Broken Open: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow

Here is the Book of thy Descent, Here begins the Book of the Holy Grail, Here begin the terrors, Here begin the miracles. —THE GRAIL LEGEND

“Human interactions reflect a dance between love and fear.” That certainly described our relationship.

Our trials have taught us lessons that have made the rest of our lives all the more precious. The first lesson is as old as the hills: “This, too, shall pass.” Everything passes and changes and turns into something you would never have imagined, if you will only let it. I have learned how suffering only increases when I demand of life that “this sh

There is no dry land, he said; there is only fearlessness, which is to be found in the heart. This is the path to freedom.

We are built to make mistakes, coded for error. —LEWIS THOMAS

If there is one thing that has made a difference in my life, it is the courage to turn and face what wants to change within me.

Twice-Born people trade the safety of the known for the power of the unknown.

I told them that the Zen master Shunryu Suzuki instructed his students to approach every meditation session—even if they had been practicing for twenty-five years—with Beginner’s Mind. He said that “in the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind, there are few.”

I have my own name for the quest. I call it the Phoenix Process—in honor of the mythic bird with golden plumage whose story has been told throughout the ages. The Egyptians called the bird the Phoenix and believed that every five hundred years he renewed his quest for his true self. Knowing that a new way could be found only with the death of his w