The Lighthouse Question

About a month ago, I had a conversation with my friend Jade Maa.
She is not just a friend, but a keeper of questions—the kind that strip you to your bones. An author, a guide, a voice who believes words can stitch what silence once severed.

Through her book Des mots sur nos maux and her podcast, she walks unflinching into grief and shame, turning wounds into language, language into lanterns.

To speak with her is to be caught in a mirror you didn’t know you were carrying—one that reflects not who you pretend to be, but who you are when no one is watching.

And that day, she asked me the question that cracked something open in me:

“What is your one guiding principle, your lighthouse?”

I fumbled. I said presence. I said as, an example, being with my siblings, watching a movie, not being alone.

But she didn’t let me off the hook.

“And if you don’t have company? If everyone leaves? Then what? Pick something you can control. Something that doesn’t depend on others.”

So I tried again. I said rootedness. Finding my footing in Massachusetts.

Again, she pressed:

“And if Massachusetts disappears tomorrow? Then what?”

Finally, I said: peace.

She asked me what peace means to me.

And this is what spilled out: