05/02/2026
Last week I was so lucky, I got to hang out with the students in the day and evening massage therapy classes at Cortiva Institute in King of Prussia. I actually read the poem for the day class but, the evening class there was a very talented student that did it so much better. I gave each of them a copy of it.
What do you think about it?
Learning to Share the Table
Leaving the classroom
can feel like stepping into weather.
You thought the world would look familiar
the same language,
the same shared purpose
but suddenly the room is louder,
and not everyone is kind.
You learn that not all healers heal well.
That skill does not guarantee generosity.
That some guard their corner fiercely,
mistaking proximity for threat.
This realization stings.
It is not what you practiced for.
But wanting what others want
is not wrong or an attack.
Standing beside someone
does not erase your right
to stand at all.
There is room here
more than fear may have you believe.
Some of the strongest work
happens side by side.
Friends can hold parallel paths,
even intersecting ones,
without injury.
The trick is not to shrink the circle
but to widen it.
If the table feels crowded,
build another table.
If the portion looks small,
learn how to bake.
This is not Ignorance.
It is strategy rooted in trust.
Collaboration multiplies.
Isolation exhausts.
A profession grows healthier
when hands reach outward,
when businesses rise together,
when success is not hoarded
but echoed.
Peace doesn’t arrive
by defending every difference
like a border.
It emerges
when we lean in,
listen longer,
and discover how much ground
we already share.
This is the next lesson
not just how to work,
but how to belong
without needing someone else
to lose.
~Xerlan Deery
