Heightening Quotes & Sayings

From the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire, let freedom ring. From the mighty mountains of New York, let freedom ring. From the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania, let freedom ring. But not only that: Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. — Martin Luther King Jr.

Her hands continued their burning climb up my arm and onto my chest. Bold moves for her. Echo's breasts rose and fell at a faster rate. "I want to stay with you tonight."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
Tender hands move into my hair, guiding my head to hers. I inhaled her delicious, warm scent: cinnamon rolls, straight out of the oven. The first taste of her lips didn't disappoint. Sweet sugar teased my tongue, heightening my awareness of the gift Echo offered to me.
This girl owned my soul and stole my heart. She'd opened her self to me, giving me love and never asked anything in return. I deepened our kiss, the words i love you stuck in my mind. — Katie McGarry

She was kahuna, creating more life around her than was actually there, heightening the momentousness of each living thing by simply gazing upon it. — Kiana Davenport

This sort of adoration of the real is but a heightening of the beau ideal. — Lord Byron

As though sensing her heightening alarm, Pinfeathers halted his advance.
"I can't help it that I'm susceptible to you," he whispered. "You know that. It's just that you're so ... unreal ... and so I have to touch you. If only to be certain that I'm not the one who's dreaming. You see, I hear that sort of thing is going around. — Kelly Creagh

In Gnosticism, the way of salvation lies in heightening consciousness and returning to the transcendent spirit, with loss of the unconscious side; whereas uroboric salvation through the Great Mother demands the abandonment of the conscious principle and a homecoming to the unconscious. — Erich Neumann

Think of my movies as heightening our awareness, not confusing the difference between truth and fiction, but heightening our awareness of how confused we can become about what is real. — Errol Morris

Men of superior vivacity and wit, when they take a wrong turn, are generally worse than other men: because wit, consisting in a lively representation of ideas assembled together, gives every sensible object those heightening touches, and that striking imagery, which is unknown to men of slower apprehensions: wit being to sensible objects, what light is to bodies; it does not merely show them as they are in themselves: it gives an adventitious colour, which is not a property inherent in them: it lends them beauties which are not their own. — Jeremiah Seed

Made up of the glories of the most precious gems, to describe them is a matter of inexpressible difficulty. For there is amongst them the gentler fire of the ruby, there is the rich purple of the amethyst, there is the sea-green of the emerald, and all shining together in an indescribable union. Others, by an excessive heightening of their hues equal all the colours of the painter, others the flame of burning brimstone, or of a fire quickened by oil. — Pliny The Elder

The price we pay for our advance in civilization is a loss of happiness through the heightening of the sense of guilt. — Sigmund Freud

Love is something difficult and it is more difficult than other things because in other conflicts nature herself enjoins men to collect themselves, to take themselves firmly in the hand with all their strength, while in the heightening of love the impulse is to give oneself wholly away. — Rainer Maria Rilke

Barrage of delectable sensations within her loins. Her whole being awakened to a heightening excitement as his tongue slowly traced around the delicately hued areola, and still she watched as if nothing more than a distant — Kathleen E. Woodiwiss

The disappointments of life can never, any more than its pleasures, be estimated singly; and the healthiest and most agreeable of men is exposed to that coincidence of various vexations, each heightening the effect of the other, which may produce in him something corresponding to the spontaneous and externally unaccountable moodiness of the morbid and disagreeable. — George Eliot

She came naked behind him as the soft melancholy yearning of the song filled the dark. Her hand stroked his hair, gathered it tight at the nape of his neck. She swayed, and he felt her press against his back, her breasts soft now, yielding and warm through his shirt, her breath tickling his ear. Her hand rested on his shoulder briefly, then slid down inside his shirt, fingers cool on his chest. He could feel the warm hard metal of her ring on his skin, and felt a surge of possession that pulsed through him like a gulp of whisky, a heat suffusing his flesh. He ached to turn and take hold of her, but pushed the urge down, heightening anticipation. He bent his head closer to the strings, and sang until all thought left him and there was nothing left but his body and hers. He could not have said when her hand closed over his on the frets, and he rose and turned to her, still filled with the music and his love, soft and strong and pure in the dark. — Diana Gabaldon

Revenge tries to solve the problem of vulnerability. If I strike back, I transfer vulnerability from myself to the other. And yet by striking back I produce a world in which my vulnerability to injury is increased by the likelihood of another strike. So it seems as if I'm getting rid of my vulnerability and instead locating it with the other, but actually I'm heightening the vulnerability of everyone and I'm heightening the possibility of violence that happens between us. — Judith Butler

Whenever a prophet got into the superconscious state by heightening his emotional nature, he brought away from it not only some truths, but some fanaticism also, some superstition which injured the world as much as the greatness of the teaching helped. To get any reason out of the mass of incongruity we call human life, we have to transcend our reason, but we must do it scientifically, slowly, by regular practice, and we must cast off all superstition. We must take up the study of the superconscious state just as any other science. On reason we must have to lay our foundation, we must follow reason as far as it leads, and when reason fails, reason itself will show us the way to the highest plane. — Swami Vivekananda

Everyone sort of sees his own life and times as being ephemeral. One thinks that everything good or important that happened, happened in the past. But I think that seeing scenes that you are used to, but with the heightening effects of poetry, perhaps makes you value your life and times more than you might otherwise do. — Vikram Seth

I want to mark him permanently, brand him as mine. I grab my ankles to keep from grabbing him, digging my short, blunt nails into my flesh, the pain heightening my pleasure. — Cynthia Sax

Integration proceeds by just the opposite route: a deliberate heightening of every organic function; a release of impulses from circumstances that irrationally thwarted them; richer and more complex patterns of activity; an esthetic heightening of anticipated realizations; a steady lengthening of the future; a faith in cosmic perspectives. — Lewis Mumford

We're all not exactly the same person online that we are in real life. I am not as happy as my Instagram makes me look. We are all heightening the positives and downplaying the negatives. — Kim Stolz

Fine old Christmas, with the snowy hair and ruddy face, had done his duty that year in the noblest fashion, and had set off his rich gifts of warmth and color with all the heightening contrast of frost and snow. — George Eliot

You and I are faced with one of those situations (which fortunately are not very numerous in one lifetime) which cannot possibly be adequately judged beforehand. It strikes me as a colossal gamble, or rather, a very great adventure. And personally I am considerably exhilarated by the risks! ... The greatness of the adventure perhaps consists partly in the fact that as a Catholic I can marry only once! But, as with being born, perhaps once is quite sufficient! In the Church, you know, there is a great heightening of every moment of experience, since every moment is played against a supernatural backdrop. Nothing can be humdrum in this scheme. — Marshall McLuhan

Style ... is a peculiar recasting and heightening, under a certain condition of spiritual excitement, of what a man has to say, in such a manner as to add dignity and distinction to it. — Matthew Arnold

I want to connect music to its highest power - which is heightening consciousness and affecting people's reality. That can't be done in normal ways, not according to my experience. — Saul Williams

As Nancy Frey writes of the long-distance pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in Spain, 'When pilgrims begin to walk several things usually begin to happen to their perceptions of the world which continue over the course of the journey: they develop a changing sense of time, a heightening of the senses, and a new awareness of their bodies and the landscape ... A young German man expressed it this way: 'In the experience of walking, each step is a thought. You can't escape yourself. — Rebecca Solnit

Fantasy is not antirational, but pararational; not realistic but surrealistic, a heightening of reality. In Freud's terminology, it employs primary not secondary process thinking. It employs archetypes which, as Jung warned us, are dangerous things. Fantasy is nearer to poetry, to mysticism, and to insanity than naturalistic fiction is. It is a wilderness, and those who go there should not feel too safe. — Ursula K. Le Guin

Jammed together at lunch. Not a drinker, nevertheless I experience a distinct alteration of consciousness in the presence of others - socially, but even in the classroom or seminar - a heightening, livening, intensifying sensation - a kind of euphoria. (Would the drinkers attain the same heights, without drinking? But they never make the experiment.) The process is deceptive: one feels oneself fulfilled, with these shreds and bits of other people, but at the same time one is being drained. — Joyce Carol Oates

I like being around people who are good conversationalists, when there's a give and take, and you are heightening an idea, exploring it together, that is my favorite thing in the world. — Paul F. Tompkins

Oh, the way he was looking at her, really looking at her . . . this was the Christopher of her dreams. This was the man who had written to her. He was so caring, and real, and dazzling, that she wanted to weep.

"I thought . . ." Christopher broke off and drew his thumb over the hot surface of her cheek.

"I know," she whispered, her nerves sparking in excitement at his touch.

"I didn't mean to do that."

"I know."

His gaze went to her parted lips, lingering until she felt it like a caress. Her heart labored to supply blood to her nerveless limbs. Every breath caused her body to lift up against his, a teasing friction of firm flesh and clean, warm linen.

Beatrix was transfixed by the subtle changes in his face, the heightening color, the silver brightness of his eyes.

She wondered if he were going to kiss her.

And a single word flashed through her mind.

Please. . . — Lisa Kleypas

An awkward consequence of heightening experience when one is inexperienced, of self-transcendence when one has not much world to lose, is that afterward one cannot be sure that one was somewhere or had newly experienced anything. If you aren't much in the world, how do you know you are "out of this world"? — Paul Goodman

You tend to think that your time is either the best or the worst, and then when you have a sense of history, you'll realize actually, no, there were times things were quite gusty in the world. I mean, just think, nowadays most people will say they support the advancement of women, woman has been equal, the fact that we're so aware of the gustiness, in a sense, also speaks about the heightening of our own sensitivity. — Desmond Tutu

In addition to giving comfort and joy, art also has the miraculous ability to let us live in other men's skins, to test our perceptions and beliefs against theirs, and perhaps to be changed as a result. It does this by portraying the world creatively, heightening our perception and enriching our understanding of things as they are. — Terry Teachout

Humid the air! Leafless, yet soft as spring. The tender purple spray on copse and briers! And that sweet city with her dreaming spires, she needs not June for beauty's heightening. Lovely all the time she lies ... — Matthew Arnold

The value of art lies in its power to increase our moral force or establish its heightening influence. — Odilon Redon

Mrs. Dashwood remained at Norland several months; not from any disinclination to move when the sight of every well known spot ceased to raise the violent emotion which it produced for a while; for when her spirits began to revive, and her mind became capable of some other exertion than that of heightening its affliction by melancholy remembrances, she was impatient to be gone, and indefatigable in her inquiries for a suitable dwelling in the neighbourhood of Norland; for to remove far from that beloved spot was impossible. But she could hear of no situation that at once answered her notions of comfort and ease, and suited the prudence of her eldest daughter, whose steadier judgment rejected several houses as too large for their income, which her mother would have approved. — Jane Austen

A poem compresses much in a small space and adds music, thus heightening its meaning. — E.B. White

And that sweet city with her dreaming spires,
She needs not June for beauty's heightening ... — Matthew Arnold

Writing about oneself is an egotistical adventure unless the act of self-exploration revolves around the distinct goal of heightening a person's cache of knowledge, ideas, and level of self-awareness. — Kilroy J. Oldster

Whatever variety evolution brings forth ... Every new dimension of world-response ... means another modality for God's trying out his hidden essence and discovering himself through the surprises of world-adventure ... the heightening pitch and passion of life that go with the twin rise of perception and motility in animals. The ever more sharpened keenness of appetite and fear, pleasure and pain, triumph and anguish, love and even cruelty - their very edge is the deity's gain. Their countless, yet never blunted incidence - hence the necessity of death and new birth - supplies the tempered essence from which the Godhead reconstitutes itself. All this, evolution provides in the mere lavishness of its play and sternness of its spur. Its creatures, by merely fulfilling themselves in pursuit of their lives, vindicate the divine venture. Even their suffering deepens the fullness of the symphony. Thus, this side of good and evil, God cannot lose in the great evolutionary game. — Hans Jonas

Penology ... has become torture and foolishness, a waste of money and a cause of crime ... a blotting out of sight and heightening of social anxiety. — Paul Goodman

Do you feel it? It's a heightening of the senses, the kind that immobilizes a cat crossing the street, transfixed by the blinding headlights of a speeding car. You know you have to head for cover, run as far and as fast as your legs can carry you. But you can't. You just have to know what's coming - even if it kills you. — Psyche Roxas-Mendoza

Patience is the specific antidote to anger and hatred. It is an attitude of accepting both the harm caused by others and the pains and discomforts found in life instead of angrily retaliating against them. Only in the calm afforded by patient acceptance is one able to clearly discern the nature of the situation and proceed to deal with it realistically. Once the mind becomes distorted and disturbed with anger, any possibility of objectivity is lost. One consequently embarks upon a course of action grounded in misconception that inevitably leads to a heightening of the initial conflict rather than its resolution. — Stephen Batchelor