I am standing in the foothills of the Himalaya. Blue expansive sky above me. Prayer flags fluttering in the breeze and just above the rhododendron forest, white Nepali mountains. And I'm not gonna see any of it because I can't take another step. My physical body is fine, but finally, the weight of my self-hatred is so heavy that I can't even pick up my leg. Next to me, with love in his eyes, my ex-boyfriend. He's just broken up with me because I'm toxic. It's not that I'm mean to him or abusive. He says it's like living with a black hole that all the joy and the happiness has just sucked inside. And I haven't realized that I hate myself. I've wanted to commit suicide for years just to escape the pain that's in my head. But I believe so strongly in reincarnation. I think you just come straight back. I can't even kill myself to escape from this planet.

And even though everything is falling apart in my world, I know that I chose this. I chose him leaving me and walking away. You see, two weeks before, I'm in a temple in India. And I am praying. Who am I? I've been reading books by gurus with unpronounceable names. Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, Ramana Maharshi, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, and they're all saying, "Ask the question, who am I?" And they talk about how we are not our body, and we are not our mind. And I think, Wow, maybe I can go beyond my mind. And so I start to pray. I want to know myself. I want to know myself. And this question comes, "What if your parents think that you're nuts?" I have dreadlocks. I've been barefoot for years. I quit my successful corporate job in advertising five years ago to hang out with shamans in Siberia, monks in Tibet.

My parents are kindhearted small-town Scottish Christians. They probably already think I'm pretty far gone. So yes, I want to know myself, even if my parents think that I'm crazy. Who am I? Who am I? Last question. Do you want to know yourself more than you want to be with Nicholas? Nicholas is my love. He's my best friend. He's my teacher. Don't make me choose. And I see those two paths. I see the life with Nicholas, us traveling the world, living in our home in Rishikesh. Maybe having a family. And the other path is just darkness. Where does that go? The path of knowing myself. Who am I fooling? And yet I know this is the only chance I ever have to be happy.

I return to my prayer. Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? I am praying with every fiber of my being, every cell of my body. I've never wanted anything more than I want in that moment. Who am I? And then nothing. There is a void. There is not even an eye to experience a void. And it's not the kind of nothing where everything stays the same after. It's the kind of nothing where everything changes. Later I discover this experience, which isn't an experience, is called Sunyata. The void. Emptiness. And after an eternity, there is an eye again, observing a void. And then my mind scrambles back. What just happened? What just happened? Did I just die? Did my dad just die? Did Nicholas just die? What just happened? What just happened? And even though I am freaking out, something inside of me knows my question was answered, and I just experienced the truth.

And so I returned to Rishikesh excited to share with Nicholas this powerful spiritual experience I've had. And he dumps me. And I know that this is leading me on my path of knowing myself, but it doesn't help that twenty-nine-year-old little girl who's just lost her home and her life and her beloved.

And I take myself to Lumbini where the Buddha was born. And I lock myself in meditation boot camp. From four o'clock in the morning until ten o'clock at night, I am in constant presence and meditation in a tiny Tibetan temple with a monk banging a drum and chanting deep dark Mahakala Pujas, the destroyer of the ego. It's dark, and there's yak butter lamps and paintings of the Buddha's life on the temple walls. And I sit there for days and weeks. And after a while, I see my self-hatred. I see that monster and that beast, and I know that I've created it. I'm this tiny little girl with a candle. And it has fangs, and it's snarling. And it can destroy me at any moment. I've got no idea what to do. And I just back away from it.

And the beating of the drum from the monk, it's like it starts to beat from inside of me. And I start to feel my heart coming back on line. And from that place, I look at the stories I've been telling myself about what's wrong with me, about why I hate myself and I trace them back. And they're just stories cos I can see from this place that nothing is true. And I get to a story where I am six years old in the playground in Scotland, and Allison and Emily are standing over me. "You're ugly. No one likes you. No one wants to be your friend. Your mom's English."

And I think they must be right because no one wants to be my friend, and I am a crybaby. And this continues for six years. Every break, every lunch, I'm running away from them, or I'm locked in the toilet with my feet up on the toilet seat so they can't find me. And I grow into an adult believing what they're telling me is truth. That no one will ever love me. That I am broken. And I put on masks, hoping that other people can't see inside—thinking if I hate myself, no one else will need to hate me.

And with this monk beating the drum and from this experience I've had in India, I realize these girls who said these things to me, they were kids. They were just kids. And I remember they had big brothers and sisters who were probably saying that to them. And, of course, I can forgive them. Of course I can just let it go because it's not true. But I realize I did the same thing. I took that hatred and that bullying home. And I did the same thing to my little brothers, and I bullied them and I was so cruel to them, and so mean to them.

Can I ever forgive myself for that? And as I ask the question, I realize that I'm stroking my hair. Yes, I can forgive myself for this. I am forgiving myself for this. And I realize every single part of me, everything I've experienced, is worthy of love. All of it. And what I didn't know then that I know now is I needed to be covered in those paper cuts. So I could sit in front of other people who've been stabbed and say to them, "You are worthy of love. You can get through this. You can forgive this. You can let this go." And they know that it's true because they see in my eyes that I've been through hell and escaped and that now I'm happy.

And in that temple, I pull the scarf back off my face, and it's packed with golden dragonflies. Out of nowhere, golden dragonflies everywhere. And it's like they're flying all around my head, and they're taking these thoughts out of my brain. And I am free. For the first time in my life, this love is just pouring through my brain, and through my heart, and through my body. And I look down at my heart and, you know, sometimes you just see that little boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, that little pulse.

And I thank my heart for always beating for me. I've treated her so badly. I've been so mean to her. I've blamed so much on her, and she's always cheered for me. And I hear my heart say to me, "Who else would I beat for?"

Thank you.