You Don’t Have to Do It Alone: The Power of Friendship

A Barge Journey with MARK NEPO on the rivers and canals in BELGIUM

A Deeper Look

Mark’s Personal Invitation

I am excited to be offering a very special weeklong journey on a River Cruise in Belgium in May-June of 2025. Our small group will embark from Ghent and meander through the waterways of Belgium to Halle near Brussels. Being on journeys like this with you is the blessing of my life as a teacher. Nothing is quite like the space of tenderness and truth that arises when we are comparing notes on being alive.

This retreat will center on my latest book, You Don’t Have to Do It Alone: The Power of Friendship. In our time together, we will explore the gift and spirit of friendship. For friendship is indispensable. We may discover our dearest friends in the dark labyrinth of seeking truth together. Or, in a moment of feeling vulnerable, we may feel safe in the care of some trusted other. We often come upon our deepest friends when taking the long way home, when forced to put down our differences, when humbled to admit that we haven’t a clue where we’re going or how to get there. In the raw and tender space of such honesty, the net of friendship is woven. In fact, the root of the word friendship means “place of high safety.”

In these sessions, we will look closely at the discovery of our kinship, the nature of friendship, the inevitable trials by which our bond is strengthened or broken, the acceptance of our humanness, and the conduit that lasting friendship becomes to the larger forces of life.

After a lifetime of trying to be a good friend, I feel called to affirm the spirit of friendship, to praise what it takes to love another well, and to better understand how friendship helps us live. So journey with me as we listen for how the spirit of friendship opens us to each other, so we can come alive together, and affirm that you don’t have do it alone.   Mark

As an invitation, let me share this poem of mine:

If You Want a True Friend

Just open your hands and say, “I don’t know.”

Say it softly and wait, so your other can see

that you mean it. Give them a chance to

drop what they think is secret. Let them

come up with a cup of what matters from

the spring they show no one. Let them sigh

and admit that they don’t know either. Then

you can begin with nothing in the way. Go

on. Admit to the throb you carry in your

heart. And let the journey begin.