This morning I listened to a podcast with Dr. Sue Varma, based upon her book, Practical Optimism. She spoke of the “4 M’s of Mental Health:” Mindfulness, Movement, Mastery and Meaningful Engagement…all elements to support our exploration of purpose, meaning, and balance in life. I’ve been thinking a lot about this concept of purpose throughout the many miles I have logged, including during a roadtrip last weekend that is depicted in the image above. Lots to think about.
I look forward to checking out the book and encourage you to do the same. This week I share some resources from some workshops I am leading to help inform your approach to our shared exploration…like the image above, our awareness evolves. Blessings on your week ahead!
Awe and Mindfulness in Leadership
Everyday awe is a basic human need. Awe signals an awareness of vast thigs that unite us with others. Awe…heightens our awareness of being part of a community, of feeling embraced and supported by others.
It is hard to imagine a single thing you can do that is better for your body and mind [and spirit] than finding awe in your environment that surrounds you.
-adapted from Awe: The New Science of Everyday Wonder (2023)
Reflection on Gratitude
I’ve been thinking about the way, when you walk down a crowded aisle, people pull in their legs to let you by. Or how strangers still say “bless you” when someone sneezes, a leftover from the Bubonic plague. “Don’t die,” we are saying.
And sometimes, when you spill lemons from your grocery bag, someone else will help you pick them up. Mostly, we don’t want to harm each other. We want to be handed our cup of coffee hot, and to say thank you to the person handing it. To smile at them and for them to smile back. For the waitress to call us honey when she sets down the bowl of clam chowder, and for the driver in the red pick-up truck to let us pass.
We have so little of each other, now. So far from tribe and fire. Only these brief moments of exchange. What if they are the true dwelling of the holy, these fleeting temples we make together when we say, “Here, have my seat,” “Go ahead—you first,” “I like your hat.” –From “Small Kindnessses,” by Danusha Laméris
Today I prepared a workshop that I am leading next week, to help a group reflect on that which they appreciate from this current academic year that is winding down. So I thought I would share a couple of the reflections on gratitude….it’s a celebratory time in my household, one of my kids is graduating on Thursday, and we have family traveling in to celebrate alongside us. God is good! Blessings on your week ahead.
From “Small Kindnessses,” by Danusha Laméris
I’ve been thinking about the way, when you walk down a crowded aisle, people pull in their legs to let you by. Or how strangers still say “bless you” when someone sneezes, a leftover from the Bubonic plague. “Don’t die,” we are saying.
And sometimes, when you spill lemons from your grocery bag, someone else will help you pick them up. Mostly, we don’t want to harm each other. We want to be handed our cup of coffee hot, and to say thank you to the person handing it. To smile at them and for them to smile back. For the waitress to call us honey when she sets down the bowl of clam chowder, and for the driver in the red pick-up truck to let us pass.
We have so little of each other, now. So far from tribe and fire. Only these brief moments of exchange. What if they are the true dwelling of the holy, these fleeting temples we make together when we say, “Here, have my seat,” “Go ahead—you first,” “I like your hat.”
From “On Prayer,” by Abraham Joshua Heschel
To pray is to take notice of the wonder, to regain the sense of the mystery that animates all beings, the divine margin in all attainments. Prayer is our humble answer to the inconceivable surprise of living. It is all we can offer in return for the mystery by which we live. Who is worthy to be present at the constant unfolding of time? Amidst the meditation of mountains, the humility of flowers — wiser than all alphabets — clouds that die constantly for the sake of beauty, we are hating, hunting, hurting.
Suddenly we feel ashamed of our clashes and complaints in the face of the tacit greatness in nature. It is so embarrassing to live! How strange we are in the world, and how presumptuous our doings! Only one response can maintain us: gratefulness for witnessing the wonder, for the gift of our unearned right to serve, to adore, and to fulfill. It is gratefulness which makes the soul great.
I just did a double take, as I settle into my umpteenth hotel of the spring…I scoured the channels and was so happy to find the San Francisco Giants game. Turns out it’s a replay of an earlier game today in Miami, but I realized my own confusion given the multiple time changes I’ve traversed in recent weeks…I was slightly confused given the timing… how could the game possibly be in the first inning at 9pm? And then, it felt so comforting to hear the voices of our announcers, Mike and Duane, and I realize the game was on delay…cool. I’ve been to six other states in the last four weeks, and it’s so nice to settle into my evening with the Giants!
This helps me appreciate and acknowledge how disorienting our own changes in routine…locations….and communities….can be at times. Thank God for faith and our shared belief in the goodness of humanity. My heart goes out to all those in the midst of transitions.
This week I share a refreshing take on a musical piece that has been so much a part of my adult experience, the Buena Vista Social Club. Decades ago, I fell in love with Cuban music, and improved my Spanish along the way, with my own introduction to this unique history. If you’re not familiar with it, I encourage you to check them out. Blessings on your week ahead!
Today I write before heading out soon to take my daughter to her first horror movie. It will also be my first one (in a movie theater)….I’m chalking it up to making the most of connecting with my youngest. I realize more and more that it’s best for me to seize the opportunity for connection whenever it presents itself. God is good.
I have been traveling all over the country in the recent months, and I have just two trips left before wrapping up the academic year. One thing that strikes me is how alike we can be, as one community of differing sizes, shapes, and colors. I consider it a gift to be able to experience such thoughtful and considerate individuals, amongst varying cultures and backgrounds, who express and live out a commitment to community. It is nice to appreciate that which brings us together, as the antithesis to that which divides us. These days, that seems counter-cultural.
This morning while walking my dog, I noticed this image on resisting fear at a local coffee shop. As I paste it into this blog, I note that my own reflection made its way into the picture. Makes me think how “assisting love” starts with ourselves, and how we reflect love out to others…just as today’s Gospel invites us to do, to “love one another.”
This week I am sharing a couple resources related to community, from two of my favorites…theologian Ann Gaerrido and the new Pope of the Catholic Church, Pope Leo XIV. May God continue to inspire each of them as advocates for the dignity and respect we all deserve. Blessings on your week ahead!
Let us continue to build relationships wherever we can, always looking for common ground amidst our differences and across our borders. Let us continue to find words to talk about what means most to us—holding fast to our deepest values, curious about why others hold what they hold and see what we don’t see. Every place is the right place and every time is the right time to love our neighbor. -Ann Garrido
In his first words to the crowds at Saint Peter’s Basilica following his inaugural mass as pontiff, Pope Leo XIV outlined a vision of a “missionary” Church which “builds bridges, which holds dialogues, which is always open”….”Help us, and each other, to build bridges through dialogue, through encounter, to come together as one people, always in peace,” he said (www.bbc.com).
I find myself in many conversations these days on the need for greater unity in our world…in my community, in our country, and in our global Church. I love the concept of “Roundtabling” when I think of building community, and am pleased to share this poem below. Blessings on your week ahead!
For God has called a People, not ‘them and us’ ‘Them and us’ are unable to gather around, for at a roundtable, there are no sides And ALL are invited to wholeness and to food. …
Roundtabling means no preferred seating, no first & last, no better, no corners for ‘the least of these’ Roundtabling means being with, a part of, together, and one It means room for the Spirit and gifts and disturbing profound peace for all.
And it is we in the present who are mixing and kneading the dough for the future. We can no longer prepare for the past. …
This week I share a few inspirations from a book I just finished (And Then We Rise, by Artist Common), a meeting I attended, and a holiday card I received. I continue to try to be aware of God’s presence in all these occurances as the pace of my life only intensifies. One day at a time.
Blessings on your week ahead!
Easter 2025- Sr. Joyce Weller, DC
Easter marks the heart of Hope. The impossible becomes possible- the improbable becomes real. Forgiveness and reconciliation become neighbors.
This Easter, let us believe in goodness, in effort, in welcome and compassion.
This Easter, let Hope be our daily bread and kindness our gift to all. Alleluia.
Pope Francis- May he rest in peace!
From Archbishop Gregory Aymond (New Orleans, April 21, 2025)
Pope Francis was a true man of God who called and challenged all of us to witness our faith in all aspects of our daily life. His ministry stretched beyond the normal boundaries into the peripheries of those who have felt marginalized by our society.
He said God’s name is mercy and witnessed for us how to live with love and mercy.
He will always be remembered for his love, compassion, humility, and care for all of God’s creation.
Cesar Chavez passed away on this day over thirty years ago, leaving a legacy of service, advocacy and a firm commitment to the dignity of work. I recall learning of him in the 1980’s due to a nationwide grape boycott, yet it wasn’t until I moved to California in 2000 that I embraced a sincere appreciation for his faith, example and dedication to those on the margins. Read about Cesar’s convictions here: How Catholicism shaped Cesar Chavez’s social justice.
Later today we’re off to the beach for a couple days to eek out some spring break downtime with our kids. I look forward to the time walking outside, the joy my children display on the boardwalk, and our hotel pool. May this season of Easter joy bring comfort to you and yours. Blessings on your week ahead!
This week I offer a simple Lenten reflection along with an invitation to re-focus our time. I invite you to try this 15 minute approach. I found it refreshing! Blessings on your week ahead.
In this holy season of Lent, I come before You with a desire to be changed. Strip away the noise, the clutter, and the pride, that I may see myself more clearly in Your light.
Teach me to pray with honesty, to fast with purpose and to give with joy.
Remind me that it is not about perfection, but transformation— not about what I give up, but what I allow You to do within me.
Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.
Nick Epley is a psychologist from the University of Chicago. Several years ago, he conducted an interesting study where he asked commuters on trains and buses to make a prediction: How would they feel after having a spontaneous conversation with a stranger next to them? Most thought they’d feel worse. They believed that solitude made for a better commute.
So Epley and his team designed an experiment. Participants were divided into three groups. One group was instructed to connect with a nearby stranger, another to remain disconnected, and another to commute as normal. Participants reported a much more positive feeling from connecting with others, even when they expected the opposite to be true.
The conclusion? Many people suffer from a “mistaken preference for solitude” and “misunderstand the consequences of social interactions,” leading them to be “not social enough for their own well-being.”
There is much to explore on this topic, but I’m going to take this in a slightly different direction than you might expect—less about the benefit of interaction, more about the chunk of time itself.
In talking about this study, Nick Epley told The Atlantic that the exercise likely did not change anyone’s life. All it did was “marginally improve the experience of one 15-minute block of time.” But what is life other than a long string of 15-minute blocks, one after another, stretched over days, months, years?
And that’s why this experiment changed Epley’s own life more than any other. He said, “It’s not that I’m never lonely. It’s that my moment-to-moment experience of life is better, because I’ve learned to take the dead space of life and make friends in it.”
How to Shrink Time
I am obsessed with this idea of the 15-minute block. Anything and everything becomes possible when you break it down into a manageable chunk, especially (you knew this was coming!) screen time habits.
As adults, we spend roughly 4 hours a day on our phones, 2.5 of which are devoted to social media platforms. We pick up our phones an average of 144 times per day. We may look at our screen time averages and think, “Oh, it’s 1, 2, 3, maybe 4 hours a days; it’s not that bad,” but when you multiply that out over a year, this represents a month or more of lost time. Look at this math:
Now, imagine that we reclaim two 15-minute chunks a day from frivolous scrolling to do anything else; it doesn’t need to be productive, just something more enjoyable or fulfilling. That’s 30 minutes a day, which adds up to 3.5 hours a week, which is 14 hours a month, which is 168 hours a year, or a full week!
I don’t know what you could do with that time—maybe squeeze in a quick workout or make headway on a good book or whip up some tasty food or call your mother—but the point is, it would barely make a dent in the overall daily screen time that most adults accrue, while making your day-to-day life feel considerably richer.
When I show that screen time slide in my talks, I say, “It’s not that every minute needs to be useful, but the things we pay attention to make us who we are. Over time, they comprise our entire lives.”
A Way to Start Doing
Another way to think of the 15-minute block is a gateway to productivity. Sometimes I look at a task and think, “I don’t know where to start,” but then I tell myself, “I’ll just do it for 15 minutes, then switch to something else.” Inevitably, as soon as I jump in, the path to completion becomes clearer, and time flies. Before I know it, I’ve spent far more than 15 minutes and I feel better about my ability to complete the task.
Here’s another example. There are days when I don’t think I have time to start preparing dinner between the end of my workday and when I need to leave for a class at the gym. But if there are 15 minutes to spare, I force myself to get started—and am always surprised by how much headway I can make. You can do a lot in 15 minutes—throw bean soup ingredients into the Instant Pot, put a lentil-rice casserole in the oven, toss some chicken in a marinade, whip up homemade pizza dough to rise. It makes life so much easier by the time I get home.
The same goes for exercise. There are days when I don’t feel like working out or going for a walk, but I tell myself that just moving for 15 minutes is better than nothing. Nine times out of 10, it turns into a full-blown hike or workout, and I feel great afterward.
Kids’ music practices are the same. It’s daunting to find time to do a daily practice, but what if you say, “Just start with 15 minutes”? Maybe that’s all they do (it’s better than nothing), but maybe it extends naturally as they get into the flow of things and realize that a full practice is only two or three or four of those short-ish chunks. Not so bad!
When my own kids were little, I could tell when they needed to go outside and burn off excess energy. They would protest, but I’d say, “You have to go out for 15 minutes.” Inevitably, as soon as they got outside, they’d get so caught up in playing that they would forget to come in after 15 minutes, sometimes staying out for an hour or more.
The full scale of a life stretched across decades is impossible to grasp. Broken down into 15-minute blocks, however, it fills with potential. The more living you can squeeze out of each block, and the more blocks you add up, the richer and more fulfilling your life will become. So, go out there, do things, and have fun!
Last night, Brigid and I made our way to our first baseball game of the season. There’s something about the rhythm of the season, and the experience of sitting still at a live ballgame, that brings me a sense of peace. Taking the train to the ballpark, walking amidst the crowd, taking in the sights and sounds….these experiences ground me in community. Unfortunately we didn’t see a Giants win but the time together was priceless.
This week I share a few resources that support me staying balanced through some ups and downs. I hope they support you in a similar way. Blessings on your week ahead!
Pilgrim Beings
To see ourselves as pilgrim beings is not merely to recognize and accept our existence but to recognize the givenness of our existence. We are neither the center nor the origin of our own existence because there is a very definite light that illuminates and guides us on our way. It is our relationship with this light—God—who gifts us with presence instead of void, meaning instead of nothingness, and hope instead of despair.
We are beings on the way, then, part of a “great cloud of witnesses” (Hebrews 12:1) on the road of life together, united in a spiritual journey. Within each of us is a sacred mystery that we must honor and acknowledge as we journey together.
I have been a lifelong student of music, and a history buff. During Covid lockdown, I became a fan of the Grateful Dead….their blend of music traditions like folk, bluegrass, blues, and jazz, plus they way they transformed live music….really impress me. Of course their San Francisco roots resonate with me, too. And so I was happy to stumble across the above quote from drummer Mickey Hart reminding us of the rhythm of life and the contributing role each of us play. I was also pleased to recently come across this rendition from lead singer Jerry Garcia – a spiritual tune called “I’ll Be With Thee.” Enjoy this grainy video and its retelling of Salvation History.
I am also finding inspiration in the season of Easter that awaits…I listened to a podcast over the weekend while on my morning walk and was delighted when the guest stated, “the Passion was only for one day. The Resurrection lasts a lifetime!” Amen to that notion. Alas, I share this below poem on “Hope” to remind us of the spirit of the Resurrection.
Blessings on your week ahead!
To Have Hope
To have hope Is to believe that history continues open To the dream of God and to human creativity. To have hope Is to continue affirming That it is possible to dream a different world, Without hunger, without war, without hatred. To have hope Is to be a courier of God And courier of men and women of good will, Tearing down walls, destroying borders, Building bridges. To have hope Is to believe in the revolutionary potential of faith, Is to leave the door open so that the Spirit can enter and make all things new. To have hope Is to believe that life wins over death. To have hope Is to begin again as many times as necessary, to live as if it were possible. To have hope Is to believe that hope is not The last thing that dies. To have hope is to believe that hope cannot die, That hope no longer dies. To have To Have Hope.
— Missionary Sisters of St. Charles Borromeo, Prayer Without Borders
Keeping the Faith 