Famous Quotes & Sayings

Integral Part Quotes & Sayings

Enjoy reading and share 100 famous quotes about Integral Part with everyone.

Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Google+ Pinterest Share on Linkedin

Top Integral Part Quotes

Integral Part Quotes By Ernest Cline

My generation had never known a world without the OASIS. To us, it was much more than a game or an entertainment platform. It had been an integral part of our lives for as far back as we could remember. We'd been born into an ugly world, and the OASIS was our one happy refuge. — Ernest Cline

Integral Part Quotes By Jerzy Vetulani

Creativity is an integral part of our personality. — Jerzy Vetulani

Integral Part Quotes By Brad Lomenick

Leaders often assume to their own peril that spirituality/faith is a good but separate part of their lives. Faith is less like your arm and more like your heart. It is not supplementary to who we are but integral. As such, you should work to keep it in good health. — Brad Lomenick

Integral Part Quotes By Zayn Malik

One Direction was an incredible experience in its own right, and it's a part of me, an integral part of my history, and I'm never going to deny that aspect of my life. — Zayn Malik

Integral Part Quotes By Jon Cryer

I grew up loving TV so much. It was such an integral part of my youth, and I was completely an Emmy geek. — Jon Cryer

Integral Part Quotes By Erich Fromm

As long as one was an integral part of that world, unaware of the possibilities and responsibilities of individual action, one did not need to be afraid of it. When one has become an individual , one stands alone and faces the world in all its perilous and overpowering aspects. — Erich Fromm

Integral Part Quotes By Frank Jordan

Our extended family is an integral part of our daily lives and Connie and I welcome you with open arms. — Frank Jordan

Integral Part Quotes By Verna Van Schaik

but in today's world with women's rights and equality being such an integral part of life I think it is an important observation, because when I look around me for a role model of a woman who has succeeded as a woman, all I see are women who are clones of the men. I can't help but wonder what will happen one day when women start playing by their own rules. — Verna Van Schaik

Integral Part Quotes By Wogu Donald

Creativity is an integral part of existence and it emanates from the mind. — Wogu Donald

Integral Part Quotes By BikeSnobNYC

A typical city dog is neutered and doesn't have much interest in reproducing. However, that's not true of its owner, who will use the dog as an integral part of the pickup process. (Humans are the only animals that use other animals to facilitate mating. Have you ever seen a monkey use a squirrel to pick up another monkey?) — BikeSnobNYC

Integral Part Quotes By Dan Lipinski

In the Gulf region and nationwide, small businesses are an integral and crucial part of local economies and communities. They should not be overlooked. — Dan Lipinski

Integral Part Quotes By James Hal Cone

Testimony is an integral part of the Black religious tradition. It is the occasion where the believer stands before the community of faith in order to give account of the hope that is in him or her. — James Hal Cone

Integral Part Quotes By Judith Wynn Halsted

Mature readers consider reading an integral part of life. It is not something they do only to relax or to escape or if there is nothing good on television. It is something they plan for in each day, and if the day develops so that they have no time for it, they may become restless, rather like joggers who miss their run. Some - busy parents, for example - stay up late at night to read their daily quota after the house is quiet, acknowledging that having balance in their lives is more dependent on reading time than on sleep. — Judith Wynn Halsted

Integral Part Quotes By Michel Callon

By saying that someone becomes the owner of something, we are referring to a market transaction, while by saying that something is a good belonging to someone, we emphasize the fact that it has been incorporated into the world of someone, of which it has become an integral part. — Michel Callon

Integral Part Quotes By Parker J. Palmer

Wholeness does not mean perfection; it means embracing brokenness as an integral part of life — Parker J. Palmer

Integral Part Quotes By Louis Jenkins

Some objects seem to disappear immediately while others never want to leave. Here is a small black plastic gizmo with a serious demeanor that turns up regularly, like a politician at public functions. It seems to be an "integral part," a kind of switch with screw holes so that it can be attached to something larger. Nobody knows what. This thing's use has been forgotten but it looks so important that no one is willing to throw it in the trash. It survives by bluff, like certain insects that escape being eaten because of their formidable appearance. — Louis Jenkins

Integral Part Quotes By Matthew Syed

Psychologists often make a distinction between mistakes where we already know the right answer and mistakes where we don't. A medication error, for example, is a mistake of the former kind: the nurse knew she should have administered Medicine A but inadvertently administered Medicine B, perhaps because of confusing labeling combined with pressure of time. But sometimes mistakes are consciously made as part of a process of discovery. Drug companies test lots of different combinations of chemicals to see which have efficacy and which don't. Nobody knows in advance which will work and which won't, but this is precisely why they test extensively, and fail often. It is integral to progress. — Matthew Syed

Integral Part Quotes By Anna Bayes

I know logically that I can live without him, but loving him has become such an integral, necessary part of my life; I am not sure I could stop, even if we parted. — Anna Bayes

Integral Part Quotes By Brian Aldiss

I am a writer and always was; being a writer is an integral part of my identity. Being published, being well regarded, is a component of that identity. — Brian Aldiss

Integral Part Quotes By Murali Murthy

The quest for self improvement and personal growth is now an integral part of my life. I'm always looking for ways to increase my capacity to grow, develop and achieve more.
And that means, I'm willing to read, observe, listen, discuss, research and do whatever it takes to become a better improved me. I hope you are too. — Murali Murthy

Integral Part Quotes By Janet Mock

What I want people to realize is that "transitioning" is not the end of the journey. Yes, it's an integral part of revealing who we are to ourselves and the world, but there's much life afterward. These stories earn us visibility but fail at reporting on what our lives are like beyond our bodies, hormones, surgeries, birth names, and before-and-after photos. — Janet Mock

Integral Part Quotes By Oliver Sacks

When writing my Leg book, I drew heavily on the detailed journals I had kept as a patient in 1974. Oaxaca Journal, too, relied heavily on my handwritten notebooks. But for the most part, I rarely look at the journals I have kept for the greater part of a lifetime. The act of writing is itself enough; it serves to clarify my thoughts and feelings. The act of writing is an integral part of my mental life; ideas emerge, are shaped, in the act of writing. — Oliver Sacks

Integral Part Quotes By Penelope Mitchell

Even though I was manically overachieving and involved in everything, I still never felt like I belonged. That's definitely affected my whole life and why I wanted to become an actor and tell people stories, because communication and feeling like you belong is such an integral part of our social fabric. — Penelope Mitchell

Integral Part Quotes By Susan Jacoby

I'm not saying that I think atheists are better than other people. God, no. What I am saying is I do feel that this an integral part of who I am. And it's not something that I could comfortably think of not sharing with the person I loved most in the world. — Susan Jacoby

Integral Part Quotes By Rowan Williams

Christian teaching about sex is not a set of isolated prohibitions; it is an integral part of what the Bible has to say about living in such a way that our lives communicate the character of God. — Rowan Williams

Integral Part Quotes By Alister E. McGrath

The burdens of taxation, the lack of due representation, and the desire for freedom were unquestionably integral ingredients in the accumulation of grievances that drove many colonials to take up arms against the king.22 Yet religious issues also played their part, not least in intensifying a sense of injustice over the privileged status of the Church of England in the British colonies.23 — Alister E. McGrath

Integral Part Quotes By George W. Bush

I pray daily, and I pray in all kinds of places. I mean, I pray in bed, I pray in the Oval Office. I pray a lot. And just different as the spirit moves me. And faith is an integral part of my life. — George W. Bush

Integral Part Quotes By Jerry Bridges

Does no good to nail an unattached branch to the vine; there is no life-giving connection. But those branches that are an integral part of the vine share in the life of the vine. — Jerry Bridges

Integral Part Quotes By C.S. Lewis

Bereavement is a universal and integral part of our experience of love. — C.S. Lewis

Integral Part Quotes By J.D. Stroube

Even knowing that my presence brought a shadow over the lives of my loved ones, I can't regret the experiences I've had with them. They gave me life, becoming an integral part of my soul. They healed me when I was broken and somehow they recovered those parts of me, I thought lost forever. — J.D. Stroube

Integral Part Quotes By Ahmet Necdet Sezner

We shouldn't waste any more time in making sure that democracy is properly rooted in our political life and the supremacy of the law becomes an integral part of our state's structure. — Ahmet Necdet Sezner

Integral Part Quotes By Bette Davis

Temperament is something that is an integral part of the artist. Not temper, temperament. There is a vast difference. — Bette Davis

Integral Part Quotes By Guy Clark

Chris is the engineer down at the studio where we do these things. And he's just such an integral part and he has such a marvelous ear. Also it turns out, we didn't know, but he's a pretty good fiddle player. — Guy Clark

Integral Part Quotes By George Saunders

In a culture that is becoming ever more story-stupid, in which a representative of the Coca-Cola company can, with a straight face, pronounce, as he donates a collection of archival Coca-Cola commercials to the Library of Congress, that 'Coca-Cola has become an integral part of people's lives by helping to tell these stories,' it is perhaps not surprising that people have trouble teaching and receiving a novel as complex and flawed as Huck Finn, but it is even more urgent that we learn to look passionately and technically at stories, if only to protect ourselves from the false and manipulative ones being circulated among us. — George Saunders

Integral Part Quotes By Arthur Schopenhauer

It may sometimes happen that a truth, an insight, which you have slowly and laboriously puzzled out by thinking for yourself could have easily have been found already written in a book: but it is a hundred times more valuable if you have arrived at it by thinking for yourself. For only then will it enter your thought system as an integral part and living member, be perfectly and firmly consistent with it and in accord with all its other consequences and conclusions, bear the hue, colour and stamp of your whole manner of thinking, and have arrived at just the moment it was needed ; thus it will stay firmly and forever lodged in your mind. — Arthur Schopenhauer

Integral Part Quotes By Roland Joffe

Music is a very integral part of the film, but it will not be as full of music as a Bollywood film. — Roland Joffe

Integral Part Quotes By Hank Stram

The receivers are an integral part of the passing game. — Hank Stram

Integral Part Quotes By Wole Soyinka

I grew up in an atmosphere where words were an integral part of culture. — Wole Soyinka

Integral Part Quotes By Julian Huxley

By speech first, but far more by writing, man has been able to put something of himself beyond death. In tradition and in books an integral part of the individual persists, for it can influence the minds and actions of other people in different places and at different times: a row of black marks on a page can move a man to tears, though the bones of him that wrote it are long ago crumbled to dust. In truth, the whole progress of civilization is based upon this power. — Julian Huxley

Integral Part Quotes By Norton A. Schwartz

The enduring responsibility of the United States Air Force is to provide strategic deterrence for the Nation and fly, fight and win as an integral part of the Joint Team. Together with our brothers and sisters in arms, we underwrite the national strategy of defending the Homeland and assuring allies, while dissuading, deterring and defeating enemies. — Norton A. Schwartz

Integral Part Quotes By Arianna Huffington

My mother was a continual source of wisdom and great advice ... she taught me that there is always a way around a problem-you've just got to find it. Keep trying doors; one will eventually open. She also taught me to accept failure as part and parcel of life. It's not the opposite of success; it's an integral part of success.
I talk a lot about learning to become fearless in your approach to life. But fearlessness is not the absence of fear. It's the mastery of fear. It's all about getting up one more time than you fall down. — Arianna Huffington

Integral Part Quotes By Mark Hyman, M.D.

Glutathione is also the most critical and integral part of your detoxification system. All the toxins stick onto glutathione, which then carries them into the bile and the stool - and out of your body. — Mark Hyman, M.D.

Integral Part Quotes By Gordon Smith

Broadcasting's best days lie ahead as both an engine of local economies and as an integral part of tomorrow's technological world. — Gordon Smith

Integral Part Quotes By S.A. Tawks

Band together with the brothers and sisters of misery and never stray. You are the integral part of the deeply depressed. We found you. Hooray. — S.A. Tawks

Integral Part Quotes By Khloe Kardashian

Messaging is such an integral part of our lives, and Begroupd will help solve problems everyone can relate to. — Khloe Kardashian

Integral Part Quotes By Mike Vallely

They told me I'd have to be there for the entire shooting of the movie which was two and a half months and again, I was surprised. Most movies I'd worked on before took only a day or so, so I realized this was a pretty big deal. I got to the set and was involved in a very integral way, which was a fun experience to be a part of. — Mike Vallely

Integral Part Quotes By Natalie Dormer

I love my camera crews on all my jobs. It's the half of the job that the audience never gets to see. They're integral. They're as much a part of making a movie or television show as I am. — Natalie Dormer

Integral Part Quotes By Pope Francis

For her part, the Church always works for the integral development of every person. In this sense, she reiterates that the common good should not be simply an extra, simply a conceptual scheme of inferior quality tacked onto political programmes. The Church encourages those in power to be truly at the service of the common good of their peoples. — Pope Francis

Integral Part Quotes By Tiffany Shlain

The 10th Annual Webby Awards represent an extraordinary opportunity to celebrate the evolution of the web from an esoteric medium to the driving force shaping popular culture, business, and society today, .. As the web enters its second decade as an integral part of everyday life, our expanded categories recognize those who are pushing the web in exciting new directions. — Tiffany Shlain

Integral Part Quotes By Kilroy J. Oldster

The transience of humanity frames the tragedy of all people. There are no happy conclusions to life, we all die, and until we die, we will experience both happiness and pain. Acceptance of the tragedy of humankind without remorse is a shattering experience; it enables us to relinquish mawkish misconceptions, destructive obsessions, and crippling attachments. Only by accepting the tragedy of life as an integral part of the incandescent beauty of life, will I understand what it means to rejoice in the indelible bloom of life. — Kilroy J. Oldster

Integral Part Quotes By Helene Cixous

In woman, personal history blends together with the history of all women, as well as national and world history. As a militant, she is an integral part of all liberations. — Helene Cixous

Integral Part Quotes By Ron Wyden

The Internet has become an integral part of everyday life precisely because it has been an open-to-all land of opportunity where entrepreneurs, thinkers and innovators are free to try, fail and then try again. — Ron Wyden

Integral Part Quotes By Moby

As people continue to do more and buy more over the Internet, continue to meet people over the Internet, connection speeds are going to get faster, and the Internet is just going to become an even more integral part of people's lives. — Moby

Integral Part Quotes By David Bowie

I suspect that dreams are an integral part of existence, with far more use for us than we've made of them ... The fine line between the dream state and reality is at times, for me, quite grey. — David Bowie

Integral Part Quotes By Esther M. Sternberg

The notion of feelings as an integral part of illness is universal - not only across continents and peoples, but across the divide of time that separates us from our ancestors. — Esther M. Sternberg

Integral Part Quotes By Milan Kundera

No matter how much we scorn it, kitsch is an integral part of the human condition. — Milan Kundera

Integral Part Quotes By Sebastian Coe

Sport was an integral part of school life. The most influential teachers were not necessarily the PE teachers, but the teachers who helped me in sport because they had an understanding of what you were going through. — Sebastian Coe

Integral Part Quotes By Edward S. Herman

The immiseration of the majority is an integral part of the Free World package for the Third World, the unsavory aspects of the package - the terror, the direct spoilation of people and resources, and western complicity - must be rationalized and, as far as possible, kept under the rug. — Edward S. Herman

Integral Part Quotes By Brian Mulroney

We decided that the environment was an integral part of our policies and the political thrust of our government. We gave it the priority and we sustained it with the money required to make it happen. — Brian Mulroney

Integral Part Quotes By Robert De Niro

Everyone's always interested in a dark theme, especially when there's humor connected to it. It seems like that helps, if that's an integral and organic part of the whole story. — Robert De Niro

Integral Part Quotes By Glenn Haybittle

That there's a deep compulsion in the human spirit to overcome the selfish antics of the I in us. War, grindingly, shifts one's perspective from I to we. Never again will many of us feel our lives so interpedently entwined as we do in these times of war. Never again will someone else's loss or gain become such an integral part of our own store of resources. — Glenn Haybittle

Integral Part Quotes By Henry Petroski

The bookshelf, like the book, has become an integral part of civilization as we know it, its presence in a home practically defining what it means to be civilized, educated, and refined. — Henry Petroski

Integral Part Quotes By Jacque Fresco

We must stop constantly fighting for human rights and equal justice in an unjust system, and start building a society where equal rights are an integral part of the design. — Jacque Fresco

Integral Part Quotes By Trent Reznor

An integral part of any relationship is knowing that you could be killed in your sleep at any time. — Trent Reznor

Integral Part Quotes By Jacque Fresco

We are all an integral part of the chain of life. — Jacque Fresco

Integral Part Quotes By V.E Schwab

As for advice for aspiring authors, the best I can give is to be brave. It sounds like a simple enough thing, but it's not. Rejection is such an integral part of this journey, and it never goes away. — V.E Schwab

Integral Part Quotes By Miya Yamanouchi

Go out and do your thing knowing that rejection and failure is an inevitable and integral part of the process to achieving your dreams. — Miya Yamanouchi

Integral Part Quotes By Wendy Beckett

In grief, part of the pain comes from our feeling that we should not suffer so - that it is fundamentally alien to our being, this even though we all suffer, and frequently. Yet we reject suffering as a basic human truth, while greeting joy as integral to our very substance. — Wendy Beckett

Integral Part Quotes By Jeff Hawkins

In grade school I was taught that the United States is a melting pot. People from all over the world come here for freedom and to pursue a better life. They arrive with next to nothing, work incredibly hard, learn a new language and new customs, and in a generation they become an integral part of our amazing nation. — Jeff Hawkins

Integral Part Quotes By Anne M. Mulcahy

Employees are a company's greatest asset - they're your competitive advantage. You want to attract and retain the best; provide them with encouragement, stimulus, and make them feel that they are an integral part of the company's mission. — Anne M. Mulcahy

Integral Part Quotes By George W. Bush

There are some monuments where the land is so widespread, they just encompass as much as possible. And the integral part of the - the precious part, so to speak - I guess all land is precious, but the part that the people uniformly would not want to spoil, will not be despoiled. But there are parts of the monument lands where we can explore without affecting the overall environment. — George W. Bush

Integral Part Quotes By Phyllis Schlafly

Wright told Klein that he saw the Obamas as secularists, for whom "church is not their thing": And even after Barack and Michelle came to the church their kids weren't raised in the church like you raise other kids in Sunday school. No. Church is not their thing. It never was their thing. Michelle was not the kind of black woman whose momma made her go to church, made her go to Sunday school, made her go to Baptist Young People's Union. She wasn't raised in that kind of environment. So the church was not an integral part of their spiritual lives after they got married. But the church was an integral part of Barack's politics. Because he needed that black base. — Phyllis Schlafly

Integral Part Quotes By Beverly Jenkins

To aspiring writers, I say : Don't give up. Storytelling has been an integral part of the human condition since the beginning of time. Don't let anyone tell you your dreams don't have value. They do. — Beverly Jenkins

Integral Part Quotes By Kerry Stokes

Ethics or simple honesty is the building blocks upon which our whole society is based, and business is a part of our society, and it's integral to the practice of being able to conduct business, that you have a set of honest standards. — Kerry Stokes

Integral Part Quotes By Gloria Estefan

I'm very excited about this wonderful opportunity to take part in the evolution of a company that is integral to the Hispanic community and a powerful force in all areas of the media. — Gloria Estefan

Integral Part Quotes By Tim Bishop

A healthy Amtrak is an integral part of New York and the Nation's economy and transportation systems. — Tim Bishop

Integral Part Quotes By John Daido Loori

Creativity is our birthright. It is an integral part of being human, as basic as walking, talking and thinking. — John Daido Loori

Integral Part Quotes By Gary Player

There are many people who enjoy animal based foods and who have no interest in changing the way they eat. And as you correctly pointed out, animal products are an integral part of some ethnic groups and societies and it would be nearly impossible for them to change thousands of years of traditional eating habits. — Gary Player

Integral Part Quotes By Andrew Harvey

It is up to the leader to create a healthy environment where people are not afraid to fail. Mistakes should be seen as an integral part of the organizational process. They are a normal part of striving for excellence. — Andrew Harvey

Integral Part Quotes By Annie Besant

The idea of reverence for God is transmitted from parent to child, it is educated into an abnormal development, and thus almost indefinitely strengthened, but yet it does appear to me that the bent to worship is an integral part of man's nature. — Annie Besant

Integral Part Quotes By Edward Steichen

The precision of hisskill places his work beyond the tentative and the experimental stage. He is continually searching and exploring both himself and his surroundings. and in this exploration of the realm of places, people and things, contrasts and relationships, Callahan is no respecter of conventional technical formula or code. His delicate sense of pattern is an integral part of his photography and not a thing by itself. — Edward Steichen

Integral Part Quotes By Colin Fletcher

By walking naked you gain far more than coolness. You feel an unexpected sense of freedom from restraint. An uplifting and almost delirious sense of simplicity. In this new simplicity you soon find that you have become, in a new and surer sense, and integral part of the simple, complex world you are walking through. And then you are really walking. — Colin Fletcher

Integral Part Quotes By Claire McCaskill

I never need to go far if I need a reminder of how important Medicare and Social Security are to Missouri's seniors. My mom, Betty Anne, is one of millions for whom these services provide a reliable safety net. Across the country, these protections are an integral part of sustaining millions of seniors' health and dignity. — Claire McCaskill

Integral Part Quotes By Garrison Keillor

IMPORTANT Book reading is a solitary and sedentary pursuit, and those who do are cautioned that a book should be used as an integral part of a well-rounded life, including a daily regimen of rigorous physical exercise, rewarding personal relationships, and sensible low-fat diet. A book should not be used a as a substitute or an excuse. — Garrison Keillor

Integral Part Quotes By Diane Helbig

As a small business owner, you must sell or you will go out of business. Therefore, you must prospect (it's an integral part of the process). You have to bring people to your business, not just wait for them to show up. — Diane Helbig

Integral Part Quotes By Ted Cruz

The Second Amendment is an integral part of the Bill of Rights. — Ted Cruz

Integral Part Quotes By Adolf Hitler

So long as there are employers who attack social understanding and have wrong ideas of justice and fair play it is not only the right but also the duty of their employees - who are, after all, an integral part of our people - to protect the general interests against the greed and unreason of the individual. For to safeguard the loyalty and confidence of the people is as much in the interests of the nation as to safeguard public health. — Adolf Hitler

Integral Part Quotes By Phil Pringle

Goal setting is another integral part of achieving any dream. It is what takes a supernatural vision into the material realm where we can see it being accomplished. — Phil Pringle

Integral Part Quotes By John Ralston Saul

Humanism: an exaltation of freedom, but one limited by our need to exercise it as an integral part of nature and society. — John Ralston Saul

Integral Part Quotes By Susan Stovall

Managing time is an essential part of making life simpler. Time should be valued and treated as the limited resource it is. Through prioritizing and planning, time management becomes an integral part of day to day activities. — Susan Stovall

Integral Part Quotes By Jonathan Davis

Our fans make the band. What they give we give right back. They're an integral part of us. They ARE us. — Jonathan Davis

Integral Part Quotes By Barry Lynes

A noted cancer specialist in Boston said he believed that if some simple and inexpensive replacement for Chemotherapy for the treatment of cancer were found tomorrow, all US medical schools would teeter on the verge of bankruptcy, so integral a part of their hospital revenues is oncology, the medical specialty of cancer treatment — Barry Lynes

Integral Part Quotes By Marcus Aurelius

Since you are an integral part of a social system, let every act of yours contribute to the harmonization of social life. Any action that is not related directly or remotely to this social aim disturbs your life, and destroys your unity. — Marcus Aurelius

Integral Part Quotes By Michel De Montaigne

Painting myself for others, I have painted my inward self with colors clearer than my original ones. I have no more made my book than my book has made me
a book consubstantial with its author, concerned with my own self, an integral part of my life; not concerned with some third-hand, extraneous purpose, like all other books. — Michel De Montaigne

Integral Part Quotes By Paul Polman

Provocative and challenging The Social License makes a compelling case for why companies must look to increase their positive social impact as an integral part of their core business strategies. — Paul Polman

Integral Part Quotes By Misty Copeland

My curves became an integral part of who I am as a dancer, not something I needed to lose to become one. — Misty Copeland

Integral Part Quotes By Thomas Vazhakunnathu

Mind is not a product of brain rather an integral part of the soul, our eternal being. Those who understand this truth can think beyond the material reality and move to higher states of consciousness. — Thomas Vazhakunnathu

Integral Part Quotes By Arianna Huffington

Failure is an integral part of life and that perfection is not of this world. — Arianna Huffington

Integral Part Quotes By Hans Arp

We attempted perfection; we wanted an object to be without flaw, so we cut the papers with a razor, pasted them down meticulously, but it buckled and was ruined ... that is why we decided to tear prewrinkled paper, so that in the finished work of art imperfection would be an integral part, as if at birth death were built in. — Hans Arp

Integral Part Quotes By Stephen Alter

Our insistence on being different from everything around us is one of the greatest mistakes of mankind. We stubbornly maintain an illusory distinction that sets us apart from rock and ice, water and fire, plant and animal. Both religion and rationality try to explain it through an elaborate vocabulary of separation - soul, atman, spirit, ghosts in the machine or simply the idea of selfhood. We have dreamed up gods so that we can reassure ourselves that somewhere, someday, somehow, after this life is over, something awaits us: a presence that recognizes who we are. But if we approach a mountain instead, accepting that we are nothing more or less than an integral part of its existence, our ego merges with the nature of the mountain. In — Stephen Alter