July 2, 2008 · by Christine
And it was then that in the depths of sleep
Someone breathed to me: “You alone can do it,
Come immediately.”
-Jules Superveille, from ‘The Call”
You cannot travel the path until you have become the path.
-Gautama Buddha
Wayfarer, the only way
is your footsteps, there is no other.
Wayfarer, there is no way,
you make the way by walking.
As you go, you make the way
and stopping to look behind,
you see the path that your feet
will never travel again.
Wayfarer, there is no way -
Only foam trails to the sea.
-Antonio Machado
I have written here before of the family systems work I have been engaging in as a journey toward my own deepening spiritual growth. It is certainly some of the most meaningful and powerful work I have ever done. For several months now I have been planning a pilgrimage for this summer. This is a journey connected to my father’s side of the family and includes Austria, Latvia, Germany, and Belgium. Latvia is the only place I have not been to before, but it has been many years since I have been to any of those other lands, and I come this time with new eyes and many new questions.
With all of the practical details of such a trip taken care of, I have been turning to the emotional and spiritual preparation for the journey these last couple of weeks. One of my favorite books on helping you to prepare for such a journey of meaning is The Art of Pilgrimage by Phil Cousineau. A couple of gems from his book:
“If your journey is indeed a pilgrimage, a soulful journey, it will be rigorous. Ancient wisdom suggests if you aren’t trembling as you approach the sacred, it isn’t the real thing. The sacred, in its various guises as holy ground, art, or knowledge, evokes emotion and commotion.”
“A vacation is easy to embark upon; everything has been laid out for us to have a predictable, comfortable, and reassuring holiday. But a pilgrimage is different; we are actually beckoning to the darkness in our lives. The fear is real.”
I love this book, because he looks at the mythical and symbolic qualities of pilgrimage and then invites the reader to consider ways to prepare for this journey through ritual and imagination as well as ways to engage in the journey itself, not as a consumer of experience, but as a seeker of the sacred. He also points to the pilgrimage as a microcosm of life — walking our path with reverence and expectation of holy encounter. I prepare for it with excitement and anticipation as well as fear and trembling, knowing I will have to confront some shadowy sides of my family system. But it is in facing the dark depths that I no longer have to live in fear of them.
Make sure to visit this week’s Poetry Party and submit your poem before Friday to be entered into a drawing to win a copy of my newest zine Season by the Sea: A Contemporary Book of Hours.
If you would like to place any orders from the Abbey Store, please do so before July 8th!
-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts
(the quotes above are also from the Cousineau book and are going into my travel journal to accompany me along the way)
Posted in Pilgrimage, Abbey Bookshelf, Family Systems | 6 Comments »
June 30, 2008 · by Christine
Our Twenty-First Poetry Party! I select an image and suggest a title and invite you to respond with your poems, words, reflections, quotes, song lyrics, etc. Leave them in the comments or email me and I’ll add them to the body of the post as they come in along with a link back to your blog if you have one (not required to participate!) I’ll add your contributions all week and then I will draw a name at random on Friday from everyone who participates and will send the winner a copy of my newest zine Season by the Sea: A Contemporary Book of Hours. Feel free to take your poem in any direction and then post the image and invitation on your blog and encourage others to come join the party! (a blog is definitely not required to participate!)
Last week I discovered this article about the advantages of limiting our options in a world where we have such an abundance of choices, both superificial as in what kind of TV to buy and the more serious as in where to live geographically or what kind of work to engage in. We have so many more options than just a couple of generations ago and it can be both liberating and dizzying. Lately I have been contemplating the way I feel pulled in many directions sometimes because I have many gifts and many ways I want to express them. I love the many facets of the work I do, but I recognize an inner pull or call to begin to consider saying no to some options as a way of developing myself in one or two areas.
We tend to believe that open doors are signs of the sacred. So I thought this might be worth exploring in poetry — have there been times when a door closing was a blessing? Can you imagine which options you might like to limit in order to have a fuller sense of how you are being called?
And if somewhere deep inside you is a voice saying “no, I don’t want to close any doors” — then write a poem about that!
*****
Shortlisted again
Despondent can I choose to
Bless the closing door
-Mavis at Set the Bird Free
*****
I choose to close the door today,
On hate,
And violence,
On deliberate “misunderstandings”
And on a closed mind.
These things
Tempt me at times
To retreat
Into an enclosed fortress
Where I am right
And others are excluded.
So I close one door
In order to open another…
Yet I wonder
Do I have the right
To close any doors at all?
-Sally Coleman at Eternal Echoes
*****
Closing Doors
Give thanks for
the doors that close
on a past of regret,
or choices left behind.
Thanks be,
the closing doors that end
our looking back and cut
ties to things undone.
Give thanks,
for the doors that close
on endings, that were
once beginnings,
when those same doors
opened on possibility
and we stepped through.
-Tandaina at Snow on Roses
*****
there is something so
defiant about waiting
to go nowhere
fast
when the angles of
twilight press hard against your
lengthening shadow,
lifting you out of
having to choose
to do anything
or be anything
except alive and present
and completely free
to live inside each
moment that passes
with the drift of your dreaming
of no other life
but this one.
-Laure at Sometimes . . . Poetry
*****
From Helen Keller: ‘When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.’
from an old journal entry:
facing out
walking away…
walking toward
embracing the mystery
filling the empty
frightened
discouraged…
wondering
anticipating…
facing out
trying again
starting over
-Carolyn
*****
Near flowing waters
embraced in shades of pine,
the artist’s door . . .
open to return to Nature,
closed to record the Sacred.
-b’oki.
*****
MIRAGE
She stood in the shadow
of the doorway looking
out across the square.
I couldn’t tell her age
or temperament, if she’d
ever suffered, or if her pain
was still to come. Those eyes,
dark umbra of her soul,
wouldn’t tell. Nor could I capture
any spark of joyful recollection,
glint of sweet anticipation
or even some secret longing
radiating from her steady gaze.
Still there was a beauty about
her, a formless mystery at once
appealing and yet estranging,
her story hidden in the shadow
of the doorway.
Then, as I watched, she sensed my
presence and, like a bird suddenly
aware of the birdwatcher, she
turned and fled into the darkness,
her burqa fluttering
as she flew away.
-John O’Hagan
*****
See ‘em stout hinges?
I made ‘em–
beat the red hot iron
out myself,
hung the hinges
straight. You’ll not find better.
Master carpenter
planed his boards true,
joined ‘em up so’s
even an angel couldna
squeeze through the cracks.
Me and him made this door
and many more like.
For doors is for keeping,
sir and madam,
keeping such as your selves safe
and harm without.
Close and lock as you need,
sir and madam,
fear not, for our
workmanship is sound,
our hands true.
Only
mark you open
our handiwork
now and again,
lest the day come
when no one can.
-Black_Pete at Red Wine and Garlic
*****
KNOCK ON WOOD
This is thusness
that is thusness —
Open or closed
it matters not.
As Shisen-jo says:
“In the cedar forest
a cedar gate.”
-kigen at Early Women Masters
*****
Two aisles of cereal
Colourful boxes enticing
I choose oats
and make porridge
-Mavis at Set the Bird Free
*****
Opening Doors
I walked up to the Fitness Center, pulling open the door.
And suddenly I thought of all the pastors who were walking up to the churches
they serve and opening the church door.
And here I was, again, opening not a church door, but a fitness center door.
Trying to open the door of healing, hope, wholeness,
wishing I were walking through a door of ministry rather than health care.
Is there a difference?
In the last 2 years I have opened hundreds of new doors:
doctors’ offices, pharmacies, hospitals, laboratories, yoga rooms, physical therapy rooms, testing rooms, locker rooms, swimming pools, therapists’ offices, car doors of those who give me rides, our own car door,
and each day the door to our home.
There are other kinds of doors that have been opened as well:
doors of fear and doubt,
doors of crying out “why?” and “where are You God in the midst of this pain?” doors of letting go, and letting go, and letting go some more
doors of anger and learning how to express it
doors of vulnerability
But there are also:
doors to receive the unending love and care and prayers of so many others
doors of forgiveness - of myself and others
doors of hope, healing
doors to a new dimension of faith
doors of unmerited grace, unconditional love
doors to my fearful and desiring, wounded and open heart
Do You not call each of us to keep opening the door, whether just a crack or flung wide open, to discover yet once again, Your gift of hope and resurrection in new and old ways?
(-from an anonymous reader)
*****
paralyzed
I refuse to choose and
so the doors that lie before me
remain forever unopened
some sit ajar…just a bit
a crack to let light in
brightening the shadows of “what if”…just a bit
immobile, however,
the hinges grow stiff in their waiting
possibility remains trapped,
paralyzed behind the door
I refuse to let swing wide
saying to myself,
“what if it’s the wrong door?”
-Kayce Hughlett at Lucy Creates
*****
Is it OK?
Is it OK to close the door?
What will people think?
Is it OK to end that friendship?
I don’t want to hurt her.
Is it OK to put myself first?
People expect a lot from me.
Is it OK to stop eating brocolli?
I just don’t like the stuff.
Is it OK to keep so many doors open?
Shouldn’t I focus on one interest?
Is it OK?
-Tess at Anchors and Masts
*****
I love the idea of closing doors! I am realizing a sense of “too much” more and more often in my life…to many choices (we just purchased a flat screen tv from amongst an endless arry on display), too many creative ideas that I could pursue, too many art supplies (hard to embrace this one). I have felt the quiet invitation to slow down, cut back, say no to more and, in doing, so say yes to depth and presence.
I found this quote in the March edition of Artist’s Magazine, and photocopied the page for my journal. I guess the closing door idea has been calling to me for some time. This is from an article about artists who have devoted their lives to their craft. This woman is 65 and a watercolor artist. She says, “One of my biggest obstacles has been a desire to try everything that’s creative! I finally realized I needed to concentrate on one area and let everything else go. It takes a lot of discipline, and I struggle with this all the time.”
It helped to hear from another that the struggle is ongoing, something that has to be learned and practiced over and over. Every now and then I imagine what life would be like to focus on one thing…one project, one method, one idea…to live with just that. How would that be? It’s not easy, and I’m still in the “considering it” stage.
Thank you, Christine, for the image of the closed door. I imagine one hand closing a door that is behind me, and the other hand beginning to open a door that is in front of me. What is most appealing to me right now is to stay for a time in the dark hallway between those two doors. Simply stay and be…Blessings
-Nancy
*****
“So, did you enter?” he said.
“The closed door meant no one else could enter,” she said.
“Was there a sign or something saying no one else could enter?” he said.
“No, there was no sign,” she said.
“Oh, well. Well, you said that you wanted to enter,” he said.
Again, she replied, “Yes, I WANTED to, but the door was closed.”
“When you knocked, no one came?” he said.
“Oh, I didn’t knock,” she said.
“That’s too bad. The door was locked then?” he said.
“Oh, I didn’t have a key, why would I have a key? …..if that’s what you mean,” she said.
“So the door was locked,” he said.
“Oh, I don’t know, I didn’t try to open it,” she said.
“I don’t understand, you thought the door would be open to all who just dropped by?”, he said.
“Well….,” she said.
“And you didn’t knock, and you didn’t try the knob, and you really wanted to enter?” he said.
“Yes…., that’s right,” she said.
“Oh,” he said.
-Sunrise Sister at Mind Sieve
*****
A Door
The peculiar design
of your hinges,
the bright radiant color of
your wood,
the solid iron of your
handle— these neither
invite or deny;
they cause me to wonder.
So I’ll wait for one
who will enter
or one who will leave;
someone to talk things over with.
Then I might know what to make
of you — divider of time.
Threshold from here
to where?
Rejection to welcome?
Fear to grace?
Despair to hope?
-Martha Louise Harkness
*****
Behind the red door
are secrets I’ll never tell
memories good and bad
locked away
There are treasures there
broken hearts
failed dreams
shining moments
and instants that pierce my heart with joy
Sometimes I open the red door
and let the good stuff come out and play
Sometimes the bad stuff sneaks out and wreaks havoc
And sometimes I wonder what it would be like
to open the door, and leave it open
To air and share all the things
that make me who I am
and be
me
-Anne Sims at Stories and Faith
*****
I see a red door and I want it painted black
No colors anymore I want them to turn black
I see the girls walk by dressed in their summer clothes
I have to turn my head until my darkness goes
-Paint It Black, The Rolling Stones
(submitted by Kievas Fargo)
*****
Please don’t knock
I am away
I’ve gone on vacation
I need to play.
My mind is resting
My mouth sealed shut
Kicked back and relaxing
Firmly planted on my butt.
I cannot be social
Today is about me
No phone calls, or chatting
I’ve no place to be.
So if you come calling
The reds all you’ll see
I’ve gone on vacation
With no one but me.
-Nichol Newcomb
*****
Not my ways
I knelt in prayer
to ask the question
which ought to be asked
so sure of the answer
this was a good thing,
for me, for the Kingdom of God
it wasn’t too easy
it wasn’t certain death
and so I raised up my question
and my hopes
so sure of the answer
only to hear something else
the rattle of a door not only closed
but locked too
a different answer which
opened doors for other people
and kept me where I needed to be
for my own self care
and I learned that
the ways of God
are not my ways.
-ymp at Means of Grace
*****
THE RED DOOR
I’m lucky,
you see,
I see,
the red door
we all live with.
Only thing is,
I’m no better off,
in figuring out,
whether
to enter
or exit.
-Rich at Pilgrim Path
*****
-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts
(door photo taken last summer near the Rock of Cashel in Ireland)
Posted in Poetry Invitation | 20 Comments »
June 27, 2008 · by Christine
“At the entrance, my bare feet on the dirt floor, Here, gusts of heat; at my back, white clouds. I stare and stare.
It seems I was called for this: To glorify things just because they are.”
-Czeslaw Milosz
(most of these photos have appeared on this blog before, but the quote inspired me to group them together)
-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts
** Come back on Monday for our 21st Poetry Party **
Posted in Visual Meditation | 7 Comments »
June 25, 2008 · by Christine
I first encountered Marcy Hall’s work through her partner’s blog blisschick who comments here very thoughtfully from time to time. I was delighted to follow the links that landed me at Marcy’s website because I discovered an artist with a wonderful sense of playfulness to her work, while at the same time exploring very sacred themes.
I also adore her use of animals in her imagery that speak to me of the sacred power our connections to creatures have. Each animal in her work seems to occupy its own world of peace and play, while also inviting the person gazing upon the work into this world, to participate in it.
I am so pleased that Marcy agreed to particiate in my Sacred Artist Interview series:
*****
Are you rooted in a particular faith tradition?
Not so much. I was raised as a Methodist, but it didn’t really stick. I think I am pretty rooted in Christianity as a whole, though I tried for years not to be. I like to try to stay open minded (for example, I wasn’t raised Catholic but there’s a lot there that attracts me and the same for Buddhism), but I am, at this point in my life, actively seeking a path that is more definite and concrete. I think that having a path helps to focus and direct your life in a way that nothing else can. Cafeteria style is fine but at some point you have to decide what to put on your tray, which is only so big.
What is your primary art medium?
My primary art medium is acrylic on canvas, though I like to explore. Recently, I’ve branched out to painting on wood panels. I have a real drive to do more multi-media work or to incorporate sculpture in some way. But I haven’t figured out how or even why to do so. I know I have to just wait and eventually it will come to me.
How do you experience the connection between spirituality and creativity?
I think they are one and the same, which is why I think I’ve had a hard time settling on a particular faith tradition — because I feel like too often the religions I’ve experienced try to separate the two by creating set-in-stone methods that are supposed to work the same way for everyone. I think our spirituality and our personal way to God is as unique as the creativity we all possess.
What role does spiritual practice have in your art-making?
Even though I don’t have a particular faith tradition (for the moment!), I do believe in one basic principle, which I try to use as the guiding principle of my life: Everything is divine in some way, in some respect. I may not know how or why, but that’s not important, because most things are beyond my ability to see. I try to represent this principle through my art in my own way, through the subjects I choose, the colors I use, the elements I incorporate, the words I write. My goal is to make art that celebrates life’s inherent divinity and specialness.
What sparked your spiritual journey and your artistic journey?
Both my spiritual and artistic journeys are constantly sparked by each other, and both are constantly sparked by a million other things. I like to think, though I am building on what came before in both cases, that I am starting over new and fresh each day. Anything can happen. In that way, each day is an opportunity for something new to happen, big or small. Both my spiritual and creative journies are also equally sparked by trying to find my place in the world and by trying to better understand how I can contribute to the world around me. I can’t contribute much if I’m not spiritually grounded (or at least seeking to become so) or if I’m not practicing my artistic gifts, which are spiritually inspired. They go hand in hand.
Do you have a particular process you use when entering into your creative work?
I do have a process that I normally follow. On the wall behind my easel and painting paraphernalia, I have an altar of sorts (just a shelf mounted on the wall) that holds a couple of candles, some pictures of loved ones (cats and people), and some other miscellaneous items of importance to me. Before I begin painting, I light my candles and remind myself not to over-analyze and not to try too hard, but to just let the images and color choices come naturally and spontaneously. I remind myself to trust my instincts and to not second guess myself. My painting room is also where my rabbit, Zoe, resides, so my creative process also involves taking a lot of snuggle breaks.
How does your art-making shape your image of God?
I’ve always had a favorable impression of God, and painting and living more artistically and creatively has only enhanced that impression. My art doesn’t so much shape an image of God for me as much as it solidifies my connection to God. Though I’ve lived a long time without adhering to one particular tradition, I’ve never doubted God, and I think that’s because I’ve always been creative or artistic in some way over my lifetime. Creativity and art-making show me personally that though I may not totally “get it” in the religion department, that’s not ultimately what matters. What ultimately matters is that I try to do the best I can every day with whatever skills, talents, and passions I possess. I think that God is Love and Love is God, and every day is an opportunity to see the world from that perspective. For me, art is what reminds me of that when I lose my way.
*****
Thank you so much to Marcy for sharing her insights here with us. As always, in the process of reading through the interview I found much that resonated and stirred me. Today I am especially moved by her statement of making art “that celebrates life’s inherent divinity and specialness”, that each day offers to us an abundance of new possibilities, and I of course love that her creative process involves snuggle breaks with her bunny. The Abbess Petunia is often my muse as well as my reminder of the delights of love which then infuses my work. I also love Marcy’s image of art-making as a way of deepening her connection to the sacred.
Make sure to visit her website to see more of her absoltuely delightful images. Also visit her Cafe Press store called Animal Dreams where you can order some of her whimsical animal art on t-shirts, cards, totes, and more.
(Images from top to bottom: Meditation, Bird Goddess, Tiger Tiger, Bridge Cat, Cherry Blossoms)
Posted in Sacred Artist Interview | 4 Comments »
June 22, 2008 · by Christine
A Great Pilgrimage
I felt in need of a great pilgrimage
so I sat still for three
days
and God came
to me.
-Kabir
Tomorrow is my birthday and lately I have been longing for some retreat time. I was wise enough to block off the next few days to rest in some stillness at home while my dear husband is away. This time of retreat is partly in preparation for a much larger pilgrimage I will be taking in just a couple of weeks and partly because I find birthdays invite reflection as I celebrate the anniversary of my own birth and sit in vigil waiting for what needs to be revealed for this next phase of my journey.
This past week I wrote about the need to be willing to walk into our despair rather than resist it and the practice of radical hospitality as one way to welcome in the strangers at our interior doors. There is another metaphor that I find helpful in this journey – the image of learning a new landscape. When we have enough courage to see sorrow or grief through the peephole and we welcome them in as treasured guests the way Rumi invites us to, there is an energy of resting in our interior dwelling space together. But there is also the energy of being invited onto a pilgrimage through unfamiliar territory. Much of our spiritual journeys hold these seemingly paradoxical movements — creating space within us to dwell and rest and be present to the strangers and shadows we would rather not welcome in — as well as the invitation to leave the place of our security, to go beyond the door of our own safe homes and be led on a pilgrimage by these strangers and shadows and being shown an entirely new landscape.
When I sit with people in spiritual direction I usually offer both of these metaphors at different moments, depending on what seems to be called for. In some ways the initial movement is the ability and willingness to welcome in the whole host of feelings and experiences that we want to resist into our interior house, into a place of safety. We make tea for our anger, serve a meal to our despair, build a fire for our sense of betrayal, so that we can create room enough within us to learn from these guests.
But while we sit over tea and scones with the fire roaring, this guest begins to take us on a journey. It is an interior journey of exploring a certain kind of landscape. In our deepest grief, when we let the sorrow in, can we then let sadness take us by the hand and walk us through the textures of that landscape? Are we willing to become familiar with the rock formations there, with the vegetation, the colors (or lack thereof) that spread out before us? Can we linger in those places that may not be beautiful, but offer us wisdom about what it means to be human?
Years ago, a wise and wonderful spiritual director sat with me as I shared a story of a betrayal I had experienced, one that had no neat resolutions to be found. She invited me to get familiar with that experience of betrayal, to welcome it into myself with the fullness of the human experience if for no other reason than to know that one day when I found myself sitting with another person going through a similar experience I could invite them to embrace the experience rather than resist it with the knowledge that I had been there too. True, my experience of the landscape of this emotional territory might be slightly different, but there was great value and compassion in simply being present to the pain in part as a gift to a future unknown other. A gift I find myself called upon to offer again and again.
In just a few weeks I leave for another external pilgrimage connected to my family systems work. I will be traveling to the places of my father and his ancestors, some of which I have journeyed through before as a child and some will be my first experience. It has taken time to get all of the preparations in place, to plan the itinerary, to make the necessary reservations, to contact the family members and old friends I want to connect with, to find someone to care for our home and beloved dog while we are away.
All those practical pieces are in place now and I suddenly realize it is time for me to make the emotional preparations as well. As someone who loves to travel, it will be an exciting journey simply to visit these beautiful places. But there will also be challenges along the way, I know memories will be stirred, unresolved feelings will show up, ancestral longings and trauma I was not familiar with before will demand my attention. I will need to put radical hospitality into practice, making internal space for all of these strangers. I will need to tend to the internal dimensions of the pilgrimage and grow intimate with landscapes and emotional territories I may not have anticipated. So these next few days of retreat are in part a time of preparation for the bigger journey ahead.
I also have some maps to help guide me along the way. I recently had my birth chart done again. The first time I went to an astrologist was about ten years ago. She was a close friend of my aunt’s and she offered a reading as a birthday gift. I accepted for the fun of it but was surprised by the complexity and beauty of what the reading offered to me in terms of understanding my own longings and the directions I felt called to go. Suddenly I imagined a God vast enough to have offered these archetypal symbols to me at the moment of my birth as one possible map, as guidance from one much wiser than myself. Astrology is not about your life being pre-determined, but a template that provides an invitation to go to the places that nurture your soul most deeply.
Ironically enough (or perhaps not really), one of the invitations in my chart I heard this past week that I hadn’t heard in past readings, is that an essential element of my work is to go to places of my own darkness so that I can also be a guide for others to do their own difficult soul work. The astrologist offered the myth of Persephone as an image and then in a lovely synchronicity, the person leading my peer supervision group the very next day invited us to work with the myth of Persephone through art as our process. I experienced deep resonance and layers of invitation unfolded before me during our time together that I will continue to explore. Persephone spends half the year in the Underworld, but while she was initially tricked into going there, she eventually becomes the Queen of this shadowy place. She becomes empowered to dwell there, but also is able to return to the earth above. I hold this story as another map to tend to in my few days of retreat and as a preparation for the pilgrimage ahead.
Lest you worry that my birthday will be spent only plunging the dark emotional depths of my soul, know that I also have the landscape of joy before me. Last Friday night I spent the most delightful and wondrous evening with a dear friend, welcoming the Solstice together, celebrating all of the delights of summer in Seattle, sharing communion together through bread and wine, witnessing each other’s journeys. I truly had the experience of breathing in the deepest kind of freedom that comes from authentic joy. And there is more of this kind of delight still to come this week. These moments provide their own kind of map as well.
What are the stories and symbols singing within you during these days of summer? What are the journeys and pilgrimages you are being invited to take (both internal and external)? Where are you experiencing the rich satisfaction of joy and the difficult places of sadness? What is the map you need to move into this new territory?
(photo taken last summer in Ireland at Glendalough and is also featured on one of the cards from my set for discernment)
* I will still be checking email this week so I welcome your comments and insights into what I have shared by comments or email notes. Wednesday there will be another Sacred Artist Interview. *
-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts
Posted in Spirituality, Grief, Pilgrimage, Family Systems | 12 Comments »
June 19, 2008 · by Christine
Season by the Sea: A Contemporary Book of Hours has finally arrived on my doorstep! Thank you for your patience everyone. I have just made the journey to the post office today to send the first batch out to subscribers and those who pre-ordered.
If you haven’t yet, I would love your support by placing an order for your own copy. I also have copies available of my previous zines Praying with the Elements, Callings: Becoming Who You Already Are, and What is Blossoming Within You? and my sets of prayer cards for discernment, grief, as well as the seasons (although I haven’t completed a set for summer yet and likely won’t this season).
You can find them all at my Etsy store or you can email me directly with your order to Christine AT AbbeyoftheArts DOT com. Please send in all orders BEFORE JULY 8th as I will be unable to ship anything from July 10-August 15.
In other fun publishing news, the book I co-authored with Sister Lucy Wynkoop for Paulist Press titled Lectio Divina: Contemplative Awakening and Awareness should be available by November. To get a sneak peek, you might want to visit some previous posts of mine on using lectio divina to pray with scripture, poetry, visual art, and music. Lectio is an ancient contemplative way of praying with scriptures that can also be used to cultivate a contemplative engagement with all of life’s experiences.
Here is what some wonderful writers have generously said about our upcoming book:
“I highly recommend Lectio Divina: a Way of Being with God and Life. While many books laud the value of integrating lectio into our lives and some may provide the briefest of explanations, this is the only source that I am aware of that provides both the tradition and development of lectio divina along with contemporary expressions of lectio in practice. This book has grown out of years of practice and in mentoring others to cultivate ways of lectio divina that deepen the contemplative stance toward life. Lectio has been the heart and gut of monastic practice for centuries; the Spirit invites all of God’s people to partake of this ancient way with God.”
-Sr. Laura Swan, OSB, author of The Forgotten Desert Mothers
“Lectio Divina: A Way of Being with God and Life is above all a practical book. It is rooted in the authors’ own practice and the experience of those for whom they provide spiritual direction. It gives practical advice for readers who wish to deepen their life with
God on the basis prayerful reading of the Bible or the other ways in which God’s word reaches us. Those who listen with their hearts to these authors’ words will be deepened in their spiritual practice.”
–Fr. Hugh Feiss, OSB, Monastery of the Ascension.
“With the rising interest in the art of Lectio Divina Christine Valters Paintner and Lucy Wynkoop have created a work of great promise. In this superb resource the ancient wisdom and the poetry of the Lectio process shines forth. This is a praiseworthy offering.”
–Macrina Wiederkehr, OSB, author of Seven Sacred Pauses and A Tree Full of Angels
“Christine Valters Paintner and Lucy Wynkoop offer a way of practicing lectio divina that is inviting, accessible and practical. Their deep confidence in this way of prayer, and the clarity and wisdom with which they beckon the reader, spring from their own lived experience. With its singular combination of insights for daily life and prayer and suggestions for practice, this book will prove helpful to both the novice and to those who teach this way of prayer.”
–The Rev. Mary C. Earle, Associate Faculty of the Episcopal Seminary of the Southwest in Austin, author of Broken Body, Healing Spirit: Lectio Divina and Living with Illness
“Wynkoop and Paintner’s LECTIO DIVINA is a lovely book, with a gentle, lyrical style that reveals lectio’s aim in the authors’ tone as well as words. In their hands, lectio takes shape as a transforming power, combining the great aspiration to love and be loved by God with full acceptance of ourselves as we are. I especially enjoy the way Wynkoop and Paintner integrate the prayer of lectio with the senses, describing its wisdom as basking and luxuriating in God’s presence, and offering specific suggestions for integrating art, poetry, images, music and the body into a lectio practice. LECTIO DIVINA is an act of consecration – the lifting up of our lives and souls to God.”
–Dr. Norvene Vest, OSB obl., author of Friend of the Soul: Benedictine Spirituality of Work
“If a college student practicing a secular adaptation of lectio divina hears the “still, small voice” that was “lost to years of Ritalin use,” then Sister Lucy Wynkoop and Dr. Christine Valters Paintner’s Lectio Divina: A Way of Being with God and Life provides an immensely practical guidebook for discerning the voices of “God” and for being with the vicissitudes of contemporary life.”
–Dr. Sarah Williams, Professor of Feminist Studies, The Evergreen State College
There is, of course, a sense of deep joy in work done well. I am eager to hold this volume in my hands and begin to share it more widely. But for the moment I rest in the satisfaction and delight of this moment, and of lingering in the possibilities ahead.
I also found out recently that I will be presenting a workshop on “Cultivating Presence Through the Expressive Arts” at the next Spiritual Directors International Conference held in Houston, Texas in April 2009. I look forward to connecting again with the spiritual direction community there, the Leadership Institute portion of this year’s conference was wonderful.
So today I welcome joy into the inner rooms of my soul. Of course the Abbess Petunia brings me her own dose of delight too. Have a wonderful weekend. May the coming of the Summer Solstice find you dancing in the light of creation and reveling in the wonder of your own being.
-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts
** Come back Monday for a continued reflections building on my previous posts this week – Wonder and Despair and Radical Hospitality — and another Sacred Artist Interview on Wednesday with the delightful Marcy Hall **
Posted in Fun, zine journal | 3 Comments »
June 17, 2008 · by Christine
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning is a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
[S]he may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
-Rumi
I am very grateful for the many thoughtful comments and emails I received in response to my post from Monday on Wonder and Despair. If you haven’t read all of the comments I encourage you to do so.
The poem above by Rumi has been one of those core life poems for me for several years — a poem that speaks to me so beautifully and simply about what I believe to be one of life’s central and most difficult tasks.
Over time, as I lived into the poem’s imagery, I began to discover a connection to the Benedictine concept of hospitality that plays a central role in my spiritual life and practice. St. Benedict wrote in his Rule: “All guests who present themselves are to be welcomed as Christ, for him himself will say: I was a stranger and you welcomed me.” The core of his idea was that everyone who comes to the door of the monastery, and by extension the door to our lives—the poor, the traveler, the curious, those of a different religion, social class, or education — should be welcomed in, not just as an honored guest, but as a window onto the sacred presence. For Benedict, our encounter with the stranger, the unknown, the unexpected, the foreign elements that spark our fear, are precisely the places where we are most likely to encounter God.
I began to see how we could apply this kind of hospitality to our very selves, to all of the elements about us that we fear and reject — the painful and dark feelings, our shadow side, the things we do and long for we don’t want anyone to know about. I began to see this as a kind of radical hospitality of the soul. The word radical comes from the Latin word radix meaning root. Radical hospitality might be seen as hospitality that proceeds from the very core or root of who we are, an invitation to extend a welcome to the stranger that dwells inside of you. We are made up of multiple inner characters and voices and some of them get invited to our inner table, while others are standing out in the rain waiting to be let in to feast and share their wisdom with us.
Rumi’s poem commands us to make space for the whole range of guests who might arrive – the feelings we experience that we push back, resist, numb ourselves to – which might come bearing gifts.
How do you welcome in the range of your feelings without being swept away by them? One way to do this is by cultivating an inner witness. Meditation practice can nurture our ability to sit and observe the rise and fall of our inner lives without resisting or seizing any particular moment. When we offer ourselves the space to simply be with whatever is happening inside, without judgement, we begin to see that each of those feelings passes with time. The inner witness is that part of ourselves – described in different ways by many traditions — that can be fully present without anxiety, that can offer radical hospitality to whatever knocks at our inner door.
We are called to be a witness to each other as well – to be fully present to the sorrow and despair of another without rushing to console or offer hope to circumvent our own discomfort. It is because I have treasured friends and other support in my life who provide a safe container for me to explore the depths of my experience, that I am able to walk into the feelings of despair when they come, rather than run the other way. It is because I make a regular practice of nurturing the ability of my inner witness to be present to the guests arriving at my inner door welcoming them in. When the difficult feelings arrive, I breathe deeply and make space so I can listen to what messages they have to offer me rather than resist and leave them banging on the door. Some days this is easier than others, some days I still want to pile the furniture to prevent their entry. But as Rumi said so wisely 800 years ago, treat each guest honorably as a guide much wiser than myself. In that act of hospitality I will walk in solidarity with those who are shrouded in pain. I will come to know how essential kindness is. I will discover moments of wonder. I will come face to face with a different kind of hope, one that rises like heat from wrestling bodies.
-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts
(photo of door handle taken in Ireland last summer)
Posted in Poetry, Spirituality, Monastic Spirituality, Contemplative Living | 12 Comments »
June 15, 2008 · by Christine
The Love of Morning
It is hard sometimes to drag ourselves
back to the love of morning
after we’ve lain in the dark crying out
O God, save us from the horror . . . .
God has saved the world one more day
even with its leaden burden of human evil;
we wake to birdsong.
And if sunlight’s gossamer lifts in its net
the weight of all that is solid,
our hearts, too, are lifted,
swung like laughing infants;
but on gray mornings,
all incident - our own hunger,
the dear tasks of continuance,
the footsteps before us in the earth’s
beloved dust, leading the way - all,
is hard to love again
for we resent a summons
that disregards our sloth, and this
calls us, calls us.
-Denise Levertov
I had a recent email exchange with one of my readers who shared with me that she sometimes goes through stages where she is “carried by a poem.” I completely resonated with this image and the Levertov poem above is one that is carrying me through these days. These lines in particular are singing to me: “God has saved the world one more day / even with its leaden burden of human evil; / we wake to birdsong” although the whole arc of the poem reflects my internal journey in this season.
I have come to recognize a deep despair that resides in the shadow part of myself, the shadow being of course those things about ourselves we don’t want to embrace. And yet the journey toward our own wholeness is precisely about naming our shadows, welcoming them into the inner rooms of our being, and listening for what they have to say to us.
Those of you who have been reading along here for a while know that I am engaging in some family systems work as a part of my spiritual journey. My father was someone who let despair consume him, his whole life he ran from his own darkness. In addition to whatever pain he experienced within his own family, his youth was layered against the backdrop of World War II, and the trauma and despair of that experience is something he never spoke of to me. I have found that resisting the despair only magnifies the weight of it.
In some ways, in saying these things, I feel like my paint is peeling, I am revealing the more difficult surfaces of my soul. I think part of my reluctance to share these struggles is my fear that others will try to step in to offer me hope as an antidote. I have an ambivalent relationship to the word “hope” — too often I think we use that term as a way of trying to circumvent the necessary process of facing our own dark emotions, we do violence to others by trying to move them to a place where we feel much more comfortable.
I am blessed with a spiritual director who does not ask me to cheer up or have hope. He asks me to walk right into the despair, to name the darkness and pain and suffering that weighs on me at times. He invites me to dwell there and imagine the pain my father struggled with so that I might cultivate more compassion and forgiveness for him.
I want to resist the despair, as many of us would. I sometimes spend a lot of energy doing precisely that. I don’t want to leap into the dark abyss where I must come to terms with the fact that this next moment could be my last, that those I love deeply will one day be gone, that we are waging a terrible war thousands of miles away whose trauma will ripple through generations to come, that we continue to wreak havoc on our planet and much of the damage is simply irreversible. When I contemplate the unimaginable horrors of the Holocaust I come to the conclusion that there is simply no consolation for that devastation. For some despair there simply is no tidy redemption offered in response, it simply is the horror that it is. Not that there weren’t stories of tremendous courage and love that rose from the ashes of that event, but the millions of crushed and broken bodies cannot be changed.
And yet, when I give myself space to walk right into that place of feeling utterly undone, of naming the things that give me reason for despair, I feel the crushing weight of sorrow and sometimes something quite remarkable happens. Sometimes when I am truly able to release my resistance to the places of darkness I am reminded of birdsong as Levertov writes, I come to treasure the simplest kindness, my heart begins to open in wonder at my own capacity for love.
These things do not outweigh the despair, as though the universe were some kind of cosmic scale. The despair and the beauty dwell together in the same space, not competing, but offering to us the full experience of soulfulness. Poetry and art help us to hold these in tension.
I come to realize that the opposite of despair for me is not hope, but precisely this experience of wonder. Wonder that there is anything at all, wonder that in the presence of great darkness there is also so much beauty, so much love.
As you read these words, I invite you to notice what stirs in you. Do you want to rush and reassure me that everything will indeed be alright? Do you want to say that the beauty of the world really does outweigh the darkness in some sort of ultimate battle?
Or can you rest here in this space with me, holding the profound paradox of the world as best as you can. Can you join me in making room within you for the full spectrum of the emotional landscape we contain within us, responding to the call to be fully present to this wondrous and despairing moment?
(photos: above taken over the Hood Canal, below taken at a sheep farm in Arlington, WA)
-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts.
Posted in Family Systems | 24 Comments »
June 14, 2008 · by Christine
This week’s winner of the random drawing for the Poetry Party is Tess at Anchors and Masts. Tess, email me with your snail mail and I will be sending you a copy of my newest zine Season by the Sea: A Contemporary Book of Hours by the end of this coming week.
Thanks to everyone for their stunning poetic offerings this week. An amazing array of beautiful words and reflections. Make sure to click over and read the wonderful poems. The next Poetry Party will be in three weeks on Monday, June 30th.
Another full week, but things are beginning to subside and I will be sharing more reflections next week at my blog, so make sure to come back on Monday. I realized after I posted the cover of my upcoming zine here last week that I made a last-minute change because of an inspiration I had to do some collage representations of the different qualities of time throughout the day, and so here you see the new cover for Season by the Sea: A Contemporary Book of Hours (the image from the previous cover still appears inside).
The issues will be here from the printer any day now and I have all of my pre-orders and subscribers envelopes ready to stuff when they arrive! Please keep the orders coming in!
-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts
Posted in Fun, zine journal | 2 Comments »
June 12, 2008 · by Christine
excerpted from “To Learn from Animal Being”
May we learn to return
and rest in the beauty
Of animal being,
Learn to lean low,
Leave our unlocked minds,
And with freed senses
Feel the earth
Breathing with us.
May we enter
Into lightness of spirit,
And slip frequently into
The feel of the wild.
Let the clear silence
Of our animal being
Cleanse our hearts
Of corrosive words.
May we learn to walk
Upon the earth
With all their confidence
And clear-eyed stillness
So that our minds
Might be baptized
In the name of the wind
And the light and the rain.
-John O’Donohue, To Bless the Space Between Us
Today is Abbess Petunia’s 11th Birthday! She welcomes birthday wishes from humans and canines alike in the comments! Both photos above are of her in all her wise and restful glory. The bottom image was the featured photo for our previous Poetry Party, but it is one of my favorites so here it appears again in her honor.
** Make sure to visit this week’s Poetry Party! **
-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts
Posted in Visual Meditation | 8 Comments »
