The Bridge #133
in which we explore "soulfulness"
Hello
& Welcome ! The Bridge is a newsletter connecting the professional and the personal creatively across cultures and a diversity of topics, until we are not only full of ideas but also ready to take action. Thanks for joining in the conversation.
The past year I’ve gotten more comfortable using the word “spirituality” to describe something that holds meaning for me and my family in how we live out our values. When talking with a close friend, though, recently I found myself talking more about soulfulness and about a love for life and for my community that extends beyond romantic love or friendship love, it’s a soulful love.
More and more, I believe we as humans — and particularly as changemakers, striving to improve the world as it is, to make the economy more fair, to care for our planet better, to honor indigenous wisdom, to respect the needs and desires of all people — will need to engage more fully with soulfulness. Because it’s not only about personal development or therapy or community organizing or advocacy, though all of that is important as well. It’s also about conscious investing, rooted parenting, creative entrepreneurship, authentic networking, and embodied healing. To hold all that together, I feel strongly we must pay closer attention to soulfulness.
Something Curious (perhaps)
With my family of four — my partner and two daughters (12 and 4 years old) — we have started a ritual in which we write down on a post-it once a week something we’re grateful for, then we put our post-it notes in a jar, and for Thanksgiving weekend we emptied the jar out and read all the notes.
This ritual of gratitude is one of several we have “formalized” in order to embed certain rhythms into our family dynamic that strengthen our values. We’ve always known as a family that gratitude is important. We didn’t want it to become “mere words,” nor did we want to rely only on our ability to remember “being grateful” — as during times of stress or busyness, we can often forget what matters most to us. So we created a habit that we hold collectively, in the hopes that gratitude becomes more interwoven into our family fabric. So far, it’s working :)
We’re also playing with a family prayer that we have written together, that is non-religious, and that allows us to share with one another what is challenging us that day and what are we celebrating. It’s a way to “make special” a certain kind of conversation at dinnertime and to remind ourselves as a family what matters.
& We are starting to talk explicitly with other families about shared holiday rituals, extending the typical festiveness into a celebration of values — community, joy, committed friendship, gathering. It’s not unlike what most people do for their holidays in general, but we’re trying to re-insert a certain intentionality and so re-create meaningfulness (or soulfulness?) that touches on something deep for all involved. We want to avoid overly superficial holiday interactions, because we don’t want to miss the opportunities to live most fully in relationship with those we love. It helps us remember why we gather.
All this I mention is an ongoing practice, and we are learning as we go. If it’s something that resonates with you, I’d love to hear how you’re exploring the topic.
Something to Consider
How to Like Poetry (Amateur Criticism)
The author Isaac Kolding (a Phd student in Buffalo) has written a beautiful essay on “how to like poetry” and what I enjoyed most is that the writing appears to follow a strict structure at first, and then becomes itself poetic, even while it gently encourages us to consider differently, or to pay closer attention to, poetry. Here is something he says:
When my students tell me that poetry is boring, I am convinced that they really mean that it confuses them. Like the child in the poem, I bring them handfuls of “grass,” and they say, like Whitman, “I don’t know what that is.” They look at these words, and for whatever reason—the language is confusing or dense or archaic—they can’t immediately understand what is happening. Then, they get worried and maybe even insecure. They want to understand what the poetry means. When the meaning does not present itself, they get frustrated. They stop at “I don’t know.” What Whitman teaches us is that, if we want to explore all of the meanings of grass, we can’t stop at “I don’t know.” We have to move on to the second part, where we make silly, conflicting, perhaps outrageous guesses. That is, as it turns out, where much of the fun is.
And Isaac Kolding continues to have fun writing this essay and unfolding the argument, which is in turns a defense of poetry and an invitation to “join in the fun.” He concludes by arguing that if we can learn to like poetry, we are practicing a kind of attentional freedom, and if we learn to appreciate the poetic act, we might even find (more often) meaningful beauty in the everyday of our lives!
Something to Listen to
Someone in my network shared about her interactions with this emerging artist who sings in Georgian and wears a kind of traditional robe as he DJs dance music with a special spice. I am not fluent in Georgian. I do not know a single word. Fortunately, this particular music video has English-language subtitles, but it’s still a bit puzzling to understand. He’s swirling between the worlds of electronic music and old georgian tradition; his name is the word for a toastmaster or table host at any Georgian feast. His commitment to the tradition feels to me not only dance-able but soulful, and so I share with you here.
A full goblet by my side, I await your judgment /
In a slumber, my enemy was thrown from me /
Your prayers will lift me - up to the sky /
You will come, I trust - or I will remain bound /
[musical interlude]
Something to Practice
Is there a way you could pay attention to the living world around you
with such intention and curiosity and patience
that you discovered a new perspective
that feels to you enlightening?
Better enlightening
than overwhelming, right?
(man, that’s heavy 😂)
JPC
Soulfull = Soulfree a wonderful rhythm you're practicing as a family and sharing with others.
I can imagine Gwenn moving to the music. A very interesting and enjoyable combination of rythyms .
Thank you for sharing yours. ⭐