When I am frightened or angry, or depressed or anxious, I am aware of intense feelings, like merciless ghosts deep inside of me. Sometimes they are angry, sometimes terrified, once in a while even excited

They are always down there, I think, stoking the old flames, stirring the pot, reminded me to be humble, and to accept that one can heal, but never completely.

The author Mark Nepo wrote that it took him many years to understand that the reason his old demons surface, the purpose of surfacing, is to continually empty his heart and mind of its sediment, “so that new life can make its way into me.”

This seems to be very real for me.

I accept the idea of releasing old hurts and fears to make room for a new life. I’ve learned that there are great dangers in not letting my deepest feelings out, and risks in letting them out too often.

The coronavirus (now being re-named Covid-19 by scientists and CEOs) asks me to empty my heart more than once in any given day. Fear and anger swirl all around it like sharks around a school of small prey.

It could fill up my heart if I let it, but I won’t let it.

I empty my heart when I see Maria sometimes, or when Zinnia shows up with mud on her nose, or when I see the Mansion residents waving at me through closed doors.

I empty my heart when I think of the out-of-work waitresses at Jean’s Place struggling to put their lives together, or the refugee parents told to stop cleaning hotel rooms, or the stories about families and young people destroyed by the disease.

Maria has emptied her heart as long as I’ve known her, she has the gift of letting her feelings and emotions out, and clearing the way for new feelings and ideas. She does it naturally, I have to work at it.

I look up and I see a look in her eyes, and she will say “I’m going to cry,” and she does, and five minutes later, she’s laughing and dancing and singing to the music of her own creative genius.

I have learned this: There is no freedom at all until I release the ghosts from the dungeons and cells they inhabit, and my heart and soul have no obstructions blocking the next feeling I have.

In this time, I empty my heart several times a day. I am always making room for other things than fear and anger.