Daily Nourishment for May 28, 2024: Delve into Yourself
Daily Nourishment Read Time: 40 seconds
Pause/Prompt/Practice Time: 10-15 minutes
“Delve into yourself for a deep answer.” - Rainer Maria Rilke
Pause.
Take six deep breaths with a six-count inhale and a six-count exhale.
Prompt.
Read the quote below two or three times.
“I ask you, dear sir, to have patience with all that is unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves, like closed rooms, like books written in a foreign language.
Don’t try to find the answers now. They cannot be given anyway, because you would not be able to live them. For everything is to be lived.
Live the questions now. Perhaps you then may gradually, without noticing, one day in the future, live into the answers. Perhaps you bear within yourself the capacity to imagine and shape a sacred way of life. Prepare yourself for that. Trust what comes to you.”
- Rainer Maria Rilke, translated by Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy
Practice.
Journal, take notes, or begin writing a new poem, story, or essay using the quote above and the questions below.
—Which questions do you want answers to right now?
—Which questions do you want to ignore?
—What might it look like to live your questions instead of finding answers to them? What would you do differently today? Tomorrow? Next week?
—What sacred way of life do you want to shape? What would you let go of? What would you hold onto?
Want More?
Read more from Rilke on the writing life from Letters to a Young Poet:
“There is only one single way. Go into yourself. Search for the reason that bids you write; find out whether it is spreading out its roots in the deepest places of your heart, acknowledge to yourself whether you would have to die if it were denied you to write. This above all-ask yourself in the stillest hour of your night: must I write? Delve into yourself for a deep answer. And if this should be affirmative, if you may meet this earnest question with a strong and simple ‘I must,’ then build your life according to this necessity; your life even into its most indifferent and slightest hour must be a sign of this urge and a testimony to it.”
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Upcoming Workshops & Gatherings:
—The May Co-Writing Schedule is live. Learn more here.
—Two bonus and complimentary Revision Stations Designed by Lauren Winner gatherings are scheduled for next Saturday, June 1st from 10:15-11:30 a.m. CT and Sunday, June 2nd from 3-4:15 p.m. CT. We had four extra Revision Stations from Lauren that we didn’t get to yesterday, so I’m offering two complimentary Revision Stations gatherings to Spiritual Direction for Writers® subscribers and all SDW Members. If you’re a SDW subscriber, you can sign up by sending an email to me at charlotte@charlottedonlon.com. Anyone who signs up will receive the Zoom link for the Saturday and Sunday sessions. Both sessions will include the same four Revision Station prompts.
Learn more details about these fantastic gatherings here: Revision Stations Designed by Lauren Winner.
Today’s Daily Nourishment was provided by Charlotte Donlon.
*Please help us protect our intellectual property, our creative process, and the integrity of our work. Spiritual Direction for Writers® Daily Nourishment is covered under the Spiritual Direction for Writers® trademark. You are welcome to share this link with others, but any other use (written or spoken) is prohibited without written permission from Charlotte Donlon.