The world is not a machine, but an exquisite sanctuary. You need to be one with the world. You need to feel that you are not an accident in this world. You need to feel that the world is not an accident either. You need to celebrate your own uniqueness in a world that is sacred. The sacredness of the world, your dignity and your sovereignty, are assured by the assumption that the world is a sanctuary. To act in a world as if it were a sanctuary is to make it reverential and sacred; and is to make yourself elevated and meaningful. What the universe becomes depends on you. Treat it like it becomes a divine place. Treat it indifferently and ruthlessly and it becomes an indifferent and ruthless place. Treat it with love and care and it becomes a loving and caring place.
In a talk about compassion, a former teacher of mine once said that practice prepares the mind, but suffering prepares the heart. Perhaps the final step in the healing of all wounds is the discovery of the capacity for compassion, an intuitive knowing that no one is singled out in their suffering, that all living beings are vulnerable to loss, attachment, and limitation. It is only in the presence of compassion that we can show our wounds without diminishing our wholeness. For those who have compassion, woundedness is not a place of judgment but a place of genuine meeting.
