What experiences in life helped you grow the most?

“There is a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in” Leonard Cohen ( 1934~2016)

Some questions make it sound as though growth comes from a few big, defining moments. As if we’re meant to point to the dramatic scenes and say, there… that’s where I changed. But most of the time, we’re growing in quieter ways.

There are the cracks life gives us without warning. Loss, change, surprise. They open something in us, and the light finds its way through before we’ve even had time to steady ourselves.

There are the tiny cracks, too, the ones we barely notice at the time. A kindness that shifts your mood. A disappointment that slows your pace. Small openings that don’t feel like lessons, yet they soften us all the same.

And there are the cracks we choose. The boundary we finally hold. The truth we stop swallowing. The moment we walk away from something that no longer fits. These openings carry their own quiet courage, and the light that enters through them feels earned.

Together, they shape us. Not in neat chapters, not in grand arcs, but in a steady, ongoing way. Big moments open us. Small moments shape us. All of them let the light in.

And maybe that’s enough to notice for now — the way the light finds us, softly, through whatever openings we have.