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7721 Author Quotes

Some people awaken spiritually without ever coming into contact with any meditation technique or any spiritual teaching. They may awaken simply because they can't stand the suffering anymore.

Awaken Because Coming Contact
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That is the real spiritual awakening, when something emerges from within you that is deeper than who you thought you were. So, the person is still there, but one could almost say that something more powerful shines through the person.

Awakening Deeper Emerges Person
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Jesus said, 'The Kingdom of Heaven is within you.' I think if he lived nowadays, instead of 'kingdom,' he would have said, 'dimension.' And 'heaven' refers to a sense of vastness or spaciousness.

Dimension Heaven Instead Jesus
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You can always cope with the present moment, but you cannot cope with something that is only a mind projection - you cannot cope with the future.

Cope Future Mind Moment
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Because of its phantom nature, and despite elaborate defense mechanisms, the ego is very vulnerable and insecure, and it sees itself as constantly under threat. This, by the way, is the case even if the ego is outwardly very confident.

Case Confident Constantly Defense
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'Beasts of No Nation' began when I read an article about child soldiers in Sierra Leone during my final year of high school.

About Article Beasts Began
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Around the world, our cities are not the idealised open, accessible, and cosmopolitan spaces of our dreams. More often than not, they are sectioned and controlled purviews of the radically wealthy, surrounded by clusters of have-nots.

Accessible Around Cities Clusters
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Lagos is a fascinatingly infuriating place that its residents love - and love to hate. Licence plates on cars here proudly display the state motto, 'Centre of Excellence,' in what often seems a sarcastic swipe at the place we live in.

Car Centre Display Excellence
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Fear seems to have many causes. Fear of loss, fear of failure, fear of being hurt, and so on, but ultimately all fear is the ego's fear of death, of annihilation. To the ego, death is always just around the corner. In this mind-identified state, fear of death affects every aspect of your life.

Affects Always Annihilation Around
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Power over others is weakness disguised as strength.

Disguised Others Over Power
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As an adult, I discovered Claritin, and my whole world changed.
Adult Changed Discovered Whole
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Thinking fragments reality - it cuts it up into conceptual bits and pieces.

Bits Conceptual Cuts Fragments
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D.C. is in my blood, my diction, my sensibility and style. I am, though, in love with a city that cannot fully love me back.

Am Back Blood Cannot
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Boredom, anger, sadness, or fear are not 'yours,' not personal. They are conditions of the human mind. They come and go. Nothing that comes and goes is you.

Anger Boredom Come Conditions
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Prejudice of any kind implies that you are identified with the thinking mind. It means you don't see the other human being anymore, but only your own concept of that human being. To reduce the aliveness of another human being to a concept is already a form of violence.

Another Prejudice Reduce Anymore
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For me, I am really interested in how I can stretch myself to produce things. If, in the process, others take note and recognise that, then wonderful.

Am How I Am I Can
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To know yourself as the Being underneath the thinker, the stillness underneath the mental noise, the love and joy underneath the pain, is freedom, salvation, enlightenment.

Being Enlightenment Freedom Joy
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I've had great writing teachers and mentors and great success with my first book.
Book First Great Great Success
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I've got to keep on writing. That's non-negotiable. At the same time, one has to look at the world and recognise that writing is not the only thing to be done - I want to have an effect on the world.

Done Effect Got Keep
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Reading 'Search Sweet Country' is like reading a dream, and indeed, at times, it feels like the magical landscapes of writers like the Nigerian Ben Okri or the Mozambican Mia Couto.

Ben Country Dream Feels
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'Talking Peace' is one of the few books from childhood that I still keep prominently displayed on my bookshelf.

Books Childhood Displayed Few
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Love is a state of Being. Your love is not outside; it is deep within you. You can never lose it, and it cannot leave you. It is not dependent on some other body, some external form.

Being Body Deep Dependent
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The first time I ever cast a vote in my 1992 Blessed Sacrament School poll, I voted for Ross Perot because - Ross Perot.

Because Blessed Cast Ever
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There are skills you pick up on in a clinical environment in terms of how to ask questions, what to look for, how to listen that serve one well when trying to write.

Ask Clinical Environment How
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What a liberation to realize that the 'voice in my head' is not who I am. 'Who am I, then?' The one who sees that.

Head Liberation Realize Sees
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Anybody who tells you they're not scared when starting a new book project is a very good liar.

Anybody Book Good Liar
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I'm a black man in the United States, and there's no two ways about that. I have a shared common experience with other black men, and through that, there's an automatic understanding.

About Automatic Black Common
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I think 'Beasts of No Nation' is a novel that hopefully will affect each person who reads it in a different way.

Affect Beasts Different Different Way
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My parents have raised me and my three siblings to be aware of the privilege we have been afforded and the responsibility it brings.

Afforded Aware Been Brings
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It's true that people will take advantage of you in Nigeria, but this happens everywhere in the world.
Advantage Everywhere Happens Nigeria
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America is decidedly not 'post-racial.'

America Is Decidedly Racial
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In general, Barack Hussein Obama brings us face to face with the discomfort our society feels with this idea of difference.

Barack Brings Difference Discomfort
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Our racial past and future is something that we Americans must address.

Address American Future Must
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I've been writing since I was really young.

Been Really Since Writing
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I suppose I'm pulled towards fiction because I really like the freedom it gives me.
Because Fiction Freedom Gives
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I love playing with language and the rhythm of language - for some reason, this seems so much easier for me to do when I get to make things up than when writing nonfiction.

Easier Get I Love Language
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In terms of medicine, I've generally been pretty interested in public health issues as they relate to sub-Saharan Africa on a broad scale - HIV/AIDS, malaria etc.

Africa Been Broad Etc
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I think, all too often, this society has too monolithic a definition of what a black American is.

American Black Definition I Think
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When I speak about 'we,' it gets very complex very quickly. Having grown up in the United States, but also being very much a member of Nigerian societies and also different parts of Nigerian societies, I understand that we construct particular 'we's.'

About Also Being Complex
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There are multiple levels of 'we' and multiple groups that can constitute this idea of who we are. We need to be aware of who we are including and excluding.

Aware Constitute Groups Idea
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It's a beautiful thing, the desire to help a fellow human who is maybe in a rough spot.

Beautiful Beautiful Thing Desire Fellow
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No one can really relate to somebody who has given up entirely.

Entirely Given No-One Really
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I feel like it's not Africans who are afraid of China's rise in Africa. It's the West that's afraid of China's rise in Africa.

Afraid Africa African China
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There are some people who will tell you oil is the greatest thing that ever happened to Nigeria. And there are other people who will tell you it's the worst thing that ever happened.

Ever Greatest Greatest Thing Happened
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It takes time for people to understand how to hold leaders accountable.

Accountable Hold How Leaders
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It takes time for people to understand how, as an individual, I can have an impact on the way that society works.

How I Can Impact Individual
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We grew up going to church, and I believe in God. I don't know that I have the ability to define what or who or how God is. You know, I think that religion kind of messes people up in that regard. That's just my own personal philosophy.

Ability Believe Church Define
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Everybody has an equal right to be on this earth and to be happy on this earth and to achieve on this earth. That's kind of the way that I would like to try and go about living.

About Achieve Be Happy Earth
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Sometimes you just wanna go out, see your action movie, be done with it, come home. You know, and, like, you see 'The Matrix' or whatever, you see whatever film it is, and you're like, 'Oh cool,' whatever.

Action Action Movie Come Cool
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There are books that are made for you to sit and puzzle over and spend time with.

Books Made Over Puzzle
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