What I discovered is that in the midst of pain, or despair or fear, even in the midst of crisis, if I remembered to be mindful, I could come back to my breath and just be in the moment, however hard it was. This stepping into the moment has a paradoxical effect, instead of making our apparent burdens harder to bear, it makes them easier, instead of intensifying our suffering, it relieves it. By being with what is, beginning with the moment-to-moment awareness of the breath as it moves in and out of our body, we are also paradoxically better able to see the whole:

--the whole of our being, and its wholeness

--the whole of our experience, and its wholeness

--the whole of the world, and its wholeness.