Some of us have a hard time believing that we are actually able to face our own pain. We have convinced ourselves that our pain is too deep, too frightening, something to avoid at all costs. Yet if we finally allow ourselves to feel the depth of that sadness and gently let it break our hearts, we may come to feel a great freedom, a genuine sense of release and peace, because we have finally stopped running away from ourselves and from the pain that lives within us.

Our lives are made of these moments. Simple words and actions, taken together, weave a single day, and our days become our life. Every gesture is a seed, and the seed determines the harvest.

We become what we love. Whatever you are giving your time and attention to, day after day, is the kind of person you will eventually become.

When we come close to those things that break us down, we touch those things that also break us open. And in that breaking open, we uncover our true nature.

A kind life...is fundamentally a life of courage.

Even in the middle of a hurricane, the bottom of the sea is calm. As the storm rages and the winds howl, the deep waters sway in gentle rhythm, a light movement of fish and plant life. Below there is no storm.

Every day, we are given countless opportunities to offer our gifts to those at work, in our families, our relationships.... If you give less than what you are, you dishonor the gift of your own precious life.