
In last week’s episode, Part 1 of Marla Levy’s story; Opening the Heart to Compassion, Marla shared her story of battling complications from a congenital heart defect. She shared that during the course of her hospital stay and the fight for her life, she experienced more than one Spiritually Transformative Experience. She explained how her heart was opened to a level of compassion that before she seldom knew. If you have not listened to last week’s episode, I highly encourage you to do so.
In Part Two, The Gift of Presence, Marla recounts how she struggled for 6 weeks simply to breathe and how this fundamental and agonizing struggle rewired her brain’s capacity to stay in the present moment. She shares in detail what she learned and what it is like to actively live in the present moment. She considers herself lucky to have fully adopted the practice of “living like she’s dying” and hopes that others can begin to do the same. What she knows is that when we do, we radically and profoundly lessen fear, while increasing our capacity for gratitude and the appreciation of the beauty that is always around us.