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strangers thank you for listening what’s
up folks
Xavier katana here with another home run
episode
this is mrs. Elizabeth lesser she is the
founder of the Omega Institute and
author of her new book marrow a love
story all I can say about this
conversation is wow it felts like
speaking to a long-lost old friend that
I hadn’t seen or heard from in in a long
time and the conversation flowed so
seamlessly and there’s a vibe or a
presence that Elizabeth has that you
feel immediately and it is just a
calming resonance that hopefully
translates through this this recording
please pick up a copy of her book marrow
a love story it is truly a great read
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is
one of the best episodes we’ve done
hands down mrs. Elizabeth lesser thank
you guys so much for listening the human
experience in session our guest today is
mrs. Elizabeth lesser Elizabeth
welcome to hxp thank you thanks for
having me
Elizabeth I I admire your work so much
starting from co-founding the Omega
Institute in 1977 you have such a wide
history and can you kind of lay the
foundation for anyone who may not know
who you are please okay well that’s what
I’ve been trying to figure out my whole
life Who am I
but what I’ve done what I’ve done as
opposed to Who I am
is well very young in my early 20s a
bunch of us were studying with a
spiritual teacher it was that time in
American history when everything was in
flux and you know politically and
socially and it was also the time when
these gurus from the East were washing
up on the shores of America and I was
raised in an atheist intellectual family
and all I ever wanted was as a kid was
to have a spiritual life I don’t know
where it came from
but when those gurus started making it
to the cover of Time magazine and I was
still in high school I was like I want
one of them and I went to college and
but what I really wanted to do was to
find a spiritual teacher and when I was
19 I did and he was an amazing man with
it like a renaissance kind of man an
Eastern teacher but a Western thinker as
well and it was his idea to start a
school of holistic studies and a lot of
what we were interested in at that time
was way at the fringe of American
culture things like yoga and meditation
and food as
medicine and natural foods and
alternative healing things that are very
much part of American culture now
Western culture but weren’t then and
that was his idea put myself and my
ex-husband in charge of starting this
school and we had no idea that Omega
Institute as we called it would turn
into what it is today
30,000 people come every year to our
workshops and trainings and we offer
like a very wide array of workshops to
people from all over the world we didn’t
know that that’s what we’d be starting
then but that is what ended up happening
yeah
Omega is so huge from Maya Angelou to
Deepak Chopra to ROM das to Eckhart
Tolle there’s so many visionaries that
are kind of part of what you’re doing
and I’m just digging right in here and
if there’s there’s one specific thing
that kind of defines you through all of
your hurdles and with with setting up
this this sort of Institute and the
books you’ve written I mean you’re a
best-selling author and just everything
that you’ve done your life what would
you say is that would be the defining
moment of that you know some people have
had an awakening in a defining moment
like you mentioned Eckhart Tolle and
people who say like I woke up and then I
was enlightened like that’s I I have not
had that experience I I would say the
defining experience for me which is
still going on is that we are all this
we are all the same we are so similar
people will say to me what’s it like
being around all those great spiritual
teachers and scientists and artists and
famous people and oh my god you must
have met such amazing people and and I
forever even when I was 21 years old and
starting
megha and even becoming a best-selling
author my experience has always been
everyone even the wisest among us the
Dalai Lama and Eckhart Tolle A’s and
whomever we’re all the same everyone
struggles everyone gets confused
no one is nice and good all the time we
get up we we vow that we’re going to put
into practice the wisdom we know and we
fail and we try again and I’ve learned
this by being around people who others
put on pedestals and I’ve seen them fall
and I’ve seen their paradoxes and
inconsistencies and what it’s given me
is a great sense of compassion toward
myself for my imperfections and toward
other people I I am NOT after perfection
I’m after authenticity and that’s what I
value in people and I think that is what
I have learned over my years of being a
seeker I think more and more
authenticity seems to be the current the
current kind of currency
I mean without authenticity of what do
we really what do you really have and
why are we doing it who are we trying to
impress and what do you get after you’ve
impressed other people you still left
with your life and yourself Elizabeth
you’ve written marrow this new book
which which actually details your your
actual help of your you were helping
your sister by donating marrow to her
and this affected you on both a
spiritual level and a physical level I
mean can you tell us more about this yes
my younger sister I come from a family
of four girls and the sister right next
to me very close in age her name is
Maggie had gotten seven years previously
a virulent strain of lymphoma and she’d
gone into remission for seven years but
then it came back and when a cancer
comes back as
you all probably know it’s very hard to
treat it again and so this time she
needed a bone marrow transplant and
siblings are the best bet for tissue
match so all the siblings got tested and
we were very surprised when it turned
out that the person who tested a perfect
match was me and I was surprised because
my sister Maggie and I were very
different kinds of people and we loved
each other but we also had a you know
kind of a rich typical sibling history
of being friends and being strangers and
betraying each other and loving each
other and the whole thing that siblings
go through and when I studied up on what
it meant to be a bone marrow donor and
to be a bone marrow recipient I I was
intrigued to read in a lot of the
research that after my sister if indeed
she did survive the chemotherapy
treatment in order to be prepared for
the bone marrow transplant she still
would have a long recovery and with lots
of dangers and the biggest danger would
be if she would reject my bone marrow
once it was transplanted in or maybe my
bone marrow would attack her attack and
rejection rejection and attack these are
the two words that come up in a lot of
the literature and I thought wow that
sounds familiar
um especially with sisters and siblings
like that’s what we’ve done our whole
life with each other we’ve either
rejected each other or attacked and I
thought I wonder if we could do some
kind of ritual or therapy or something
where we would relive our childhood
together and visit how we rejected or
attacked each other and like put it
aside and work through it and walk into
a field of unconditional love and maybe
we could teach ourselves to do the same
thing once they’ve been transplanted and
I had to be careful recommending
to my sister because she’s not like me
and didn’t have the same interests and
the same compulsion to go deep all the
time she had sort of a bemused attitude
about my work and books but she was very
very into this idea and so we did over
the course of many months what we called
our soul marrow transplant yeah tell us
more about this the soul marrow
transplant and how did I mean what and
what was involved in this as as you kind
of opened up to each other well um well
first of all I’ll just tell you what I
mean by soul cuz it’s kind of a loaded
word well it was for my sister I had
explained to her what I meant you know
the ancient Greeks believed that every
human being came into life as a baby
with something they called the genius
which was like this indwelling spirit a
guide almost that if you got in touch
with it and especially if your parents
and your school your culture helped you
like determine oh that’s that’s his
genius he’s like this let’s help that
person discover exactly who he is not
who we think he should be or the other
siblings are like or or the culture
needs like oh let’s let’s promote the
indwelling genius and that’s the way I
relate to the word soul like we each
come in with this shining seed of who we
are and then parents try to help us fit
in try to make us fit in schools do
siblings do and layer by layer we cover
the soul the authenticity the authentic
seed of who we are and and then we
relate to each other kind of
surface-to-surface so this our soul
marrow transplant though it’s what my
sister and I did with the help of the
therapist
was we we tried to show each other
exactly who we were and that included
how we hurt each other and what we
really had been thinking why we did some
of the things we did you know for
example there were quite a few years in
our young adulthood when my sister
rejected me and I couldn’t be close with
her and I never knew what it was but I
never bothered to ask her either you
know the way we just kind of build up
these stories believe them and never
check them out and as it turned out her
reason for doing that was such a painful
one for her it really had nothing to do
with me it had more to do with her
marriage and what if her husband wanted
her to do but she never told me that I
never told her my hurt and what was so
amazing about our experience was and
this was made easier in a way because of
the life-and-death nature of what we
were doing was that all she had to say
was oh my god I didn’t know you were
hurt this is why I did it
and just hearing that everything
disappeared all the years of pain and
rejection disappeared and there we were
together like our souls intact relating
to each other soul to soul so that’s
what we called our soul marrow
transplant and so by the time we went
into the bone marrow transplant we felt
really ready to give and receive
interesting so I just want to read a
small passage from from your book it’s
part of your your field note that well
the field notes are my sister’s words
the field notes are my sister when I
started writing the book you know
memoirs a very we’re very dicey risky
form to write and in this case it was so
much about my sister I wanted to get her
approval and I was reading her early
versions of the book and she also wrote
and she wanted me to
perhaps include some of her writing in
the book and that’s what we call her
field notes okay let me
I really am really touched by this
passage so I I want to I want the
listeners din to hear it field notes
March fifth now that it’s a possibility
I have to decide about the transplant I
feel trapped with no way out damned if I
do damned if I don’t I’m frozen in place
my hair is falling out I’m down to
ninety five pounds I hurt everywhere in
my body and in my heart today I saw my
daughter we were driving down the road
with the intention of going shopping
my only go goal for the outing was to
stay positive
but as I drove I began to break down and
we when we pulled over I could no longer
contain my crying it goes on I mean this
book is so touching why take this why
why bring it to this format why write a
book about it well that’s the question
anyone who is called by memoir asks
herself or himself every day of writing
you know I I kind of answered that
question the way a mountain climber
would answer why would you climb that
mountain in the middle of winter like
what would you do that and they say
because it’s there and for me the it
that’s always there are the deep deep
questions of life life struggle
suffering joy bliss letting go death I
let me tell you I would way prefer to
write cookbooks or a book about knitting
or something but I am called to the deep
I always have been I was as a child and
when I wrote my first book the Seekers
guide it’s a very big book and it’s very
researched but I also used my own life
as a seeker weaving through it not very
much of my own life but some and people
would say to me oh I loved your book
actually I didn’t read the whole thing
actually I just read those stories about
you and so I thought well if I write
another book I probably since I write
about the very deep human issues I
promised write more about myself so when
I wrote broken open how difficult times
can help us grow I ended up writing it
as a memoir and my difficult times the
biggest one I wrote about in that book
was getting divorced and becoming a
single mother and um lo and behold much
to my surprise it became a New York
Times bestseller and I was on Oprah
several times and suddenly all of my
dirty laundry was flapping in the breeze
for everyone to read about and it didn’t
really bother me about myself
I don’t mind revealing my about myself
but I felt really bad for my family
members and my friends because when you
write about difficult times you end up
writing about people and so I vowed I
will never write a memoir again like I’m
just sick of writing about myself I feel
sorry for my family but I was wanting to
write about this idea of authenticity
and I tried to write it as a novel I
tried to write fiction I spent two years
working on a novel and now I look back
at it and I think oh my god I should
have finished that novel because it was
about a woman politician trying to be
authentic in a world of disingenuous
Ness and that would have been very
relevant today but I just couldn’t
wrestle a novel that formed to the
ground is just like not my form and then
when I went through this experience with
my sister each one of us trying to offer
the other one our our most authentic
clear loving self I thought well here’s
the form to write a book about
the truth of authenticity like what does
it really mean to be authentic and how
can we do it with each other
because if all we’re doing in trying to
become authentic is about me me me it’s
I’m not interested in that I’m more
interested in what would happen if we
all related to each other from our core
selves didn’t hide out from each other
who weren’t embarrassed about being who
we were were accepting of the others
authenticity that’s what I’m really
interested in so that’s why I wrote the
book okay okay you’re also a segue
artist you’re going into broken open and
seekers guide to which I have questions
for but let’s let’s stick with
authenticity because this is this seems
to be your main kind of message that you
seem to be relating here so why don’t we
define that what is how do you define
authenticity I’m fine authenticity has a
way of uncovering it’s a path I don’t
think one should hold out in front of
oneself this idea that I will finally
get to Who I am and I will rest there
and then I’ll know it’s more a path of
constant uncovering at the very very
very deepest core of who we are is
something that I almost hesitate to talk
about because it sounds kind of cheesy
and unobtainable and that’s that we are
all one we are all a fabric together but
on the way to that when we we get out of
the way our shame of our body our
discomfort with our eccentricities all
the voices in our heads who tell us
you’re bad if you’d want that you’re
good if you do that all the way that
we’ve been conditioned to exist in
family and culture
it’s uncovering those voices and seeing
okay
some of them really maybe me but some of
them aren’t who am i if I really just
allow that shining seed to take root and
blossom and grow where would it lead me
what would I do if I was listening to
that inner voice so it’s the great art
of uncovering and a beautiful thing
about being an authenticity seeker today
is that there’s so many ways to conduct
the search psychotherapy to me is like a
holy type of seeking trying to quiet the
voices who who give us bad advice
healing the body is a way of uncovering
the soul because often what we’ve done
is our physical ailment is actually a
way of defending against what we’re
feeling you know a lot of people who say
they overeat so they don’t feel they
don’t take care of themselves on taking
care of the body healing the body making
the body strong making the body vibrant
can be a way to uncover the soul and so
can the traditional religious and
spiritual parents there was a there was
a TED talk that you did that I found
really remarkable you you said something
that I found really remarkable at the
beginning of the TED talk you said that
there was within the room that there
were 600 people but there’s actually so
many more because in each one of us
there’s a multitude of personalities and
you said that in yourself you have two
primary personalities that are in
conflict and conversation and you call
them the mystic and the warrior can you
can you define that a little bit
more for us yeah and actually that sweet
spot where the mystic and the warrior
meet that’s close to what I would call
my authentic self and that’s often the
case in people like there are a lot of
conflicting ideas and proclivities and
we’re afraid to marry them all see what
would happen so for me my mystic self I
was born with my mystic self and by
mystic I mean someone who allows the
mystery of human existence to kind of
work on me and I’ve always wanted to
explore the mysteries Who am I where did
I come from how do I live while I’m here
where do I go when I die this is the
mystic the mystic is someone who
fearlessly wants to explore those
questions so that’s alive and well in me
and I was raised by social activists and
intellectuals and my parents truly
believed and in their own life lived out
this ethos of you must give back to the
community
you must stay aware you must work for
justice my mother was very involved in
anti-war and social justice movements my
father was a naturalist and an
environmentalist and I often think like
I had like Rosa Parks and Henry David
Thoreau as my parents like that’s what
we were raised to do and to be so I took
up very with a lot of energy that called
to always give back to the community but
I also had this much bigger picture of
human life which was the mystic part of
me and when I got to college I felt
those two urges in diametrically opposed
to each other
the MS
stick said drop out of life go become a
nun
just follow the spiritual path and the
activist in me was very angry and what
was going on in the world and I wanted
to do something about it so that idea of
like all as well that’s what the mystic
feels all makes sense all as well don’t
stress don’t worry and then the angry
one who wanted to do justice in the
world they have been in conversation my
whole way yeah Wow it’s so powerful you
know I just there’s you know there’s so
much kind of advice and I mean you
you’ve been around so many people who
and you know and you’re at the beginning
of this conversation we kind of talked
about you know how we’re all kind of the
same and we tend to put the people that
we look up to on two pedestals and
there’s a lot of hero worship that
happens there do do you notice that
happens with yourself do you notice that
happens towards you with it from other
people oh that’s such a great question I
I’m shocked when it happens toward me
and I’m kind of I guess I’m kind of
naive about that on a couple of levels
one I have worked so hard not to do that
with other people and I’ve had a great
opportunity to make that a practice not
to put people on pedestals not to do
that because one it’s not the truth no
one no human being no matter how famous
or rich or learn it or wise or
experienced no one is immune to the
struggle of being human everyone
struggles the wisest people have moments
of dark depression and despair and the
most famous and rich people can be
miserably
happy I mean I’ve met the greatest
relationship experts in the world who
are getting divorced and I’ve met the
you know organization guru whose car is
a mess as she drives into the Omega
parking love like it’s just and this
this has never really upset me or made
me cynical it’s more like oh my goodness
human beings are a mess we’re all a mess
and we’re all trying and we’re all
looking for help but just because
someone can help you doesn’t mean
they’ve got it also not and I know this
because I’ve met the greatest helpers in
the world so when people put me on a
pedestal I think it’s kind of silly
but I also have become more and more
comfortable with accepting the role of
someone who has walked a few steps
farther on this path and and I do indeed
have skills and wisdom to offer so I try
to hold it very lightly yeah I agree I
really do believe that you have a lot of
wisdom to offer and that’s a very humble
stance that that you’ve taken on your
position on just of holding other people
in that regard I love it
so I mean Elizabeth II I mean Omegan Stu
was do you started this in 1977 so it’s
39 years ago for decades this is a long
time running I mean what what is your
vision for this and what has been the
vision for this and where is it where is
it kind of going and from here on well
fortunately for me there’s a whole crew
of people now running Omega on a
day-to-day basis I used to live and
breathe it and work it 24/7 in the very
beginning we didn’t know what we were
doing we’re a bunch of young people
running after a dream and it
taught us everything we know and we made
no money and we’re real visionaries
zealots and it has grown into a real
institution and it has a very large
staff now and other people who are
running it and they could more clearly
tell you the vision for today although I
will I will tell you some things about
that because I am involved still but
what we always envisioned it to be and
and what we have always strived to make
sure it maintains is a sense of
community you know the the church where
the synagogue used to be in this country
like the place where people went at
least once a week to feel part of
something bigger than themselves like a
tribe of explorers of the human
condition at least once a week you could
go there and there would be inspiration
and solace and tradition and ritual and
that just does not exist for most people
anymore and that is a human need the
sense to belong to a group of
like-minded people exploring what it
means to be alive and we often joke at
Omega like our catalog comes out every
year and there’s more than 300 workshops
and trainings in the catalog and we joke
that it’s really one workshop and then
we just stick different words in it and
of course that’s not true because there
are things like learning acupuncture or
learning African drumming or the whole
thing in-between but what we mean is
that what people are really coming for
is because Omega gives them an oasis in
this supercharged world this busy busy
connected world this world where you
never put your cell phone down and
you’re working all the time and you’re
just trying to get through the day
Omega gives you a respite an oasis where
you can come and relax and disconnect a
little and
talk to people on a deeper level people
will always say to me I met someone at
lunch in the dining room and I think I
know her better than I know my best
friends because we just immediately went
deep together and that’s that’s our
purpose it’s always been our purpose to
create a community of like-minded people
who are learning and growing together
and you know over the years different
subject matters percolate up to fit the
needs of the culture and over that I’d
say the past eight years maybe 10 I
don’t know we have we have felt the need
to do what we’ve called the movement
from me to we that we have really
perfected workshops about taking care of
yourself and now we’ve really wanted to
guide people toward self-care meeting up
with care of our world which is in such
a need of wisdom and care and that’s why
a lot of our initiatives now besides our
regular workshops which we maintain are
things like a lot of work for veterans
responding to vets coming home with PTSD
and while working with them we have a
Women’s Leadership Institute that is
helping women learn how to trust their
voice in leadership so that maybe we
could do power differently and another
big part of our curriculum is
environmental work training individuals
and municipalities and other
constituents to have a lighter footprint
so I mean what does this taught you I
mean it so I mean you’re not running it
now but you were you co-founded it and
you or the core of it for a long time so
what did it what did it teach you to
organize something that now is affecting
so many people
well let’s see you know of course I’m
the most mundane level it taught me
quite a bit of the subject matter
because my job for most of my years
there was programming choosing our
faculty and also writing our catalogue
so I would have to take large books and
turn them into pithy little to paragraph
descriptions of a workshop or a
professional training so I learned a
whole lot about a whole lot of subjects
from science and brain science and
different religions and music and art
and so I have kind of a broad knowledge
of a lot of subjects but um I think I
think what it taught me the most is the
idea of working really really hard for
one thing really choosing something to
focus on and giving it your all all of
your concentration and study and work
and love and you know people will often
ask me like how do I find my purpose in
life that’s a very loaded question but
my answer probably disappoints them
which is just pick something something
even if it’s a little close to your
heart and work on it for 20 years
work on it really hard and you will be
given so much you’ll give be given way
more than that one thing because there’s
a great joy in in completion and seeing
things to the end and doing something
that serves other people so that’s one
of the big lessons for me is picking
something and sticking to it I mean it’s
the same thing as you could say for a
marriage that that if you’re always
looking for that work to be the perfect
thing before you commit you’re never
gonna find it but if you commit to
something that’s pretty darn good but
not perfect you get to perfect yourself
Wow so profound so you know Elizabeth I
it’s it’s kind of hilarious to me
sometimes because we get we get a lot of
emails here at the show and a lot of
different types of feedback and you know
people people kind of just expect the
show to kind of run and even when even
when the guests kind of come on you know
just they just expect everything to work
properly they have no idea that I’m that
I’m working you know like eight or nine
different knobs here and making sure the
levels are right and and then all
everything that is behind the engine
that you know that we’re kind of
creating here and is there something
that that you kind of connect that
analogy to yes well the first thing that
comes up is and I’ve learned this from
working at Omega with a lot of different
people we have a large staff and when
you’re in a leadership position the
people who work with you really want you
to know what they’re doing they want you
to see what they’re doing not because
they’re narcissists because as you say
people are always doing way more than
you think they are always what it takes
to do one thing takes 40 things and as I
have stopped as a leader and turned
around and looked at the people who work
with me and really seeing what they’re
doing so that they are seen and I know
what my business really takes to run
it’s a really important aspect of
leadership to do that with the people
you employ to really know what they’re
doing and I the the law of work to me is
that everything takes longer and ever
is working harder than you think and
give everyone that benefit of the doubt
now of course there’s always charlatans
and lazy people but most people are
working their tail off and you just
don’t know it Elizabeth
you know we’re we’re about 40 minutes in
to the interview and if there’s one
thing that you could kind of give to
someone who’s made it this far into the
episode and what I mean what what is
something that you would give someone
who is you know struggling with
self-doubt has has trouble with finding
sort of their life mission someone who
is struggling I mean what do you do what
do you tell to that what do you say to
that person
well the first thing I say and I’m gonna
sound like a broken record is that you
are not alone there is nothing uniquely
screwed up about you and that that
secret shame we carry around that
everyone else was given the instruction
book that but we weren’t is really
crippling because on top of the general
difficulty of being human we add this
layer of everybody else hasn’t figured
out we don’t you know you know the poet
Rumi he always talks about the open
secret and by that he means we we all go
around hiding this big secret from each
other and that secret is almost a joke
because it’s not really a secret we all
try to hide from each other that we wake
up confused that sometimes we fail we
are sad a lot we don’t know what to do
we don’t know if we’ve made the right
choice we struggle we fail we fall but
we try to hide that from each other so
you meet a friend on the street and you
say hey how are you oh I’m great how are
you oh I’m great and both people are not
great they have something going on
that’s that’s you know hurting their
heart but since one said great then the
other says great and then we walk away
and both are thinking something like god
I wonder why she has it all together or
oh I bet her kids are all doing great in
school and and it’s it’s not that we
need to all go around and complain to
each other all the time but by hiding
the sense that we suffer we miss out on
real help and connectivity and intimacy
and and we have this secret shame all
the time and I really believe that
letting go of that and owning your
humaneness with
a sense of humour and a sense of
belonging to this odd life we live our
living that is way more than half the
end to the suffering now that’s that’s
only half the way but by putting down
that burden of thinking that you’re
uniquely screwed up all sorts of helpful
hands come to help you because suddenly
you’re just being a receptive human
being and there’s a lot of help out
there and I feel it’s like angels appear
for the one who is vulnerable and open
and real and that may sound whoa whoa
but I have experienced it in my own life
when I put down defensive nough sand
disingenuous –mess life rushes in to
help me so that’s the greatest greatest
advice I have yeah Wow love it you’re
really big on meditation you have a blog
a toolbox for daily life where you kind
of just post stuff that people can use
one of the things I guess you would say
it would be medicine is meditation
why is meditation so important well for
me it’s been really important some
people get the same effect from other
kinds of spiritual tools so you don’t
have to meditate but for me meditation
has been a tremendous friend and I’ve
done it so much now that I can access it
in a second just by shifting my posture
or breathing in a certain way but it’s
the kind of practice that you know it’s
the word practice like you practice to
be a great basketball player by doing
drills or scales on the piano
meditation is a practice so that you can
become skilled at the art of living it’s
not you don’t meditate to like become
the best meditator or have like the
hippest
yoga mat or something the practice of
meditation is the the best way I can
explain it in a quick way is you look at
the posture in the great iconography of
religions like the Buddha with his
straight back or Joan of Arc on the
horse lots of different religions have
this same posture in their leaders which
is a strong straight back a warrior back
but the front the heart is open and soft
and you see this both in paintings where
you actually see the heart like Mary in
her straight back and her blue veil but
her heart is illuminated so the practice
of meditation is a straight back meaning
I am strong and a very very soft and
open heart and when I meditate after
years of doing it working with different
teachers what I do is I take that
posture and I feel like I’m riding on a
horse and I am so balanced and so strong
in my back but I’m so sensitive that I
can feel even a tiny wind in my heart
and that’s what meditation has taught me
how to be both strong and boundary and
clear and clean and also open and kind
and good and compassionate and I can say
those words and you can hear them
intellectually but the practice of
meditation actually teaches you how to
be both strong and soft it’s beautiful
it’s perfect
that’s one of the best definitions of
meditation I’ve ever heard I want to I
want to give you the chance to kind of
if you could if you could go back to the
25 year old Elizabeth lesser and give
her one piece of advice one one thing
that you could tell her would there be
is there something that you would tell
her
well you
that wonderful poem from Rilke Rainer
Maria Rilke or he says it’s in his
little tiny book it’s a great book it’s
called letters to a young artist I think
that’s what it’s called and he says well
I can’t tell you that
now he’s writing he’s probably 50 and
he’s writing to a 25 year old artist
something like that he’s like I can’t
tell you what to do
cuz you wouldn’t be able to hear it
because that’s not what you’re supposed
to hear now you’re supposed to be
confused now and then he tells him live
the questions now and then one day maybe
you will find yourself living in to the
answers so I guess I would say to my 25
year old self like don’t be freaked out
by those questions that are really
tricky I have to admit of life and death
and what should I do and who am i and
who should I marry and should I stay
married and just live really fully into
those questions like know that everyone
has those questions and live them out
and be fearless and brave and somehow
trust that you will live into the
answers Oh God so beautiful I I don’t
know how to ask anything else eh I think
we should pretty much wrap it up there
Elizabeth where can where can people
find your work your website the book
well my book comes out on September 20th
my new book mero my other books are on
amazon and other bookstores of course
and my website is elizabeth lesser dot
o-r-g ok guys we have been talking to
mrs. Elizabeth lesser the book is called
marrow a love story comes out on
September 20th you can pick that up on
Amazon and book stores Elizabeth is also
going to be doing a book tour make sure
you get to her web
site elizabeth lesser org to find out
where she’s going to be if you’re
interested in seeing her thank you guys
so much for listening this is the human
experience we will see you guys next
week
you