Abbey of the Arts

Transformative Living through Contemplative & Expressive Arts

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      • Day 1 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Cathedral
      • Day 2 Morning & Evening Prayer:
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    • Sacred Time:
      Embracing an Intentional Way of Life
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      Cultivating Wonder and Gratitude through Intimacy with Nature
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      12 Celtic Practices for Seeking the Sacred
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      A Contemplative Journey to Wholeness for Women
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      Embracing the Wisdom of Monks and Mystics
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      Eight Practices for the Journey Within
    • Eyes of the Heart:
      Photography as a Christian Contemplative Practice
    • The Artist's Rule: Nurturing Your Creative Soul with Monastic Wisdom
    • Desert Mothers and Fathers: Early Christian Wisdom Sayings Annotated & Explained
    • Lectio Divina–The Sacred Art: Transforming Words and Images into Heart-Centered Prayer
    • Water, Wind, Earth & Fire: The Christian Practice of Praying with the Elements
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      Bringing the Arts to Spiritual Direction
    • Lectio Divina: Contemplative Awakening & Awareness
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        A Spiritual Survival Guide for Dark Times
        with Kayleen Asbo, PhD
      • The Spiral Way:
        Celtic Spirituality and the Creative Imagination
      • Journey with the Desert Mothers and Fathers (Lent 2021)
      • Sacred Time: Embracing an Intentional Way of Life (Spring 2021)
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      • Creative Flourishing in the Heart of the Desert:
        An Online Retreat with St. Hildegard of Bingen
      • Dreaming of the Sea:
        A women’s discernment journey through the story of the Selkie
      • Earth, Our Original Monastery
        A Companion Retreat to the Book (SELF-STUDY)
      • Exile and Coming Home:
        An Archetypal Journey through the Scriptures
      • Eyes of the Heart:
        Photography as Contemplative Practice
        (Companion retreat to the book)
      • Honoring Saints and Ancestors:
        Online Retreat for the Season of Remembrance
      • Lectio Divina:
        The Sacred Art of Reading the World
      • A Midwinter God:
        Making a Conscious Underworld Journey
      • Sacred Rhythms of Sky, Sun, Sea & Stone:
        A Creative Retreat with the Elements (SELF-STUDY)
      • Sacred Seasons:
        A Yearlong Journey through the Celtic Wheel of the Year
      • The Soul of a Pilgrim:
        Eight Practices for the Journey Within
        (a companion retreat to the book)
      • The Soul's Slow Ripening: 12 Celtic Practices for Seekers of the Sacred (a companion retreat to the book)
      • Water, Wind, Earth & Fire
      • Watershed Moments
        in the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures
      • Way of the Monk, Path of the Artist:
        A 12-Week Companion Retreat to The Artist's Rule
      • The Wisdom of the Body:
        A 10-Week Online Companion Retreat to the Book
      • The Wisdom of Mary and the Sacred Feminine
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Monk in the World Guest Post Series

Monk in the World guest post: Kristen Kludt

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission for the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Kristen Kludt's reflection on being a Monk on the Move:

I am a millennial. I am of a generation of transplants: leaving our homes at eighteen, many of us never return outside of holidays and vacations. We are like succulent plants – able to be snapped off and replanted again and again, multiplying and spreading wide. We are adaptable, versatile and flexible, but I long for deep roots.

I am a monk on the move.

For the last eight and a half years, my husband and I have lived in California, 2,071 miles away from our family in the Midwest. Practically, that means we travel often and have frequent visitors. We want our two-year-old son to have deep relationships with his extended family. We want him to be friends with his grandparents. We want them to have the privilege of watching him grow. So, in this season, that means we travel several times a year, and we have visitors every month.

A friend of mine asked me last fall what gets in the way of my time with God – my time of stillness, of reading and reflection and art and prayer, my time of cultivating deep soul-roots. I answered immediately, “Interruptions in my regular rhythm of life.” I have daily and weekly rhythms of solitude that ground me in God’s love for me, but each time we have a visitor or go out of town I give up those practices in an effort to be fully present in the moments with our family, not wanting to miss anything. Yet, in my attempt to soak in every moment, I am giving up the moments that make me me. When I am unmoored from my rootedness I don’t bring my best self, my whole self, to my days.

I am coming to grips with the fact that my life will never be “stable” – change comes, expectedly or unexpectedly, and I cannot control that. My life will never be stable, but I can always be rooted.

Last month we went home to Wisconsin for two weeks. We went to the children’s museum and the botanical gardens, out for ice cream and to the lake to throw rocks out on the ice. We took our son sledding for the first time. We squeezed every drop of joy and laughter and togetherness from each moment with our extended family. And, for the first time, I protected time each day to spend with God. When our son went down for his nap, I snuck to a back room with my journal and my books and my Bible, and I closed the door or put in headphones. Because this was winter in Wisconsin, I often sat at a warm hearth. The hearth is the center of a home, once the seat of nourishment, a place of both solid rock and living flame. It became a symbol for me of that place I return to within me – the Heart of God, where I am warmed, sustained, impassioned.
I sat before the hearth and I was still.

In those moments, I reflected on the year and on what God was saying to me. I copied quotations that spoke to me into my journal. I drew a little bit. I paid attention to what I was feeling. I listened.

Through those times, I stayed rooted in a way I never have when we’ve traveled. I gave up precious minutes of conversation with family, and I fought back guilt over my selfishness and fear of missing out on something, but ultimately I brought a more whole self to the rest of our time. In taking some time to be away, I became more present.

Kristen 1When it was time to leave, I was sad. I felt again the loss, the grief that it is to live so far from our family. I realize now that this may always be a wound I carry, one that I must learn to live with well. As our plane curved over the bay, readying for landing, the sunlight cut through the layers of fog hovering over San Francisco like through a prism, covering the city in rays of golden light. It was a consecration: this place is yours, and it is mine. Stable or not, this is the place where I meet you. I am everywhere always; you are here, now. This is the place where we meet together, and where your roots will grow down deep into the soil of my marvelous love.

Now I carry my hearth with me. Yesterday I bought bright orange flowers at the Farmer’s Market, and this morning I lit candles at my table. My mom shipped me a box of rocks from my childhood, and they are scattered around our home. I fill my home with rock and flame, reminders that I am sustained everywhere I go.

I am a monk on the move. Wherever I live, wherever I travel, I am warmed by the fire of God.


Ryan Murray PhotoA wife, mother, and Jesus-follower in the East Bay of San Francisco, Kristen writes as a spiritual guide and contemplative poet.  She is finishing a book about practice-based spiritual formation in times of difficulty, tentatively titled The Dark in the Song.  You can read more of her work at www.kristenleighkludt.com.

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8 Comments June 11, 2015

Upcoming Programs

The Way of the Hermit:
A Spiritual Survival Guide for Dark Times

January 22-24, 2021
with Kayleen Asbo, PhD

The Spiral Way:
Celtic Spirituality and the Creative Imagination

Hosted by the Rowe Center
February 1-21, 2021
with Christine Valters Paintner, PhD

Recent Reflections

  • Humility + Join us today for live prayer! ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess
  • Hildy Tales 2: Tús maith leath na hoibre – by John Valters Paintner
  • New Book Club for 2021: Lift Every Voice ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess
  • Hildy Tales One: Dia dhuit, is mise Hildy! by John Valters Paintner, Your Online Prior
  • Celebrate the Earth Monastery Prayer Cycle podcast with us!

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