I am going to begin with a definition. Imposter Syndrome: the persistent inability to believe that one’s success is deserved or has been legitimately achieved as a result of one’s own efforts or skills. How many of you have experienced “imposter syndrome” in some area of life? show of hands. Good. There are multiple takes on imposter syndrome. Today I want to lean on its value for spiritual practice. Imposter syndrome is when you don’t believe your success is deserved, achieved, or the result of your effort. Good. Its not. Our effort is showing up and having it be done unto us. Whenever ..read more

Maurice Sendak who wrote Where the Wild Things Are used to receive truckloads of letters from kids about that book, but he said his favorite was from a mother. It went like this….Dear Mr. Sendak, my 6-year old son, wrote you a letter and you wrote back with a drawing of one of your wild things. When he received the drawing of the wild thing, he loved it so much he ate it. Sendak said that was one of the highest compliments he’d ever received. The boy didn’t care that it was an original Maurice Sendak drawing or anything. He saw it, he loved it, he ate it. For me, that boy represents the ..read more

“To know the dark, go dark.” — Wendell Berry Each solstice and equinox Contemplify offers a public Lo-Fi & Hushed contemplative practice session for both free and supporting subscribers of the Non-Required Reading List. For those interested, go tell it on the mountain… The third week of Advent salted on joy. Not because of the circumstances, but despite them. The work remains to create the conditions for the gift of joy to emerge. The candlelight had built around the Advent wreath and solstice was breaking into a light jog. The arms of Advent and winter solstice were outstretched, re ..read more

“Oshida’s life and legacy is an experience of the spiritual senses knowing the mystical voice. Biblical in sources and Buddhist in form, reading this book took me as a reader to the great pause of silence.” — Sister Meg Funk, OSB Lucien Miller received his PhD in comparative literature from Berkely and taught Comparative Literature and Chinese at the University of Massachusetts. He is a deacon, spiritual director, and author.  Lucien and I talk about his book, Jesus in the Hands of Buddha: The Life and Legacy of Shigeto Vincent Oshida, OP. Fr. Oshida taught with a clarity born of my ..read more

“You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.” — ‘Wild Geese‘ by Mary Oliver Carmen Acevedo Butcher, PhD, is an author, teacher, poet, and award-winning translator of spiritual texts. Today Carmen and I talk about the importance of practice; chanting, lectio divina,walking meditation, poetry, drawing, and other customized pecularily particular practices. Carmen models what her practices looks, sounds, and feels like shares the impact on her life. Th ..read more

“A meditative blend of history and travelogue . . . brings the soundscape of the desert to life.” ― New Yorker Dr. Kim Haines-Eitzen is a Professor of Religious Studies with specialties in Early Christianity, Early Judaism, and other ancient Mediterranean Religions at Cornell University. Her book Sonorous Desert: What Deep Listening Taught Early Christian Monks—and What It Can Teach Us explores the dynamic relationships between ambient environmental landscapes and the religious imagination, especially in the case of desert monasticism. Dr. Haines-Eitzen was born in Jerusalem and gre ..read more

“I highly recommend What Makes You Come Alive to churches, religious and educational institutions, and spiritual seekers everywhere who are looking for an inward journey that finds its home in the world of nature, people, and things.” — Walter Earl Fluker – Editor and Director of the Howard Thurman Papers Project Dr. Lerita Coleman Brown is a retreat leader, speaker, spiritual companion, and professor emerita of psychology at Agnes Scott College. Professor Brown frequently speaks on contemplative spirituality and Howard Thurman. She is the author of What Makes You Come Alive ..read more

Good morning, good people. Welcome to the grand experiment of Lo-Fi & Hushed, this very first one marks the passage of the Autumn Equinox. And since it is the very first one, I am going to use this space before Lectio to offer a brief introduction on Lectio Divina for those whom this is new for and then we will do a slightly shortened version of lo-fi and hushed. In future sessions, the thought before Lectio will be much briefer A few quotes on Lectio Divina… “Seek by reading and you will find by meditating; cry in prayer and the door will be opened in contemplation.” — John of the Cro ..read more

“David Shumate’s High Water Mark is absolutely fresh and unpredictable. . . . You will be surprised by your confrontation with the utterly first rate.” — Jim Harrison David Shumate is the author of The Floating Bridge and High Water Mark, winner of the 2003 Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize. His poetry has appeared widely in literary journals and has been anthologized in Good Poems for Hard Times, The Best American Poetry and The Writer’s Almanac. Shumate is poet-in-residence at Marian University and lives in Zionsville, Indiana. David and I talk ab ..read more

“I have been pursuing the love ‘born of and nurtured by darkness’ all of my life. In The Insurmountable Darkness of Love, Douglas Christie invites readers to embark on a journey of ‘silent attention’ awakening, shedding, and finally the embrace of what cannot be known. So, how do you write about something that cannot be captured in words? Christie uses vulnerability, life stories and memories as well as excellent scholarship. The end result is breathtaking!” — Barbara A. Holmes, author of Joy Unspeakable: Contemplative Practices of the Black Church Douglas E. Christie, Ph.D., is ..read more