Muhammad is more human, more self-doubting, even self-tortured at times. His story is full of adventure, intrigue, betrayal.

People need to know that they have all the tools within themselves. Self-awareness, which means awareness of the body, awareness of their mental space, awareness of their relationships - not only with each other, but with life and the ecosystem.

If you pay attention to those aspects of God that demonstrate love, truth, beauty, intelligence, order, and spiritual evolution, those aspects will begin to expand in your life. Bit by bit, like a mosaic, disparate fragments of grace will merge to form a complete picture. Eventually this picture will replace the ore threatening one you have carried around inside you since infancy.

Fear is the memory of pain. Addiction is the memory of pleasure. Freedom is beyond both.

If I may take the risk of defining what a spiritual experience is, it is one in which pure awareness reveals itself to you as the maker of reality - where you suddenly discover through insight or meditation or a freak accident that your essential nature is spiritual, non-material.

If all of the steps of surrender are present, then a great Rembrandt or Monet will evoke love because the artist is simply there in all his naked humanity.

My head monk asked how it was walking. I said it hurt without shoes. And he said, 'It hurts on the foot that's down, but the one that's up feels really good - so focus on that one'.