What is spiritual direction?

The goal of spiritual direction is to cultivate openness and responsiveness to the Spirit’s presence in our lives. Individuals usually seeks out a spiritual director because they need to be heard by someone they trust as they give voice to their deepest spiritual concerns, questions, and yearnings. The spiritual director serves as a companion on the journey, listening attentively, without pressure or expectation, to whatever comes to the surface as people seek to give expression to their experience of the holy in their lives

Kathleen Fischer says in Women at the Well that spiritual direction is "a conversation in which a person seeks to answer the question, ‘What is spiritual growth and how do I foster it in my life?’ The exchanges that comprise a spiritual direction relationship focus on awareness of and response to God in one’s life. But since God is the deepest dimension of all experience, the conversation will range over every area of existence. Spiritual direction concerns the movement of our entire lives in and toward God."

There are few road maps for spiritual direction. Each relationship is unique. Over the course of time, the two seek to discern what is emerging in the person’s life — where there are blocks or fears that are preventing a deeper communion with God and where there is movement and change and growth.

If you are seeking a nonjudgmental place where your experiences will be taken seriously and held in confidence, then spiritual direction may be what you seek.

What spiritual direction is not:

Spiritual direction is not counseling or psychotherapy. The focus of spiritual direction is to pay attention to and nurture relationship with God. Those with complex emotional problems or dilemmas will need the assistance of a therapist or twelve-step groups. However, spiritual direction can work in tandem with therapy.

Spiritual direction does not offer quick solutions. A spiritual director cannot answer or solve all spiritual dilemmas, quandaries, and questions. No one can do another’s spiritual "work." The director is also a seeker rather than someone who has "arrived."

Spiritual direction offered by Leaven

The Leaven Center provides a beautiful, restful context for individual retreats. Meditative pathways wind through woods, through fields of wildflowers, and alongside the Grand River. A bench in the orchard looks out over rolling farmland. By a spring-fed stream you can pause to listen to water tumbling over moss-covered rocks.

Times: One-hour sessions can be scheduled to occur monthly, every other week, or weekly.

Cost: Contact your spiritual director for fee information.

Location: Sessions can be held at the Leaven Center in Lyons (midway between Lansing and Grand Rapids) or by arrangement in the Lansing area.

Directed Retreats: The Heron Rising Guest House next door to the Leaven Center can be reserved for overnight, weekend, or week-long retreats. Periodic meetings between director and retreatant can be scheduled during the retreat. Directed retreats can also take place at the Lodge when space is available.

 

Leaven’s Adjunct Spiritual Directors

April Allison is a graduate of the Internship in Spiritual Direction at St. Francis Retreat Center in DeWitt, Michigan. For 10 years she was on the staff of The Leaven Center. She is a Quaker (Religious Society of Friends), and serves on the Worship and Pastoral Care Committee of her meeting. She also travels in the ministry as an elder and companion through the Friends General Conference Traveling Ministries Program. In addition to offering spiritual direction, April runs the Heron Rising Guest House for use by individuals or small groups who wish to make a private retreat. She can be reached at aprilallison@heronrising.com or 989-855-2277.

Carol Ingells is a spiritual director, teacher and former hospital chaplain. She has taught spirituality, prayer and meditation through retreats, presentations, and classes, for almost 30 years. She has a private practice in spiritual guidance/direction. An active lay leader at St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Lansing, she also has a long history of diocesan leadership, particularly in religious education. As a chaplain, she worked in hospital emergency and critical care for ten years and co-created an exceptional training program for lay chaplain assistants.

Her background in public and religious education, ecumenical program development and leadership, chaplaincy, and training in spiritual guidance at Shalem Institute in Washington, DC, gives her a strong foundation for a ministry of listening, acceptance, and compassion. She has studied with Parker Palmer, Henri Nouwen, and Locke E. Bowman, Jr., among others. Her late husband, Norris Ingells, was a journalist and photographer, well known throughout Michigan for his work in promoting social justice, environmental quality, and nature education. Their daughter, Melissa Ingells, is  local host for Morning Edition on WKAR-FM, MSU Public Radio. She can be reached at cningells@earthlink.net.

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