I have realized that you can close yourself off to life if you put walls up, but it's a difficult thing. . . You can't see over, people can't see in, and you also can't see out. So I've gotten quite comfortable with just being unafraid. I keep saying the same thing: it's not about being fearless but really just embracing the fears and using them.
Finally one arrives at this: the state of sleep has an ambiguous function; in sleep, the lack of contact with the culture brings out the worst and also the best in us.