In previous iterations of the sabbatical, the term ‘soul care’ struck a chord with me. I was looking for a way to respond to the feelings of dissatisfaction and unease that I had been seeing among my friends and acquaintances – their jobs were okay, their friends and partners were fine, but everyone described this tension they felt between being grateful with what they had and a restlessness for more meaning. There may be a lot of different causes for this, but one explanation that caught my attention was in a report by Ministry Innovation Fellows at Harvard Divinity School.
It was written for the US context, but I think there are similarities that can be extracted. According to the authors, we’re “living in the crisis of in-between…tipping from one paradigm to the next, coming to understand the project of being human in new ways”. They explain it here:
Fifty years ago, most people in the United States relied on a single religious community to conduct spiritual practices, ritualize life moments, foster healing, connect to lineage, inspire morality, house transcendent experience, mark holidays, support family, serve the needy, work for justice, and—through art, song, text, and speech—tell and retell a common story to bind them together. Now, we might rely on the Insight Meditation Timer, mountain hikes, Afro-Flow Yoga, Instagram hashtags, Friday shabbatlucks, Beyoncé anthems, and protesting the Muslim Ban. But no common story.
As we’ve unbundled and remixed, we’ve also isolated and made insecure. If I write my gratitude journal alone and whisper a prayer in the shower, am I doing it right? Will I offend my friend with the text I send after her mother dies? With no collective place to share our deep sorrows and joys, they begin to feel illegitimate. And this is exactly what we have to relegitimize: binding ourselves together in our deepest experience of being human.
Care of Souls
The report goes on to describe 7 roles whose ancestors may be found in religious or secular practices and communities, that may be able to address the deeper human needs and desires that we have. I’m always fascinated by the ways that we can learn from different contexts, which is part of the reason why I’ve been attending Quaker meetings for the past two Sundays.
One of the new tools I learned about were Clearness Committees. In the clearness process, an individual meets with 3-4 other Quakers in a spirit of worship, listening and loving concern. The committee’s job is to help the person discover whether there is clarity to move forward with a matter, wait or take other action. The people on the committee listen deeply to the person’s questions and concerns, and they use careful, gentle open-ended questions to draw out clarity. They’re not there to give prescriptive advice, or to tell the individual to read a book or talk to an expert, but rather to help them uncover the layers of habitual thinking and get to deeper truths. For Quakers, having that silence and space provides room to hear the voice of God. Regardless of whether you believe in a higher power or not, I think there’s something to be said about tuning into your inner wisdom, and clearing out the stuff.
Parker Palmer, an author and activist who founded the Center for Courage & Renewal, explains how hundreds of years ago, Quakers had no clerical leaders to solve their problems for them – there was no head pastor or priest to whom you could take your questions (and still isn’t). As a result, Quakers needed to draw on both inner and communal resources to deal with personal problems. The committee members are not supposed to be experts in your particular issue. You select the people that you would like to have on your committee, and ideally they would know you from different areas of your life, and are people that you trust are able to keep their personal agendas at bay. Quakers I spoke to talked about how Clearness Committees could be used to help figure out if you should take that job, or whether you should get married (you can experience the committee as a couple), or a host of other life problems or big decisions that you may face.
I’ve had the privilege of being mentored by incredible friends and colleagues, for whom asking deep questions seems to come naturally to them, and I know the power that a conversation can have. Imagine how that power can be magnified by having several people you trust hold space for you as you grapple with an issue. How great would it be to have this in schools, or in workplaces? So here’s an open invitation to anyone who’s looking to experience this – if you’re working through something, I’d love to be part of your Clearness Committee, if you think it might help.
More resources:
Detailed how-to on holding a Clearness Committee from the Center for Courage and Renewal
9-min video from QuakerSpeak, project of the Friends Journal
STEP BY STEPH 