Scenes from a writing weekend

Over the weekend I had the good fortune to attend a women’s writing and meditation retreat. I can’t think of anything I would rather have been doing in the first days of the new year than listening to poetry, writing, practicing yoga, watching the breath, walking in the woods.

Here is the way our retreat room greeted us on Friday afternoon:

Retreat room

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From a contemplative weekend

I just spent several beautiful and quiet days next to Tomales Bay and Point Reyes, California. (Yes, by myself I’m raising the earth temp from all my recent air travel.) The occasion was a retreat for academics sponsored by the … Read More…

We, the Earth: Ecological crisis as spiritual practice

“There is no separate self,” say the Buddhists. Twenty-five years ago I couldn’t warm up to the idea. Of course selves are separate; that’s why I was putting so much individual work into building one. Separate self? It was repetitious, … Read More…

Connecting with a cottonwood

It’s a treat to return in August to Prescott, Arizona, with its annual din of cicadas. Today, as I approach the corridor of trees lining summer-dry Granite Creek, the chorus of insects in the treetops is boisterous. Eagerly I slip … Read More…