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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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.

One of my favorite spiritual practices is walking a labyrinth. I was introduced to it years ago at a New Year’s Eve candlelight labyrinth walk. I’ve been hooked ever since and would do it more often if we had an accessible one nearby. On Sunday we put out our fabric one (similar to the picture) for the Sunday morning service. I’m the Chair of our Spiritual Practices Council which planned the service. I was the main speaker and my sermon was titled: “Finding Your Center in the Midst of Chaos.” After the service one of our congregation members, psychology professor Dr. Robert Thayer, came up to me and we talked about walking the labyrinth in relation to his research. He was familiar with labyrinths but it was his first time actually walking one.

Since I’m drowning in reading for my studies right now, I was glad to find this article in Spirituality & Health magazine by Stephen Kiesling that summarizes Dr. Thayer’s work (also here with pictures).

“The best and most reliable way to improve your mood is to take a brisk, ten-minute walk. No kidding. If you are in a bad mood (and perhaps semiconsciously craving a sugar snack, a call to a friend, a trip to the mall, a cigarette, a cup of coffee, a shot of tequila, or whatever) the most reliable way to immediately start to feel better is to take a brisk walk. Taking a walk may not come to mind as the best choice, but the research says that it is best.”

Through my own experience I discovered the importance of walking in terms of health and stress-relief. Dr. Thayer gives us specific language which describes states of energy and tension that work together for optimum happiness and effectiveness. Not surprisingly, high energy and low tension is the best combination. In the next article, Kiesling makes a more direction connection to spiritual practices such as walking a labyrinth.

“The beauty of Robert Thayer’s mood research is that it is so firmly grounded by the documented experience of thousands of people. He can say with authority that the best ways to improve mood are to take a walk or talk to a friend or meditate or pray. Meanwhile, other researchers, such as James Rippe, M.D., at the University of Massachusetts, have expanded on that work to test combinations: Are walking meditation, prayer-walking, and mindful exercises such as Tai Chi more effective at boosting energy and reducing tension than walking alone? The answer, not surprisingly, is yes. Combining prayer or mindfulness with walking turns out be a “double dip” of happiness.”

Stumbling through the forest in search of the path to healing, I discovered that the very act of moving my body can be healing. Not just the cumulative effect of regular exercise which is the focus of medical research, but in the very moment that I am moving. I found that my intention and emotion can shape whether movement is healing. I found a big difference between the walks I took that focused on physical intensity and speed and the walks that focused on relaxation and fluidity. It was the latter type that I found the most healing for chronic pain. When I progressed from short 5-15 minute walks to regular 30-60 minute walks, I added dance to my movement repertoire. Our Parks & Recreation program offers bellydance classes that have become a favorite of mine.

Attending the Neuroscience and Spiritual Practice conference at Claremont Theological School yesterday, I was reminded by one of the speakers, Dr. Monica Coleman, of my interest in Gabrielle Roth‘s dance method of spiritual practice. I have some of DVDs and had tried them a few times and kept meaning to get back to them. When I returned from the Spiritual Formation class in August, I actually dug out the DVD set and it had been sitting on my coffee table waiting for me. Inspired by last night’s lecture, I moved past my inertia and put The Wave in my DVD player. I then danced my stiff body around my living room for about 3o minutes. It felt awkward at times, but I know over time I will move past my self-consciousness. Gabrielle Roth even points out that we will feel resistant to some types of movement and to just move through it. I also unearthed Roth’s book which I had been meaning to read, Sweat Your Prayers: Movement as Spiritual Practice. Since becoming a full-time graduate student, I spend a lot of time sitting so I need to balance it with more movement. Perhaps I will create a daily dancing practice. Wouldn’t that be wonderful!

My fascination with the Gratefulness.org site continues. Today I explored the Labyrinth and enjoyed the option to be guided through the meditation instead of at my own pace. What a wonderful place to visit and available where ever you have access to the Internet. However, I think the only way I will remember to visit the site at work will be to make it my homepage!

Funny thing is… I’ve been to this website before, but this time it had more of an impact. I liked it enough to bookmark it, but then forgot about it. I guess I’m seeing it with new eyes.