Dear Friends,

More daily meditation paintings from March: if you’re looking at these thinking, “I could do something like that!” you’re right! Why not take out some watercolors, trace a circle with an old cd, and have some fun?

The Book Chronicle: I’m deep in the midst of Draft three of Developing Your Inner Life as a Political Act, taking into account the feedback I received from my first readers (thank you!). I’m going to have to cut a lot, as it’s currently 460 pages. Also, I’m realizing that if I were to move around some chapters the book would be stronger, so that’s going to be the next draft. I’m not exactly discouraged, but I am relating to the comments of other authors who have said “If I knew how much work it would be, I might never have started my book”. Another friend congratulated me on finishing the first draft: “Congratulation on the birth of your new ‘baby’! Now all you have to do is take it home and raise it until it’s ready to leave home!” And that’s what it’s like —– I thought I’d accomplished a lot, and I did — but there’s just a lot, lot more to go!

Meanwhile, I keep arting a bit most days, and writing some poetry for our open Mic here in Lethbridge. Here’s one about the body:

I Used to Hate You

—– Cat Charissage

I used to hate you.

I was ashamed, embarrassed by you.

I wondered — constantly — how others saw you.

If only you were . . .

a little more of this

a little less of that,

if only you behaved,

then my life would be okay. 

I took you to the doctor oh so many times,

Hoping he would talk some sense into you —

or give you some medication, or recommend something.

How much pain you’ve brought me!

I kept thinking it was me who was trying so hard,

punishing you for doing just what you wanted,

punishing you by ignoring you, 

never buying you anything beautiful.

never adorning you with color and scarves and shawls.

And slowly, slowly, I realized just how loyal you are,

how you keep me going

giving me your last bit of strength.

For years your demands were few

until you just couldn’t go, or do, or serve anymore.

The doctor said “You’re all worn out!”

And yes, I was.  And filled with pain, too.

Dear Body, forgive me for thinking that YOU hated ME

when all along, what I hated was a culture

that wants skinny women and bony bums.

Dear Body, I thought I was the one trying so hard

when I treated you as a workhorse.

And what do people do with a worn out horse?

Well, they shoot horses, don’t they?

And I, in collusion with an unhealthy world 

that commodifies women’s bodies and 

values you only for what you can produce,

almost did kill you.

No more! 

How could I ever think that you were other than me?

How could I try to shape you so others would approve?

How could I ignore you for so long?  

You and I are one.

I will no longer be mean to myself, to you, dear body.

You are marvelous!

You heal from insults and you heal from death scares.

Your scars are marks of valor — we’ve been places, haven’t we?

Your way of holding on to nourishment, to every last calorie

enabled my ancestors to survive famines,

surviving long enough to bring forth another generation.

I love how much you try, how much I try.

I love how faithful you are, how faithful I am.

I love how wise you are, how wise I am.

Dear body, dear body mine,

Here I am!  

Surviving and strong!

My body, My Self!

Take care dear friends! May Day and the New Moon —- much newness to revel in.

With much love and many blessings,

Cat

Hello dear friends,

It’s the New Moon, just a week after the Spring Equinox, and also April Fool’s Day! I’ve been experimenting with different ways to approach my days. I have the incredible luxury of being in charge of my own schedule —- I have projects and commitments, but very few places I have to be at a certain time. And I’ve been waiting my whole life for this! I do find that routines create rhythms for my days, and my current rhythm is to come down to my study after breakfast and devote about twenty minutes to painting contemplatively, in silence, with as little plan as possible. I’ve shared here a few of my mandala paintings; I draw a circle using an old cd, and then fill it with watercolor. They’re not perfect, but they don’t have to be. I encourage you to find a daily practice that gives you a little quiet time to let your mind, heart, and soul settle.

Last Wednesday evening was Open Mic at Owl Poetry. It was our first time back live, in person, at the Owl Acoustic Lounge. We’d been meeting over Zoom during the pandemic, and as thankful as I am for zoom technology, there’s nothing like being in person. We had 25 poets reading, with nine of them being newbies (first timers at Owl Poetry)! It was a wonderful time. I read two of my latest poems, poems that I’ve written in response to these crazy times we live in. I’ve included them here; I hope you enjoy them.

With much love and many blessings,

Cat

Our Responsibility to be Informed

Cat Charissage, March 2022

How do you get your news?

How do you live out your citizenly responsibility to be informed?

In times of war it feels that we must keep up with it all,

We must know which cities are now occupied by “the enemy,”

We must watch the crowded lineups of women and children escaping the country while they can,

must keep up three, five, nine times a day as our phones “ping” another notification of death, of suffering.

We feel good knowing these things, keeping up with the latest.

We’re being responsible, well informed citizens.

We even think we know what’s really going on

Forgetting that the first casualty of war is truth.

But — what is really going on?

And did you hear about some other news?

That in Red Deer, healthy twins were born to a couple who’d yearned for ten years for a child.  And now they have two!

Did you hear about that family in Calgary whose grandparents needed to move into assisted living, renovated their home so that the grandparents could move in with them?

Did you hear that in schools around the world, teachers gently taught little ones how to read?  And not just today, but every day?

Or that in every hospital in every nation the nurses cared for their patients, and lives were saved?

Be conscious of what news you take in.

What’s really going on?

A lot more than we’re told.

April Fools

Cat Charissage, March 2022

The news around me is harsh:

Stats are showing that the vaccines themselves may make you more susceptible to covid.

The new chemicals that civilization has released into the air and water over the last seventy years may be responsible for the explosion of neurological difficulties in children.

Toxic masculinity is alive and well when an actor wallops the comedian whose joke he took offense to — on worldwide live television.

And, oh yes, don’t forget that imperialism burst out in war in the Ukraine.  Russian empire building at its ugliest.  And just as ugly, American empire building.

So what’s a trickster to do on April the First?

First, extend April Fools day to the rest of the year, 

and be a fool every single day!

Be a fool: go write a poem!  Ain’t nobody gonna get rich doing that!  Ain’t nobody, well, practically nobody, gonna make a living doing that!

Be a fool: major in Religious Studies in university!  How are you going to get a job with that?

Be a fool: raise the next generation of adults!  Daycare workers and at home moms aren’t going to be any engine behind economic prosperity.

Be a fool: listen to stories and read philosophy!  Hang out with friends discussing them til dawn, but you might be late to work tomorrow — a foolish thing to do.

Be a fool: date your spouse!  Even after forty years with each other.

Be a fool: look into the eyes of the people you meet!  Know that they are probably struggling, too.

Be a fool: dare to be happy, and peaceful!  Have no need to argue, harangue, or conquer.

Be a fool:  The wisdom of peacemakers appears foolish to powerful men.

Be a fool.

Dear Friends,

With all of the conflict in ourselves, our relationships, and our world, the war in the Ukraine is another example of the horror that humans can perpetrate on other humans, animals, and the earth itself. I’m so sad that the people in the Ukraine have to deal with this, in the midst of a cold and grey winter, far from the sunflowers that are its national symbol.

For those of us not in the middle of that particular conflict, or directly impacted by it, it is far too easy to give in to feelings enflamed by all of the news, the photos, the social media, and the commentators. Many of us are feeling horrified, and/or angry, and so many of us are feeling the panic that comes from not knowing what we can DO to help the situation.

May I suggest that that you create an oasis of calm within yourself, for at least a few moments? These moments of calm will help you to discern what immediate actions you can take that might be of help. You may want to contribute to various organizations that will help the Ukrainian people, and/or write letters or meet with your representatives to pressure our governments to help resolve the situation. You may reach out to friends who are Ukrainian and Russian, asking how they are affected and how you might be of help. You might sit with your children to locate where the Ukraine is on a map and together study a bit of the long history of that part of the world. Humans have lived there for more than 50,000 years, and the Ukrainians have especially suffered through the 20th Century.

One of the best things you can do is to be a calm, grounded, and loving presence in this world, both to discern how you can truly be of help and to bring calm and understanding to all those within your reach. Beyond checking in with the news once a day (if that), I’m not sure that further news consumption will accomplish anything good for the most of us. Remember that there are not just “two sides” in every conflict; there are multiple sides, multiple opinions, multiple points of view, and different information that is available to different people.

We often say “I’m just trying to be a responsible citizen by figuring out what’s really happening!” but how do we truly do that —- find out what’s really happening? We can barely figure out what’s really happening in our own families, much less halfway across the world in countries with a very long history of injustices and tragedies. That is not at all to say we should bury our heads in the sand, though. Let us just recognize the impossibility of knowing with certainty what is going on, and the futility of trying to know the exact motivations of and consequences to every person who is affected by this conflict. We’re not used to the feeling of not-knowing, or of helplessness, and they feel pretty awful. But it’s closer to the “TRUTH” than pretending that the one or ten news sources that you listen to will give you a complete understanding. Even if you were to study the history of any particular region of conflict, you’d need to remember that almost all history is written by the victors and your job of understanding needs the viewpoints of so many ethnic groups, political groups, families, mommies and daddies who are no longer alive to tell us their stories. Don’t give up studying history, just know that it is all a lot more complicated than what you can learn in a few books.

You can, though, be a person who promotes peace and respect, and possibly be one of the people who will have prevented a war in the future. Within your own reach, you can listen first before you talk, whether with your child or with that “foreign” neighbor. When someone starts to express their opinion, really listen, instead of just formulating your response that will “straighten them out”. Ask the other person to tell you more of how they think about a situation, and then ask “Where have you learned what it is that you know about such and such?” and “And how did THEY hear about what’s going on?” and “Might other people of good will think differently about this situation?” “Have you heard from them?” Et cetera.

But it takes a lot of patience and energy to be able to do that —- to listen, and to speak, without enflaming conflict. One way to have that patience and energy is to create regular oases of time in order to check in with ourselves and work through our own inner conflicts.

Here are some of the things I’ve done in the past few days. Besides writing in my journal about my feelings and fears, I’ve sat with some markers and watercolors to express what I don’t have words for. The above watercolor circle started as something just to calm my senses with pretty color. I was amused to find out that even my own watercolors won’t stay where they’re supposed to! They took off beyond the circle, outside of my control. Life lesson, eh?

These next three images were made with markers using a circle template and a square template. After drawing the shape, I just let the pen “do what it wanted to do”. As I drew and colored in, I felt mostly quiet inside, yet some ideas did come up. I wrote the word “Remember” to remind me to remember how so many things and people are connected, also to bring healing when possible, as in to “re-member” what has been broken.

The spiral started out as a way to bring myself calm, to bring the marker round and round a center point, which I had colored pink/violet to represent Love. But as I continued the spiral, it was hard for it to stay regular, in line, and I let go into the waves and swirls I felt more represented my inner state. I felt surrounded by darkness, conflict everywhere, but then remembered that we all are surrounded (if we allow ourselves to be) by immeasurable Love.

In the third image, I made shapes by starting with my pen on the circle, then just making shapes and crisscrossing them. I picked colors I like, and colored it in to represent how I WANT life to be —- interesting, with variety and balance, but not toooo regular!

The final two blocks started with thought rather than simply with color or shape. I thought about the people and groups that are in conflict, divided by jagged borders. Even the people within groups are often divided from each other. I drew in little black shapes to represent the real people who are suffering because of this:

All the little dots are prayers, or intentions of peace and well-being. I noticed that many of the figures looked more like keyholes than the people they are meant to represent. And that started a train of thought wondering what the key is that we need right now. What’s key to all of this?

This final image I’ve included is a representation of what I hope can happen next — that there will be some breaks in the major walls that divide us, and that many boundaries are not able to be seen anymore, that groups will be less separate from each other, and that members will move between and among groups so that the groups take on a different tone, where the ideals and hopes overlap more and people are willing to find out how other people live and what is important to them. This image is rather chaotic compared to the rigidness of conflict situations, but it’s also true that real diversity is much more complex than we expect at first glance.

Try making some images like this. It doesn’t take talent or skill, nor does it take “art” supplies. Use your children’s Crayola markers, make circles by drawing around an old cd. Eyeball a square shape, and give it a try. Just make some shapes and add some color. For me, this kind of activity allows me to express what I don’t have words for, yet the activity itself gives me new words and new ideas. I go back to my family, my friends, my community a little less frantic and frightened, a little more resourced to be the calm, grounded, and loving presence who can help rather than enflame.

With much love and many blessings on this New Moon,

Cat

Hello dear Friends,

Happy New Moon today! We’re on the upswing of lunar energy — what kind of project are you beginning now? I decided to take an art course, Design Boot Camp, from Julie Fei Fan Balzer. I’d been following her blog and youtube channel for years. She’s a mixed-media artist, and has literally hundreds of videos available, most of which demonstrate techniques to make all sorts of art from collage to gelatin printing to Christmas ornaments to painting. A testament to her teaching abilities is that even though her art style and mine are very different, she’s one of the best teachers I’ve ever learned from. She teaches HOW to THINK about the choices involved in our art rather than showing us how to copy her artwork step by step.

The images above are experiments in my studio notebook, aka Sketchbook. The course, Design Boot Camp, is about the Elements and Principles of art: to use the analogy of food, the Elements the ingredients. They’re what makes up our art, and we all use the same ingredients such as line, shape, form, texture, color, et al., while the Principles are the recipes, or how we use our ingredients. It’s giving me an awareness of the different things that make up my art, and a vocabulary and skills to identify what might be missing in a work that I don’t quite like —- and helps me to try different things to fix it. And for my artwork that I love, it helps me discern if there is anything that may enhance it, or communicate my intentions more clearly. It’s a very intense course, two intense hours twice a week for 5 weeks, and with tons of homework. Julie teaches us how to learn on our own, and I imagine that I’ll have enough material and ideas to keep my learning going for months and months.

Did I NEED to take this course? Of course not. I’m not an artist who is trying to make a living from my artwork. In fact, I’m in the middle of writing a book! But learning something new, or going deeper into an area of interest, is always enriching, and I believe that the creativity within seeds the other creative works one is involved in. As I grow and expand in one area, the other areas of my life grow as well, filling up the spaces I’m making in my neurons and in my life.

Intentionally learning new things has so much to offer us. It keeps me engaged in something interesting that isn’t scrolling more on my Facebook or Instagram feeds. It’s cheaper than therapy and a lot more fun! Not to diss therapy, which has been a lifesaver at different points in my life —- but if you’re doing therapy primarily as a form of inner growth, oftentimes taking on a new learning project can fulfill the same goal. It’s also less expensive than travel —- which we can do so little of these days, anyway! And I never get carsick or have an uncomfortable bed, either.

I’m really enthused about this learning. I’m always reading and learning on my own, but having the guidance and accompaniment of a gifted teacher is such a delight. This course is so different from the other art instruction I’ve enjoyed. Instead of new techniques or inspiration from a particular artist’s style, this is art theory, or graphic design. Had this been the first art course I’d ever taken, I probably would not have gone on to play with paint and try to communicate my visions. I needed to have enough experience to know the real limit of my skills and to be ready to study the more “boring” things in art. But I’m not finding them boring at all! New ways of looking at art, more skills with color, and learning how to learn from other artists’ work are all percolating through my days. So thankful that I can do this now, at this time in my life.

This artwork is a perfect complement to the re-reading and the editing of my book that is filling the rest of my time. It’s a magical time, too: The Feast of St. Brigid, Candlemas, the Celtic festival of Imbolc, the cross-quarter time (the day right between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox), and even Groundhog Day are all happening in the next day or so. And the New Moon. I sincerely hope that you are involved in activities that you love that can spice up all the things you have to do! There’s so much to worry about. Do what you can to be as prepared as possible, and then turn your attention to what brings joy.

With much love and many blessings,

Cat

Dear friends,

May this New Moon in this New Year bring joy, health, and abundance for all of us! Do you do any rituals or make any resolutions for the new year? For the past couple of years I’ve chosen a Word of the Year. I selected a word that encapsulates some important quality that feels like it’s time to nurture. For last year it was FOCUS (and I did get the first draft of my book done). The previous year was INNER SPACIOUSNESS. And this year, I’ve chosen RELEASE. As many of you know, I’m always battling with the feeling that I don’t have enough time to do what I feel I’m called to do and what I want to do. In addition, I suffer from an unhealthy dose of FOMO (fear of missing out). And then fibromyalgia slows me down quite a bit, and on top of that I spent two months this year healing from from some very severe burns. I often feel quite frustrated that my days seem so short. But I don’t want to live my life frustrated, nor do I want to feel as if I’m always behind on a To Do List that only grows rather than diminishes.

I’m moving into Elderhood, and well know that there are not an unlimited number of days left in my life. I want to come to peace about this feeling of never quite getting enough done, especially because it’s not the truth: I get done the most important things I want to accomplish and I almost never waste whatever time is in my control. I’m learning to reframe my “not enough time” into an awareness that, in fact, I’m blessed with many interests that call to me to explore. But how to choose? Which interests will resonate with what is most truly “me”? What is it that is mine to do? I actually don’t think that we are assigned certain tasks before birth that we’re “supposed” to accomplish in our lives (that’s a story for another day), but given that we all have different skills, talents, and interests, and different opportunities in our unique life situations, what is it that I’m best positioned to do, to be, and to enjoy?

A few years ago at one of Dr. Estes’ trainings, she encouraged us to not run after every shiny distraction that is thrust into our lives at the rate of a firehose shooting water. She suggested a little prayer to help us to remember who we really are: “Please remove from me everything that is not myself.” And so, as this all has arisen for me in the last few months, I’ve chosen that as my 2022 intention along with the word “RELEASE”. I also love that “release” sounds much like “real ease”. Yes! That’s what I want!

I painted this image to hold that intention. The background of a gold-rimmed red rose blossoming reminds me of the Mystery of Life unfolding around me all the time, just waiting for me to pay attention to what I see and what I know. The figure is me, with the purple feathered cloak as the boundary between myself and all that is not mine to do or to be. I want to discover more deeply what is already within me, and to share whatever may be of help to others, offered as a small golden rimmed purple rose. The asemic writing includes my intention in the form of an unreadable future.

What about you? The New Moon is a good time to think about what it is that we want to nurture in our lives as the moon gradually becomes full. At Full Moon we can be thankful for all that has grown, and let go of whatever we don’t need anymore. I often think of the time from full moon to new moon, when the visible moon is smaller and smaller, as cleaning up whatever was too much in what we created: I organize the mess, I throw out or recycle the real and symbolic leftover pieces, and I ready the studio (and myself) for whatever is coming next.

And that’s what I did this past couple of weeks. I gathered my journals for the year and re-read what I wrote in 2021. I’ve put some things away, kept track of promising ideas and inspirations, and expressed gratitude for all the wonders and kindnesses. One big gratitude was the love I felt from so many people who contacted me when I was healing from my burns in July. Thank you. Your love was needed, and your care kept me going in my “a little too close to death” experience.

Even if you don’t have special rituals or do resolutions, take a few minutes to go over that second pandemic year we just finished — 2021. Congratulate yourself on coming out the other side, and recognize your strengths that you tapped into this year. What is it that you want to bring into 2022? What is it that you will leave behind?

May we all have “real ease” in 2022!

Cat

My dear friends,

Please take a listen to this poem from Shane Koyczen. It is my wish for you, for all of us.

Let’s make a world we want to live in.

Love,

Cat

Happy New Moon, dear friends!

It’s a grey, grey day here, this Friday in Lethbridge. No snow, yet marching into Winter. Here in my studio I enjoy a bright, busy, cluttered cocoon, hopefully creating something beautiful something true. I’m about halfway through the editing of my book with the new working title of We Belong With Each Other: Developing an Inner Life as a Political Act. It goes well, and I’m hoping to get it to my beta readers before Christmas. Remember, if you would like to be one of my first readers, please let me know. I do have enough first readers to give me the feedback I need, but would love to have a few more, just for the variety of worldviews of the readers. (Deep thanks to those of you who have already contacted me.) What’s involved: I will send you the whole book, and ask you to read one particular chapter (that I choose for you) and give me feedback. What I’m looking for is checking for the usual grammar, spelling, typos, etc., but also “Does it make sense? Is it easy to read, or did you have to stop and reread anything to understand what I was saying? Does what I say ring true for you? If not, let me know your thoughts. If you had written this book, would you feel good about it going out into the world as it is?”

It would be your choice whether to read anything more that the one chapter that I ask you to comment on; you may want the context around “your” chapter, or not want to wait until its published to read it in full. (Personally, I vastly prefer “real” books rather than reading online!) I hope to send it out before Christmas, with a hoped -for deadline of mid January to get your feedback to me.

Here’s an excerpt from the chapter on Embodiment:

“When we do reflect on our physical bodies, what is it, exactly, that we are thinking about?  We almost always focus exclusively on the aspects of ourselves that are enclosed within our skin, the boundary that separates you from me .  Yet none of us can survive more than a few days if we’re not taking into ourselves parts of our earth in the form of water and food.  What we take in becomes the actual cells and organs enclosed within our skin.  So, how are we actually separate from the waters in the rivers that we use as our drinking water?  How are we separate from the plants and animals that will become a part of our physical bodies, even though at this moment they might still be growing in the fields around our cities?  What we excrete from our bodies, though no longer enclosed by our skin, breaks down into nourishment and moisture for the soil or for microorganisms.  Gases within our bodies are excreted by our breath and become nourishment for the plants which rely on this carbon dioxide.  The plants and trees then excrete through their pores the oxygen which we ourselves so need in order to survive.

But many of us have become so numb or so distracted from these processes that we don’t even notice when the new coal companies bring new poisons into the watershed along with the few new jobs they promised.  Clearcut forests are literally hidden behind strips of trees lining the highways in order that the public doesn’t get upset seeing all those bare stumps.  When there are few trees to absorb carbon, where will the carbon go except into an atmosphere that slowly warms, and warms, and warms?  Where do our own bodies begin and end, when even our skin boundaries absorb sunlight —- and the chemicals in the sunscreen lotions along with?

So as I talk about embodiment here, keep the question of where your own body begins and ends in mind.  How does your own awareness of what constitutes your body impact what choices you make?  Do you even know what choices you may have? I am well aware that each of us and all of us have huge limitations as to choice, but I also know that I haven’t yet met anyone, including myself, who is aware of and makes use of all the choices that we do actually have in each day that influence our own bodies/the world.  How might we know more, become aware of so much more all around us without overwhelming ourselves?  How do I  do what I can, when at the end of an ordinarily stressful day just figuring out what to make for dinner can reduce me to tears?”

Many blessings to you, as we enter into the darkness of the year which has so many Holidays (holy days) of Light Returning. Our times have much pain, and it’s sometimes impossible to see what we might be able to do to be of help. Let’s take as much hope as we can from the stories of Light in the Darkness!

Much love,

Cat

Dear friends,

After hitting the huge milestone of finishing my first draft of Making Meaning, Making Soul: Developing Your Inner Life as a Political Act, I took a couple of weeks off just to breathe and heal from my summer adventures. Now I’m watching a course from The Teaching Company called How to Publish Your Book, and I have to admit that the course is making me feel as if writing the book is going to have been the easy part! Oh well, I’ll take it one step at a time. I will get this book out into the world one way or another!

While watching the program, I’ve been making little notebooks. It’s terribly easy, and terribly fun. I just use cardstock or leftover thick paper from other projects, cut a small pile of copy paper scraps a slight bit smaller than the thicker covers, and staple them at the crease. Totally zero waste, they are made up of the waste from other projects. The books are limited to the size of the stapler — since the staple is in the middle of the cover, the papers need to fit inside the length of the stapler. So far, I’ve just glued on images I’ve cut from magazines or copied from the internet. The “Owl Stay Weird” notebook is from a sticker for the Owl Acoustic Lounge, the venue where (in non-Covid times) we had our monthly Poetry Open Mics. (The Open Mics are currently conducted on zoom). Perhaps I will do some simple original painting on the covers, but I want them to be ordinary pocket notebooks, used for notes, grocery lists, and great ideas we don’t want to lose.

I find that when I make things from paper, or put images on paper or canvas with paints, my brain goes into the most exquisite dreamy space —- my hands busy, my mind wanders and rests, escaping from the busy world’s imperative to do, do, do! Doing art and making things is one of my ways to “practice what I preach” in my new book —- that at least 20 minutes a day of refusing to give in to the overculture’s demands allows a person to know themselves, what they love, and what they’re willing to give their life’s energy to. It frees a person to be themselves — human, unique, a gift from the universe to themselves and to all of us. I’m looking forward to quieter days of doing just that, to being just that.

With much love and many blessings,

Cat

Dear Friends,

As of this afternoon (Wednesday) at 2:30, on this new moon in October, I have finished the first draft of my book Making Meaning Making Soul: Nourishing Your Inner Life as a Political Act! I am so pleased, but also rather daunted by all the work yet to do! I plan to review and revise it until it’s as good as I can get it, then send it out to my beta readers who will provide feedback for me (if you’re interested in being one of my readers and offering feedback on one chapter of the book after it’s revised, please let me know!), then I’ll do another revision incorporating the feedback, and then, I’ll work on figuring out how to get the book out into the world. It’s 362 pages long right now, and represents one helluva lot of work distilling four decades of thought and experience!

The book has two parts, one part giving all kinds of reasons why investing 20 minutes a day in contemplative practice, that is, in practices that nourish our inner lives, is deeply helpful to any person whether they come to their inner lives with a religious outlook or not. Contemplative practices help us to tune in to ourselves, explore our values and how we’ve acquired those values, relax, find what gives us deep pleasure and meaning, and examine how the world around us pulls us in such a variety of ways that may not be in integrity with who we really are, what we really want, and what we really believe.

The other part of the book contains dozens of practices that one can do in 20 minutes or less to bring us back to our true self. These practices are divided into five different categories of Word, Image, Dream, Silence, and Embodiment. “Word” refers to the practices such as collecting quotations or poetry that are meaningful to us, journal writing, responding to prompts that help us explore areas of life we may not have considered very deeply, as well as other practices. The “Image” chapter includes ideas to help us notice and examine the images that we’re bombarded with every day, whether in advertising or in images of the “good life”, simple exercises in art making, color, and mark making to create small havens of beauty, and collecting images that inspire us. “Dream” includes collecting and examining both night dreams and day dreams, and helps us to notice and deconstruct all the stories we sometimes take for granted in our lives, as well as how to imagine new stories for us to grow into. “Silence” looks at the many ways to bypass words and stories to clear out space for peace, rest, and new creativity to arise, including various ways to meditate. And the chapter on “Embodiment” asks us to consider who we are as physical bodies, where we begin and end, how we are interconnected with all that is around us, and invites us to experience that interconnection in ways we may not have thought of before.

These practices are helpful in healing the wounds that so many of us have suffered, and helpful in our healing the world around us. The book is for both beginners and more advanced practitioners, for both people who would describe themselves as spiritual or religious as well as people who want nothing to do with a religious point of view. As true humans, there is more to us than the everyday, and we face deep challenges to the earth’s and our own survival. This book can help us become conscious of just how many resources we have within us, and help us to know what is uniquely ours to do and to be, for justice and the good of all of life.

With much love and many blessings,

Cat