Last Friday and Saturday I was at St. Placid Priory leading a workshop and a retreat. Much of my work is leading retreats – and while I spend a lot of time designing the flow of experiences, ultimately it is about creating and holding sacred space for others. On retreat the invitation is to cross the threshold of ordinary awareness and enter liminal space for a few hours or days to receive the new questions waiting for us.
This coming weekend I go on my own time of retreat to the place where the forest meets the sea. This space where wild edges meet invites me to ponder the questions which “make and unmake a life.” When I enter into silence, solitude, sabbath, and spaciousness I hear the quiet inner voices which get drowned out in the rush of daily life. I have had life-changing moments on retreat. I have encountered longings which carried me over new thresholds. I have been transformed in my willingness to meet myself. On retreat I can walk for hours among trees, I can gaze upon the unfolding of wave after wave, I sleep when I feel tired, I write pages and pages from a heart which begins to see things widely again. Daily life can narrow my vision and tighten my gaze. Retreat invites expansion, the pondering of horizons, the dancing on edges.
Retreats come in many shapes and sizes. Sometimes all that is necessary is an hour with the phone and computer turned off, a cup of tea, a journal and pen, and some silence to begin to reconnect with the heart.
How might you bring the gift of retreat to your life this season?
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CELEBRATE WITH ME! ART JOURNAL GIVEAWAY!
The Abbey blog is four years old this week! To celebrate my anniversary I am giving away a set of art journals (all five titles which are perfect companions for your own retreat). To enter the random drawing leave a comment below by MONDAY, MAY 10th and share your necessary ingredients for a time of retreat.
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NEW SESSIONS of ONLINE CLASSES AVAILABLE SOON!
Later this month I will be launching a redesign of my website as I move toward offering more resources online for integrating the experience of retreat into your everyday life. I have been pondering the shape of next year’s offerings here at the Abbey and will be announcing them by the end of May. Some free online gifts for my wonderful supporters are also in the works. Subscribe to the Abbey Email Newsletter to be one of the first to hear the details.
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EASTER SEASON LINKS:
Sunrise Sister at Mind Sieve ponders the element of fire and asks some wonderful questions
Melinda at Inspiraculum offers her reflections on air as breath of God and the art she created in response
Diamonds in the Sky with Lucy contemplates the renewal and release of water
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© Christine Valters Paintner at Abbey of the Arts:
Transformative Living through Contemplative & Expressive Arts
63 Responses
1 place of beauty
1 heart of openness
1 God
full measure of stillness
ears to hear
Mix well and wait. Repeat as needed.
Congratulations on 4 years of the sacred work of the Virtual Abbey!
It’s as if pulling in the driveway
It’s as if watching the robins squabbling over a worm
It’s as if the white-noise hum of the freeway
Becomes the chime to bring spaciousness into the day.
And when the time is ripe
For a longer respite from the distractions and struggles
of the Everyday Life
Those daily paused are then strung together into longer intervals
With maybe a different scenery
Just for good measure.
Congratulations on 4 years of leading others into the beauty of holiness! Love and blessings for many more. :-)
My ingredients for a retreat?
Silence/quiet spaces
Occasionally gentle, soft music
Candle light
A good spiritual book to chew on
A journal in which to write/draw reflections, thoughts, Words
A place for walking in the fresh air (alone with God)
Art materials, including but not only: watercolour paint, a sketch book, drawing pens, collage materials (paper, fabric, glue), a spinning wheel/roving, or some other rhythmic textile art
Opportunity for naps
Wholesome, simple food and drink
Ideally, my cat and my own cozy bed!
I have a quiet room with my books and other things in it, and a comfortable chair that was my grandfather’s sits by the window. A prayer shawl knit by my mother is over the back of the chair. Two small matching side tables flank the chair, for my cup, my candle, my clock…and often my cat.
I can look out at the side yard, the trees, and listen to birds and squirrels. I start my days there with coffee or tea. The best day-starts include that space, three pages of writing, and some prayer and reflection. I love to light a candle…but the cat has to watch out!!
An oasis just a door away from the TV my husband loves.
Like some others here my necessary requirements include essential ingredients of time spent alone to reflect and absorb. Nature for replenishing myself and filling myself with the Beauty. Silence, no other voices to interrupt my thoughts.
Not very often am I able to go away on a retreat. I am able to sit in the backyard with a glass of iced tea and absorb the sun and greenness, listen to the birds sing, and look at the mixture of glorious colors from the garden. Making the most of what is right in front of me.
Retreat. Step back. Away. Into. Within.
Slip. Out of. Into. Something more comfortable.
Silence.
Vast. Deep. Deepening.
Retreat is that space, that sacred ground where I enter myself, by myself, with myself to connect to all that is Holy. Divine. Sacred within my being the One I have been seeking.
A moment. An hour. A day. A weekend. A week. Retreat consumes time, whatever there is, and breathes peace and honesty, joy and tranquility into each microsecond, each cell of my body.
It is where I feel retreat. In my cells. In the microbes of my being. Within the archetypal foundation of my core connecting to the Divine essence of my being part of this vast and majestic landscape of my life before time, before being, before my world became separate from Yours.
All I need for retreat is to carve out a time and space, no matter the place to simply be. At peace. At one with the One.
All I need is the willingness to step away from ‘busy’ into that place where the world is far away and distant as I surrender and fall in Love.
Nameste
My “at home” retreats are brief intervals with a journal and pen or a contemplative book, a pot of tea and something quiet on the sound system like Bach’s Goldberg Variations (Glenn Gould’s rendering) or the Scarlattis keyboard sonatas (Pletnev’s rendering). At other times, my retreats are rambles in wild places, through the forest, along a river or by a lake. A camera usually comes with me, but there are times when my cameras stay at home. I drink in the quiet like wine and am renewed – my retreats are as necessary as breathing.
I crave quiet & beauty & connection…meanwhile I am so busy taking care of grandkids because their parents work long hours or have lost their job…my “little ” retreat is that one hour from 9-10pm when they have (usually) gone home. The TV is off & I can sit in silent Centering Prayer or choose which of a myriad of books to read, fiction with its varying relations among characters who grow or refuse to grow or non-fiction with its startling facts or supportive nudge to grow in my own spirituality.
The beauty part is much easier…I just look out my west windows at rolling hills, empty fields, masses of trees (far enough away to give me views of their variously shaded tops)…for this I am grateful…I snap photos in all seasons because this 180º view is constantly changing, provides constant awe, sheltering flora, fauna, and my very soul.
Time away on a “real” retreat is disturbing…it is too quiet (though quiet is what I long for)…having wee children around at home so much makes me want to chat, talk, connect to other adults on retreat…I want to “get something accomplished”, but sleep feels so refreshing & I find I want more and more time to just close my eyes without interruption.
Retreats connect with with and refill my quota of hope.
Necessary Ingredients for Retreat
Quietness
Journal book to write in
Privacy
Extra Delightful Luxuries:
Candles
Beautiful Music
Nature
Sacred, Inspirational readings
Like-minded people to share retreat with
Yoga and meditation
Peppermint tea
Kindness to self
Art materials
Optional?
Sense of humor
Percy the cat
Congratulations on your 4th blog birthday!
Retreats are such a necessary part of my life though I don’t get to do them as much as I’d like. Silence is my most basic requirement and one of the things I look forward to most on retreat.
The luxury/necessity of long periods of silence is the one element that helps me switch from “normal” (read:busy) life to a time of more mindful and connected living.
I’m beginning to learn to schedule short periods of silence into my days and weeks for times of mini-retreats..