Finding the sacred, and my voice
You know who I’m thinking about a lot lately? A lady I met exactly one time, in a pool, when I was a young teenager visiting my grandparents in Stuart, Florida.
I was sixteen or seventeen. We used to make the four hour drive to Stuart regularly, more often during the summer, to see my mom’s parents and occasionally the actual beach. My three siblings and I would alternate between gorging ourselves on air conditioning and cable (luxuries we definitely did not have at home) and padding down to the neighborhood pool in their golf-course community.
There were sometimes other folks at the pool, but not all that often, and the arrival of four teenagers was often enough to clear the place out. Sometimes people asked who we were visiting. On this occasion, my memory says that it was only me in the water for a while, taking a break from the novel I’m sure I was reading. Then an older woman joined me, started chatting. Really the only bit of the conversation I remember with any clarity was when she asked me if I was religious or had any spiritual beliefs. I said “no, not really,” trying to keep the judgment and skepticism out of my voice. The woman, in her forties or fifties, nodded and said, “It’ll be important to you someday.”
In the moment, I thought, “well, that’s presumptuous.” She wasn’t being condescending, though, just said it like it was a fact: someday, spirituality would mean something to me. Still, it rankled (does a teenager un-rankled by things adults say exist anywhere at any time?), which I think is why I’ve never forgotten it.
I slowly grew through (around? past?) my righteousness, softening all the time. When I found the Enneagram in my late twenties, I thought, “Here it is. I have been waiting for this language for SO. LONG.” By then I had acknowledged to myself that although I would likely never join an organized religion, spirituality had indeed become important to me. I craved a spiritual community, had made tentative feints at yoga and meditation as regular practices, read a lot of “spiritual but not religious” books, and didn’t talk to a single soul about any of it.
My parents had different attitudes about religion and they rubbed off on me in different ways. I bonded with my dad and his disclaiming of religion, reveling in feeling connected through our mutual disdain for the opiate of the masses, and our mutual superiority. Largely (at first) because I wanted to impress him, I read a lot of philosophy and science, embracing materialism and existentialism. My mom, as far as I could tell, just didn’t care that much about spirituality. She never talked about it, often changing the subject when it came up. Today, I can appreciate the burdens of running a business and a family of 6, and I think, yeah, I wouldn’t have time for armchair philosophy either.
I still love reading philosophy and science (I’m way more enthralled by quantum physics than any counselor strictly needs to be). I’m still very much an existentialist, but I’ve added in a healthy dose of compassionate humanism. The thing that remains most strongly is the quiet—the not talking about spirituality. I’ve been actively working on shifting this silence in myself over the last few years. It still makes me nervous. I get worried that people will stop taking me seriously, that a mention of spirit will turn people off and away. (My friend and mentor says, “then those aren’t your people,” and she’s right. But my people-pleasing runs deep in places.)
A week or two before I graduated with my Ph.D. in August 2022, I was moving and spreading wheelbarrows of mulch for the better part of a Saturday. My parents were hosting a party for me, and I was helping get the house ready. As I huffed around the yard, dodging fire ant mounds, gulping water, and wiping the sweat out of my eyes, I had an idea for a workshop. I still have the note I dictated into my iPhone, unwilling to take off my work gloves. The central notion was to help people in “finding the sacred and the everyday” by offering a bunch of different practices, including chanting, walking meditation, grief work, contemplative writing, and “plants?”
The original note in my phone.
I still haven’t hosted this workshop (hey, 2025!) but the idea for the current incarnation of my practice was born that day.
That lady in the pool was right.
Spirituality is important to me.
It informs my work, my choices, my relationships, my practices, and my senses of compassion, hope, & optimism.
Here are a few tenets of my spirituality, my everyday sacred:
Everything is connected. We are not separate from each other, or from the rest of existence.
A connection to Self, other people, and nature is central and critical to our well being.
The Self is our individual portion of the energy that animates the universe.
You have inherent value and worth.
You are more than your personality.
We operate best when we have dialogue and integrity between the three centers of intelligence: body, heart, and mind.
“Your feelings are real, but not true.” (Tsoknyi Rinpoche). This is also the case for your thoughts.
Relationships are healthiest when they are mutual and reciprocal.
Meaning is yours to discover and create.
Your identities and experiences are unique, valuable and important.
Change is the only constant. (Hat tip to Octavia Butler, prophet and visionary.)
I’m still getting comfortable talking about spirituality in public. I struggle against the spiritual wellness industry and “spa spirituality.” (My sister once called it “White lady woo woo shit” and this remains my true favorite description.) For me, spirituality is not always light and gauzy; there’s struggle and grit and grief in there too. It’s important to me to keep my feet on the ground, my toes (and hands) in the dirt. There’s plenty more to say on that, but it’ll have to wait for another day—I have plants to tend and workshops to plan.
