About Spiritual Direction
Spiritual direction is a covenant relationship between fellow travelers on a spiritual path, mindfully and humbly conducted in the presence of Spirit, or whatever name you give to a sense of the sacred in your life.
This guidance takes the form of helping clients, or directees, notice where the sacred may be especially active in their life—and sometimes where it may seem to have abandoned them. Together, under the guidance of a greater and often mysterious presence, the director and directee take a long, loving look at the real—life as it is, here and now. I welcome people from diverse spiritual traditions (and no tradition at all), and my practice is open and inclusive of all identities. In particular, I have a longstanding interest in gender and racial justice and how historical inequities compound personal challenges.
Some years before my formal training in spiritual direction, during a beautiful autumn hike in the Rockies, a dear Jewish friend described her tradition’s understanding of tikkun olam—the mending of the world. Her description gave me language for something I wanted to be part of, and I now hold the language from her tradition alongside Martin Luther King Jr.’s notion of building the beloved community.
I see spiritual direction and coaching as healing practices for the world, one person at a time. I strive to help clients free themselves of the things that keep them from being their kindest, most loving, and most open selves, in thought and action. More often than not, this means many gentle lessons in self-compassion—lessons we all need to revisit throughout our lives.
Although my immediate focus falls on the client, I believe that healing only happens fully when we understand the culture(s) in which we’ve grown up and now live, as culture informs how we see the world and perceive opportunities. Healing ourselves, at its best, is therefore both prophetic and justice oriented. It is the contemplative activity necessary for effective social engagement and activism.
— Kaudie McLean