We think we are so connected. We read blogs. We interact through social media. We write emails. Some of us even write letters and read the newspaper. We think we are aware and involved and then we get an email from a friend which says, “Sorry, I haven’t been in touch for a while. I had a heart attack and quadruple by-pass surgery.”

What’s worse is the email came in a week ago and it took me several days to open the email and read it. I could spend a few minutes here gnashing my teeth about being too busy and self-absorbed but it would only be a cover-up for embarrassment. And really, all that fury and upset is just more self gazing.

Here’s the scoop.

My friend John Lee,the best-selling author of The Flying Boy: Healing the Wounded Man, had a heart attack and is recovering from quadruple bypass surgery at his home in Alabama. For the last twenty years, he has been a leader in the men’s movement and led countless workshops on anger management, emotional regression, recovery, relationships and spirituality. He has written sixteen books, including his latest release The Missing Peace.

His email said that he will continue to work. After all, this work healed John as much as it did his clients. But things will change. If he became a leader in the field of anger management and recovery to heal himself, then I would bet the healing from heart surgery will lead him down a different path. Already he has begun a blog to ask himself the kinds of questions that I think will lead to a deeper healing and contentment.

Not just in his life.

John’s thoughts and questions have always asked me to look a little deeper and understand myself a little more. From his May 8th post was this question: What has taken your heart and turned it around?

The answer for me is easy. Being a mother. It put my rudder in the water and the wind in my sails. At last, I loved someone more than myself and it has made all the difference.

Thank you, John, for continuing to ask great questions and for still being in my life.