In a creative journey, it is essential, no matter how far one runs, to examine that which is closest to home.

Those memories that are engraved within me become teaching tools, ways of connecting with others, of creating an empathic bridge, of reaching out a hand and saying, I've been there, too.

I was doing a lot of yoga and learning to meditate, and I found that extremely helpful, and still do and hopefully always will.

I don't want to lean back into the past, or forward into the future. I don't want to wish the present moment away.

Part of my spiritual work is learning to live with the knowledge that we can't protect our loved ones from pain and heartache.

Let me tell you something about hypochondria: It's a pernicious, undermining little demon. It won't kill you, but it will sap the color from your life so that in the loveliest moments, the moments of grace, you are hit with that whisper in your ear that takes it all away. I'm sick, I'm dying - I just don't know it yet.

I try to remember that the job - as well as the plight, and the unexpected joy - of the artist is to embrace uncertainty, to be sharpened and honed by it.