While listening, again, to "Soul Life", a six cassette "Care of the Soul" retreat by Thomas Moore, I began to be aware that I was having thoughts of my own while listening to the words spoken by Moore. I remembered what he said at the beginning of tape 4 entitled 'Art and Soul'. When someone asks him, "How can I begin to care for my soul?", he answers "...respond to however the soul is making itself felt at the moment. Before I said it might be something in the house that needs attention. It might be an aspect of relationship. Pay attention, ...noticing what the soul is asking for at this particular moment." As I paid attention to my responsive thoughts, I remembered a practice that I learned for the first time, years ago.I was attending, and my life was deeply emersed in what I, now, believe, was a very cult-like church. One of the characteristics that flow from a cult-like culture, is that there is no distinction between the individual and the organization. You lose tract of your own thoughts, feelings and experiences and everything is filtered through the doctrine of the organization. Somewhere along my journey, however, I learned a very power practice that, I believe was instrumental in separating me from the organization. I read or heard somewhere, "Do not write down what I say, but what you think, as a result of what I say." It may take some deliberation, to understand how subversive that practice is. As I sat in church, instead of feverishly writing copious notes on what the preacher said, I began to write about my thoughts, memories of experiences and images that came to my mind. I began to recognize myself and my thoughts and experiences as being separate from that of the church and sometimes in opposition.
For the life of me, I can't remember where I first heard about that practice, but I strongly believe that I first heard about it from Charlie "Tremendous" Jones, a Christian, Sales Trainer, Motivator, Speaker and Life Coach long before there were any Life Coaches. He wrote "Life is Tremendous" and was a great advocate for the power of enthusiasm, reading and books. I had forgotten about the practice for a long time until I was reading Parker J. Palmer's book, "Let Your Life Speak: Listening for the Voice of Vocation". Palmer is a practicing Quaker and author and activist in the field of Education, holding workshops and retreats on how to combine "Soul and Role" helping educators to bring heart to their classrooms. In "Let Your Life Speak", he describes how people who come to workshops take notes about what the retreat leaders say and even participants whom they deemed wise, but seldom wrote down the words that they,personally, uttered. He began recommending that they write down their words and I would add: write what you think as a result of what you hear.
Palmer writes, "Verbalizing, is not the only way our lives speak, of course. They speak through our actions and reactions, our intuitions and instincts our feelings and bodily states of being perhaps more profoundly than any through our words. We are like plants, full of tropisms that draw us toward certain experiences and repels us from others. If we can learn to read our own responses to our own experience - a text we are writing unconsciously every day we spend on earth - we will receive the guidance we need to live more authentic lives." Doesn't that sounds like the "soul" that Thomas Moore talks about!
So, as I try to remember, everyday, to not just consume the "great" and "not so great" posts on the internet, or in my reading or TV watching, I'd be interested in your thoughts as a result of what I wrote....and of course, I'll pay attention to how I respond to what you write....and we'll care for our souls, together.
Namaste
