(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) We live in a culture of denial and youth. How can we find a freedom of heart in this world of birth and death? We can start by acknowledging that everything is subject to change. Death is an advisor that can give us clarity about what really matters.

We can be the loving witness of this life, yet not cling to it. We can cherish life, yet in the end we will have to let go.

As Mary Oliver writes:

To live in this world

you must be able

to do three things:

to love what is mortal;

to hold it

against your bones knowing

your own life depends on it;

and, when the time comes to let it go,

to let it go.