God Bless the Brave, the Compassionate, the Exhausted

I need today to divert today from my usual theme of sobriety and seeking a higher power. Instead, I will share a passage from The Endless Practice, by Mark Nepo (https://www.amazon.com/Mark-Nepo/e/B001JOVBDG?ref_=dbs_p_pbk_r00_abau_000000).

I don't know what he was trying to say, but he hit a bullseye in today's battle against coronavirus. This is dedicated to doctors, nurses, paramedics, firefighters, and others who are on the front line battling covid-19.

"That we go numb along the way is to be expected. Even the bravest among us who give their lives to care for others, go numb with fatigue when the heart can take in no more, when we need time to digest all we meet. Overloaded and overwhelmed, we start to pull back from the world, so we can internalize what the world keeps giving us. Perhaps the noblest private act is the unheralded effort to return: to open our hearts once they have closed, to open our souls once they have shied away, to soften our minds once they've been hardened by the storms of our day....

"Our compassion waits there to revive us."