The metaphor that I love is Michelangelo would look at a block of marble, and he would say, the sculpture is already inside. I just need to chisel away the layers that are in its way. And I think dharma operates in very much the same way. I can almost guarantee for you and me and anybody who's listening right now, there is an essence that you've already been in touch with at some point in time.

It could have been when you were a little kid. It could have been last week. But you've had brushes, incidents with this essence. It may be buried under deadlines, under drop-offs, under all the other things we have going on in our lives. And we can start to kind of chisel away those layers.

One of the ways that we can do that is through good questions to kind of come back to who we are. One of the questions that I love the most is, what would you do for free? If compensation was not a factor, what is it that you would want to spend your time doing anyway?

If you can clearly answer that question, now you're starting to get closer to this thing inside of you that wants to express itself, no matter how the outside world reacts.