We are fans of Mark Nepo. On our site you’ll find pages and pages of interviews, reviews, book excerpts, spiritual practices, and blog posts from and about him going back a quarter century. He is one of our most essential Living Spiritual Teachers.
This new book is all about friendship, which Nepo explores in many respects, from “deep companionship” to self-giving, empathy, and discovering what is real in life with the help of another person. He offers spiritual-practice suggestions called “Thresholds to Friendship” at the end of each short chapter in the form of journal prompts and promptings of topics to discuss with a friend of your own.
Early chapters are about our universal need for friendship, looking for friends, finding and building friendships. “All of the traditions speak of a glowing bond with others that is needed to move through the tangle that is our lives,” Nepo writes. And short teachings appear in summary at the end of chapters, such as this one: “Meeting, sitting, listening, and helping are the resources that allow us to discover the friend that waits in every stranger.”
Then the book moves into the uniqueness of each deep friendship and how to foster this spirit with other people. In one late chapter, Nepo describes his long-time friendship with fellow spiritual author and teacher Parker Palmer and ruminates on the importance of authenticity in life. Reflecting on how important it is to have a friend with whom you can be your honest self, Nepo quotes Parker saying to him: “You know, there is only one reality and the only way to experience it is to be real.”
Nepo also points to friendships that are built on conversations that never end — are continued from one visit to another — and “are always reuniting to reveal the One Conversation which holds us and carries us.”
There are also several original poems by him throughout his book.
This intimate book shows the holy grounding of human friendship, how important it is to befriend life, and how friends are the foundation of all that’s sacred.
