Non-Fiction: Spiritual Life. Hardback from Jossey-Bass. Published in 2001. 172 pages. On loan from the Kent District Library
I had hoped that this book would have some thoughts about how travel can change you for the better spiritually, and in a way it did. But mostly it just really confused me. I couldn't get a real grip on what she believes. I read on the back cover that the author was a minister, so I expected a Christian book. What I got was a book in which the author confesses, for example, to "having abandoned the central message of the song How Great Thou Art", (even though she sung it at the top of her lungs in a valley in the Himalayan mountains), and where she uses a man leaving his family when he figured out that he didn't really love his wife as a good example of the proper response to a spiritual pilgrimage. Finally I decided to look closer at her biography in the back of the book and discovered that she is a Unitarian Universalist Minister. That explained a lot about the way the book seemed to just pick and chose from several different belief systems. I think there are some good ideas in there about how to be a part of the world around us, and to experience it. But there is a lot of other stuff I don't agree with to wade through to find it. That's not always a bad thing to have to do, but I did not go into the book thinking that was what I was getting, so it was disappointing to me.
Publisher's summary:
Gazing at Himalayan peaks or wandering the shores of Scotland's Iona Island makes for compelling travel experiences. Yet the adventure of such journeys is not just about travel, it is about seeking greater spiritual depth. In her down-to-earth and engaging new book, Pilgrim Heart, Sarah York examines the many dimensions of soul journeys: from forming an intention, to preparing to go, to leave-taking, and then to returning. As her experiences and insights reveal, such journey-making is not just a movement through time and space. It demands a willingness to face the strange and disorienting in order to change and grow. And finding home requires an appreciation for one of the greatest paradoxes: we leave, letting go of the security of our physical homes in order to open ourselves to our spirit's home.
Online book shopping:
Powell's: Pilgrim Heart: The Inner Journey Home
amazon.co.uk: Pilgrim Heart: The Inner Journey Home
amazon.com: Pilgrim Heart: The Inner Journey Home
Audible.com: not available as audio
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