Life is the Master

I have a tattoo on my arm that reads, “Life is the master.” It’s not just ink. It’s a compass. A reminder. A truth carved in.

My personal rule for tattoos? Wait two years. Sit with the symbol, let it follow you around, whisper to you, prove it deserves permanence. And this one did. Though even after two years, I never thought to add the word "teacher" — as in, "Life is the master teacher." But that’s what I meant. That’s what it is. My confrontational mentor. My honest guide. The curriculum and the classroom all in one.

I got the tattoo after sitting with a master in India. He was cross-legged. Quiet. Blind as a bat without his thick glasses, which he left resting in his lap. He was speaking with my father about the most banal of things - getting luggage to the airport. But still, occasionally, he would stop, pause and he would gaze out at the crowd as if he could see their souls. Silent. Present. And people responded. They wept. They lit up. They nodded in the kind of understanding that doesn’t come from words.

He couldn’t see them. But he saw them.

And that’s when I understood: he wasn’t teaching. He was letting life speak.

He wasn’t pushing wisdom. He was making space for it to rise.

That’s what made him the master. He got out of the way. He let life pass through, undistorted. It's not the doing, it's the embodiment of not doing that made him the master. 

That’s what the tattoo reminds me.

Get out of the way.

Let life in. Shape yourself in conjunction with it. 

Life presses in, and we push back. It offers us friction, and we respond with form. It molds us, yes—but only to the extent that we meet it with our own texture, our own resistance, our own openness. What becomes of us isn’t simply what life does to us. It’s what we make together in the tension, in the dance, in the space where who we are meets what life demands.

We live in a world where we’re constantly seeking answers, chasing solutions, battling for control. But the greatest technology isn’t some shiny new gadget or AI bot. It’s life itself. It shapes us like a river shapes a canyon. A glacier shapes a valley. Over time, it carves us, molds us, reveals what’s hidden beneath. And in the intersection of us and life—that’s where we become who we’re meant to be.

This is the expedition I’m on with Getting Under the Skin podcast, - GUTS for short - testing out a thesis that has been with me for years: that life shapes us with gifts, and in turn, we’re meant to develop those gifts and give them back. Your story can be medicine for someone else. And their story can be medicine for you. Isn’t that what wisdom is? I've seen it first hand on my GRACE_ retreats that I have hosted. One person’s lived experience distills into a lesson—sometimes hard-earned, sometimes heartbreakingly clear—and that becomes the missing piece in someone else’s puzzle. We don’t always need to build the whole picture ourselves. Sometimes we see clearer because someone else shared what they've seen and that fills in the gaps we've been missing. 

David Viscott once said, “The purpose of life is to find your gift, the work of life is to develop your gift, and the meaning of life is to give your gift away.” These words have stayed with me, because they speak to what I believe is the essence of this journey. The gifts we’re given, the lessons we learn, the magic we experience—it’s all part of a continuous exchange.

This is an expeditionary journey told in podcast form. A search for life's wisdom manifested in the experiences of living.  It’s about stepping into the flow and letting life shape us—and allowing it to be the teacher and honoring that. 

If any of this resonates—come listen to a few conversations. That’s what GUTS is. It’s not a performance. It’s a space where real people tell real stories, and we let life speak through them.

Listen here or view here.