connect with one another. Not because someone tells you to, but because every person carries a light that someone else may need.

The ritual itself wasn’t new. Many people have their version of it—coffee, cigarettes, scrolling, distraction, noise, something to soften the sharp edges of being human. But this morning felt different. The sun hadn’t fully claimed the room yet, and somehow a single question rose from somewhere deep inside me: “What’s lacking in my life?” Not financially. Not socially. Spiritually. That question sat heavy in the room. And when a question like that arrives honestly, there is n