Guided Writing Session Directory
Below, you will find recordings for each Guided Writing Session dating back to August 2021 when the sessions began.
Take a moment to review the Usage and Guidelines Folder below for information on how to post work and use the directory.
Use the Independent Entries Folder for submissions not specific to a monthly program or Guided Writing Session.
More About Guided Writing Sessions
Deepening Lesson for A Play of the Senses
The Writers Circle Deepening Lesson
This month, we’re looking at the role of the senses in spiritual awakening and how to dissolve inherited shame over pleasure (aka “the sins of the flesh”), induced by moralistic religious beliefs. The notion that we are fallen creatures because we have a body, and that sensory experience leads to sin, is not only outdated and harmful: it is anti-spirit, anti-God, anti-wonder and anti-awakening. Rather than slice the world in two – between body and spirit, profane and sacred, bad and good – a mature understanding of the human condition integrates the full range of our experiences and factors the divine into all that we do. When we view the world as the theater of God, an expression of the supreme intelligence, we realize that the senses are, in fact, our guides to a deeper connection with all that exists, provided we use them mindfully in ways that don’t harm others or the environment.
Our capacities for delight and pleasure, wonder, and awe, lift the spirit in times of trouble and remind us of life’s effulgent blessings. When we open our eyes and pay attention to the precious details of our existence – an opportunity intensified by this lockdown – we’re often stunned by how much we’ve been missing. To quote the student’s poem I read during my talk: “The day is strung with these moments/a rosary of awe and wonder … Eight weeks ago I noticed none of it.”
This switch from numbness to sensitivity, from blindness to sight, is the essence of the seeker’s path, and the key to a happy, fulfilling life. Here are three writing prompts to help you explore your attitudes toward pleasure, shame, and playfulness, and the role of the senses on a spiritual journey. Feel free to approach these prompts in whatever way appeals to you, and if none of these questions resonates, don’t hesitate to formulate (and respond to) to your own.
What do you feel ashamed of that also gives you genuine pleasure? What is the story behind this shame? How might you shift this destructive story?
Describe an experience of sensory delight that intensified your spiritual awareness, and why.
Are you able to appreciate the psychological and spiritual benefits of this lockdown period? If so, how would you define these benefits? If not, why not?