how to participate

1. Do The When is Now program on your own.

2. Interact with us on Instagram for daily inspiration, art, ideas and links. 

3. Participate in optional weekly Zoom meetings.

what you’ll need

• Journal : Someplace to answer your reflective journal prompts each day. I use Decomposition Notebooks that I buy at independent bookstores

• Writing and art supplies: pens, colored pencils, glue stick, scissors, stickers

• Support network: While you can go through this 21 day process alone, having a support network to do it with might enrich the experience. This could be your family, the people you’re sheltering in with, a group of friends or our TWIN Facebook Group 

• An open heart. An open mind. A healthy dose of humility. And a willingness to leave life as you know it behind

• Time commitment: 10-15 minutes a day

day one: start here

Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.

- Howard Thurman

We find ourselves in chaotic times. This chaos isn’t new but in the past year it has reached a place where it can no longer be ignored. The question is where do we find ourselves amidst this current level of unprecedented change. Are we the calm, still eye in the center of the storm? Or are we swirling along with the frenzy of the winds? Neither one is good nor bad and yet it’s essential to find ourselves right now. Where are we? Where are you? 

Last year I had a session with two wonderful mystics who told me that my life would be on its best course if I did what I wanted. I liked the sound of that but it was a foreign concept for me. I was always on other people’s schedules, answering to the demands of someone else. My son. My dog. My job. The discipline of my exercise regimen. The rigors of my ambition.

What was said to me reminded me of a verse from my favorite Mary Oliver poem, Wild Geese. You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves. But what did I love? I wasn’t sure. That started a personal journey of being able to answer that question, not only in broad strokes, but in tiny moments - whether it was what to eat or which movie to see. Don’t get me wrong, it doesn’t mean we can have what we want at all times but knowing what we want and naming our feelings makes a difference. 

In The Talmud it says, the quickest way to neutralize a demon is to name it. Even the most frightening emotions are more manageable when named. Where are you right now? Today. What are you feeling? You can answer this question a hundred times a day. When you feel out of sorts, when someone asks something of you, pause and ask yourself this question and then listen. This honors yourself. 

To start The When is Now journey with authenticity, we need to know where we are. What is our starting point? Anywhere is okay. Just name it. Scared? Overwhelmed? Exhausted? Happy? Grateful? 

Reflective Journal Prompts 

1. Locate yourself at the start of this journey. What have you been feeling during these past six months—past weeks—past days? And what do you feel right now? They might be different. 

2. What does the soft animal of your body love? 

Discussion Question 

• If you’re sheltering-in with others or working with others, ask them how they feel? Then just listen. Don’t fix, explain or add meaning. Just listen. 

• If you have children in your home you can have them draw a gingerbread man to locate where in their body they’re experiencing feelings. They can use markers to illustrate their feelings. Then ask them to describe what they drew. You can even draw one along with them.

Suggested Action

• Pause 3x today and sense into how you’re feeling and name those feelings.

Feel free to get in touch with questions, leave comments below and join the private Facebook Group to discuss.

day two: acceptance

There are two ways to be. One is at war with reality and the other is at peace. 

Byron Katie 

Hope your Day One was interesting. For those who like a road map, this first week will mostly be about ourselves. Knowing ourselves and how we function is a key component to both living well and bettering our world. Let’s start with a parable. 

There’s a story about a horse. A man has a prized horse. Everyone in the town is jealous of this horse. One day the horse runs away, and the townspeople are quick to say, Your horse ran away—bad luck. And the man replies, Good luck, bad luck, who can say? A few weeks later, the horse returns with ten wild horses in tow, and the townspeople come to see what the noise is about. Your horse returned and now you have a whole herd—good luck! The man replies, Good luck, bad luck, who can say? The man’s son is so happy to have his horse back that he takes him for a ride, and the horse who’s been cavorting with wild stallions throws the boy, breaking his leg. The townspeople come to see the boy and say, Your son has broken his leg—bad luck. And the man replies, Good luck, bad luck, who can say? Then a war breaks out and all the boys are taken off to battle, but the man’s son can’t fight because of his injury. All the other sons go off to war, and the townspeople say, Gee, your son doesn’t have to fight—good luck. And the man replies, Good luck, bad luck, who can say?

Can you be like the man and remain unattached, waiting to see how things play out? Or do you resist reality and think what’s happening should be some other way? Do you judge triumph as good and trials as bad?  

When curveballs happen in life, because they always do—hello, coronavirus—we often get panicked or scared. Damnit, something is deviating from the plan. We might ask ourselves what we say about what’s happening? What is the story we tell ourselves when a pandemic hits? A parent dies? A car breaks down? A job is lost? A spouse cheats? A flight gets cancelled? Are the detours viewed as a distraction, a hindrance or a necessary help? Did you ever get lost in a new city, only to discover a store, a tree or even your soulmate—or were you too frustrated to notice? Did you ever consider that the detour may have helped you avoid an injury or a fatal accident? We know what’s happening in the world right now is causing pain and suffering, which is devastating, but have you also considered that other calamities may have been prevented by our current conditions?  How you perceive what happens, or the narrative you create, can have more impact than the event itself.

When I worked as an Executive Coach at a startup, I ran a weekly class called LifeLAB. It was a way to present to a larger group recurring themes that came up in 1:1 coaching. It was founded on the premise that in a laboratory, chemical compounds are neither good nor bad. We simply do experiments to determine how they react to each other. Pour this into that, nothing happens. But pour that one into this one, and BOOM! What would happen if we maintained a neutral curiosity about whatever was happening in our lives without our own attachment to the outcome? 

Reflective Journal Prompts 

1. In what ways do you accept what happens to you? And in what ways do you argue with life, thinking you know better? 

2. Write about something that seemed good but wasn’t. And something that seemed bad but that helped you grow in unexpected ways. 

Discussion Prompts 

Share the parable of the man and his prized horse with someone and ask them what they think of it. By the way, children love this story. 

Suggested Action 

As you walk through your day today, observe things without judgment, more like a lab technician would. Notice what that feels like.

Further Reading

For more about accepting reality, I recommend reading Byron Katie’s Loving What Is or checking out her website where she demonstrates a technique called The Work.

All drawings done by my brother, Robert Fiordaliso. Sheltering at home has allowed him to be more creative and spend long periods of time with his family — something that was never possible while working a corporate job and commuting 2 hours a day.

day three: numb

Let everything happen to you. Beauty and terror. Just keep going. No feeling is final.

- Rainer Maria Rilke 

Have you ever tried to play the notes on a clarinet wearing mittens? Or pick up something with your toes while wearing shoes? It doesn’t work too well. Yet this is what we do when we try to navigate life in a numb way. I get it. Life is hard, especially right this very minute. We’ve created and installed more and more ways to numb ourselves out of the now and into oblivion, thinking that tomorrow with its hopeful promises might arrive sooner. There used to only be alcohol and food. Nicotine and the newspaper. But now there’s porn available 24/7, endless scrolling on Instagram (I confess), round-the-clock news and the worldwide web.

We don’t ever have to be alone or present. There’s no quiet walk from the subway. You can’t even pump your gas without having information and noise thrust upon you on a screen. And the less time we spend alone with our feelings – with what Pema Chodron calls the hot loneliness – the more we fear it. If you want to know what you really feel, remove whatever you’ve been using to numb yourself and observe. Over the past year, many people have been forced to do this. For those of us who are addicted to busyness, we’ve had to be still, and this can be hard. 

But here’s the rub: we can’t be numb and have a fulfilling life. No way. No how. We have to meet our feelings head on. It’s the only way. We have to invite them in – all of the feels – the pleasant ones and the painful ones. The extent to which we’re willing to live a full life is directly commensurate with how willing we are to let go of the things that numb us. It’s no wonder that so many people like Brené Brown, Malcolm X, Glennon Doyle and countless more find their greatest success or power after getting sober. 

From heartbreak to betrayal, from shame to unworthiness, from loss to regret, and every feeling in between, life can be terrifying, but there’s something worse than the most terrifying feelings, and that’s being numb. Only with full access to our feelings can we know our purpose and live our potential. We can be fully alive — and fully alive people can do anything—even change the world.

Reflective Journal Prompts 

1. What are the ways that you numb yourself? At what age did you install these numbing agents and why? Over this past year, have you been numbing more or less than usual? 

2. What are the feelings you find most uncomfortable? What would be possible for you if you didn’t have to work to keep those particular feelings at bay?  

Discussion Prompts 

Ask someone if they’ve been numbing themselves during this time and, if so, what fear or emotion are they trying to protect themselves from. Offer to listen. For children, notice the ways they might be numbing (screen time and sugar are top contenders) and see if you can be more attentive to their real feelings. 

Suggested Action 

Give up something you use to numb yourself and observe if there are feelings or needs that you’ve been masking.*

Further Reading 

In 2012, I wrote a Modern Love essay for The New York Times about what numbness costs.

* If you suspect you have an addiction and need resources, please contact me.

day four: manual

Everyone is flailing through this life without an owner's manual, with whatever modicum of grace and good humor we can manage. 

-Anne Lamott

Yesterday may have been a challenging day. If you’re the type of person who finds reality too painful to bear, whether it’s your individual reality or the reality of the world, it’s normal to feel the need to escape. Numbing is how we escape. And it’s understandable that we’d be reluctant to give up those comforts, no matter how short-lived, until we install coping mechanisms that directly and effectively address our pain and fear. 

When we buy a new car, there’s a fancy pouch in the glove box that holds an extensive and official-looking manual. If you’re like me, you’ll never read that thing until the day comes when some light starts blinking on your dashboard and you wonder, What the hell does that mean? The blinking light grabs our attention. That’s when we pull over, rip off the plastic for the very first time and discover that the flashing orange light only means we need to change the oil or get more air in the tires or let the car warm up. Whew. We drive on, relieved. The whole manual is pretty simple, albeit long. There are different books for each make and model of a car. Human beings don’t come with a manual, but what no one tells us is that we must write our own. 

This human form we live in requires learned expertise and maintenance to function well, and it’s our job to figure out what works for each of us. Many of us grew up with parents who didn’t see us, hear us or know how to address their own needs and feelings, let alone ours. Not to mention that messages about how to look and what to feel and how to be may have led us to ignore whatever inner knowing we were born with. Be nice. Stop crying. Nice girls do this and big boys do that. But even if we weren’t met with love and acceptance in our childhoods, or by the world, that doesn’t mean we can continue to withhold these things from ourselves. The sooner we write our manual, the better life will be. 

We all fall prey to thinking we’ll follow the latest diet or exercise regimen. We’ll take the supplement-du-jour. Do you remember ever having kale growing up? No! Kale was something that was used as decorative greenery around gas stations, but now it’s impossible to be healthy without it. We think that our grief has to follow the five stages. Or that to create happiness, we can take this pill or do that particular kind of therapy. Life is far more difficult when we attempt to use someone else’s manual for our own guidance or think that a one-size-fits-all approach can work. It never does. There’s no way to bypass the step of figuring out what we each need regarding exercise, diet, sleep, healing, emotional support, stress management, stimulation, inspiration, etc. 

Please note, an owner’s manual is a work-in-progress. It’s an evolving, living document. Perhaps right now when you feel anxious, you need connection, but at some other point in life, you’ll need solitude. That’s okay. If you take the steps of avoiding numbing agents and feeling more fully, writing an owner’s manual for yourself will get you through with more kindness and more compassion, and no one in the history of humankind has ever overdosed on that. 

Reflective Journal Prompts 

1. In what ways do you judge and shame your own needs and feelings? In what ways do you meet those needs and feelings with kindness and compassion? 

2. Select some of your “uncomfortable feelings” from yesterday’s prompt and write out your own personal approach for how to be there for yourself. 

Discussion Prompts 

Ask someone to share what they’ve learned over the past year about what they need in times of crisis.

Suggested Action 

Create an owner’s manual. Let it evolve slowly. Write what you need re: diet, exercise, connection. Make it as creative as you’d like. Include times of tension, grief, injustice, transition. This is a great project to do with children or as a family. Imagine what your life might’ve been like if you had started asking yourself these kinds of questions early on. 

Further Reading

Take the free quizzes on The Five Languages of Love (also for anger and apology) — great information to put in your owner’s manual.

day five: golden

Depression is your body saying, I don’t want to be this character anymore. I don’t want to hold up this avatar that you’ve created in the world. It’s too much for me. You should think of the word ‘depressed’ as ‘deep rest.’ Your body needs deep rest from the character that you’ve been trying to play.

-Jim Carrey 

It was simple. All I did was remove everything that wasn’t David. This was how Michelangelo responded when asked by the pope about the secret of his genius while sculpting what’s considered one of the greatest works ever made. He also said, All I did was free the angel from within the marble. 

One of the great myths of life is that we feel we must acquire titles and things. It starts the second we are born. The first layer is gender along with its imposition of pink or blue accessories. Then name. Then wellness or sickness. Then traits and features of our relatives. Then our parents’ ideas for who we will be added on top of our very simple, very perfect, I am existence. Titles. Degrees. Roles. Responsibilities. Talents. Skills. Stuff. Designer purses. Houses. Spouses. Children. I am a woman. I am a man. I am a wife. A mother. A lawyer. An artist. A CEO. 

The more titles we acquire, the better we’re supposed to feel. Only problem is we don’t. The more we get, the worse we feel, and then we feel bad about feeling bad. And that’s when we start “shoulding” on ourselves. I should be so happy—look at everything I have or all my money or everything I’ve accomplished. This also contributes to the need to numb. We think we should feel happy and satisfied, but we don’t. 

For many of us, we’ve worn these heavy layers of identity on top of our existence for a lifetime. And Jim Carrey is right: we need deep rest from the exhaustion of carrying this heavy armor that’s meant to give us value but leaves us tired and empty. Over the past months, many of us have been forced to shed those layers we’ve worked so hard to acquire. What are we left with? What really matters about who we are when we leave those layers at the door? 

We can shed the layers that we’ve gathered like a tumbleweed as we’ve moved through life—we can free the angel inside, underneath all the stuff, underneath the societal and parental expectations, underneath the status and also underneath the shame and regret. 

Some of us don’t only use the things we’re proud of to define us; we also use our shortcomings, our addictions, our learning disabilities, our losses. I am depressed. I am an alcoholic. I am a widow. I am disappointed. I am a divorced. I am overwhelmed. I am afraid. I am obsessive. You are not these things. They are not you. They are experiences you’ve had or are having. In English, we only have I am -- fixed and solid.  But in romance languages the first thing you learn is the difference between I am and I am. One is for permanent states like your gender or race or nationality (although we’ve seen that gender can change). And the other is for temporary states you’re experiencing like visiting another place or being sick—conditions, locations, emotions. This difference is important. 

In 1957, an entire monastery in Thailand was being relocated by a group of monks. One day they were moving a giant clay Buddha when one of the monks noticed a large crack in the clay. The monk used a hammer and a chisel to chip away at the clay exterior until he revealed that the statue was, in fact, made of solid gold. Our gold is not our clay covering—the external layers. Our gold is what’s inside—who we are—our mere and magnificent existence. 

All we need is to be. We’re told to have a plan and a plan B. But all we really need is Plan Be. Plan be here now. Thank you, Ram Dass. I am. Just as I am. Period. 

Reflective Journal Prompts 

1. What are the identities you’ve acquired?  Is the value that you ascribe to your life based on what you do or what you have or who you are? 

2. Take your list of I am identities and make them temporary. For example, I’m a teacher becomes I’m employed as a teacher. I’m disappointed, becomes when I had to cancel my trip to LA, I felt disappointed. From now on, consider the ways you use I am statements. 

Discussion Prompts 

How has this period of time in history made you think about the roles you play? If you’re with children, ask them who they are and see if they’ve already layered on certain identities. These activities/questions for children might add unexpected growth and development to their online learning.

Suggested Action 

Listen to the voices in your head. Michael Singer calls that voice your roommate. If the voice is not you, who are you? The simple answer is that you are the one who witnesses the voice, not the voice itself. Observe it. 

Further Reading 

The Untethered Soul, Michael Singer

day six: perception

A miracle is a shift in perception from fear to love. 

-A Course in Miracles 

Did you ever see the optical illusion of the old lady and the young woman? You stare at this image, convinced you’re seeing either one woman or the other, and then all of a sudden it shifts and something you couldn’t see a second before is clear as day. So much of how we feel is determined by our perception, and yet how we perceive things is often not only inaccurate, but inaccurate in disempowering ways that leave us feeling bad. Anais Nin said, We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.

A dear friend gave me permission to share the following story. 

John was stuck in the past for almost fifty years. He’d been replaying one traumatizing memory in his mind and at workshops over and over and over, attempting to be free and to understand. When he was eight, John’s father died. His mother made the choice to send him to boarding school where they lived in England. She couldn’t bear her grief and the responsibility of two sons. His little brother was too young to go away. The day his mother dropped him off, the giant door closed with a thud and John was alone staring at it. Alone with his grief. No mother. No brother. No father. No family. He was in a strange place where everything was scary and unfamiliar. He heard it and felt it: the giant door closing and the terror of separation.

Then one day deep in meditation, this same scene played out repeatedly—the sound of the door closing and the feeling of being left, over and over—when suddenly something was different. He heard the door close, but he was on the other side. For all the times he’d replayed this scene, this was a side of the door he’d never been on before. It took a moment to realize he was in his mother’s skin. He was seeing things from her side. Feeling them from inside her skin. The grief of losing her great love. Her best friend. Her lover. The pain of watching her son’s tear-stained face. The door closed again but from her side. And then having to walk away, stunned and numb, he felt the crushing agony of her decision, the enormity of her grief—all of it—the pain of leaving her precious little boy.

He had a whole new perspective he’d never had before; this new perspective allowed him to feel compassion for his mother. Instead of upset, confusion and resentment, John was able to forgive her and find peace by understanding the lived experience on the other side of that giant door. She had died a few years before this, but he finally understood that first day at school more completely. And he was able to forgive himself for not seeing it all sooner. The door closed on a painful part of both their pasts.  

Forgetting to see another person’s perspective is common for us humans, but it doesn’t just happen on a personal level—it can also happen on a global level. Being born in 1972, I grew up hearing a lot about The Vietnam War. However, it was only this past year while reading a friend’s blog that I learned that in Vietnam they have another name for the war—it’s called The American War.  I continue to discover blindspots in my own perspective all the time.

Reflective Journal Prompts

1. Write about a situation in your life where you haven’t fully considered another person’s perspective. 


2. Write about something that’s happened, or is happening in the world from another perspective. 


Discussion Prompts 

Ask someone if they ever discovered that their perspective on a situation was incomplete, incorrect or based on a misunderstanding. Ask children, how they imagine their parents or friends feel in any given situation. 

Suggested Action 

Not everything we see is real or right. Take a look here at some amazing optical illusions.

day seven: fear

What the mind doesn’t understand, it worships or fears.

-Alice Walker

We’ve been together for a week. I wish I could sit down with each of you and ask how you’re doing. As things start to open up, anxiety ran higher for some. Others felt calm. There’s no perfect way to do anything right now — we are in uncharted territory. Some people are productive. Others need daily naps Whatever you’re feeling is okay. Feelings are not good or bad. Just like most weather is not good or bad. We need all of it. Even fear serves its purpose. 

Number one, fear is normal. We’re animals; our DNA is only 1% different from our primate cousins. Fear is installed to keep us safe and ensure our survival. Fear can provide necessary information. It can help us take certain preventive or protective actions or encourage us to be more cautious.

Number two, we can befriend our fears. From childhood on we tell people don’t be afraid of this and don’t be afraid of that, but we can’t talk anyone out of feeling fear. If you have a child you might know that offering them all the reasons why their fear is irrational only escalates their discomfort. Last year there was a meme going around that said, Never in the history of calm down did anyone ever calm down by being told to calm down. Fear is sorta the same. 

Despite wanting a pet my whole life, I got my first dog when I was 37. Percy is a mixed chihuahua, spaniel blend who is a regal looking creature but after living on the streets is afraid of almost everything. I’ve learned so much from co-habitating with him for 9 years, but one of the things I’ve found most interesting is this: when he encounters a scent that’s unfamiliar to him, he doesn’t resist it. Instead he rolls in it. Rubs his face against it. Gets it all over himself. This has taught me something important: when something is unfamiliar or even scary, it can help to move closer to it rather than pulling away. Kind of like we discussed on Day One about naming all our feelings, especially the ones that intimidate us. 

Moving closer to our fears means getting curious about them. What shape is it? When did it start? If you gave it a voice, what would it say?  Instead of trying to silence our fears, let them speak.

Reflective Journal Prompts   

1. How has fear played a role in your life? In the past, what things were you most afraid of? Which did you share and which did you keep to yourself?  Why?

2. Identify a fear you overcame. What happened? What could that teach you about something you’re afraid of right now? 

Discussion Prompts 

Ask someone to share a fear with you. For children, when they say they’re afraid, ask them to describe the fear in detail - to give it a voice, a gender, a name. 

Suggested Action 

When you feel fear at any point today, try moving closer to it rather than pulling away. Notice what happens. 

Further Reading 

As I was preparing to walk the Camino de Santiago alone, I encountered two main fears; being robbed of my documents and money, and being sexually assaulted. I used Tim Ferriss’ approach to managing fear before I left—it helped.

day eight: surrender

Uncertainty is an uncomfortable position. But certainty is an absurd one. 

-Voltaire

Welcome to Week Two! This week we will continue to focus on the self and then transition to our relationships to other people and the world. When our relationships are challenged, many of us feel destabilized. Strong and communicative connections can make everything better, even a global pandemic. 

Few things have made us have to face how little control we have like the events of the last year. 

I received a text from a dear friend who lives with his infirmed father, an ex-con and an unemployed chef. The four men range in age from 51-80. To my friend, safer-at-home seems like an oxymoron. Luckily he’s maintained his sense of humor. 

Have you noticed signs everywhere lately? Updated information. Rules and reminders. Well my friend made a sign of his own and sent me a photo of it. With thick silver duct tape, he stuck a drawing on the door of a circle made with black Sharpie. Inside the circle, it read: within my control—my thoughts, my feelings, my actions. Outside the circle, it read: things I can’t control—EVERYTHING ELSE.  

Maybe you can relate. I know I can. I wish I’d been given this sign earlier in my life—had it tattooed on my palm or face. In college, I secured a summer job by April because I couldn’t deal with the uncertainty of three empty months looming ahead. I finished college at twenty and immediately got a job while friends went backpacking into the wild unknown. And then I had a child, and quickly discovered you can’t control anything. But even then I found a way to control what I could by going from the world’s messiest person to the world’s tidiest one. 

When my son went to college, I tried my usual approach of controlling and planning. I put a contract on an old house in Upstate NY, gave notice on our place in California and left my corporate job. Then the house fell through and I had to accept that I have no control. We never do. We only have the false belief that we can control things. 

That’s when I started to employ a new way of living. I made fewer plans. I let life come to me rather than orchestrating everything. I gave myself permission to break plans when I knew I needed rest. Allow and surrender became go-to mantras.

Reflective Journal Prompts 

1. Draw a circle of your own. What specific situations or feelings would you put on the inside of your circle as things you can control and what specific situations or people would you put on the outside of your circle as things you can’t control. 

2. Now that we’ve been forced to embrace the unknown—what actions or attitude could you bring into your life when the regular pace returns? 

Discussion Prompts

Talk about what aspect of relinquishing control has been surprisingly delightful—it could even be not wearing a bra or not shaving everyday. 

Suggested Action 

Spend a day controlling as little as possible. For children, decide on a certain period of time and let them be the boss. Do whatever they dictate. 

day nine: reflections

Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.

-C.G. Jung 

Did you ever think about getting pregnant and suddenly see pregnant women everywhere? Or consider a certain car and then there’s one on every corner? The outer world mirrors our inner states. We know our phones listen to us and then send us targeted ads but this isn’t new—the universe has been doing it since the beginning of time. 

My mother tells a story of a family who relocated to a new town for work. On the outskirts of the town the family stopped to fill their gas tank. The attendant noticed the packed car and asked if they were moving to the town. Yes, we are. We’re a little nervous about it. What’s it like here? The attendant asked, Well, what was it like where you came from? The family was quick to respond, Actually, it wasn’t great. The people weren’t friendly. Neighbors kept to themselves. There wasn’t anything fun to do. The weather sucked. Yeah, I guess you could say we’re looking forward to a new beginning. The attendant said, I hate to break it to you, but it’s the same here. A little while later another family pulled into the station with a packed car and the attendant asked the same question. New in town? And they answered, Yes, we’re moving here for work. We’re so excited, what’s it like here? Again the attendant asked the same question, What was it like where you came from? And they answered, It was so wonderful. The community helped each other. The weather was great. And we loved our home. We were sad to leave but couldn’t say no to this opportunity. The attendant said, Don’t worry, my friend. It’s the same here. 

The story illustrates the notion that wherever you go, there you are. I often see this happen in my life. The same issue will appear in a romantic relationship, at work and with a friend. Maybe it has to do with not speaking up or not feeling appreciated. Has this ever happened to you—the same issue showing up everywhere? It can feel like the universe is messing with us. How can all these things possibly be happening at the same time? In those moments, life can feel unkind. That’s when it’s a good time to look for patterns because life is actually doing us a service—asking us to pay attention to a theme by presenting it over and over until we take notice. Only by seeing it can we start to transform it. 

On the flip side, when we notice the narrative in our head and rewrite it, the outer world can show up in a different way. 

Reflective Journal Prompts

1. Write about an experience where you kept noticing a recurring pattern or theme showing up in  your life. What was asking for your attention? What needed to shift or change? 

2. As we look around at the world right now, what is being reflected about our inner states of mind? Prior to the pandemic, in what areas of your life were you already feeling unsafe? Restricted? Vulnerable? Alone or lonely? 

Discussion Prompts

Share the story of the family who are new in town with a friend and see what they think/feel about it.

Suggested Action 

Notice any synchronicities in your day. Could be a meaningful song or a contact from a person you recently thought about.  For children, play a game of mirroring them. This could be matching movements or words or sounds. 

Further Reading

If you’re in need of beauty, here’s a poem that seemed timely.

In the Middle of Human Invention

Annie Lighthart

In the middle of human invention

I took my sorry head out of its kingdom of news

and went into the sun that was the chief

of all elements.  I walked warm and unthinking

through every green field.  Fed as if with good

bread and wine, the hours followed and shouted. 

We were a long, ridiculous, happy parade.

For once, my warring city-states slept.

For once, the workaday world lived beyond prediction.

The sun pressed its warm thumb on the earth

while I pulled my mind behind me like a red wagon

and lived a whole day without lie or desire.

day ten: purpose

Whatever you’re meant to do, do it now. The conditions are always impossible. 

-Doris Lessing

Did you ever wonder about your purpose in life—desperately wanting to make a difference but not clear about what to do or how to go about it? I did. I falsely believed that one day something would hit me over the head, and it’d be crystal clear. The path would appear out of nowhere like it did for Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, and I’d start walking with a clear destination ahead of me. Or maybe for you, the messages you received from the world about what you should do, or what your family or society expected you to do, drowned out the sound of your own voice. 

Years ago, when I unexpectedly got pregnant with my son, it seemed like a detour, but it gave my life immediate focus that I liked. There was a clear mission: deliver this child safely to adulthood. There was also a clear deadline: his 18th birthday. Once I met that milestone, however, I was left with a wide open space, a blank page and no clear purpose. After dropping Joe off at college, I set off on a gap year to figure things out.

Through the generosity of a friend, part of that time was spent in a farmhouse in rural upstate New York. Last year was a long, hard winter and I was often iced-in alone—dog and hot mug in tow. On the tags of my Yogi tea, inspiring messages like empty yourself and let the universe fill you, what’s yours shall come to you and let things come to you guided me. According to my warm beverages’ wisdom, a lot was meant to be coming to me, but nothing seemed to be arriving.

Then one day, standing in the yard, looking at the frozen landscape something hit me. The lilac tree isn’t sitting here all winter wondering, what it should be—come springtime. It’s not torturing itself thinking maybe this year it’d be way better or more fulfilling to be a hydrangea bush or an apple tree. It’s waiting for the ideal conditions and the right time, and then it will bloom—lush and fragrant—it knows what it was born to be. And so, I started to live like the lilac, trusting that nothing could stop my purpose, my reason for being—it was already encoded in my DNA. And so is yours. 

Deepak Chopra said, We are absolutely necessary in the grand scheme of things. The universe needs you in a unique way, because only you can have the experience that your life represents.  I’m here to tell you that your voice, your life, matter. What you do doesn’t have to be grand. It can be a mission to save the planet or a mission to save your marriage. It can be a conversation. A moment of presence or patience. It can be a work of art or an artful email. 

Mary Oliver said, Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

Tell me—I’m listening. 

Reflective Journal Prompts 

1. Write what you would be doing if nothing was holding you back. If the world was going to end in two weeks or two months or two years time—what would you do? 

2. How are you different from anyone else? What specific traits do you have to offer the world? 

3. If a genie came out of a bottle and told you—you could do or be anything—what would you say? Ask children this question.

Discussion Prompts

Talk about how you answered what do you want to be when you grow up versus what you became. If the answers are different from each other, what happened? 

Suggested Action 

Take an action that comes from your deepest longing—your secret wish about what you want to do or who you want to be. As Martin Luther King said, faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase. Why wait till life gets back to normal to take this first step—what better time than today to take one step on the staircase? 

Further Reading

I received messages saying that the poem yesterday was appreciated. Here’s one sent by a fellow participant:

The Buddha’s Last Instruction by Mary Oliver

Make of yourself a light,

said the Buddha,

before he died.

I think of this every morning

as the east begins

to tear off its many clouds

of darkness, to send up the first

signal - a white fan

streaked with pink and violet,

even green.

An old man, he lay down

between two sala trees,

and he might have said anything,

knowing it was his final hour.

The light burns upward,

it thickens and settles over the fields.

Around him, the villagers gathered

and stretched forward to listen.

Even before the sun itself

hangs, disattached, in the blue air,

I am touched everywhere

by its ocean of yellow waves.

No doubt he thought of everything

that had happened in his difficult life.

And then I feel the sun itself

as it blazes over the hills,

like a million flowers on fire-

clearly I’m not needed

yet I feel myself turning

into something of inexplicable value.

Slowly, beneath the branches,

he raised his head.

He looked into the faces of that frightened crowd.

Daily Images: my brother, Robert Fiordaliso

day eleven: relationships

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.

-Rumi 

Many full moons ago, when I was one month away from finishing my Masters in Social Work, I took a trip to the Caribbean. Sitting on the beach, I met a four-year-old girl who was vacationing with her mother. While playing in the sand, I tried to explain my job to her—what a psychotherapist does. Let’s just say that Jack is upset with Joanna—Jack might come to talk to me about it. Her face scrunched up as she poured sand from one hand into the other and then back again. She looked confused. Then she asked, Why doesn’t Jack just talk to Joanna? 

Sitting in front of the gorgeous turquoise water, the degree I worked so hard to earn seemed silly. She was right—why don’t we just talk to each other? One of the reasons is that it can be damn hard and that often makes us put it off, taking for granted that we’ll have the time to make things right, to forgive, to get it sorted—someday.  

But if a global pandemic can teach us anything at all—it’s this:

The unexpected can happen at any time. We live like we have forever but our life and the lives of our loved ones are temporary. Every breath is borrowed. As David Whyte says in The House of Belonging:  And I thought this is the good day you could meet your love, this is the gray day someone close to you could die. 

The intensity of this past year may be holding a magnifying glass on our relationship dynamics. 

It may help us see that we need outside assistance to heal a relationship—pay attention. Seek it out. 

It may help us see that we’re  sorry for something—pay attention. Admit our wrong doing. 

It may help us see where we’ve been holding a grudge—pay attention. Forgive. 

It may help us see who drains our energy—pay attention. Let them go.

It may help us see who shows up for us—pay attention. Say thank you. 

It may help us see who needs our presence—pay attention. Be there. 

It may help us see whom we long for—pay attention. Let them know. 

Let us not squander what we’re seeing. Let us use it. For connection. For healing. For love. And for good. 

Reflective Journal Prompts

1. What is the magnifying glass showing you about your relationships, near and far, old and new? 

2. Who would the little girl on the beach urge you to talk to?  What would you say?

Discussion Prompts 

Talk about what you’re learning about your relationships. For children, ask them how they feel about their friends, teachers, relatives. Or ask them to draw a picture of the people they miss most. 

Suggested Action 

Reach out to someone to voice any unsaid sentiments—whether unresolved, appreciative or affectionate. 

Further Reading

It Happens All the Time in Heaven

Hafiz 

[Note: this poem was written in Iran in the 14th century.]

It happens all the time in heaven,

And some day

It will begin to happen

Again on earth -

That men and women who are married,

And men and men who are lovers,

And women and women

Who give each other

Light,

Will often get down on their knees

And while so tenderly

Holding their lover’s hand,

With tears in their eyes

Will sincerely speak, saying,

My dear,

How can I be more loving to you;

How can I be more kind?

day twelve: grief

There’s a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in. 

-Leonard Cohen

This past year has opposites coming together in some ways. Shadow and light. Hope and fear. But despite opposites, many of us are feeling grief and loss of some kind. The loss of normal with no idea what the new normal will look like. The loss of a loved one or the simple loss of one’s routine.

The other day we spoke about moving closer to—rather than pulling away from—unfamiliar or painful feelings. Grief is one of them. In the western world, in particular, we shy away from grief, which robs us of an essential aspect of being human. 

In 2015, I was asked by my friend actress/writer Fawzia Mirza to join her in making a documentary about Sabeen Mahmud, a world-renowned activist who was assassinated in Pakistan. At the time, I was already juggling full-time work and raising a son alone so it wasn’t the wisest undertaking, but something intangible propelled me to say yes. The short documentary took two years to complete, and in 2017, on the 2nd anniversary of Sabeen’s death, the film premiered at the Nashville International Film Festival. 

Around that time, I received a Facebook message from Sabeen’s mother, Mahenaz, who hadn’t yet seen the film, wondering if I might find a way to screen it in London on what would’ve been Sabeen’s birthday. Tania, a Londoner who’d found our film project on a crowdsourcing site while going down a Twitter rabbit hole, had become an unexpected donor and found us a cinema at short notice.

The day before my flight to England, I got a text from Tania with a picture of a blazing building; she had just escaped a fire in her home, Grenfell Tower. Two days later, Mahenaz, Tania and I sat in a cafe in Marylebone, London over cups of tea. Here were two women—one who had watched her only daughter die in front of her and had a second bullet lodged in her own back and another woman who had just lost her home of forty-one years, all her belongings and 72 of her friends and neighbors in what was the most deadly fire in Britain in over 100 years.

I, too, had recently experienced great loss. Over a fourteen-month period from 2015-2017, I lost five close friends. Mahenaz, Tania and I laughed and wept and held each other. And as we did, something hit me: this moment was the reason I had made the film—so I could come together with these two women, who in the wake of unimaginable grief, still had the capacity for joy, profound connection and deep love. They had been expanded by their losses, not diminished by them. And if they could do it, I believed I could too. It was the start of treasured friendships.

In Japan there is an art of repairing broken pottery with gold called kintsukuroi. It’s based on the belief that brokenness can render us more beautiful. Our losses don’t make us lose value, instead they can embellish us. Grief can be a gift of gold if we let it.

This story was told with Tania and Mahenaz’s permission. 

Reflective Journal Prompts 

1. Mary Oliver wrote, Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift. What are some of the gifts that grief has given you? How has grief expanded you? 

2. Periods like this one can resurrect earlier losses. Maybe you are grieving for something old or something current. What, if anything, do you find yourself grieving for now? 

Discussion Prompts 

Talk about an aspect of loss you’ve been feeling during this time. For children, ask them if they’re sad about anything.

Suggested Action 

Notice in the course of your day, how people you’ve lost still make an impact. The human body is definitely finite but the human spirit might be infinite. Maybe it’s hearing a familiar song in a TV show that you sang with that person, a certain smell or flavor, or even a dream.

Further Reading

The World to Come: Navigating Grief During this Pandemic  

That Discomfort You’re Feeling is Grief

My Wife Said You May Want to Marry Me: A Memoir 

Further Listening

Mahenaz Mahmud on The When is Now podcast.

day thirteen: children

One child, one teacher, one book, one pen can change the world. 

-Malala Yousafzai

When my son Joe was five-years-old, I picked him up from school one day and the first thing he said was, We’re going to see a rainbow today. I looked up at the cloudless Los Angeles sky and said, Honey, it’s very rare to see a rainbow. I didn’t want him to be disappointed. We proceeded to have breakfast-for-dinner at the local IHOP, and when we left the restaurant there was a full rainbow over Santa Monica Boulevard.You were right, I was wrong, I said. It was in that moment that I realized that my small child had access to a different kind of knowing than I did. 

Years later, a spiritual teacher would tell me, evolution moves forwards not backwards. Children are here to teach us, not the other way around. Our job as parents is to keep them alive until they know how and to love them—that’s it. I’ll take it one step further. Our job is also to listen to our children and to the young people of the world. 

The Diary of Anne Frank has been published in 67 languages and has sold over 30 million copies. She wrote the book over two years from her 13th birthday (the red and white checked diary was a present) until she was sent to Auschwitz and later Bergen-Belsen concentration camp where she died. Anne is one of the most influential voices of the Holocaust. 

Greta Thunberg has become one of the most important activists in the world for climate and environmental change. She’s now 17 and has already graced the covers of the most respected publications in the world, been named Time person of the year, earned two Nobel Peace Prize nominations and has 10.2 million followers on Instagram. 

At age 17, Malala Yousafzai was the youngest person to have won a Nobel Peace Prize for her education activism. I spoke to Patricia McCormick who’s the co-author of Malala Yousafzai’s best-selling biography, I Am Malala: How One Girl Stood Up for Education and Changed the World (Young Readers Edition), about young people’s voices.

TWIN: What surprised or inspired you through collaborating with Malala? 

PM: How wise she was. She almost intuitively had answers to life’s biggest questions – about inequality, about faith, about the need to stand up for what you believe in.

TWIN: How do you suggest we start soliciting and amplifying young people’s voices more?

PM:  I think one of the best things we can do is to help young people become more comfortable with stillness. It is in those quiet moments that we come to hear an inner voice that is wise and unique. Out of stillness comes a voice that can speak loudly.

TWIN: How do you recommend young people find stillness in such a busy world? 

PM: I always tell kids—unplug. Whenever you're listening to a song, watching a show, looking at FB, you are on the receiving end of someone else's creativity. You have to turn that off to generate your own creativity. 

There’s a critical and unadulterated lens through which young people see the world. What would happen if we, as adults, invited their opinions and ideas more often? What if we used our money, experience, access and platforms to get their voices heard?

Not us or them. But us and them. Together.

Reflective Journal Prompts

1. What did you see more clearly as a child about inequality, faith or the need to stand up for what you believe in? 

2. In what ways have you resisted or undervalued the voices, opinions and ideas of younger people? How can you amend that in the future? 

3. What do you think the young people of the world are here to teach us? If you have children of your own, what do you think they are specifically here to teach you about your life or the world? 

Discussion Prompts 

Discuss the wisest things that young people have taught you. 

Suggested Action 

From the beginning of The When is Now, I’ve offered discussion prompts and actions that could be done for children, however, I had a second reason in mind. I thought that by inviting their opinions you might hear or learn something that would enrich you during this critical time in history.

I invite you to consciously ask for young people’s ideas (now and always) about what your family needs, what the world needs and how we can evolve as human beings.

day fourteen: unity

We are already one. But we imagine that we are not. And what we have to recover is our original unity. What we have to be is what we are.

-Thomas Merton

In this time of national (and global) uncertainty, people have remarked on the similarities between now and 9/11: a feeling of violation combined with vulnerability. While some with less of a safety net will suffer more greatly, leveling the playing field a little bit gives us all an opportunity to be reminded of our connection and unity. 

On Thursday September 13, 2001, I did crisis intervention counseling for the employees who worked at Windows on the World, the restaurant at the top of the World Trade Center, and in the dining facilities of adjacent buildings. Two days prior, many of those men and women arrived to see the towers on fire and people jumping. Many lost their job sites and beloved co-workers. As a clinician, nothing in my training taught me how to handle this. Like so many other emergency responders in that era, whether paramedics or firefighters or social workers, I was in unchartered territory. Much like we are now. 

On the Tuesday the towers fell, I was living on the east end of Long Island with my one-year old son. I immediately said yes when I received the call to come in and help, but due to bridge and tunnel closures, I couldn’t get into the city until Thursday. The first thing I noticed was that there was a palpable sense of cohesion and calm on the streets. It was something I had never felt before in New York City. 

Then I arrived at the site where I’d be counseling. People shared their stories. They listened to each other. What they’d seen. How they felt. The shock. The horror. The irreconcilable loss. I expected all that. But what I didn’t expect was that each and every group I met with wanted to do the same exact thing. They wanted to stand in a circle, hold hands and pray. I took their lead. I was meeting with a mix of kitchen and waitstaff, diverse in every aspect, yet they didn’t care if the hand they were holding on either side of them belonged to someone of a different gender, a different race, a different religion or a different sexual orientation. They didn’t care about the person’s immigration status or who would be sleeping in their bed that night, because in those few days, in their grief and fear, they were the same. We were one. 

Those days were a clear expression of America’s motto: e pluribus unum—out of many, one. Over these past few years, however, it has seemed like we moved so far away from cohesion and kept choosing more and more division. Then this pandemic came, and now I see again the opportunity to focus on what connects us, leaving me wondering why we need a horrible crisis to feel united? How do we sustain that sense of empathy and synergy that was palpable after 9/11? We moved on from unthinkable tragedy by standing together with compassion and kindness. In 2001, we did it for a few short months. What would it take for us to do it forever?  

Reflective Journal Prompts

1. Since the global pandemic started, in what ways have you felt a greater connection to the people of your local community, country and the world? 

2. In what ways do you still feel divided? Better than certain people? Different from others? Who and why? 

3. What would it take to find kindness and compassion for all? 

Discussion Prompt 

Discuss why tragedy brings people together and what it would take to create that kind of unity in slower and more serene times. For children, ask them why they believe human beings are all different and how they feel about our differences and similarities. 

Suggested Action

Think of anyone you feel divided from and take an action to feel empathy and compassion for them. If this feels challenging, you may want to do the loving-kindness meditation. 

day fifteen: rebirth

You have been telling people that this is the 11th hour. Now you must go back and tell people that this is The Hour. 

-Hopi Elder 

Many agree that the world as we know it has died but it’s up to us to decide what will be born in its place—what phoenix will rise from these ashes. We cannot go back. We must move forward and create something new.

The When is Now began as a phrase spoken to me by a friend while walking through the streets of Edinburgh in October 2018. He and his wife moved to the UK after his mother-in-law died. In our conversation, he shared how they’d been postponing various things in their life. When we retire. When we sell the house. When this and when that. Maybe you have your own list of whens. I sure did. Then a confluence of events made them realize the when is now. No more waiting. No more someday. 

In October 2019, I finished writing an outline for a coaching book, and when I mentioned the title to a writer friend she told me that it was already being used by a sci-fi TV show. At that moment, I realized The When is Now was the better name, so I asked my friend in the UK if I could use it and he generously said yes. But the story doesn’t end there. I left shortly after last Thanksgiving with a one-way ticket to London. 

On Boxing Day, the high street in Hampstead was covered with anti-semitic graffiti. Days before I had been there for a Hanukkah party. The same had happened on the performing arts building at my son’s university in Manhattan and also at the subway station I use. Only two weeks prior to Boxing Day, I was in Anne Frank’s annex in Amsterdam. Climbing the steps she climbed. Looking out the windows she looked out. What was happening in our world? Why did it seem we were going backwards instead of forwards? 

I didn’t know what I could do about the hate and division I was witnessing in our world, but I knew that doing nothing was no longer an option. I booked a return ticket to the US and started working on The When is Now’s second iteration—a movement of sorts that would include inspiring content and large group gatherings. I imagined something that would create empathy and unity, but I couldn’t see all the pieces. My perfectionistic personality didn’t like the vague process, but I surrendered to it.

I took the steps as they presented themselves. I bought the URL and started building the website. I secured social media handles and enlisted the help of respected friends. When the coronavirus pandemic hit and large group gatherings were no longer an option, I realized I’d been building the infrastructure for this without knowing it, and so here we are—since 3.30.2020, hundreds of people have read these lessons about change and considered what their part in this new world might be, no matter how big or small. 

Over the desk in the makeshift office I created in a closet at my mother’s house where I’ve been since the beginning of the quarantine, I have a huge photo of Martin Luther King Jr. tacked up. A new world starts with a dream. It starts in our imagination.

As I consider the world I hope we build, I keep returning to Arundhati Roy’s words:

Historically, pandemics have forced humans to break with the past and imagine their world anew. This one is no different. It is a portal, a gateway between one world and the next. We can choose to walk through it, dragging the carcasses of our prejudice and hatred, our avarice, our data banks and dead ideas, our dead rivers and smoky skies behind us. Or we can walk through lightly, with little luggage, ready to imagine another world. And ready to fight for it.

The bubonic plague killed half of Europe’s population—it was followed by the Renaissance. 

Reflective Journal Prompts

1. Write about what new world you are imagining. Let yourself go wild. It doesn’t matter if what you see is realistic or not. 

2. What part of that new world you wrote about are you personally willing to fight for? 

Discussion Prompts 

Talk about what good could come out of these unsettling times. How the world might be better because of what’s happening. For children, ask what they like about this time period. 

Suggested Action 

Commit to a change you’ve been forced to make during this time that you’d like to keep.

day sixteen: enough

Live simply so that others may simply live. 

-Ghandi 

We’re in the final stretch, and so many of you have written to say how reading each day has anchored you in deeper thought. I’m grateful for all of your participation and your feedback. This week we’ll be taking our reflections and turning them into committed actions that might better our own lives and the world.

We teach our children that sharing is good. At the playground, we encourage them to share the free swing; at the beach, we tell them to share their sand toys. Share the book. Share the cookie. Share. Share. Then we grow up and do the very opposite. We stop sharing and start hoarding. Why is that? Why don’t we as adults live the very thing we work so hard to teach our children? 

At the beginning of lockdown, food disappeared from shelves, people got physically violent over toilet paper and a nearby Costco had to close midday for a break because of the fighting. It made me think about the New Testament story of the loaves and the fishes. 

A crowd followed Jesus to a remote place.  When night was falling, his disciples encouraged him to send them back to the villages so they could buy food, but Jesus said to feed them instead. The disciples explained that they only had five loaves of bread and two fish. Jesus asked that the people be brought to him and, after giving thanks, he was able to feed all 5,000 men till they were satisfied and even had twelve baskets full of food leftover. This count didn’t even include women and children. Insert eye roll here. 

Some might believe that Jesus miraculously transformed five loaves of bread and two fish into a feast for thousands. But I disagree. My interpretation has always been that Jesus inspired people to awaken and live with charity, to take out the food they had been hoarding for their journey and to share it with those around them. And once they did, there was more than enough to go around. 

The United States comprises less than 5% of the world’s population, yet we utilize a third of the world’s resources. 41 million people in this country don’t have enough food, yet we are the global leader in food waste, throwing out 30-40% of our food supply. Something doesn’t add up. The numbers don’t work. We accept unacceptable truths with a defensive stance that there will always be rich people and poor people, as if there’s no choice about how much we keep and how much we share. Or which jobs and people we value and which we don’t.

Outside a local store at the beginning of the pandemic, a sign read, Before you buy ask: Is it necessary? Is it essential?  It was obvious to ask those questions then, but why don’t we ask them all the time? In recent years, Marie Kondo has had millions of people reconsider their stuff. Now we need to ask ourselves the same questions about everything we have.

Reflective Journal Prompts 

1. How have you been wasteful or excessive in the past? Where do you have more than you need?

2. What are you rethinking about what’s essential?  Unnecessary? 

3. Imagine what a world with a more balanced distribution of resources might look like. Describe it.

Discussion Prompt 

There’s a Haitian saying that goes, If you get a piece of cake and eat the whole thing, you will feel empty. If you get a piece of cake and share half of it, you will feel both full and fulfilled. Talk about how living with less might be more fulfilling. For children, ask them why sharing is important. 

Suggested Action 

Write a list of how you are enough and have enough.

Further Reading

Are We All in This Together? | NY Times 4.13.20220

day seventeen: stillness

All men’s miseries derive from not being able to sit in a quiet room alone. 

-Blaise Pascal 

The word business comes from Middle English—the state of being busy. But as time passed, business and busyness referred to different things and yet there’s an undeniable similarity between the two. This past year has forced the majority of us into greater stillness. For some of us this shift has been very jarring, like hitting a wall in a speeding car. For others, it’s been a long-needed change of pace. Some of us have resisted the stillness and some of us have embraced it. 

During Shelter-in-Place, my household along with other friends on Zoom, read Hope for the Flowers. This story, written in 1972 by Trina Paulus, tells the tale of a caterpillar named Stripe who after being born, crawls around and eats for a while and then feels like there has to be more to life than eating. Other caterpillars must feel this same impulse because there’s a huge pile where caterpillars are climbing over each other to get to the top. Then Stripe meets Yellow and the idea of stepping on her head to get ahead doesn’t seem right. Yellow leaves the pile, but Stripe can’t quiet the voices that tell him that he’s meant to ascend. Seeing no other way, he keeps climbing.

The instinct to rise was correct but the method was wrong. 

Yellow, too, wanted to get higher so she went off and became a butterfly. From her new vantage point she could see that there were hundreds of piles of caterpillars all going nowhere. They didn’t need to busy themselves with the business of crushing and killing themselves and each other—they needed to slow down, to go inward and to sit in the stillness where they would become the glorious beings they were born to be. 

Like the caterpillars, we too have bought into the false notion that climbing to the apex of nothing might make us happy. We sacrifice so much to get somewhere that rarely leaves us fulfilled. We place great value on money, titles, awards and accolades. From research, one of the top five regrets people mention on their deathbed is, I wish I hadn’t worked so hard. Before the coronavirus pandemic, it seemed to me that the pace of the world wasn’t sustainable. Something had to shift, but what? 

In recent months, I keep hearing the story of what happens to a caterpillar before it enters a cocoon. It becomes The Very Hungry Caterpillar and eats hundreds of times its weight in food. This period of overconsumption and busyness is what leads to its transformation. What if everything that led up to this moment—our lack of respect for the earth and each other—was an unfortunate part of our evolution? What if we’re not in a time-out from Mother Nature as some suggest?  Instead, what if we’re in our cocoons preparing to become what we were born to be: beautiful and free? What if we’re leaving behind our lives of crawling and readying ourselves for our natural state of soaring? 

Reflective Journal Prompts

1. Can you identify times in your life when your striving or busyness took you away from more important things or people? 

2. What is the current state of stillness allowing you to hear? What is it beckoning you to notice about who you are or who you could become? 

Discussion Prompts 

Talk about what’s becoming possible because of this time of cocooning. 

Suggested Action 

Watch the movie Parasite — available on Hulu.

For children (of any age), draw pictures of caterpillars and butterflies. Ask whether they feel more like a caterpillar or a butterfly and why. Post your drawings on Instagram with #thewhenisnow or in our Facebook group. 

Further Reading

My friend sent me this interesting piece Why Rich People Are So Mean? about how generosity and empathy often decrease as one’s wealth increases.

day eighteen: paradigms

The day science begins to study non-physical phenomena, it will make more progress in one decade than in all the previous centuries of its existence.

-Nikola Tesla 

Have you ever seen the Pixar movie Monsters, Inc.? It tells the story of a scare factory that captures children’s screams and uses them as an energy source. When a child accidentally gets into their city, it’s seen as a disastrous invasion, but the monsters soon learn that laughter has far more energy than screams do, and the tiny adorable intruder becomes a game changer. We need a paradigm shift of this magnitude.

Fear disables clear thinking. When our vision is clouded, we’ll believe (and buy) almost anything. Just like screams were an inferior form of energy for the monsters, we need to consider that fear may be inhibiting our evolution. Sure, every parent has used fear to try to gain control at some point. And we as individuals also use fear to control ourselves, maintaining the status quo because it’s comfortable, but as the famous meme says: the magic happens outside your comfort zone. 

Old doors won’t open new ways. Fear creates a certain kind of consciousness that keeps us in fight, flight or freeze mode, but if we set that fear down, a void gets created for a new kind of consciousness that includes empathy, community and love. If we set fear down, we’d move from surviving to thriving. If we set fear down our thinking would clear and we’d get more creative about everything from the environment to hunger to healthcare to equality. And we’d also use new forms of learning and thinking.

These new forms might include non-physical phenomena—like Tesla speaks about in the quote above—new ways of knowing, like imagination and intuition. Thich Nhat Hanh said, Many scientists acknowledge that great discoveries are often realized through intuition. For them, reason is not an agent of discovery but a tool to explain and support it afterwards. They say that we human beings use a small percentage of our brain's capacity—what if we were invited to use all parts of our brains including all of our senses? What if we utilized non-traditional methods more? For instance, Michael Pollan’s best-selling book How to Change Your Mind has had millions of people consider that psychedelics might be an alternative approach to hard-to-solve mental health issues including PTSD and complicated grief. What if, along with modern medicine, we included Hippocrates old tenet of health, let your food be your medicine.

Per the prophecy of the eagle and the condor, which comes from the indigenous people of North and South America, to save the world someday we’d need to bring opposites together. We’d need science and technology along with—not in opposition to—the wisdom of ancient cultures. We’d need women and men. The young and the old. Artists and academics. Shamans and doctors. I think they were right, and I can’t help but wonder if this is the time they were speaking of. 

Reflective Journal Prompts 

1. How has fear helped you maintain the status quo? It could be in your work life, your relationships, your family or your community. 

2. How could you invite in the thoughts and ideas of groups you haven’t been considering? How could you invite in new ways of sensing and knowing?

Discussion Prompts 

Talk about non-physical phenomena that have enriched your life. For me, it was when my dear friend was dying at a hospital two hours away from where I lived. It pained me not to be with her in person all the time. On more than one occasion we met in dreams reassuring us both that there was a way to be together despite the physical distance. 

Suggested Action

Blindfold yourself for an hour and see what you discover when you have to rely on other senses. I did this once in NYC for a whole day.

For children, watch Monsters, Inc. and discuss it. Available on Disney +.