Resources - soulspace ® Spiritual Direction

Montana Sky Time, An Audio Reading

Kirsten Harrison — Wed, 08 Apr 2026 15:00:08 +0000

A Voice Memo Poetry Reading

Listen from the inside, noticing what is stirred in sensation, feeling, and/or cognition.

This poem comes to us from the Spring 1990 issue of Parabola, “Time & Presence.”

To Bear, Encircled and Encircling

Kirsten Harrison — Sun, 05 Apr 2026 18:54:13 +0000

In this season of death, this season of life, I have been consciously working with the relatedness of two postures: TO BEAR and TO RESOUND.

What do these two words stir in you?

I’ve selected an image to offer as a Visio Divina, paired with one line from a Sara Groves song.

As my inner gaze meets the collage this morning, the words singing in my heart surprise me: “O Day of Resurrection.” I recognize them as words chanted in the Liturgy of the Hours.

The image sings to me of the felt sense of bearing whatever comes on the inside with the utmost tenderness—of encircling the whole.

A Visio Divina Practice

Come into rhythm with breath and the space around you.

What is it like to be with the image, as it is. Resistance is not a problem. As the mind wanders, return to the image.

What is it like to bear what comes?

“What if I sat right here and took you in without the fear and loved you whole without the flight and didn’t try to pass this cup?”

-Songwriters Sara Groves & Ellie Holcomb

Musical Accompaniment

If you would like a song to accompany you in the practice, I offer this one.

An Invitation to Notice

At the conclusion of bearing the image, here are some questions to guide you in deep listening:

Are there sensations?
Is there a feeling?
Are there words?
Are there inner contradictions calling to be encircled?

You may want to journal, leave yourself a voice memo, or talk with a loved one about what this was like for you. If you’d like to enter in together in spiritual direction, I would love to hold space for you.

The Liturgy of the Hours I sing with is by the monks at New Camaldoli Hermitage in Big Sur, CA.

Wisdom: A Knowing in Darkness

Kirsten Harrison — Wed, 11 Mar 2026 20:20:01 +0000

Twilight Radiance/Big Sur, CA

This post is a part of the Maps, Lenses, and Mirrors Series, a collage of conversations, music, voice memos, visual art, and words exploring how to know. Here’s Part One: Visible Contradictions + Knowing How To Know. And Part Two: What Strength It Takes to Bear A Slow Unfolding

A Voice Memo Read-Aloud

Today, we will continue exploring how to know with an audio read‑aloud.

In practice yesterday, I was drawn to a small section on wisdom and mystery from the work of Dr. Chris Morris and Bruno Barnhart, so I hit record on the voice memo app.

Morris writes:

For Barnhart, wisdom is first and foremost a knowing in ‘faith,’ “a knowing in darkness, an affirmative cognition of mystery…and the knowing is consequently obscure as it is certain.

Listen from the inside, noticing what is stirred in sensation, feeling, and/or cognition.

Sources:

Doctoral thesis—the source of the audio excerpt: Chris Morris, The Cross Now Rooted Breaks In Bloom: A study of Bruno Barnhart’s “Wisdom Knowing” and Wholeness in Christian Life.
Blog post—a lovely (and brief) entry point: “A revolution in wisdom vital for our time” (Living Water; first published 2021, reposted as a tribute after Morris died unexpectedly in 2024)
Podcast episode—to listen to Chris in his own voice: “Christ in the Torn Places.”

Silence: Words + Portals

Kirsten Harrison — Sun, 22 Feb 2026 02:33:19 +0000

What a gift it is when another human describes inner experiences with granularity. In this collection, there are words about silence and portals to enter.

A friend found words to describe the vibrancy of silence in this video podcast episode called Making Art From Your Heart Space. I’ve bookmarked the words so you can drop right in. If it stirs something, watch the whole episode. (I love the sign on the bookshelf behind him!)

“Sweet Darkness,” a poem written and read by David Whyte
A poetry film by Charlotte Ager & Katy Wang featuring Wendell Berry reading his poem, “The Peace of Wild Things.”

Henry Schoenfield offers a way into the grounding spiritual practice of sacred chant. The words of this particular chant are simply: “When silence turns to presence, in silence, there is presence.”

Silence: The Mystery of Wholeness, Robert Sardello describes vivid worlds nesting within silence.

Dr. Chris Morris’ crystalline presence is energetically preserved in this audio artifact, “Christ in the Torn Places,” recorded just three months before he died, unexpectedly, in 2024. Here, he speaks about the connection between silence and justice work, participatory wisdom, trauma, and a spacious way to see the work of transformation: the capacity to bear.
Salt of the Earth, a short film by my friend Adam Thom, featuring Thomas Merton in his own voice. Watch for scenes from Adam’s visit to our little island with our beloved friend Ryan, whose earthly vibrancy came to an unexpected end in 2024.

I am so glad you’re here. These reflections and practices are written by a human artist and spiritual director. They are joyfully and freely given.

If you are nourished here and are presently able to, there is a way to offer appreciation by way of of virtual tip jar on the “Buy Me A Coffee” site. I am not buying coffee, though. Your generosity keeps my home fires burning and makes it possible for me to give my energies to this work. The support also makes it possible for me to offer soul care and witness to others at a reduced rate.

Another way to support this work at no cost is to share it with a friend, post on social media, link it to your blog or website, or share it in your email newsletter. Thank you!

About the Author

This little collection is curated by Kirsten, a spiritual director and collage artist. If you want some company as you attune to what is stirring within you, Kirsten is available to meet for deep listening, online and in-person on Vashon Island.

What Strength It Takes To Bear A Slow Untangling

Kirsten Harrison — Sun, 22 Feb 2026 01:48:01 +0000

Help me be strong, help me be, help me

I wake up with lyrics on my lips from the distant past. Attention gathers at a cellular level, and there is an impulse to press play on a dusty mixtape.

I do not brace against outgrown words. Every cell in my body is grateful.

An image coalesces…

I am a delicate gold necklace, tangled and unintentionally tied into a knot. I keep trying to die to myself, but the context is all wrong. Something, someone, is untangling me with the fiercest tenderness, slowly loosening constriction. In this spaciousness, I am undefended.

What strength it takes to bear slow untangling.

I walk in the shoes of others’ wisdom—lyrics my heart recognizes, but cannot presently find words for. One song at a time, circulation is being restored.

I drink deeply when this tap is turned on. Attention is different here. Truth slips past defenses. I have a front row seat to inner contradictions and to something else. I sing myself home, over and over again—on walks, on short and long drives, in between Zoom calls, while I do the dishes.

Attention crescendos. Light shines on a few words from a new angle.

Words I have sung hundreds of times ripen and fall from the tree, a subtle synaptic restoration. According to the clock, these moments are inconsequential. In every other way, they are voluminous.

If we require a definition, let us call it knowing: a knowing that is personal, experiential, and tending toward union with that which is known.
-Father Bruno Barnhart on Wisdom

Questions to Ponder…

If time is not linear, is who we are presently singing to ourselves in another dimension?

Are we all perpetually singing in the round?

What songs called to you before you understood the resonance?

Are there brief clock moments that seem incredibly spacious? As you tune into your sense of time, is there a felt sense that wishes to come into expression? What do you know?

My name is Kirsten. I practice spiritual direction online and in person on Vashon Island.

I love the way Rob Bell describes the type of space I hold for others, “A spiritual director is trained to ask you the questions—to help you enter into whatever it is more fully, so that you can begin to discern what Spirit is up to in even this. This chaos, this turmoil, this joy. This challenge. This obstacle. This dark night of the soul.”

If you find resonance here, you can read more about my accompaniment offerings here.

Can’t go under it. Can’t go over it. We’ve got to go through it.

Kirsten Harrison — Thu, 12 Feb 2026 03:15:44 +0000

Holding the Tension of Opposites

Every single tender shoot of my soul’s emergence has been preceded by a merciful scambling. Tectonic rumbling magnetizes something irreconcilable, and neural circuits are not quite ready to bear it. The tension of opposites comes calling again.

Death is the only choice, but there is more than one way to die.¹

What does holding the tension of unreconcilable opposites generate in the heart?

The heart’s fear of being open is not fanciful: holding powerful tensions over time can be, and often is, a heartbreaking experience, but there are at least two ways to understand what it means to have our hearts broken. One is to imagine the heart broken into shards and scattered about — a feeling most of us know, and a fate we would like to avoid. The other is to imagine the heart broken open into new capacity — a process that is not without pain — but one that many of us would welcome. As I stand in the tragic gap between reality and possibility, this small, tight fist of a thing called my heart can break open into greater capacity to hold more of my own and the world’s suffering and joy, despair and hope…(Keep reading in the footnotes!²)
Parker A Palmer in A Hidden Wholeness: The Journey Toward An Undivided Life

A Transmission, A Motion, A Practice

Dr. James Finley tells two poignant stories in this video that evoke the felt experience of the holding paradox—an extraordinarily familiar neural overload and the faint felt outline of something else.

The whole video is gold; I have bookmarked the stories. The teaching that follows gives words to inner experiences. See if you enter first through a felt sense rather than headfirst.

A Note About Content:

These are not easy stories. They touch primarily on two clinical settings, an impatient alcohol treatment facility and working with a client whose wounded spouse was dehumanizing her. Dr. Finley is exceedingly gentle. It is not easy to find places to where these things are talked about with such care and beauty.

My heart is magnetized to keep returning to the felt sense of these paradoxes, and so I do, over and over. In twenty-minute increments of silence, I climb into dissonance and breathe with it.

In this moment, she is completely vulnerable, and in this vulnerability, she is invincible in the world.
In this moment, she is childlike, and in being childlike, she’s manifesting the essence of maturity.
In this moment, she’s alone unto herself, and in this aloneness, she bears witness to the mystery that we’re all alone together.
In this moment, she knows nothing, and in knowing nothing, she manifests the essence of true wisdom in the world.
In this moment, she is dying, and in her death, someone is being born.

We’re Going On A Bear Hunt

In the heart of this season of paradoxical prayer, words from a children’s story come calling.

Questions for Opening

Tune into the whole of you. Where is bracing’s ground zero?
What is it like to spread bracing out, to let it be shared?
As you breathe, see if something in you wishes to smile upon bracing.
If there’s a loving wind at your back, perhaps a smile will form. If not, you are welcome to carry the wish.
Tune in to the spaces between toes, to earlobes, and to your solar plexus…to the sound of rain, the memory of golden hour light on the trees, the spaces between thoughts.
Is there a single square inch of softness? Where is its epicenter?
What is it like when softening wraps its arms around bracing just to be with it?
What is it like inside, in your real life, the instant gotta go through itdawns?

This version is too cute not to share…

Footnotes:

1 There is no wrong choice. The soul is patient. The Ocean, persistent. If I miss this wave, there will be another. And another. And another.

2 Name anyone who is famous for a personal devotion to truth and justice, love and forgiveness. I cannot think of a person fitting that description who has not spent a lifetime in the tragic gap, torn between the world’s reality and a vision of human possibility. That, in brief, is the story of the Dalai Lama, Aung San Suu Kyi, Nelson Mandela, Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks, and Thich Nhat Hanh, to name a few. Hearts like theirs have been broken open to a largeness that holds the possibility of a better future for us all.

E.F. Schumacher painted the picture well: ‘Through all our lives we are faced with the task of reconciling opposites which, in logical thought, cannot be reconciled…Countless mothers and teachers, in fact, do it, but no one can write down a solution. They do it by bringing into the situation a force that belongs to a higher level where opposites are transcended—the power of love.

Parents often find themselves standing in the tragic gap between their hopes for a child and what is happening in that child’s life. If the parents fail to hold that tension, they will go one way or the other, clinging to an idealized fantasy of who “their baby” is or rejecting this “thorn in their side” with bitter cynicism. Both ways of responding are death-dealing for all concerned. But many parents will testify that by standing in the tragic gap and holding the tension, they not only serve their children well; they themselves become more open, more knowing, more compassionate.

-Parker A. Palmer, A Hidden Wholeness: The Journey Toward An Undivided Life

My name is Kirsten. I write, collage, and practice spiritual direction in Vashon, WA. Describing what spiritual direction is feels like trying to “catch a cloud and pin it down.” Here's what's freshly alive in me: Spiritual direction is spacious accompaniment. Together we attune to the deep and the timeless. We hold questions no one else can answer for you and listen deeply to what arises. We open to what you sense and ground intuitions in rhythms and practices that anchor you as you live into what is emerging. We notice what is—obscurity, pain, fear, longing, wonder, delight, hope—and invite it into the home within you where true belonging and wisdom are always, already present.

Visible Contradictions + Knowing How To Know

Kirsten Harrison — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 15:06:29 +0000

It’s sometimes in the most unusual places that you actually discover the gift of the Beautiful. I always think that contradiction is what makes a person interesting. -John O’Donohue

The Maps, Lenses, & Mirrors Series

Years ago, I stumbled upon Eugene Peterson’s words. Peterson spoke in his unique voice and context, but I recognized them as a Truth already alive inside of me…

…each soul is unique: no wisdom can simply be applied without discerning the particulars of this life, this situation.

We have access to endless streams of information. We carry it around in our pockets, summon it with a question; machines fetch, collate, and serve it to us.

Wisdom is so close in every moment — there are sacred texts and traditions and lights left on for us by others. Our bodies bear Wisdom’s imprint and speak its language gesturally. It is visible in nature, alive and flowing in the spaces between us.

There is no singular piece of knowledge, no living teacher that can impart wisdom that will exempt us from discerning the particulars of our unique existence.

No other human has traversed the precise set of circumstances before you now—constellations of nuance, nature, relatedness, potential consequences, and the flesh that will bear those consequences. The process of wrestling that ushers in Truth also grounds what is known in a non-transferable robustness.

The Maps, Lenses, and Mirrors Series is a collage of conversations, music, voice memos, visual art, and words exploring how to know.

There is a deep and pristinely clear "something" in each one of us, regardless of the outer circumstances of our lives, that has the capacity to recognize Wisdom when we meet it, and it is the nature of Wisdom teaching to call this 'something' forth. But until the spark of recognition actually goes off in us, Wisdom remains invisible.

-Cynthia Bourgeault

An Invitation

If there is resonance here for you in this series, or you want to dip in from time to time, consider entering in consciously, with a WISH.

When we earnestly seek, we will find—but not directly or finally. These words from the Gospel of Thomas ring true over and over…

If you are searching, you must not stop until you find. When you find, however, you will become troubled. Your confusion will give way to wonder. In wonder you will reign over all things.
Your sovereignty will be your rest.

Video Artifact #1

Earlier this year, a friend asked if we could start recording our conversations. Each time we talk, there is a lingering wish for an artifact. These dialogues make space for something new to emerge, in us and between us. We have pulled snippets from my end of the dialogue to include in this series of posts.

Though these videos have a real-life, non-polished quality, and I don’t get the words just right, something inside says they are worth sharing. For accuracy’s sake, there are notes below to contextualize and clarify.

Watch the video on Kirsten’s Faint Outlines YouTube Channel

Seeing Ourselves Clearly

A granular reflection of our particular blind spots can be hard to find. And when we do find it, what is reflected can be hard to bear. This conversation with Carin is a present-moment excavation of what her question stirred and the context that’s guiding me as I come face-to-face with the generative friction of my inner contradictions.

Context does not change the realities we find ourselves in, but it does change how we orient to those realities.

We do not develop into a full expression of our nature through ease and good fortune. The dynamic aspects of the birth chart—the part of our fate that seems the most harrowing—provide the agitation required to bring the soul into full flowering.

"Wholeness is born of the acceptance of the conflict of the human and the Divine in the individual psyche."
-Helen Luke

Developing A Soul

I have heard it said that the soul is a seed. For this seed to take root and flourish into full expression, it must be developed.5

Astrology is a vital element in my soul-developing work. Most relevant to this dialogue, as a mirror for seeing and deepening interior fluency, bringing what is unconscious above ground, where new possibilities for conscious choice (sometimes) become perceptible.

A horoscope shows the precise location of planetary bodies at the moment of one’s first breath. This snapshot bears within it the qualities of time and space present as Spirit enters form, teeming with latent possibilities, predilections, and precarities.

This portrait of the sky represents twelve Zodiacal Signs and twelve slices of celestial pie, each corresponding to a domain of life experience.

In the video, I speak of the friction and flow between the planets. An “opposition” is when two planets are 180 degrees away from each other, on opposite sides of the circle; it is a polarity.

In my horoscope, the Sun is in Gemini in the 11th House, and Neptune is in Sagittarius in the 5th House…

Do not let unfamiliar symbols overwhelm! Notice the dark red lines for a moment. These are oppositions—contradictions that make up part of my nature.

To Be Clear

When I speak about Neptune, what I am really excavating is how the Neptune-Sun polarity operates within me. My words are a bit confusing—the planets themselves do not “like” anything.

If you are an astrologer, you will recognize that Sun-Neptune is one small piece of the overall friction, flow, and dynamism at play. I recognize this, too. I am learning to live my chart from the inside, and do not yet have expert fluency in articulating this.
Though I mistakenly reversed the order of this question, it is potent, nonetheless. Here it is, as it is written7…

How do you tell the difference between ‘the invincible certainty of your heart’ and neurotic self-delusion?
-Cynthia Bougeault

The Lyrical Nature of Our Own Belonging

Let us ground this entire conversation in the context of Beauty, by contemplating the poetic wisdom of John O’Donohue…

It’s sometimes in the most unusual places that you actually discover the gift of the Beautiful. I always think that contradiction is what makes a person interesting.
If we decide that contradiction is undesirable and has to be either hammered out or rooted out, or flattened, then it will do immense damage to the mystery of our own inner landscape.
Under the pressure of not contradicting oneself, and not being in contradiction with oneself, one runs the terrible risk of severing and dividing different sacred dimensions of your interiority from each other, and ends up creating a schizoid interiority. In other words, dualism is a consequence of our fear of contradiction. That also means that dualism is the force that most severely damages the seamlessness and lyrical nature of our own belonging.
People feel under pressure to choose one side or the other side of their own contradictory nature. And that choice always means loss, because you lose the side, you lose a part of yourself that is very necessary to your being and to your identity and to your future, indeed.

Why It Matters

I will not presume to understand fully. For now, I’ll leave you with a song, a quote, and an image in words that this inquiry stirs in me…

How we relate to the inner world will be how we relate to the outer. If we can appreciate and have compassion for our parts, even the ones we’ve considered to be enemies, we can do the same for people who resemble them. On the other hand, if we disdain our parts, we’ll do the same with anyone who reminds us of them.
-Dr. Richard Schwartz

Orienting to Soul-Developing Work On Planet Earth In January 2026

This episode of the On Being Podcast echoes in my heart years after its airing. Let’s carry this image together…

I’ve had an image in my mind for the last period of time that the world is a baby in our hands, and the baby is running a fever. And if I were holding a baby, my baby, in my arms, and the baby were running a fever, I would feel two things that don’t always come together that I think we need to bring together. One is such a sense of tenderness and love and open-heartedness, and also a sense of such ferocity and willingness to fight and do whatever I need to do to get this baby well.
-Rabbi Ariel Burger

Songs for Opening

“Ask With Your Body” by Epiphany Today on bandcamp

“May I Be Empty” by Batya Levine on bandcamp

Resources + Notes

This is the class I reference with Dr. Richard Tarnas (Cosmos & Psyche) and Dr. Becca Tarnas. I learned last January (in this video) that the elder Tarnas and Bruno Barnhart were friends, which is delightful to me. I will share Bruno with you in Part Two. (Also, I refer to him as Rick at one point, and I don’t think this is correct!)
Here are some of Thomas Hübl’s words about relating. If this short clip draws you, follow it back to its source. Another excellent starting place is his book Attuned: Practicing Interdependence to Heal Our Trauma—and Our World.

This On Being episode is a moving introduction to Eugene Peterson.
Eugene emphasized the potency of presence in the discernment process. Here is the full quote from Working The Angles as he spoke from his context as a pastor and a pastor to pastors…

(1) God is always doing something: an active grace is shaping this life into a mature salvation; (2) responding to God is not sheer guesswork: the Christian community has acquired wisdom through the centuries that provides guidance; (3) each soul is unique: no wisdom can simply be applied without discerning the particulars of this life, this situation.

Here’s how one of his students described the potency of this “with-ness”…

Eugene’s faithful presence and insistence to wait with me before God brought about deliverance that only comes when one really moves into the neighborhood of one’s soul and decides to stay, to love and care.
From A Burning in My Bones, Winn Collier’s biography of Eugene Peterson

My conversation partner is Carin Huebner
I have been contemplating this blog post, where Cynthia refers to Gurdjieff’s teachings on developing a soul. Here is the first paragraph…

According to Gurdjieff, the mysterious “X-factor” that enters in the moment of conception is not yet soul but essence. Think of it as the hand of cards you’re dealt at the start of a card game. It comprises a set of unique characteristics including race, gender (and most likely gender orientation), basic body type and other genetic factors, influences emerging from more distant ancestry and bloodline—and yes, that unquantifiable legacy “from the stars”—all combined primarily according to what Teilhard would call “tatonnement” (“trial and error”): evolution’s predilection for trying out any and all possibilities. Cumulatively, all of the above will combine to confer on you what is commonly known as your “nature.”

A Book List

Here’s a link to my storefront on Bookshop.org. Any book you buy from this site supports small, local bookstores and my work, and there are lists with some of my favorites.

The links below will take you to Amazon, which gives me a small commission.

Eugene Peterson, Working the Angles

Winn Collier, A Burning in My Bones

Thomas Hübl, Attuned: Practicing Interdependence to Heal Our Trauma—and Our World

Cynthia Bourgeault, Love is Stronger Than Death

John O’Donohue, The Inner Landscape

Dr. Richard Schwartz, No Bad Parts

About the Author

Re-Member Yourself: A Note From Kirsten + A Poem About Holding Obscurity

Kirsten Harrison — Fri, 23 Jan 2026 17:00:10 +0000

Returning to Presence

We are here. Here we are.

Sometimes I forget to look up, to breathe consciously, to open to the life on the inside and the outside. I’ve been setting three alarms a day to pause and come back to my wish to act from what is most awake within me.

I look into the eyes of my son’s dog, gaze into my own eyes in the mirror, or imaginatively picture the eyes of a loved one looking at me — someone presently living on Earth or one still alive in my heart (like my friend Ryan, sitting on a log in the photo above).

There is a new poem below. Breathe with it, if you want to.

Listen for a word or phrase that draws your attention. Tuck it into your pocket or transcribe it in a journal. Let it unfold.

May you be warm and well,
Kirsten

Drench Yourself Anew

When obscurity rises, and
you cannot see where to step next,
your gaze turns ever-so-slightly outward.
Oh, how humbling it is to be human!

You tucked a wish
into the time beyond time; now
the entire surface of your
magnetic heart
is covered in paperclips.

You left breadcrumbs methodically,
vowing never to get lost again.
Can you decipher love notes
written in your own hand?

Nothing can fall out of Love.
What you fear is lost
still hovers nearby,
waiting for an opening.

Do not strain toward clarity
in this top-heavy state.
You will be carried...
past delineation, over deliberation,
into the knowing beyond knowing.

LISTEN TO THE MUSIC!
RETURN.
RE-MEMBER YOURSELF.

Let the ancient, the emergent,
permeate your porous frame.
Every moment is teeming with help;
drench yourself anew.

PRESENCE + SPACE | WITNESS + WITH-NESS

My name is Kirsten. Come and journey with me in spacious accompaniment/spiritual direction. It is a place to attune to your inner experiences over time, a place to ask questions and excavate intuitions in the spacious presence of a fellow traveler. I meet clients online and in person on Vashon-Maury Island in WA.

What My Soul Already Knows: A Simple Poetry Practice for a Dark Night of the Soul

Kirsten Harrison — Thu, 01 Jan 2026 20:47:00 +0000

Anchoring Into Deep Knowing

In the thick of a relational conflict years ago, I could not understand what my body was bracing against. Though I had no experience with poetry, I found my way into a surprisingly nourishing practice. Guided by a simple template called a “French Pantoum,” I remembered myself.

Attuning to my inner experience of the conflict helped me access things I already knew but could not reach directly amid the stress and my nervous system’s survival strategies.

It was powerful to name what I knew deep inside. Writing this poem was grounding—a way back to the wisdom that is already, always within me.

I’ve adapted that template as a Scaffold for Obscurity.

Writing a Pantoum for Obscurity

Here’s a practice that may help you slip below rational thinking and pro-con lists into intuition and wisdom. I hope this practice is as grounding for you as it has been for me.

Step-By-Step Instructions:

STANZA 1

Line 1: What it’s like when I’m connected and feeling alive (Try and tune into the good here)

Line 2: The inner experience of the hard thing I’m holding

Line 3: A song lyric that resonates with me

Line 4: Words of wisdom I would say to my younger self, or words of wisdom from a loved one that stick with me

STANZA 2

Line 5: (repeat of line 2 in stanza 1) The inner experience of the hard thing I’m holding

Line 6: (new line): My felt sense of what is hard right now (can be an image or a somatic sensation)

Line 7: (repeat of line 4 in stanza 1) Words of wisdom I would say to my younger self, or words of wisdom from a loved one that stick with me

Line 8: (new line): What I wish to feel or experience

STANZA 3

Line 9: (repeat line 6 of stanza 2) My felt sense of what is hard right now (can be an image or a somatic sensation)

Line 10: (repeat line 3 of the first stanza) A song lyric that resonates with me

Line 11: (repeat line 8 of stanza 2) What I wish to feel or experience

Line 12: (repeat line 1 of the first stanza) What it’s like when I’m connected and feeling alive

Here’s an example:

I can see the past, present, and future with a vast spaciousness.
I am so very tired of bracing.
Can I see I’m not my mistakes? Will I learn to let them go?
Life is hard, and that doesn’t mean you are doing it wrong.

I am so very tired of bracing.
I can’t seem to get a deep breath.
Life is hard, and that doesn’t mean you are doing it wrong.
I want to remember.

I can’t seem to get a deep breath.
Can I see I’m not my mistakes? Will I learn to let them go?
I want to remember.
I can see the past, present, and future with a vast spaciousness.

An example of a different pantoum (not quite the same as the format above).

I release the breath I’ve been holding, and my body softens into the moment.
I’m terrified, and I’m not totally sure why.
I see you, and I’m not going anywhere.
There’s a calming and a quickening. I am reminded that the way is made by walking.

I’m terrified, and I’m not totally sure why.
You are safe. You are loved. You are wise.
There’s a calming and a quickening. I am reminded that the way is made by walking.
I start feeling like myself again.

You are safe. You are loved. You are wise.
I see you, and I’m not going anywhere.
I start feeling like myself again.
I release the breath I’ve been holding, and my body softens into the moment.

If you want to share your poem with me, I’d love to read it!
You can listen to this podcast episode to hear more about the French Pantoum as a Scaffold for Lament with Tara Owens (one of my spiritual direction teachers), recorded at the very beginning of the pandemic. Her template is available in the show notes.

PRESENCE + SPACE | WITNESS + WITH-NESS

Another way to support this work at no cost is to share it with a friend, post on social media, link it to your blog or website, or share it in your email newsletter. Thank you!

PRESENCE + SPACE | WITNESS + WITH-NESS

Something Else: A Spiritual Director on Holding Obscurity & Disorientation

Kirsten Harrison — Fri, 26 Dec 2025 17:56:15 +0000

Breadcrumbs Abound

If you are in the thick of obscurity, holding inner tensions that cannot be resolved, or feeling disconnected from your deepest knowing. If you are disoriented as the sands of time flow through the hourglass at a dizzying pace and there is no rest in sight, please open to this possibility with me: a taste of something else may also be very nearby.

Precisely what?
Precisely how?

No one can say for sure, but breadcrumbs abound…

Resonance & Recognition

Something else may beckon through a felt sense of recognition, a resonance that “makes no sense” or hasn’t before been consciously considered.
💡 An idea
🖼️ An image
🎶 A song
🎬 A movie
📰 A blog post
😴 A dream
Anything, really!
Something else may encircle what has been deemed unworthy, illuminating a possibility just now, just here…in the presence of something else.
Something else may not conform to time as you have previously known it. One literal instant with something else may seem like hours or even days on the inside.
Something else cannot be explained. If you try to pin its wings down, it will evaporate, but something else can be sensed in your presence. Knowing this may save you time and energy.
Something else may be difficult to contain. This is normal. Nervous systems can be strengthened to bear what has not before been bearable…inner experiences that register as “so good” and the ones that seem “so hard.”
Something else cannot be possessed. Savor every last drop. That feeling you are left with is GOLD. You can work with it consciously…
✨Write a poem, paint, or collage…whatever your current art form is, or try a brand-new-to-you medium.
✨Record a voice memo to remind yourself what you know in the presence of something else. Or send a voice memo to a friend.
✨Call to mind someone who is carrying a particularly fresh heartache or traversing a dense forest of uncertainty. Hold them and the feeling of something else together.
✨Take that GOLD with you on errands! How do others appear when you are fresh from something else? Your presence may transmit the glow of something else without saying a word…or maybe saying a word is exactly what you’ll intuit. There are no rules.
✨What else would you add to this list?

Staying Present in the Absence

If you tasted something else, and now there is only absence, I am sorry. Please, please, please do not doubt yourself OR something else. I will make this wager: your encounter with something else was not an illusion.

Part of something else’s elusive, allusive beauty is improvisational genius. A great shape-shifter, something else keeps things fresh. Absence may be as powerful as presence. Both may call forth great art.

With all of this context in mind, there are ways to open to a direct encounter with something else.

Orienting To A Way Of Being: Expectancy Without Expectations

🫧 Sink into a present moment experience with a memory of something else. What does it feel like/taste like/smell like/look like when it arrives? Get really granular!! How do you recognize something else?

🫧 Start the day with a WISH to remember. Spend one conscious moment asking. Open your Notes app/Notion/journal/etc. Tell something else you are opening, and you wish to see/hear/taste/smell/feel/sense/know, and then move on with your day.

🫧 Give yourself to rhythms and practices. There is no singular right way. You might start by giving your full attention to a song that moves you. Breathe with it. Feel it. Sense it. Let it surprise you.

Dear Something Else…

🫧 Honest words like these are beautiful, too…
Please, dear something else. I am lost. I am afraid. It feels like I am going under. Will you remind me of the things I know, but can’t remember?

The Inner Landscape: John O’Donohue on Suffering & Complexity

John O’Donohue is a soul friend over space and time. His words are portals to the immediacy of presence. John died unexpectedly in 2008, but the wisdom he transmitted is alive. I experience it most profoundly in his audiobooks and lectures.

The Inner Landscape is a two-chapter audio lecture John delivered on suffering, produced by Sounds True. I return to it again and again, especially when heartache and pain are most acute. Here is a description from the website:

Our bodies are mere outlines of a vast and complex interior world, a landscape of contradiction and immense mystery. This Celtic view of the human condition predates Christianity yet survives to this day as part of Ireland's unique spiritual tradition. In The Inner Landscape, poet and Catholic scholar John O'Donohue explores the themes of self-exile and hardship and the Celtic way of welcoming paradox and finding precious light in the darkest valleys of our inner terrain.
Instead of fearing the contradictions of the outer world, O'Donohue begins, the Celtic people welcomed them. They developed special blessings for times of suffering in the belief that hardship leads to a special insight or gift of the spirit. When you learn the Celtic "secret of equilibrium" - how to see every difficulty as a threshold of possibility - you renew your life with unending possibilities. Despite our vast technologies, O'Donohue says, our real knowledge is minimal. Only within "the inner landscape" with which we are each blessed can true knowing take place.

It is also available on Audible.

This blog post is drawn from the Soulspace Newsletter. If there’s resonance and you’d like to receive missives like this in your email inbox, please sign up at the bottom of this page.

What Are You Nourishing?

Kirsten Harrison — Wed, 24 Dec 2025 02:09:13 +0000

This summer, I spent four hours every weekend watering trees. This hose wrangling made space for a different kind of attention. There are vivid memories of standing under a plum tree, listening to Rumi.

When I wasn’t sure how to be present to suffering, I sang songs about hope and light that shines in darkness, trusting these vocal vibrations would carry over land and sea to nourish parched hearts. I know what it’s like to be on the receiving end of a sudden infusion of something new…to be mysteriously carried beyond my capacity.

There is a visual memory…

Water meant to flow into the hose is dripping from the spigot, seeping into the ground underneath it.

This well-irrigated little patch of Earth is incredibly fertile, but has not been cultivated with intention.

I have been watering weeds!

Now that I see this, a new possibility is emerging. Maybe I will work with this “leak” consciously.

The next few days are ripe for glancing at what we notice with the utmost tenderness — noticing where precious energy is nourishing weeds. Is there another possibility?

In this video podcast, Dr. James Finley tells Pete Holmes a story about a nun with anxiety who sought therapy with him to help her stop smoking. She felt so guilty about doing this and went to great lengths to hide it. She wanted to stop, but felt powerless to do so. His response to her is utterly disarming…

“Well, it would be good if you wouldn’t smoke, because it’s not good for your health, but I have another suggestion. Next time you are leaning toward the window, take a very deep drag and blow it out the window as incense to the Divine Mercy that is infinitely in love with you as yousmoke your cigarette, and the smoke will go better.”

“We know that we are compromising our wholeness, and we can’t stop.”

-Dr. James Finley

Finley’s words are precious and totally worth listening to in full. They invite a way to orient to what we notice…

Active waiting isn’t indifference or passivity (e.g., I’ll just keep doing it, I don’t care…), but you wait in a willingness to do it. When the grace is given to you to do it, you’ll do it…and it’s not there yet. And in the fact that it’s not there yet…

I can learn not to do violence to the fragility of my waiting.

Whatever this week holds, let us remember…

“When you go inwards with gentleness, even though the journey may be precarious, you will still in no way be going into isolation. Rather, you will be coming into deeper kinship with everything that is. The mystery of the unity of the world and of the Universe, and of the Earth is that the closer you journey to your own source, the more you come into rhythm and harmony with everything that is actually there.” - John O’Donohue

With you and for you,
Kirsten

Primal Fear & Primal Trust

This quote crossed my path recently and has been relevant and timely in several conversations. I will share it, in case it sparks something in you, too…

“In a talk hosted in 1972, ‘Primal Fear and Primal Trust,’ Gebser considers this inquiry of origin (‘Where do I come from?,’ ‘Who am I?,’ and ‘Whither do I go?’) as a singularly important set of questions concerning the integral human being.
So long as we do not find an answer to those questions, primal fear reigns. From it springs, to the degree that we become aware of those questions, the diverse creaturely, psychic, and intellectual anxieties. It is also, in the last analysis, the trigger for aggression and depression... which can lead to the destruction of others or of oneself. Only (s)he who finds an answer to these questions awakens primal trust and thus is freed from primal fear.
What is most incomprehensible is that in this case, he will have overcome the primal fear forever and is therefore not threatened by any relapse into it."
Seeing Through the World - Jean Gebser and Integral Consciousness by Jeremy Johnson (this is an Amazon link)

This post is drawn from a recent Soulspace Newsletter. If you enjoyed it and wish to sign up to receive these missives by email, you can sign up below.

My loves, drink these words.

Kirsten Harrison — Sat, 25 Oct 2025 22:03:45 +0000

“Anything that’s human is mentionable, and anything that is mentionable can be more manageable.”

-Fred Rogers

Let us prepare for the unthinkable, speak of the unmentionable...

How does a mother ready her children for an unspeakable horror?

Though it was nearly impossible to bear, words flowed, and with them…

Grave recognition.
Exquisite tenderness.
Guttural anguish.
Poignant gratitude.
Tears.

I cannot protect them. But, this…this, I can do. This I will do…

With all that I am and all that I have, I will deposit love into a time-release capsule. I will top off each glass with the living water of presence. 1

There will be an icon-making party.

Every guest gets a paintbrush to dip into their life force — its colors and flavors, fragrances and melodies, textures and dreams.

We’ll spread out photos on every surface to recall still-living artifacts of memory. We will laugh so hard that we cry. I will wheeze and slap my knee, just like my dad.

We’ll talk about finding our way, making it through what we thought would be the death of us, and how we wouldn’t give any of it back if we could. We will lament how quickly time passes, whisper regrets, and dare to speak of what our hearts really want. We will pass out tissues and swallow lumps in our throats. There will be reverent witness and lots of hugs.

At the end of the night, I will stand firm on shaky legs and say what I must.

I will look into their eyes and take my time getting the words out. My voice will crack, but they will see that I really believe this will work.

Maybe, just maybe, they can believe it, too.

My loves, drink these words.
Bind them around your neck.
Write them on the tablet of your heart.

LETTER #1 | For Homesickness & Hunger

It’s a collage, cause that’s how I roll.

The ache of not knowing if
you’ll ever be home again is overtaking you.
A sob is rising that you cannot dare
let slip through your lips.

It’s true, you cannot come home now,
but for a moment,
let home come to you.

There’s a new welcome mat at the front door
that says: “So happy you’re here.”
What it is like as you reach for the door and
sense the warmth of
every good thing that has ever been home to you
right there on the other side?

Set any lingering heartache
still connected to home down
right here, next to the keys.
There is no risk of losing what you
aren’t ready to let go of.

Here, on the underside of time,
minutes melt into
whatever depth of time you need to
come alive again.

LISTEN.

There is a song in the air. “On The Nature of Daylight” is always my go to.

Richter makes an audacious choice.
He tunes these players
to the key of respite
instead of rescue.

There’s a moment near the end where
the tiniest violin pierces the darkness, and
I catch a glimpse of hope.

There is sweat on hope’s brow as he
bears a weight that
no one is sure
won’t crush him,
but when he looks my way,
there is still a twinkle in his eye.

The sensation of
TOTAL CELLULAR UNITY
flows through me.

Your turn! Which song did you put in the queue?

There is time to clean up
and privacy to take care of
what should never have to be public.
The shower is clean, the toilet paper restocked. I
just pulled the towels out of the dryer.
Take all the time you need.

There’s a t-shirt in the closet from a show
that changed your life.
What was the name of the band again?
If you close your eyes, can you go back there?

The Band Joseph at The Moore Theatre

When you are ready for company,
summon your people one by one.
Stretch out your arms and
feel them reach for you.
Hug for at least one minute.
Breathe together.
There will be an instant between
the anticipation and the softening.

Tune into this moment.

Come look out the window.

Tell me...
What is the furthest thing you see.
What is the closest?

You may now request your favorite meal! The sky’s the limit, so don’t be shy.

I’ll go first, so you know I really mean it.
Here’s what’s being served in
my memory’s kitchen today...

-Brown butter mashed potatoes
-Roasted, carmelized brussel sprouts with rosemary, sprinkled with toasted pepitas and parmesan cheese
-A sparkling raspberry mocktail like Mallory made at Thanksgiving last year, crafted with love and attention - they look as delicious as they taste
-Sam's banana pudding ice cream with hot fudge

Since there are no limits, I’ll have a double-double, animal-style, too.
What’s on your menu?

Tell me every mouthwatering detail.

There will be a moment when you realize you cannot stay here. A moment when the ache for home rises.

No other human can take away the reality of your hunger, this ache, or the vibrancy of your aliveness. That will not stop them from trying.

All of this is yours to carry in the secret place.

Hold on, my loves.

Mom

Strong Winds Pose No Threat, A Dimensionally-Layered Practice

Kirsten Harrison — Mon, 15 Sep 2025 20:31:20 +0000

Seemingly vulnerable to demolitions accidental and intentional, never weary of bringing together what has been separate, trustworthy in ways you know, but will never be able to explain...

A Serving Suggestion

I have been playing the song below, “Mercy,” on a Bluetooth speaker or TV while gazing at the collage, and listening to the audio reading of the poem on my computer or phone. The layering of the three together adds dimensionality to all three.

Links to “Mercy” on Spotify and YouTube:

Poem + Audio Reading by Kirsten

Is there anything new on the road oft traveled?

Vibrant beauty that once
took away breath
is a backdrop now; you search for
novel sacraments.

Today, though, the sun shines through
effervescent raindrops
on spun silk.

Recognition is lightning
in every cell.
You see for the first time
what you have always known.

This mystery will bear your weight.

The Ocean is In Us, Too: A Spacious Dialogue About Living, Creating, and Becoming

Kirsten Harrison — Thu, 21 Aug 2025 21:57:48 +0000

Unscripted, intuitive, and soul-deep.

There’s a certain kind of magic that happens when we drop into the flow of relating, present to the “unclear edge” of what is sensed, but needs space to find verbal expression.

This conversation with Carin Huebner has been singing in me for weeks.

Though we draw water from different streams and use different words to speak of our experiences, what flows between us springs from a common Source. The flow between is what sings most vividly.

We are becoming together.

Our dialogue recalls to memory John O’Donohue’s words. He says good conversations are like “food and drink for the soul,” and asks…

When was the last time you had a great conversation?

…A conversation in which you overheard yourself saying things that you never knew you knew.
…A conversation in which you heard yourself receiving from somebody words that absolutely found places within you that you’d thought you’d lost.
…A conversation that brought the two of you onto a different plane.
…A conversation that continued to sing in your mind for weeks afterward.”

In this conversation, we explore...

Practice, Presence & How Showing Up Matters

What if showing up—especially when nothing feels profound—is the work? We talk about how moments of synchronicity redirect us toward trust, even when clarity is missing, and how spiritual practice plugs us into more than we understand.

The Greenhouse & The Art of Letting Go

Carin walks us through a tangled morning in the greenhouse, where romaine grew wildly and needed to be pulled to save the peppers. What do we do when abundance threatens what is essential? Tender noticings related to sacrifice, grief, and being reminded of what we already know logically, but cannot access.

Chaos, Quantum Connection & Finding a Still Center

Thomas Keating once wrote, “Chaos is our home.” What if silence and stillness aren’t the absence of chaos, but ways to move through it? Carin recalls a children’s book that continually guides her — stillness, like the surface of a pond, makes it possible to see and to sense our connection with the wider field of consciousness.

Leaving Home, Remembering Self, and Quietly Returning

A tender excavation of what it’s like when our nervous systems protect us from doing what we wish to do. Inhabiting our “us-ness” and the possibility of self-witnessing in real time. Can we bless ourselves as we leave and welcome ourselves home when it’s time?

Artifacts of Presence & Creativity as Collective Flow

If we are each a drop of the ocean, the ocean is in us, too. We talk about artmaking, bottling up aliveness, and constellations of creation: you never know who your light will beckon. Maybe even you.

A Note of Clarification from Kirsten:

Early in the video, I use the word obedience, and some of you may be understandably disturbed by this choice. Once a word with negative connotations for me, Cynthia Bourgeault reversed the direction of energy in it with this clarification in her book Eye of the Heart…

We now turn to the question of obedience. To our modern ears, the term seems to suggest knuckling under to an external authority, but the Latin word - ob audire - actually means “to listen deeply’” or ‘”to listen from the depths,” “with the ear of the heart” as St. Benedict puts it. And yes, that listening is, in itself, also a doing, a submission to what the heart has heard.

Who or what are we “obeying”? That which is lower in us bows to that which is higher. Maurice Nicoll deepened my appreciation for the virtue with a new twist in his book The New Man…

The power that man may gain over himself, in the sense of making all that is in him, all his different desires, different momentary wills, different thoughts, moods, etc., obey “something” in him, owing to the fact that this “something” in him is of such a nature that it deprives all these different things of any power to affect him. The Greek words for faith, pistis, is from the verb “patho,” which means to persuade or make, to obey.
What in a man will make all sides of himself obey him? What persuasion in his mind will bring him into a position where everything in him will yield its power to him?

So, if you can bear the dissonance, please hold space for the reclamation of the word “obedience” as a movement toward sovereignty and wisdom that arises from what is deepest and truest within you.

About Creative Sessions

Creative Sessions is an ongoing conversation between two artists and seekers—Carin Huebner and Kirsten Harrison—exploring the sacred, strange, and often contradictory terrain of being human and making art in this moment.

Maybe you’ll find resonance with these words and images; perhaps you are holding similar questions. Maybe the words, images, and questions you carry are different. It is our wish to offer spacious openings for deep listening.

Kirsten Harrison holds deep space for the sacred within daily life as a spiritual director, collage artist, and writer. Her offerings of spacious accompaniment and generous soul hospitality have a unique flavor that is shaped, in part, by neurodivergence, dancing with uncertainty, and a wish to continually soften into healing and becoming in service to the whole.

Carin Huebner lives at the intersection of existential curiosity and practical creativity as an artist, creative coach, and founder of SPACEBUG—a creative wisdom studio that supports artists and weirdos in rewilding their practice.

Show Notes

Be Still, Life by Ohara Hale

“Starting from the premise that everything is alive—a feeling that is deep and immediate for many children—Be Still, Life draws the reader into a still place where everything is moving. Thought-provoking in its depiction of the relationship between stillness and motion, this is certain to engage children, slowing them down through sheer fascination and delight.”

“The Beauty of Chaos”

“We try so hard to put order into our lives and into the cosmos. There is none. Instead, there are lots of comings and goings, ups and downs. In fact, everything at the subatomic level is chaos. Moments of perfect order coalesce, only to dissolve again into the thrilling immensity of infinite possibilities. Love is all because it is nowhere, not in one place, but every place. Every form is teeming with life and with various forms of consciousness or no consciousness, like bees swarming or in a hive or ants on an ant hill.
Life on every level is busy, yet it's doing nothing, remaining for a moment, and then quickly passing away, only to be back in another form and another kind of community, and another chaos. Chaos is our home. It is always becoming, ending, and starting anew.”
— Thomas Keating in Reflections on the Unknowable

The Kaos Trailer
Rick Levine on the Nodes and Quantum Astrology (video is bookmarked at the wave/particle section)
Gurdjieff Movements: Precision does matter in the Movements, and the emphasis is not on competence. There is a stunning distillation of this Wisdom Practice here.
Dr. Shannon Michael Pater, Notice the Journey, “Dysregulation as Prophetic Voice” Blog Post and Foundations of Trauma-Supporting Care Essays
Cynthia Bourgeault:
“The Roots of Hope Run Deep,” Science and Nonduality Video Podcast Episode
“I Am Not a Space that God Does Not Occupy,” A Blog Series
Eye of the Heart: A Spiritual Journey into the Imaginal Realm
Chani
Moonbeaming episode with Sarah Faith Gottesdiener
Zach Bush on Nature, AI, and our Collective Spiritual Awakening
The Karate Kid Scene
“You Always Get What You Want,” Alan Watts

If there is resonance here, please join us by subscribing on YouTube.

Panning for Gold: Wake Up, Remember

Kirsten Harrison — Thu, 14 Aug 2025 04:12:45 +0000

This is a story about pain and love. I find it nourishing and important to speak directly to the weight of our collective moment and to share lived experiences of holding it, particularly.

A Note About Content: This post weaves stories together from the experiences of an EMT and touches on themes of trauma and suicide. Please take care, and take your time. If you can’t read about hard things right now, that is understandable. Save it or skip it.

Let’s ease into the story with a two-minute video about panning for gold

“See the darkness, know it’s real…light a candle anyway.” - Sarah Bessey

We got a family tattoo while all of the kids were home this year.

Each of us has endured at least one season of very low firelight when our spark was nearly extinguished. Each of us has taken turns holding the light. Because we know encountering darkness is a part of being human, we engraved a reminder of the ever-present reality of light on our skin.

“It is the light in the lantern which shows you the path, not the lantern.”

-A Yogi Tea Quote

Speaking about hope is no simple thing, especially in this moment of great collective uncertainty. How does one use words to describe what can only be truly known from the inside?

Because any spiritual perspective I offer these folks I parent will be anemic if it doesn’t speak to their realities honestly, I’ve gone back to the drawing board over and over — learning and excavating, following what I sensed, but could not yet say spaciously.

More vitally, though, I’ve had to cultivate the inner stability to be WITH them.

Micro-Dosing Human Tragedy

Until I saw what it is like for my son Ryan to face the unimaginable in his role as an EMT, I did not understand the gravity of suffering our first responders bear witness to as they enter into the worst moments of our lives. It is the call they carry 1 on our behalf.

Severe injuries are not the heaviest weight. It is the steady micro-dosing of human tragedy that wearies the soul.

“We begin to understand God as the presence that protects us from nothing, even as God unexplainably sustains us in all things.”

- Dr. James Finley

When I first heard these honest, poetic words 2, a knot within me loosened. This is the first description of God I have found robust enough to truly take comfort in, and it is one I boldly whisper to the hearts of folks that I love.

As I share Dr. Finley’s words with Ryan — words that have been helping me reconcile a loving God with the reality of suffering — I see something shift; he is taken aback, and then still for what seems like a full minute. He picks up his phone and reads from an EMT Reddit thread.

Another EMT pours out words to fellow stretcher-bearers that his family and friends cannot witness. After responding to a horrific domestic violence call, he knows without a doubt…THERE IS NO GOD.

Because bearing the weight of tragedy alone drains the color out of Ryan’s life, we hold it together.

Being Present to the Rocks and Sand of Suffering

Without violating HIPAA, Ryan recounts residue he is presently carrying but has not yet felt.

Seemingly innocuous instances not felt in the moment are released on a drip once Ryan clocks out. He is cursed at, spat on, bitten, and occasionally even hit on. Early in his career, he was “sucker punched” in the face by the partner of a patient he was actively caring for. Any one of these dehumanizing assaults would be shocking to many of us, but they are not at all unusual to a first responder.
As he revives a nearly lifeless body on the street with Narcan and gets the now stable patient into the ambulance, Ryan hears cries for help. Another soul has overdosed one block over and won’t make it until the next ambulance arrives. Regulations prohibit what he knows he must do. “He will die if you don’t do something…and it will be on you!” is seared into a first responder’s memory. This is not the first time a hurting human has yelled these words in Ryan’s direction, and it will not be the last. He makes an impossible split-second decision. The resuscitated patient will be safe with his partner. He listens to the inner voice, throws a starfish back into the ocean.
Ryan climbs through wires and debris to reach a second-story apartment. A sick woman has delayed care as long as she possibly can because she is a caregiver for a non-ambulatory spouse with dementia. They do not have a backup plan; no one is coming to save them from this chronic emergency.
On his way home from work, an angry driver flips Ryan off when he doesn’t immediately accelerate as the light turns green. This is the most isolating moment of the day.

A Fresh Reminder of Human Vulnerability

The advanced life support calls are heavy, too.

Ryan and six other first responders are dispatched for CPR. The patient’s family looks on expectantly while the team moves in harmony. Each one gives attention to the part they are playing and to the flow between them. As they silently recognize further efforts will not be life-saving, they seamlessly shift focus to dignity for the deceased and compassionate care for this family.

In the moment between this recognition and the life-altering news being delivered, Ryan sees smiling eyes, life, and breath in family photos on the wall — someone’s brother or mom. A child who will never grow up. A dad whose young kids may not remember him.

Ryan anticipates the medic’s next move and gets a blanket from the rig. He gathers trash and moves furniture back into place. From one moment to the literal next, life as this family knows it will never be the same.

The ride home is silent. At the station, they stay in motion, quietly cleaning and restocking supplies for the next call. The air is thick with a fresh reminder of just how fragile life is. Someone asks, “What’s for dinner?”

Glimmers of Gold

As we sift through the rocks and sand of suffering, glimmers of gold catch Ryan’s heart’s eye. Pain is not the only story. It may not even be the truest story. Because we know that negative experiences stick to us like Velcro and positive ones slip off like Teflon 3, we savor the heck out of gold.

An unhoused couple knocks on the window of the ambulance. The husband is in pain and needs care. He is not dying, but unattended, he will get very ill, lose a finger or a hand. They kindly decline emergency transport, saying they will walk to the hospital. It is 2:00 AM in below-freezing temperatures. Ryan watches them walk away without spite or complaint. They do not spend energy bracing against “what is” and have no expectation of him in that moment. As they set out on the two-mile trek, everything in him screams, “You have to do something!” Ryan phones his supervisor to ask if he can give them a ride, and his request is met with compassion. Front-door service to the hospital is offered and accepted. Ryan buckles each of them in and carefully lifts everything they own into the aid car like the precious parcels they are.
Later, as Ryan “posts up” in a parking lot in between calls, he sees a man lying on the ground. He walks over to ask if he’s okay. “Yes,” comes a reply. “I am just resting.” Another man sees this anomalous decency from a bench across the street and calls to Ryan, “Thank you for checking on him. My wife died of an overdose. I’ve overdosed twenty-two times, but I have been clean for two years now.”
Ryan picks up the phone when a co-worker reaches out to share an experience of a call so devastating that it is barely bearable. Ryan knows what this is like. He knows the sensation of circling back through each moment of the call to see if there’s anything he could have done differently…to feel shock and anger…to feel alone in his pain. This may not sound like gold quite yet, but let me thread this needle for you. It is a very particular type of witness that is needed in these searing moments of moral injury. Ryan has everything he needs to hold space for his colleague tonight. He has lived through similar circumstances, gleaned wisdom from veteran EMTs and paramedics 4, and has enough distance from this situation to see clearly. Ryan validates this EMT’s disorientation and clearly states his grounded orientation — he will continue to be available anytime, anywhere. He speaks truth with compassion and deep seriousness. This felt experience of holding the light for another EMT is like taking a deep swig of gold.

The Felt Sense of Gold

The felt sense of gold is hauntingly sweet, heart-wrenchingly full of life. I want to bottle it up and spray the scent of gold all over the planet with reckless abandon.

What a wonder it is that one can drink this gold even when not cognizant of its existence in the moment 5. One can tune in to the aliveness it arouses at the core of one’s being.

If each of us is a drop in the same vast ocean, could there also be a fleck of gold within that becomes perceptible only in the flow of resonance between us?

Given how hard life is 6, it makes sense that we fall asleep to this oneness. The life Ryan experiences while listening to Tool has stirred recognition. In “Pneuma,” they plead with us to wake up and remember 7:

We are spirit bound to this flesh
We go round one foot nailed down
But bound to reach out and beyond this flesh
Become Pneuma
We are will and wonder
Bound to recall, remember
We are born of one breath, one word
We are all one spark, sun becoming
Child, wake up
Child, release the light
Wake up now
(Spirit)
(Spirit)
(Spirit)
(Spirit)
Bound to this flesh
This guise, this mask
This dream
Wake up remember
We are born of one breath, one word
We are all one spark, sun becoming
Pneuma
Reach out and beyond
Wake up remember
We are born of one breath, one word
We are all one spark, eyes full of wonder

“Through mechanical love, we all suffer. Conscious love heals us.”

- Maurice Nicoll in The New Man

When Suffering Hits Close to Home

I picked up burritos for dinner last winter when Ryan and I were at home together. At the kitchen table, we dropped into a conversation that neither of us will ever forget.

Earlier in the week, Ryan was dispatched to the home of a young mother. It is not uncommon for EMTs to care for folks whose acts of desperation did not bring an end to their suffering.

As his patient’s despair rose to an unbearable level, the only relief she could imagine was to no longer exist. She tried to end her life while her baby was sleeping in the next room. On the way to the hospital, excruciating physical pain was eclipsed by the emotional agony and shame of a choice made in the darkest moment.

That night in the ambulance, Ryan held back tears that were forming in his throat and behind his eyes. This was not his emergency. He provided medical care, compassionate witness, and words of comfort.

As he describes his felt experience of this call to me, we drop into tender territory. I ask Ryan if he remembers.

Seventeen years earlier, after enduring more toxic stress than my body could bear, I was on the threshold of letting go. I didn’t know how to metabolize the pain.

Ryan does remember.

He reaches for my hand and says, “Thank you for staying alive for me.”

He embraces me with strength and compassion, and then speaks words that pierce my heart. “I have been staying alive for you.”

Ryan can bear witness to suffering because he knows suffering from the inside. With tears in our eyes, we time-travel…

No one tells my seven-year-old son what is happening, but he can feel it. He sits outside my bedroom and stares at the door. As waves of darkness are taking me down, and his dad is working full-time, caring for three kids and a depressed wife, Ryan is alone to make sense of a terrifying experience.

Ryan is 24 now. In this moment at the kitchen table, I see him. The presence and witness I could not provide on those days he needed me is accessible now. I cannot take his pain away, but my heart stays open while he tells me about it.

“Love brings together what needs to be brought together.”

-Kabir Helminski in Living Presence

Hold These Polarities with Max

Ryan and I intuitively hold all of this together by turning on our favorite Tiny Desk concert. We close our eyes and sink into “On the Nature of Daylight.” We feel the pain no words can touch, co-present with gold. Instead of writing it off as “all good,” we breathe with it.

You never have to wonder if Max Richter is telling you the whole truth.

Richter makes an audacious choice. He tunes these players to the key of respite instead of rescue. There is a moment near the end when a tiny violin pierces the darkness; it cuts right through the impulse to let go of hope once and for all.

In the presence of this honesty, good and bad meld together until they are no longer distinguishable.

In the presence of this honesty, color returns to Ryan’s body as sensation from heart to fingertips and space in lungs that could barely recall what a deep breath feels like. Pain is purged as salt on cheeks.

In Ryan’s presence, I experience second-hand gold. I remember that I am and we are. I know in my bones that we are held by a love that “protects us from nothing, while unexplainably sustaining us in all things.”

Thank you, Ryan…

Thank you for doing this very hard work that you love.
Thank you for finding a why that sustains you in the hardest moments.
Thank you for caring for your patients like you would want another EMT to care for me.
Thank you for letting me see you and know you.
I love you.

To every first responder who is reading this, thank you for your service. In the most isolating moments, may you be reminded that your efforts matter and that your flourishing matters, too. And may the rest of us remember how vital it is for us to lean in with gratitude and care.

A Blessing

May glimmers of gold catch your heart’s eye as you are present to rocks and sand, and may there be a witness to hold it with you.

And if there is no witness, if gold is imperceptible, may a fresh wind blow through these stories to recall to your senses the gold which is always, already within you, and may you keep the eyes of your heart peeled in the waiting.

Keep going, friends.

Love,
Kirsten

A Panning for Gold Playlist

Because music is so foundational to our experiences of holding pain, Ryan and I created a playlist to share. These songs are internally congruent with these stories and played a role in shaping the words you are reading.

“The Call We Carry: Confronting PTSD in the Fire Service” is a documentary film directed by firefighter paramedic Cody Shea and is free to watch on YouTube.

“In a profession that few ever see, and even fewer understand, a crisis is brewing amongst today’s first responders. Over 37% meet clinical diagnosis for PTSD, and most go untreated and even unrecognized. In a culture where showing vulnerability means showing weakness, this ground-breaking documentary attempts to break down these barriers and smash the stigma of mental health in the fire service.
Follow the journeys of 4 Tacoma Firefighters as they share their stories of pain, sacrifice, and resiliency in the midst of an unprecedented call volume increase. The film provides an intimate glimpse into lives of those who put it all on the line everyday, in an effort to prove once and for all that NO ONE FIGHTS ALONE…”

Dr. James Finley has known great suffering from the inside, too. In the video below, he shares what has shaped his healing words. After severe and ongoing childhood trauma, Finley became a Trappist Monk. He then went on to become a therapist, spiritual director, and teacher. The quote above is from the “Sink into the Taproot of Your Heart” episode of the Turning to the Mystics Podcast. You can read the transcript here. It was recorded near the beginning of the COVID-19 Pandemic, just a week after his beloved wife died.

“Take in the Good,” a blog post by Dr. Rick Hanson

This Ted Talk has been meaningful and instructive to Ryan, “The Effects of The Suck it Up Culture: An EMT on PTSD.” Anthony, thank you for speaking these vulnerable truths out loud, for educating those of us who have EMTs and paramedics in our lives, for normalizing what has been stigmatized, and for accompanying those who feel alone in their pain.

The 1-Minute Challenge for “Taking in the Good” with Dr. Rick Hanson, a short guided practice with a bite-sized neuroscience lesson.

One of my favorite scenes comes to mind anytime I share these words…the “Bathtub Talk” from Garden State with Natalie Portman and Zach Braff.

Andrew: “Fuck, this hurts. so much.”

Sam: “Yeah, I know. But that is life…if nothing else, that is life. It’s real, sometimes it fucking hurts, but yeah, it’s sort of all we have.”

Ryan introduced me to Tool. Their music tells the truth about pain and speaks of this deeper reality that we are all woven into. What is it like inside when you give your full attention to this genius polyrhythmic drumming by Danny Carey?

Practicing Presence with Abstract Art

Chad Glazener — Mon, 28 Jul 2025 21:15:00 +0000

A Guest Post by Contemplative Abstract Painter, Chad Glazener

Chad Glazener (image courtesy of Mark Pratt-Russum)

How Abstract Art Can Shape Our Inner Life

I remember being in museums with friends who just didn’t know what to make of abstract art. While I found myself drawn in, they’d rather wander off to admire Monet than spend time sitting with Mitchell. And honestly, I understood. Abstract art can be puzzling, confusing, even disorienting. I’ve felt that way too. I’ve shuffled uncomfortably from one painting to the next, wondering what I was supposed to be seeing, what I was supposed to be feeling. I’d catch myself thinking “I should have something insightful to say,” but truthfully, I didn’t always know what sort of experience I was supposed to be having.

I get it. For years, I felt the same way about abstract art. It wasn’t until much later in my adult life that something began to shift. Through a series of small, almost accidental practices, I started to discover the vitality hidden in these works. To my great surprise, abstract art opened a door into my inner world. It stirred something deep, inviting new insights and connections.

Over time, engaging with these pieces became more than just looking at art—it became a kind of contemplative practice for me. What I once found confusing began to feel essential. The gifts I received through this slow, curious interaction began to ripple outward, quietly transforming other areas of my life.

If you’ve felt unsure about abstract art, here are a few suggestions that have helped me.

Practicing Patient Presence: The First Gift of Abstract Art

The first gift abstract art offers is the opportunity to practice patient presence. When you stand before a work that resists immediate interpretation—something that doesn’t look like anything—it can be baffling. Instinctively, we try to make associations with something familiar. This kind of projection is natural, and can even be useful (something I’ll return to in a bit) but it’s not the best place to begin.

Instead, I invite you to try something different. Think of it as an experiment in patience and presence.

The next time you’re with an abstract artwork, whether in a museum or your own space, try this: don’t rush to label or explain. Just look. And an important caveat—this exercise happens best when you’re with an artwork in person. There’s a profound difference between encountering art and seeing it on a screen. In real life, there’s a physical and emotional resonance that’s hard to replicate digitally.

So when you’re with an abstract painting, the first lesson is: don’t rush. Take your time. Attend to your gaze to make it gentle and natural, as you might rest your breath in meditation. Let your eyes soften and settle over the entire image. You might notice that your eyes want to look away, or fixate on one part of the painting. But just like a meditative practice, notice what your eyes want to do and return to the whole. That’s part of the practice.

Simply be with the artwork. No need to narrate it, no need to escape into language. Just observe. Let the image hold your attention. Even if the artwork doesn’t start to reveal its power, this act of sustained, silent looking builds a deeper skill: the capacity to give your full presence to something beyond yourself. It’s a practice we can carry into every area of life. This habit of quiet attentiveness helps us anchor in the present moment.

Abstract art is especially suited for building this meditative muscle because it relieves the pressure to interpret. It asks nothing of us except to be there, with open eyes and an open heart. And from that place of quiet, what the painting has to offer begins to unfold. Not through our usual mental scripts, but through embodied, heartfelt awareness.

“The Ghost in the Machine” (2025)

Turning Inward Without Words

As you continue the practice of patient presence, something subtle may begin to shift. Your mood, your physical awareness, or even your sense of time might start to change. Before some paintings, you might feel a quiet rest settling into your body. With others, you may sense a growing agitation or a surge of energy, as if your whole being is humming in response to something invisible and just beyond words.

These sensations are meaningful. And with abstract art, we can become aware that they are happening.

Each person’s response to a work of art is unique. No two viewers will experience the same painting in the same way, and no single piece will always evoke the same feeling. This is what makes the practice so rich and so personal.

This way of interacting with abstract art invites you into self-observation. You begin with patient presence before the artwork, but then gently turn inward. Notice how your body is responding. Pay attention to the space of your heart. What emotions, sensations, or energies are rising within you as you remain present with the artwork?

Sometimes, you may find yourself drawn into a kind of wordless interaction. You might feel the quiet hum of a silent, mutual attunement between you and the painting. If this happens, cherish it. That’s a profound moment. But know, too, that not every encounter will lead there. There will be times when you sit with a piece that initially caught your eye—something you had hoped would move you—and nothing seems to shift. That’s okay. Truly. It’s not a failure on your part, nor a flaw in the artwork. It’s simply a reflection of where you are in that moment.

We arrive at different artworks as different versions of ourselves, shaped by our energy, emotions, and experiences that day. Some pieces will meet us powerfully. Others may not. This self-acceptance of our changing sense of self is part of the practice, too. The key is not to judge the experience. Don’t dismiss the artwork if it doesn’t “work.” Don’t blame yourself if the opening never comes. The practice itself—the act of returning again and again to offer your full, quiet presence—is the enduring gift.

Whatever the outcome, you’ve honored something sacred: the willingness to be still with something beyond yourself, to listen without expectation, and to allow the art to meet you where you are.

“Lotus Position” (2025)

Learning to Ground Your Inner Experience

Let’s say you’ve started to notice subtle shifts in your mood or your body while sitting with a work of art. What next?

There are a few gentle steps you can take from here. None of them are mandatory, and none of them need to happen in a strict order. Your next move will depend on your energy, your environment, and whether you’re alone or with someone else. Sometimes I’m drawn into a quiet, introspective stillness. Other times, I feel energized and expressive. Let your own state guide you.

One powerful next step is this: after practicing patient, present observation, begin to describe what you literally see—without jumping to metaphor or personal association. Instead of saying, “This reminds me of a plate of spaghetti” try saying, “There are magenta lines making overlapping oval shapes in the lower right corner.”

The goal here is to connect the visible elements of the artwork with your invisible internal experience. Even though others may not feel what you feel, they can see what you see. This kind of description creates a shared language of observation—anchoring your private, internal experience in something external and concrete. It’s a simple but powerful grounding practice.

Naming what you see with precision helps you remain present. It keeps you tethered to the here and now. In fact, this is the same strategy used to manage anxiety or panic: rather than spiraling inward, you reach outward. You name five things you can see. You describe what is physically, undeniably there. You connect your emotional regulation to the physical, tangible world.

This simple act of putting words to form, color, shape builds a neurobiological bridge between your inner world and the outer one. It invites you back into your body and into relationship with the present moment. It’s a practice not just of looking, but of feeling the ways you belong to yourself, the world, and others.

“Vesper Light” (2025)

Offering Unfiltered Expression

Another powerful practice is stream-of-consciousness reflection. After practicing patient presence with an artwork, we narrate our experience as it unfolds, freely weaving between our visual observations and our internal landscape. This practice is a gift because with it, we practice radical self-acceptance. We refuse to filter or censor our observations. We build the trust that if we continue to follow the thread, we will get to where we need to go.

Let’s say you’ve spent time with a piece of abstract art, and you feel stirred in a way that’s hard to name. Rather than trying to make it neat or presentable, give yourself full permission to let your thoughts and feelings tumble out, uncensored and unguarded.

You might do this aloud—especially if you're with someone you trust. Say, “I’d like to speak for three minutes without stopping. Would you set a timer for me?” When the timer ends, you can choose to keep going or stop. The point isn’t polish or precision—it’s presence.

Or, you might do this on your own, with a journal or voice recording. Just begin. Let yourself narrate, riff, react. Let what you feel and notice spill out in whatever form it takes: awkward, emotional, poetic, raw. Just keep going without stopping because there’s no right or wrong way to do this.

The goal isn’t to create something coherent. The goal is to mirror the brave energetic offering of the artist. Here’s what I mean: when an abstract artist is at work, they leap into their own wordless subconscious. They commune with Source and offer the contours of their inner life in an act of public generosity. When we reflect on an artwork, we do the same kind of work. We continue the exchange, offering ourselves in the same vulnerable way. It’s a way of honoring the gift of the artist—by accepting and offering yourself in return.

Later, you might read or listen back to what you expressed. That secondary act of witnessing (gently, with curiosity and care) can reveal threads of insight you didn’t even realize were forming. Often, it’s in that reflective space that the deeper meaning begins to emerge. This process of reflection doesn’t require talent or training. It just requires your presence and your willingness to throw your own words at the wall and see what sticks.

“Photo Finish” (2024)

The Quiet Power of Abstract Art

The true gift of encountering abstract art in these ways is how it supports a contemplative way of living. Non-representational art invites us beyond the noise of our thoughts and the scripts we’ve inherited for how to see the world. It offers us something quieter, deeper: a wordless language. A kind of presence. A shared field of energy that can be felt, even if it can’t be named.

Whether you engage with abstract art alone or in the company of others, this form of expression has the power to sensitize you to subtle, sacred forms of communion. We enter a space beyond words where we can share more of ourselves with one another and with Source itself. We can wake up to the fact that this connection is always there, even in times when we are unaware.

Encountering abstract art is for everyone. It isn’t about showing off or proving how sophisticated we are. It’s about waking up our hearts. It’s about approaching the artwork with openness, letting it be a doorway into our inner landscape and into the gentle, generous space between us.

Chad Glazener (he/him) is an abstract artist and writer in Portland, OR. In his creative process, Chad attempts to enter and attend to the energy of presence, exploring the creative potential of silence and the expressive power of gesture. Through gesture, humans articulate when words are not enough. With his organic marks, Chad’s art holds meaning beyond what words can carry. Incorporating these practices into your experience with abstract art can enhance your connection to the artwork and yourself.

If you’d like a companion for your own encounter, you can purchase one of his seeing sessions or add it to any artwork purchase.

In addition, Chad offers commissioned paintings that integrate spiritual direction and co-exploration to create artwork for threshold moments. To learn more about his commission process, visit his website.

He Wished to See the Teacher: A Poem and Collage to Listen With

Kirsten Harrison — Wed, 02 Jul 2025 22:25:28 +0000

He Wished to See the Teacher

He is one of many who,
while walking the road of daily-ness,
catches a fragrance
so tantalizing, so familiar,
like no other thing there are categories for,
and cannot not follow it.

An invisible thread
lifts his heart, his gaze.
Now there is space for a series of
tiny obediences.

Go…but don’t go early.
Take your time…this can’t be forced or missed.
Look up…choose an out-of-the-way place with a clear line of sight.

Since he is one of many,
it is bewildering to know
this magnetic pull is
a recognition.

As he sees you seeing him,
the wind blows time open, or at least that’s how it seems.

When you tell him to come down —
say that you are “coming to his house today,”
two things he can’t quite name come together.

What follows is a blur,
like no other thing there are categories for.
The clock tells this story with a start and an end.
The mind sees one thing, the heart knows something else.

Floating around in fantastical puddles
slams time closed, or at least that’s how it seems.

Bearing the urge to shape to the shapeless
takes some getting used to.
Can anyone do it without making a mess?

The Dynamism of Becoming: Notes from Real Life

Kirsten Harrison — Wed, 11 Jun 2025 20:57:13 +0000

“A man needs moments of retirement for the sake of relating attention, parts of himself with other parts, attention to some reality of life in him; then he needs to go towards life willingly in order that it brings him the impressions of himself that he needs, even though they are difficult to swallow. They are food.” -This quote and the title of the post are from Henriette Lannes, as quoted in Attention is the Fire of Our Being

An Aim: To develop finer discrimination around the story-telling impulse

I wish to see
from whence a story
is arising.

A thought enters…
What if the distinction is not discernible
in the substance of the story, but the
felt experience of telling it?

This seeing I wish for will require pain — a felt experience shitty enough to shock the system.

A South Star

I will hear words spill out of my mouth, sticky with self-importance, earnest insincerity. A viable intuition will warp as I mentally rearrange my entire future around what I think I see. Efforts to drag this clear seeing into the realm of explanation will dissipate precious energy. When I realize what’s happening, there will be a unforgettable heaviness. I will briefly despise my humanity. The prospect of loss will be a dark cloud over my head.

This will be good, but I will not see it that way intially.

One of the Many In-Between Moments

There will be a palatable felt experience. A fresh perception will arise. I will be totally lit up inside and not at all sure the dam will hold. Surprisingly, there will be enough will to hold excitement without filling all of the space unconsciously, but I will be white-knuckling. It will require effort and zap my energy. I will do it as a service, a reluctant obedience, a step in the direction of aim.

I will be grateful for an opening and savor this tiny emergence.

A North Star

There will be a mouthwatering taste of another dimension suffusing every cell. Aliveness will surge, and I will let it. (There will be help!) I will not strain to shape to the shapeless. I will breathe with it, let go of needless tensions. This concrescent force will radiate beyond the perimeter. Words will rise and flow like wind.

This impression will be indelible. It will sit next to a snapshot of heaviness. I will hear a voice in my heart say, “Let it go.”

I will not hesitate.

Artifacts will arise from within and without, (I)cons to call me back home.

“May you return to and rest in the center space where your clarity is stone still.” Chad Glazener

I’m Kirsten. I accompany folks as they attune to the inner experiences of life. It’s a place of presence and connection, a place to anchor briefly amid the chaos, a spacious place to be seen and known. If you would like to read more about this type of accompaniment, you can visit my offerings page here.

What if losing one’s way from time to time is the way?

Kirsten Harrison — Sat, 31 May 2025 19:07:51 +0000

What if losing one’s way from time to time is the way?

I’m gesturing around a center core,
an absence.

Initially, it’s excruciating,
unfamiliar.
It is a pearl,
but not a pearl of “substance.”

Hands get it first.
They trace the circumference
of absence, perceive its vibrancy.

Absence warms,
suffusing each cell
of each limb
with feeling.

This elegant force
radiates the tenderest of
affections, encircling vivid
(i)mpulses — to banish, to cling.

Under the influence of absence,
(i)mpulses morph into an
(I)ntimate beloved
(I) wish to protect.

I refuse to close,
to crush absence.
Yes, it’s true;
a part of me can’t stand an insubstantiality
which never fully ebbs.

As the body de-contracts into absence,
the sensation is barely bearable.
How grand!
Exquisite!

And then waves roll in.

Hello, my old friends…
the (i)mpulse to possess
the (i)mpulse to make meaning
the (i)mpulse to tell everyone I know,
to (i)nterpret this, so the good news will spread
far and wide.

Deeper still, blessed absence.

Hands cup absence,
trace its warmth, its depth.

I want to guard what I now fear
may evaporate,
but dare I risk defiling
this delicious vapor?

Vulnerability surges,
then melts into a wish…
“I wish to remember what the heart sees.”

A gesture.
A felt sense.
An indescribable image.
(I)cons, all.

Has anything ever been more clear?
Anything more obscure?

One by one each dial on a
golden lock turns;
I cannot say exactly how.
When the tumblers align, you’ll know.

The Presence of Absence

Last summer I wrote about the presence of a palpable absence.

Though initially enticed and mystified by koan-like words about absence, in the words of a wise Quaker chant, “There is a great difference between comprehending the knowledge of things and tasting the hidden life of them.”

In the synergy of group practice, a gesture emerged. This poem followed. Over time, absence has become “tangible and savorous to me;” though only the teensiest bit more bearable. By nature, it is tantalizingly allusive.

These words are icons. Breathe with them if they call to something within.

About the Author

My name is Kirsten. I practice spiritual direction and spacious accompaniment in Vashon, WA and online. Together, we enter presence and attune to your inner experience of life. It’s pretty ordinary, really. Over time, though, an intentional rhythm of slowing down and living awake fortifies the capacity to meet your life with an inner stability. I have reverence for your unique experience of the divine and will be with you as you listen for wisdom.

Glimmering Landscape Time: Spacious Spiritual Practices to Hold Us in Spiritual Disorientation

Kirsten Harrison — Fri, 02 May 2025 14:02:23 +0000

Words are rearranged from “The Moon Ground” by James Dickey. The original poem was printed in a special issue of Life Magazine on July 4, 1969 leading up to the flight of Apollo 11

How do I hold this _______________? (chaos, obscurity, grief, disorientation, restlessness, dark night of the soul…)

It is difficult to hold obscurity with kindness.

We are living in a collective moment that requires we develop the capacity to stabilize in the midst of uncertainty. When there are no answers, when our illusions of control and security are falling away, how do we return to the present moment, even briefly, to get our bearings?

My blog post on moving through a dark night of the soul is the most widely visited article I’ve written. This tells me we are collectively longing for soulful nourishment and guidance that is robust enough to hold us amid disorientating times.

Practices are prisms through which timeless truths are illuminated — making the invisible visible. Practices support un in connecting with our direct spiritual experience.

There are no formulas. The invitation is to enter in with expectancy, but not expectations — these are openings to be with “what is” in the present moment. Being present is the practice, even if nothing seemingly profound happens.

A Spacious Found Poetry Practice: Opening to a New Emergence

Cut out words from an old book or magazine. Lay all of the words out in front of you.

Which words stir resonance within?
Which words evoke resistance?

When you are ready, notice if the words want to cohere in a new way. Open to the possibility of rearranging the words into a question, a prayer, a wish, or wisdom to hold you here, to hold you today.

From my heart I say I think something
You look as though
You know me, though the world we came from is
glimmering landscape
Time
At being here: we must look
We must look for it: the stones are going to tell us
Not the why but the how of all things
We are here to do one
Thing only

A Simple Felt-Sense Practice

Here’s a three-minute invitation to presence. Breathe with this if you want to. If it stirs something, listen for your felt sense of it.

Let it be unclear at first. Maybe a felt sense will arise today. Maybe the memory of this will return when it’s time.

“Do not despise the shallows”

I took this video at the shoreline on Vashon-Maury Island.

Listening With Images, A Visio Divina Practice

Clear a space and breathe for a moment or two. Gaze at the collage at the top of this post and listen for what it stirs in you.

Follow the questions that draw you:

What do you notice?
Is there resonance? Resistance?
Does the image evoke a feeling or sensation?
Is there a word or phrase that shimmers?
Is there anything here that is synchronous or seems to connect with other happenings in your life presently?
Would you like to use this image as a journal prompt or explore it together with a friend in conversation?
If the image is pleasing to you, take an inner snapshot of your felt sense of it to carry with you.

Creating wisdom collages is one of the primary ways I engage with my direct spiritual experience. The image at the top of this post arose from my most recent practice time. Creative expression opens my heart to deep listening beyond the thinking center. You’ll find a step-by-step guide to create wisdom collages here.

Resources - soulspace ® Spiritual Direction

Montana Sky Time, An Audio Reading

A Voice Memo Poetry Reading

Read More on the Soulspace Blog

To Bear, Encircled and Encircling

A Visio Divina Practice

Musical Accompaniment

An Invitation to Notice

Wisdom: A Knowing in Darkness

A Voice Memo Read-Aloud

Sources:

Related Blog Posts:

Silence: Words + Portals

About the Author

Read More on the Soulspace Blog:

What Strength It Takes To Bear A Slow Untangling

Help me be strong, help me be, help me

An image coalesces…

If we require a definition, let us call it knowing: a knowing that is personal, experiential, and tending toward union with that which is known.

Questions to Ponder…

Read More on the Soulspace Blog:

Moving Through a Dark Night of the Soul: A Spiritual Director Holds Space for Obscurity

We Are Here

Practicing Presence with Abstract Art

Please Tell Me What To Do: The Gift of Not Receiving What I Thought I Wanted in Spiritual Direction

Can’t go under it. Can’t go over it. We’ve got to go through it.

Holding the Tension of Opposites

What does holding the tension of unreconcilable opposites generate in the heart?

A Transmission, A Motion, A Practice

We’re Going On A Bear Hunt

Questions for Opening

This version is too cute not to share…

Footnotes:

Read More on the Soulspace Blog:

Moving Through a Dark Night of the Soul: A Spiritual Director Holds Space for Obscurity

We Are Here

Practicing Presence with Abstract Art

Visible Contradictions + Knowing How To Know

The Maps, Lenses, & Mirrors Series

An Invitation

If you are searching, you must not stop until you find. When you find, however, you will become troubled. Your confusion will give way to wonder. In wonder you will reign over all things. Your sovereignty will be your rest.

Video Artifact #1

Seeing Ourselves Clearly

"Wholeness is born of the acceptance of the conflict of the human and the Divine in the individual psyche."

Developing A Soul

To Be Clear

How do you tell the difference between ‘the invincible certainty of your heart’ and neurotic self-delusion?

The Lyrical Nature of Our Own Belonging

Why It Matters

Orienting to Soul-Developing Work On Planet Earth In January 2026

Songs for Opening

Resources + Notes

A Book List

About the Author

Read More on the Soulspace Blog:

Moving Through a Dark Night of the Soul: A Spiritual Director Holds Space for Obscurity

Can You Still Reach Your Stubborn Hope?

Listening for Wisdom Artfully

Re-Member Yourself: A Note From Kirsten + A Poem About Holding Obscurity

Returning to Presence

We are here. Here we are.

Drench Yourself Anew

PRESENCE + SPACE | WITNESS + WITH-NESS

Read More on the Soulspace Blog:

Moving Through a Dark Night of the Soul: A Spiritual Director Holds Space for Obscurity

What if losing one’s way from time to time is the way?

He Wished to See the Teacher: A Poem and Collage to Listen With

Being Human: Beautiful and Ominous

What My Soul Already Knows: A Simple Poetry Practice for a Dark Night of the Soul

Anchoring Into Deep Knowing

Writing a Pantoum for Obscurity

Step-By-Step Instructions:

STANZA 1

STANZA 2

STANZA 3

Here’s an example:

An example of a different pantoum (not quite the same as the format above).

PRESENCE + SPACE | WITNESS + WITH-NESS

Related Blog Posts:

Something Else: A Spiritual Director on Holding Obscurity & Disorientation

If you are searching, you must not stop until you find. When you find, however, you will become troubled. Your confusion will give way to wonder. In wonder you will reign over all things.
Your sovereignty will be your rest.

My loves, drink these words.
Bind them around your neck.
Write them on the tablet of your heart.

Is there anything new on the road oft traveled?

Vibrant beauty that once
took away breath
is a backdrop now; you search for
novel sacraments.

Today, though, the sun shines through
effervescent raindrops
on spun silk.

Recognition is lightning
in every cell.
You see for the first time
what you have always known.

This mystery will bear your weight.

“We begin to understand God as the presence that protects us from nothing, even as God unexplainably sustains us in all things.”

- Dr. James Finley

“Through mechanical love, we all suffer. Conscious love heals us.”

- Maurice Nicoll in The New Man

“Love brings together what needs to be brought together.”

-Kabir Helminski in Living Presence