Monday, April 27, 2009

More Nouwen Wisdom

Today's words from Henri Nouwen's Bread for the Journey do a great job of summarizing what writing does for me. I have been amazed at the outpouring of support and love from my most recent post here, as well as another soul-baring post on Facebook. What a wonderful community you all are for me and for my family! I am still under a deadline crunch for a few things, but once I have met my responsibilities on that front, life promises to slow down a bit for us, just in time for summer. We have 19 school days left--hooray!

Writing to Save the Day

Writing can be a true spiritual discipline. Writing can help us to concentrate, to get in touch with the deeper stirrings of our hearts, to clarify our minds, to process confusing emotions, to reflect on our experiences, to give artistic expression to what we are living, and to store significant events in our memories. Writing can also be good for others who might read what we write.

Quite often a difficult, painful, or frustrating day can be "redeemed" by writing about it. By writing we can claim what we have lived and thus integrate it more fully into our journeys. Then writing can become lifesaving for us and sometimes for others too.


I continue to be amazed at how pertinent so many of these are to where I am in my own life these days. Blessings & peace to each one of you.

JPT

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