On the Practicalities of Spiritual Practice

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Rev. Chris Jimmerson and Lee Legault, Ministerial Intern
December 29, 2019
First UU Church of Austin
4700 Grover Ave., Austin, TX 78756
www.austinuu.org

Lee and Rev. Chris discuss their own and other spiritual practices, how to maintain them and why they are more important than ever in the year to come.

Chalice Lighting

As the days begin to lengthen, the world slowly moving from winter to spring, we kindle the flame of Transformation, the fifth of the five values of our congregation. May the light of Transformation lead us to the growth that shapes our lives and heals our world.

Call to Worship

IN THIS MOMENT
By Chris Jimmerson

In this moment, we gather together, in this our beloved community.

In this moment, we gather to know the power and beauty of ritual, music and the blending together of the loving presence we each have to offer.

In this moment, we gather to glimpse that which is greater than us but of which we are part.

In this moment, we gather to worship together.

Affirming Our Mission

Together we nourish souls, transform lives, and do justice to build the Beloved Community.

Meditation Reading

DEFINING SPIRITUALITY
by Brene Brown

Spirituality is recognizing and celebrating that we are all inextricably connected to each other by a power greater than all of us, and that our connection to that power and to one another is grounded in love and compassion. Practicing spirituality brings a sense of perspective, meaning, and purpose to our lives … For some people, that power greater than us is God; for others, it’s fishing. Some are reminded of our inextricable connection by faith; others by expressions of shared humanity.

Sermon

Lee and Rev. Chris discuss their own and other spiritual practices.

Leo: To start, I’d be interested to know how you might define “spiritual practice”, Chris.

Chris: Well, I suppose we would have to define what we mean by “spiritual or spirituality”, and I loved Brene Brown’s description of it that you read earlier. So for me, then, a spiritual practice is anything I can do that gives me that perspective and grounding in love, compassion and interconnectedness that sense of being a part of something much more powerful and larger than myself.

Leo: Lee, Does Chris’s definition of spiritual practice resonate with you?

Lee: Yes, Leo, except that I often exchange the word “practice” for “habit.” You’ll hear me use “spiritual practice” and “spiritual habit” interchangeably this morning. Thinking of them as spiritual habits made experimenting with them more accessible to me when I was just starting out. A habit is a behavior repeated so many times it becomes automatic. Washing your hands, brushing your teeth, stopping at a red light, those are all habits, and I am great at those! I knew I had transferable skills related to habit building back when I did not know the first thing about a spiritual practice.

Also, I use and depend on my spiritual habits like a carpenter uses tools or Navy Seal uses weapons. My spiritual practices are my gear or armor for encountering life. If they are absent, rusty, or not working properly, then I do not have everything I need to do what the moment requires.

Leo: Can you share some of your own spiritual practices with us?

Chris: Sure. I tend to have a couple of types of spiritual practices. The first I would call committed, on going practices – what some folks call spiritual discipline. There are two examples I have practiced in the past. One was going on meditative hikes in nature three at least three times per week, weather permitting. Most often, would bring my camera, because having it helped me notice and focus on the beauty all around me.

Another was was listing three things for which I was grateful in the notes application in my iPhone each morning. That then got shared across all of my computers and devices so that I could access the list to remind myself later of all for which I have to be grateful. I have found over time that those became less effective for me, and I recently read that there are sound neurological reasons why me might want to change our regular, committed spiritual practices.

Currently, I spend an hour each month speaking with a spiritual director. I have also come to realize that going to the gym and working out three to four times per week, for me has become a regular spiritual practice. It beaks up my work day and requires me to be mindful of just the exercises I am doing for that time period. Even when I am tired or having a stressful day or am not feeling all that well, I find that after going to the gym I usually feel much better physically, have more energy and that the stress has melted away.

The other type of spiritual practice or the ones that I do not do on a regular basis but that are more impromptu, spur of the moment activities. So, for instance, though I don’t do the meditative hikes or list gratitudes on regular, scheduled basis, I still sometimes do these practices if I am feeling a particular need for them. Another example is that sometimes during the workday here at the church, I will go sit quietly in the sanctuary for just five or ten minutes or walk the grounds of the church. These seem to clear my thoughts and help me center myself. A friend of mine from seminary says that she has an impromptu spiritual practice of sipping Chateau st. Michelle Chardonnay.

Leo: What are your spiritual practices, Lee?

Lee: I tie my spiritual habits to things I do at certain times of day. After my alarm goes off in the morning, I say a mantra: “I greet this day with an open mind, a happy heart, and a grateful spirit. I will enjoy all that I can and learn from the rest.”

After I brush my teeth, I pick the stone pendant I will wear and the pair of rock balls to put in my purse and hold throughout the day whenever I’m seated for any length of time. I think of making these selections as a type of divination. I open my mind to what challenges the day may hold and feel into what rocks might best help me meet those challenges.

If I’m going to be working with people who are upset, I’ll choose black rocks to remind me to keep my own boundaries and avoid taking on pain that is not mine. If I feel down, rocks associated with nurturance or support may feel appropriate, like Jasper or Moonstone, and using them reminds me to be gentle with myself. Divination helps me have an open mind and listen for wisdom from the inner teacher or from the Spirit of Life.

When I feel cranky at mid-afternoon, I do twenty minutes of meditation. I love to do a body scan meditation while lying down, but some days walking meditation of seated breath work better fit my schedule.

I always have a beaded rock bracelet on or with me, and can hold it any time I have a few minutes and do some breath prayer work. I touch a bead and say on the in-breath, “I serve the One,” and on the out breath, “Glory be to God.” Then I move my finger to the next bead and do the same thing. The words don’t matter, but it is helpful to say something a little longer on the out-breath so you are breathing in a four-seconds-in, six-seconds-out pattern. You could say “breath in,” on the in breath and “release the breath now,” on the out breath and achieve this 4-6 pattern.

Leo: What other types of spiritual practices might folks consider?

Chris: You know, I think we tend to think of spiritual practices as being in some way tied to one or more religions – prayer, meditation, yoga and various religious rituals. But prayer doesn’t have to be seeking help from a higher power. It can simply be articulating our wishes and hopes and inner state. And spiritual practice can also be simply digging in the ground if gardening centers us. They can be journaling, creating art, singing, chanting, knitting, learning something new, acts of kindness toward other people, engaging with others in public act for justice, absorbing the beauty of nature, holding those we love in front of a fire at night, volunteering, attending a communal bonding event – the list goes on and on. We’ve given everyone a hand out with a partial list spiritual practices. The main point is that any activity which gives you that sense of grounding, interconnectedness and being a part of something larger can be a spiritual practice. Some practices are more directed toward the mind, others the body, heart or soul. A wonderful book called, “An Alter in the World” by Barbara Brown Taylor talks about how just the way we go about our daily lives, if we practice mindfulness, can be a spiritual practice. So from that perspective voting our values or the way in which we treat other people can be spiritual.

Leo: You do more than one spiritual practice a day then?

Lee: Yes. The reason I like to layer up my armor of spiritual habits is that the day that you most need your spiritual practices is going to be when everything is going wrong. On that kind of day, you’ll miss most of your spiritual practices, and that is fine, because you will have fallback practices.

I learned this lesson when my husband had a near fatal car accident. A neighbor called me, saying he did not did not know if my husband was alive or dead but that paramedics had used the jaws of life to pull him from the wreckage, and an ambulance had taken him to the nearest trauma 1 hospital. Well, I missed my twenty minutes of meditation that day. I missed my gratitude practice. I was in spiritual freefall for a lot of hours, waiting to see if he would emerge alive from emergency surgery (which he did and he is miraculously 100 percent recovered).

The spiritual practice that I grabbed onto during the freefall was my prayer beads. I have them in my purse, so they are essentially always with me. I could do my prayer bead work in fits and snatches and unobtrusively in front of other people. In that situation, I had a tool that helped me meet the moment. All it takes is one, but you are a lot more likely to have the right spiritual practice if you have options you are comfortable with to choose from.

Leo: What obstacle or challenges can folks encounter when trying to maintain their spiritual practices?

Chris: For me, one of the biggest challenges is that when I am busy or stressed out, I tend to feel like I don’t have the time available to engage in my practices. And of course, these are the times when I need them the most! Having an accountability partner can help. For example, knowing that I have an appointment with a trainer at the gym (and that I get to pay him whether or not I show up!) is good for getting me there even on days when I am tempted to skip it. I think sometimes people get frustrated because the first few things they try don’t have the desired effect for them. For instance, I have never been good at sitting meditation. I’m too hyperkinetic. But then I discovered walking/hiking meditation and that can still be very powerful for me sometimes. Also, as I mentioned earlier, sometimes a practice may become less effective for us over time, so we may not vary our practices from time to time or find ways to deepen the ones we are already doing.

Leo: Lee, what tips do you have for folks starting out with spiritual practices? [To ask just before or after Chris talks about obstacles or challenges of spiritual practices.]

Lee: I offer four pointers for building a successful habit from James Clear, author of “Atomic Habits”:

Make it obvious,
make it attractive,
make it easy, and
make it satisfying.

Make a new spiritual practice obvious by stacking it on top of a preexisting habit. “After my alarm goes off, I will wake up [an existing habit] and then I will [do my spiritual practice: meditate, say a gratitude, create an intention for my day–whatever].”

Make your spiritual habit attractive–step two–by bundling it with something you want to do: “When my alarm goes off, I will wake up [existing habit] and do my spiritual practice [new habit], and then I will have coffee [making the new habit attractive by smacking it against something you like to do].”

Step three is “make it easy.” Set the bar for your new spiritual practice so low that you can’t fail. If your new habit is saying a gratitude, then say one and say it in your head. If your new spiritual practice is meditation, meditate for five breaths–not five minutes–in the beginning. Build up your spiritual practice after you have succeeded in building the habit of doing the spiritual practice in the first place. Your goal is to get 1 percent better at doing this new thing every day, not 100% better at doing it on the first day. Make it easy.

Finally, make your spiritual practice satisfying. What is rewarded is repeated. My prayer bead bracelets are smooth and beautiful. It is sensorily satisfying for me to use them.

Eventually, the intrinsic reward of feeling less stress and more compassion is reason enough to use them, but in the beginning, it helped a lot that I loved and wanted to hold them, like a crow likes shiny objects. For a new spiritual practice to take root, make it obvious, make it attractive, make it easy, and make it satisfying.

Leo: Finally, why would you say that engaging in one or more spiritual practices matters for us?

Chris: Well, first, I would mention that there is a pretty good amount of research on at least some of these practices that shows they can be very good for us psychologically, physically and spiritually. They can even do things like lower blood pressure and relieve depression and anxiety. I also think they help ground and sustain us, especially when times are tough. They help us gain perspective and give us a sense of interconnectedness and belonging. And I think we are really going to need practices that help give us this resilience as we come up a new year where we know things like a senate impeachment trial and an election that likely to get very ugly will be happening. Finally, I would say that our practices do not all have top be individual. We can support each other. We can develop shared practices such our guided meditation group. These bind us together, deepen our relationships and reminds us that during these challenging times, we are never truly alone.

Leo: Lee, Why should people go to the trouble of developing spiritual practices?

Lee: I think your identity–indeed your humanity–is tied to your daily habits. To me, karma is a kind of compounding of habits. Peaceful, loving people practice being peaceful and loving. They do peaceful and loving things daily. Spiritual practices are embodied actions consonant with the kind of people we want to be. With practice, we become those kinds of people.

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