What is it that makes us human? I discovered that being human is a balance of what is alive in us and what is not alive in us. What is not alive in us is the product of our ability to talk to each other, and to cooperate in complex ways. This balance allows us to accomplish the amazing feat of creating civilization in the midst of nature, but it also leaves us with an uncomfortable sense of fracture and isolation, in society and in ourselves. We cannot eliminate this fracture without also ceasing to be human. But we can learn to live peacefully with the discomfort of the fracture, by honoring both our instinctive vitality and the word-based agreed rules of civilization, while adding untalkable love.