We invite everyone to experiment with being inwardly guided in our daily lives, families, work, schools, communities, and society. We each experience an inward guide differently, as Spirit, God, transforming power, love, conscience, or however you name it. It is a palpable living sense of the creative, regenerative source, gift, and nature of life. As human beings, we have the ability to discern the inner nature and relationship of things, even when obscure, that leads to keen insight and judgment.
We commit to testing discernment in order to distinguish inspiration from other inner voices of narcissism, egotism, fanaticism, or distress.
Tests of Discernment
- Stopping, silence, stillness, solitude.
- Persistence, especially in the silence.
- Nearly impossible or seemingly trivial.
- Not what I desired or wanted.
- Curious and open, not rigid or absolute.
- Spiritual texts or writings of others on this path.
- Writing in a journal or log and publishing.
- Feedback from companions and, if affirmed, from the community.
- Fruits of living out the insights.
Daily personal practices
Daily practices prepare us to test our own and others’ discernment.
We set aside regular time to:
- Sit or walk in open contemplation.
- Read others’ experiments with inward guidance.
- Keep a journal or log of your experiment.
- Meet with 2-4 companions regularly every 1-3 weeks to: listen inwardly, discharge emotion, seek insight. Then testify to insights, practices, or directions, reflect back what we hear, and exchange feedback.
- Express insights in public record: pamphlets, books, poetry, music, curriculum, law, courts, etc.
- When discernment is not clear, record nudges and concerns, then try and test it by its fruits.
Weekly community practices
Weekly community practices are changed by our daily experiments. On that foundation, we gather weekly in silence to listen for inward guidance for us as a people. Keep messages for yourself inside or write in your journal to let them work on you. Speak out messages for us as a people or a community. We close when a message for us becomes clear, which we record and send out to all attenders to remember and experiment with how the message works on us during the week.
We ask if anyone had any special insights, practices, or directions arise in the past week. We listen, reflect back what we heard, and offer feedback if requested. Then we go around to hear something from each person’s reading or experimenting in the past week. Attenders are encouraged to bring a reading or song. We typically have soup, bread or rice, tea, and water and maybe a baked item. So then, we eat, visit, play, and sing.
Meeting for Worship
Friends, it’s time to settle into silence for the Meeting for Worship.
- Let go of any tension in your body and mind.
- Open to Spirit and wait for guidance; notice Spirit working within you.
- Messages for yourself, keep within you, let them work on you and change you.
- Messages for others, please stand and speak; Spirit speaks to us through us.
- Typically, speak only once to leave room for everyone.
- Leave silence between speakers to let each message work among us.
- Close once the group has received its message or guidance for the week.
- Experiment with that guidance in daily life.
Spiritual Companions
Friends, meet with others committed to spiritual life and transformation
- 2-4 people meet every 1-3 weeks
- Share time equally to give each person good attention.
- On your turn, take time to do what you need:
- Listen inwardly.
- Discharge emotion.
- Seek insight and direction.
- State what is clear.
- Ask for reflection or feedback.
- Do YOUR own work, do not explain yourself to or take care of your companions.
Discernment Meeting
This is a meeting for worship with a concern for the affairs of the Meeting.
- Address one agenda item at a time.
- Is it clear? Clarify one point at a time. If not clear, refer to a committee to clarify.
- Do Friends have concerns? Address one concern at a time, and ask if others share the concern.
- Speak from your experience of your best sense of how Spirit is moving in this matter for us as a Meeting.
- Listen with curiosity to learn, be teachable, and changed by what you hear.
- Speak again when asked for a sense of the Meeting – we need to know if Friends have changed since the last time speaking.
Readings
