“We waste so much energy trying to cover up who we are when beneath every attitude is the want to be loved, and beneath every anger is a wound to be healed and beneath every sadness is the fear that there will not be enough time.
When we hesitate in being direct, we unknowingly slip something on, some added layer of protection that keeps us from feeling the world, and often that thin covering is the beginning of a loneliness which, if not put down, diminishes our chances of joy.
It’s like wearing gloves every time we touch something, and then, forgetting we chose to put them on, we complain that nothing feels quite real. Our challenge each day is not to get dressed to face the world but to unglove ourselves so that the doorknob feels cold and the car handle feels wet and the kiss goodbye feels like the lips of another being, soft and unrepeatable.”
— Mark Nepo
Welcome! I am a lawyer turned freelance writer, essayist, and editor. On staff at Literary Mama and the co-founder and co-editor of the literary journal, The Sunlight Press, my essays and reported work have appeared in The Washington Post, The Lily, Saveur, Civil Eats, Brain, Child, ESPN and elsewhere. I am currently at work on a memoir on grief and culture and how it provides perspective on life’s ordinary graces. I invite you to appreciate the ordinary with me. I hope my daily practice of seeing the magic in the mundane helps you celebrate and find more of these moments in your life too.
I love this quote, Rudri. I’ve been thinking about this a lot these couple of years and Mark Nepo captures it perfectly. I struggle with a friend who seems very reluctant to shed that exterior that says she has to appear perfect to others. It doesn’t help if I open up about my weaknesses first, as she seldom responds. Anyway, I really do love his words here – the whole idea of protecting ourselves with external layers…I wish more people were willing to live naked and honestly.
To feel. To be raw. To experience the world first hand – without gloves and masks. We get so much more and we give so much more when we do. This is lovely and so thought provoking.
So difficult to do.