Everyone Is the Teacher

Imagine if every soul you meet is one of your guides

Look deeper and you may recognize them

Beneath their human disguise

Every person is a reflection of your perspective

Mirroring how much you have grown

Through a web of synchronicity we are deeply connected

With each lesson learned we’re bringing each other home

Pay close attention to the language of the heart

You’ll hear its whisper in silence

If you’re present enough, you’ll experience life as a work of art

The return to love will shatter our confinements

Selective Memory

People love to the depths that they are able

Maybe their depth

Is your surface

It is far too easy to paint over the darkness of our memories

And selectively remember the beautiful parts of someone

If they are meant for you, they will be with you

Silence

We are always covering up silence

Wondering why we cannot hear the answers we seek

It is life’s grand joke to have you search everywhere but here

Looking for love in different places and faces

When it has always existed in the moment

Close your eyes and listen

Seconds

Every second you spend being anyone but yourself

Is a second you deprive the world of your unique gifts

For Ida

My grandmother called me her little one

Though she looked at me as though I were anything but little

As though she saw the size of my heart mirrored her own

And the same river of strength ran in my blood

She taught me how to dine like a lady and play poker in the same day

She forced me to sit for Shabbat dinners

But then would sneak me ice cream instead of matzah

That was her, you see

Full of contradictions and the stubborn refusal

To let anyone tell her who she is

She was fiercely gentle

And had a sparkle of joy permanently painted on her eye

But beneath that sparkle there was worry

Never for herself, no

She was worried for her family

Always thinking of their happiness

As though she could be the sun, the water, and the fertilizer that made them bloom

If only she knew she did not have to be all things

Because the truth was her love was everything

I hope to find a fraction of her strength in myself

Don’t You See?

Don’t you see? This life is what you make it. Whether you go right or left, you’re still on this human journey for a short while, floating in timeless space. And maybe you didn’t choose where you came from or how it is you got here. But you’re here. You made it. Never forget that, at any moment, you can decide to get up and walk away. You can explore a new place, learn a new skill, find a new love—it’s all just an experience. The only tragic thing would be to find yourself sleepwalking through the miracle that is your life. If you chase what is not meant for you, that pain of “what if?” will always weigh heavily on your chest.