Hello and welcome to another episode of One Heart, One Mind.

I'm Thomas Mockocky. Thank you for listening. Big out breath.

That is how I'm feeling in life right now.

I am officially on the other side of graduate school.

After three years, I have no words for how I feel right now because I have never felt how I feel right now. But I am very happy

to be recording an episode of One Heart, One Mind. I've said in past episodes that this has

quickly become a devotional practice for me to hold something in my heart throughout the

week and to think about you all, even though we have,

many of us have never met in person. I hold you in my heart and I search for some aspect

of contemplative prayer that I feel would be helpful to communicate, to share, to elaborate on in this podcast form.

I am so grateful that you listen and that I have a chance to do this.

Okay, before I jump into today's content, I want to say because I am now no longer a graduate student, I have time, space, energy, attention to turn back to my teaching practice, to my community.

Some of you will know Lower Lights School of Wisdom, the Lower Lights Community.

I've been doing this work full time since 2011, and it means so much to me to be

able to do. And I wanted to let you know about a couple of offerings coming down the pike.

I'll tell them in reverse chronological order, because the one is easier to explain in a breath.

At the end of September of this year, there is a seven-day meditation retreat at Shoals Valley Lodge in Oregon.

I remember when I first heard a friend of mine say they did a seven-day meditation retreat.

I thought, how on earth does one survive that?

And it sounded completely otherworldly. But I was so intrigued I had to do it. And this was almost

20 years ago. And I have been in love with the form ever since. I'm a total convert to intensive

practice in contemplation in prayer because I've seen how much it

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