I want desperately to be a green-thumbed person.  My spiritual worldview is largely centered around connectedness to nature.  The knowledge that I tend to kill plants makes me feel like some kind of unnatural menace.  When someone gives me a plant as a gift, I smile but I’m thinking “No!  For the love of God, don’t leave that defenseless living being with me!”  I tell the story of the nice plant that I took with me to college.  It spent the semester dying and then was brought back to life during the breaks when I brought it home where my mother took care of it.  Ironically, I can seem psychic when around my cats, but I’m completely out of sync with plants.

Stories about gardening as a spiritual practice make me determined to give it another try.  I plan to put plants around our new house.  Not only do I want the pleasure of seeing them, but I know they are good for indoor air quality.  I want to have plants around our deck that will attract butterflies and hummingbirds.  Perhaps I will start with one indoor plant and try to work up from there.  Now that I live near my mother, I will have her visit from time to time to check on the poor little things.  Meanwhile I will try to focus on the spiritual practice aspect of garden with hope that in the process I will find myself transformed (or turned slightly greenish in hue).  As Terry Hershey would say, I will open my heart to the rhythms of the garden.

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Life has a funny way of moving forward whether you are ready for it or not. I’ve been wishing for a pause button ever since the semester started. I can see myself saying, “Wait, wait, just give me a sec, I’m coming!” Of course, my tendency towards perfectionism isn’t helping. Gotta do it right and not skip anything. Hah! Talk about futile.

As with many things, I’m out of sync with one of my favorite TV shows, Religion & Ethics Newsweekly. I watched the September 25 episode this morning while bustling around the kitchen and eating breakfast. The segment on the retirement of Harvey Cox particularly caught my interest during the interview:

ABERNETHY: Meanwhile, especially in Christianity, Cox sees a shift away from beliefs and hierarchies to an emphasis on individual faith.

COX: I call it an age of the spirit, the yearning for some kind of personal experience, even the yearning for some kind of, let’s call it, an ecstatic encounter with God or with the divine.

A labyrinth walk at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Long Beach, CA

The indoor labyrinth at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco was among the images being shown and those walking included Lauren Artress of Veriditas. I was excited to see this spiritual practice included both because it means so much to me personally but also because I think it is a wonderful spiritual practice for UUs to embrace.  Harvey Cox refers to the general trend in religious life as toward ecstatic encounters, however, I would call it embodied spirituality which I consider a welcome trend.  Labyrinth walking provides a wonderful opportunity for UUs to experience an active meditation practice that shares our commitment to welcoming people of all faith traditions.  I included labyrinth walking in my recent article on gratitude as a spiritual practice.

View of falls and Liberty Bridge at Falls Park in Greenville, SC.

This year my life has been a whirlwind of challenges and blessings, culminating in our move to Greenville, SC. I’m grateful to live only a short drive from my parents now. It’s interesting to transition back to the East Coast after 18 years in Southern California. I’m excited to get back into the rhythm of the seasons. I’ve been looking forward to walks along the paths in Fall Park. Ironically, I fell and sprained my ankle just a few weeks after we arrived so I have yet to enjoy those walks. I picture myself walking the paths in my mind though as I’m healing!

Another new venture is writing on Examiner.com as the Greenville Spirituality & Wellness Examiner. It will be another chance to write about my favorite topics and I will continue to blog (or return to blogging) on my Well Soul blog just located now at www.wellsoul.net.  If I’m lucky I may earn enough from my online writing to pay for some of my seminary textbooks

Hope the fall season finds you well in body and in spirit.

In the process of planning a cross-country move, simplicity soon became a major theme.  Extreme simplicity.  As you get quotes for the cost of shipping your stuff, it is easy to begin to question how much you really need it.  Like is it $3,400-shipping-cost worthy?

I had been itching for a new wordpress theme and this one seemed to fit nicely with my focus on simplifying.  It is also netbook friendly which is important to me since I transitioned to a netbook.

This was actually part of the seeds of my simplicity quest.  I love the idea of affordable, mobile technology.  I have Linux (Ubuntu) installed on my netbook but have thus far been only booting the Windows XP which involves no learning curve.  But just using XP is a simplification from my miserable Vista laptop.  It’s funny how the 15 inch laptop now seems humongous compared to my 10 inch netbook.

Speaking of mobile technology, this seems like a win-win trend: Mobile gadgets threaten in-flight entertainment.

Since I’m having trouble posting regularly lately, I realized that I should occasionally share what I’m writing in my online class discussions. We recently discussed mourning as a spiritual process of “letting go” and this was my response:

Much of my concept of “letting go” and grieving comes from the health crisis which ended my life as I knew it. Not only did work and school come to an abrupt halt, but I lost my ability to function on a daily basis becoming dependent on my husband for things you take for granted. (Try to pay attention to how often you use your hands.) I became focused on finding meaning in the crisis in spiritual terms. I saw the losses as deaths, and an overall death of my identity. Everything that comprised my self-concept was gone.

I came to see losses as a natural part of the cycle of life that create space and opportunity for something new to grow. Everything I was became fertile ground for the growth or rebirth of my self. It was not ultimately truly lost, but transformed. Perhaps like the butterfly, we must be willing to let go of ourselves, trusting that is a necessary part of making way for the new life to come. I see life as a process of allowing parts of our lives to die, to make way for the new. I think that if we are stuck holding on to and maintaining what is, we become rigid and closed to the unknown miracles life has to offer. Even in our breathing, we must release the air with our out breath trusting that more will come in the next breath in.