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Spirituality @ Work
Summer
2001
SAW
On-Line!
New Conversation begins the Week of September 3rd!
Now YOU can be a part of an SAW Conversation!
Wherever
you are, if you’re reading these words and have
access to the Internet, you can now be a part of an
SAW conversation! Late last Spring, SAW experimented
with its first on-line course. Invited by the Church
Divinity School of the Pacific (an Episcopal seminary
in Berkeley, CA) to teach an Internet course on
Spirituality at Work, SAW Board member, Mary Wagner,
assisted by SAW coordinator Whitney Roberson, put
together a seven-week on-line course. More than a
third of the eighteen participants enrolled in the
course were from outside the United States. The global
dimension of the conversation proved enriching for
all. The course proved transformative for many who
participated.
SAW plans to offer this course
again, probably in the Spring. However, a
less-structured online "conversation" is
available more immediately and will be starting
September 3rd. Focusing on the general
theme, Working From Love, the conversation will
last eight weeks and cover four topics. Participants
can log-on at a time convenient for them, read the
conversation materials, post their
reflections/question and read and respond to those of
others. Cost for the eight weeks is $40. For more
information or to register, contact Mary Wagner at
mary.wagner@ sri.com.
SAW Participates in the Presidio
Dialogues
S AW
Coordinator Whitney Roberson will be one of three
speakers featured at San Francisco’s "Presidio
Dialogues" on September 12 at the Lone Mountain
Campus of the University of San Francisco. Each month,
the Dialogues offer an evening of conversation with
respected authors and speakers on some area of
contemporary work and culture. The title of September’s
Dialogue is "Spirit Matters at Work" and
will include on the program, besides Roberson, Rabbi
Michael Learner, well-known author, and Fr.
Stephen Privett, S.J., President of University
of San Francisco. Cost for the evening is $30. For
more information or to make a reservation, contact
John Renesch at john@renesch.com.
SAW Invites Participants and Friends
Help Fund our Work
T he
SAW Board has been focusing much of its time and
energy on developing a business plan in preparation
for applying for major grants to fund our projects.
The business plan is now complete and we’ve come to
the exciting conclusion that SAW has gone as far as it
can go with part-time and volunteer staffing: in order
to continue developing our innovative program we’ll
need substantial capital over the next three years!
The first step toward our goal of
obtaining grants for $500,000 is the initiation of a
major funding campaign among our own participants and
friends. As this quarte r’s S@W goes to press,
we have pledges of $20,000 toward our first phase
$50,000 campaign goal! A great start but we need your
help! We’ll need several more major contributions of
$1000 to $10,000 and many, many smaller donations of
$50 to $999. We’d love to have your help with this
effort. If we can demonstrate to major foundations the
tangible support of our own participants and friends,
we believe we can attract their support, for we
believe the work we’re doing addresses a real and
significant need. We hope you agree!
Your contribution is
tax-deductible. Checks may be made payable to
Spirituality At Work and send it to Spirituality At
Work, c/o Diocese of California, 1055 Taylor Street,
San Francisco, CA 94108.
SAW Conversations
San Francisco :
Tuesdays, bag lunch: Paladin Capital
Management, 41 Sutter Street, Suite 720 ; 12:10
to 1:10 p.m.Contact Whitney Roberson at whitney@spiritualityatwork.com
or phone 415-387-7224.
On-line: Virtual, beginning September
3rd. Contact Mary.Wagner@sri.com.
"…what you will do!"
By Whitney Wherrett Roberson
A
number of years ago, I found myself at a sort of life-crossroads. I
needed to make a decision about what life direction I would follow; I
needed, I thought, to find out what I wanted to do. Over a period of
months, I sought the counsel of a wise older friend who listened
patiently as I ruminated about possibilities. I talked about my
dreams; about what I wanted to do; about next steps I might take.
Finally one day, he looked at me, smiled gently, and said, "I’d
like you to stop talking about what you want to do and decide
what you will do!" He saw what I hadn’t seen: that I
already did know what I wanted, what I needed now was the
courage and will to begin. I needed to make a choice.
It’s easy in today’s fast-paced world to "go
unconscious" about what we truly need and want; it’s easy to
get swept up in whatever is most urgent and immediate in our work or
personal lives so that before we know it, we’re on "automatic
pilot." Having the life we really want, however, does take an act
of will, a decision – many of them, actually. And the process of
making creative choices requires two things, I think. First of all, it
requires enough "down time" to explore the deeper parts of
ourselves, to see what it is we really do want. I believe that’s
what "sabbath" is about. In the Judeo-Christian tradition,
Sabbath is mandated as a time of rest and renewal, a time of
remembering our identities as children of divine Mystery and of
recalling the divine Invitation to participate in a grander purpose,
in a celebration of Life. Sabbath is meant to be the time in our
day/week/month/year when we reflect on our part in the larger scheme
of things and discover what choices we need to make so that we can
become co-creators of that Reality.
When we know what we want, then the second thing we
have to do is to find the courage and strength of will to make the
choices needed to move us in this life-giving direction. Spiritual
practice may be a crucial part of the choice-making process, for such
practice places us -- emotionally, intellectually, spiritually –
within divine Reality, re-ordering our perspectives and clarifying our
life purpose.
Being a regular part of a faith community, too, can
support our choice-making, offering support and encouragement,
especially when choices seem risky. I hope that our own Spirituality
at Work conversations can be such communities of empowerment.
Making creative "big choices" – about
major work or life changes -- may require, first, making creative
"little choices," making a decision to set aside time each
day for spiritual practice, or a determination to take a first step
toward a new direction, or a resolution to find a community to hold us
gently accountable to our own choices. It might be useful for us to
list – specifically -- the steps required to move us from
where we are to where we want to be. The "specifically" is
important: it’s much easier to move ahead when we see precisely what
we’re asking of ourselves. And, the "big choice" is less
formidable when we can see clearly the several smaller choices leading
to it.
If we are not entirely satisfied with things as they
are, we really have more choice than we may imagine. In the end,
however, each of us must stop talking about what we want to do
and decide what we will do.
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