directing self-disclosure

One of the things I've been trying to get my head around in my ministry is how to take ordinary situations and make them opportunities for spiritual direction. I agreed to teach a workshop on question asking for a peer counseling program at the high school. I've been doing some searching online thinking that maybe I'd run across what I'm looking for. The problem is I had to think about what I'm looking for. Here's what I've discovered.

I'm thinking the work of discipleship is moving into the realm unknown to yourself and others. What I'm looking for is how do I as a pastor, spiritual director or friend, encourage someone into their unknown?

Here is my hypothesis. To encourage movement from left to right, from open to blind, I can engage the person with compliments. Positive information they may not know about themselves will both build relational trust and begin shared discovery. Here are some insights I found from an article "The Manager As Conversationalist"

1. Give Direct, Honest, and Personal Compliments:
   Positive observations about appearance, disposition, general responsiveness and accomplishments are usually easy to make and well received.
   
2. Ask people for information, for advice or merely for an opinion:
   Questions are one of the most subtle forms of compliment. They directly acknowledge the value/superiority of the other person by asking for assistance.
3. Tell your associates about their strengths, what they do well and their contributions to you.
   Frequently the people with whom we work are the last to know how we really feel about them. We assume they know and therefore never share with them our feelings.
4. Identify the most positive impression people make and share it with them
   This may require developing a personal list of strength words such as charming, poised, professional, competent, warm, genuine, intense, forthright, pleasant, etc. If you are not used to doing this, it will take some practice. The more accurate you are, profound the effect.

Another form of feedback useful in this movement to the blind spot, is clarifying repetition. By stating observations about what you are hearing in what your friend is telling you, may open a new realization to him as to what he is really saying, what he really believes.

In moving down the window, encouraging self disclosure (moving from open to hidden) I think that my own self-disclosure will encourage a greater reciprocal self-disclosure. Also the use of open questions encourages self disclosure.

I think by simultaneously using techniques to move deeper shared discovery can happen. Alternating questions and feed back, self-disclosure and compliment, moving more and more to the spiritual, the inmost hidden parts of who we are together. It this the essence of spiritual direction?

I know this is basic interpersonal communication stuff, but what is a new idea to me is using the johari window for some one else, eliciting response, rather than just understanding my own side. By opening my window actively with others I encourage them to open theirs and together we share spiritual discovery.

spiritual formation based congregations.

Foster has some great thoughts on how to build a congregation that is centered on spiritual formation.

My second point is simple enough to say though exceedingly difficult to practice: Spiritual problems demand spiritual answers. We simply can never solve a spiritual problem with a programmatic answer. It is vital in any congregational setting to be working with God on the spiritual nature of the community. Is pride pervasive throughout? Then spiritual disciplines of Service are called for. Is nervous, anxious over commitment evident everywhere? Then disciplines of Solitude and Silence can help. Is there a lack of trust in God? Then experiences of Prayer and Fasting are needed. Are we taking ourselves too seriously? Then multiplied opportunities for Celebration need to break forth!

Times come in the life of any congregation that in order for us to be attentive to God we have to become firmly anti-programmatic; that is, we learn to stop doing things. At such times we are to discover ways, as a people together, to follow the counsel of François Fénelon, “Be silent, and listen to God. Let your heart be in such a state of preparation that his Spirit may impress upon you such virtues as will please him. Let all within you listen to him. This silence of all outward and earthly affection and of human thoughts within us is essential if we are to hear his voice.”

Masters Update

Things aren't looking good for beginning my masters in January. My search for grants has yielded nothing yet. I said that I wouldn't take out a loan, nor could I, and that if it was proper time, God would provide. I am not seeing his provision. I am facing the disappointment of putting this opportunity off.

It is particularly disappointing since Richard Foster would be speaking at the intensive seminar in January. I received the reading list and it looks so good.

• D. Bonhoeffer, Life Together
• D. Willard, Great Omission
• T. Ware, the Orthodox Church

It is my happy birthday!

Leave me a greeting today, and I'll be even happier!

Search for Augustine

I had my library get a few different translations through inter-library loan. I have looked so far at Oxford university Press, World's Classics translated by Henry Chadwick; Signet Classic translated by Rex Warner and my copy which is Modern Library translated by Edward Pusey. I like Chadwick the best so far. This line from book 7 will show you why:

Pusey: "What were the pangs of my teeming heart, what groans, O my God! yet even there were Thine ears open, and I knew it not: and when in silence vehemently sought, those silent contritions of my soul were strong cries unto thy mercy" (one sentance).

Warner: "What agonies I suffered, what graons, my God came from my heart in its labor! And you were listening, though I did not know it. When in silence I strongly urged my question, the quiet contrition of my soul was a great cry to you for mercy."

Chadwick: "What torments my heart suffered in mental pregnancy, what groans, my God! And though I did not know it, your ears were there.
"As in silence I vigorously pursued my quest, inarticulate sufferings of my heart were loudly pleading for your mercy" (2 paragraphs).

It is the poetry that Chadwick provides that originally atracted me to the mystical Augustine.

Strining Christmas Lights

Next year I have it all figured out. I will wind a string of white lights tight to the trunk of the tree, to light the insides. Then I will swirl flashing lights up the tree like a candy cane, so that no single flash will black out the color of that part of the tree, those lights will be back into the tree a ways too. Then around the whole thing I will wind another layer of white lights to give the tree a continual shapely glow.

A story about "The Confessions of St. Augustine"

The Confessions of St. Augustine

by Augustine

I am going to give this another go. I have the Modern Library version, translated by Pusey. I gave up a few years back because the sentance structure and syntax were at times challenging. I have been searching for a better translation, but in the mean time I thought I’d go back and see if I’d changed enough to handle this one.

See more about The Confessions of St. Augustine

The Pastoral Life

Life as a pastor isn't always Arcaidian bliss. Sometimes the sheep smell like poo. Still a shepherd I am, and a shepherd I must be.

Graduate funding

My fafsa yielded nothing. I trust I can find some grants or scholarships, God willing. Or a generous benefactor perhaps.

Masters Degree

I have a renewed energy and joy, I found a graduate program I can do while pastoring here! It is an online masters in Spiritual Formation and Leadership from Spring Arbor University. I have been looking for a good Spritual Formation Degree program since I came to Sebewaing (well at least since I found out that the U of M offers a Ph.D. in Cultural Anthropology and not a Masters). I have applied for the program and filled out my FAFSA.

It all rests on God to provide the dough. My one-time mentor Nancy Eckstien told me once, in the midst of her doctoal work, not to do graduate work unless someone else pays for it. That bit of advice is a neccesity at this point. I am researching grants and the like, but the simple truth is that if God does not provide the finances I can't do it yet. The Spiritual Autobiography below is from my aplication proccess.