It came to me while reflecting on that woodland encounter with the night that there are two very valuable spiritual gifts that simplicity gives to us. It seems the more we can strip our lives down to essentials, the more deliberately and awake we can live; with few wants and more time for silence and contemplation, the more we have access to our inner resources. The more lightly we walk on this earth, the more she gives to us. I call these spiritual gifts inner smiling and outgoingness of the heart.
...But we do have to figure out how to create narratives — amongst people who hold very similar beliefs, but also with those who do not... All of those ideologies are, at heart, antidotes to the deep sadness at the heart of everyday life. We need better ones.