NUDGINGS: a journey into the unknown

“It was a cold but sunny January Day. The surface of the parking lot and the sidewalk was snow covered an just a little slippery. I was standing contemplating the step up to the sidewalk wishing I had brought my cane from the car when I saw a hand extended to me. It belonged to an elderly gentleman. I thanked him for ‘the helping hand’ and we chatted pleasantly as we both went into the pharmacy, he to find his wife and me to pick up a prescription.” It was just a small, unimportant encounter that lasted only a few minutes. But I found myself reliving it over and over again in the days and weeks that followed. It made me smile, that simple, unimportant event. I might well say it made my day! Unfortunately he doesn’t know what a lift he gave me just when I needed it most.  I hear people all the time saying, “I want to do something to make the world a better place but what can I really do? Nothing !” And yet by the simple gesture of offering me hand, this gentleman changed my...

 February is 'Heart Month" in Canada, and a good time to look at just how the writers of the Bible understood the word 'heart'.. For sure, they weren't thinking about heart attacks as the Heart and Stroke Foundation does today. “I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the Lord’, for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord”  (Jeremiah 31:33-34) “You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, to be known and read by all; and you show that you are a letter of Christ, prepared by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.”   (2 Corinthians: 3: 2-3) The human heart has been written about for hundreds of years  by poets and sages as the seat of where human emotion resides. Once a year, in ...

A miracle happened today at our house! We bought a new scale, an Aria, because it was suppose to interact with our Fitbit devices and our computers. After loading the software on both of our computers a couple of days ago, I stepped on it for the first time this morning. It immediately greeted me by name, and sent the information to the correct computer. How did it recognize me? A miracle! A dictionary definition of ‘miracle’ is: ‘an unusual or wonderful event that is believed to be caused by the power of God: a very amazing or unusual event, thing, or achievement’ For me, living in the first world, with constant exposure to computers, the second meaning, ‘ a very amazing … thing, or achievement’ explains my seeing it as a miracle. I know that someone (probably a lot of someones), somewhere, understands the why and the how. But for me, with my limited knowledge and understanding, it is nothing short of a miracle. Now, if I were to take this technology and place it in...

In a recent blog of Richard Rohr’s, ‘Transformation as Awakening’,  January 11, 2015, he asks the question:  "How can we turn information into transformation? How can we use the sacred texts, tradition, and experience to lead people into new places with God, with life, and with themselves?” It would be nice if I could say Rohr then goes on to say exactly how that can be done and list those steps here for you!  Richard does go on however to include the following quote from Tobin Hart, author of From Information to Transformation and a professor of psychology, who maps six interrelated layers of knowing and learning:  1) information;  2) knowledge (where direct experience brings information to the level of mastery and skill);  3) intelligence (integrating intuitive and analytic),  4) understanding (seeing with the eye of the heart);  5) wisdom (blending truth with an ethic of what is right);  6)  and finally transformat...