Liminal space psychology
Most of us feel like the end of a chapter in life; maybe it is by choice, illness, age, certain circumstances, or some kind of traumatic event. We are left behind thinking about the past and worrying about what is lying ahead in life. This means we are in liminal space. It can be a confusing and scary period of time. This article is all about liminal space meaning, its examples stories, and how beneficial it is, so let’s get started:
Liminal space meaning
The word “liminal” belongs to the Latin root, limen meaning “threshold.” Liminal space meaning is crossing over space, “a space where you have left something behind, yet you are not yet fully in something else. It’s a transition space.”
Liminal space definition
Here is the official liminal space definition with you:
“Liminal space is a place of transition, a threshold between two points, signaling the end of one time or space, and the beginning of another. These spaces exist in the real world as physical locations, but are also present in our cognition and psychological experience, often related to major life changes and periods of uncertainty.”
According to Richard Rohr, liminal space definition is as follows:
“It is when you have left the tried and true, but have not yet been able to replace it with anything else. It is when you are between your old comfort zone and any possible new answer. If you are not trained in how to hold anxiety, how to live with ambiguity, how to entrust and wait, you will run…anything to flee this terrible cloud of unknowing.”
Liminal space psychology
Think about that early morning when you are just floating between sleeping and waking up where your dreams are merged with day reality, and you are not sure is this a dream or reality. You are not sure whether you are waking or sleeping. There is a whole different thing going on with your brain; dream and life experiences are superimposed until your brain is fully awakening. This explains the liminal space well. Liminal space psychology is complicated yet simple. People often tell stories about how their lives changed in a moment; they talk about turning points in their life revolving around a disruptive event. A serious event happens where no old rules or ways of being tenable occurs a sudden shift happens and changes life.
The whole transformation and liminal space are just like the trapeze act. It is impossible to move on to the next phase until you totally leave your current self behind. But you just can jump from one phase to another; there is an in-between phase too. It is a moment when you need trust, faith to let go of the past and grab the next thing.
Liminal space threatens us; that’s why we try our best to avoid it. It feels crazy as we lose control. Sometimes it is a strong push from life where something forces this change, so you can’t really avoid it. Liminal space psychology is good in a way that when it pushes, you can’t help it, and you have to deal with it, but if you prepare yourself and willingly enter into liminal space, you can have a little control over things. For doing so, you will need focus and intention that you really want to enter into liminal space. Rituals can make it a bit easier, along with repetition. It will also help you to take help from a person who understands what it is like holding this sacred space.
If you learn how liminal space works, why it is important, you will learn to go with the liminal phase and can use it to develop and grow. When you are done with that, it will become easy for you to enhance creativity and enter into Universal wisdom. You will learn about the ways you can use to build a different world around you. That’s when the magic happens.
Examples of liminal spaces
Liminal spaces can exist physically, or they may be a state of mind. Let me share some examples of liminal spaces with you:
Physical examples of Liminal Spaces
Often physical spaces are liminal spaces. Sometimes the same place seems liminal, and other times may not. Some other places may feel liminal irrespective of the time, day, or year you visit. When we are at someplace during an unusual time, it can feel discomforting. If we are in a liminal space longer than usual to move towards our destination, it may feel like something is off, but it will not be easy to pinpoint the real issue. Here are some physical examples of liminal spaces;
Passage rites and ceremonies initiation
A passage right may include a walk through a jungle, loss of virginity, game hunt, or something really important to signify the transition to society. Initiation ceremonies are similar kinds of liminal space. Ceremonies like weddings or coming of age birthdays are common examples of liminal spaces.
These are crucial moments where society recognizes you as going through an important threshold and getting a new identity after these ceremonies. You will be able to enjoy new rights and will have new responsibilities to fulfill.
Lifts, stairwells, and hallways
The passage between two different places is a literal example of liminal space. Lifts and Stairwells are clearly visible threshold or in-between spaces. Their purpose is to move you from one place to another. That is the reason slowing down of lifts or stairwells may feel awkward and annoying. Stairwells are empty and quiet liminal spaces used in often unintended ways.
Cafeterias and break rooms
Cafeterias, lunch areas, and break rooms all are liminal spaces. These are places where we sit to spend some free time after doing some work and waiting to do upcoming work. You wait around between classes, do your homework or prepare yourself for the next class. You are really nervous when you have to do a presentation in the next class or meeting at work.
Waiting or lounge areas is another extraordinary example of liminal spaces. They are in a real sense spaces for ‘pausing’ before you cross that threshold to see the specialist, dental specialist, or go in for that prospective employee meeting. You can regularly feel the pressure in lounge areas at the specialist’s office. People are anxious on the grounds that they don’t have a clue what the specialist will discover. They may likewise feel unwell and awkward that their bodies are going to be examined by a specialist. Likewise, there is pressure in sitting areas when hanging tight for an interview.
Air terminals are another incredible example of physical liminality and moment of transition. People are getting ready for experiencing life abroad, standing by restlessly for friends and family to show up home, and making dismal farewells to companions they are leaving there. Alain de Botton wrote an incredible book on the liminality of air terminals – A Week at the Airport: A Heathrow Diary.
Hotel lobbies are brimming with people sitting tight for transport, or cleaning their rooms, and so on. These are regularly the moments of change between one aspect of a traveling adventure and the following. According to Arnold van Gennep it is classified as liminal space physically.
Liminality times happen to come consistently in our lives. There will be occasions between different parts of our story. It is the point when a new part of our life starts:
Teenagers are not exactly kids; neither are adults. It means they are literally in a liminal space where they are sorting things out. They are exploring different avenues regarding new characters, gradually increasing new rights and obligations, and settling on choices about what they need to do with their careers after secondary school.
Change to Adulthood
At the point when people leave school and change to life past, they frequently don’t have the foggiest idea of how to deal with themselves. A few people go on to college, others take some rest, and some others start trading. Postmodern scholars Anthony Giddens and Ulrich Beck state that this liminality moment is getting more difficult to navigate through life. In the past, people that come from the working class knew what kind of job they are going to do after high school. They would follow their father into trading or mother into parenting. But currently, the world is brimming with healthy and better opportunities. This is both energizing and startling as you need to sort things out for yourself!
After getting divorce
Generally, we feel that something is lost after a separation. We have to deal with the loss of a loved one and also have to build a new identity without them. Being left alone after a break up can be overwhelmingly terrifying; however, it can likewise be energizing as we are ready to start a new chapter with new open doors that were not already open to us.
After the death of parents
This is perhaps the saddest example of liminality. At the point when a parent dies, we feel terrible, and it is like we are prepared; we always thought no matter what, they will stay by our side. In this sort of liminal space, the loss is a common feeling for those grieving and incredibly painful.
Between the Jobs
Numerous people take half a month off between jobs. This timeframe is a liminality moment when people can take off some time from work responsibilities. They may go on a vacation or remain at home to understand books and appreciate some serenity before the hustle of the new position starts.
At the point when children leave home
We know about people feeling depression when their youngsters venture out from home. They may have adored having their family close by consistently.
Others might get excited at having the option to remodel or begin voyaging. That second after a kid has ventured out from home and you’re remaining in an unfilled house unexpectedly is an ideal case of a liminal space.
Why is liminal space important?
If you are wondering why is liminal space important? You are in the right place. Although it brings a lot of confusion and loss of control, but it is necessary for your development and growth. It is often disorienting and uncomfortable as everything thing is blurry; there is not the slightest idea of what is coming ahead. Still, it allows you to see the world with a new perspective and let you grow. Let me share some of its benefits with you:
It brings excitement
It may seem unreal, but it is a fact. You have the same life routine, but liminal space is the time when changes occur. So it can be full of opportunities and excitement. New and better things could be coming into your life. According to Richar Rohr, it is a good space where chances of genuine newness are plenty.
A new beginning
It is also said that this space is full of opportunities gives you a fresh start. You can leave bad past situations you never liked behind and start a new life with a fresh outlook. You can avoid previous mistakes too, and make your life better.
Innovative and creative ideas
Liminality can bring strong emotions; when you are in liminal space, a lot of creativity occurs. Books, artwork, and songs are generated to explaining the emotions liminality brings with itself. The best example of this is a poem written by Dylan Thomas named “Do not go gentle into that good night.”
Some drawbacks of liminal space
Now you know why liminal space is important, but if you cannot handle this transition phase, it can prove dangerous for you. By dangerous, I don’t mean life-threatening, but it can affect your personal and social life. So here are some disadvantages of liminal space:
It can bring discomfort.
Liminal spaces are never comfortable; these periods in your life can be extremely uncomfortable and scary. When there is uncertainty everywhere, we feel anxious and confused. If we talk physically, they can be empty also, for instance, empty stairwells.
You will feel unprepared.
Another drawback of being in a liminal space is that we are not prepared at all before. It is sudden; for instance, when we are waiting for medical test report results from the doctor, we may not want to face reality. When we are going to graduate from university, it may feel like we are not prepared for the practical world, and it is too soon to start a new job.
You may need support.
Because of this uncertainty and discomfort liminal space brings with itself, people may need help and support. During this time, they could seek help from professionals or ask for support and unconditional love from friends, family, and loved ones.
It is fearful
Liminal space can make us feel afraid. It is true, especially when it seems that there are several disadvantages of going through a threshold to move towards the next phase of life and not many advantages.
Liminal space spirituality
Liminal space is actually an inner state, but sometimes it can be an outer situation, where you can start thinking and acting in new and different ways. It is an in-between space when you have not yet left the room or stage of life entirely and have not entered the next one either. A person usually enters into liminal space when their previous way of life or self is changed or challenged; maybe by loss of a job, or a loved one, at childbirth, relocation, or during sickness. It is really a favorable time, but it does not seem this way sometimes. We are not sure about anything, and nothing seems to be in our control. The global pandemic we have faced is also an example of collective and intense liminal space.
The openness and vulnerability of this liminal space makes room for something to happen something new, genuine, and exciting. We are receptive and empty; there is a whole new space for new words to write. This is the most teachable space, as most of us are humble during this time. Instead of ego-confirmation, we are in a state of continuous shadowboxing, dealing with some hidden meanings behind certain things. It is a unprecedented time and this brings anxiety unfortunately.
There is nothing surprising that we try to avoid being in liminal space. A lot of work of human development and authentic spirituality is to bring people into their liminal space and to make them stay here unless they learn something new and essential. Several spiritual people, for instance, Mohandas Gandhi, Dorothy Day, Julian of Norwich, and St. Francis, knew the value of liminal space spirituality. That is the reason they tried to lives in a permanent state of liminality on the periphery or edge of the dominant culture. This borderline phase between two worlds allows you to think and live from a broader perspective.
Liminal space spirituality is explained by Richard Rohr in an excellent way. According to him, liminal spaces are a magically unique spiritual space. Humans hate to be there, but Biblical God is always there to lead them. It is a time when you are confused and anxious. If you are not well trained regarding how to control and process anxiety, you will want to run away from it.
While living in a liminal space, sometimes, there is no need to perform in the usual pattern that was successful previously. We need to experience emptiness rather than fullness, avoid speaking and cherish silence, try being anonymous, enjoy being penniless. It will take some time for sure, but this experience can prove helpful in reentering the world with a creative approach and freedom to life.
Liminal space stories
Liminal spaces are scary, no doubt. Liminal spaces’ are places where you are supposed to feel the reality of life. It is like everything was hidden under a mask, but now it is going to reveal itself. The veil that kept separated two worlds is now getting thin, and you are about to step into a whole new world. I have been through this; in fact, we all have been there at some point in our lives. There is always a little unsettling, turning the lights hazy. There are plenty of Liminal space stories; let me share mine with you.
My grandmother died about four years ago because of cancer. She fought hard against it. She was old and sweet; I was very attached to her. I was a college student back then, and she used to give me money for college and always took care of me. And then she was dead, even though I was kind of prepared for it as cancer was at the last stage still it felt like I was not prepared enough. It felt like it was too soon; I should not let her go; there are so many stories she has not told me yet. I can’t start my day without her kiss on my forehead. How will you go to college without her saying goodbye from the balcony? It felt like I was floating in the air, and I had nowhere to go. Those days were terrible; I could not study well and felt very bad. I was in this phase of uncertainty and discomfort for about two months. My family and friends supported me a lot, and after a hard struggle, I came out of this, but I realized I was not the person I used to be. There was something that changed…
There are plenty of movies sharing liminal spaces stories; here are some examples.
The Terminal is an amazing movie by Steven Spielberg that revolves around the life of Viktor Navorski (played by Tom Hanks). It is about when he gets stuck in New York at JFK airport. Viktor does not want to go to the US and also is unable to go back to his home country because of a military coup during flight. It is a true story based on Mehran Karimi Nasseri, who was bound to stay in Charles-de-Gaulle Airport in Paris for about 18 years. It is a perfect example of liminal space, where the character is stuck between what was his life at home and what it is going to be like in a country he was forced to live within. It is full of uncertainty, whether the nation will accept him or not and possibility, like how he can make his life even better than the past.
The Lion King
Most of us have seen this movie, but here you will see how it follows liminal space theory. After the death of Simba’s father, he runs away from home and starts living with Pumba and Simon in exile. Here samba is living in a phase of liminality; he is afraid to go back to his tribe. It is clear to everyone that Simon will never stay in exile forever. The audience feels really excited to know what happens next when Simba leaves his phase of liminality eventually to return to his home and fights with his uncle, Scar.
Some of the famous books on this concept of liminal space are as follows:
The Perks of Being a Wallflower
It is a book by Stephen Chbosky revolves around teenage angst and coming-of-age. The characters learn about how life will be like in adulthood, about adult sexuality, and how their lives will go after high school. Living in liminality moment in high school temporarily, the story paints emotions of anxiety, moments of highs and lows, and the most important question regarding how life will be after high school; there is uncertainty and plenty of opportunities.
It is a novel by Alex Garland. It is about a secret community of travelers from Thailand. They have put their lives on hold for suspending them within a phase of liminality. Most part of the book is suspenseful with questions regarding how this liminality will end. Characters are well aware of the fact that they cannot live in their fiction world forever. Still, they do not know how they can move on to the next phase. This uncertainty drives everyone mad on the island.
There are plenty of poems on the concept of liminal space. Let me share the one which explains liminal space theory in the best way:
Do not go gently into that Good Night.
This famous poem is about the story of a dying man who is facing the upcoming odds of death. He is in liminal space, close to death, and his life is going to end soon. He is grieving the loss of his own life; he chooses to make most of his time in liminal space and resist to pass through this threshold into death.
Liminal space helps you grow, but sometimes you just get stuck. If you feel stuck in this phase, make sure to get help from professionals. With the help of a life coach and little therapy, you can figure out what to do in the future and how to move on with your life in a better way. I hope so this article will prove helpful in understanding the whole concept. Please call 03333443853 for a free consultation with a certified life coach book your appointment today.
- “In the universe, there are things that are known, and things that are unknown, and in between them, there are doors.” ― William Blake
- “Liminal moments. Those moments apart from time when you are gripped. Taken. When you are so fully absorbed in what you are doing that time ceases to exist. Those early morning birthday moments were liminal, Sidda thought. Momma knew how to embrace liminality inspite of (or maybe because of) her emotional acrobatics. Momma taught me rapture.” ― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood
- “When we enter the world of birth, we step across the threshold from the mundane to the sacred. Pregnancy and birth are a space between worlds — a liminal space — a place where you are no longer not a parent and not yet one either. This betwixt and between is sacred space within which powerful and profound events occur — often uninvited.” ― Britta Bushnell
- “The line between insanity and mysticism is thin; the line between reality and unreality is thin. Liminality as a spiritual concept is all about the porousness of boundaries.” ― Esmé Weijun Wang, The Collected Schizophrenias: Essays
- “The question is not what you look at, but what you see. It is only necessary to behold the least fact or phenomenon, however familiar, from a point a hair’s breadth aside from our habitual path or routine, to be overcome, enchanted by its beauty and significance.” ― Henry David Thoreau
- “I become ocean, mercury, silver, shimmers, fairy tales, fascinated.” ― Helene Cardona, Life in Suspension: La Vie Suspendue
- “I now wear the memory of nothingness, a piece of white sail wrapped like second skin.” ― Helene Cardona, Life in Suspension: La Vie Suspendue
- “At first, you must be willing to enter a state of liminality. In other words, you must be willing to enter a state in which you stand on the threshold and are no longer grasping the worldviews and sense of yourself that you held in the past, nor yet completely ready to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. You stand on the threshold, the doorsill, neither in one world nor another. This can be a frightening place to be.” ― Laurence Galian
- “The greatest forces lie in the region of the uncomprehended.” ― George MacDonald, A Dish of Orts
- “Honour the space between no longer and not yet.” Nancy Levin
- “We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned so as to accept the life that is waiting for us.” Joseph Campbell
- “The essence of life takes place in the neutral zone phase of transition. It is in that interim spaciousness that all possibilities, creativity and innovative ideas can come to life and flourish.” Susan Bridges
- “The moment in between what you once were, and who you are now becoming, is where the dance of life really takes place.” Barbara de Angelis
- “I was afraid of death. I chose to remain behind. I sometimes wonder whether I oughtn’t to have…well, that is neither here nor there..in fact, I am neither here nor there. I know nothing of the secrets of death, Harry, for I chose my feeble imitation of life instead.” — Sir Nicholas, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
- “With dawn of the new year on the horizon, I resolved to exert my will on the world.” – Holly Black
- “The church of Jesus needs to wake up from the exile of passivity and embrace liminality and adventure or continue to remain a religious ghetto for culturally co-opted, fearful, middle-class folk.” – Alan Hirsch
- “Humility is not an exaggeratedly low opinion of yourself. Humility is self-forgetfulness.” – Peter Kreeft
- “Everyone pretty much acknowledges that he’s the man, and I still feel that underrates him.” – Jack Nicholson
- “Respect is earned by effort not age, all things age without effort.” – C. Sean McGee
- “At liminality, at a transitional point between his last night dream and reality, he realizes he has made a big mistake and happiness is possible without death. (Coming back to himself.)” – Lara Biyuts
- The attributes of liminality are necessarily ambiguous… Liminal entities are neither here nor there; they are betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention, and ceremonial.” Victor Turner
- “And no wonder; for the new technique of “subliminal projection,” as it was called, was intimately associated with mass entertainment, and in the life of civilized human beings massed entertainment now plays a part comparable to that played in the Middle Ages be religion.” Aldous Huxley
- “Sometimes Midas suspected that life was a film with subliminal messages. Things would move along with an acceptable degree of predictability, then be punctuated by some horrible childhood memory.” Ali Shaw
- “The twins were too young to know that these were only history’s henchmen. Sent to square the books and collect the dues from those who broke its laws. Impelled by feelings that were primal yet paradoxically wholly impersonal. Feelings of contempt born of inchoate, unacknowledged fear—civilization’s fear of nature, men’s fear of women, power’s fear of powerlessness. Man’s subliminal urge to destroy what he could neither subdue nor deify.” Arundhati Roy
- “It was my decision to get clean, I did it for meAdmittedly I probably did it subliminally for you” Author: Eminem
- “And there are many people, both Moslem and Christian, who have a good grasp of each others0 conceptions of surrender to God an other principles. But the widespread existence of bias, misinformation and lack of knowledge (…) militate against the effectiveness of dialogue, (…) by the most subtle and one of the most effective of instruments, the subconscious, almost the subliminal, introduction of hostility.” Idries Shah
- “Jinn . . . occupy bodies which are in a liminal state . . . when consciousness is a sheet of copper beaten down, mirroring only the moment” J. M. Ledgard
- “She kept asking herself whether, if he had looked cleaner, she might have been more concerned; whether, on some subliminal level, she had confused his obvious signs of neglect with street-smartness, toughness and resilience.” J.K. Rowling
- “(…) met the owner of this cozy book-and-candle Apt. G, a tall, leggy, striking girl named Bea or maybe just the letter B or maybe the insect Bee, not sure, her long blond hair pulled in a ponytail, her no-doubt banging body effortlessly buried beneath a pile of tights and sweaters and scarves – she is a walking coat rack – and as we shook hands, Bea fixed me with the most alarming blue-eyed stare of my life, the kind of stare in which you think some potent subliminal message is being passed along (Run away with me or maybe just Run away), (…)” Jess Walter
- “Advertising rises to an art when it stimulates not a perceived need, but boredom. Generosity sweepstakes, patient repetition, diligent associations, claims of skyrocketing temperance – a cavalry charge of techniques weaseling the tedious virtues into subliminal consciousness to make people fidget in their jiggling bodies, necrohabits, and abusive relationships. This campaign of discontent would implant not a longing for this or that product, but a heartache to jump on the bandwagon of another existence altogether. To lodge ennui in the soul is to commodify life.” Bauvard
- “Somebody referred to what I do as subliminal activism, which I like.” Edward Burtynsky
- “Inherent in the artist’s creative inspiration is the process of subliminally sniffing out environmental change,” observed McLuhan in a 1969 interview. “It’s always been the artist who perceives the alterations in man caused by a new medium, who recognizes that the future is the present, and uses his work to prepare the ground for it.” John W. Whitehead
- “Liminal sucks. You can’t grasp it with your hands and shape it. You can’t make midnight come faster, or grow up sooner, or avoid the in-betweens. You can only hang in there, and get through them.” Karen Marie Moning
- “At liminality, at a transitional point between his last night dream and reality, he realizes he has made a big mistake and happiness is possible without death. (Coming back to himself.)” Lara Biyuts
- “I had been coming to America very frequently for many, many years, so I had plenty of exposure – and maybe the best kind of exposure, because I think first impressions are very important. Maybe I notice stuff that is just subliminal to people who live here all the time.” Lee Child
- “Fragrance speaks the loudest on a subliminal level.” Marian Bendeth
- “Data that comes subliminally and is acted upon will look like luck or inspiration.” Peter Redgrove
- “It is a subliminal thing. It is the tick of a clock that has ticked so long one no longer notices. Something is in a room when a man lives in it. Something is not in the room when a man is dead in it.” Ray Bradbury
- “Every writing teacher gives the subliminal message, every time they teach: ‘Your life counts for something.’ In no other subject that I know of is that message given.” Roger Rosenblatt
- “I’m in road-coma at the moment. But it’s OK. I think you subliminally become a junkie of being on the road. As much as you think you’re burnt out, the minute you get off you go stir crazy and you just wanna go right back.” Shannon Hoon
- “I saw a subliminal advertising executive, but only for a second.” Steven Wright
- “Why travel to the Moon or Mars if we only continue our wars there with Russia or China or Africa? Why build rockets at all? For fun? For adventure? Or is this the same process that sends the salmons back upstream year after year to spawn and die – a subliminal urge in mankind to spread, in self-preservation, to the stars? Are we then secretly fearful that one day the sun might freeze and the the earth grow cold or the sun explode in a terrific thermal cataclysm and burn down our house of cards?” Ray Bradbury
- “I perceive value, I confer value, I create value, I even create — or guarantee — existence. Hence, my compulsion to make “lists.” The things (Beethoven’s music, movies, business firms) won’t exist unless I signify my interest in them by at least noting down their names.Nothing exists unless I maintain it (by my interest, or my potential interest). This is an ultimate, mostly subliminal anxiety. Hence, I must remain always, both in principle + actively, interested in everything. Taking all of knowledge as my province.” Susan Sontag
- “To photograph people is to violate them, by seeing them as they never see themselves, by having knowledge of them that they can never have; it turns people into objects that can be symbolically possessed. Just as a camera is a sublimation of the gun, to photograph someone is a subliminal murder – a soft murder, appropriate to a sad, frightened time.” Susan Sontag
- “In my songs, the sex is all subliminal. It’s subliminal, spiritual.” Ziggy Marley
- “Advertising, music, atmospheres, subliminal messages and films can have an impact on our emotional life, and we cannot control it because we are not even conscious of it.” Tariq Ramadan
- “In these days of faith-cures, and hypnotism, and telepathy, and subliminalities – why, the simple old world grows very confusing. But rarely, very rarely novel.” Walter De La Mare
- “Second, the reason to embrace and celebrate these novels as the countercultural event that they are is due largely to the subliminal messages delivered by Harry and friends in their stolen wheelbarrows. Readers walk away, maybe a little softer on the occult than they were, but with story-embedded messages: the importance of a pure soul; love’s power even over death; about sacrifice and loyalty; a host of images and shadows about Christ and how essential ‘right belief’ is for personal transformation and victory over internal and external evils.” John Granger
- “To gain a true understanding of human experience, we must understand both our conscious and our unconscious selves, and how they interact. Our subliminal brain is invisible to us, yet it influences our conscious experience of the world in the most fundamental of ways: how we view ourselves and others, the meanings we attach to the everyday events of our lives, our ability to make the quick judgment calls and decisions that can sometimes mean the difference between life and death, and the actions we engage in as a result of all these instinctual experiences.” Leonard Mlodinow
- “Children may not understand all that’s happening below the surface of a story. It doesn’t matter. Because even though they may not be able to define or verbalize it, they sense there’s something more than meets the eye; on an almost subliminal level, they’re aware of a richness of texture, or meaning and emotion — a richness that, in a great book, is inexhaustible. And the child may well come back to it again and again, perhaps long after he’s stopped being a child.” Lloyd Alexander