When a volcano rumbles, erupts, spews forth, and spills over in torrents of flowing lava, we are left with an empty crater. Our current situation makes me feel we’re like volcanoes. Inwardly, we continue to shudder and smolder with heat and passion, but outwardly we’re barren voids of nothing-to-do-and-no-where-to-go. How are we going to fill that vast hollowness of time and space? Will we helicopter in people and activities from the outside? Will we try to fill in the emptiness from the sky? Or will we wait for the still-smoking heat to ignite our heart’s deepest desires and let them bubble up from our innermost spirit? One thing we know: no matter how devastating is a volcanic eruption, nature does reassert itself eventually. Over the course of time, algae and lichen begin to grow again in the space that was opened up. Then mosses, ferns, and native plants re-emerge. A field of lupines. Or a lush koa forest. Maybe a rare yellow orchid. If we allow it to, the joy that lives in our deep heart’s core will peek out from the thick crush of lava that buried it long before this current cataclysm occurred. When we have plenty of time, we also have more space. Instead of trying to fill it, wait and watch what happens.