Not only must we follow the golden thread towards spiritual freedom, but we must also unravel the garden-variety twine that is wrapped tightly around our hearts and minds.

One does not practice meditation to become a great meditator. We meditate to wake up and live, to become skilled at the art of living.

I'm calling my initiative take the other to lunch. If you are a Republican, you can take a Democrat to lunch or if you're a Democrat, think of it as taking a Republican to lunch because there is no shortage of the other right in your own neighborhood, maybe that person who worships at the mosque or the church or the synagogue down the street or someone from the other side of the abortion conflict - or maybe your brother-in-law who doesn't believe in global warming.

I think it's better that people actually are saying what they feel. Especially, people are saying, I'm not heard. I don't have a voice in America.

Don't persuade, defend or interrupt. Be curious, be conversational, be real. And listen.

Each one of us regardless of our situation, is in our search of our most authentic, vital, generous and wise self.

I pull from a place within me that has ultimate faith in the meaningfulness and beauty of human life.