The first time I went to prison, I wasn’t gone long enough to know what it meant to ‘do time’. I spent the first half of my sentence reminiscing about the past, and the second half fantasizing about the future. I was never forced into the uncomfortable predicament of making the present moment – prison – into a home. That changed when I was arrested again in 2005.
In this talk, I explore what it means to make home in difficult and painful circumstances, and the process by which profound suffering might transmute into beauty and awakening. Shared for the Big Heart City Meditation SF sangha on August 7th, 2026.
