Yesterday, after beginning to read John O'Donohue's conversations with John Quinn, I woke up in the middle of the night, with these thoughts forming. I think many of us are not present to our own lives; it's as if we see the outline of ourselves but can't quite occupy them. We're either living smaller than we're made to be, or outside the frame of who we really are. I'm not one to believe that there is a guiding hand that decided for us in advance what kind of person we would turn out, but something emerges in formative years, aspirations mingling with wounds to produce a sense of calling. Later this solidifies into the answer to the questions about what brings both healing to the world and joy to the person doing the healing. How to fill the space that has been given you, no less and no more.