Nourishing Rhythms: A Day Retreat in Cambridge
Four daily rhythms that help me stay healthy are reading, writing, walking, and praying. When I have time, I plan a Four-Hour Retreat and do each for an hour. When I have other things that require my energy and attention, I do each for 30 minutes or 20 minutes 10 minutes. Some days I’m just getting by with the basics and hope to read, write, walk, and pray the next day.
Plan an Individual Spiritual and Creative Retreat
One way to establish and inhabit nourishing rhythms is to set aside a full day or half a day for an individual retreat. Because I’m a writer and a spiritual director who embraces contemplative spirituality, I’m a huge fan of individual retreats.
I’m currently in Boston and decided to have my own retreat in Cambridge yesterday. Here’s a glimpse into my wonderful day full of reading, writing, walking, and praying. You can see more images in this Instagram post.
Nourishing Rhythm: Read
I went to Grolier and browsed. I found some old favorites and some new-to-me poets, I read several poems, and I bought seven(!) books. I also had a nice chat with Jason. (If you happen to see this, Hi, Jason!)
Nourishing Rhythm: Write
I enjoyed the house latte at Tatte while revising a prose poem. AND I submitted the poem to a literary magazine for publication. I think this is my first poetry submission(!). We’ll see how that goes.
Nourishing Rhythm: Walk
I walked to the Harvard Art Museums main entrance on Quincy Street. I wandered around and looked at some great art. One of my favorites was a wonderful painting by Kehinde Wiley based on Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story “The Yellow Wallpaper.”
Nourishing Rhythm: Pray
I believe prayer is always happening in my soul, but I prayed more intentionally yesterday with a slow reading of the poem “Rembrandt’s Last Fruit” by Marc Vincenz.
More Reading and Writing
I found a great spot in the museum for reading and writing so I sat down and did more reading and writing.
Yesterday was pretty dreamy, to be honest. Cambridge is such a great place to visit. Be on the lookout for more glimpses into my adventures in reading, writing, walking, and praying! More coming soon to Our Faith in Writing.
Plan Your Own Individual Spiritual and Creative Retreat
If you’re like me and you don’t live in the Boston area, you can easily create your own retreat using Our Faith in Writing’s Guide for Planning Your Individual Spiritual and Creative Retreat.
Hire Charlotte Donlon (Me!) to Plan Your Individual Spiritual and Creative Retreat
I love to help my clients plan spiritual and creative retreats. Learn more here.
Charlotte Donlon helps her readers and clients notice how they belong to themselves, others, God, and the world. Charlotte is a writer, a spiritual director for writers, and the founder of Spiritual Direction for Writers™ and Parenting with Art™. She is also the founder and host of the Our Faith in Writing podcast and website. Her essays have appeared in The Washington Post, The Curator, The Christian Century, Christianity Today, Catapult, The Millions, Mockingbird, and elsewhere. She holds a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing from Seattle Pacific University where she studied creative nonfiction with Paula Huston and Lauren F. Winner. She holds a certificate in spiritual direction from Selah Center for Spiritual Formation. Her first book is The Great Belonging: How Loneliness Leads Us to Each Other. To receive Charlotte’s latest updates, news, announcements, and other good things, subscribe to her email newsletter.