Sharing Circle: The Moon
What is your personal connection to the Moon? Does the Moon ever symbolize something for you? Does tracking its cycles take you back to a more organic relationship to time?
Sharing Circle: The Sea
What is the meaning of The Sea in your life?
Sharing Circle: Rainbows
What does the Rainbow symbol mean in your life?
Is there a time that a rainbow lifted your spirits to a moment of enchantment or transcendence?
Torah Study: Well as Meeting Place
Wells play an important role in the Torah. Abraham and his son Isaac measure wealth in terms of the many wells they have dug (Genesis 26:12-22). The Torah has a number of stories about matches being made at a village well. That makes sense since the job of drawing water often went to the young women of the house, and the well was a place where men and women might mingle with propriety (the original “watering hole”). (more…)
A Midrash: Wellsprings as Source of Divine Inspiration
The Midrash takes the biblical story of Jacob meeting Rachel at the well, and “runs with it,” insisting that the scene, with its evocative well, three (mystical number) flocks, and stone (gateway to the well) holds many symbolic allusions to future Jewish history. In particular, the water of the well is a symbol of the Holy Spirit,Ruach Ha-Kodesh, Divine Inspiration:
Sharing Circle: Water From Underground
Filling Your Well
Some of the ways I fill my well are: Torah study, prayer, meditation, time in nature, exercise, talking to loved ones, going on retreats. For some people it may be gardening, art (doing or appreciating), poetry, literature.
Right now, are you overflowing, or feeling dried up? What are your sources of inspiration? How do you refill your inner wellspring? Do you dip in regularly? (more…)
Sharing Circle: Wind and Spirit
Sharing the Spirit
Join the virtual Sharing Circle and comment here to share your experiences with wind, spirit, scent, or any of the other themes in this Gateway.
A few questions to get you started: (more…)
Sharing Circle: Mountains
Peak Experiences
Have you had an experience of trial, vision, spirituality or exaltation in a mountain environment?
Have you had a “peak” experiences (at any altitude)? What was it like?
Do you have any practice or do anything to nurture peak experiences? If you have one, how do you bring it “down the mountain” into your everyday life?
Sharing Circle: Wilderness and Desert
Wilderness and Desert Experience
How do you empty your mind of clutter and find the awe?
Have you had a formative or healing experience in the desert, or in any wilderness setting?
What does the Midbar mean in your life, whether as an actual location or a state of mind? (more…)
Sharing Circle: Trees
Trees in Your Life
Join the virtual circle and share your reflections.
Did (or do) have have a tree that played a big role in your life? What kind of tree, where was/is it, and what is your relationship to it?
How do you protect, enjoy, and celebrate trees?
Please share the names of organizations you support that plant trees and protect our environment. (more…)
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