Something I wrote back in the early 1990s:

“Truth lies like the grain of sand at the heart of a pearl. It may not be elegant, it may not even be pretty, but it is the core of the sugar coating we call our lives. The more we shield our heart, the more it suffocates, locked in by the pressure of its own protection. Crack through the lemming layers that insulate us from our own truth, binding our minds in a vice-grip of ignorance. What we find at the center may be red and raw, but it will respond. We may be enraged or hurt, but we will be aware. And through that awareness, we will grow again.”