A Life in Light: Meditations on Impermanence

One definition of adulthood is that we can see our parents as people, independent of their relationships with us.

What could save me was loosening my grip and surrendering to the situation I could not change.

Expensive hotel rooms and bouquets of flowers were no substitute for watching the stars blink on and the sun and moon rise. Kind people in book lines did not keep me from missing my friends. To feel truly alive, I needed the sights, sounds, and smells of home.

could choose to stop making myself unhappy by waiting for something that would never happen. I could declare a truce with my own neediness and simply walk away from it. I could end my argument with reality and accept life as it is. This heart/mind insight comforted me.

Pain, like almost everything else, is impermanent. Receiving love is impermanent, but giving love can be permanent.

No matter our circumstances, with effort, we can learn to control our attention. We can accept responsibility for our own happiness and look inside ourselves for the light we can always find. As a flourishing friend told me, “I have everything I need to be happy right between my ears.”

What had saved me was stopping the struggle.

I was accepting impermanence and moving in gratitude for what was present.

discovered I was a person who only did well around familiar people in my own territory. I needed that grounding to stay calm and to sleep at night.