there is no greater act than putting yourself before another.

To hold nothing back in every breath means staying committed to letting whatever we experience make its way in and letting whatever is in make its way out. Holding nothing back means holding the intention to be an open vessel, in a daily way.

It all tightens until what others need is anticipated beyond what is real, and then, without any true need being voiced, an anxiety to respond builds that can only be relieved if something is offered or done. At the heart of this is the ever-present worry that unless doing something for another there is no possibility of being loved. So the needs o

the secret of life somehow always has to do with the awakening and freeing of what has been asleep.

As we have discovered so many times, we have everything we need within us. This ability to listen inside is our oldest oar. You are the boat.

So, when feeling miserable, we must look wider than what hurts. When feeling a splinter, we must, while trying to remove it, remember there is a body that is not splinter, and a spirit that is not splinter, and a world that is not splinter.

small brilliant fish mouth pebbles along the ocean sand, sucking off bits of food and spitting back the rest. This is how they comb the bottom, and these small limbless creatures teach us how to suffer and move on, how to sift through what is nourishing and how to give back the rest.

In loving ourselves, we love the world. For just as fire, rock, and water are all made up of molecules, everything, including you and me, is connected by a small piece of the beginning.

MARCH 18 The Life of a Caretaker