"The ripening of maturity, beauty to behold!" by Diane Saunders

This semester I have had the opportunity to discover two valuable sources that have helped me immensely in navigating these unparalleled times in modern history with the advent of the Covid 19 pandemic.  I have worked over the past years with a Catholic parish community in East Mesa called St. Bridget of Kildare Catholic Community.  As a parish community we embrace the spirituality of St. Bridget as the parish patron saint.  St. Bridget was an abbess for a monastery of both men and women, and believed to be an ordained bishop, in 6th century Ireland. In her time Christianity adopted the Celtic notion of wells as holy sources of divine encounter.   This became a central understanding of the Irish people and their spirituality.  Many travel still today to Kildare, Ireland to visit St. Bridget’s well and the historic site of her monastery.  

I have leaned into this imagery for today as relatable in living in desert environs and in a challenging polarized society that often can feel dry and lifeless.  Inviting the search for wells of nourishment and life can enliven and empower people in the development of their own spiritual lives. Like Jesus, in his encounter with the women at the well in the gospels, they didn’t meet one another in church but in the marketplace.  In their encounter at the well, she discovered the Good News of a life of God that lives in her, through a well that never runs dry. The notion of ‘wells’ has offered a new metanarrative for spiritual growth as a Christian community today. 

In this post I would like to share with you two wells that I have discovered in this season of unparalleled world challenge.  Both, when brought together, can work to raise us up a bit, offering a path for the cultivation of maturity for today. My hope is in encouraging a ripening of maturity for these times, it might offer a shift beyond our deadening western right and wrong cultural grip. 

One well is the work of Dr. Carole Whitaker, a scientist whose current work focuses on the science of spirituality.  The other well is the Storytelling Institute at South Mountain Community College.  Dr. Whitaker has her doctorate in Chemistry from UCLA and taught as a college professor for many years. From UCLA she also gleans from the Mindful Awareness Research Center for her work today. She also was a Catholic religious sister for 18 years before beginning her doctorate.  She has brought at this season of her life both fields together to offer workshops, classes and lectures on the Science of Spirituality.  Dr. Whitaker in her workshops uses a chart that demonstrates the ways of knowing in relationship to growth and human consciousness.  I would like to share her chart and how I imagine storytelling as the tool to foster maturity.

She identifies from the bottom of the pyramid going up Ways of Knowing and the consciousness it cultivates:

1. Spirit accessed through sacred silence produces the Mystics’ Gift. 
2. Soul accessed through feeling producing the Shaman’s Gift. 
3. Mind accessed through reason producing the Philosopher’s Gift.  
4. Body accessed through the senses producing the Scientist’s Gift.  

She suggests that our Western culture has elevated the Mind as the primary way of knowing.  She demonstrates how this can be extremely limiting and narrow. Additionally, when people as individuals or communities experience pain, grief and trauma they can get trapped in their mind causing stunted growth and illness.  I found this helpful in naming how we have possibly become a culture in regression, a culture of blame and shame response, creating polarization. The result is disintegration of individuals and society as a whole. 

I have been greatly inspired in observing the utilization of Storytelling in the class on Using Storytelling for a Variety of Settings. It has been awe inspiring to discover this tool and the shifts it invites.  I would like to propose how Storytelling can begin to dismantle the frozen polarized state in both individuals and communities.  My suggestions for growing maturity in ways of knowing are below:

1. Soul level of knowing matures to Wisdom through stories. Stories engage feelings and stir the imagination, opening access to soften the hardened, closed heart. I would like to suggest that storytelling cultivates Wisdom, and Wisdom grows maturity.
2. Mind level of knowing matures to Understanding through stories. Stories open the mind to dialogue and an exchange of knowledge and ideas. Understanding represents the maturity of knowledge, having engaged with others thoughts, cultures, ideas and information. This fosters a welcome of ideas and knowledge found in the other.
3. Body level of knowing matures to Expression.  Stories call upon the senses through the opening of experience.  Our senses can get frozen in the body having negative effects on health.  Stories offer the freeing of the senses through personal expression. 
4. Spirit level of knowing matures to Insight. Stories invite a person to reflect on life’s bigger questions reflecting on the meaning in life and the question of call and purpose.  Stories invite transformational growth, aha moments filled with the grace of new Insight. 

My musings invite the mingling of these two wells in the hope of storytelling lighting the spark of inner transformational growth.  Thus, calling forth maturity in knowing, with the growth of Wisdom, Understanding, Expression and Insight.  Maturity offers the possibilities of breaking through the hardened polarized ground of these desert times in the Right vs. Wrong, Red vs. Blue, Fox vs. CNN, Boomers vs. Millennials mentalities.  I am grateful for the discovery of this remarkable well of storytelling.  I hope to find ways to invite others into its nourishing magical refreshment in all aspects of life, in our desert community and times.

Comments

[Nancy Allen Wolter]

Diane! This is wonderful. I love St. Bridget---my daughter was baptized there years ago, when Father John was pastor. I also know Carole Whitakerwho has been a superb spiritual teacher (she taught the Wisdom of the Enneagram at the Casa). You've inspired me to look her up and take more workshops with her.

[Myranette Robinson]

I love the way you used wells and water in this post. it reminds me of some translations of the Bible to guard our hearts because from it flow the springs of life. When we are careful with our hearts as well as others, it makes us see how precious all lives are.