us still fall into that category, at least some of the time–the experience always provides an opportunity for us to come to grips with how we feel about ourselves, and continue to do the personal work required that renders us invulnerable to insult. From this more powerful place, we can then deal with those who would insult or demean us in a much more effective manner.

Understand that I am not advocating that we individually or collectively suffer in silence when hateful and prejudicial speech is directed at us; I am suggesting that if we have allowed ourselves to be emotionally impacted by such speech, and have given these words power over us, we are unlikely to be able to deal with the situation in an effective manner.

Societal Ego

Many people in our society have not yet done the consciousness work that makes them feel immune to criticism. They do not take personal responsibility when they feel insulted and maintain an identity that supports their own victimhood. One of the problems with this, especially in this age of social media and rapid communication, is that we have started to share this sense of victimhood as a collective, and our societal ego has grown into some kind of Frankenstein.

These days, we are getting more and more into the habit of banding together on social media in feeling victimized by the words of others, even if they are not directed at us; what is more damaging, we feel justified in expressing our raw outrage and self-righteous indignation at people who are speaking their minds, as though it will somehow make the situation better.

The fact is that this does not make things better, no matter how 'offensive' the words may be. It only works to bury the dark thoughts and beliefs of people instead of allowing them to come out and be expressed, which is the first step towards healing. We put too much emphasis on preventing words from being said, and too little on helping people overcome the ignorance that sponsored the words in the first place.

Political Correctness

Political correctness, with its mandating of words and phrases not to be used in public, is a symptom of this. Let's use our discernment here, because there is some nuance to this, and a simplistic approach can only cause polarization.

It is all well and good for us to agree that certain words, terms and phrases have a pejorative meaning, and foster a negative or demeaning perception of the group of people the words refer to. If we come to agree that there are better words to use, this can be helpful to foster a more neutral or positive perception of such groups within social discourse.

But this can be taken too far. When people or groups rely too much on 'society' to police offensive speech, rather than working towards becoming immune to it, it can cause the kinds of overblown reactions that are rampant on social media these days and actually start to hamper our individual impulse to speak freely.

We have seen the growth of what Salman Rushdie calls, 'The Outrage Industry,' that gives legitimacy to people taking words personally such that they feel they have legal recourse for the suffering wrought by their own emotional reaction. This industry makes it possible for not only 'victims' but lawyers and other supporters of such a system to profit from being insulted.

Tactics Of Control

There are some telling signs that this has been part of the agenda of our authority all along, to cause us to unknowingly police each other in suppressing our own individual ability to speak freely.

Bringing to bear the influence of government, the legal system and mainstream media to promote victimhood of offending speech culturally, our authority gains an entry point of control over what one is allowed and not allowed to say.

Fortunately, brave voices have already spoken out against that in the past. In a speech in support of the removal of the word 'insult' from a British law that made it possible for law enforcement to arrest someone for saying something 'insulting' to someone else, British comedian Rowan Atkinson had this to say about it:

The law…is indicative of a culture that has taken hold of the programmes of successive governments that, with the reasonable and well-intended ambition to contain obnoxious elements in society, has created a society of an extraordinarily authoritarian and controlling nature. That is what you might call The New Intolerance, a new but intense desire to gag uncomfortable voices of dissent. 'I am not intolerant', say many people; say many softly spoken, highly-educated, liberal-minded people: 'I am only intolerant of intolerance'. And people tend to nod sagely and say 'Oh, Wise words, wise words' and yet if you think about this supposedly inarguable statement for longer than five seconds, you realize that all it is advocating is the replacement of one kind of intolerance with another. Which to me doesn't represent any kind of progress at all. Underlying prejudices, injustices or resentments are not addressed by arresting people: they are addressed by the issues being aired, argued and dealt with preferably outside the legal process. For me, the best way to increase society's resistance to insulting or offensive speech is to allow a lot more of it. As with childhood diseases, you can better resist those germs to which you have been exposed.

We need to build our immunity to taking offence, so that we can deal with the issues that perfectly justified criticism can raise. Our priority should be to deal with the message, not the messenger. As President Obama said in an address to the United Nations: '…laudable efforts to restrict speech can become a tool to silence critics, or oppress minorities. The strongest weapon against hateful speech is not repression, it is more speech' and that is the essence of my thesis; more speech. If we want a robust society, we need more robust dialogue and that must include the right to insult or to offend. As Lord Dear says, 'the freedom to be inoffensive is no freedom at all.'

You can see Rowan Atkinson's entire speech in the video below:

youtube

Internet Censorship

One area in which our authority has made great inroads in limiting our free speech is on the Internet. Social media giants such as Facebook, Youtube, and Google are now using designations such as 'hate speech' and 'inappropriate content' to justify blocking, shutting down, and deleting content, mainly because the content goes against the mainstream narrative or provides truths that our authority do not want out in the public domain.

Much more will be discussed on the subject of Internet censorship at a later time. And note, we are not talking about examples of the Internet being used in ways that could physically harm people. We are talking about words, opinions, points of view. For our purposes here, suffice it to say that I believe the rights to free speech supersede any perceived 'right' to be offended, and should not entitle authority to censor subjectively defined 'insulting', 'demeaning', or 'hateful' content. We should not be allowing external censorship, and have to take back our power and right to choose what content is appropriate for us.

Defending Free Speech

But it all comes back to us getting beyond taking things personally. If we get insulted by what someone says, we are not well placed to respond objectively to it. The point being made here is not that we should condone hateful, pejorative, negative speech; we are as free to make our feelings known about another's words as they are free to speak them. Like the old saying goes, 'I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.'

As awakening beings, we need to recognize that dealing with points of view we don't agree with is essential for our growth. If those points of view happen to be laced with vitriol and judgment, all the more reason to allow them to be aired and, to the extent that we are able, to respond with equanimity, if not with compassion. This creates the possibility for understanding, growth, and healing for all.

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adrianafashionstyle · 8 years ago

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In this article you can discover some of the best books and you can find the top of the most popular books at this moment. What’s hot in books these days? Take a look at the below recommendations from the list and find the best books in literature, fiction and nonfiction.

Explore best sellers in books for romance, mystery, fantasy and thrillers, science fiction and biography.

Rediscovering Americanism: And the Tyranny of Progressivism

Hardcover – June 27, 2017

by Mark R. Levin

From #1 New York Times bestselling author and radio host Mark R. Levin comes a searing plea for a return to America’s most sacred values. In Rediscovering Americanism, Mark R. Levin revisits the founders’ warnings about the perils of overreach by the federal government and concludes that the men who created our country would be outraged and disappointed to see where we've ended up. Levin returns to the impassioned question he's explored in each of his bestselling books: How do we save our exceptional country? Because our values are in such a precarious state, he argues that a restoration to the essential truths on which our country was founded has never been more urgent. Understanding these principles, in Levin’s words, can “serve as the antidote to tyrannical regimes and governments.” Rediscovering Americanism is not an exercise in nostalgia, but an appeal to his fellow citizens to reverse course. This essential book brings Levin’s celebrated, sophisticated analysis to the troubling question of America's future, and reminds us what we must restore for the sake of our children and our children's children.

Turtles All the Way Down (Signed Edition)

by John Green

This is a signed edition. Limited quantities available. The wait is over! John Green, the #1 bestselling author of The Fault in Our Stars, is back. It all begins with a fugitive billionaire and the promise of a cash reward. Turtles All the Way Down is about lifelong friendship, the intimacy of an unexpected reunion, Star Wars fan fiction, and tuatara. But at its heart is Aza Holmes, a young woman navigating daily existence within the ever-tightening spiral of her own thoughts. In his long-awaited return, John Green shares Aza’s story with shattering, unflinching clarity.

Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis

by J. D. Vance

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER, NAMED BY THE TIMES AS ONE OF "6 BOOKS TO HELP UNDERSTAND TRUMP'S WIN" AND SOON TO BE A MAJOR-MOTION PICTURE DIRECTED BY RON HOWARD

"You will not read a more important book about America this year."—The Economist

"A riveting book."—The Wall Street Journal

"Essential reading."—David Brooks, New York Times

From a former marine and Yale Law School graduate, a powerful account of growing up in a poor Rust Belt town that offers a broader, probing look at the struggles of America’s white working class

Hillbilly Elegy is a passionate and personal analysis of a culture in crisis—that of white working-class Americans. The decline of this group, a demographic of our country that has been slowly disintegrating over forty years, has been reported on with growing frequency and alarm, but has never before been written about as searingly from the inside. J. D. Vance tells the true story of what a social, regional, and class decline feels like when you were born with it hung around your neck.

The Vance family story begins hopefully in postwar America. J. D.’s grandparents were “dirt poor and in love,” and moved north from Kentucky’s Appalachia region to Ohio in the hopes of escaping the dreadful poverty around them. They raised a middle-class family, and eventually their grandchild (the author) would graduate from Yale Law School, a conventional marker of their success in achieving generational upward mobility.

But as the family saga of Hillbilly Elegy plays out, we learn that this is only the short, superficial version. Vance’s grandparents, aunt, uncle, sister, and, most of all, his mother, struggled profoundly with the demands of their new middle-class life, and were never able to fully escape the legacy of abuse, alcoholism, poverty, and trauma so characteristic of their part of America. Vance piercingly shows how he himself still carries around the demons of their chaotic family history.

A deeply moving memoir with its share of humor and vividly colorful figures, Hillbilly Elegy is the story of how upward mobility really feels. And it is an urgent and troubling meditation on the loss of the American dream for a large segment of this country.

The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Come and Get It!: Simple, Scrumptious Recipes for Crazy Busy Lives

by Ree Drummond

Delicious recipes for busy lives from the #1 New York Times bestselling author and Food Network host.

For home cooks, nothing beats spending a long, leisurely day preparing dinner for your family while savoring every flavorful step. But let's face it: Few of us really have the time to do that anymore, with school, sports, work, and activities pulling us in all directions. What busy home cooks really need are scrumptious, doable recipes to solve the challenge of feeding their families wholesome food that tastes great, day after day, week after week—without falling into a rut and relying on the same old rotation of meals.

Ree Drummond provides readers with her very best make-it-happen dishes, pulled from her own non-stop life as a devoted wife, mother of four, food lover, and businesswoman. The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Come and Get It! includes more than 125 of Ree’s best solutions for tasty, nutritious meals (with minimal fuss!) for breakfast, lunch, or dinner.

With a mix of flavors that will please everyone, Ree makes it easy to whip up delicious, simple, down-home recipes that go from stove without a lot of stress. Cooking should be a happy occasion!

Wonder Hardcover – February 14, 2012

by R. J. Palacio

SOON TO BE A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE STARRING JULIA ROBERTS, OWEN WILSON, AND JACOB TREMBLAY! Over 5 million people have read the #1 New York Times bestseller WONDER and have fallen in love with Auggie Pullman, an ordinary boy with an extraordinary face. The book that inspired the Choose Kind movement. I won't describe what I look like. Whatever you're thinking, it's probably worse. August Pullman was born with a facial difference that, up until now, has prevented him from going to a mainstream school. Starting 5th grade at Beecher Prep, he wants nothing more than to be treated as an ordinary kid—but his new classmates can’t get past Auggie’s extraordinary face. WONDER, now a #1 New York Times bestseller and included on the Texas Bluebonnet Award master list, begins from Auggie’s point of view, but soon switches to include his classmates, his sister, her boyfriend, and others. These perspectives converge in a portrait of one community’s struggle with empathy, compassion, and acceptance. "Wonder is the best kids' book of the year," said Emily Bazelon, senior editor at Slate.com and author of Sticks and Stones: Defeating the Culture of Bullying and Rediscovering the Power of Character and Empathy. In a world where bullying among young people is an epidemic, this is a refreshing new narrative full of heart and hope. R.J. Palacio has called her debut novel “a meditation on kindness” —indeed, every reader will come away with a greater appreciation for the simple courage of friendship. Auggie is a hero to root for, a diamond in the rough who proves that you can’t blend in when you were born to stand out.

Astrophysics for People in a Hurry

Hardcover – May 2, 2017

by Neil deGrasse Tyson

The #1 New York Times Bestseller: The essential universe, from our most celebrated and beloved astrophysicist.

What is the nature of space and time? How do we fit within the universe? How does the universe fit within us? There’s no better guide through these mind-expanding questions than acclaimed astrophysicist and best-selling author Neil deGrasse Tyson.

But today, few of us have time to contemplate the cosmos. So Tyson brings the universe down to Earth succinctly and clearly, with sparkling wit, in tasty chapters consumable anytime and anywhere in your busy day.

While you wait for your morning coffee to brew, for the bus, the train, or a plane to arrive,Astrophysics for People in a Hurry will reveal just what you need to be fluent and ready for the next cosmic headlines: from the Big Bang to black holes, from quarks to quantum mechanics, and from the search for planets to the search for life in the universe.

The Handmaid's Tale

Paperback – March 16, 1998

by Margaret Atwood

From the bestselling author of the MaddAddam trilogy, here is the #1 New York Timesbestseller and seminal work of speculative fiction from the Booker Prize-winning author. Now a Hulu series starring Elizabeth Moss, Samira Wiley, and Joseph Fiennes. Includes a new introduction by Margaret Atwood. Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead. She may leave the home of the Commander and his wife once a day to walk to food markets whose signs are now pictures instead of words because women are no longer allowed to read. She must lie on her back once a month and pray that the Commander makes her pregnant, because in an age of declining births, Offred and the other Handmaids are valued only if their ovaries are viable. Offred can remember the days before, when she lived and made love with her husband Luke; when she played with and protected her daughter; when she had a job, money of her own, and access to knowledge. But all of that is gone now…. Funny, unexpected, horrifying, and altogether convincing, The Handmaid's Tale is at once scathing satire, dire warning, and literary tour de force.

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life

Hardcover – September 13, 2016

by Mark Manson

New York Times Bestseller

In this generation-defining self-help guide, a superstar blogger cuts through the crap to show us how to stop trying to be "positive" all the time so that we can truly become better, happier people.

For decades, we’ve been told that positive thinking is the key to a happy, rich life. "F**k positivity," Mark Manson says. "Let’s be honest, shit is f**ked and we have to live with it." In his wildly popular Internet blog, Manson doesn’t sugarcoat or equivocate. He tells it like it is—a dose of raw, refreshing, honest truth that is sorely lacking today. The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F**k is his antidote to the coddling, let’s-all-feel-good mindset that has infected modern society and spoiled a generation, rewarding them with gold medals just for showing up.

Manson makes the argument, backed both by academic research and well-timed poop jokes, that improving our lives hinges not on our ability to turn lemons into lemonade, but on learning to stomach lemons better. Human beings are flawed and limited—"not everybody can be extraordinary, there are winners and losers in society, and some of it is not fair or your fault." Manson advises us to get to know our limitations and accept them. Once we embrace our fears, faults, and uncertainties, once we stop running and avoiding and start confronting painful truths, we can begin to find the courage, perseverance, honesty, responsibility, curiosity, and forgiveness we seek.

There are only so many things we can give a f**k about so we need to figure out which ones really matter, Manson makes clear. While money is nice, caring about what you do with your life is better, because true wealth is about experience. A much-needed grab-you-by-the-shoulders-and-look-you-in-the-eye moment of real-talk, filled with entertaining stories and profane, ruthless humor, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F**k is a refreshing slap for a generation to help them lead contented, grounded lives.

Camino Island: A Novel

Hardcover – June 6, 2017

by John Grisham

A gang of thieves stage a daring heist from a secure vault deep below Princeton University’s Firestone Library. Their loot is priceless, but Princeton has insured it for twenty-five million dollars. Bruce Cable owns a popular bookstore in the sleepy resort town of Santa Rosa on Camino Island in Florida. He makes his real money, though, as a prominent dealer in rare books. Very few people know that he occasionally dabbles in the black market of stolen books and manuscripts. Mercer Mann is a young novelist with a severe case of writer’s block who has recently been laid off from her teaching position. She is approached by an elegant, mysterious woman working for an even more mysterious company. A generous offer of money convinces Mercer to go undercover and infiltrate Bruce Cable’s circle of literary friends, ideally getting close enough to him to learn his secrets. But eventually Mercer learns far too much, and there’s trouble in paradise as only John Grisham can deliver it.

Milk and Honey

Paperback – October 6, 2015

by Rupi Kaur

#1 New York Times bestseller Milk and Honey is a collection of poetry and prose about survival. About the experience of violence, abuse, love, loss, and femininity. The book is divided into four chapters, and each chapter serves a different purpose. Deals with a different pain. Heals a different heartache. Milk and Honey takes readers through a journey of the most bitter moments in life and finds sweetness in them because there is sweetness everywhere if you are just willing to look.

The Silent Wife: A gripping emotional page turner with a twist that will take your breath away

Paperback – February 24, 2017

by Kerry Fisher

Would you risk everything for the man you loved? Even if you knew he'd done something terrible?

'A heart-wrenching and gripping tale. I was hooked from the very first page.' Write Escape

Lara’s life looks perfect on the surface. Gorgeous doting husband Massimo, sweet little sonSandro and the perfect home. Lara knows something about Massimo. Something she can’t tell anyone else or everything he has worked so hard for will be destroyed: his job, their reputation, their son. This secret is keeping Lara a prisoner in her marriage.

Maggie is married to Massimo’s brother Nico and lives with him and her troubled stepdaughter. She knows all of Nico’s darkest secrets – or so she thinks. Then one day she discovers a letter in the attic which reveals a shocking secret about Nico’s first wife. Will Maggie set the record straight or keep silent to protect those she loves?

For a family held together by lies, the truth will come at a devastating price.

A heart-wrenching, emotionally gripping read for fans of Amanda Prowse, Liane Moriarty and Diane Chamberlain.

What everyone's saying about The Silent Wife:

'A compulsive read about secrets, lies, and the complexities of families' Bloomin' Brilliant Books

'What a great novel this is! A very moving story filled with deception, betrayal and, contrastingly, loyalty, love, caring and forgiveness... and it has a brilliant ending!' Splashes Into Books

'Well, this book is a firecracker!...you will experience a rollercoaster of emotions, with laughter, sadness and a satisfying ending that will bring a lump to your throat.' Many Books Many Lives

'A fantastic, thought-provoking story, told with pace and style' Laura Bambrey Books

The Letter: The #1 Bestseller that everyone is talking about

Kindle Edition

by Kathryn Hughes

The #1 EBook Bestseller. Every so often a love story comes along to remind us that sometimes, in our darkest hour, hope shines a candle to light our way. Discover THE LETTER by Kathryn Hughes, the Number One bestseller that has captured thousands of hearts worldwide. Perfect for fans of The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks. 'A wonderful, uplifting story' Lesley Pearse And if you love THE LETTER, you will adore Kathryn's second novel THE SECRET... Tina Craig longs to escape her violent husband. She works all the hours God sends to save up enough money to leave him, also volunteering in a charity shop to avoid her unhappy home. Whilst going through the pockets of a second-hand suit, she comes across an old letter, the envelope firmly sealed and unfranked. Tina opens the letter and reads it - a decision that will alter the course of her life for ever...

Billy Stirling knows he has been a fool, but hopes he can put things right. On 4th September 1939 he sits down to write the letter he hopes will change his future. It does - in more ways than he can ever imagine...

The Letter tells the story of two women, born decades apart, whose paths are destined to cross and how one woman's devastation leads to the other's salvation.

The Life We Bury

Paperback – October 14, 2014

by Allen Eskens

College student Joe Talbert has the modest goal of completing a writing assignment for an English class. His task is to interview a stranger and write a brief biography of the person. With deadlines looming, Joe heads to a nearby nursing home to find a willing subject. There he meets Carl Iverson, and soon nothing in Joe's life is ever the same. Carl is a dying Vietnam veteran--and a convicted murderer. With only a few months to live, he has been medically paroled to a nursing home, after spending thirty years in prison for the crimes of rape and murder. As Joe writes about Carl's life, especially Carl's valor in Vietnam, he cannot reconcile the heroism of the soldier with the despicable acts of the convict. Joe, along with his skeptical female neighbor, throws himself into uncovering the truth, but he is hamstrung in his efforts by having to deal with his dangerously dysfunctional mother, the guilt of leaving his autistic brother vulnerable, and a haunting childhood memory. Thread by thread, Joe unravels the tapestry of Carl’s conviction. But as he and Lila dig deeper into the circumstances of the crime, the stakes grow higher. Will Joe discover the truth before it’s too late to escape the fallout?

The Boy on the Wooden Box: How the Impossible Became Possible . . . on Schindler's List

Paperback – August 18, 2015

by Leon Leyson (Author), Marilyn J. Harran (Contributor), Elisabeth B. Leyson (Contributor)

“Much like The Boy In the Striped Pajamas or The Book Thief,” this remarkable memoir from Leon Leyson, one of the youngest children to survive the Holocaust on Oskar Schindler’s list, “brings to readers a story of bravery and the fight for a chance to live” (VOYA). This, the only memoir published by a former Schindler’s list child, perfectly captures the innocence of a small boy who goes through the unthinkable. Leon Leyson (born Leib Lezjon) was only ten years old when the Nazis invaded Poland and his family was forced to relocate to the Krakow ghetto. With incredible luck, perseverance, and grit, Leyson was able to survive the sadism of the Nazis, including that of the demonic Amon Goeth, commandant of Plaszow, the concentration camp outside Krakow. Ultimately, it was the generosity and cunning of one man, Oskar Schindler, who saved Leon Leyson’s life, and the lives of his mother, his father, and two of his four siblings, by adding their names to his list of workers in his factory—a list that became world renowned: Schindler’s list. Told with an abundance of dignity and a remarkable lack of rancor and venom, The Boy on the Wooden Box is a legacy of hope, a memoir unlike anything you’ve ever read.

The Best Seller

Paperback – May 27, 2016

by Dina Rae

When Maya Smock writes her first novel, everything seems to go her way. Her book practically writes itself. She marries her gorgeous agent. Her name is on all of the best seller lists. Billionaire author Jay McCallister takes an interest in her meteoric rise to fame and invites her into his world of alien-believing celebrities. Her life changes forever when he tells her that they were both created inside of a laboratory. These authors are embedding an alien genetic code within the pages of their novels that originated from Nazi Germany because... The time has come. They are here.

When God Whispers Your Name (The Bestseller Collection)

Hardcover – June 7, 2009

by Max Lucado

Are you ready to hope again? Are you ready to let go of doubt and sorrow? Just listen carefully. God is whispering your name.

Somewhere, between the pages of this book and the pages of your heart, God is speaking. And He is calling you by name.

Maybe that's hard to believe. Maybe you just can't imagine that the One who made it all thinks of you that personally -- that He keeps your name on His heart and lips.

But it's true. In the Bible and in the circumstances of your life, He whispers your name lovingly. Tenderly. Patiently but persistently. Let these stories remind you of the God who knows your name.

Some of the stories are from the Bible. Some are drawn from everyday life. Most are about people who are lost ... or weary ... or discouraged -- just like you may be. If you let them, they will tell the story of your life. And the story of a God who speaks into your situation.

So listen closely as you turn these pages. Listen for the Father's gentle whisper that can erase your doubt, your sorrow, your weariness, your despair.

It really is your name that you hear, and the Voice that calls is more loving that your ever dared dream. Listen. And learn to hope again.

Ashes to Ashes: The Sunday Times bestseller returns with the most gripping book of 2017! (Detective Mark Heckenburg, Book 6)

Kindle Edition

by Paul Finch

The Sunday Times bestseller returns with his next unforgettable crime thriller. Fans of MJ Arlidge and Stuart MacBride won’t be able to put this down.

John Sagan is a forgettable man. You could pass him in the street and not realise he’s there. But then, that’s why he’s so dangerous.

A torturer for hire, Sagan has terrorised – and mutilated – countless victims. And now he’s on the move. DS Mark ‘Heck’ Heckenburg must chase the trail, even when it leads him to his hometown of Bradburn – a place he never thought he’d set foot in again.

But Sagan isn’t the only problem. Bradburn is being terrorised by a lone killer who burns his victims to death. And with the victims chosen at random, no-one knows who will be next. Least of all Heck…

A Man Called Ove: A Novel

Paperback – May 5, 2015

by Fredrik Backman

Read the New York Times bestseller that has taken the world by storm! Meet Ove. He’s a curmudgeon—the kind of man who points at people he dislikes as if they were burglars caught outside his bedroom window. He has staunch principles, strict routines, and a short fuse. People call him “the bitter neighbor from hell.” But must Ove be bitter just because he doesn’t walk around with a smile plastered to his face all the time? Behind the cranky exterior there is a story and a sadness. So when one November morning a chatty young couple with two chatty young daughters move in next door and accidentally flatten Ove’s mailbox, it is the lead-in to a comical and heartwarming tale of unkempt cats, unexpected friendship, and the ancient art of backing up a U-Haul. All of which will change one cranky old man and a local residents’ association to their very foundations. A feel-good story in the spirit of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry and Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand, Fredrik Backman’s novel about the angry old man next door is a thoughtful exploration of the profound impact one life has on countless others. “If there was an award for ‘Most Charming Book of the Year,’ this first novel by a Swedish blogger-turned-overnight-sensation would win hands down” (Booklist, starred review).

Firefly Lane

Paperback – January 6, 2009

by Kristin Hannah

From the New York Times bestselling author Kristin Hannah comes a powerful novel of love, loss, and the magic of friendship. . . .

In the turbulent summer of 1974, Kate Mularkey has accepted her place at the bottom of the eighth-grade social food chain. Then, to her amazement, the "coolest girl in the world" moves in across the street and wants to be her friend. Tully Hart seems to have it all---beauty, brains, ambition. On the surface they are as opposite as two people can be: Kate, doomed to be forever uncool, with a loving family who mortifies her at every turn. Tully, steeped in glamour and mystery, but with a secret that is destroying her. They make a pact to be best friends forever; by summer's end they've become TullyandKate. Inseparable.

So begins Kristin Hannah's magnificent new novel. Spanning more than three decades and playing out across the ever-changing face of the Pacific Northwest, Firefly Lane is the poignant, powerful story of two women and the friendship that becomes the bulkhead of their lives.

From the beginning, Tully is desperate to prove her worth to the world. Abandoned by her mother at an early age, she longs to be loved unconditionally. In the glittering, big-hair era of the eighties, she looks to men to fill the void in her soul. But in the buttoned-down nineties, it is television news that captivates her. She will follow her own blind ambition to New York and around the globe, finding fame and success . . . and loneliness.

Kate knows early on that her life will be nothing special. Throughout college, she pretends to be driven by a need for success, but all she really wants is to fall in love and have children and live an ordinary life. In her own quiet way, Kate is as driven as Tully. What she doesn't know is how being a wife and mother will change her . . . how she'll lose sight of who she once was, and what she once wanted. And how much she'll envy her famous best friend. . . .

For thirty years, Tully and Kate buoy each other through life, weathering the storms of friendship---jealousy, anger, hurt, resentment. They think they've survived it all until a single act of betrayal tears them apart . . . and puts their courage and friendship to the ultimate test.

Firefly Lane is for anyone who ever drank Boone's Farm apple wine while listening to Abba or Fleetwood Mac. More than a coming-of-age novel, it's the story of a generation of women who were both blessed and cursed by choices. It's about promises and secrets and betrayals. And ultimately, about the one person who really, truly knows you---and knows what has the power to hurt you . . . and heal you. Firefly Lane is a story you'll never forget . . . one you'll want to pass on to your best friend.

Sister Sister: A gripping psychological thriller

Paperback – May 23, 2017

by Sue Fortin

USA Today bestselling author of The Girl Who Lied

‘Gobsmacked…a thrilling finale’ Rachel’s Random Reads

Alice: Beautiful, kind, manipulative, liar.

Clare: Intelligent, loyal, paranoid, jealous.

Clare thinks Alice is a manipulative liar who is trying to steal her life. Alice thinks Clare is jealous of her long-lost return and place in their family.

One of them is telling the truth. The other is a maniac. Two sisters. One truth.

What people are saying about SISTER SISTER:

‘I would definitely recommend this if you love psychological thrillers’ – Stardust Book Reviews

‘Sister Sister has everything – conflict, family secrets and betrayal, all of which go to make it thoroughly deserving of the five stars I’ve given it’ – Brook Cottage Books

‘A truly absorbing psychological thriller’ – Joan Hill, Reviewing Recommended Reads

The Secret Wife

Paperback – November 8, 2016

by Gill Paul

The USA Today bestseller

‘A cleverly crafted novel and an enthralling story… A triumph.’ DINAH JEFFERIES

A Russian grand duchess and an English journalist. Linked by one of the world’s greatest mysteries…

Love. Guilt. Heartbreak.

1914

Russia is on the brink of collapse, and the Romanov family faces a terrifyingly uncertain future. Grand Duchess Tatiana has fallen in love with cavalry officer Dmitri, but events take a catastrophic turn, placing their romance – and their lives – in danger . . .

2016

Kitty Fisher escapes to her great-grandfather’s remote cabin in America, after a devastating revelation makes her flee London. There, on the shores of Lake Akanabee, she discovers the spectacular jewelled pendant that will lead her to a long-buried family secret . . .

Haunting, moving and beautifully written, The Secret Wife effortlessly crosses centuries, as past merges with present in an unforgettable story of love, loss and resilience.

Perfect for fans of Kate Morton and Dinah Jefferies.

Ordinary Grace

Paperback – March 4, 2014

by William Kent Krueger

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER WINNER OF THE 2014 EDGAR AWARD FOR BEST NOVEL WINNER OF THE 2014 DILYS AWARD A SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL BEST BOOK OF 2013 “That was it. That was all of it. A grace so ordinary there was no reason at all to remember it. Yet I have never across the forty years since it was spoken forgotten a single word.” New Bremen, Minnesota, 1961. The Twins were playing their debut season, ice-cold root beers were selling out at the soda counter of Halderson’s Drugstore, and Hot Stuff comic books were a mainstay on every barbershop magazine rack. It was a time of innocence and hope for a country with a new, young president. But for thirteen-year-old Frank Drum it was a grim summer in which death visited frequently and assumed many forms. Accident. Nature. Suicide. Murder. Frank begins the season preoccupied with the concerns of any teenage boy, but when tragedy unexpectedly strikes his family—which includes his Methodist minister father; his passionate, artistic mother; Juilliard-bound older sister; and wise-beyond-his-years kid brother—he finds himself thrust into an adult world full of secrets, lies, adultery, and betrayal, suddenly called upon to demonstrate a maturity and gumption beyond his years. Told from Frank’s perspective forty years after that fateful summer, Ordinary Grace is a brilliantly moving account of a boy standing at the door of his young manhood, trying to understand a world that seems to be falling apart around him. It is an unforgettable novel about discovering the terrible price of wisdom and the enduring grace of God.

The Missing Ones: An absolutely gripping thriller with a jaw-dropping twist (Detective Lottie Parker Book 1)

Kindle Edition

by Patricia Gibney

The hole they dug was not deep. A white flour bag encased the little body. Three small faces watched from the window, eyes black with terror. The child in the middle spoke without turning his head. ‘I wonder which one of us will be next?’ When a woman’s body is discovered in a cathedral and hours later a young man is found hanging from a tree outside his home, Detective Lottie Parker is called in to lead the investigation. Both bodies have the same distinctive tattoo clumsily inscribed on their legs. It’s clear the pair are connected, but how? The trail leads Lottie to St Angela’s, a former children’s home, with a dark connection to her own family history. Suddenly the case just got personal. As Lottie begins to link the current victims to unsolved murders decades old, two teenage boys go missing. She must close in on the killer before they strike again, but in doing so is she putting her own children in terrifying danger? Lottie is about to come face to face with a twisted soul who has a very warped idea of justice.

Top Best Seller Books To Read This Summer, Discover Best Books You Must Read Now

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