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Dec 11, 2023

"Without warning, thresholds can open directly before our feet...In the ecstasy and loneliness of one's life, there are certain times when blessing is nearer to us.

" --John O'Donohue

How to Bless Each Other

"Every once in the bluest moon, if you are lucky, you encounter someone with such powerful and generous light in their eyes that they rekindle the lost light within you and return it magnified; someone whose calm, kind, steady gaze penetrates the very center of your being and, refusing to look away from even the most shadowy parts of you, falls upon you like a benediction.

That we can do this for each other, but that it happens so rarely, is both the great miracle and the great tragedy, for there is no loneliness like the loneliness of having your light unmet. The great Irish poet and philosopher John ODonohue (January 1, 1956January 4, 2008) takes up these immense and intimate questions in the opening pages of his altogether wonderful final book To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings (public library) -- his parting gift to the world, published just before his untimely death, celebrating the gift that a blessing can be..." Maria Popova shares more.