The bravest people I know are those who’ve walked through the fire and come out on the other side.

places where it’s safe to be fully human and fully known.

But the paradox of pain is that it is only universal in retrospect. In the present, it is fiercely personal. In the immediacy of my fresh grief, I am nothing like Jody, and Jody’s pain is nothing like mine.

I’d pulled out the easy buttons of pretending and denial and held them out to her.

Real sexy is letting your true self come out of hiding and find love in safe places.

“Yes. Like when you dance. Many of the things you see me do each day, I do to be beautiful. It’s why I take time out to spend with good friends. It’s why I read and look at art and always have music I love playing in the house. It’s why I light candles in every room. It’s why I watch you climb our banyan trees in the front yard. It’s why I roll

The booze numbs the pain but God insists on nothing short of healing. God deals only with truth and the truth will set you free, but it will hurt so badly first.

But I know the moon’s always there, too, waiting for its time to be seen. The day has to fall to make way for the night and the night has to surrender its place so the day can have its turn. This strikes me as a holy rhythm. I wonder if whatever created this rhythm of the tides and the sky and the sun and the moon has a holy rhythm for my life,

I am going to love you now because you are the vessel through which the world delivers beauty and love and wisdom to my soul.