Recently, my yoga teacher and friend, Tanya Deacove, gave me a wonderful gift when she loaned me Stephen Cope’s The Great Work of Your Life. It turns out that this is a book for all who face uncertainty about life’s true purpose. “What is your biggest fear?” Cope asks. His answer, “I’m afraid that I’ll die without having lived fully” surely resonates for many of us. If you bring forth what is within you, your sacred calling, he says, …
When my 90 year old, almost-blind, artist mother was returned to her hospital room after surgery to mend a broken hip, she demanded a pencil and paper from the nurse. Fumbling but intent, she began making sketches of the hundred year old woman sleeping in the next bed. Over the next few days as the fragile images piled on her hospital table, doctors and nurses began taking time off to visit this unusual patient and sift through the remarkable likenesses. …
When I am hardest pressed, one truth becomes resoundingly self-evident. In the darkest times, the unlikely solution seems to be to add more love. The first time this occurred to me was when dealing with the grinding wickedness of a five year old son. That afternoon nothing worked with my generally pleasant, charming boy. Not reasoning. Not distraction. Not the array of interesting games and puzzles I offered. Not reading aloud. “No” was everywhere. Three times we had changes of …