Why We’re Building This (Sean’s Version)
The PATH came into my life through my friendship with Danny (our founder), and his willingness to share his ideas with many of us who crossed his path while at the University of Chicago’s Divinity School. I didn’t know it at the time, but our conversations about our unique spiritual journeys, how we came to study the meaningful questions in life, what we wanted to put out into the world, and the avenues for making such an impact; all wove together a bond and invitation to be a part of this amazing project!
Although, in reality, and with reflection, I was a PATH seeker years before I ever met Danny. As someone who grew up with Irish Catholic roots and then became spiritually un-housed, a yearning to live “a more meaningful and values-aligned life” drove me to search for ways to reintegrate a sense of spirituality. I then found my way to spiritual practices such as embodied forms of movements (Yoga & Qigong) and stillness (meditation), which became my places of comfort amidst the tumult of my early 20s. I was reshaping my identity, coming to terms with tenuous family dynamics, trying to chart my course ahead, and evidently grappling with what I now know to be an existential crisis as I was waking up to the fact that the world as I knew it then, wasn’t what I thought it ought to be.
Due to my lack of a grounded spiritual orienting system or a worldview that could hold the nuances of life: suffering, injustices, hope, despair, passion, purpose, and fulfillment; I needed to seek a new way of moving through the world….seeing the world…..understanding my place within and as a part of a greater whole. Back then, I didn’t have a path or really much guidance about how to find one. Luckily with time, and with the help of many mentors, teachers, guides, and community, I was able to piece together what I now claim as my spirituality. Just as it was an evolutionary and amalgamative process from the start, it still is today! What’s changed is that I have come to feel rooted in place, in relationships, in my body, and thus my seeking no longer feels dire – rather it is life-affirming!
This knowing, as I understand it, is what brings me back to wanting to share The PATH with you all. And what I know, is not what others know, nor should it be. Each of us comes into this world with an array of different culturally embedded burdens and blessings, that will present themselves as we traverse life. Therefore, what would it look like for those unique qualities to be acknowledged, and to be interwoven into one’s spiritual journey? Here at The PATH, we are committed to walking alongside one another to build emotionally healthy spiritualities – plural!
“Each of us comes into this world with an array of different culturally embedded burdens and blessings, that will present themselves as we traverse life. Therefore, what would it look like for those unique qualities to be acknowledged, and to be interwoven into one’s spiritual journey?”
Our world contains multiplicities and here at The PATH we honor such differences in the way we see the (re)mixing of all of our values, beliefs, and practices.
