Discerning My Pathway, Trusting the Path-Maker
A Second Half of Life Prayer Exercise
I am in Australia visiting family while I write this. Getting around unfamiliar places means I rely on my phone’s GPS which gives me two options: turn-by-turn directions or a walking map. Not paying for cellular data while I am here means I have to take a picture of the GPS information before I set out.
Yesterday I went to the post office to mail cards to friends and family. Here are two ways GPS told me to get there.
One set of directions gives me information.
The other stimulates my imagination.
One set clearly marks my destination.
The other invites exploration.
I see here first and second half life invitations.
In the first half of life we want - we need - clear instructions and assurances of a real destination.
In second half of life, those instructions are still “written in our hearts,” but the freedom and confidence we have to imagine and explore life choices and life contributions come from a wisdom born of maturity and confidence in the mutual sharing of God’s joy and delight.
You make known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand (Ps 16).
The LORD makes firm the steps of the one who delights in him (Ps 37).
As Richard Rohr says, “we move from what I call meritocracy, quid pro quo thinking, to the huge ocean of grace where you stop counting and calculating.”
On our 2HC website we use the image of a walking trail to give people an idea of the nature of our ten-month long learning environment.
Venturing on a walking trail has significance for us. We are given just enough information to what is ahead.
The team of hikers walking on dotted lines suggests that we will do this with others at a slow pace.
Our hope is that butterflies, clouds, trees, tents, sunshine and the green landscape invites us to see this as an experience to explore, not just content to learn.
Now at the end of our 2HC ten-month learning environment, we ask that we continue to see life as a trail or a path to be experienced, perhaps more slowly than most would like. Forks in the trail, unclear signposts, and unknown terrain will challenge all of us as we lean more and more into the second half of our lives.
We will need discernment for these challenges. The prayer exercise below — using images, questions and suggested conversation with the Trinity who is our Path-Maker — is designed to help us grow in wisdom.
Discerning My Pathway, Trusting the Path-Maker Prayer Exercise
Go online and do a search of “pathways” or “trails” or “walking” or “roads” images. Anything that gives you a sense of moving or not being able to move.
Scroll through them until one of them jumps out at you, or you feel a heart tug towards it that describes where you sense you are in your life right now and where you want to be. Be generous with your imagination.
Below are two sample photos. Please find ones that suit you.
FIRST REFLECTION: Getting to know Me and My Path
Take time to reflect on the image of your choice. Why did this image stand out for you? You may use as few or as many of the prompts below to begin your reflection.
What is the MAIN impression I get from my selected image?
What do I feel looking at my path? What consolations? What desolations?
Where am I physically and interiorly? Do I sense unhealthy attachments that might hinder me from walking this path?
Who do I want here with me? Or not with me?
Where is God? How is God manifesting himself here and now - through whom? through what?
Where is my path leading?
How might it express my spiritual path? My life contribution? Or just the next step I want to take?
SECOND REFLECTION: Getting to know the Path-Maker
In a series of conversations with God about God’s rich investments in you, consider using these prompts below.
Creator God, you saw my path long before I was born and you created me to know how to walk it. You have opened my mind to understand my life experiences and to grasp Scriptures that I have hung on to as your life promises for who I am and who I have yet to become.
Remind me of them again.
Jesus, my Trusted Friend, as you and I walk together in my life, you have opened my eyes to see where you have been with me and where I have been with you.
Remind me of them again.
Holy Spirit, Good and Beautiful Guide of my path, you have opened my heart time and again to the acute sense of your presence:
as the swelling tide of love,
the quieting conviction of truth,
the wind that blows me ever outwards into new and unchartered paths,
the power that assures me that I am not making all this up, that there is real
evidence I am walking my path in ways that help others
Remind me of them again.
And we say,
Make your ways known to me, O Lord;
teach me your paths.
And God says,
I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go.
I will counsel you with my loving eye on you (Ps 25 and 32).