Developing a Holistic Spirituality – Sermon
Aug/095
A number of weeks ago I tweeted that I was going to be preaching at my local church. A number of people asked if they could hear the sermon. I know it won’t be everyone’s cup of tea but the church has put the sermon online so I thought I’d share the link.
The topic was on developing a Holistic Spirituality.
I’ve also included below a picture of the model/diagram that I was centering my presentation on. I’ve not included the full slide set so you’ll have to imagine some of that – but this picture will hopefully help you visualize the main points I’m making (click to enlarge).
How I Meditate – Examen
Jul/0927
A number of people have emailed me in the last few days asking about what methods of meditation I use (after I mentioned that I meditate in my previous post on the Rest/Work matrix) – so I thought I’d take the opportunity to describe one method that I’ve found to be very helpful.
Image by Baloulumix
The meditation is actually an ancient one – it’s called Examen of Consciousness (sometimes just called Examen) and it was developed by St. Ignatious Loyola (that’s a picture of him below – I think he’s blogging).
Examen a Christian meditation but I’m sure people of other faith backgrounds could use much of it with some modification and that even those who don’t practice any religion could benefit from some of the exercise too. I’ll write it up primarily as I practice it (I’m sure there are many variations) and from the Christian perspective but do feel free to adapt and fit it to your own situation.
The point of Examen is to find the movement of God in our daily lives as we review the day that we’ve just had (or are having). As a result I find that it’s best to do at the end of the day (I quite often use it in bed and fall asleep part way through).
The meditation has 5 stages or steps and can take as long as you have. I usually take 10-15 minutes to move through it but occasionally do a longer one looking back further than the day I’ve just had (ie it can be done looking back over a week, month, year or more).
