In May of 2019, when I came home from my three-week-travels in Scotland, and home from a one-week-long retreat on the Holy Isle of Iona, Scotland, I didn't say much about what I had seen, and felt, and learned. And known. About what I had intuitively known.
It took me a few months to unpack all of this intellectually, emotionally and spiritually. Those few months were very much a percolating time. A time to collect my thoughts and to collect myself. It was very much a gathering time. A time for me to put everything on the table, put it in context, put it in perspective, and, put it up front where I could fully appreciate it, all of it.
I didn't ever say that I came home a changed person, but I see this all so clearly now. That summer was a major turning point in my faith journey. And in my personhood. In the Autumn of 2019, I began to write. I guess I had something to say!
I had written creatively, poetically, liturgically for many years, but never professionally other than legally in my daily required nursing notes and documentations.
November 2019 found me penning the outline of my very first fiction novel. And, when I set it aside to allow it 'to become' on its own, I then collated a lot of my previously written prose and prayers and contemplative musings. I created a psalm-based prose collection, intricately interlaced with the ancient Celtic Wisdom. It was published first!
Then, after some welcomed and insightful editing from a seasoned fiction editor, my contemplative novel was published! Then, through the idle months of Spring and Summer of 2021, I created a seasons-based prose collection, which was married up with my very own woodland and wilderness photography. Book number three was born!
So, back-tracking now. In the words "intuitively known" .... Just what did I discover that I had intuitively known? In the word "unpack" .... Just what knowledge and wisdom and truth and insight did I unpack? In the word "changed" .... Just how had I changed, transformed, transcended?
Hmmmmm .... Well .... Just again yesterday, I stood in a small intimate ceremony at Victoria University in the University of Toronto, with fourteen other students who had just completed their Celtic Wisdom Curriculum in the School of Celtic Consciousness, led by author and Celtic Wisdom Scholar, John Philip Newell. And today, I feel I will soon, again, be 'unpacking' all that I have seen, felt, learned and known, intuitively known, through my journey of Celtic Wisdom study. Life is good. So very good.
And, I welcome all of this. My unpacking. My changing. And my intuitive knowing. Such a beautiful place to be, here and now. Such a beautiful place to deep dive, to muse, to contemplate, to discern, to grow, to understand, to reveal, to voice, to share, to become.
Sigh.
God, please walk with me as I unpack the volumes, the truth, and the Light.
God, be with me, as I unpack, as I find my way.
God, with me .... Amen.