The Trifecta.

You.

Your path.

Me.

The old supportive, sturdy tree to lean on.

St. Raphael in the Valley, Benson Arizona

Us.

The door. The growth. The life.

The Bellbrook Story.

A couple of years ago, a friend and I collaborated on a potential book of retreat centers and sanctuaries throughout the country. Joyce dearly loved escaping the world for contemplative and sacred places, as have I, and because I didn’t have the resources to fulfill the dream of building my own, visiting and writing about them were the next best things. Unfortunately, life, and then death, got in the way. She passed away in 2019, and her best friend, also a friend of mine but with whom I hadn’t been in regular contact, called with the sad news and a proposition. We formed a two-person writing group duo and practiced regularly throughout the year. At the same time, an uncannily-timed onslaught of writing workshops and courses came to my email inbox. I joined everything I could and, in writing and listening, I became clearer about what I wanted to work on. It was jumbled and didn’t make much sense even in my head for a long time, but I felt Flow. And then I felt Place. I won’t go into the details here, but it involved the last day with someone I loved, which was accidentally spent at the Woodland Cemetery in Dayton, Ohio, where Erma Bombeck is buried.

I fell in love with retreating about 15 years ago, when a friend suggested that I find a peaceful escape from some neighborhood misery at the time. I was so fortunate to find the Franciscan Center in Oldenburg, Ohio. My son is my love in this world, but the OFC was (it sadly was sold in 2015) a close second. I spent the next few years staying at several other retreat centers around the Midwest, and continued this practice when I moved to the Southwest. I have visited quite a few in both Arizona and New Mexico, but fell in love with The Desert House of Prayer here, where I worked part-time and regularly retreated for three years until it closed due to 2020’s unfortunate circumstances. (Rita Winters wrote a book called, “The Green Desert”, which is the most lovely of tributes to this place and experience. It will make you fall in love with retreating, if you haven’t already.)

The Office Manager (and friend) suggested that I visit the Holy Trinity Monastery in St. David, Arizona. It was also closed at the time, but on the way home through another tiny desert town, I slammed on my brakes when I saw it. A little church. Unassuming, but its design and structure enthralled me. I took entirely too many pictures and couldn’t stop thinking about it when I got home. I actually emailed the vicar to request a tour, visited, and felt immediately at home with the people, their missions, and of course, the place. I went back two weeks later, for no good reason, and noticed a For Sale sign in front of a place nearby that I didn’t see on my first trip. Also a church, on 5 acres, with a separate office building. All for $185K.

And then, I received an out-of-the-blue email newsletter from a writers’ studio I belonged to 20 years ago. It was a lovely place in town, but set back in some woods. It was a personal residence originally, but new owners bought it, did a little rehab, and opened the Indiana Writers’ Center. They eventually grew enough to add another building for speakers and now it’s grown so much, they’ve moved to a larger (and more “corporate”) location.

What to do with all this? So many disconnected ideas, and yet so much synchronicity.

When overwhelmed with too many ideas, we can end up with a list of to-do tasks or unfinished projects. Or maybe we end up lost or stuck and don’t yet know how to or want to start.

There is joy in the practice of approaching something with a beginner’s mind. I want that for myself, and I want that for you.

So this is my beginner’s story. I’d love to hear yours!!

Thank you.

Two YouTube videos from Mel Robbins that I think are very helpful when we’re thinking of sharing our creative selves:

A few posts on the site to my trying to make sense of it all: