Quotes & Sayings About Presents

I shall call modern that art which ... presents the fact that the unpresentable exists. To make visible that there is something which can be conceived and which can neither be seen nor made visible. — Jean-Francois Lyotard

I have not been on any river that has more of a distinctive personality than does the Missouri River. It's a river that immediately presents to the traveler, 'I am a grandfather spirit. I have a source; I have a life.' — William Least Heat-Moon

All prejudice presents itself as piety, propriety. — Hal Duncan

Any writer who presents an American home today where the television is not the head of the family is living in a fantasy world. — Kurt Vonnegut

Instead of showing visibly distinct alternate identities, the typical DID patient presents a polysymptomatic mixture of dissociative and posttraumatic stressdisorder (PTSD) symptoms that are embedded in a matrix of ostensibly non-trauma-related symptoms (e.g., depression, panic attacks, substance abuse,somatoform symptoms, eating-disordered symptoms). The prominence of these latter, highly familiar symptoms often leads clinicians to diagnose only these comorbid conditions. When this happens, the undiagnosed DID patient may undergo a long and frequently unsuccessful treatment for these other conditions.
- Guidelines for Treating Dissociative Identity Disorder in Adults, Third Revision, p5 — James A. Chu

Imagine not being frightened by any feeling. Imagine knowing that nothing will destroy you. That you are beyond any feeling, an state. Bigger than. Vaster than. That there is no reason to use drugs because anything a drug could do would pale in comparison to knowing who you are. To what you can understand, live, be, just by being with that presents itself to you in the form of the feelings you have ... — Geneen Roth

There are few sights more pleasant to the eye than a wide cotton field when it is in bloom. It presents an appearance of purity, like an immaculate expanse of light, new-fallen snow. — Solomon Northup

To those Romans December twenty-fifth was the birthday of the sun. They wrote that in gold letters in their calendar. Every year about that time, the middle of winter, the sun was born once more and it was going to put an end to the darkness and misery of winter. So they had a great feast, with presents and dolls for everybody, and the best day of all was December twenty-fifth. That feast, they would tell you, was thousands of years old- before Christ was ever heard of. — John G. Jackson

The only safe guide is the Bible. It is the revelation of a God who has infinite knowledge and can therefore give you absolute truth. God has given you a revelation that is robust and complete. It presents an accurate and comprehensive picture of children, parents, family life, values, training, nurture, and discipline - all you need to be equipped for the task of parenting. — Tedd Tripp

As parents, I think we're always novices, and every day presents a new challenge. — Ewen Bremner

He sifts through all the pebbles until he finds the smoothest one he can, and presents it to her as a token of his love. — Mia Sheridan

One keeps looking out for innovation in IPL, but of late it hasn't been all that obvious. Lionel Richie as an opening act? Johnny Mathis must have been busy. Matthew Hayden's Mongoose? Looks a bit like Bob Willis' bat with the "flow-through holes"; Saint Peter batting mitts are surely overdue a revival. The only genuinely intriguing step this year, bringing the IPL to YouTube, was forced on Modi by the collapse of Setanta; otherwise what Modi presents as 'innovation' is merely expansion by another name, in the number of franchises and the number of games. — Gideon Haigh

The Romans had, like other Pagan nations, a nature festival, called by them Saturnalia, and the Northern peoples had Yule; both celebrated the turn of the year from the death of winter to the life of spring - the winter solstice. As this was an auspicious change the festival was a very joyous one ... The giving of presents and the burning of candles characterized it. Among the Northern people the lighting of a huge log in the houses of the great and with appropriate ceremonies was a feature. — Samuel L. Jackson

I am attracted only to music which I consider to be better than it can be performed. Therefore I feel (rightly or wrongly) that unless a piece of music presents a problem to me, a never-ending problem, it doesn't interest me too much. — Artur Schnabel

There's something that scares me. It's the way media in the United States presents the rest of the world. I feel like people in America are getting a completely different picture of what's going on in other countries than what is reality. — Rula Jebreal

But Rhett, you mustn't bring me anything else so expensive. It's awfully kind of you, but I really couldn't accept anything else."
"Indeed? Well, I shall bring you presents so long as it pleases me and so long as I see things that will enhance your charms. I shall bring you dark-green watered silk for a frock to match the bonnet. And I warn you that I am not kind. I am tempting you with bonnets and bangles and leading you into a pit. Always remember I never do anything without reason and I never give anything without expecting something in return. I always get paid. — Margaret Mitchell

By the time the Deputy Minister presents a matter for decision to cabinet, he or she tends to present three options: ' the unacceptable', 'the politically courageous', and 'the bureaucrat-preferred' options. As such, it is usually best to get down into the department to the person doing the first drafts of any policy. — Don Johnston

The center of all my enjoyments is the home wherein are my wife and children, and I have no wish to wander out from that home in pursuit of any pleasures that the world presents. — Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar II

The present: It is interesting that the "NOW" is called "the present." The present is the ultimate gift; it is the gift of truth and life. You are given the present every second, and you will receive it forever. The present is the only thing that exists, the only thing you are ever conscious of. Your life is a series of presents moving through time. The future does not exist until it becomes the present.

Life is one perpetual present.

Creation is happening now: Your body, mind, and the world around it are being created from microsecond to microsecond. Things may look the same, but they are not; everything is constantly changing and being recreated. Our life and our world is being created from moment to moment.

Life and everything in it is always new. — Michael Smith

But the real and actual 'riggedness' of the Eurovision lies in the vision it presents to us as to what 'Culture' is supposed to be: a monotone, cheap, cloned industrialized song with some glamour attached. The formula is always the same: 24 cloned songs, like computer automated, and 2 'crazy' ones so it seems that all this clonedness is actually supported by creativity. But in this image of 'craziness' there is the same formula: cloned, boring songs with some carnavalesque stuff attached. The factual dynamics of the event are in fact fascist: its almost purely Riefenstahl, but the Chinese mass production version of it. It shows us one thing and one thing only: Countries are an illusion, they are all the same. There are no countries. — Martijn Benders

The best presents don't come in boxes. — Bill Watterson

Why are you giving this to me?""well, for a lot of reasons. most of which i can't really explain properly. that's why people give presents, right? because they don't know how to express themselves in words, so you give gifts to symbolically explain your feelings. — Matthew Quick

Your children need your presence more than your presents. — Jesse Jackson

The special joy of putting a lead ball into any person who presents a nuisance. — Jonathan L. Howard

Presents are made for the pleasure of who gives them, not the merits of who receives them. — Carlos Ruiz Zafon

What we are confronted with now is the problem posed by the economic and symbolic structure of television. Those who run television do not limit our access to information but in fact widen it. Our Ministry of Culture is Huxleyan, not Orwellian. It does everything possible to encourage us to watch continuously. But what we watch is a medium which presents information in a form that renders it simplistic, nonsubstantive, nonhistorical and noncontextual; that is to say, information packaged as entertainment. In America, we are never denied the opportunity to entertain ourselves. — Neil Postman

That is, the only reason salvation is necessary is to get us back to the garden. The Pentateuch not only presents where we began but also why we are not there any more, and why and how we need to get back. — David Baker

Lowering his voice, he said, "In America we have a custom. When you're given presents for your birthday, you're supposed to open them and say thank you."
Tatiana nervously looked down at the present. "Thank you." Gifts were not something she was used to. Wrapped gifts? Unheard of, even when they came wrapped only in plain brown paper.
"No. Open first. Then say thank you."
She smiled. "What do I do? Do I take the paper off?"
"Yes. You tear it off."
"And then what?"
"And then you throw it away."
"The whole present or just the paper?"
Slowly he said, "Just the paper."
"But you wrapped it so nicely. Why would I throw it away?"
"It's just paper."
"If it's just paper, why did you wrap it?"
"Will you please just open my present?" said Alexander — Paullina Simons

There are spiritual gifts like mercy, faith, or generosity that enable people to set the standard, so to speak. But just because you don't have that spiritual gift doesn't mean you aren't held to any standard at all. Even if you aren't gifted in that way, you're still called to live mercifully, faithfully, and generously. You might not set the standard, but you need to meet the standard. There is a baseline that all of us are called to. When the opportunity presents itself, we need to show mercy, exercise faith, and give generously. In the same sense, all of us are called to take risks. If it doesn't involve risk, it doesn't exercise faith. — Mark Batterson

There is a vast difference - a constitutional difference-between restrictions imposed by the state which prohibit the intellectual commingling of students, and the refusal of individuals to commingle where the state presents no such bar. — Frederick M. Vinson

Even today, I am still very child-like while designing. It's a bit like Christmas - each of your designs you create is like unravelling your presents. — Christian Louboutin

Her eyes widen and she shoves me back and then there's a space between us, enough to paralyze me with all of the things I could do to her next. I could raise my hand and hit her in the face or bring my knee into her stomach, take a fistful of her hair and rip it out of her skull. You don't get to do this when you're a girl, so when the opportunity for violence finally presents itself, I want all of it at once. — Courtney Summers

Now, Venus is an extremely hostile environment, and as such presents a lot of challenges for a science fiction author who wants to create life there. However, as I began to research it more thoroughly, I found myself intrigued by the possibilities the world offers. — Sarah Zettel

I think I know who that one's from," said Ron, turning a bit pink and pointing to a very lumpy parcel. "My mum. I told her you didn't expect any presents and - oh, no," he groaned, "she's made you a Weasley sweater. — J.K. Rowling

I listen to National Public Radio, which, to me at least, presents the most rounded view of things. — Ed Harris

Technology presents us with a unique spiritual challenge. Because it is meant to serve us in fulfilling our created purpose, because it makes our lives easier, longer, and more comfortable, we are prone to assign to it something of a godlike status. We easily rely on technology to give our lives meaning, and we trust technology to provide an ultimate answer to the frustration of life in a fallen world. Because of this, technology is uniquely susceptible to becoming an idol, raising itself to the place of God in our lives. — Tim Challies

It's not hard to understand why an accomplished director like Gus Van Sant (whose most recent success, Good Will Hunting , gave him mainstream clout) would be interested in making this film. The lure of an exact remake presents a tremendous challenge. Unfortunately, it was undoubtedly a lot more stimulating for Van Sant and his crew to make Psycho than it is for an audience to watch it. [C]uriosity is going to be one of the primary reasons why people pay money to see this movie; boredom will be the predominant result. — James Berardinelli

The idea persists that faith is a remnant of an ancient way of life, a way of knowing that asks for unthinking acceptance of a belief system or adherence to specific dogma. This may be the case for some spiritual traditions, but the Buddha insisted that his disciples investigate his teachings with the powers of reason, test them in the inner laboratory of meditation, and build their faith on a firm foundation of knowledge. As a result, faith in the Dharma implies faith in one's ability to recognize truth when it presents itself and to take responsibility for verifying it through analysis and meditative experience. — Dharma Publishing

Greenhouse gas pollution, through its contribution to global climate change, presents a significant threat to Americans' health and to the environment upon which our economy and security depends. — Gina McCarthy

The sage of Nazareth may satisfy those who have never faced the problem of evil in their own lives; but to talk about an ideal to those who are under the thralldom of sin is a cruel mockery. Yet if Jesus was merely a man like the rest of men, then an ideal is all that we have in Him. Far more is needed by a sinful world. It is small comfort to be told that there was goodness in the world, when what we need is goodness triumphant over sin. But goodness triumphant over sin involves an entrance of the creative power of God, and that creative power of God is manifested by the miracles. Without the miracles, the New Testament might be easier to believe. But the thing that would be believed would be entirely different from that which presents itself to us now. Without the miracles we should have a teacher; with the miracles we have a Savior. — J. Gresham Machen

She told me if I clean all the ashes out of the grate, then I'll be able to help my sisters get ready for the bal." "It's Christmas, Dashiel. Can't you give that atitude a rest?"
"Merry Christmas, Dad. And thanks for the presents."
"What presents?"
"I'm sorry - those were all from Mom, weren't they? — Rachel Cohn

I recognized that Christianity had taught me that sacrifice is the way of life. I forgot the neighbor who raped me, but I could see that when theology presents Jesus' death as God's sacrifice of his beloved child for the sake of the world, it teaches that the highest love is sacrifice. To make sacrifice or to be sacrificed is virtuous and redemptive.

But what if this is not true? What if nothing, or very little, is saved? What if the consequence of sacrifice is simply pain, the diminishment of life, fragmentation of the soul, abasement, shame? What if the severing of life is merely destructive of life and is not the path of love, courage, trust, and faith? What if the performance of sacrifice is a ritual in which some human beings bear loss and others are protected from accountability or moral expectations? — Rebecca Ann Parker

The Bible presents a grace-soaked, spectacular vision for female beauty. It insists that the King is enthralled - ENTHRALLED! - with the beauty of every woman who puts her faith in Him. We — Mary A. Kassian

People you meet on your journey may not give you direct answers, but listen and observe. Everyone on your path presents a lesson for you. — Sheila Burke

Give your fullest attention to whatever the moment presents. — Eckhart Tolle

Technology is not in itself opposed to spirituality and to religion. But it presents a great temptation. — Thomas Merton

If you bed enough women, some will give you presents, — George R R Martin

I always listen," Ranger said. "I don't always agree. I have a problem right now that I can't seem to solve by myself. I need you to help me find my daughter. And there's an even bigger problem involved. I feel a financial and moral obligation to my daughter. I send child support, I send birthday and Christmas presents, I visit when I'm invited. But I've kept myself emotionally distanced. I'm not emotionally distanced from you. I couldn't live with myself if something happened to you because I was using you to find someone . . . even if that someone was my daughter. So I have to make every effort to keep you safe." "You're a little smothering. — Janet Evanovich

A brand-new pair of toe shoes presents itself to us as an enemy with a will of its own that must be tamed. — Toni Bentley

The Pain-Free Shopping Method: Buy a present for you, then a present for a friend. Then another present for you. Then a present for a friend. Then two presents for you. Then a present for a friend. Then go home, get into bed, and pull up the covers. — Cynthia Heimel

To write a novel may be pure pleasure. To live a novel presents certain difficulties. As for reading a novel, I do my best to get out of it. — Karl Kraus

For often, when one is asleep, there is something in consciousness which declares that what then presents itself is but a dream. — Aristotle.

One has to seek Beauty and Truth, Sir! As I always say to my pupils, you have to work to the finish. There's only one kind of painting. It is the painting that presents the eye with perfection, the kind of beautiful and impeccable enamel you find in Veronese and Titian. — William-Adolphe Bouguereau

Sexual abuse of children now presents society with the ultimate crisis of patriarchy, when children refuse to protect their fathers by keeping secrets. — Beatrix Campbell

I just do these 'Sleep' type tracks when the situation presents itself. I never set out to do them, like wait all day until I'm really tired or something. Gotta come natural. — Aaron Funk

the Christmas tree. Do you know where that comes from?" "No idea." "Saint Boniface decided to 'christianize' a ritual intended to honor the god Odin when he was a child. Once a year, the Germanic tribes would place presents around an oak tree for the children to find. They thought this would bring joy to the pagan deity. — Paulo Coelho

Unless you first do the hard work of answering those questions about a text, your meditations won't be grounded in what God is actually saying in the passage. Something in the passage may "hit" you - but it may hit you as expressing almost the opposite of what the biblical author, inspired by the Spirit, was saying. When that happens, you are listening to your own heart or to the spirit of your own culture, not to God's voice in the Scripture. A great number of books advise "divine reading" of the Bible today, and define the activity uncarefully as reading "not for information but to hear a personal word of God to you." This presents a false contrast. It is certainly true that meditation personalizes the Word, but before we can meditate on what the text personally means to us and our time, we must first need to know as much as possible what the author meant to say to his readers when he wrote it. — Timothy Keller

As each situation in life represents a challenge to man and presents a problem for him to solve, the question of the meaning of life may actually be reversed. Ultimately, man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather he must recognize that it is he who is asked. In a word, each man is questioned by life; and he can only answer to life by answering for his own life; to life he can only respond by being responsible. Thus, logotherapy sees in responsibleness the very essence of human existence. — Viktor E. Frankl

Despite the perturbations of the world, life goes on.
The sky presents an endless canopy of translucent blue. The still air is suffused with sunshine.
Perhaps tomorrow the beneficent clouds will gather and it will finally rain. The earth will cool and revive and in that seminal moment all our sins perchance will be washed away.
It might happen.
But somehow I doubt it. — John Dolan

Accept the fact that life presents us with opportunities to find more than one "one," and that you have learned a mighty life lesson when the next one comes along. — Emily Yoffe

Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect is as follows. You open the newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray's case, physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward - reversing cause and effect. I call these the "wet streets cause rain" stories. Paper's full of them.
In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in a story, and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about Palestine than the baloney you just read. You turn the page, and forget what you know. — Michael Crichton

Understand this: The Bible presents Christ. You have an inner sense of an indwelling Lord. You either have that or you do not. The man God needs will live in a vital, living relationship with Jesus Christ. — Gene Edwards

It's a way of life to be always texting and when you looks at these texts it really is thoughts in formation. I do studies where I just sit for hours and hours at red lights watching people unable to tolerate being alone. Its as though being along has become a problem that needs to be solved and then technology presents itself as a solution to this problem ... Being alone is not a problem that needs to be solved. The capacity for solitude is a very important human skill. — Sherry Turkle

Dear Aunt Patty,
Thank you for coming to be part of what definitely ranks in the top five worst days of my life. While your generosity is appreciated, I am returning this gift, as forced bachelorhood necessitates total abstinence from bamboo placemats and matching napkin rings in my daily life.
Sincerely,
Emory
Too much? — Cary Attwell

infancy presents body and spirit in unity — Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Shall I tell you the difference between our Holy Father and ourselves? We see things from a single view-point. He sees things from several. We decide that the thing is as we see it. But He has seen it otherwise, and He presents it as a more or less complete coaction of its qualities. See this sapphire. Well, you see the face of it: underneath, if I take it off my finger, there are a number of facets to be seen and a number more which are hidden by the gold of the setting. Now my meaning is that our Holy Father has seen all the facets as well as the table of the sapphire, or the thing. Consequently He knows a great deal more about the sapphire, or the thing, than we do. You must have noted that in Him. You must have noted how that every now and then, when He deigns to explain, He makes mysteries appear most wonderfully lucid. — Frederick Rolfe

Every client presents a practitioner with a novel and unique problem to solve. A therapist has to be a general problem-solver, and part of this expertise is grounded in an experimental style of reasoning originally developed for scientific purposes. — Richard S. Hallam

Human nature presents human minds with a puzzle which they have not yet solved and may never succeed in solving, for all that we can tell. The dichotomy of a human being into 'soul' and 'body' is not a datum of experience. No one has ever been, or ever met, a living human soul without a body ... Someone who accepts - as I myself do, taking it on trust - the present-day scientific account of the Universe may find it impossible to believe that a living creature, once dead, can come to life again; but, if he did entertain this belief, he would be thinking more 'scientifically' if he thought in the Christian terms of a psychosomatic resurrection than if he thought in the shamanistic terms of a disembodied spirit. — Arnold Joseph Toynbee

[It] is not that television is entertaining but that it has made entertainment itself the natural format for the representation of all experience. [ ... ] The problem is not that television presents us with entertaining subject matter but that all subject matter is presented as entertaining. (87) — Neil Postman

The musician writes for the orchestra what his inner voice sings to him; the painter rarely relies without disadvantage solely upon the images which his inner eye presents to him; nature gives him his forms, study governs his combinations of them. — Hermann Ebbinghaus

A Catholic culture does not mean or imply universality. A nation or a whole civilization is of the Catholic culture not when it is entirely composed of strong believers minutely practicing their religion, nor even whit it boasts a majority of such, but when it presents a determining number of units-family institutions, individuals, inspired by and tenacious of the Catholic spirit. — Hilaire Belloc

Nobody spoke for a minute; then Meg said in an altered tone, "You know the reason Mother proposed not having any presents this Christmas was because it is going to be a hard winter for everyone; and she thinks we ought not to spend money for pleasure, when our men are suffering so in the army. We can't do much, but we can make our little sacrifices, and ought to do it gladly. But I am afraid I don't," and Meg shook her head, as she thought regretfully of all the pretty things she wanted. — Louisa May Alcott

Even though the outside world has not changed, your brain dynamically presents different interpretations. — David Eagleman

In one important sense, Marxism is a religion. To the believer it presents, first, a system of ultimate ends that embody the meaning of life and are absolute standards by which to judge events and actions; and, secondly, a guide to those ends which implies a plan of salvation and the indication of the evil from which mankind, or a chosen section of mankind, is to be saved. — Joseph Alois Schumpeter

I believe in the soul ... the small of a woman's back, the hanging curveball, high fiber, good scotch, that the novels of Susan Sontag are self-indulgent, overrated crap. I believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. I believe there ought to be a constitutional amendment outlawing Astroturf and the designated hitter. I believe in the sweet spot, soft-core pornography, opening your presents Christmas morning rather than Christmas Eve, and I believe in long, slow, deep, soft, wet kisses that last three days. — Kevin Costner

All the Christmas presents in the world are worth nothing without the presence of Christ. — David Jeremiah

Never trust the enemy that gives you presents — Alexandre Dumas

In this city [Palermo] ... it's the souls of the dead who bring presents to the children ... We go to the cemetery to ask the dead for toys. — Gianni Riotta

What then is the difference between film and theatre? Or should one not rather ask: what are the differences? Let us be content wi th the reply that the screen has two dimensions and the stage three, that the screen presents photographs and the stage living actors. All the subtler differences stem from these. The camera can show us all sorts of things
from close-ups of insects to panoramas of prairies
which the stage cannot even suggest, and it can move from one to another with much more dexterity than any conceivable stage. The stage, on the other hand, can be revealed in the unsurpassable beauty of three-dimensional shapes, and the stage actor establishes between himself and his audience a contact real as electricity. — Eric Bentley

Presents are the best way to show someone how much you care. It is like this tangible thing that you can point to and say, Hey man, I love you this many dollars-worth. — Michael Scott

...this world presents us with so many false prophets that it's difficult for those of us with the most faith and love to refrain from just giving it all away to the first or flashiest bidder — Jonathan LaPoma

everyone down to street level is easy enough, with the ropes. Sergeant Parks decides the order: Gallagher first, so there's someone on the ground who knows how to use a gun, then Helen Justineau, then Dr Caldwell, with himself bringing up the rear. Dr Caldwell is the only one who presents any kind of a problem, since her bandaged hands won't allow her to grip the rope. Parks makes a running knot, which he ties around her waist, and lowers her down. They — M.R. Carey

Presents? Cake? I could use a new bat, maybe some good work boots or running shoes. — Patricia Hamill

Akhmatova, like Gogol, wanted to possess nothing. She gave away the presents given to her, and a few days later they would be found in other people's houses. This characteristic recalls the behavior of nomads, compelled to the provisional by necessity and by choice...When eastern Europe furnishes such models of detachment, why seek them out in India or elsewhere? (from Anathemas and Admirations) — Emil M. Cioran

But Milo had a shiny gold present to open, and presents trumped sad trees any day of the week. — Kate Milford

The only difference between a genius and one of common capacity is that the former anticipates and explores what the latter accidentally hits upon; but even the man of genius himself more frequently employs the advantages that chance presents to him; — Guillaume-Thomas Francois Raynal

The Bible presents God as above, beyond, and outside the experiences of mortal man. His thoughts are higher than our thoughts, and His ways are past finding out. God cannot be known by human intellect or reason, except through the new birth. Belief in God is not the product of seeing and knowing, but seeing and knowing are the products of believing.
Truth is revealed by God through the Scriptures-the Holy Bible. Truth is what the Bible declares, and not what the masses believe or what is the consensus. Reason, science, experience have nothing to do with truth. The test of truth is "thus saith the Lord. — Roger McIntyre

Many delight more in giving of presents than in paying their debts. — Philip Sidney

The body is an arrangement in spacetime, a patterning, a process; the mind is a process of the body, an organ, doing what organs do: organize. Order, pattern, connect ... an immensely flexible technology, or life strategy, which if used with skill and resourcefulness presents each of us with that most fascinating of all serials, The Story of My Life. — Ursula K. Le Guin

You need to acquire a lover, Madam President. — Lynn Raye Harris

Having undertaken, for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian faith, and honor of our King and Country, a voyage to plant the first colony in the northern parts of Virginia, do by these presents solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God, and one of another, covenant and combine our selves together ... — William Bradford

I was reading Raymond Chandler very much with the feminist eye. In six of his seven novels, it's the woman who presents herself in a sexual way, who is the main bad person. And then you start reading more fiction, whether crime fiction or straight fiction, it's just bad girls trying to make good boys do bad things, going all the way back to Adam and Eve. The woman that thou gavest me made me do it, Adam says to God. — Sara Paretsky

Edmund P. Clowney wrote, "The Bible does not present an art of prayer; it presents the God of prayer."129 We should not decide how to pray based on the experiences and feelings we want. Instead, we should do everything possible to behold our God as he is, and prayer will follow. The more clearly we grasp who God is, the more our prayer is shaped and determined accordingly. — Timothy Keller

We are no different today, friends. We get caught up in the season, busily making preparations for Christmas. We decorate, bake cookies, shop, and wrap presents, and yet we aren't truly ready. We aren't waiting with great expectations. Our hearts aren't prepared to receive this holy guest, this heavenly visitor. — Melody Carlson

Women like clothes, they like shoes, they like flowers and they like people to look at them and think,'God, she's gorgeous.' The more people who think that, the better it is. The one day in your life where you get all that rolled up into one is your wedding day. And it
comes with jewelry and presents and ends
with a vacation where it's practically law that you have to wear fabulous underwear and have lots of sex. — Kristen Ashley

The Christmas presents once opened are Not So Much Fun as they were while we were in the process of examining, lifting, shaking, thinking about, and opening them. Three hundred sixty-five days later, we try again and find that the same thing has happened. Each time the goal is reached, it becomes Not So Much Fun, and we're off to reach the next one, then the next one, then the next.
That doesn't mean that the goals we have don't count. They do, mostly because they cause us to go through the process and it's the process that makes us wise, happy, or whatever. If we do things in the wrong sort of way, it makes us miserable, angry, confused, and things like that. The goal has to be right for us, and it has to be beneficial, in order to ensure a beneficial process. But aside from that, it's really the process that's important. — Benjamin Hoff

The whiteness celebrated in Paris is Burning is not just any old brand of whiteness but rather that brutal imperial ruling-class capitalist patriarchal whiteness that presents itself -its way of life- as the only meaningful life there is. What could be more reassuring to a white public fearful that marginalized disenfranchised black folks might rise any day now make revolutionary black liberation struggle a reality than a documentary affirming that colonized, victimized, exploited black folks, are all too willing to be complicit in perpetuating the fantasy that ruling-class white culture is the quintessential site of unrestricted joy, freedom, power and pleasure. — Bell Hooks

When I went to the Oscars - the only time I've ever been to the Oscars - a few years ago, I wore this Prada dress covered in cooking utensils. I got drunk at the end of the night and started ripping them off and giving them as presents to people, so that was fun. I'm pretty sure that was the point of it, that's how Miuccia meant for it to go I'm sure. — Carey Mulligan

The buddha-dharma does not invite us to dabble in abstract notions. Rather, the task it presents us with is to attend to what we actually experience, right in this moment. You don't have to look "over there." You don't have to figure anything out. You don't have to acquire anything. And you don't have to run off to Tibet, or Japan, or anywhere else. You wake up right here. In fact, you can only wake up right here.
So you don't have to do the long search, the frantic chase, the painful quest. You're already right where you need to be. — Steve Hagen

The scientific evidence is now overwhelming: climate change presents very serious global risks, and it demands an urgent global response — Nicholas Stern