INICIO Inspiring New Beginnings
Welcome to Inicio, a new email offering from Nuos Formation. This word, Inicio, used within Latin, Portuguese, and Spanish languages, contains deep and nuanced meanings. It speaks to initiations, putting on something, and new beginnings. It also means to inspire and that word holds a reference to the inhaling breaths we take in order to live. Each of these definitions speak to the repeating nature found in daily life: Beginnings, endings, and new beginnings. Each edition of this email will help you identify and engage with the Inicio that exists within and around you in the moment.
What Remains for Tomorrow by Julie Barrios (encaustic and char)
In Search of New Things
This morning I walked slowly down my street, noticing the burnt oranges, vibrant reds, and rich yellows surrounding me. I love experiencing this mystical change that happens every fall, when the seemingly normal green leaves transform into artistic masterpieces. Even though this change alludes to a coming death (these leaves will soon paper the streets until they decompose), there is something delightfully new about these colors. For a brief moment.
Fall is its own sort of liminal space, where beginnings and endings become entangled with each other. In Celtic traditions, the doorway figures prominently in new year celebrations, because the door represents both an opening and a closing, a beginning and an ending. These liminal spaces found in nature have an interesting way of mirroring our own liminal spaces. As much as I resist these in-between places - it’s uncomfortable to live in that tension - when I finally enter in, I am surprised by the beauty that is found in the doorway between beginnings and endings. Just as beautiful as the fall colors surrounding me right now.
-Jen Manglos (Seattle)
In Practice
In each edition of Inicio, we will offer a way for you to engage with the content through practices and embodied exercises.
Set some time aside to take a walk in nature or your neighborhood, or even a cityscape. Ask God to surprise you with something new to notice. It could be the height of a tree, the crack in a sidewalk, the sound of wind rustling leaves… Share what you notice with God. Tell God what stood out to you. Describe its shape, color, your sensory experience of it, etc. Ask God, “Is there anything you would like me to know about who you are or who I am in light of what stood out to me?”
Comments