Mark Nepo: Inside of the Miracle
OMTIMES: Inside the Miracle encompasses almost thirty years of work? Please tell us about the themes and ground this book covers.
MARK NEPO: One of the great transforming passages in my life was having cancer in my mid-thirties. This experience unraveled the way I see the world. It scoured my lens of perception, landing me in a deeper sense of living. Twenty-eight years ago, that struggle brought me close to death. Today, I remain committed to surfacing the lessons of transformation, as they continue to shape the lens that life has given me. The transformative events may differ for each of us, but every soul will face a life-changing threshold that will keep shaping who we are for the rest of our life. This book gathers twenty-eight years of my writing and teaching about suffering, healing, and wholeness. It is a thematically integrated work that draws from three sources that span all these years: the original poems and prose from the first edition of Inside the Miracle (1994, 1996, now out of print), ten relevant essays from my collected personal essays, Unlearning Back to God (2006, now out of print), and thirty-nine new poems and prose pieces not yet published.
OMTIMES: You speak about this book as if it’s alive and growing? What do you mean by this?
MARK NEPO: Transformation, even from a single event, can continue for eternity. And so, I continue to be transformed by my journey with cancer. This is a book that continues to be written, because this is a story that continues to be lived. I felt compelled to expand this book because almost dying and having cancer cracked my life open and continues to deepen who I am. I felt compelled to rework and further unfold these life lessons as my understanding keeps evolving. I felt uplifted to add new lessons from the growing perspective of decades.
OMTIMES: What does the subtitle ENDURING ILLNESS, APPROACHING WHOLENESS mean?
MARK NEPO: We are each in a lifetime conversation with suffering and care that, in time, will open us to our strengths and gifts. We are meant, it seems, to come apart and come together, so we can discover who we are at the core. We are meant, it seems, to be rearranged by what we go through and held up to that process by those who care. We are meant to accept suffering and care as our teachers, our mentors, as the tools used by time to shape us into what matters. So, though no one can tell us how to endure our way into wholeness, there are common passages. We can help each other learn how to withstand the hardships of life and we can love each other into the fullness of a whole life. Though we never finally arrive, we keep maturing and refining through the good use of our heart. Through this unending process, we help each other stay alive and be alive.
