On The Path with Kissiah Young

There are so many things that we unknowingly outsource, such as answers to questions where the answers rest within. Validation is so desired that we nearly abandon our own path for that of another, or someone else's thoughts and opinions about who or what we should be. May we be reminded that we hold many of the answers to our deepest questions; they rest within.  No two people walk the same...

How often we take for granted our bodies and the ways they carry us. We do not necessarily focus on gratitude that they continue to withstand. I believe we need to. It's important. As strong as our bodies, is as fragile as our bodies, and the reality is, they won't last forever. Let's pause and contemplate this truth. Let's pause and give ourselves the attention we need as we p...

I am thinking about the Los Angeles fires and the many people whose lives have been completely undone, and am reminded of this nine-part series on the inevitability of death, and the nature of impermanence in general.  There are many causes of death.  So often we live each day going about almost in the blind not realizing how shifts happen in an instant. Then something brings us to the vivid pictu...

Where are you in this moment now? Have you given thought to how much of a gift it is? So often we wake and move through life as if the moments thereof are guaranteed. We seem to operate on a kind of autopilot that takes for granted the reality that our lifespan is not fixed, and that death arrives spontaneously. Join me today as we look more closely at the moments of our lives and how those moment...

Death is inevitable and will arrive when it arrives. It needs neither invitation nor permission to enter when it knocks. Death has access to our lives whether we desire it or not, are prepared or not, and it requires nothing of us in order to reveal itself. The reality of this brings us to the question, what does it mean to prepare for death?  Death will indeed come, whether or not we are prepared...

In her poem, The Summer Day, poet, Mary Oliver, asks  "Tell me, what is it that you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" Have you ever asked yourself a similar question, and not with the intent to be "productive," but rather from a place of knowing your lifespan is ever decreasing (mine, too)? Our time here is finite. Are we truly aware of this? Have we paused long...

Have you ever sat and gave thought to the truth that you are going to die? Have I? Death is inevitable, so what are we doing with the reality of that? This episode explores the first of nine contemplations on death that we are gifted from scholar and monk, Atisha (also Atisa) Dipamkara:  Death is inevitable; no one is exempt. Holding this thought in mind, I abide in the breath. Let us take a momen...

So often we live as though death is out there somewhere, reserved for other people. We neither see nor seize the moment to befriend the reality that we will one day die. Imagine sitting with it and giving ourselves the attention we need on the topic. Imagine turning toward the truth of death and how intimate we are with it, and seeing where the path leads us. Join me today for a kind of entry into...

I am one of those authentic people in life. Anyone who truly knows me can attest to this. I believe in being true to ourselves, which often means having the ability to enter into hard or uncomfortable matters. I find authenticity to be the path of true connection and closeness. After all, how intimate can we truly be when we aren't being ourselves?  Join me tonight as I share a bit about myse...

What are you thankful for in this moment? Who resides at the tender place of your heart that perhaps this time of year brings to the surface? How is your heart right now? I find myself thinking about the patients I've recently lost, and my father who died many years ago. I can't help but hold them with tenderness and warmth and with gratitude for all that they offered me by giving me par...

As much as this time of year brings many joy and happiness, it is also a time of deep grief, loneliness, and sadness for so many. We just never know what a person is going through. So, as we go about our days in celebration this time of year, let's be mindful that the person sitting or standing beside us may not be having that same joyous experience. They may actually need a hug, a listening...

Do you ever think about dying? Have you planned for when that inevitable time comes? As someone with a hospice and palliative care background, I know how difficult it is for many to even begin consider the possibility of dying. Taboo, still, the topic of death that we treat it as if a plague rather than the period at the end of our life's sentence. But what if we chose instead to meet it, to...

We are at a time of great dismay for many. Our thoughts and feelings may be overwhelming, and so much so, that we find ourselves being pulled deeper and deeper into the dark of the injustices, disbelief, and great many disappointments. The reality of this has me thinking about where we are placing our thoughts and energy. I can't help but wonder what it is we're creating and cultivating,...

It isn't always easy to receive feedback, yet it is the key ingredient needed to change. What do we do when we receive feedback, and if we truly feel sorry, are we willing to change? If so, are we taking that willingness and actually practicing change?  Join me in this episode as I share a moment in my own practice of self reflection, and how I navigated feedback given to me by my partner. It...

When the rubber meets the road, who do you become? Are you someone who practices openly and fully expressing what is true for you, or are you someone who tends to shut down? I've been thinking about communication and how shutting down is a kind of shortchange; we lose out on the full experience of our lives and inadvertently abandon ourselves. Is this what we ultimately desire, and how does t...

Feedback is essential to our growth and expansion. It's a key ingredient in change, yet it's one of the hardest things for people to practice being with. We are often concerned with not wanting to upset someone or fear their response, so rather than communicate our experience of another, we keep quiet and carry on. What we don't realize is the damage that does both to ourselves and...

As actor, Uzo Aduba releases her memoir, The Road Is Good, I am brought to reflect upon the grief that rests within me, a grief rooted in what does not exist between my mother and me: a connection. What do we daughters do with this kind of grief? Where do we place the tender spots that went missing as a child, and continues now? How do we arrive within ourselves when the beauty of who we were as y...

Communication, and the many ways of its importance, has been in the air for me these days. I see how easily we miss opportunities when we choose not to communicate. We lose, and others lose because of us. How is there to be true repair when we do not communicate? How is there authentic connection and relationship, including friendships, if we are quieting our truth and proceeding from some place i...

I am often in thought or conversation about time and how it's the one thing we do not get back. It's something I contemplate regularly in my practice to stay alert. I appreciate time, and yet so often it isn't given the presence of its due. We easily take it for granted until the hour glass begins to fill and what is being poured thins to fade. What makes us feel like there isn&apos...

Communication is important and yet so lacking. The consequences can be weighty, particularly when we aren't being seen clearly by those in positions of power and privilege. I've been dealing with this at work and it's rather unfortunate.  Join me tonight as I share a personal experience navigating, and being with, the impact and effects of not being seen clearly. Thank you for your...

We're not always gonna be on the path. That's impossible. The nature of being human has a connection to imperfection. So we seek instead to be as aligned as we are able by way of being alert, awake to ourselves and our lives. When we find ourselves off the path, or teetering about, the inquiry and exploration becomes about our practice for returning to truth. What do you do to bring your...

Take a moment to pause the happenings and drop into yourself. It's far too easy to get swept up and away by the tasks and to-dos of life, that we give little to know thought to ourselves. It isn't sustainable. It just isn't. We may not yet see the effects or how grand a reality of the many things being compromised, but it's happening. Cause and effect are real.  It's a new...

Grief is such a little word of magnanimous power and presence. In the same way that it can bring us to collapse, it can crack our hearts so wide open that we see the beauty and gift of each moment. Grief is beautiful. It's devastating and heartbreaking, yes, and it is beautiful. I invite us to feel the fullness of our grief in the same way that we feel the fullness of what has arrived us at t...

Yes, you read that correctly. This episode is about the experience of having an inner-ruption. It's that dis-ease or angst or unsettled feeling or stress or insert the very thing that is disrupting your inner. It's often that feeling we feel when something has happened and remains unresolved. Perhaps we feel slighted, unseen, disrespected, disregarded, or there's an injustice of som...

In 2017, I quit my job and career in hospice care and moved to San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. I did this without any real planning, plan, or financial abundance. I felt moved, called, and so I left. What you should know, is that the leaving was easy. Letting things go and walking away, felt normal to me for whatever reason. It was the return that exercised my truest, deepest, and realist inner str...