Nourishing Seasonal Practices

“Practice makes your moments more intentional and vivid. And it allows you to be more available to what matters most to you in life.”

Kristi Nelson, Wake Up Grateful

Many around the globe are entering a season that invites connection and joy but one that can also be difficult. Some of us become too busy, and others of us would relish more community. Some have much to celebrate and others are grieving. Life continues with its poignant mix of experiences and emotions, and the holidays can highlight any gap between how we wish life were and how it actually is.

Adopting a simple practice can sometimes offer the support and inspiration we need. As Kristi Nelson suggests in the quote above, committing to a practice can help us be more present to what matters most to us — a deepening of our lived experience any time of year. So whether you’re looking for ways to remain centered and clear during the holidays or ways to enhance your experience of gratefulness, consider trying one of the 7-day practices below and discover how they might serve as both rudder and lighthouse for the days ahead.

Cherishing Connection

We exist in a constellation of human relationships that is at once complex, life giving, and beautiful. Even in times of loneliness or despair, we remain bound to one another — held, even — by the smallest of daily acts, the realities of interdependence, and the mysteries of the heart. While this constellation of human connection always illuminates our lives, we experience it most powerfully when we turn toward it with attention and care.

This 7-day practice offers resources and guided reflections that help build, nurture, and cherish the connections in our lives, culminating with a focus on how to gather with intention — perhaps the perfect inspiration for your holiday planning.

7-Day Gratitude Journey — Reflection.app

The brand new 7-Day Gratitude Journey offers a guided, inspirational pathway for Grateful Living, focused on the foundational principle Life Is a Gift and themes such as wonder, connection, and healing. Created in collaboration with our partners at Holstee and hosted on their Reflection.app, this practice is perfect for those who love a good app or for anyone wanting to try something new! 

Each day offers a powerful quote from Br. David Steindl-Rast and other Grateful Living voices, a brief framing, guiding question, and private online journal space. Consider sharing this option with a special young person in your life!

Tending the Rituals of Our Lives

This season is full of rituals, from private reflection to community events, lighting candles to playing music, meditation to prayer. We gather and reflect, celebrate and praise. What better time to take stock of the rituals in our lives, carry them out with intention, and perhaps create something new?

This weeklong practice explores the many ways that rituals can guide, connect, and heal us; invites us to deepen the rituals that are central to our lives; and inspires the creation of new rituals to light our individual and collective paths. If you’re looking to deepen the rituals in your life and carry them out with intention and creativity, this practice will support your journey.

All the practices we offer throughout the year are free, with an option to donate in support of our ongoing work.
If you are moved to support what we do and offer, please consider making a year-end gift here. Thank you.

Photo by Arthur Poulin