Clarifying Peace
  • The Facts
  • Calling Mother
  • Spiritual Direction
  • Blog
  • poetry, story telling, and prayers
  • Essays and Papers
  • Contact

unedited

4/29/2010

0 Comments

 

Yesterday, I said that I would look for ways words help me follow the lead truth offers. I listened to myself speak, for at least part of the day, and so learned a piece of what I need for the coming leg of my journey. This is how the insight came to me.

Last year I led a retreat with a friend. This past weekend, I led one by myself. I was indirectly supported by the priest present, but her leadership role was contained in our closing healing service. At the conclusion of the retreat, I felt spent, probably more spent than necessary.

So, when Father Mark, my priest asked me how the retreat went, I said, "I was really spent." Then, in my mind, I heard the beginning of the next sentence I was about to speak. Does this happen to you? I am talking while forming the thoughts for the next sentence, and in that moment, I have the chance to edit those words. This time I consciously let them come out as they had come up within me. So I continued speaking saying something like, "I think it cost me something to spill my guts." I didn't want to sound that out of control, that messy, that unprofessional, but more than my desire to attempt to control my image, I want to be free and to be free I know that honest vulnerability is required. So I let myself say that in some fashion I had spilled my guts as the leader of a retreat. 

I believe a retreat leader's role is to provide a holding space for others to be present to whatever the Spirit is stirring within them. Retreats are not meant to provide one person with a captive audience for the unintegrated and irresponsible parts of their personality. Although I think I could take my confession too seriously, I am not. I believe that owning the fact that in some way I had spilled my guts, in saying just a little to much,or too graphically, I can learn the fine balance between too much and too little vulnerability as a retreat leader.

So I am studying the art of being present with others in this role. 
0 Comments

let your truth lead me

4/27/2010

0 Comments

 
"Oh send out your light and your truth; let them lead me; let them bring me to your holy hill and to your dwelling." Psalm 43:3

One way to follow the lead truth offers is by paying attention to the words we use. What happens when we are careful to be truthful? 

Recently, I had a Sunday off from teaching in our Godly Play class at St. Luke's Episcopal Church. After church, I asked a child how her Godly Play class had been. She said, "We didn't have it, because nobody came." I thought, "That's not right -- you came." Because I have learned to value the path that speaking truth opens, I was able to somehow make a break in the conversation at that point and her mother, who overheard us talking, explained that she had joined the older children for Sunday school.

Does it mean anything that she could not count herself, that she did not say something like, "I joined the older class because I was the only one to show up for ours" or "nobody else came but me, so I went to the other class?" If truth will lead us, I believe that we will be more easily led if we practice speaking truthfully. As adults, we can help the children rely on truth as a gift or tool of God, by speaking accurately, even when we think it does not matter or maybe especially when we think it cannot matter.


I will look for an example of learning to speak more truthfully myself today. Somehow, you know how humans are, I more easily remember the errors of others! 





0 Comments

seeds

4/15/2010

1 Comment

 
Picture
I have a new lap top, a MacBook. I am learning to use it, to integrate the stuff of past computers, and to play with what I find. Here is a photograph taken by Molly Kunselman a few years ago, that signifies the joy I receive in caring for the smallest seeds of new life. 
1 Comment
    Picture

    Archives

    September 2022
    May 2022
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    April 2020
    October 2016
    August 2015
    October 2014
    September 2014
    May 2014
    March 2014
    December 2013
    September 2013
    July 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010
    November 2010
    October 2010
    September 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    June 2010
    May 2010
    April 2010
    March 2010
    February 2010
    January 2010

    Categories

    All
    A Beautiful Dress That Fit
    After We Die
    Artesian Well Spring
    Barker Dam
    Be
    Bearing The Responsibility Of Others
    Beautiful
    Body
    Butterfly Girl
    Calm
    Clean Daily
    Confession Of Sin
    Courage And Cowardice
    Couturier
    Dark Horse
    Darkness And Light
    Darkness Cannot Overcome Light
    Dock Gently
    Dog
    Enough And Enough
    Epiphany Work
    Game Of Conversation
    Generous Gifts
    Happy
    Healing Prayer
    Heart
    Held In Balance
    Holy Living
    Hydrofracturing
    Inner Work
    In Time
    I Will Not Carry
    Joshua Tree National Park
    Loss And Discernment
    Love
    Magi
    Making Peace
    Mavis Staples
    Name It
    Not Alone
    Nothing Is Lost
    O Come Let Us Adore Him
    Opportuntity To Persevere
    Orion Magazine
    Peaceful And Lucky
    Peonage
    Praying About Changes
    Rebirth
    Receiving The Gifts Of God
    Rest
    Seeds
    Seen
    Singing
    Sitting In Silence
    Sleeper Awake
    Slow Down
    Song
    Speaking And Listening
    Steingraber
    Strength
    Sunlight
    Telling Your Story
    The Help
    The Iron Thing They Carried
    Thought In The Form Of An Experience
    To Start Healing The Child In Me
    Transcendent Moments
    Transformation
    Trust
    Unconditional Love
    Unspoken Mantras
    Waiting
    Walking On Water
    Words

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.