Welcome to Pushing Pause where we take a moment each week to explore faith, rest, and beauty in our everyday lives. In each week’s email you’ll find a short reflection, a resource, and a practice to go deeper with the week’s topic. I’m glad you’re here!
In the first few weeks of this soul series we’ve talked about what soul care is and why it matters. Today we’re going to wade into the waters of what soul care looks like and take some steps to build in rhythms of soul care into our everyday lives.
Ten years ago I would have assumed soul care meant, prayer, reading your Bible, and going to church. These can be part of our soul care but soul care is broader and richer than only those things. Soul care can take on different forms that are unique to our personalities. It is a beautiful gift that there is no prescriptive way to do soul care but that we can tailor our care to our needs.
While soul care can take on many different forms at the root of it is paying attention. Our soul demands our attention. Left untended our soul becomes burdened, fatigued, bitter, or neglected. Soul care begins with paying attention to your desires, longings, and needs in the presence of God and then honoring those. Are you lonely and in need of community? Are you needing silence to process some big thoughts and feelings? Are you needing joy and fun to balance out the hard of life? When you pay attention, what do you notice?
Part of my soul care looks like creating space and margin for quiet in my life. Rushing will leave me feeling depleted so I pay attention to my schedule of where I can honor my need for a slow pace and then use that time to do things that will help me to feel at home with myself in the presence of God like walks, prayer, reading, laying in the hammock, taking pictures, exploring somewhere new, and being with friends.
Perhaps you feel yourself come alive with music. Soul care for you may be creating a playlist you love and listening to that instead of a podcast in the car. It might mean making music of your own. For others it’s art, writing, gardening, fishing. Leaning into our unique personalities is honoring the wholeness of who we are and using that to help us commune with our Creator brings care to our souls.
While soul care can be personal to our interests and needs, there are some components that serve as foundations for us as we practice kindness and care to ourselves.
Solitude and Quiet
Practices and Rhythms
Community
While the soul is needy, it is not pushy. Your soul has needs but it will not scream for your attention. We will however feel the effects of neglecting the deep needs for rest, connection, and joy if we ignore it long enough. We can’t look to other people to tell us what our soul needs, only we can discover and name that. As we start with paying attention we need space to engage our soul more deeply. This requires some time spent in solitude and quiet. Even 5 minutes to check in daily with ourselves in an intentional way helps to connect us to our needs. In the presence of God we listen to the yearnings and longings and we bring them into the light of naming. We often fear being alone with our thoughts but God is gentle with us and loving. Paying attention to our souls may require something of us but it always leads to wholeness for our good. Without the practice of solitude and silence we will crowd out the quiet whispers of our soul.
Practices and Rhythms are where we bring our personality and unique ways of being to our soul care. Like we talked about earlier, these practices will look different for each of us. For me it’s walking in nature or reading in the morning with a warm cup of coffee. You likely already have in mind several things that bring you joy or that help you notice the presence and peace of God. These practices and rhythms will help to form some anchors in your days where there is intentional soul care. It may be a simple rhythm of taking 1 minute to practice deep breathing at the end of your work day before moving into your evening. It could be yoga once a week. It might be reading during your lunch break instead of scrolling your phone. When we build in rhythms and practices with intention we are cultivating space for soul care.
Soul care is such a personal experience but that’s not to say it has to be isolating. We are meant to need one another. Community helps to nurture our souls in ways that we can’t do alone. I’m prone to my introverted ways but if I lean too heavily on that side of my personality I can begin to have tunnel vision in only seeing my narrow slice of life and then feel lonely. When I open myself up to others to listen to their stories and share my own, my life feels richer. I need others to experience a fuller picture of God. Friendships help to point me to truth and beauty when I can’t see it, and they offer a joy that isn’t experienced alone.
Each of these give us a loose framework for what soul care looks like in our lives. It’s not a formula or manual to follow exactly but it serves as the scaffolding that helps us build something beautiful.
Soul care isn’t an extravagant act, it’s a basic necessity for living wholeheartedly in a harsh world.
If she got really quiet and listened, new parts of her wanted to speak.
-Susan Ariel
A Practice
Begin with paying attention
Think through the 3 key areas of soul care and pay attention to your thoughts, feelings, and longings in regards to each.
Solitude and Quiet
Practices and Rhythms
Community
Which of those will you give your attention to more this week as you build in soul care?
I would love to hear more about your journey in soul care. Which of those areas are you struggling with or wanting to pay more attention to? You can reply to this email and keep the conversation going. Thanks for reading! - Lindsay