I stop in the middle of our conversation on the street and feel those around us working on themselves and their relationships, solving problems and imagining new ways of being. For a moment, as the sun comes through, I can sense the entire city at work on their worth, unlacing trouble, looking for peace, each trying in their own way to be kind and useful in the face of storm and time. I am stopped by the sound and glow... Read more

In the ocean of history, things build and then are worn away to what is most essential. This is an irrevocable and recurring tide of time. And while the storms, whatever their form, first push us away, it is only by coming together that we endure and emerge even stronger, clearer, and more loving. This seems to be where we are now. And the practice, so simple and so difficult, is how to move through the days with caution and... Read more

When I was ill, I walked the antiseptic corridors, holding God so tightly  I couldn’t see a thing.   Only now, years later, have  I had this dream in which  a small bird is singing light. It follows me and everything  it brushes begins to glow.  I catch it, to have with me always. But in my hands, it stops singing.   It’s made me see that more than  holding, we need to be held,  by the larger things that ... Read more

After forty years, my oldest friend, Robert, took my hand and said, “I didn’t give you one thing you didn’t already have when we met. I just warmed it open with love and truth until you opened like a flower, blossoming into yourself.” This is what friendship does.   A Question to Walk With: Describe a friend who has loved you the way the sun loves flowers and trees. What is the greatest gift this friend has given you. Once... Read more

While every love we know is unique and has its own history, every chance to care traces back to the same enduring love that lives below all names. The way the branches on this towering oak trace back to its enduring trunk. By loving you thoroughly, I love everyone completely. By kissing one thing, we kiss everything. Now I love the fog that holds the flickering light. It seems to say, “You don’t have to try so hard.”    A... Read more

  As I travel to offer workshops and retreats, I enter a depth with willing others who’ve been opened and shaped by life. Through that depth, we create a path to what matters by which we enter the temple that is the world. I remain humbled and excited by the mystical fact that, try as we do, this depth can’t be opened alone. We need each other to do this, even though no one can experience life for you. And... Read more

When humbled, we finally stop fighting—  against life, against the tide of time, against the avalanche of disappointment, if we can outwait the stubbornness of our dreams. For  every storm, no matter how fierce, dissipates  itself. The question is how much damage  it does while wearing itself out. Eventually,  once broken open, once our soft center  spits out its pearl, we try to put all that  we’ve damaged back together. And no  one tells us that the storm hurts itself. ... Read more

The more a comet burns away, the brighter it gets.   As it enters the atmosphere, more and more of it flakes off and burns up.   Until there is only light.   This is our journey as a spirit in a body over a lifetime.   As the years wear us down and burn us up, we grow brighter.   Until at death, we are all light.   A Question to Walk With: Describe an aspect of who you... Read more

Death has been with me, getting my attention, saying nothing. So this morning, in a hotel in New York, I take a long shower, hoping the hot, anonymous stream might wash the aches from my heart and the fear from my mind. Yet once rinsed of my memory and worry, death takes off its mask and it is only life trying to get my attention one more time. But I insist, I have never taken any of this for granted.... Read more