Writings of a Beholder 🌿 5.31.24

A Change of Scenery for the Soul

I’ve always been one for routine and familiarity. I think that’s why I find so much peace in engaging with spiritual practices because they’re rhythms I can return to that always seem to help ground me in God when everything around me feels unclear and ambiguous.

I like to feel grounded in my body, in my soul, and in my very being, so when I don’t, I kind of start to panic. When the rhythms or practices that usually help facilitate an intimate relationship with God suddenly don’t fit like they once did, I can feel like I’m suspended in midair.

I’ve noticed that this usually happens when the season of my soul and my life is transitioning or shifting into something new and different. What worked to keep me grounded and embodied before doesn’t work when things start to shift because not only has the season of my soul changed, but I have, too, whether I recognize it or not.

I struggle to brace against these changes, my initial reaction being one of fear as I reach out panicked hands for something — anything — to give me some semblance of certainty. But the longer I walk with God, the more I’m learning that the harder I resist these changes and transitions of the seasons, the more anxious, disembodied, and discontent I feel.

It’s when I let go, trust, and surrender to the waves of change that I’m able to find my feet and my breath again — that I’m able to find God again.

After all, as human beings, we were created to grow and evolve constantly. That’s the very heart of spiritual formation, isn’t it? To allow ourselves to be changed and transformed by the Spirit of God to look more internally like the heart of Jesus.

So finding safety in familiar rhythms — finding my solace in spiritual practices alone and relying on those to ground me — is not what I was created for. I think of spiritual practices or rhythms more like tiny soul compasses, constantly pointing me to God and a deeper, closer, and richer spiritual walk with Him. Spiritual practices are not to be held onto so tightly that they become more like legalistic to-do’s that I have to engage with in order to feel worthy of God’s love.

Spiritual practices are birthed from a place of already knowing I am loved, helping me grow in and live from that knowledge as I open myself up to the Spirit of God within and around me.

This isn’t to say that finding comfort in our practices is a bad thing, because it isn’t. Finding peace in our routines and rhythms can be a gift. It just becomes limiting to our spiritual growth when we place what we do above who we already are in Jesus, making the practice feel more like a chain than a place of relationship and surrender.

I’ve done a lot of reflecting on this lately because I’ve had to change my practices and rhythms to fit with this new season of my life. And honestly, it’s been challenging. Like I mentioned earlier, I like to stick to what I know, but what I know isn’t really helping me grow right now so I’ve had to reevaluate with the Spirit what it is that my soul actually needs at the moment versus what I think it should need.

As I’ve done this, I’ve realized that what my soul has been needing the most is a change of scenery — a new space.

Ever since getting married nearly 8 years ago, and living in four different places throughout those 8 years, my sacred space has always been my living room couch. It’s been an 8-year-long practice of mine to get up in the mornings, make a cup of tea, grab a cozy blanket, and have my prayer time with God on that living room couch. Here, I journal, pray, read the Scriptures, or practice centering prayer. Depending on the day, the rhythm might change, but the space is always the same.

Then I got pregnant and I started to very slowly notice that the living room couch was a space I dreaded coming to. It started to feel like an expectation rather than an invitation and my time with God became distracted, scatter-brained, and truly unenjoyable. At the time, I didn’t know what it was exactly that was making me feel this way and I started to wonder if the problem was me.

But then one morning as I sat frustrated on the living room couch yet again, I heard a quiet whisper — a gentle invitation — to gather my books and my cup of tea and meet God in the newly furnished nursery that my husband and I have been working on in preparation for the arrival of our little girl.

A little surprised, but slightly relieved, up I went, books, blanket, tea, dogs and all. I said goodbye to the living room couch, a sacred space that has held so many versions of me, and surrendered to what my soul had really been needing all along — a change of scenery.

As I stepped into my daughter’s room and took in the soft morning light splashed along her cream-colored walls, the oat rocker in the corner beckoning me to come and sit, my whole being exhaled for the first time in what felt like months. I opened the window, let the sounds of the morning leak in, and sat in that rocker with my cup of tea and basked in the presence of Love.

It felt like coming home; coming home to God and coming home to myself.

The living room couch was a spiritual practice — a sacred space — that I was being invited to shed. Not because there was anything wrong with it or with me, but because it simply didn’t fit with who I was becoming or what my soul needed anymore. My daughter’s room — Gracie’s room — fits me like a glove right now. Perhaps it’s God’s way of showing me that I’m more ready than I think I am to step into this new season of motherhood. Maybe it’s His way of gently guiding me over this new threshold as I leave one room and prepare to enter another.

I suspect that both of these things are true. I suspect that it’s one external way He’s showing me that my internal life is already changing — growing — and me right along with it.

And that all is well — my soul is well — because He is always with me. Through every season, transition, and shift, He walks beside me and is patient with me even when I struggle to let the old go so that the new can grow. Even when it takes me months to realize that the room I’m in doesn’t fit me anymore.

That’s living, breathing grace.

So, friend, my wisdom to you in all of this is that perhaps the next time you start to feel a little dry in your walk with God, or when your usual practices and rhythms don’t seem to be life-giving anymore, take some time to evaluate your space.

Does the room you’re in no longer fit you?

Is your soul craving a change of scenery?

If the answer is yes to those questions, ask the Spirit where He might be inviting you to come and be with Him. Maybe this is a physical change of scenery, like it was with me, or perhaps it’s a shift in your soul that He’s guiding you towards.

Either way, may your answer to His stirrings and invitations be ‘yes’.

May your surrender lead you to deeper ways of being with God.

Selah.

With you on the journey,

Celia

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Life Lately

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A Breath Prayer for Your Weekend

Inhale: Keep me rooted.

Exhale: In You, Jesus.

(adapted from Colossians 2:7)

*If you’d like to learn more about the practice of breath prayer, download this complete digital guide to practicing breath prayer.

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Resources & Good Things to Pick Up

As we come to the end of May, it can be helpful to take time to reflect on the month behind us before stepping into the month ahead of us. Spiritual director, Izabela Cormier, offers what she calls a ‘Monthly Reset’, a free PDF download to help you look behind you so you can set your intentions for the month ahead of you. Grab it on her website here: May Monthly Reset

My mom is an ovarian cancer survivor who decided to create an encouraging planner for those walking through their cancer journey. It would also be a life-giving tool for caregivers and loved ones walking beside their cancer warrior. The ‘For Such a Time as This’ planner is officially available for purchase now here: Quiet Hope Co.

My Etsy shop, The Beholding Co., offers contemplative resources to help you slow down, seek still moments, and behold God’s presence with you in the everyday. Purchase some breath prayer cards, a Lectio Divina bookmark, and more.

Grab a copy of my Bible study, You Are Beloved: a 21-day study on how to root your identity in the love of God, over on Amazon. If you’d like a free 3-day sample of the study, reply to this email and I’ll send it right over!

My friend and licensed spiritual director, Kari Bartkus, offers an 8-week journaling program for those who want to process their grief and trauma with God within the safety of blank journal pages. I’ve completed the program myself and can say confidently that it was incredibly impactful and healing: Journal Gently

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An Invitation to Pause & Reflect

A regular practice of reflection helps us recognize what’s going on beneath the surface of our souls so we can name it in the Lord’s presence. Because as we learn to name what we feel, what we need, and what we long for, we’re also learning to discern the Spirit’s sweet, gentle voice within our hearts and lives.

Take a few moments today or this weekend to journal or contemplate with the Holy Spirit the following question(s) or prompt(s):

Does the room you’re in no longer fit you?

Is your soul craving a change of scenery?

If the answer is yes to those questions, ask the Spirit where He might be inviting you to come and be with Him. Maybe this is a physical change of scenery, like it was with me, or perhaps it’s a shift in your soul that He’s guiding you towards.

Allow yourself to be open to the Spirit’s voice, trusting that He’ll lead and care for you, no matter what.