One year I decided to plant English ivy as a border around my flower garden. I dipped the small vines in some pH-balanced enzyme powder and planted them around the flowers. Some weeks later the ivy had grown into a small jungle, clinging around the flower stems and causing the blooms to shrink and shrivel.

Standing over my flowers, I understood the deadly effect of clinging. Now I was beginning to understand its effect on the spiritual life. Clinging creates a shrinking within the soul, a shrinking of possibility and growth.

from When the Heart Waits