The journey is made easier when we can accept that the process of living is designed for what matters to come through us tenderly.

The many ways to listen have been reaching into me for years. To enter deep listening, I've had to learn how to keep emptying and opening, how to keep beginning. I've had to lean into all I don't understand, accepting that I am changed by what I hear.

To listen is to lean in, softly, with a willingness to be changed by what we hear.

As the seed buried in the earth cannot imagine itself as an orchid or hyacinth, neither can a heart packed with hurt imagine itself loved or at peace. The courage of the seed is that once cracking, it cracks all the way.

Each soul on earth is complete unto itself.

All the buried seeds crack open in the dark the instant they surrender to a process they can't see.

When the sweet ache of being alive, lodged between who you are and who you will be, is awakened, befriend this moment. It will guide you. Its sweetness is what holds you. Its ache is what moves you on.