Most of us make an effort to do and be the best we can be, which leads to a distinction we need to make between the notion of struggle and the notion of effort.

The heart, like the grape, is prone to delivering its harvest in the same moment it appears to be crushed.

When the heart opens, we forget ourselves and the world pours in: this world, and also the invisible world of meaning that sustains everything that was and ever shall be.

Most of us make an effort to do and be the best we can be, which leads to a distinction we need to make between the notion of struggle and the notion of effort.

I woke up early one morning a couple of years ago and felt the tenderness of my being alone, the bitter sweetness of it. It has many colors, being alone. I walked out into my living room and I can say honestly that everything was pouring with life - the red sofa, the chairs with their patterns of roses, even the coffee table with its scattering of books. Everything was alive with the presence of being. Seeing the world though those eyes, I realized that I could never really be alone.

There is a stillness in all of us that is really the essence of who we are. A stillness and a silence that doesn't move, that doesn't go anywhere and our task is to experience that while being in time.

When we fall utterly, something gathers us up. But our falling must be without reservation, without expectation, without hope, though not hopeless. You cant plan that kind of falling. When you abandon yourself utterly to life, the river will flow, and the log jam will free. Impossible is another word for grace. Who wouldve thought it, life takes another turn, and you are gathered up into a whole different way of seeing and being.