Finally! It’s a beautiful day! We are all longing to get outside! Besides going for a walk or looking in your garden for some signs of life, what else could we do outside?

We could build a homemade labyrinth!

A few years ago, I took a course about labyrinths and I fell in love with them! Most of us confuse mazes with labyrinths. A labyrinth has a single path. There are no choices or intersections and the path leads unfailingly into the center. Mazes, on the other hand, have multiple paths, and myriad choices, most of which lead nowhere. Mazes are meant to trick or confuse us. Labyrinths are meant to bring us peace and clarity.

The earliest form of a labyrinth was the simple spiral. The most beautiful form of labyrinth is the medieval eleven circuit laybrinth which is found on the floor of Chartres Cathedral in France. ( Google that and you will easily find it and can see it for yourself.)

Robert Ferre says in his introduction to the book Living the Labyrinth that “we generally see our lives as mazes, not as labyrinths. It is easy to feel that we are off the path, that success is not assured, or that it comes only with luck and struggle.” He then says something so surprising and so reassuring. “Our spiritual quest, I feel,can be summarized as a single obligation: to switch from life-as-maze to life-as-labyrinth. The transformation from maze to labyrinth requires us to dismiss much of our conditioning, to reevaluate our identity, and to apply a new context to our lives. With life-as-labryinth, we discover that all paths are part of the One Path, leading unfailingly to the center, where, despite appearances and differences, we will eventually all meet. No one will be lost. If we are alive, we are on the path.”( pg x-xi )

With all this in mind, I want to invite you to make a simple spiral labyrinth in your own backyard. I made one a few years ago completely out of materials I found lying around the yard- including stones, sticks and bricks. If you look at the photo below, you will see the one I made. The paths are about 18 inches wide, and the whole spiral is about 10 feet wide. You can also make a spiral by using a long piece of rope, or even a brightly coloured piece of yarn. In the center, I added a concrete brick to sit on, because often I like to stay in the center of the spiral for awhile.

Once we have this done, what do we do next? Jill Kimberly Hartwell Geoffrion, a noted labyrinth facilitator says that we walk into our spiral/labyrinth to ‘ ask, listen, receive and be grateful.' At the mouth of the labyrinth we think of a question we have, a scripture we want to pray, something we want to ponder more fully. Then we enter the labyrinth and walk slowly towards the center. When we reach the center, we stand or sit quietly, waiting for God to speak to us. We receive what God has to say. Then we slowly walk back out to the entrance with gratitude in our hearts.

In her book Living the Labyrinth, Jill offers suggestions for thing we can ponder. Here are a couple of my favourites:

1) Like a snake shedding its skin as it grows, walk the labyrinth when it is time to let go of something. As you walk to the center, imagine your old skin dropping away. In the center, welcome sensations of renewal and growth. As you walk out, become aware of your expanding reality. After crossing the threshold, give thanks for what has been, what is, and what will be. (pg 58)

2) If it seems very difficult to disconnect from troubling thoughts, go to a labyrinth and pray. Let the movement of your body and the winding pathway help you to find peace. Keep walking until your mind quiets. It may take two or three or even four walks to the center and back out. As you finish your laybrinth experience, give thanks for where your walk has brought you.(pg 76)

I am happy to share more of Jill’s suggestions for walking a labyrinth with anyone who would like more. I have been walking my little spiral labyrinth in the backyard for the past 3 summers and i really love it. Though it is a very simple and small example of a labyrinth, it works for me, to bring clarity and calm. I am hopeful it will do the same for you!!

This is the labyrinth in my yard. You can easily make your own labyrinth too!

I love the writings of John O’Donohue, who was a priest and a psychotherapist. He really knew the human soul. I think my favourite book of his is Anam Cara. I find it hard to read more than a page or two at a time because there is so much to reflect on, savour, and put into practise in one’s own life.

Many people have told me they are having trouble sleeping through the night these days. That is, of course, so understandable! When we awaken at night, where can we put our attention that would allow us to relax and fall back to sleep again? John O’Donohue tells us that deep within us there lies a wellspring of love and he tells us that focussing there can give us peace.

“You can search far and in hungry places for love. It is a great consolation to know that there is a wellspring of love within yourself. If you trust that this wellspring is there, you will then be able to invite it to awaken. The following exercise could help develop awareness of this capacity. When you have moments on your own or spaces in your time, just focus on the well at the root of your soul. Imagine that nourishing stream of belonging, ease, peace, and delight. Feel, with your visual imagination, the refreshing waters of that well gradually flowing up through the arid earth of the neglected side of your heart. it is helpful to imagine this particularly before you sleep. Then during the night you will be in a constant flow of enrichment and belonging. You will find that when you awake at dawn, there will be a lovely, quiet happiness in your spirit.”

Anam Cara page 28

If you awaken through the night tonight, may focusing on the ‘wellspring of love’ be helpful in settling you back to sleep. It is wonderful to know that we can focus on ‘the well at the root of our soul’ any time! May we all be blessed with a greater experience of ‘lovely, quiet happiness’ in our spirits this day.

This year, I am reading the revised and updated version of Simple Abundance, written by Sarah Ban Breathnach. It is set up as a book of daily readings. Sometimes, I must admit, I read more than one, maybe 3 or 4, until I find a reading which says something that really satisfies my mind, heart, soul and/or spirit. Today I found myself reading until I got to the April 13 entry. There, Sarah quoted the Chinese sage Lao-Tzu, who said, “ Be really whole, and all things will come to you.” Sarah then comments that Lao-Tzu taught that the only way to be made whole is to yield.

The quote and the advice that yielding leads to wholeness really stopped me in my tracks. You know the feeling when you read something that feels right, but you don’t yet understand it? That’s where I find myself today!

I invite you to join me in the pondering if this quote appeals to you too. I am not yet sure how, for me, this quote links to coping with a pandemic, and doing my part, but I am sure that it does.

I pray that as we open the windows, listen to bird song, turn our faces to the sunshine, and engage with our hurting world today, that we will find ways to feel whole inside, and be of service and encouragement to others on the outside.

Love, Sue

I am in a collage making course these days offered by Shelley Klammer, called Affirmative Collage Play. Shelley is therapist who offers many, varied, affordable online expressive arts courses. Go to www.coursecraft.net if you would like to explore!

To make an affirmative collage, choose one magazine and cut out 4 or 5 images from the magazine that appeal to you. Glue or scotch tape these to a piece of paper like a piece of photocopy paper. Then step back and look at what you have created. Give a title to your collage. Then write a little 3 line poem about your collage.

This whole process can take as little as 10 minutes or as long as 30 minutes, depending on the time you have available. I am trying to make one daily, and I am finding it to be an enjoyable, tactile, easy, calming and centering activity I look forward to engaging in each afternoon before supper. After I make each collage, I am placing it where I can look at it for the rest of the day. I invite you to give it a try too!

“Sitting quietly, doing nothing, spring comes and the grass grows by itself.” Zen koan

I came across this saying sometime in the past few weeks, although I can’t remember where. Something about it is so comforting to me! Each day, as i go for my walk, I have been realizing how true the saying is, as I observe crocuses blooming, trees beginning to bud, and many birds singing merrily.

It is amazing and awe inspiring to see that no matter what is happening in our world, the seasons keep changing. Spring is unfolding and summer will come too. We will be able to enjoy the sights, sounds, fragrances, textures and taste of spring. This is so very good to know.

I am really enjoying Sarah Ban Breathnach’s Simple Abundance , the ‘revised and updated’ version that was published at the end of 2019. In one of the daily readings she tells us that ‘every 24 hours we are given a new canvas to prime and paint.’

I love that idea! I have been thinking about the question, “What’s the best way for me to go about priming and painting the new canvas I am given every morning?”

Right now, as we deal with the reality of coronavirus, I am realizing that when I awaken, I should not look at my smartphone right away. Instead, I am choosing to go downstairs, have a bowl of oatmeal, make a cup of coffee and return to cozy up in bed again for awhile. I am reading the meditation for the day in Simple Abundance while sipping my coffee and savouring 2 or 3 squares of dark chocolate. Then I am reading a few verses from Matthew and engaging with them using the Lectio Divina process. Finally, I am using my prayer beads to remember and pray for each family member and friend, and for my work in the world.

By the time I have finished that, an hour has gone by, and I feel I am ready to engage with the world, from a grounded and settled place. I feel there is more chance that I will create a beautiful painting of my life this 24 hours.

Bless you all today with a settled, grounded, contented day, despite whatever news we discover when we turn on our smartphones today. May you be healthy and may your loved ones be healthy this day.

Love, Sue

Now that we are getting used to our new reality, we are all trying to figure out how to move forward with our lives. I feel like setting up some sort of daily schedule, or routine. I am finding i know what to do with myself in the mornings, but the afternoons, my usual time of service to others, can be long. What can I do that will keep me engaged, and feeling productive in the afternoons?

A clue came when Bruce said he would love it if I could make homemade macaroni and cheese. I had the ingredients I needed, so I was able to make it for him that very night. Over supper he reminisced about growing up in Newfoundland, and about how macaroni and cheese was a comforting and satisfying staple of their dinners together at home.

On the weekend, our neighbour’s son had his birthday. To our delight and surprise, our neighbour offered us two slices of homemade carrot cake!

Hmmmm! In times like these home baking has suddenly become much more appealing to me. Our local bulk food store is still open, so flour and sugar etc are available to me. Today, I will be making a birthday cake for Bruce’s grandson, but tomorrow, what could I make from scratch that could be shared with our neighbours?

It’s gotta be chocolate, that’s for sure! And i am looking forward to looking through my recipe box for an idea!

What do you like to bake? Feel free to share your ideas with us!

And don’t forget to get outside for a walk today. Signs of spring are there! I saw 3 crocuses in my garden yesterday!

Blessings to all of you for the day that lies ahead. We continue to send prayers for strength and health and safety for all those providing us with essential services. Thank you for all you are doing!

I was thinking today about how to get myself going. I was feeling kind of sluggish and housebound. I have some good dance CDs at home and I decided to put some of them on. I chose my favourite pieces and began slowly, but surely, to move to them. Within 15 minutes, I was feeling a lot happier and re-energised.

I also opened the window in my home office a little bit and that has helped too, as well as going for a walk.

I looked on You Tube to see if any of my favourite dance pieces were available there. There were some!! Here are couple of ideas to get you going:

1) Rick Fines CD called Riley Wants His Life Back is good for listening, and I think the title song Riley Wants His Life Back is the best one for dancing.

2) Jaylene Johnson put out a CD called Potter and Clay. Again, the whole CD is lovely to listen to but my favourite tunes to move to are #7 Pray, Pray Again, and #11 Rest in Me.

When you have a moment and feel like moving, I invite you to go to You Tube to check out these artists and see if you too find these tunes danceable!

Enjoy!

How the world has changed in 10 days. There is so much coming at us, and there isn’t enough time to process all of it. What can we do when we are feeling fear, anger etc?

One of the best ways to process strong emotions is to write them out. One way is to write Morning Pages, a method developed by Julia Cameron, the author of The Artist’s Way. You can use sheets of photocopy paper or write in a large notebook. She suggests that we should keep writing until we have filled 3 sheets of paper. Just write out what you are thinking and feeling, for your eyes only. Don’t edit yourself, just pour out onto the page everything that’s been going around inside your head. If it takes you more than 3 pages, keep going. At the end of this time of writing, your head will be clearer and your heart less heavy, and you can go on with your day.

Another thing we can do is to be sure to take a 2-3 hour block of time each day away from the TV news, our smartphones, the internet in general, to lessen the amount of information coming at us.

What can we do during that time off? Going outside for a walk is a great idea. This will give us a fresh perspective, and increase our bodies’ Vitamin D levels via exposure to sunlight, which is known to be good for us in many ways.

We could lose ourselves in something.. like reading an engrossing novel, like making a craft, like watching an old favourite movie. Just relaxing in this way will give our hearts and minds a break and again, we will be able to carry on.

We want to do everything we can to keep the levels of the stress hormones, cortisol and adrenaline, down in our bodies, and increase the levels of dopamine and serotonin. Preparing and eating a good meal alone, or with the family members we are at home with, will increase the levels of dopamine and serotonin. Praying together, if that is part of your faith tradition, will too.

Dear Lord, please bless us all with the ability to find the ways, unique to us, for processing strong emotions and the ways, unique to us, that help us find pleasure and calm, even in the midst of the strife around us. Help us be resourceful. Help us be generous. Help us be kind to ourselves and to those around us that we have access to. Lord, help us sleep well enough at night to awaken refreshed.

Amen!

I read a book a few years ago about prayer beads. Called A String and a Prayer : How to make and use prayer beads by Eleanor Wiley and Maggie Oman Shannon, I learned a lot about the history of prayer beads and how to make them. I used to think that they were used only by Catholics, in the form of the rosary, but in fact almost every religious tradition has their version of prayer beads. I made some of my own, stringing clay beads on narrow pieces of leather. I made a strand for nuclear family, one for extended family, another one for friends and one for work concerns, then joined them together. I have used them daily for a couple of years, and I can’t tell you how comforting it is to hold a bead named for each dear one in my life, and then to pray for them. In ordinary times, it has been a source of peace for me to use them.

Now, in extraordinary times, my simple prayer beads have become even more important and meaningful to me. I was trying to picture how when stores are closed,one could make a set of prayer beads if one wanted to. I think we could use shoelaces or yarn that we have around the house to string beads or buttons on.

I remember as a young child watching my grandma praying using her rosary beads. Who knew that as a woman of 65 now, I too would turn to my prayer beads for comfort? Thanks Grandma Gleeson for showing me the way!