The Contemplative Life

It turns out there’s a big trend going on in our society right now. In 2021, over 1 million people left their jobs. And if the statistics are correct, over 95% of people have considered, or are considering, leaving their jobs. But, while some of these shifts may be due to the desire for things like higher pay or better benefits, many are leaving over questions of meaning and purpose. Something in...

Dreams happen to all of us, even if we aren’t in the habit of paying attention to them. In this episode, we talk about how setting an intention to engage our dreams can be both informative and even transformative. Join us as we talk about the practice of allowing our dreams to become a part of our spiritual experience. Additional Resources Podcast: Finding God in Your Longing , Spiritual Direction...

Today we talk about Divine Encounters and how it relates to Epiphany – moments of sudden revelation or insight that can come, sometimes, quite unexpectedly. Join us as we share the ways in which the Divine has broken into our very ordinary moments, changing us, blessing us, and bringing us together with others in surprising ways. May each of our listeners have a moment to slow down, breathe deeply...

Celebrations, whether big or small, take even the ordinary moments of life and make them special. It’s easy to feel anywhere from bogged down to outright traumatized by our lives. Celebration provides the exhale we need – that moment to relax, to look around, and say, “Yes! This IS the day. And I am fully living in the middle of it.” Join us in taking a few moments to let out our “Yay!”  Additiona...

In today’s episode, we take a look at a spiritual practice that can help us make sense of our lives. Whether the questions are big or small, whether we’re looking for themes or goals, whether we use paper or conversation, it all brings us to a space of reflection that can help us enter our new year with excitement and hope. May your next year be blessed!  Additional Resources Podcast: Ep 37: Adult...

The Winter Solstice is an opportunity for natural pause. In today’s episode, we ask a lot of questions: How do we lean into the darkness and even enjoy it? What resources will we need? What’s the significance of community? What does it mean to immerse ourselves in a “deeper soaking?”   Sacred, beautiful, and important things happen in these winter months. Join us as we discover them together.  Add...

Awe is a universal emotion that we experience and has been paid attention to by both spiritual and scientific communities. It turns out that experiencing awe is (amazingly!) good for us. And when we are tuned in to it, we can find awe everywhere, from nature to – wait for it – shiny trash can lids. Join us as we talk about ways to open to even more awe in our lives.  Additional Resources TV Series...

Is balance something we can achieve or is it just an idealized concept that we’ve made up for ourselves? And if it’s the latter, what else is available to us when we’re feeling the weight of it all?  Today, believe it or not, we’ll visit some good news as it relates to stress in our lives, and we’ll dive into a few contemplative questions that can help us find those places of spaciousness and free...

Most of us tend to have specific ways that we’re used to connecting with God, and those things serve us to some degree, giving us a sense of belonging and security. But in today’s podcast, we also talk about the benefits of exploring a variety of ways to connect spiritually. Join us as we nerd out about words and talk about how we can lean into the expansiveness of our spirituality.  Additional Re...

Our culture is always talking about self-care, and so today we ask: Can the contemplative life help me with this? Many of us are so easily plagued with self-doubt: Am I doing enough? Am I doing it right? Is this the meaningful life I was hoping for? And so today we take a moment to talk about the tell-tale signs of needing a little self-love. We talk about how to practically engage without dysregu...

We all come to those moments in life where we find ourselves asking: Is this it? What’s the most I can hope for?  Thankfully, many people today are feeling evermore empowered to tackle these questions. Just because we’ve been headed down one particular path doesn’t mean we can’t make adjustments.  And so today, we talk about living into our meaning, about finding that meaning a little bit at a tim...

If ever there was a tricky situation to be in, it’s got to be this one: Sometimes, we’re operating out of our conscious mind – things we know we’re thinking about. And sometimes, we’re operating out of our unconscious mind – things we haven’t yet become aware of. And yet, our unconscious selves are still affecting us! A tricky situation indeed. Today we look gently at our lives from the perspectiv...

A lot goes on, both within ourselves and in the world around us. And all of that can leave us feeling very unclear about how to engage. We often want to show up with a spirit of generosity, but we just don’t know how. Today’s episode breaks down 4 specific ways of being compassionate that can help us engage in manners that feel healthy and sustainable.  Join us as we have a concrete conversation a...

Today we talk about the Enneagram as a way to help us understand how we - and those we interact with - show up in the world. We may hear ourselves asking sometimes: Where does that come from? Why does that happen? Or we may even feel confused about why so many of us aren’t entirely consistent and predictable. The Enneagram helps us with these interactive questions and can help us have more success...

Interspirituality is a new term for many of us, but broadly speaking, it’s the experience of finding the common ground between our faith traditions and appreciating the ways in which those traditions compliment each other.  In this episode, we dive into four different ways of being Interspiritual, and we consider how we’ve seen these ways of being emerging in our own lives and in the world around...

It happens to all of us. We reach that fated moment in life where we’re expected to behave like “a responsible adult,” where all the mundane tasks of life suddenly become ours to do. Did “being an adult” sneak up on you? Do you find yourself agonizingly asking, “Why is this happening?!”  In this episode, we ask: Can contemplative practices and lifestyles help us in navigating the mundane (and some...

Many of us have picked up ideas – and ideals – about everything and anything. Ways that we think people *should* be, the ways in which we think things *should* be done, even ways in which we think God is likely to act and behave. And when the world doesn’t act the way we want it to, we tend to have feelings about that.  In this episode we talk about the Images that have come to be in our lives – w...

One of the great things about music is the power it has to move us – to draw us out, to speak to us, to help us become more receptive – both to our experiences and to our feelings. In this episode, we “sing the praises” of music, pointing out how helpful it can be in interfaith settings and how easily it can be paired with other contemplative practices.  So join us as we talk about the mysterious...

We all know that how we process – or don’t process – our emotions can affect our lives in big ways. What’s more, many of us haven’t been given a whole lot of help in figuring out how to process what we might view as “negative emotion” in our lives. And so in today’s episode, we explore any number of contemplative practices that have been useful in helping us move through some of the more challengi...

In today’s episode, we spend some time talking about the how-to’s of meditation and what some of our personal preferences are, all through the lenses of our bodies, our minds, and our spirits. Do you sometimes wonder: Am I doing this right? What does it even mean to meditate? Join us as we tackle some of meditation’s big questions together. #MeditationForChildren #CenteringPrayer #Journey #Letting...

Ep 31 Second Naïvetés and Spirituality Second Naïvetés are the act of returning to our experiences and beliefs with fresh eyes and new outlooks, and it’s a common story for many in seasons of questioning in particular. In today’s episode, we spend some time specifically talking about how each of us has seen our prayer practices evolve as we’ve come in contact with the contemplative and why that ev...

Ep 30 Exvangelicals Exvangelicals are people who come from evangelical traditions but who no longer identify as such. Many have begun speaking out rather than quietly moving on. And so today we talk about it: How do we live into new spaces as we experience change in our lives? Where do we turn as our ideas about our faith lives evolve? What do I do with the grief and the angst that comes up in me...

Today, instead of examining “what am I thinking,” we take a moment to ask, “What am I feeling, seeing, smelling, touching, tasting?” In other words, how does wonder open up our awareness – aka – our contemplative experience? Our senses offer us so much – calm, delight, awe…May we all find ourselves going out and being invigorated by our sensory experiences!  #Smell #Touch #Senses #Nature  Addition...

Today we talk about our stories, why they matter and how we’re changed as we interact with both our own stories and the stories of others. As it turns out, research and experience show that sharing our stories helps us overcome pain, adversity, and struggle. But sadly, many of us suffer from the inability to even know what our story is. In this episode, we’ll explore a few ways to get back in touc...

Today we talk about rest! As we begin to move towards post-pandemic life, some of us have questions: Do we like our old pace? Are there rhythms we’ve enjoyed that we want to keep? Today we talk about the many benefits of rest. Because let’s face it, productivity is great! It’s caused lots of advancement in our society. But what would healthy rhythms look like for us personally?  #FourQuadrants #Sa...