Spiritual direction is a contemplative practice. It is companioned prayer.
Spiritual direction is concerned with advancing one’s spacious mind and one’s listening skills for hearing and responding to one’s soul, one’s spirit, one’s higher power beyond religious identification. In action, spiritual direction alone is a contemplative practice; it is an advanced practice with significant silence, pointed questions, and once monthly sessions.
The human spiritual director does not “direct” in the sense of giving advice, offering opinions, or solving problems. Rather, the director reverently stands out of the way, helping a person engage in personal discovery and witness God’s undeniable invitation to a deeper relationship through our experiences.
The human director holds the concentration and objectivity to:
- surround observations and questions with a silence long enough to engage the heart and to hear a response beyond convention, beyond habit, beyond what is already known;
- maintain strong confidence in divine compassion amidst the uncertainty, paradox, and formlessness that challenge the heart to express its deepest longing, fears and regrets;
- provide understanding and compassionate acceptance of our human condition and our human responsibility;
- meet the directees frame of reference, observations and readiness with relevant and meaningful scripture and wisdom books for further contemplation.
The real director, Infinite Presence, speaks wisdom to our hearts with subtle and sometimes broad movements, continuously challenging us to open the gates of the heart to greater meaning, compassion, generosity, understanding and life.