How to prepare for a Spiritual Direction session

Carve out an hour before we meet to reflect upon your life over the past few weeks. This will help you to make the most of our time together. You may wish to reflect in your journal or at the computer, whichever works best for you.

Sometimes you’ll come to spiritual direction knowing exactly what you want to bring to share. At other times you may wonder what there might be to talk about.  Either way it’s helpful to do some self-reflection before we meet.

Reflect on the time between spiritual direction sessions, looking for connecting threads, themes, patterns, images or dreams.

See if anything you set yourself to do last session has been done.

Prioritise what you would like to use the hour for e.g. of several different moments of awareness of God, what is the most important to explore? Or which of your questions needs quality attention?

This preparation will ensure that what is most important will be discussed, if you’re being honest. Sometimes the most important things are also the most painful and for that reason are easily omitted.

Questions for self-reflection

• Review the broad strokes of what you’ve experienced and learned; what stands out to you?

• How would you describe your relationship with God at the moment?

• How open and responsive to God have you been lately, and what has affected this?

• What things has God been speaking into your life and what has your response been like?

• What real life issues would you like to bring into a process of discernment or guidance?

• If I think in terms of an image, music, colour or a word or phrase, I’d describe my life lately as….

• These experiences, events, relationships have communicated a sense of God’s presence with me….

• These experiences, events, relationships have contributed to a sense of God’s absence….

• I am currently attending to my spiritual life in the following ways….

• These things have helped (or hindered) my pursuit of God….

• This is also important to note….

Further suggested reading