Sadness

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From The Great Transformation (2006)

  Instead of seeking ataraxia, the Axial thinkers had forced their contemporaries to accept the reality of pain. Jeremiah had denounced those who retreated into denial as “false prophets.” The tragedians of Athens had put suffering onstage and commanded the audience to weep. You could achieve liberation only by going through sorrow, not by going to elaborate lengths to make sure that it never impinged on your protected existence. The experience of dukkha was a prerequisite for enlightenment, because it enabled the aspirant to empathize with the grief of others. But the Hellenistic philosophies were entirely focused on the self. True, the Stoics were urged to take part in public life and work generously for the good of others. But they were not allowed to empathize with the people they served, because that would disturb their equilibrium. This cold self-sufficiency was alien to the Axial Age. Friendship and kindness were crucial to Epicurus’s commune, but they were not extended outside the Garden. And however kindly intentioned, there was more than a hint of aggression in the Skeptics’ therapy, as they went around picking arguments with other people in order to undermine their convictions. The approach was markedly different from that of the Buddha and Socrates, who always started from where their interlocutors actually were, not where they thought they ought to be. Many Axial thinkers were mistrustful of pure logos and reason, but the Hellenistic philosophies were based on science rather than intuition. Epicurus, for example, developed the atomism of Democritus to show that it was a waste of the precious lives we had to fear death, which would inevitably occur when the atoms fell apart. It was pointless to ask the gods for help, because they too were composed of and ruled by the atoms. The Stoics taught that it was possible to align yourself with the divine process of nature only if you understood scientifically that it was programmed by the Logos and could not be altered. The third century was the great age of Greek science. The new Hellenistic kingdoms of Ptolemy and Seleucus were far richer than the old poleis, and kings vied with one another to attract scholars to their capitals, bribing them with grants and salaries. Euclid and Archimedes both lived and worked in Alexandria. The Milesian and Eleatic philosophers had concentrated on those aspects of natural science that related to human beings, rather like popular scientists today, whereas the new scientists of the third century were at the cutting edge of mathematics, physics, astronomy, and engineering. Science had now lost its early religious orientation and become a wholly secular pursuit.

• From The Great Transformation (2006)

  Priests were still colluding with the am ha-aretz, and the people continued to take foreign wives. For a whole day, the inhabitants of Jerusalem had to watch in dismay as the king’s emissary tore his hair and sat down in the street in the posture of deep mourning. Then he summoned all the members of the Golah to a meeting: anybody who refused to attend would be cast out of the community and have his property confiscated. On New Year’s Day, Ezra brought the Torah to the square in front of the Water Gate; standing on a wooden dais and surrounded by the leading citizens, he read the Torah to the crowd, expounding on it as he went along. 8 We have no idea which text he actually read to them, but it was certainly a shock to the people. Religious truth always sounded different when written down and read aloud, and the people burst into tears, shocked by the demands of Yahweh’s religion. Ezra had to remind them that this was a festival, an occasion for rejoicing, and recited the text that commanded the Israelites to live in special booths during the month of Sukkoth, in memory of their ancestors’ forty years in the wilderness. The people rushed into the hills to pick branches of olive, myrtle, pine, and palm, and soon leafy shelters appeared all over the city. There was a carnival atmosphere: each evening, the people assembled to listen to Ezra’s reading of the law. The next assembly was a more somber occasion. 9 It was held in the square in front of the temple, and the people stood shivering as the torrential winter rains deluged the city. Ezra commanded them to send away their foreign wives, and women and children were, therefore, expelled from the Golah to join the am ha-aretz. Membership in Israel was now confined to the descendants of those who had been exiled to Babylon and to those who were prepared to submit to the Torah, the official law code of Jerusalem. The lament of the outcasts may have been preserved in the book of Isaiah: For Abraham does not own us And Israel does not acknowledge us; Yet you, Yahweh, yourself are our father. . . . We have long been like people who do not rule, People who do not bear your name. 10 Suffering and domination had led to a defensive exclusion that was alien to the unfolding spirit of the Axial Age in the other regions. But that cold, rainy scene was not the end of the story. The books of Ezra and Nehemiah comprised only a small part of the Hebrew Bible. Their perspective was shared by many of the people but it was not the only viewpoint. During the fifth and fourth centuries, the Bible was compiled by editors and the more inclusive traditions of Israel and Judah were also represented.

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  Every one knows how panic is increased by flight, and how the giving way to the symptoms of grief or anger increases those passions themselves. Each fit of sobbing makes the sorrow more acute, and calls forth another fit stronger still, until at last repose only ensues with lassitude and with the apparent exhaustion of the machinery. In rage, it is notorious how we 'work ourselves up' to a climax by repeated outbreaks of expression. Refuse to express a passion, and it dies. Count ten before venting your anger, and its occasion seems ridiculous. Whistling to keep up courage is no mere figure of speech. On the other hand, sit all day in a moping posture, sigh, and reply to everything with a dismal voice, and your melancholy lingers. There is no more valuable precept in moral education than this, as all who have experience know: if we wish to conquer undesirable emotional tendencies in ourselves, we must assiduously, and in the first instance cold-bloodedly, go through the outward movements of those contrary dispositions which we prefer to cultivate. The reward of persistency will infallibly come, in the fading out of the sullenness or depression, and the advent of real cheerfulness and kindliness in their stead. Smooth the brow, brighten the eye, contract the dorsal rather than the ventral aspect of the frame, and speak in a major key, pass the genial compliment, and your heart must be frigid indeed if it do not gradually thaw! This is recognized by all psychologists, only they fail to see its full import. Professor Bain writes, for example: "We find that a feeble [emotional] wave . . . is suspended inwardly by being arrested outwardly; the currents of the brain and the agitation of the centres die away if the external vent is resisted at every point. It is by such restraint that we are in the habit of suppressing pity, anger, fear, pride—on many trifling occasions. If so, it is a fact that the suppression of the actual movements has a tendency to suppress the nervous currents that incite them, so that the external quiescence is followed by the internal. The effect would not happen in any case if there were not some dependence of the cerebral wave upon the free outward vent or manifestation. . . . By the same interposition we may summon up a dormant feeling.

• From Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble (2014)

  Over the winter I’ll do a lot of skiing. I’ll take a trip to Utah and visit some friends. By the time ski season ends it will be April, and I’ll have hit my one-year anniversary and can slip out quietly from HubSpot. I remind myself that I have a lot to be thankful for—realizing, even as I do, that the only people who say this are people who are desperate and miserable. Nonetheless, my health is good. I’m employed. The family is happy. My son has been playing soccer, and this season I have seen all of his games. My daughter has a piano recital and will dance in the local Nutcracker , and this year I can attend both of them. Last year I was in San Francisco. Sasha’s migraines are under control. She’s happier and less stressed out. So what if my job sucks? I’m working. I’m getting paid. Things could be worse. HubSpot has a policy that says anyone can work from home whenever they want. I now take full advantage of this. When I have to work in the office—usually because there’s a meeting that I have to attend—I go in late and leave early. In meetings I say as little as possible. I stare at my laptop and pretend to take notes, when really I’m browsing the web and catching up on Facebook. Between meetings I return to my desk in the cacophonous spider monkey room, put in my earplugs and headphones, listen to Mozart, and gaze around at the doomed souls. It’s a lonely, isolated existence. Around noon I walk across First Street to the Galleria mall, eat sushi in the food court, then return to my desk and my headphones, burying myself in my cocoon. Sometimes I go for a walk around the offices. I visit different floors, just looking around. I’ll find a kitchen and make a cup of coffee and sit by myself on a couch in a lounge area, reading news on my phone. By around four o’clock it’s dark outside, so I put my laptop into my backpack and head home. Entire days go by when I do not speak a word to anyone. The whole thing feels surreal. Gradually I slide into depression, swinging between a restless, herky-jerky anxiety and a mind-numbing lethargy. Some nights I lie awake, unable to sleep, my mind racing, until finally I take an Ambien to knock myself out. Other times I do nothing but sleep. I go to bed at eight, sleep until seven, and still have a hard time waking up. Sasha and the kids can tell how miserable I am. Instead of regaling them with stories about the latest hijinks at HubSpot, as I used to do, now I arrive home and shuffle upstairs and put on my pajamas. There is no choice but to soldier on. Sasha is not working. The job of making money has fallen to me.

• From Prayers of the Social Awakening (1910)

  Grant them with sober eyes to look beyond these sweet days of friendship to the genera- tions yet to come, and to realize that the home for which they long will be part of the sacred tissue of the body of humanity in which thou art to dwell, that so they may reverence themselves and drink the cup of joy with awe. [88] FOR THE IDLE GOD, we remember with pain and pity the thousands of our brothers and sisters who seek honest work and seek in vain. For though the unsatisfied wants of men are many, and though our land is wide and calls for labor, yet these thy sons and daughters have no place to labor, and are turned away in humiliation and despair when they seek it. O righteous God, we acknowledge our common guilt for the disorder of our industry which thrusts even willing workers into the degradation of idleness and want, and teaches some to love the sloth which once they feared and hated. We remember also with sorrow and compassion the idle rich, who have vigor of body and mind and yet produce no useful thing. Forgive them for loading the burden of their support on the bent shoulders of the working world. Forgive them for wasting in refined excess what would feed the pale children of the poor. Forgive them for [80] setting their poisoned splendor before the thirsty hearts of the young, luring them to theft or shame by the lust of eye and flesh. Forgive them for taking pride in their work- less lives and despising those by whose toil they live. Forgive them for appeasing their better self by pretended duties and injurious charities. We beseech thee to awaken them by the new voice of thy Spirit that they may look up into the stem eyes of thy Christ and may be smitten with the blessed pangs of repentance. Grant them strength of soul to rise from their silken shame and to give their brothers a just return of labor for the bread they eat. And to our whole nation do thou grant wisdom to create a world in which none shall be forced to idle in want, and none shall be able to idle in luxury, but in which all shall know the health of wholesome work and the sweetness of well-earned rest. 11 Ipo] MORITURI TE SALUTANT

• From Cultish (2021)

  They filled women’s ears with promises of financial independence, the sort that wouldn’t threaten their traditionally feminine, wifely image. To this day, unemployed women, especially those living in blue-collar towns, continue to make up the majority of MLM recruits. Quickly, the direct selling industry figured out how to target other communities locked out of the dignified labor market. Immigrant Spanish speakers, inexperienced college students, and economically marginalized Black folks became additional targets. The industry takes advantage of the trust that already exists within tight-knit groups like churches, military bases, and college campuses. Their ideal recruit is one who is striving for financial stability and has a proven track record of faith and optimism, whether it’s hope for a fresh start in a new country, youthful enthusiasm for the future, or belief in a higher power. The typical MLM joinee isn’t some greedy jerk looking to get rich quick; they’re an everyday person looking to pay their basic bills. A blend of monetary struggle, close community, and idealism is the jackpot for any upline. Christian communities wind up being a hotbed for MLMs, many of which actively identify themselves as “faith-based”: Mary & Martha, Christian Bling, Younique, Thirty-One Gifts, and Mary Kay are just a few of the many MLMs that lead with an explicitly religious credo. In dozens of American neighborhoods, you’ll find salt-of-the-earth people holding the Bible in one hand and pricey lotion samples in the other. It’s why the state of Utah is home to more MLM headquarters than anywhere else in the world—Mormons, as direct sales leaders have discovered, are an ideal sales forc e. “Latter-day Saints are born and bred to be missionaries . . . so preaching the gospel to friends often naturally flows with selling MLM products to their friends,” a source told the investigative podcast The Dream . “When your uncle comes to you and says, ‘I have this great life-changing opportunity,’ sometimes it sounds a lot like a message you would hear at church.” Religion has been intertwined with MLMs—and with American labor culture in general—since before the United States even existed. The marriage of godly blessings and monetary “blessings” goes back half a millennium to the Protestant Reformation. Sociologists attribute the dawn of modern capitalism to this sixteenth-century movement, which gave birth to so many of our contemporary American workplace values, like the basic idea of “a good day’s work,” “keeping your nose to the grindstone,”* and “the good paymaster is lord of another man’s purse.” Protestant Reformers, especially French theologian John Calvin, conceived of the idea that God plays a role not just in human beings’ spiritual successes and failures but also in our financial ones. This idea helped create the “Protestant ethic,” marked by diligent work, individual effort, and accumulation of wealth, which aligned perfectly with Europe’s emerging capitalist economy. Soon, everyone began aspiring to the new ideal of a pious, self-reliant entrepreneur.

• From A Way of Being (1980)

  THERAPIST Mm-hmmm. Like a new discovery, really. CLIENT (Speaking at the same time.) I never really did know. But it’s—you know, it’s almost a physical thing. It’s—it’s sort of as though I were looking within myself at all kinds of—nerve endings and bits of things that have been sort of mashed. (Weeping.) THERAPIST As though some of the most delicate aspects of you, physically almost, have been crushed or hurt. CLIENT Yes. And you know, I do get the feeling, “Oh you poor thing.” Here it is clear that empathic therapist responses encourage her in the wider exploration of, and closer acquaintance with, the visceral experiencing going on within. She is learning to listen to her guts (to use an inelegant term). She has expanded her knowledge of the flow of her experiencing. Here, too, we see how this unverbalized visceral flow is used as a referent. How does she know that “guilt” is not the word to describe her feeling? She knows by turning within, taking another look at this reality, this palpable process that is taking place, this experiencing. And so she can test the word “hurt” against this referent, and she finds it closer. Only when she tries on the phrase, “Oh you poor thing,” does it really fit the inner felt meaning of compassion and sorrow for herself. In my judgment, she has not only used this aspect of her experiencing as a referent, but has also learned something about this process of checking with her total physiological being—a learning she can apply again and again. And empathy has helped to make it possible. We can also find in this slice of therapy what it means to let an experiencing run its course. This is clearly not a new feeling. She has often felt it before, yet it has never been lived out. It has been blocked in some way. I am quite clear as to the reality and vividness of the unblocking that follows, because I have many times been a party to its occurrence, but I am not sure how it may best be described. It seems to me that only when a gut-level experience is fully accepted and accurately labeled in awareness can it be completed. Then the person can move beyond it. Again, it is the sensitively empathic climate that helps to move the experiencing forward to its conclusion, which, in this case, is the uninhibited experiencing of the pity she feels for herself.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  You’ll have to walk, though, because that bunch of rogues who have just left took your nag away with them.’ Resigning herself to the loss of her nag, the girl begged them in God’s name to conduct her to the castle; whereupon they set out, and arrived there when the hour of tierce was about half spent. The castle belonged to a member of the Orsini family called Liello di Campo di Fiore, whose wife, a devout and exceedingly worthy woman, happened at that time to be staying there. On seeing Agnolella, she recognized her instantly and gave her a cordial welcome, and insisted on knowing precisely how she came to be there. The girl told her the whole story from start to finish. The lady, who also knew Pietro because he was a friend of her husband, was greatly distressed to learn what had happened, and on hearing where he had been seized, she was convinced that he must be dead. So she said to the girl: ‘Since you have no idea what has become of Pietro, you must stay here with me until such time as I can send you safely back to Rome.’ Pietro had meanwhile stayed put in the branches of the oak, feeling as miserable as sin, and towards midnight he saw at least a score of wolves approaching. On seeing the nag, they crept up on him from all sides, but the nag heard them coming, and, tossing his head, broke loose from his tether and started to run away. Since he was surrounded, he could not get very far, so he set about the wolves with his teeth and his hooves, holding them at bay for quite some time till eventually they forced him to the ground, throttled the life out of him, and tore out his innards. They all began to gorge upon their prey, and having picked the carcase clean, they went away leaving nothing but the bones. Pietro was thrown into despair by this spectacle, for to him the nag was a sort of comrade, a prop and stay in his afflictions, and he began to think that he would never succeed in leaving the forest alive. He continued to keep a lookout on all sides, however, and a little before dawn, when he was all but freezing to death up there in the oak, he caught sight of a huge fire, about a mile from where he was sheltering. So as soon as daylight had come he descended from his perch, feeling distinctly apprehensive, and made off in that direction. On reaching the spot he found a number of shepherds sitting and making merry round the fire, and they took pity on him and asked him to join them.

• From Cultish (2021)

  “I just wanted to do the levels and move back to New York and be a musical theater actress,” she recounted dolefully. “But of course that didn’t happen.” Promises for an extraordinary life are how they roped in Cathy, who stayed in the church for eighteen years, long after she was desperate to leave it. In 1991, Cathy was a twenty-three-year-old entertainer on the rise living in Chicago. She was starting to book big commercials and voice-over jobs (“I don’t know if you’ve heard ‘SC Johnson: A Family Company,’ or ‘Applebee’s: Eatin’ Good in the Neighborhood,’” she performed for me over the phone). That year, Cathy met a sweet fellow actress who told her about an amazing artists group she was part of, full of up-and-comers just like her. It was called Scientology. Cathy had never heard of the group, but it sounded legit. It had “science” in the name, after all. Cathy started accompanying the actress to local meet-ups, which she later learned were organized by the church. “Like, ‘See? We’re not so crazy. We’re artists,’” Cathy explained of their motives. “Art is the universal solvent! L. Ron Hubbard said that.” In the beginning, Cathy seemed like the perfect recruit—bright-eyed, dedicated, making a good living, and eager to do good in the world. “Like lots of people in their early twenties, I wanted to join the Peace Corps or Habitat for Humanity, some type of group where I could contribute in a way that wasn’t being a self-centered performer,” she explained. And she was searching, spiritually. A cradle Catholic from Nebraska who grew up one of ten kids, Cathy lost an older brother suddenly in a car crash when she was thirteen. “That was a turning point for me,” said Cathy, who stopped going to her home church after they tried convincing her God had “chosen” her brother to die young, because he was “ready to be with God.” It was a thought-terminating cliché, and Cathy wasn’t buying it: “I thought, ‘Well then that’s not the kind of God I want anything to do with.’” She spent the next decade seeking a higher power elsewhere—everything from crystal meditation workshops to churches where they spoke in tongues. Nothing stuck. Originally, Scientology was pitched to Cathy as a nondenominational group whose primary goal was to “spread hope for mankind.” She recalls, “Everyone I talked to said the same thing, ‘Oh, you can practice whatever you like,’ and I believed them. They play it cool.” But once inside, Cathy quickly learned that partaking in other religions was absolutely not allowed. “They call it ‘squirreling,’” she told me. “One day you look up and you realize you’re in a room of five hundred people hip-hip-hooraying for a bronze bust of L. Ron Hubbard at the front of the room.” ii.Back in Los Angeles, Mani skipped (as I trudged) into the elephantine lobby of Scientology HQ, where we were greeted by a too-smiley white gentleman in his forties.

• From The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica Volume 10 (2011)

  “May I close the door?” he asked, still choking up, and Isabel nodded, as if to say, please do. When he retook his seat, Owen again spoke without looking at her, but occasionally met her eyes and glanced away, testing new waters of trust. “My wife,” he said, “I don’t — I don’t mean to put her down. She can’t help it. I know depression is a disease, that’s what the doctors say. I understand that. But she sleeps hours and hours a day — sometimes all day. I bring her books and newspapers — I brought her an easel with an expensive palette, for she used to paint. They all go unused. She’s taken every pill invented and none has worked for more than a week. What am I supposed to do? Nothing? That’s what it feels like she wants for me to do, not to leave her but to leave her be. How can I? She stays behind a closed door that seems as big as that space monolith in that movie where — oh, of course, you wouldn’t know it, you’re too young.” ‘The idea of Isabel’s age had stopped his confession, returned him to reality, and Owen swiveled to the side, seeming grateful that something had. Isabel felt a bit offended. She had seen that movie, or at least part of it once, had heard of it, anyway, and besides, he was too young to have seen it originally, either; he wasn’t that much older. In any case, she knew that in the only way that mattered, they were the same: Owen was a person going to waste, as she was. “I do know,” she blurted out, and thought she sounded even younger, a child asserting sophistication. It made him smile — mostly with his eyes, if that were possible, as he barely moved his mouth — and that hurt her even more. Stull, her youth meant something to her: Isabel waited for him to speak before continuing the conversation — not because he was her boss, exactly, because what he was going through was something she hadn’t experienced, the depth of his despair was something she The Dead End Fob 159 had never known. Wasn’t that worthy of respect or at least silence? This wasn’t about her impressing him, after all, though she wanted to, had to force herself not to keep trying, to make him know that she understood him, understood everything, even though she sensed she didn’t. But Owen wouldn’t respond, so Isabel had no better idea than to leave. When he saw her start to go, he rose at the same time, actually making a decision, moving toward her as she moved to the door. He was faster than she, because he wanted to get where he was going more.

• From Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble (2014)

  As much as I want this not to hurt, it does. I’m upset in part because of what Trotsky is saying to me—but more so because I’ve put myself in this position in the first place. What was I thinking when I took this job? Why have I subjected myself to this for so long? How have I ended up trapped in a room with this tattoed sadist, playing out this psychology experiment? Like an idiot, I start talking. I babble. I spill my guts. I tell Trotsky how disappointing this is, how nothing like this has ever happened to me before, and by this I mean the whole thing, the whole shitty year and a half at HubSpot. For twenty-five years my career went up and up. I went from one job to a better job. I got promotions, and raises. And I was happy! I loved my work. I made good friends—lifelong friends, people I still talk to all the time. “Maybe I’m not cut out to work in marketing,” I say. “That’s fine. But I’ve never worked in a place where I didn’t make friends. I’ve never been in a place where everyone makes it so clear that they don’t like me, or want me around. Some jobs you like better than others, but I’ve never felt lonely at work. That’s how I feel here.” I’ve gone through my entire life feeling that I am basically a likeable person, someone who can make friends and fit in. But here I have stumbled into a world where I am really and truly not wanted. Some of that may have to do with my personality, and some of it has to do with my age. Apparently I have crossed some invisible line, and I now live in the Land of the Old. That’s what’s hitting me here. That’s what this job has forced me to confront: I’m old. A few months ago I turned fifty-four. One hundred years ago that was the average life expectancy in the United States. At this age, I would be getting carted off to the cemetery. Instead, I’m here. What’s really depressing is that this is entirely my fault. If I’d managed my life better, I would be retired now. I would have stayed on the track to become a doctor, which was my original plan and the one my parents urged me to follow. Most of my high school friends became doctors. They’re retired now, or working part-time. They’re coasting. They’ve made their money, and they’re all set. Meanwhile I’m still working my ass off, still needing to earn a paycheck. I’ve reached a point in my life where I should not have to put up with being degraded like this, punched around by some buffoon like Trotsky. But here I am. “The whole thing is depressing,” I say. Trotsky smiles. I’ve given him an opening.

• From The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica Volume 10 (2011)

  Each angel holds a bronze sword, and in the light of the setting sun these swords appear to be aflame, just like the sword wielded by the angel who guarded the entrance to Eden. When entering the grounds, the one angel keeps the outside world at bay, and on leaving the hotel, the other angel keeps back all that has happened there. Within the hotel are hallways set with an infinity of doors, marble stairs leading to hidden verandas, and dimly lit corridors set with lush carpets and hung with faded and obscure paintings. There are ballrooms and dining halls, a spa and pools for taking the waters (in ancient times there were Roman baths here), and although the grounds and hotel are impeccably kept, there is a feeling that time has passed this place by; or rather that time has a different meaning here, measured not by the passage of the seasons, but by the continuity of human habitation. ze Valerie Grey The hotel has assumed a kind of seamless grandeur within the landscape in which it sits, rather like a queen sitting in state over an empty kingdom. This is the sight that Dominique Béry sees as she alights in front of the hotel from the limousine that has brought her from the station: the marble steps that sweep up to the portico, the parade of Palladian windows gleaming in the dull light, punctuating the ancient fa¢ade of the building with a calm and stately rhythm, the ornamental statuary overgrown with spots of ancient moss. She is slim, with large brown eyes and blonde hair, impeccably dressed in a simple white suit; from her placid appearance there is nothing to suggest that she’s a fragile shell, that inside she’s still tender and bruised, wounded by the bitter finish of a marriage. She’s brought herself to Hotel Arensen to try to recover the person she used to be; to try to break through the icy scar that has grown around her heart. She is lost. She can hide here. She plans to return to the world fixed, healed. Right now, she feels her life is like a pretzel, twisted and going nowhere. The doorman has seen this all before, and takes her bags without a word. She’s brought quite a bit of luggage; most guests do. They arrive with the shards of their lives in tow; uncertain as to what to leave behind and what to take with, and so they all bring too much. He leads the way, and Dominique walks to the desk where her key is waiting.

• From The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica Volume 10 (2011)

  though, I knew her luck couldn’t last. Whatever is out there hates the lucky and the innocent. If there was a sin in Jasmine, in her perfect fortune, this unblinking good luck, it was that it didn’t leave much room for depth or brains. Jasmine was a spirit who walked slowly through life, letting it bump her this way and that. Never ask her to meet you anywhere, never make plans around her. Jasmine was pot and incense and a soft, warm body that fit so comfortably in your arms, but she wasn’t someone you could count on. No one who knew her said it, but we all knew it was true — and having her turn up two years after we all put her to rest in the Long Beach Municipal Cemetery proved it. She was late for her own funeral. I can’t really remember the first time I met Jasmine. Maybe it was that party to celebrate Rosie getting her first gig at the Red Room. Maybe it was that picnic that Robert and Steve threw down at the remains of the old Pike. Maybe she had just shown up on my doorstep like she always seemed to, jingling her tiny silver bells and lazily sweeping her tie-dye skirt back and forth. No place to sleep that night and Roger Corn was,always up, awake, and willing to take 6 her in. : God knew what we had in common, save we .. . fit somehow. We didn’t talk music (Airplane! NIN! Joplin! Love!) or books (Kesey! Coupland!) or anything else for that matter (You’re always so damned happy! What do you have to feel sad about?), we just fucked and played and took our respective drugs (Coffee and weed! H and pot!). A spirit of the 1960s and one hack writer making his bread and butter writing porn, True Detective Stories, and articles on how to get your cat to use the toilet. We just seemed to go together somehow. We tolerated each other because we liked to fuck and kiss each other. Relationships can be based on worse things. When I got that call, Rosie so calm and collected, I was sort of ‘ ready for it. Jasmine always did what you expected her to, if you understood her, so when the phone rang and Rosie said that Jasmine had “passed on” I knew almost exactly how, where and why. The funeral was sparse and sad for the little spirit — just the four of us. We had all pitched in to get the coffin. It was a colorful affair, you had to give it that: Rosie in a gaudy color-blast of a red sequined gown and boa, Robert in his own retro seventies platforms and | polyester, Steve with his beads and a (where the fuck did he score that?) Nehru jacket. I wore something aside from black. It was hard to find, but I managed to score a brilliant red shirt from a friend of

• From A Way of Being (1980)

  Can Learning Encompass both Ideas and Feelings? This chapter ranges widely over the field of education, from a definition of whole-person learning, to a plan for a radical change in teacher education, to some of the research carried out on the effects of teachers’ attitudes on students’ learning. But I believe that underlying these different topics, there is a unified theme: the value of combining experiential with cognitive learning. This topic has long been of intense interest to me. I deplore the manner in which, from early years, the child’s education splits him or her: the mind can come to school, and the body is permitted, peripherally, to tag along, but the feelings and emotions can live freely and expressively only outside of school. I wrote this paper to show that it is not only feasible to permit the whole child to come to school, with feelings as well as intellect, but that learning is thereby enhanced. This chapter mentions experiences with the Immaculate Heart high school and college system, in Los Angeles, and with the inner-city school system of Louisville, Kentucky. In an epilogue to the chapter, I give an updated report on each of these situations. ... In classes and seminars I have tried to communicate ideas and intellectual concepts to others. In psychotherapy and in encounter groups I have facilitated personal learnings in the realm of feelings—the experiencing, often at a nonverbal gut level, of the important emotional events going on in the organism. But I cannot be satisfied with these two separate kinds of learning. There should be a place for learning by the whole person, with feelings and ideas merged. I have given much thought to this question of bringing together cognitive learning, which has always been needed, and affective-experiential learning, which is so underplayed in education today. Since I am using abstract terms, let me illustrate this merged kind of learning with a personal example. For four years I have been trying to grow two beautiful golden-leaved shrubs at either side of the entrance to our driveway. Recently they have, at long last, been really thriving. Then the other day I was in a hurry. I backed quickly down the driveway, swung the wheel, hit something, and stopped the car. To my horror, the rear wheel had gone right over the center of one of this shrubs. My

• From Fields of Blood: Religion and the History of Violence (2014)

  47 The outcome was tragic. There is always a moment in warfare when the horrifying reality breaks through the glamour. Humbaba turns out to be a very reasonable monster, who pleads for his life and offers Gilgamesh and Enkidu all the wood they want, but still they hack him brutally to pieces. Afterward a gentle rain falls from heaven, as though nature itself grieves for this pointless death. 48 The gods show their displeasure with the expedition by striking Enkidu down with a fatal illness, and Gilgamesh is forced to come to terms with his own mortality. Unable to assimilate the consequences of warfare, he turns his back on civilization, roaming unshaven through the wilderness and even descending into the underworld to find an antidote to death. Finally, weary but resigned, he is forced to accept the limitations of his humanity and return to Uruk. On reaching the suburbs, he draws his companion’s attention to the great wall surrounding the city: “Observe the land it encloses, the palm trees, the gardens, the orchards, the glorious palaces and temples, the shops and market-places, the houses, the public squares.” 49 He personally will die, but he will achieve an immortality of sorts by cultivating the civilized arts and pleasures that are enabling humans to explore new dimensions of existence. Gilgamesh’s famous wall was now essential for the survival of Uruk, though, because after centuries of peaceful cooperation, the Sumerian city-states had begun to fight one another. What caused this tragic development? Not everybody in the Middle East aspired to civilization: nomadic herdsmen preferred to roam freely in the mountains with their livestock. They had once been part of the agricultural community, living at the edge of the farmland so that their sheep and cattle did not damage the crops. But gradually they moved farther and farther away until they finally abandoned the constraints of settled life and took to the open road. 50 The pastoralists of the Middle East had probably become an entirely separate community as early as 6000 BCE, though they continued to trade their hides and milk products with the cities in return for grain. 51 They soon discovered that the easiest way to replace lost animals was to steal the cattle of nearby villages and rival tribes. Fighting, therefore, became essential to the pastoralist economy. Once they domesticated the horse and acquired wheeled vehicles, these herdsmen spread all over the Inner Asian Plateau, and by the early third millennium, some had reached China. 52 By this time they were formidable warriors, equipped with bronze weaponry, war chariots, and the deadly composite bow, which could shoot with devastating accuracy at long range. 53 The pastoralists who settled in the Caucasian steppes of southern Russia in about 4500 BCE shared a common culture.

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  [510] Cf. Aristotle's Nichomachæan Ethics, VII. 3; also a discussion of the doctrine of 'The Practical Syllogism' in Sir A. Grant's edition of this work, 2d ed. vol. I. p. 212 ff.[511] The Duality of the Mind, pp. 141-2. Another case from the same book (p 123): "A gentleman of respectable birth, excellent education, and ample fortune, engaged in one of the highest departments of trade, . . . and being induced to embark in one of the plausible speculations of the day . . . was utterly ruined. Like other men he could bear a sudden overwhelming reverse better than a long succession of petty misfortunes, and the way in which he conducted himself on the occasion met with unbounded admiration from his friends. He withdrew, however, into rigid seclusion, and being no longer able to exercise the generosity and indulge the benevolent feelings which had formed the happiness of his life, made himself a substitute for them by daydreams, gradually fell into a state of irritable despondency, from which he only gradually recovered with the loss of reason. He now fancied himself possessed of immense wealth, and gave without stint his imaginary riches. He has ever since been under gentle restraint, and leads a life not merely of happiness, but of bliss; converses rationally, reads the newspapers, where every tale of distress attracts his notice, and being furnished with an abundant supply of blank checks, he fills up one of them with a munificent sum, sends it off to the sufferer, and sits down to his dinner with a happy conviction that he has earned the right to a little indulgence in the pleasures of the table; and yet, on a serious conversation with one of his old friends, he is quite conscious of his real position, but the conviction is so exquisitely painful that he will not let himself believe it."[512] 'Le Sentiment de l'Effort, et la Conscience de l'Action,' in Revue Philosophique, XXVIII. 561.[513] P. 577.[514] They will be found indicated, in somewhat popular form, in a lecture on 'The Dilemma of Determinism,' published in the Unitarian Review (of Boston) for September 1884 (vol. XXII. p. 193).[515] See Grundtatsachen des Seelenlebens, pp. 594-5; and compare the conclusion of our own chapter on Attention, Vol. I. pp. 448-454.[516] Thus at least I interpret Prof. Lipps' words: "Wir wissen us naturgemass in jedem Streben umsomehr aktiv, je mehr unser ganzes Ich bei dem Streben betheiligt ist," u. s. w. (p. 601).[517] Such ejaculations as Mr. Spencer's: "Psychical changes either conform to law or they do not. If they do not, this work, in common with all works on the subject, is sheer nonsense: no science of Psychology is possible" (Principles of Psychology, I. 503), —are beneath criticism. Mr. Spencer's work, like all the other 'works on the subject,' treats of those general conditions of possible conduct within which all our real decisions must fall no matter whether their effort be small or great.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  With Conradin the male line of the Hohenstaufen became extinct. Its tragic end was enacted on the soil which had always been so fatal to the German rulers. Barbarossa again and again met defeat there; and in Southern Italy Henry VI., Frederick II., Conrad, Manfred, and Conradin were all laid in premature graves. At Conradin’s burial Charles accorded military honors, but not religious rites. The Roman crozier had triumphed over the German eagle. The Swabian hill, on which the proud castle of the Hohenstaufen once stood, looks down in solemn silence upon the peaceful fields of Württemberg and preaches the eloquent sermon that "all flesh is as grass and all the glory of man is as the flower of grass." The colossal claims of the papacy survived the blows struck again and again by this imperial family, through a century. Italy had been exposed for three generations and more to the sword, rapine, and urban strife. Europe was weary of the conflict. The German minnesingers and the chroniclers of England and the Continent were giving expression to the deep unrest. Partly as a result of the distraction bordering on anarchy, the Mongols were threatening to burst through the gates of Eastern Germany. It was an eventful time. Antioch, one of the last relics of the Crusaders in Asia Minor, fell back to the Mohammedans in 1268. Seven years earlier the Latin empire of Constantinople finally reverted to its rightful owners, the Greeks. In the mighty duel which has been called by the last great Roman historian283 the grandest spectacle of the ages, the empire had been humbled to the dust. But ideas survive, and the principle of the sovereign right of the civil power within its own sphere has won its way in one form or another among European peoples and their descendants. And the fate of young Conradin was not forgotten. Three centuries later it played its part in the memories of the German nation, and through the pictures of his execution distributed in Martin Luther’s writings contributed to strengthen the hand of the Protestant Reformer in his struggle with the papacy, which did not fail. § 46. The Empire and Papacy at Peace. 1271–1294. Popes.—Gregory X., 1271–1276; Innocent V., Jan. 21-June 22, 1276; Adrian V., July 12-Aug. 16, 1276; John XXI., 1276–1277; Nicolas III., 1277–1280; Martin IV., 1281–1285; Honorius IV., 1285–1287; Nicolas IV., 1288–1292; Coelestin V., July 5-Dec. 13, 1294.

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  “That was my problem when I married Hugo.” The sadness in her voice made it even more melodic. “I was twenty. He was twenty-four. And neither of us had had any experience with sex. I was much too shy to tell him how to please me, so he couldn’t learn.” She must have seen the shock on my face because she quickly added, touching my hand, “This is entre nous. Do you know that term?” “Between us only. Yes.” “For the first two years of our marriage, I remained a virgin, because he was so afraid of hurting me. Then we went to a doctor who talked to Hugo, and after that he was able to penetrate me. It did hurt, though, because he was too large for me.” I tried not to show my fear and repugnance, but it was no use. “Don’t be afraid. It is unusual; and even so, if he had known how to prepare a woman so that her juices made her ready, it would not have been so much a problem. But he had developed bad habits during the time that we both thought only of his pleasure.” “But that must have changed,” I said shyly, “because I saw how much in love you are. I’ve never seen a married couple so much in love.” Her eyes shifted towards the entry hall but then returned to me. She touched my hand again, a sign that she was about to give me a piece of wisdom. “It is important that you choose the men in your life carefully so the father wound is not deepened. It’s important that you choose as your first lover a man who is receptive and interested in your pleasure as well as his own, a man to whom you can tell what you want and what you don’t want.” “But I don’t really know if Jean-Jacques is …” “I’m afraid I can’t tell you how he is as a lover.” “No!” I blushed. “I wasn’t going to ask that. I meant to say I don’t know if he’s really interested in me. I don’t know anything about him, if he’s married or has a girlfriend.” “He probably has one of each in France. He comes from a wealthy old Parisian family. But he’s a black sheep because he’s an artist of sorts. He puts on ‘happenings’ in Paris. Have you heard of them?” I shook my head. “Happenings are a kind of street theater but without a script. The actors are not actors, just people he randomly chooses. They improvise their lines and business the day he phones them and tells them a location where to meet.” She saw my smile and said, “You see? He’s playful, and that’s what you want in a lover.” We fell silent when Millie appeared on the balcony. She set down a sliced apple and some moldy cheese and announced that she was leaving for the day.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  She got up. No good in trying to sleep, those eternal questions kept stifling, tormenting. Dressing quickly she stole down the wide, shallow stairs to the garden door, then out into the garden. The garden looked unfamiliar in the sunrise, like a well-known face that is suddenly transfigured. There was something aloof and awesome about it, as though it were lost in ecstatic devotion. She tried to tread softly for she felt apologetic, she and her troubles were there as intruders; their presence disturbed this strange hush of communion, this oneness with something beyond their knowledge, that was yet known and loved by the soul of the garden. A mysterious and wonderful thing this oneness, pregnant with comfort could she know its true meaning—she felt this somewhere deep down in herself, but try as she would her mind could not grasp it; perhaps even the garden was shutting her out of its prayers, because she had sent away Martin. Then a thrush began to sing in the cedar, and his song was full of wild jubilation: ‘Stephen, look at me, look at me!’ sang the thrush, ‘I’m happy, happy, it’s all very simple!’ There was something heartless about that singing which only served to remind her of Martin. She walked on disconsolate, thinking deeply. He had gone, he would soon be back in his forests—she had made no effort to keep him beside her because he had wanted to be her lover. . . . ‘Stephen, look at us, look at us!’ sang the birds, ‘We’re happy, happy, it’s all very simple!’ Martin walking in dim, green places—she could picture his life away in the forests, a man’s life, good with the goodness of danger, a primitive, strong, imperative thing—a man’s life, the life that should have been hers—And her eyes filled with heavy, regretful tears, yet she did not quite know for what she was weeping. She only knew that some great sense of loss, some great sense of incompleteness possessed her, and she let the tears trickle down her face, wiping them off one by one with her finger.

• From A Way of Being (1980)

  3. NANCY MOURNS While it is fresh in my feelings, I want to write about an incident that occurred recently in a large workshop. It was a seventeen-day workshop consisting of seventy very diverse people, focused on cognitive and experiential learning. All had been in encounter groups for six sessions in the first six days. There had been special-interest topical groups and almost daily meetings of all seventy people. These community meetings had become deeper and more trusting. This episode occurred on the eighth day in a morning community meeting. The Episode (This portion is written in the third person because it is the product of several people. I prepared a first draft, then showed it to the major participants, each of whom corrected or rewrote the portion describing his or her own feelings and behavior to make it conform to his or her perception of reality. Consequently, I believe the account is as accurate a picture as can be obtained. All names are disguised except those of my daughter Natalie and my own.) The group had been discussing, with great sensitivity and listening to all points of view, the issue raised by the fact that some people had brought visitors to the community sessions. Nancy had been one of these people, having brought her husband to the previous meeting, but she was not present this morning. A consensus was finally reached that in the future (without criticizing any person up to this point), anyone thinking of bringing a visitor should first raise the question with the community. The group passed on to another issue. At this point Nancy arrived, very late. Ralph, trying to be helpful, quickly described to her the conclusion we had reached. None of us gave Nancy the opportunity to respond, though evidently she tried. The group went on in its discussion. After a few moments, someone sitting close to Nancy called attention to the fact that she was shaking and crying, and the community immediately gave her space for her feelings. At first it seemed that she felt criticized, but Maria gave her a more complete description of what had gone on, and she seemed to accept that she was not being blamed or criticized. But still she was trembling, and was very upset because she felt she had been cut off. It was not the first time, she said; she had felt cut off before. Encouraged to say more, she turned to Natalie, Carl’s daughter, and said, “I’ve felt you as very