Introduction:
This monthly guide, which will be published throughout this special Jubilee Year in the Catholic Church, is designed to spark a personal spiritual practice that is flexible and doable.
The theme of the Jubilee Year, “Pilgrims of Hope,” reminds us that we are pilgrims, constantly on the move. The guide is meant to be a road map that examines dynamics of the creative life and spiritual life.
While designed for creatives, the themes and exercises apply to any discipline. These monthly guides aim at strengthening a sense of how each of us can be “tangible signs of hope for those of our brothers and sisters who experience hardships of any kind,” as Pope Francis said in his announcement of the Jubilee Year.
How to Use it:
Each month’s new theme is described first, followed by a personal application and an example of how I find it pertains to my own creative work. As you begin each unit, read the theme quietly, perhaps in the context of prayer, and allow the theme to stay with you. The personal stories are meant to open a door to reflecting on your own experience.
Finally, decide how often you want to engage in your practice (every day, once or twice a week, etc.). Each time you engage, reread the theme and choose one exercise from the list. You can repeat exercises, stay with the ones that bear fruit or rotate through the entire list, according to where you find your desire on that day.
Month 1: Beginning
At the beginning of this Jubilee Year, we are all invited to become “Pilgrims of Hope.” Any pilgrimage, actual or figurative, begins with a first step. Whether we are beginning something we have not experienced, or “beginning again” by getting back to something we’ve done in the past, very often the first step is the most difficult. The unknown of what lies before us can be intimidating, daunting, paralyzing. We can experience even more setbacks if our memories of trying in the past are not pleasant ones. Rather than take the first step, we spin our wheels about the many possible first steps, expecting a definitive direction and forgetting that we can always make adjustments along the way.
When an infant ventures into walking, there is a certain amount of wobbling and falling that is expected and understood as part of the process. And yet there is joy and intense curiosity of a new possibility that fuels the infant to get up and begin again and again. The first step is, after all, just one step. When it becomes two and three, a possible pattern emerges, a possible direction presents itself, and the fun of connecting the dots takes over. Pick a dot, any dot. You can always adjust later.
Go for a walk and realize that you’re already walking … already on pilgrimage.
Life Story:
I was a volunteer working in the motor coordination unit of a state hospital. Many of the hospital residents had reduced hand-eye coordination because of the medication they were taking. One of the residents had a therapy of removing the pegs from a pegboard: about 50 wooden pegs that fit into snug grooves. I used to fill the board, and he would remove them. One day, the supervisor called in sick, and I had the unit to myself. After filling the board twice, the resident came to me with the pegs and board a third time. I was overwhelmed with the other residents, and I said to him, “I bet you can fill that board yourself.”
He shook his head no.
I said, “I’ll make a deal with you: If you can put one peg in that board, just one, I’ll fill the rest of it for you.”
He struggled, the peg wobbled and skipped around the groove in his fingers, until he found the groove and the peg slipped in. When he saw that he could do one, he himself picked up another … and another … and another.
Work Story:
Working with director Anne Bogart and playwright Paula Vogel at the American Repertory Theatre was an opportunity to watch and participate in exemplary collaborative process. Developing one of Paula’s new scripts, Anne would offer it to the actors to find our intuitions, then take those impulses and shape them, and offer it back to Paula to make any adjustments she saw fit.
All we needed to begin was the reminder that we had already begun.
Some of the most exciting work was on the composition of the stage picture, putting the actors in the space. Anne would give us a game with a few simple elements as a framework — and then give us a gentle nudge to get things going. This kind of work was entirely new to me, but I remember as my mind was racing trying to “get things right,” Anne’s confident voice impelled the action with a simple but firm verbal reminder that “we’ve already begun.” That was freedom. That was permission. That was the first peg slipping into a groove and looking at the many places where the next peg could fit. All we needed to begin was the reminder that we had already begun.
Further Investigation:
Read the address that Pope Francis gave to begin the preparations for this Holy Year: “Spes non Confundit“
Rollo May’s book “The Courage to Create” is a great look into the creative process: the things that make it thrilling and the things that make it risky. His accessible style and clear focus to each chapter make it easy enough to read at one sitting yet friendly enough to consider one section at a time.
Exercise Suggestions:
- Doodle. Just put the pencil to the paper and start moving it. See where it goes and what it does. Or make a few dots and connect them.
- Plant a seed. Or better yet, a few seeds. Could be anything, an orange pit, a seed from a commercial package of seeds, or one from a plant that you walk by every day that might have its own seed pods. Put it in some soil in a sunny spot, water it and be patient.
- If you don’t already have a journal or a place to jot your thoughts, start one. Maybe even a blog!
- Pay attention to the “firsts” of your day as they happen in the moment: your first move, your first thought, your first sip of coffee, your first “hello.”
- When you go to bed at night, write down something that you want to read immediately when you get up.
- At the end of the day, list five beginnings that you had this day
- Go for a walk and realize that you’re already walking … already on pilgrimage.