March 1, 2025

Sacred Kinship is one of the nine points of the Enneagram of Soul and is found at Point Six. 

Sacred Kinship is the landing place for sacred hospitality, sacred interaction, sacred family, sacred friendships, and all matters relating to our soul and community. Without Sacred Kinship, we would have no spiritual ties to others. With Sacred Kinship, we access the human family and have more intimate connections with family, friends, and the sacred community. 

February 28, 2025

A dear person with whom I share a spiritual kinship recently had a health crisis. They were in that scary time while awaiting the results of medical tests. Fear and uncertainty over health matters can be pretty challenging for anyone. I was feeling their anxiety and realized that they would benefit from some much-needed support from our spiritual community, of which they are a part. 

February 27, 2025

Sacred Kinship is essential because it supports our true nature. Those with whom we share Sacred Kinship experience our soul, its spiritual nature, and the spiritual intentions of our being. And we experience theirs. However, people who know us superficially are not in the circle of sacred Kinship and, therefore, know mostly our outer selves. Because we are not consciously in Sacred Kinship with these dear souls, it is less likely that the more intimate aspects of our spiritual lives will be shared. 

February 26, 2025

Why is a spiritual community so powerful? The apostle Paul spoke to the question when he says in First Corinthians, “Now you are Christ’s body, and each of you a limb or organ of it” (12:27). He talks about all believers being in one body in Christ. A genuinely spiritual community has tremendous power that transforms its members, and the people they touch. Community members take on the various parts of the body, which, in concert, makes a unified functioning body. In the Christian community, this is part of the larger body of Christ. 

February 25, 2025

I first heard the word “kin” in family discussions as a child. For example, a relative would ask if someone was “kin” to someone else, meaning were they were part of the same biological family. Or the word would be used to state that someone is a biological relative of a specific family—for instance, “Aunt Ruth is kin to the Robins family.” Then I noticed that the word “kin” and “kinship” could also be used to describe relationships that are close but not necessarily biological. 

February 24, 2025

One of the most effective ways of reconnecting with our peace is through the spoken word. When disheartened or afraid, our unchecked ego mind can work overtime to help us feel better. Depending on our ego type and stress level, it may tell us many things — all the way from “Don’t worry” to “You are doomed.” But many times, in overwhelming fear and discouragement, our ego’s efforts don’t work. If fear and negativity get a foothold, it’s very hard for others to comfort us. If something doesn’t happen to relieve the situation, we can move toward panic and depression. When we’re completely out of touch with our peace, it’s time for the soul to take over. 

February 23, 2025

In the womb, we float in amniotic fluid, and nurturance is provided through the umbilical cord. We don’t expend energy on navigating the world or making our needs known; they are automatically met. We are carried around in a warm container insulated from the outside world. Though there are a lot of sounds in the womb, such as voices, mother’s digestion, and heartbeat, we are used to these sounds because they have been there forever. So, we begin life in relative calm and peacefulness. But our peaceful condition is disturbed once we come into the world with its demands, fears, desires, and stressors. Our essence is preserved in our soul child years, but as demands increase, we eventually give control over to the ego.  

February 22, 2025

It is challenging to be peaceful with ourselves, especially in the middle of chaos and conflict. One of my most potentially chaotic situations is making it through TSA (Transportation Security Administration) checkpoints in airports. Besides standing in long lines, we passengers must keep track of our IDs and boarding passes while unloading our pockets, taking off coats, belts, shoes, and glasses, and unloading our phones, computers, wallets, passports, and watches, and placing them in bins. 

February 21, 2025

Emotions such as terror, anxiety, confusion, hatred, dread, and any of the nine major passions are part of life. Such emotions and passions are brought about by life's difficulties, such as abandonment, sickness, illness, loss, injury, death, and the myriad of traumas we experience of mind, body, and heart. To have Peace in the face of these difficult or even terrible experiences, we must have a belief system that provides strength, faith, and hope. 

February 20, 2025

One of the greatest enemies of peace is uncertainty. In uncertain times, we want reassurance that all is well. But oftentimes, that assurance is not available. There may be a huge financial problem or a health issue that cannot be solved readily. Maybe someone we care about is in a severe crisis, and we do not know what to do.

February 19, 2025

Having and keeping peace within ourselves is a wonderful state of being. Those who live spiritually and desire peace must surrender their burdens to a power beyond themselves. But to release our burdens, we must often also surrender our complete understanding and control of them. Then we can place the burdens in the care of a superior understanding. This superior understanding is that of the Divine. 

February 18, 2025

Are you at peace? If you are, what makes you peaceful? If you are not, what prevents it? Peace is calmness and tranquility; it is the absence of conflict and the expression of harmony. In peacefulness, we are serene and emanate serenity.

February 17, 2025

There is a saying that I love: “Let’s make new memories.” These words remind me that every present moment will become a memory, and we can be conscious of making good ones. This is not to say that all memories must be good ones. We still need to remember some of them regardless of their unpleasantness. But making new memories conveys the notion that the memories made will somehow enhance the relationship.

February 16, 2025

It was 1971 and we five young men made a list of things we wanted to experience as we backpacked across Europe. That summer we traveled all the way from northern Norway to Naples in southern Italy. Among the places we visited was Dachau, the Nazi concentration camp in Germany.

February 15, 2025

When I visit my old friend in the memory unit of his retirement facility, he doesn't know who I am. He is around my age, and we have been very good friends for decades. I attended his wedding, and we became fathers around the same time. We shared our faith over the years. He is a wonderful person whose disease slowly took him away from his dear family and from lots of us who cared about him. Ralph, I will call him, is an intelligent man with a varied career and many experiences that make his life interesting and colorful. His most incredible qualities are warmth and knack for seeing the truth. 

February 14, 2025

Fortunately, my treasure chest of beautiful memories is overflowing. In reflection, one such memory lights up the sky of my heart like a shooting star. 

As a child, I always enjoyed my extended family; I loved my grandmother, aunts, uncles, and cousins. I even loved my aunts and uncles by marriage.

February 13, 2025

When we re-play the movies of our memories, we re-experience emotions we had when the memory was made. Some of us have terrible memories whose emotions sweep over us, sending us into sadness, guilt, grief, anger, and more. Many come in the form of unwanted flashbacks brought on by specific places, people, sounds, smells, and even odors. Emotions that we can’t work through are not healthy for us. But when we work through why the memory is so destructive, it can become an agent of healing and wholeness.  

February 12, 2025

Memories are stored and accessed on three levels: the subconscious, the pre-conscious, and the conscious. All three levels are important. Memories held in the subconscious are not in our conscious awareness. These are forgotten memories that are deposited or stored in our subconscious. Also in our subconscious are memories that have been suppressed and repressed. These can be recalled through dreams, hypnosis, guided imagery, and other means. Memories can be stored in the pre-conscious, a special territory between the subconscious and the conscious. Because pre-conscious memories are just below the surface of the conscious level, they can be re-membered more readily. Memories in the conscious level of our mind are the most readily accessible to us.