This week’s Soulful Homes activity lifts up a theme-related mantra for your family to carry with them throughout the month. The authors invite us to think of these “family sayings” as tools for the journey, reminders that help us re-focus and steady ourselves and our kids as we navigate through life’s challenges and opportunities. Write them on sticky notes to put in your car, on kitchen cabinet fronts, on computer screens and/or your family message board. Share them out loud at home and out in the world, where and whenever the need arises.
We encourage you to use the “Soulful Homes” activities posted weekly to support your role as the primary religious educators of your children. These activities can help you stay engaged with the monthly theme and support you in carving out spaces for spiritual grounding and family connection. Staff will be including a weekly activity from Soulful Homes or another source once a week on this Family Ministry blog. Please contact me if you have questions, feedback or suggestions on how we can support families during this time of social distancing. Take care.
Rev. Claudia
faithdev@uuasheville.org.
March’s Mantra: What wisdom does this hold for me?
Sometimes we recognize wisdom right when we encounter it, but more often, it takes careful reflection, a little more life experience, or a good amount of time passing before we come to understand the deeper truth and meaning of what we’ve been part of or witness to.
Still, we know that our experiences–especially the challenging ones–are places where our wisdom is grown. This month, we invite you to keep the mantra in front of you whenever you find yourself facing something unusual or mildly unsettling: What wisdom does this hold for me?
Asking the question in and of itself can help us shift away from reactionary thinking and into more critical thinking. It also reminds us that when our beliefs or assumptions get shaken up a bit, it can be an opportunity for us to re-examine old ideas to either be sure they still fit or change them.
Realizing that you’re late on something you really, really wanted to do on time… “What wisdom does this hold for me?”
Noticing a couple or a parent and child arguing in public… “What wisdom does this hold for me?”
Disagreeing with a friend or acquaintance on a core belief of yours… “What wisdom does this hold for me?”
Again, you may only seldom have an answer, but the question is signaling a readiness to welcome epiphanies and realizations wherever they may be found, even in your challenges.
