So many skins have fallen off of me. My “skins” have included old messages and assumptions about life that developed in my childhood, behaviors that bound me to unhealthy ways of approaching life, religious beliefs that kept my spiritual world too small, and boxed-in views of my self-identity. Skin-shedding has been a time of discovering what keeps me from growing. Joyce Rupp, Dear Heart, Come Home
1) What skins have your shed?
2) What skins would you like to shed?
3) Have you spent time in the darkness?
-What do you most resist about the cave of darkness?
-How has darkness been a teacher for you?
-List significant times you have experienced darkness.
Fear often enters into the process of skin-shedding. Kathleen Norris writes: “Fear is not a bad place to start a spiritual journey. If you know what makes you afraid, you can see more clearly that the way out is through the fear.”
List your fears. Study each fear, which ones are imaginary and which ones are real?
What comes to you as you write down your fears? Choose one or two and do a ten minute free write about that fear.
Remember, no editing or critiquing, just write all that comes up for you.
Ardine Martinelli 