**Substitute the deity of your choice: Great Spirit, Isis, Creator, Source. My friend Elaine prays to “Whoever Is On Duty.”

Eckhart Tolle says that “nothing you can know ABOUT you is you.” It’s content, not essence. Here’s another juicy quote I like a lot:

“What we truly are, objectively, is that unique essence that distinguishes us from one another. It equips us to reveal some special piece of cosmic truth to which the essential uniqueness of other individuals is less favorably attuned. But, in our alienation from essence, what we lack is the compellingly direct experience and cognition of the astounding fact that our body, in its entirety, is intelligence — Mind.” -David S. Devor, “Intuition, Creativity, Mind & Matter,” http://www.projectmind.org/intuition.html

That said, anyone who cares to can throw a few K (dollars, not bytes) my way until I become better acquainted with my essence…. Mary

P.S. My last several postings on my blog http://writingqueen.wordpress.com speak to the issue of knowing onself and thereby finding one’s place in Creation… that is, doing what you were born to do, doing what only you can do, doing the only thing that brings lasting satisfaction.

I still think it’s ult that your piece made Communication Arts. You’re still my hero…. M

Don’t have any interview stories as “good” as that one, but there was a religiously-inclined firm I interned with at which one of the employees said to me “so prove to us you aren’t gay and sign our petition to ban gay marriage.” Cuckoo!