Mark Nepo

I don't think anybody planned this, but we have the pandemic.

We have technology, the insulation of social media.

And we have this, I think one of the things that seems so simple, but it's so profound is many of us have lost our direct connection with life.

and why is this important because when we are directly connected to life we have a reverence for life and if we have a reverence for life we can't do harm one of the things when we're not connected with life our need to feel and be here doesn't go away and so it comes out sideways and in some ways violence is a desperate last attempt to feel

It's we'll do anything to feel this is where the whole notion, the psychological self harm of cutting people who are so blocked from their heart.

So have no access to what they're feeling into the life around them that they still need to feel.

They still want to do something to open up and it comes out in very hurtful ways.

So I think, and all the traditions give us ways.

to reconnect with life and each other.

And so it starts with taking a risk.

It starts with when we're closed, how do we open?

When we're numb, how do we wake up?

And I think it always starts with the risk to be present, to hold nothing back.

For me, and so all these states, we will experience them

Because we're human.

We're not going to eliminate them.

But this is what it is to be a spirit in a body in time on Earth.

We're always course correcting.

Oh, today I was too closed.

Oh, today I gave myself away.