"The Erotic is the Antidote to Death" This line is another great one from the amazing Esther Perel. What does it mean? It means that when we study our deepest desires and longings, we come alive. We experience more daily joy. We become who we are meant to be. Why is that? Because, at the deepest level, the desire that animates us and moves through us isn't really "ours." It doesn't belong to us. It is Life's desire, moving within us, like a river. Like the breath, breathing us. Desire aches...
13 days ago • 1 min read
When Desires Clash I like the perks of my stable job, but I keep dreaming of quitting and starting my own business. I love my committed partner, but I miss the excitement of dating new people. I really want to get fit and go to the gym every day, and yet my bed calls to me for more sleep each morning. Have you been caught in the tug-of-war between two powerful, competing desires? Each side pleading with you to follow it for more comfort, excitement, safety or joy? How do you handle it? Most...
15 days ago • 1 min read
I Can't Get No Satisfaction Everything was going fine for my meditation client, Luke. He had a busy job, great family, and yet, his overwhelming feeling was one of depression and numbness. He had lost interest in sex with his wife and didn’t experience a lot of joy from his work or his family. When I asked him where he found pleasure in his life, he drew a blank. “I guess when we go on vacation to a new place,” he finally responded, after several minutes of searching. “How often do you go on...
17 days ago • 3 min read
Get Your Hopes Up I went home for Thanksgiving by myself about three weeks after I started dating someone new. Over the holiday, I could not stop thinking about my new relationship. Would it last? Was he thinking about me? Would calling him look needy? Would not calling him be rude? Why wasn’t he calling me? Was that a bad sign? Around and around these thoughts went in the miserable echo chamber of my mind. One evening, my aunt asked me about the relationship. I filled her in and then told...
about 1 month ago • 2 min read
Stepping into Desire I spent many years trying to slice out desire from my life, believing that if I did, I would end my suffering. After all, so much of my time was spent wanting things I didn't have and not wanting things that I did. I found Buddhism because I thought it would help me to remove my desires and allow me to FINALLY just be happy with what I had, forever. Fortunately, I feel very differently about desire now. I have seen how it wasn't my desire that was the problem, but my...
about 1 month ago • 2 min read
August 27, 2025 Through Heartbreak and Renewal: Introducing Sefira Wellness Dear Ones, How are you all holding up? This summer has been busy and wonderful and challenging. I've been crying and praying about the horrors - near and far - and donating money to groups like Standing Together and the Immigrant Defense Project. I've spent a LOT of time with my kids. I spent a few weeks doing some deep Jewish learning with the Shalom Hartman Institute in Berkeley CA, combined with a life-changing,...
2 months ago • 2 min read
Dear Ones, I've been thinking about scarcity mentality a lot lately. Scarcity mentality is the belief that there isn’t enough—enough time, enough love, enough success, enough space at the table. It is not about the very real resource scarcity that many in our world are facing at the moment. Scarcity mentality is when we actually have more than enough of what we need but instead we feel like if someone else has something, there’s less left for you. But scarcity mentality is just one way of...
5 months ago • 1 min read
Dear Ones, Last week I shared a haiku that I wrote* and it led me to find this gem on the internet from 2018, when John Paul Lederach was on the On Being podcast and offered a number of haikus. Here are some of my favorites. Don’t ask the mountain / to move. Just take a pebble/ each time you visit. Wild and unruly. / Quiet enough to be held. / Silence between words. Smile. Offer gratitude. Leave the poem. We never know, really, where change begins. Do you have any favorite haikus that you...
5 months ago • 1 min read
Dear Ones,Wow, I am aliveAliveness is just like thisAliveness just isI made this haiku for you! I’ve been thinking about real, human aliveness in the age of rapidly all-encompassing AI everything. At the science museum this weekend, I stood in the heat-seeking camera and saw my body heat reflected on the screen. I felt so comforted by the red and orange glow reflected back at me - proof of my aliveness! I didn’t really realize I was doubting it before that moment, but its undeniability on the...
5 months ago • 1 min read