Reading Rainbow

Cousineau, Phil. The Art of Pilgrimage: A Seekers Guide to Making Travel Sacred
A week before I left on this journey I was walking through Powell’s with a mission – to buy a book for a friend and not spend any more money. (Un)fortunately my eye was caught by the title of this book and I lost the willpower roll. I bought it and am imminently glad that I did.

The Art of Pilgrimage is like many “self help” books, or books to help inspire your creativity. Many of the points, observations and ideas are common knowledge or obvious. If you’re anything like me though, you will agree that having them in print, expounded on, phrased from a slightly different point of view, more encompassing, ordered and just there make them that much more powerful. I feel that (and this is a definite catalyst for this blog) one often doesn’t understand how they feel or think about anything/person until they attempt to put those thoughts or feelings into words.

“all we need do is reimagine the way we travel. If we truly want to know the secret of soulful travel we need to believe that there is something sacred waiting to be discovered in virtually every journey”

“for a journey without challenge has no meaning, one without purpose has no soul”

“pass by that which you do not love”

The five excellent practices of pilgrimages –
practice the arts of attention and listening
practice renewing yourself every day
practice meandering towards the center of every place
practice the ritual of reading sacred texts
practice gratitude and praise – singing

For anyone undertaking any sort of travel I highly recommend this book. It has been my bible along my journey, acting as a touchstone to remind me to practice.