During one of my attempts gardening, a friend explained to me that regular pruning can help plants to thrive, even when its branches were not…
On Practice and Change
For almost seven years I have committed to a daily meditation practice. Some days I am only able to manage a few minutes, other days…
The Symbolic Dimension of Our Lives
The part of us that lives in the unconscious is hard to sense yet easy to find. Jung coined the evocative image of “the Shadow:”…
What is the Unconscious?
Western culture has internalized enough psychological language and insight as to give even the most uninterested person a casual understanding of concepts like the unconscious,…
What You Avoid Might Help You
The imagination is powerful and often undisciplined. Our minds fill in empty space with images and stories of what might be, and our bodies react as though those…
Starting Fresh Takes Its Own Courage
I missed my weekly posting last week, and nearly allowed myself to miss this week’s. I am in a major transition between one phase of…
Sense of Life
What is your sense of the life that you long to live? Is there within you some image, some feeling, some idea, some sensation that…
Change
Every goodbye is a hello. Each exhalation makes space for the next inhalation. The river moves, currents pulling forward, each molecule of water greeting the…
Meditation on Division and Wholeness
Today I can stretch to include more of myself. I notice the urge to choose between and cut away, dismiss, or marginalize something. A part…
The Mask
Sometimes we become trapped by the person we are trying to be, and deny the suffering beneath. This outer mask of personality is uniquely shaped…