Reading Archive (Grief)
Before You Know What Kindness Really Is
Before you know what kindness really is you must lose things, feel the future dissolve in a moment like salt in a weakened broth....
Praying With The News
The 17th of the Hebrew month Tammuz initiates a three-week period of mourning that leads to Tisha b’Av, which is the day that...
Difference Between Healing and Curing
In my thirty years of working with cancer patients, I've seen a profound distinction between curing and healing. Curing is what a...
Pain, the Price of Freedom
Wise beings do not want to remain a slave to the fear of pain. They permit the world to be what it...
Hard Times Require Furious Dancing
I am the youngest of eight siblings. Five of us have died. I share losses, health concerns, and other challenges common to the human...
Receiving Each Day as an Invitation
Each new day is a path of wonder, a different invitation. Days are where our lives gradually become visible. Often it seems that we have...
This is the True Ride
My friends, let’s grow up. Let’s stop pretending we don’t know the deal here. Or if we truly haven’t noticed,...
Death Connects Us To Life
Growing up with monastic teachings around the impermanence of life, I got the opportunity to apply them when my grandmother passed on,...
Choosing Suffering over Safety
“Can you walk, sweetheart?” I say these words to our dog Stella who is dying. It’s time for breakfast and if she walks...
The Liminal Space
What do you do when a friend has lost a child and you can’t ease their grief? Or when your partner loses her job and you...
Two Types Of Heartbreaks
A disciple asks the rebbe: “Why does Torah tell us to ‘place these words upon your hearts’? Why does it not tell us...
Cognitive Bypassing
I am a physician, neuroscientist, and anxiety expert. Many people I speak with have anxiety because they are trapped in their...
Wisdom Of Grieving
Not only is grieving a stage of the spiritual activist’s journey, but the grieving process itself often unfolds in stages, which...
Living Lessons of Biomimicry
Biomimics are men and women who are exploring nature’s masterpieces -- photosynthesis, self-assembly, natural selection, and...
Starlings In Winter
Chunky and noisy, but with stars in their black feathers, they spring from the telephone wire and instantly they are acrobats in...
The Power of Here
Wisdom traditions worldwide say there's no greater blessing than to live the life of your soul, the source of your deepest personal...
Why Do We Send Flowers?
Why do we send flowers? To make up for what is intangible? Those feelings we can’t hold in our hands and present as a gift to our...
Citizen Of Dark Times
Agenda in a time of fear: Be not afraid. When things go wrong, do right. Set out by the half-light of the seeker. For the well-lit...
In Hardship, Choose Bewilderment Over Cleverness
In grappling with degenerative autoimmune disease, I often wished for a speedy redemption, for something meaningful to come out of my...
The Gaps on Your Resume
My students say to me sometimes, as they apply to doctoral programs or jobs in parish ministry, "How shall I account for the two, or the...