Category — Train with Magpie Girl
Behind the Mic: Right-Fit Spirituality for Artists
I have about a dozen people lined up who I’d like to interview in our Relig-ish series about right-fit spiritual practices and relig-ish hybrids. But right now the time to ask for and edit those interviews is not accessible to me. Thanks why I’m grateful for Create Hype, who kindly interviewed me about art + spirituality over at their place. It was nice to step behind the mic for someone else. This was my favorite question:
Your community and website focus on spirituality and crafting a belief system that nurtures YOU, just special you. Why is it so important to form such a belief system as an artist?
Curious? Click here to read my answer.
Thanks for being here today.
Much Warmth,
Rachelle
*your magpie girl
Relig-ish – 5 Ways to Uncover Your Right-Fit Spiritual Practice
Last week I taught at the Soularize learning party on right-fit spiritual practices. I know creating habits and practices that nurture your soul and inspire your living is something you value, Magpie. So I’m sharing my workshop notes here in a mini-series at Magpie Girl.
In the last post we looked at 5 indicators your practices might not be right-fit for you, and we looked for things that would help us notice practices that are working well. In this post I’m summing up 5 things that will help you explore different practices so you can uncover the thing (or things) that nuture you and help you connect to ___________________. (Fill in the blank…God, Love, Creativity, The Divine….).
Over the past few years I’ve been privlidged to be a part of a couple different soulcare communities which were (and are) engaged in exploring spiritual practices. In time I came to notice recurring habits that help communities make good soulcare discoveries. Here are are 5 Ways to Uncover Your Right-Fit Practices:
1. Experimentation. Just as you would play with costumes from a dress up box, try-on different habits and practices and observe the results.
2. Accepting Failure. Don’t be discouraged by failed experiments. Failure — when approached with curiosity and humor — directs us onto a more healthful path.
3. Emphasizing functionality. As that great thought-leader Dr. Phil says, “How’s that workin’ for ya?” As my evangelical friends say, “Is this bearing fruit?” If your practice brings shalom (wholeness) to yourself and others, it has high-function in your life — even if it doesn’t seem like a “typical” or traditional practice.
5. Learned from other wisdom traditions – If the practices of your tradition aren’t enhancing your life, consider looking outside your wisdom tradition. Then look for places of common connection and lean into those.
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What about you Magpie? Do you have a soulcare practice you just adore? How did you find it? Do tell!
Relig-ish: 5 Indicators Your Spiritual Practices Might Not Be Right-Fit for You
I’m teaching this week at the Soularize learning party about right-fit spiritual practices. The group I’m working with is very good at honest deconstruction. Now we are working together on creative reconstruction. Many of us here would love to craft a set of practices that are rooted, authentic and creative enough to grow-a-long with us – even if they don’t look very much like what we have come to know as “church.”
I know that many of you are interested in that as well, my curious creative Magpies. So I thought I’d do a quick-and-dirty post with some of my tips and techniques notes from the right-fit spiritual practices workshop. These aren’t fully fleshed out, so if you see something that makes you go “hmmmm…curiouser and curiouser” please let me know. Your questions and comments could become good fodder for an upcoming Ask Magpie column.
Right-fit spiritual practices are habits that help you stay connected to The Divine/Spirit/That-Which-Guides-You while authentically reflecting your core values, and keeping you connected to your deep historic roots.
Indicators that your spiritual/soulcare practices are not right-fit for you any longer (deconstruction):
- You don’t know what the mean or why your community started doing them in the first place.
- You dread and resist going to any meeting or gathering where they might be practiced.
- You have a pervasive sense of guilt.
- You know it used to work for you, and your baffled why it doesn’t feel nurturing, inspiring, guiding anymore.
- You’re doing them because you are “supposed to” not because you enjoy them.
Take a moment to reflect on your current set of practices – from prayer to knitting, from worship to running. Is there one that has at least 3 of these traits? You have a couple of options, each of which is totally legitimate depending on your needs:
1. Stop doing that practice all together, and don’t pick up a new practice.
2. Find a completely new practice to replace that one.
3. Adapt and re-create the practice to better fit your current needs, beliefs, and values.
If you decided to replace or re-create, you can look for clues about what might be a better-fit practice.
Traits of a right-fit spiritual practice (reconstruction):
- Right-fit practices are adaptable over time and grow with you.
- Right-fit practices feel juicy and engaging.
- Right-fit practices leave you feeling nurtured not drained; confident, not not disempowered; “enough,” not guilty.
- Right-fit practices leave room for mystery and wonder so that you have space to explore and question.
Take a moment to reflect on your current set of practices – from prayer to knitting, from worship to running. Is there one that has at least 3 of these traits? How can you lean into the practice and spend more time there?
Next up: Five things that will help you discover your right-fit spiritual practices.
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You Might Also Like:
- For examples of right-fit practices from a slew of creative souls. Click here.
- For more ideas about the relig-ish life. Click here.
- For a few of my favorite odd-ball practices that have been right-fit for me, click here for shrines or click through the tag cloud for seasaonl celebrations.
Art of Noticing: Free Nibbles
It’s the last week of April. Are you gasping at that? Are you thinking, “Where does the time go?!”
Then my new class is just-right for you, my sweet.
The Art of NoticingA 30 day practice group for savoring your life.
$30
This is the last week to register. Class begins May 1st. Click here to join us!
Want a taste of what Noticing can do for you? Here’s a complimentary sample platter for you to nibble on:
- The Art of Noticing: When to be still.
- The Art of Noticing: How to receive love.
- The Art of Noticing: What helps you feel better?
- The Art of Noticing: Seeing old things in a new light.
- The Art of Noticing: How much is too much?
- The Art of Noticing: Noticing resistance and going with the flow.
- The Art of Noticing: Stand in the place where you live.
- The Art of Noticing: Noticing the natural world.
Hungry for more? Click here.
The Art of Noticing
A 30 day practice group for savoring your life.
$30
The Art of Noticing :: Noticing Nature
I am not an optomist.
I tend to see
the things that annoy me
Before noticing
the mud grown to grass
the soil erupting with hyacinths
the cherry blossoms busy at their dance
and the dandelions, saucy after a long hibernation.
Touch the ground today.
Lay your hand on the tree
that stands,
four seasons long
as a sentinel on your street corner.
Say “thank you”
to the season
as she turns, and turns,
and turns again.
And find in exchange
gratitude
springing forth in your
(maybe)
optimistic heart.
What about you? What are you noticing about the natural world around you? What is Nature whispering to your heart?
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The Art of Noticing is about practicing presence in accessible, everyday ways. It decreases resistance, increases gratitude, and opens your eyes to what Mary Oliver calls your “one wild, precious life.” Learn to notice in The Art of Noticing, a 30 day practice group beginning May 1st. Click here to join me.
Relig-ish: A New Tribe
We are a new kind of soul, you and I; determined to live with honesty, hungry to find the truth that dances in a thousand places, and radically dedicated to the gospel of Love.
We are creative, soulful be-ings who want to curate the best of our religious past, while crafting an honest spiritual future. We are the high priestesses of our homes, creating seasonal celebrations that reflect our deepest values. We are the women creating rites and rituals out of art, and movement, and the food on the table. We are the amateur theologians writing creeds that allow us to look people in the eye. We are the people longing for a community built on support and curiosity, not judgment and condemnation. We will find that community. And if we cannot find one, we will create one because we are as wise as we are powerful.
This is what I want to assure you of: You are not alone. There are companions to travel with – withmates for the journey. We can each create our own spiritual path, and we can dance together at the crossroads.
We’ve been homeless for a while — we of the creative mind, we of the wandering soul. I grew tired of this. I also wanted a place to call home. So I created Flock, an online soulcare community where women like us can get advice, share resources, and celebrate our year together. It’s our new nesting place, and we seats are now open.
You’ve been fluttering around for a long time now It’s time to find a landing space. Welcome home.
The Art of Noticing: Excess
The Art of Noticing series is about practicing presence in accessible, everyday ways. Tired of feeling like life is just whipping past you? Want to feel what you are feeling now, rather than having it sneak up on you later? Eager to find the sacred in your everyday? Join my mailing list to get info on The Art of Noticing: A Practice Group starting May 1st. Thank you for being here!
The Art of Noticing: Excess
It’ s Lent and most of my friends are giving something up. Sugar. Bread. Television.
Many a year I too have given things up for Lent. Yet I have to admit, even when I was a traditional pastor, I never really got the connection between forgoing Snickers for 40 days, and the suffering of a man who was crucified. I know it’s a lot more complicated than that, both in theology and practice. I know that theoretically the practice of fasting during Lent can connect us to our mortality, help us see the need for forgiveness, and make us more aware of the suffering of others. But for me, well, it always just felt like “New Year’s Resolutions: Round Two.”
This year as a part of my post-Christian reality I’m finding a spirituality that fits– even around Lent. As a part of that journey, I’ve been thinking a lot about Excess. Here in America, even when we are in lean times there is still Excess. Excess worry. Excess entertainment, drinking, and junk food to numb the worry. Excess outrage at the power-that-be. The modus operandi for our consumerist culture is ”MORE”. So much so that even in times of crisis, we find ways to over-indulge
So for Lent, I thought I would spend some time noticing the Excess in my own life. Then I thought I’d ask God-and-the-Universe to show me how I might both release the Excess and transform it into Abundance for someone else during this giving season. It’s an experiment. I want to get curious, don’t you? So here it goes–my list of *8Things that I have too much of in my life.
*8Things: Excess
1. Televisions/Movies: I don’t have a TV, but damned if I don’t consume a lot of movies and shows on Hulu and Netflix.
2. Email. Not sure what to do about that one.
3. Sugar. I’m not supposed to eat it, and yet is is always in my house.
4. Sleep. I could really stand to be a bit more of an early riser.
5. Negative Self Talk. Wow. There would be so much more productivity in a day if I didn’t spend this much time with my Gremlins.
6. Debating About What’s The Most Important Thing to Do Next. (See number 5.)
7. Diet Coke. I quit it like most people quit smoking. It’s snuck back in.
8. Toiletries. Why do I keep buying lotions and potions?!?!
Hmmm. It was harder to come up with *8Things then I thought. I guess my half-assed minimalism and determination to Do Less has been effective. If I had made this list a year or two ago it would have involved lots more loot. (Especially clothes. My year without clothes really honed my closet down to an effective minimum.)
Based on the things I noticed here, the most logical thing to give up for Lent would be Television/Movies. Frankly I don’t feel strong enough to do that right now. It enjoy the escape at the end of the day, and having something on in the background is the only way I power through my most hated daily task — making dinner/cleaning the kitchen. Plus the $7.99 a month I spend on Netflix really wouldn’t make much of a dent in the Tsunami Relief efforts.
I’m leaning towards sugar. Sugar and Diet Coke. If I give these things up I can redirect about $10 a week towards a charitable cause. Plus both of these things are driving me more quickly towards death, so giving them up makes me more aware of my own mortality and my desire to not get there any sooner than necessary. (That’s kind of Ash Lent-ish, right?) So there we have it. I’m giving up sugar and Diet Coke for Lent.
I’m sure Jesus would be very proud. ;-)
What about you. What is your list of *8Things: Excess? What do you have too much of in your life? Where is there Excess that drains you? How can you transform your Excess into Abundance for others? You’re answers are sure to inspire us. Grab a button and play along. If you put your list on your blog, give us the permalink (not your homepage address) in the Mr. Linky below. Thanks for playing!
The Art of Noticing: A Video Sneek Peek
The Art of Noticing series is about practicing presence in accessible, everyday ways. Tired of feeling like life is just whipping past you? Want to feel what you are feeling now, rather than having it sneak up on you later? Eager to find the sacred in your everyday? Join my mailing list to get info on The Art of Noticing: A Practice Group starting May 1st. Thank you for being here!
The Art of Noticing: A sneek peek.
Art of Noticing: Sneek Peek from Rachelle Mee-Chapman on Vimeo.
*8Things: The Art of Noticing, Old Things:New Eyes
The Art of Noticing series is about practicing presence in accessible, everyday ways. Tired of feeling like life is just whipping past you? Want to feel what you are feeling now, rather than having it sneak up on you later? Eager to find the sacred in your everyday? Join my mailing list to get info on The Art of Noticing: A Practice Group starting May 1st. Thank you for being here!
The Art of Noticing: Old Things, New Eyes
LaLa’s sun, courtesy of Leanna Ramsey-Corrales, Which Way is Home Again.
Yesterday my yoga instructor asked me to “contemplate the characteristic of Surya, the Sun…” She always asks me this. She never forgets. Why? She’s on a on a DVD
But not this time. This time I actually thought about the Sun and her characteristics. Living in northern climes as I do, I am usually desperate for the sun. For Light. For heat. So much so that these are the only characteristics I remember about the her. But yesterday as I looked at the sun — well, at the watery hint of her existence, there, behind the clouds — I came to notice stunning things about her.
*8Things: Characteristics of the Sun
1. The sun warms whatever she touches.
2. The sun grows things — with the help of others. (rain, oxygen, earthworms…)
3. The sun has no fear of running out of energy in this lifetime.
4. The sun is universally loved.
5. The sun goes on burning, even when no one is noticing it.
6. The sun is egoless.
7. The sun, while needed by all living things, is not strained by her necessity.
7. While the sun may appear to grow stronger or weaker, that comes from viewing her from a fixed perspective. At her core, she is consistently energized and un-depleted.
8. The sun does the work of her life without effort or strain, but simply by be-ing
Is there something omnipresent in your life that you need too direct your gaze to once again? Can you see something old anew? We’d love to know what you are re-discovering today. What is your list of *8Things: Old Things: New Eyes? Grab a button and play along. If you put your list on your blog, give us the permalink(not your homepage address) in the Mr. Linky below. Thanks for playing!
*8Things: The Art of Noticing, Feel Better
The Art of Noticing series is about practicing presence in accessible, everyday ways. Tired of feeling like life is just whipping past you? Want to feel what you are feeling now, rather than having it sneak up on you later? Eager to find the sacred in your everyday? Join my mailing list to get info on The Art of Noticing: A Practice Group starting May 1st. Thank you for being here!
The Art of Noticing: What helps me feel better.
Yesterday I was turning the pages of my Moleskine calendar 
How can we experience — really experience — the life we are living? Does being present to our everyday help us recognize the sacred? Does paying attention reduce our stress and fill us up? Can the The Art of Noticing give us what we need to save ourselves and others?
I think so.
Let’s start with *8Things. What *8Things help you feel stronger, healthier, better? Don’t make resolutions to do them every morning. Don’t create a plan. Not yet anyway. Just take a moment to ask you body/mind/spirit, “What help you feel better, friend?” I’ll show you mine, if you’ll show me yours.
*8Things: Feel Better
1. I feel ”cleaner” when I drink water.
2. Sun salutation or laps in the pool help me feel bright and alert.
3. I feel calmer if I make my bed and wash my bowl.
4. I am more loving towards my family, if I have some time to myself each day.
5. I feel super nutured if I read in the bathtub.
6. Clearing my desk clears my head.
7. Bare-bulb lighting nurtures my spirit.
8. I feel jolly when friends come to eat at my house.
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What are *8Things you notice helping you feel better? We need your good ideas, because “there ain’t no place to go but together.” Grab a button and play along. If you put your list on your blog, give us the permalink (not your homepage address) in the Mr. Linky below. Thanks for playing!
