"What if we were to expand our definition of wealth to include those things that grow only in time—time to walk in the park, time to take a nap, time to play with children, to read a good book, to dance, to put our hands in the garden, to cook playful meals with friends, to paint, to sing, to meditate, to keep a journal."
In 2011, Wayne Muller co-founded The Institute of the Southwest, an educational organization dedicated to the liberation of wisdom, collaboration, wholeness, and transformative change. Their combined skills bring over 70 years’ experience working nationally and internationally with individuals, groups, families, corporations, organizations and governmental institutions.
Many good, kind, generous people feel overwhelmed by incresing demands at work and at home. In spite of working longer hours, and using technoligies to get more done, the bar of necessary responsibility keeps rising. At the end of the day, we feel exhausted, overwhelmed, and disappointd - in ourselves.
We cannot bring our best, our magnificance, our most precious gifts to the table. This constant "making peace" with less than our best, keeps breaking our heart. We are better than this. There is a vast reservoir of sadness in every organization I know. Few people ever feel permission to stop, to find sanctuary or refuge.
Yet every spiritual tradition honors th necessity of quiet reflection, solitude, like-hearted companions, and dep nourishment for body and soul. How can we create Sabbatical experiences for ourselves without the luxury of a year, or six months, or even a month of sacred rest, sabbath time, and sabbatical?
Wayne Muller has created a Sabbath made for you. The Sabbatical is crafted using traditional elements of Sabbath, yet designed to be flexibly shaped and responsive whatever the neds of your life, your schedule, and your personal yearnings for peace and contentment.
From Leaving to Going; from Ariving to Landing; from Listening to Attending; from Action to Reflection, and returning again to Action; the Muller Sabbatical is designed to help insure there is a Sabbatical available for anyone and everyone, regardless of time, space, or life situation.
As with Mentoring and Private Retreats, Wayne personally works with you to shape a private retreat, Sabbath or Sabbatical of any length. People normally travel to Santa Fe for some agreed-upon period of time to explore specific areas of personal or spiritual inquiry. (See Private Mentoring Page).
It is increasingly important to feel we have a safe place to create covenants of permission to tell the truth about our lives, and transform how we live and work. In hospitals, in community organizations, in large corporations, and in small, private circles, Wayne, along with a variety of passionate partners and colleagues of all ages, have been seeding small invitational gatherings, or Wisdom Circles.
We begin by naming what we know to be true for ourselves, about what we can and cannot do skillfully, honestly and well. We listen for the difference between what we love to do with gusto and enthusiasm - and what we can barely “handle.” We feel together what is enough for today - enough growth, enough success, enough protection, enough accomplishment, enough contentment, enough money – even enough love.
Still. There is much to be done. The world aches for well rested, deeply nourished souls to gather and remake the world, heal her wounds, lift up her astonishing beauty. But first, we must have eyes to see, and ears to hear, where that beauty and wonder and freedom from suffering lives. In us, in the world. So that, called to lead others home, we can keep our promise, fiercely clear, knowing in our heart, soul, and body that we can be trusted to know the way.