I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest posts series from the community. Read on for Elaine Patterson’s reflection on walking labyrinths.
Pilgrims are poets who create by taking journeys. ~ H. Richard Niebuhr
I have always thought of myself as a ‘pilgrim’. I have never thought of myself as particularly ‘monk-ish’. But I loved the invitation to write about being a ‘monk in the world’ which would not let me go. And as I found myself reading the Abbey’s definition of a monk as someone ‘who lives in the world, immersed in the everyday with a single-hearted presence but always striving for wholeness and integrity’ and the detail of the Monk Manifesto, I started to entertain the possibility that I might indeed be becoming ‘monk-ish’.
Initially I found this reflection amusing but as I played with the invitation, I started to recognise myself – I felt myself coming home to myself and found myself somersaulting inside with joy!
Over the last 20 years I have sought to live a more soulful, contemplative and creative life honouring our shared humanity and our shared human condition. I would say I have been on a pilgrimage of unfurling and unfolding gently responding to my soul’s yearning and to her kindly call to come home again and again to what truly matters to me in life and work.
I have always loved Nordic walking and journaling mixed with nature and art based creative practices. I have always loved stillness and silence so that I can hear the murmurings and musings of my soul. But it was the discovery of the Chartres Labyrinth in France (and labyrinths in general) that sealed my commitment to monkish living – although I would not have had the words at the time.
I have learnt to see each experience of a labyrinth as a contemplative pilgrimage – where through a path of meandering prayerful inquiry, through the power of sacred geometry and through the luminous language of image and metaphor journeying into the magic and mystery – my psyche is gifted the possibility of meeting my shy soul and where I can learn how I can keep coming home to myself. And whilst each person’s experience of the labyrinth is their own each time they walk or write the labyrinth, I have found that what is true for me has also been true for many others who I have hosted on their own walks.
This is because I found a spiritual home in the Labyrinth which offers a spiritually prayerful meandering and meditative path to the centre – our centre. The Labyrinth offers us an invitation to weave our Remembering and Gratitude as we enter, to Release as we walk to the centre, to Receive in the centre and how we Return (sometimes even dancing) back into our everyday lives having often touched the magic and mystery of life. In the words of Lauren Artess: Veriditas 1st Facilitator Training Manual
“The labyrinth initiates the soul’s organic unfolding process, which expands far beyond the specific act of walking the labyrinth.”
I have found the Labyrinth to a creative and generous host to all my confusions, worries and not knowings – and also to others who walk the path – a place of prayer, a place for reverence, a place to reclaim of kith and kin, a place for remembering, reclaiming and discerning what matters, a place of integration and healing and a place of infinite hospitality which can resource us to hold it all in the midst of everything. The labyrinth reminds me who I am when I get lost – and helps to resource me with my ‘what nexts?’ and my wonderings about ‘what is life asking of me now?’
My own experiences of taking my stories of loss, lostness and doubt into the labyrinth have always been generative, creative, hopeful and life affirming. I experience the labyrinth as welcoming as well as being gently challenging helping me to face into my shadows and to find their inner gold in later life.
This shift in identity and perception of myself as a ‘monk in training’ is exciting and fresh. I have sought to live into my calling. I have since been on a week’s retreat to the Chartres Labyrinth with Veriditas, I have trained as an Advanced Labyrinth Facilitator with Veriditas, I am learning how to be a Spiritual Companion and I have just started writing a book on working with Labyrinths. The working title of the book is “An Ode to Labyrinths: Walking Ourselves Back Home to Soul, Spirit and Belonging”. More Soon!
Elaine is a writer and soul companion finding inspiration in the beauty of nature, the whisperings of our souls and the wisdom of our hearts for a kinder and gentler world. She lives between London and the beautiful Lake District in Cumbria, UK. Website: CentreforReflectionandCreativity.org
