Ten Thousand Sorrows : The Extraordinary Journey of a Korean War Orphan

We all struggle alone through the ten thousand joys and ten thousand sorrows of our lives.

People said things to me like "They're just animals. They're here for our use." I had a visceral reaction to that phrase, maybe because I was told countless times during my growing-up years that I was "just like an animal." I had suffered much of my life because I was considered less than human. Animals were suffering because they were less than human. And it seemed to me that human didn't have much to be proud of, if they treated other living things with such blind cruelty.

I want true love in this life, and true contentment and peace. But maybe the only way I can find those things is to let go of the belief that this life is my reality.

I loved reading the Dalai Lama's words: "My religion is loving-kindness." I realized that meant loving-kindness to everyone in my life: past, present, and future; and that meant loving-kindness to myself--in my pain, in my jealousy, in my fear.

Fears and hopes and dreams and sorrows all will dissolve like the fog they are, and what will be left is the light and warmth of my deepest self or soul or whatever it might be.

I think that any loving act, even if it's only momentary, has a limitless power for good. A big part of the reason I feel that way is the memory I have of him.

Poetry first introduced me to the concept that pain could, perhaps, be viewed as 'the pain' and not 'my pain.' That sorrow and loneliness and abandonment were the human condition, not my sole possession

For years, well into my adult life, I had recurring nightmares about that desk. I'd be walking past it, barefoot on a cold, hard floor. I'd hear a sound like wind rushing through a tunnel and feel a magnetic force sucking me inside. I'd be pulled, helpless, underneath the scarred roll-top and into the cubbyholes where the papers were stashed. I'd find myself in a room with a dirt floor, strapped to a table, and people would be standing around branding ugly names on my body with hot irons

Everything vanishes someday! If love were to arrive, the knowledge that someday it would leave would be devastating. Everyone dies. Life changes us. Experiences and circumstances change us!