What wants to live in you may be waiting...at the end of a long loneliness.

I have noticed if I pull from fear or despair about the state of the world, I get tired, ineffective, afraid and sometimes mean-spirited.

But when I learned about the dangers of rejection or attack, I thought, it's time to change this. What if we faced any pain we had caused each other and, instead of rejection or attack, could we listen? Could we forgive? Could we merge?

My years as a mystic have made me question almost all my assumptions. They've made me a proud I-don't-know-it-all.

We need each other's ideas. Now, I'm not talking about racist ideas or misogynistic ideas or cruel or criminal ideas. I'm talking about most of us who have very varied experiences, needs and ideas. It's really about believing that it's an important part of healing America.

There's something in our makeup and in our bodies that really wants to luxuriate more in just the joy of being alive and not always consuming, creating, building. There's something inside of us that wants desperately to stop and experience and just be - not just always do.

Forgiveness doesn't mean being a wimp. It doesn't mean being weak. It doesn't mean having no principles and no values. Sometimes we have to stand firm for what we believe and make really hard decisions.