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.

Here the intoxication is the emotional relief that temporarily comes when answering a loved one's need. Though it never lasts, in the moment of answering someone's need, we feel loved. While much good can come from this, especially for those the caretaker attends, the care itself becomes a drink by which we briefly numb a worthlessness that won't

We tend to make the thing in the way the way.

I became very good at this, could spin in a crowd of loved ones, accommodating many needs at once. I came to believe that I was being selfless, an agile listener, reliable and giving. I thought I had found a way to be both who I am and considerate.

When experiencing something troublesome, how many times do you go over it in your mind? Why? What would happen if you only went over it once?

We are all made up of yearning and light, searching for a way out, afraid we will be shut in or cut off or repelled back into the ground from which we are reaching. This is enough to begin: To know, before all the names and histories drape who we are, that we want to be held and left alone, again and again; held and left alone until the dance of it

Imagine if trees never shed their leaves, or if waves never turned over, or if clouds never dumped their rain and disappeared.

But whatever it might be for you, it is more important to swim through the

To love by admitting our connection to everything is how we stay well.