In Jack Kornfield’s book on meditation, A Path With Heart, he tells about counseling a woman whose husband had died. The woman and her husband had been active in a number of different spiritual communities, and in the aftermath of his death, members from all of those communities rushed to comfort her. Their words of comfort confused her because, as you might expect, they conflicted with each other.

Kornfield asked her to consider carefully what she actually knew herself to be true. “If she put aside the Tibetan teachings, the Sufi teachings, the Christian mystical teachings and looked in her own being and heart, what did she already know that was so certain that even if Jesus and the Buddha were to sit in the same room and say, ‘No, it’s not,’ she could look them straight in the eye and say, ‘Yes, it is.’”

It’s a powerful idea I think, that there are things we absolutely know to be true, and that maybe those truths are enough to guide us through even the scariest, loneliest, saddest times.

So, of course, I made a list of my truths. Here are four of them…

1. We are all connected.
2. At the heart of fearless love lies a willingness to be vulnerable.
3. Everything changes; the greatest trick of all is knowing when to hold fast and when to let go.
4. No one looks good in Speedos. (It’s not helpful, but it is true.)

Okay, your turn. What are your truths?