Something To Think On

No bird can fly

without opening its wings,
and no one can love
without exposing their heart.

It is perhaps the oldest of inner laws, as inescapable as gravity. There is no chance of lifting into any space larger than yourself without revealing the parts you hold closest to your chest.

Any time you hesitate revealing who you are, picture yourself as a bird perched on a roof, wings tucked at your sides. To enter a relationship without opening your heart is to jump off that roof without spreading your wings.

It's true that baby birds hesitate the first time out of the nest, but once tasting the air, it is in their nature to open and rise, and close and land. This is their life. It is ours too.

The paradox, of course, is that we must trust that the power to lift and land, for us, is in revealing what we hide. Once revealed, these tender things become our wings.

-The Book of Awakening, Marc Nepo