When we practice loving all life, we begin our lessons in relationship.  Everything we learn we learn intimately, whether it be in psychotherapy, in spiritual practice, or in our family life.

True learning is not a matter of a neuron registering some fact with no involvement from ourselves; in order to know, we always must participate in the act of knowing.  Learning takes place not by acquiring something, but from opening up, dropping self-centered concerns, and meeting each other.

If when we encounter each other we wish for a true “meeting of minds,” we can only accomplish this through intimacy.  Learning or teaching, we exchange not just information but also something essential of ourselves.

Robert Rosenbaum, Zen and Psychotherapy