When I was little, people used to call me an old soul – maybe because I enjoyed quiet, reading, and adult conversation, maybe because I had language and discernment for complicated things, like emotions. I often felt out of step with peers and was very fortunate in the relationships I formed

I was recently part of a leadership retreat where we, quite by accident, got to belly laughing. I was leading a guided meditation and invited participants to take a deep breath in, and then exhale, releasing whatever sound might come with it, if they wished. A friend and fellow traveler

A long-ago therapist taught me to see life as a climbing, expanding spiral. “If you look outward, as you come around the bend, it may seem like you are just repeating yourself, stuck in the same old cycle,” she said. “But if you cast your gaze inward and down

For many years, the running joke we’ve had about my mid-March birthday is that sleet is always the forecast. The weather in Chicagoland in March is, of course, very changeable. Even before the equinox, March can feel like spring, or even a bit of summer. It seems more

A couple days ago, our local county conservation staff held an event that occurs regularly at this time of year: a prescribed burn of our prairie fen. Such burns generally blacken some portion of this beloved place across the street from our home, offering a scorched viewscape, often in stark

I’ve been thinking lately – in light of recent events, near and far – about how pain and grief sit in our bodies. Often we humans like to make a distinction between mind, body, and spirit, as I often do. But in fact, all the thinking and feeling we do happens

Solstice is just again behind us and, as the year begins to close and the sunrise pauses on the horizon before changing trajectory, it is a fitting time to reflect on the year that has been. In many cultures around the globe, historically and currently, this window between the solstice

I have kept a personal journal since childhood – not altogether in regular fashion, but going through periods where I might write every few days, and then longer periods where it would lie fallow until I next needed it. For many years I wrote in it before bed as way to

Many faiths contemplate a life following the one we know now. Will we have an existence beyond this life? Will there be a place for us beyond this known world? Will we like it there? Will we be rewarded there – and if so, for what? Will we be punished there

Lately I have found myself explaining to folks what constitutes a spiritual practice – and as there has been a shift in my own practices over the last few years, I've been doing some re-thinking myself. When people hear the phrase, “spiritual practice,” they most often think (if

When the Covid pandemic first shut down the world, though I was heartbroken for those most impacted, in my own role as a religious professional, I felt initially like I could meet the moment. There was plenty to keep me occupied – the shift to all-online or home-delivered worship

Spiritual Direction is, quite simply, setting aside time with a skilled guide to contemplate one’s spiritual journey. Regular consultation with a spiritual teacher is an ancient practice across the world’s religions. Spiritual Direction is a continuation of this ancient practice, reinvigorated by the modern fields of psychology and