There is an old story: a heartless general, at the head of a ruthless army, devastates village after village. He arrives at a temple and, to his surprise, finds the gate unlocked. In the middle of the courtyard within kneels a monk. The general dismounts, unsheathes his sword, and approaches the monk. The monk fails to prostrate himself before the general, which offends him. “Do you not know who I am? I am not afraid to kill you,” to which the monk replies, “Do you not know who I am? I am not afraid to die.”….Matilda and I worked together for quite a while, and she taught me more about courage than any colleague, friend or family member ever did. And one of the most important lessons we learned together was to embrace the truth of her mortality, while understanding that now, she was alive. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross hoped that, as people normalized the grief process around death, that they would paradoxically become freer to embrace the vitality that was yet in them. The monk doesn’t want to die, but he has embraced the eventuality of it, and it no longer frightens him. He cannot be threatened…and when we talk of safety, isn’t that what we’re really talking about? Continue Reading The Illusion of Safety, and How to Get Past It