community spotlight

Centers for Spiritual Living

by Wendy Nadherny Fachon

Through a variety of events and classes, Centers for Spiritual Living (CSL) are uplifting humanity through the teachings of Science of Mind. CSL founder Ernest Holmes (18871960) studied the world’s many religions and identified commonalities, including the concept that our thoughts create our reality. Holmes correlated his findings to establish a unifying set of new thought principles that are scientifically provable in practice.

Holmes’ work and the Science of Mind teachings are rooted in transcendentalism, the philosophical movement that developed in New England in the late 1820s and 1830s. CSL has grown into a global community comprised of more than 400 spiritual communities, teaching chapters, study groups and other ministries in 30 countries. The Concordia Center, in Warwick, Rhode Island, is preparing to celebrate its 35-year anniversary, and it has inspired the emergence of more CSL communities around the region.

“Wherever you’re at on your spiritual path, you are welcome here,” says Rev. Alan Vukas, community spiritual leader at the Concordia Center. He shares CLS’s vision, which is to create a world that works for everyone. “This begins with creating a life that works for you,” he continues. “We provide the new thought teachings and equip you with tools to use for your own personal growth. Change your thinking/ change your life.”

One of CSL’s guiding principles is a belief in the individualization of the Spirit in us and that all people are individualizations of the One Spirit. Rev. Gina Colvario Krupka, who leads CSL activities in the Greater Boston area, explains, “Spirituality means the relationship with Spirit is within each one of us. Through spiritual connection, we learn that Source is right where we are, and this awareness shifts our world.”

Vukas adds, “When we discover

this inner awareness, it is up to us to demonstrate it to others. When we connect with peace within, we become peace, and this effects the people around us.” He alludes to several great spiritual leaders— Jesus, Mahatma Ghandi and Martin Luther King, Jr.—who led and taught this to others through living by example.

Barbara M. Fuyat, RScP, spiritual director of CSL SouthCoastal MA Teaching Chapter, explains their unique approach to integrating into the community and sharing the Science of Mind philosophy, faith and way of life. “We are passionate about the principle of Oneness— Oneness with each other and all of creation. One way we live this belief is by holding our ceremonies and services at local beaches, parks and farms, without walls or borders, honoring nature as our spiritual temple,” Fuyat states.

While these New England centers offer different celebrations, classes and services, they are unified in their vision, purpose, principles and spirit. The CSL community embraces people of all faiths and beliefs. An emphasis on unconditional love allows everyone to be free to be whoever they are, while also understanding that all are connected in Oneness. Visit a center and experience a change of thinking that can light up your life.

Locations: See sidebar for locations and contact information. For more information on Science of Mind new thought principles, visit CSL.org/ spiritual-community/what-webelieve. See ad on page 23 and Resource Guide on pages 37 and 38.

Wendy Nadherny Fachon is a regular contributor to Sustainable Living News and host of the Story Walking Radio Hour on the Dream Visions 7 Radio Network. Visit DreamVisions7radio.com and search out her podcasts on sustainable living.

Local Communities

Center for Spiritual Living Greater Boston

CSLBoston.org Contact: Rev. Gina Colvario Krupka Phone: 617-947-2743 Email: Gina@CSLBoston.org

Center for Spiritual Living South Coastal MA

CSLSouthCoast.org Contact: Barbara Fuyat, RScP Phone: 401-793-1753 Email: Barbara@CSLSouthCoast.org

Concordia Center for

Spiritual Living

ConcordiaCSL.com Contact: Rev. Alan Vukas Phone: 401-732-1552 Email: RevAlan@ConcordiaCSL.com

Transforming Our World

Working Together for Meaningful Change

by Linda Sechrist

With all the chaos occurring in the world today, it is challenging to remain centered and not feel overwhelmed. Every shocking headline seems to pull the proverbial rug out from under us. Thought leader Laureen Golden explains the dilemma this way: “Psychologically, we were raised, educated and socialized in a world that no longer really exists. We have a new world that we must navigate, and we need a new psychology, a whole new way of being for that world. Reducing, compartmentalizing, separating things in order to understand them no longer works for us. It’s going to take work to get out of this paradigm.”

Drawing from her background in education and social work, Golden ponders, “How does that new psychology develop when all our institutions charged with cultivating consciousness—schools, families, religious institutions and organizations—are set in the 19th and 20th centuries? Since learning is how we go from one paradigm to another, where do we go to learn the skills and the structures we need to be successful in such a complex world? We can’t do it individually. We must learn in collectives.”

The paradigm shift envisioned by Golden offers an opportunity for us to access innovative methods of

learning, discovery and connection, such as sociocracy (a self-governance system based on the equality of its members); systems thinking (an approach to complexity that looks at the whole and analyzes relationships, rather than splitting it into smaller pieces); permaculture (exploring natural ecosystems as a whole); circle methods (thinking things through as a group); and Indigenous wisdom (focusing on the interconnectedness of all things).

All of these methods focus on an ethos of collaboration and teach us how to discern wisdom, which is different than knowledge. By engaging in these conversations and explorations, we learn that if we tug on any one part of the web of life, we tug the whole web— an important analogy for our times.

A Beloved Community Co-Creating an Island of Sanity Through Collaboration

Instead of shouting, “The sky is falling, and the seas are rising,” in response to a world that is unraveling and experiencing the growing realities of global warming, residents of St. Petersburg, Florida, are embracing resilience. To prove that the future is born in webs of human conversation, the city is counting on collective intelligence to emerge.

Among the tools city participants are employing is The World Café, developed by Juanita Brown and David Isaac, which allows people to host group conversations around thoughtful questions. The concept is designed to evoke deeper listening and give rise to solutions for today’s challenges in a more conscious, intentional and strategic way. Forty citizens have taken The World Café facilitation course. Employing a simple and flexible format for hosting large group dialogue, this methodology enables participants to clarify the context, create hospitable space, explore questions that matter, encourage everyone’s contribution, connect diverse perspectives, listen together for patterns and insights, and share collective discoveries.

Other important work being applied is that of bestselling author and longtime community organizer Margaret Wheatley. Her training, which is designed to cultivate what she calls “Warriors of the Human Spirit,” arouses people’s inherent generosity, creativity, compassion and need for community. Known as a big-systems thinker throughout her 45-year career, Wheatley has concluded that the only opportunity for change is at the local level. Questions that encourage collective learning became integral to creating cohesiveness in St. Petersburg this year.

Dr. Donella Meadows’ “systems thinking” has helped St. Petersburg participants understand that living systems begin as networks, shift to intentional communities of practice and evolve into powerful systems capable of influence. Also instructive has been “complexity theory”, which helped participants recognize human systems as organizations, families and communities.

“The city leaders felt conversations were important enough to invest $20,000 to cultivate a culture of conversational leadership in the neighborhoods. Another $25,000 was granted by the Community Foundation of Tampa Bay to research the outcomes. Now, the Florida Council of Churches, University of South Florida, Community Foundation of Tampa Bay and The Connection Partners have received a Community Vibrancy grant of $14,500 to pilot conversations in three neighborhoods, spreading the skills in creating participatory democracy. Participants will host conversations in their own neighborhoods,” says St. Petersburg resident Sharon Joy Kleitsch, founder of The Connection Partners and a longtime catalyst for applying strategic actions based on the new sciences of complexity theory, strategic thinking and quantum science.

“Those who have used World Café as a tool know that a culture of conversational leadership offers citizens the opportunity to experience a sense of oneness and connectedness. We’ve explored what happens when we share feelings of care, compassion and appreciation toward a beloved community,” says

Kleitsch. “We found that group resonance, profound personal involvement and deeply engrossing, interactive conversation supports a City of Compassion and an International City of Peace, which St. Petersburg was chosen to be. I want to be sure that people understand that we do not have answers. Together, we are exploring pathways and listening for the answers to emerge.”

Since 2020, a thoughtfully selected group of Florida activists—including participants from St. Petersburg—have been holding weekly online Zoom conversations that matter. In 2021, they were joined by participants from Ohio to study the Capra Course, which is based on The Systems View of Life: A Unifying Vision by bestselling author Fritjof Capra.

“What we discovered after only two weeks was that we were ourselves a living system connecting to itself and becoming self-organized,” says Kleitsch. “We became aware that we were learning together. We were sharing what we were learning around subjects such as honoring Indigenous peoples, local food systems, the human right to clean water, reimaging capitalism and many more subjects. We’ve also bifurcated into a Sarasota [Florida] cohort. The key is, we were not random. We were a self-selected study group learning collaboratively, which is the best way I recommend activists study the Capra Course.”

Argerie Vasilakes, who is researching outcomes, explains that her work is dedicated to helping teams, communities and organizations become more coherent. “I start with traditional ways of thinking about our relationships with nature that native peoples have never forgotten—humans are part of nature, not apart from nature,” she explains. “To me, human organizations, communities, families and governments are also part of nature and examples of natural ecosystems. So, I naturally look at things from a living systems perspective.” Vasilakes advises, “In a group that is learning together, such as those in the St. Petersburg neighborhoods, group conversations organized around questions specifically crafted for the context and desired purpose of the World Café evoke a deeper kind of listening, the most important factor determining the success of a Café. They spark learning conversations that can produce insights and innovation for meeting the challenges they face. Through practicing shared listening and paying attention to themes, patterns and insights, participants begin to sense a connection to the larger whole.”

According to Wheatley, the important work is to foster critical connections. She believes it is not necessary to convince large numbers of people to change; instead, she suggests we connect with kindred spirits. Through these relationships and tools like The World Café, we can develop the new knowledge, practices and commitment that lead to broad-based change.

Wheatley sometimes opens her interviews with an ancient Hopi prophecy that reads as if it were applicable to our current times: “Here now is a river flowing very fast. It is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid, who will try to hold on to the shore. They are being torn apart and will suffer greatly. The elders say, ‘Let go of the shore, push off and go into the middle of the river. Keep your heads above the water. Know the river has its destination.’ The elders say, ‘See who is in there with you and celebrate.’ At this time in history,

we are to take nothing seriously; least of all, ourselves. Gather yourselves. Everything we do now must be done in a spirit of celebration, for we are the ones we’ve been waiting for.”

Seeing who is in the river of chaos with us, we can choose to respond with, “How can I serve with what I have, where I am?” This is what any Warrior of the Human Spirit would say because in the same river of chaos, there are also the seeds of transformation. In these turbulent times when all the old boundaries are unravelling and all the old certainties are dissolving, there is a possibility for creative transformation if we work together.

Linda Sechrist is Natural Awakenings’ senior staff writer.

Happy Holidays from all of us at

Moving From Grief to Grace

Tools to Ease Sorrow

by Angela Craig

Grieving is a universal part of life. After the loss of a loved one, the discovery of helpful, hopeful and healing tools and practices can support us in moving from grief to grace. There are no rules or timelines when it comes to the grieving process, and there certainly isn’t a one-sizefits-all method for easing sadness. Exploring a combination of different practices, over time, can help to soften the edges and ease our sorrow ever so slowly.

The following practices may be worth exploring: Journaling: A journal practice is one way to allow our innermost voice to stream unfettered. It can feel almost like a sacred space to spend a short time in with our lost loved one. The benefits can be astounding. A meditation practice: The simple practice of breathing, growing quiet and going within can open doors we never knew existed. A gratitude box: Renowned medium Hollister Rand believes that gratitude is an important component to connecting with our loved ones after their death. Filled with messages on slips of paper that connect us to a loved one, in ways only we know about, a gratitude box offers the simple exercise of pulling a message from the box and remembering our loved one in a way that can be soothing, comforting, uplifting and often puts a smile on our face. Metaphysical books: Reading about other’s experiences of connecting with their loved ones can be one of the most healing and uplifting tools. There is no shortage of excellent titles to explore, including Messages from the Afterlife, by Mark Ireland, and The Light Between Us, by Laura Lynn Jackson. Mala beads: A Mala bead practice is another form of meditation that can produce a sense of peace and calmness when our world has been turned up-side-down. The practice consists of completing one full breath (inhale and exhale) while touching each bead, moving around the strand for 108 breaths. Talk therapy: Sharing with others in an on-line group, in person or with a grief therapist can take us to another healing place. Signs: Learning to recognize signs from our loved ones is one of the most magical, mystical and heart-opening experiences. They can come in the form of a favorite song out of the blue, scents when we least expect them (perfume, cologne, cigar smoke, cooking smells, flowers), visuals such as a name or initials on a random car license plate or a message on a billboard or on the side of a van. When they arrive, we somehow just “know” that there is no other explanation for the unexpected timing of this compelling sign, and the brief connection with our loved one’s spirit soothes our soul.

When we allow our hearts to remain open after the loss of a loved one, grief has gifts to offer in the form of compassion, connection, personal growth, gratitude and the comforting possibility that this life is not all there is. Grief writer Chelsea Ohlemiller reminds us, “The only reason we have an empty space is because we were blessed with someone who loved us so beautifully it occupied an entire part of our soul.”

The tools and practices that Angela Craig used after losing her husband of 33 years led her to develop Spiritual Care Packages, toolboxes to nourish the grieving heart and soul. The contents of each box are carefully curated by her to help people overcome their profound loss. Learn more at Spiritual CarePackage.net. See ad on page 9 and Resource Guide on page 38.

The Upside to Stress

by Sara Garvin

The way we all understand and use the word “stress” only describes negative situations, which leads us to believe that all stress is negative. But this isn’t true. Some events or situations in our lives excite us, such as weddings and the holidays, but nonetheless cause stress as we become busy with to-do lists and overscheduled social calendars.

Dr. Hans Selye, sometimes described as the "father of stress research," described a series of reaction phases in response to continued stress. These start with the alarm reaction, progresses through adaptation and finally to exhaustion. Selye showed that if the stressor is unrelenting, actual damage occurs during the exhaustion phase, and death can be the end point. Stress is currently thought to be a culprit in heart disease, for example.

It’s Okay to Like Stress

Building on Selye’s work, psychologist Richard Lazarus proposed a dynamic concept of stress, considering individual differences and responses. Describing a difference between good stress (called eustress) and bad stress (or distress), he pointed out that some stressful situations are positive, even exciting. Some even lead to good results or changes.

In recent years, this positive reaction to stress has been explained in terms of hormesis. In the fields of biology and medicine, hormesis is defined as an adaptive response of cells and organisms to a moderate and usually intermittent stress. An easy example of this is exercise: there’s a sweet spot where enough exercise causes strength and stamina improvements without causing injury. Exercise is an example of a stress that, when approached correctly, leaves a person better off.

One major difference between good stress and bad stress is whether it feels like it’s within our ability to cope with it. (If you feel constantly unable to cope, consider seeking outside help.)

This seems to be an important boundary between the stressors that are exciting and positive and stress that damages our health.

So, stress isn’t all bad. It can help us improve; it can help us get things done. The problem is when stress is unrelenting, feels out of our control and there is no relief in sight. Consequences of chronic stress are serious and range from burnout to heart disease and early death.

Good Stress

We must be deliberate at breaking chronic stress patterns by disconnecting, unwinding and downshifting. One way of doing this is to work on the body-mind connection by creating situations that allow our bodies to talk to our brains and vice versa. Take the time to listen to this conversation; make room for bodily stress reactions to turn off. Breathwork, exercise, as well as stress-relief stalwarts like yoga, meditation and massage all can help.

Another suggestion is to spend time around water. In his book Blue Mind, biologist Wallace J. Nichols describes how water has a unique ability to calm and soothe. Swimming, cold plunges, visiting the ocean or a local creek, and even taking a turn in a friendly neighborhood float tank are all options that can help us find our calm and cool “blue mind” of the book title.

Practice interrupting stress and downshifting from it, even if only tem-

porarily. It’s good to have a variety of tools in the stress-relieving toolbox, so keep exploring different methods and modalities. With time and practice, instead of frantically trying to repair what’s broken, something solid and beautiful can be built. Enjoy and recognize the positive stresses in life. Our hearts will thank us.

Sara Garvin is a co-founder of FLOAT Boston, located at 515 Medford St., Somerville, MA, which opened in 2015. She is a graduate of Kalamazoo College and the Chicago School of Massage Therapy and worked as a massage therapist for 15 years. For more information or to schedule a float session, call 844- 443-5628 or visit Float Boston.com. See ad on pages 8 and 21 and Resource Guide on page 35.