Dear friends,

A teacher once said, “If you think you can wake up without breaking open, you’re mistaken.”

Growth is not polite.
Truth is not always gentle.
And transformation often hurts.

But it hurts like birth hurts.
Like muscles growing hurt.
Like a heart opening wider than it ever has before.

We don’t heal alone.

Even when we think we must.

Every great turning in your life involved another human being—someone who listened, someone who stayed, someone who did not turn away when you were afraid.

We are not meant to carry everything by ourselves.
We are meant to carry one another.

It doesn’t mean we fix each other.
It means we refuse to abandon one another.

When you walk through grief and someone sits beside you, you are changed.
When you face uncertainty and someone lights a candle, you are changed.

This is what community means:
Not agreement.
Not sameness.
But shared courage.

We are not strong alone.
We are strong together.

That is not sentimental.
That is survival.
That is love.

With metta,
Jack

*This article was inspired by themes from my new book out now, All In This Together: Stories and Teachings for Loving Each Other and Our World.