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“We build on foundations we did not lay.
We warm ourselves at fires we did not light.
We sit in the shade of trees we did not plant.
We drink from wells we did not dig.
We profit from persons we did not know.
We are ever bound in community."

Rev. Peter Raible (paraphrased from Deuteronomy 6:10-12)



Sunday, January 15, 2012

Day 15 of Spiritual Practices and Reflection: Pick One, and Stick with it

Even though I'm offering lots of spiritual practices and ideas on this blog, I invite you to pick one, stick with it for a while, go deep with it. Practice praying for the month. (Imagine the fun you'll have when people ask, "How are you? What have you been up to?" and you can answer, "I've been practicing prayer.")

Or really dig into lectio divina for a while. Sit with a poem or scripture for a couple of mornings. Really let it speak to you. Let it come alive in your heart and body. Or start a daily gratitude journal, or send a letter of gratitude to someone every day. Or go back to the opening post in this series, and re-read the article about our Unitarian Transcendentalist forebears, and how they engaged in many of these practices, as a way to grow and cultivate their souls. Get inspired by them, and pick a practice. Stick with it. Go deep.

I'm curious - what are you practicing? What's your discipline? How's it going?

2 comments:

Eric Brown said...

Justin, I came across the following visual - The Tree of Contemplative Practices - at http://www.contemplativemind.org/practices/tree.html.
I have chosen to do "tonglen" this month, but there's a lot of good ones to choose from. I had an idea to choose one from each category, as a "stretch goal", to practice. I don't know if I will have time to do them all well but it feels good to think about as a growth opportunity.

Justin Schroeder said...

Thanks for sharing this, Eric.