Patricia Pearce

Helping You Be the Change

Becoming a Practicing Creative

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clay revelation
What in you is paralyzed, longing to be set free?

Whether I was weeping outwardly I don’t recall. What I do know is that inwardly I was — from gratitude and a deep sense of relief for what the lump of clay in my hands was revealing to me.

I was at a workshop led by theologian Walter Wink and his wife June Keener-Wink, a potter. We had just been studying a biblical story about Jesus healing a paralytic whose friends had hauled him up onto the roof of a house, dug through it, and lowered their friend down on his mat to get him near Jesus, who was teaching in a crowded room below.

After we studied the text, we did a role play, and then June gave us each a lump of clay and instructed us to go find a quiet place and simply work the clay as we held the question: What in me is paralyzed?Continue Reading

It’s Just One Thing After Another

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paintbrush
The great task is nothing but a series of small acts.

At our house, construction has been going on since last fall. After two years of planning we finally took the leap and had a roof deck built, and due to several factors — among them the most severe winter in recent memory — the project, which was supposed to have taken two months, has taken nearly eight.

It’s been grueling living in a construction zone, dealing with the dust and the disruption, although the end product is turning out to be everything we’d hoped for.

Part of the project included gutting, insulating and sheet rocking our home office, as well as ripping out and replacing the bathroom ceiling, and since the contractors finished their part of the interior work several weeks ago I’ve been very busy reclaiming our inner space: spackling walls, sanding, painting rooms and doors, and vacuuming up the plaster dust that managed to float into every nook and cranny.

Fortunately, an out of town guest was coming to stay with us a couple of weeks ago, and I say fortunately because having a firm deadline did wonders to keep me focused. I didn’t have the luxury of indulging the temptation to become overwhelmed, throw up my hands and fall into the pit of paralysis.Continue Reading

Solstice Greetings

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Rather than sharing a written post in honor of the Solstice, when we in the northern hemisphere experience the planet turning back toward the light, I thought I would share one of my collages instead.

May this season fill you with the knowing that mystery is real and possibilities are endless.

 

 

Happy Solstice to You All!

Patricia

 

 

Living by Heart

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The Heart creates from the limitless possibilities of uncertainty.

I’m recently back from retreat, and once again I am convinced that taking time away from the incessant noise of our society is good for my soul. I can hear myself so much more clearly when I’m unplugged than when I am constantly navigating and responding to external communications and distractions. I can tune in more completely to the wisdom of my heart that perceives possibilities that my analytical mind is simply unable to access.

While on retreat I always do a drawing or two by heart — meaning, I let my intuition guide the process — something I wrote about in a previous post, The Life of a Heartist. This year on retreat I again immersed myself in the fluid ways of intuitive knowing, and in the process I saw more clearly that when we live guided by the heart, we must by definition live in the field of uncertainty.

Our society values certainty. We live in a very left-brained culture that believes that in order to accomplish anything you must have a clearly laid out plan and you must focus your attention on numbers, statistics and “proven” strategies. All of that has its place, but only if it is in service to the heart’s desires and the heart’s guidance. To live a life in alignment with our deepest values and soul purpose, the heart must be in the driver’s seat.

I suspect one reason we prefer to live out of the analytical left-brain is that we feel more secure. If we can head out the door knowing exactly where we’re going and how we’re going to get there, we feel safe.

To live by heart is to live very differently. When we live by heart we center our lives not in certainty, but in trust. We don’t know ahead of time what the outcome of our actions nor the destination of our path will be. We simply follow the step-by-step leading of our intuition.Continue Reading

Yes, And: Life As Spiritual Improv

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What would Yes, And look like for you?

This past summer I met a woman who teaches comedy improv, and our conversation piqued my curiosity since I teach extemporaneous preaching, which is its own sort of improv. So I started doing a bit of research into improv, and what I discovered is that many of its principles — just as in the case of extemporaneous preaching — are the very same things that make for a spiritually aligned life.

The most important principle in improv is known as “Yes, And.” What it means is that when your improv partner does or says something during a scene, you accept what has been offered and then build on it with your own interesting response. By doing so you keep the action moving forward in an unexpected, creative and sometime hilarious direction.

One thing that kills improv is if one of the players takes a stance of “Yes, but” or simply “No,” refusing or ignoring what has been offered and instead forcing the scene to move in a direction based on his or her own desires which have nothing to do with what their partners have already created.

I see life as spiritual improv. It presents us with situations, sometimes quite unexpected, and it’s up to us what we do with them. If we let go of our resistance to what is and accept our situation, then we are able to respond imaginatively in a way that allows circumstances to evolve in an innovative direction.Continue Reading

Pas de Deux

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Where did the expression “leap and the net will appear” come from? When did it come into use? Is there evidence for its veracity? I guess I don’t have enough faith to assume that this vast Universe cares enough about any particular leap of mine to put a net under me in the nick of time.

They say spider’s silk has a relative tensile strength greater than steel cable. It is certainly far less visible and weighs a fraction of it. Is the tensile strength of the theoretical net-to-appear as strong as spider’s silk? Is it as invisible as wind?

Several years ago I was driving along a familiar road when out of the corner of my eye I saw a large hawk, high on a branch in a cluster of pines. I pulled over immediately and shut off the engine to watch this bird sitting silently amidst wind invisibly setting needles and branches dancing.

The bird was quite still. I watched. Time telescoped. I don’t know how long we stayed that way, in spacious time.

Spaciousness feels liberating –– a big inhale, ribs expanding, arms extending wide, followed by an exhalation of great relief. So comforting. A friend once explained her experience of Sabbath as “A Palace in Time.” In the luxury of spaciousness I can float, buoyed by invisible currents of thought or creativity or simply being. Yet without a center that can hold, vast openness can provoke anxiety.Continue Reading

We the Poets

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How long will it be until you call me sister?

It’s a typical afternoon at Al Aqsa Academy in South Kensington, Philadelphia. Back from recess, 30 third-graders burst into the classroom, carrying stories, alliances, and scuffles that began in the playground. Calmly, their teacher reminds them that it’s time for poetry, and we begin. I tape up a poster of N. Scott Momaday’s The Delight Song of Tsoai-Talee, which uses metaphor to capture the poet’s self-awareness and relationship to the world outside himself.

I am a feather on the bright sky
I am the blue horse that runs in the plain. . .

Its powerful repetitions are very pleasing. Students tap their feet to the rhythm of each line. Thinking of Walt Whitman, as well as my own Hebrew Sabbath prayers, I wonder if the children are reminded of Islamic prayers. Walking around the classroom, I glance at first drafts as students compose. Two wonderful poems stand out, written Zubair and Zayd. These thoughtful twins have written poetry for three years, since I begin lessons in first grade at this large Islamic day school.  When asked about the title of his poem, Zubair says that this is the poem of his life. His brother, Zayd, is quite concerned with the environment and what he can do to care for it.Continue Reading

Follow Your Tail

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If you had a tail, when would it wag?

Recently I was going out for coffee with a friend. As we walked across the cobblestone avenue to get to the bakery where we were headed, I saw furry black dog standing on a stoop, happily wagging its tail at the woman petting it.

I wondered what it would be like to have a tail to wag when happiness welled up in me.

“If I had a tail,” I thought, “what would make it wag?”

I know a dog, Jazz, who gets so excited when friends come to visit that even a wagging tail isn’t enough to express her delight. She fetches her stuffed rabbit whenever she sees them approaching, then dances in a circle in the living room when they step through the door.

Her joy is simply irrepressible.

In contrast to Jazz’s unabashed expression of joy, a few months ago I was driving cross-country when an idea floated into my mind: I ought to start writing music again. It was something I used to do a lot of, and it brought me great joy.

When the idea arose, I felt a gleeful delight fill my being. If I’d had a tail it would have been wagging like nobody’s business. But immediately, another part of me slammed down like a sledgehammer, telling me that writing music was an impractical and illegitimate use of my time.

The joyful part of me was crushed, tucked its tail between its legs and whimpered back into a shadowy corner of my being.

Fortunately, I had the presence of mind to notice what had just happened, and I was horrified. I mean, for decades I’ve been exploring my own creativity and encouraging others to do the same, and even worse, what had just transpired in me felt like an act of violence.

I did some inner work on it. I listened to that part of myself that had squelched the joyful idea to find out what was going on, and I couldn’t help but feel compassion. It was so anxious, and truly believed that following my joy was a frivolous, irresponsible luxury that would lead to disaster.

Since then I’ve been coaxing my joy back out of the dark corner where it had retreated, because I sense that the things that bring me joy are precisely the things the Universe wants to bring forth in and through me. A few months ago I even took my guitar out of its case and have added to my morning array of spiritual practices one more: improvising melodies and harmonies on my guitar. Nothing yet has evolved into a full-fledged song, but my heart is happy.

So, let me put the same question to you: What things bring you joy? If you had a tail, what would make it wag?

I hope you’ll honor those things, because I’m pretty sure that if you follow your tail, you’ll end up where you belong.