• being human,  breath,  embodied liturgies,  embodiment,  musings,  writing

    Wisdom through Lived Experience

    I have been on a spiritual journey for years, and am amazed at the way ideas merge and converge, especially related to matters of the heart. God is always leading us. Nothing stands in isolation. I truly believe that. Which is why I believe God is speaking to us every day … God is speaking directly to us, through our embodied lived reality. During my experience in the Living School, we learned of a ‘tricycle model’ of spirituality … the front wheel is lived experience and the back wheels are tradition and scripture. All three are important if we want the tricycle to work. Lived experience without the other two leaves us misguided and on our own. Tradition and scripture without lived experience discounts very real ways we can know. (Note: our culture, capitalism, politics and the ‘matrix’ of 21st century life does its…

  • being human,  embodiment,  learning,  writing

    Gazing

    Lately I’ve been pondering my inner life and exploring various ways of being, specifically contemplative ways of being as it’s such a beautiful way of life. Interestingly, the yoga path is also a contemplative path, with its emphasis on embodiment, unity (of heart, mind, body and spirit), and conscious awareness. Life is pretty amazing, when you think about it. I couldn’t have planned it the way it’s worked out. All praise to God for leading me down the roads I needed to travel to become more of who I’m supposed to be. But I digress, back to the topic at hand … as we move into the cooler months of the year, it’s pretty typical for me to go deeper inward. While we are who we are, we also have great choice in the ways we live our lives. It’s easy to go through…

  • being human,  embodiment,  learning,  spiritual direction

    Anam Cara for Grief, Loss and Trauma

    What follows below is my Reflective Expression for a module about grief, loss and trauma as part of my Spiritual Direction Training … Reflect on your experience learning about grief, loss and trauma through a spiritual guidance lens. What wants to be uplifted from this module in terms of your unfolding understanding of who you are as an SG and how you can compassionately companion others?  As I sit to write, I realize that this module was hard for me to get through. I knew it before writing—-I just didn’t have the desire to finish after I started. Now as I write, I’m reflecting about why that is … It’s been a wild summer, a life-changing one. My therapist commented that I was grieving when I last spoke to her about a month ago. I believe she was talking about me grieving my old…

  • being human,  breath,  musings

    Writing Truth to Power

    Lately I’m more driven to write. This tendency has always waxed and waned throughout life, but in the aftermath of illness, much is moving through. I’m witnessing myself more fully and feeling a need to express the things I witness. Yesterday I got an email from an editorial member of a growing platform, informing me that they wanted to feature my writing alongside big names like James Clear, Simon Sinek and Mel Robbins. It’s the second email I’ve received from her. I paused, took it in, then deleted the email. While I’ve been a writer for the entirety of my career, I’ve mostly been paid to write specific industry-related content, whereas here I write for myself, for my family, for posterity. I feel like I’m still honing my voice here, and this voice may not be suitable for a larger audience. I’m not sure…