Learn more about What Spiritual Direction is all about from this podcast recently recorded during worship at Wheatland Salem UMC in suburban Chicago with Pastor Corey Ashley and Spiritual Director Laura Lies.

 

 

 

Contemplative Photography (see more images on the document below)

1. Taking a “long and loving look,” what do I see in this image? What stands out to me?
2. “Listening” with my eyes and my heart, how do I receive the invitation in this image?
3. What is the “story” that this image tells me? Where am I in this story? What feelings arise in me?
4. How does this image connect with what is going on in my life at this time?
5. What is waiting to be revealed?
6. What draws me to this image?
7. What pierces me about this image?

“There is a road from the eye to the heart that does not go through the intellect.” (G.K. Chesterton)

Sources:

Re-Creating a Life. Learning how to tell our most life-giving story. By Diane M. Millis, PhD.

Spiritual Director’s International Contemplative Photography & Spiritual Direction webinar.

Nurtured by Sacred Beauty. Treasures for each day. By Linda Kviz.

“The spiritual journey inward to the Beloved is the journey home. To who I truly am. A circular, spiral, womb-like experience. Non-linear. Journey of remembering and forgetting.

Contemplative prayer is about aligning myself with the highest intention; to be with my beloved.  Learning that we cannot figure out holy mystery with our minds.

When the sluggish worm completely dissolves into a sort of cellular soup, becoming nothing in a cocoon. And later transforms into a beautiful butterfly flitting about.

Coming to know God with God’s own mind. Coming to love God with God’s own heart. Looking through the eyes of love and seeing only love.

When lover dissolves completely into the Beloved. The subject/object distinction is obliterated. There is no longer union with the Beloved. There is only love. Consummated marriage of the soul.

Then we return to the world of seeming separation, knowing that there is no separation; that I am in Him and He is in me.

And now the only task is to give ourselves in service to the world. That is all that is left to do.  Seeing every face as the face of the Beloved.

To be of service may look very different from what we think it will look like. Do only what is yours to do. Let not others tell you otherwise.”

(Mirabai Starr speaking on The Interior Castle webinar series available through Center for Action and Contemplation. Learn more at https://cac.org/online-ed/interior-castle-course-description/)

The Calling by Mirabai Starr (excerpts)

Inspired by Teresa of Avila Interior Castle

This magnificent refuge is inside you.

Enter.

Shatter the darkness that shrouds the doorway.

Listen.

The One you love is calling.

Listen.

His call is flute music.

Far away.

Be brave, and walk through the country of your own wild heart.

Be gentle, and know that you know nothing.

Be still.

Listen.

Keep walking.

This is your rightful place.

That is your Beloved reclining in the inner-most chamber, waiting for you. Offering wine from a bottle with your crest on the label.

The path home to your true love unobstructed after all.

Know that the Beloved has chosen as His dwelling place, the core of your own being.

For that is the single, most beautiful place in all creation.

Waste no time.

Enter the center of your soul.

Listen to Mirabai Starr read the full version of The Calling at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zii_c3jHl9c&t=8s