At the same moment when I see this stuff, my heart hurts. But you don’t protect your heart from breaking, because a broken heart is like cracking a shell to let the deeper heart come forth.
Cultivating a compassionate heart is like the monk who is crying because his son has died, and his student comes up and says, “What are you crying about? You know it is all illusion.” The monk replies, “Yes, but the death of a son is the greatest illusion.”
You don’t close off your humanity, but if you don’t find balance within that humanity you’ll burn out. If you don’t balance your humanity you end up putting armor around your heart, and if you armor your heart you’ll starve to death; that’s why you burn out, because you’re not getting fed.
If you are going to be free, your freedom means that you do not avert your eyes from anything, in yourself or in anyone else.
– Ram Dass
