I confessed recently to an old friend, "I realized I was looking at you, in your visit, through old glasses. Speaking old words. Telling old stories. I realize that in my life I've made so many physical changes and I need to give my spirit time to catch up." Time for my spirit to look at my friend through the new glasses of current life experiences. Old friends are precious. They become even more treasured when they are wrapped in the currentness of life experiences and not relegated to the past in which they once lived.

When we have a circle of friends, we have more fun. We get more done, we feel and are stronger, and we really do celebrate the power of our 'us.'

Share your heart as deeply as you can reach.

I offer gentle understanding to myself. I position myself in love, not fear. I look behind me with forgiveness. I look forward with festive anticipation. I embrace this holy moment and assert, "Now. This moment is the moment to love, the moment to serve, the moment to seize the legacy instead of the small. Now. Now I will live large, love boldly, reach to the edges of my unfurled heart and fully enrolled hope."

I wrap the potential for bitterness, resentment, martyrdom in the blanket of forgiveness and just set it down. Then it just melts in the warmth. And goes away.

Nurturing is not complex. It's simply being tuned in to the thing or person before you and offering small gestures toward what it needs at that time.

If you follow the trail of your own enthusiastically repeated stories, you will begin to rediscover the things that invigorate and enliven you.