The hard knocks are actually wake-up calls that keeps us aware and listening. And it is possible to run toward such knocks rather than run away from them, once we glimpse the possibility for compassion and service that comes when we are off our high horse. It is possible to stay open in the midst of breakdown, or "to keep the heart open in hell," as author Stephen Levine has described, and even to ask for more. It is possible to participate in a larger arena of humanity's suffering, using our prayer as a means of transforming suffering into the substance of love.
— Regina Sara Ryan, Praying Dangerously