When we can manage to live our own life, letting nothing real slip away, the larger ocean of life draws us with a magnetism all its own, the way a fish is drawn by light to a surface it can't imagine.

Questions to Walk With

QUESTIONS TO WALK WITH

•  In your journal, describe a time when you were chasing life and what that felt like. Then describe a time when life came to you and what that felt like. Describe the times you feel closest to life. How can you open to that feeling more often?

•  In conversation with a friend or loved one, explore how love and suffering have loosened your grip on where you thought things were going. How have love and suffering affected your sense of will and control?

•  In your journal, explore a way of thinking that isn’t working any longer, one that is limiting your ability to experience life directly. What kind of new knowledge do you need in order to be more fully alive?

•  A deep paradox of life is that no one can live your life for you, but no one can make it through life alone. In conversation with a friend or loved one, tell the story of a time when you experienced both sides of this paradox and how it changed you.

•  In your journal, describe the one thing you stand on when the weather of life stirs up its storms. When things get rough, how do you find your footing? Ask this of a friend.

•  In conversation with a friend or loved one, describe the difference between who you were ten years ago and who you are now. What is the most important thing you’ve learned about life and about yourself during those ten years?

Midway in Our Journey

MIDWAY IN OUR JOURNEY

Just when we’re softened by the years,

when we have enough experience to see

for ourselves, our maps are torn from us.

This can be frightening, but there’s

divine timing in the dissolution of a

stubborn mind, the way an inlet waits

on the last rock to crumble so it can

find its destiny in the sea. Losing the

way set out by others is necessary so we

can discover for ourselves what it means

to be alive. Now we can burn the clothes

others have laid out for us, not in anger

but to light our way. Now we can let the

soul spill its honey on the unleavened life

we’ve been carrying. Now we can rise.

Magnificence

MAGNIFICENCE