Research on child abuse suggests that religious beliefs can foster, encourage, and justify the abuse of children. When contempt for sex underlies teachings, this creates a breeding ground for abuse.

My block was due to two overlapping factors: laziness and lack of discipline.

In the back of my mind was the constant hankering, almost yearning, to write but something always stopped me in my tracks. Or if I did find my way to put a pen to paper or finger on a keyboard I'd give up after a few minutes. I'd find other things to do: Anything but writing.

Krishna children were taught that in the spiritual world there were no parents, only souls and hence this justified their being kept out of view from others, cloistered in separate buildings and sheltered from the evil material world.

I was a new devotee of Eastern mysticism and even though I did not join that particular group, I could well have done. They seemed a bit extreme but I regarded myself as not quite ready.

I have never been nervous in all my life and I have no patience with people who are. If you know what you are going to do, you have no reason to be nervous. And I knew what I was going to do.

Reading Stephen King's book, On Writing, was like being cornered and forced to have a long, drawn out mental enema.