The Mystical and the Market Place meet.
I lived an incredibly rich, challenging and creative life as a nun in the Catholic Church for 30 years – in a Monastic Order that was actively engaged in the world. I was there for life; my commitment was rock solid. It was a surprise to me – though perhaps less so to some of my community – when the same Spirit that drew me into the Monastic Life drew me back out into the Market Place.
An unusual journey from the Convent to the Market Place? I didn’t know it at the time but I would gradually learn that the wisdom and beauty that had been distilled over centuries in silence, meditation, visions, good works, divine song and mystical union were now destined to expand beyond the Monastery walls and spillover into receptive hearts, homes and enterprises – everywhere. What’s more I only had a dim notion that my calling now was to harvest the essence of the mystical tradition, to assist build a Monastery without walls and to play my part in the evolution of a new spiritual consciousness.
I left the convent after thirty years with a wealth of education in both secular and spiritual fields to find my way in the world – with virtually no experience in setting up house, going out to work and enjoying life outside the convent. And there’s the clue! In those everyday moments, little by little, with each new experience, it became clearer to me that my task was to integrate my learnings from inside the Monastery walls with my ‘new’ learnings outside the walls such that the sacred and the secular, religion and life could come together afresh and anew. I sensed I was in for a powerful transitional ride, that the planet was in transition and institutional forms of religion were in transition. A radical transformative process was afoot and nothing could stop it now! I was caught up in its flow.
Before hitting the Market Place I needed a serious make-over – on many levels. I needed to transform myself – significantly yet light-heartedly. It was as if in my very body I reflected aspects of the hierarchical institution I walked away from. My energy was focused in my head, and yes I had absorbed the beauties of the mystical tradition but on some levels I was disembodied and disconnected.
To equip me for my task of bringing the Mystical to the Market Place I needed to explore and activate all the areas of myself. I needed to open my heart in new ways and so integrate the Sacred Feminine with my deeply inherited Masculine modes of being. I needed to sing and dance and enjoy different kinds of relationships. As a nun I had explored many spiritual modalities and experienced liberating energetic work, but I was still in a rather rarified space and needed to be firmly grounded. My journey from the Convent door led me to just the right people and places for opening up areas of myself that had been long dormant – right down to the fashion make over.
As a nun, unwittingly I had been preparing myself to assist bring the Monastery without Walls into the Market Place. As a Secondary School Principal I was quite driven to integrate the sacred and the secular so that it held meaning and vitality for staff, parents and students. So I found ways to re-language many traditional spiritual concepts to keep their essential truths intact while enabling them to be heard afresh. Thus I left the Convent with many treasures in my kitbag – especially treasures from the depths of the mystical tradition. I was well educated, spiritually enriched and with years of teaching, learning and leadership behind me.
In the Convent all earnings from our work went into the common purse. During the course of earning my living out in the world and paying off my mortgage, LIFE led me work scenes where I gained much corporate knowledge in the Finance, Public and Education Sectors. At heart my work focused on structural reform – organisational change and development. I was gaining a firm foothold in a Market Place where I became increasingly aware of a thirst for more meaning and vitality. Just as the institutional Church needed reform and renewal, so too I could sense a parallel need in the corporate spaces.
So here “I am now with my Soul and Spirit more earthed and grounded than when I left the Convent” with a product that I find is in increasing demand. As an Executive and Life Coach I work with Spiritual Intelligence as well as with IQ, EQ and Body Intelligence to assist clients move beyond ego limitation into the freedom of their deeper resources. On the various performance indicators the results are transformative. Leaders and other clients are moving into their true power, connecting effectively with staff and finding new levels of joy and delight in their lives. The wisdom of the mystical tradition is pivotal to this transformation and it is expressed in simple, practical every day language. An example of a piece of wisdom from the mystical tradition concerns the benefit of being in the present moment. Learning this skill has a direct impact on one’s presence, awareness and grounded communication; it also helps one manage stress and minimise the anxiety of worrying about past or future. Above all being in the present moment ensures one lives life to the max and expands beyond 3 dimensional experience.
Many have spoken of the lost Soul in our contemporary material society. My strong sense is that the Soul is closer than we suspect and more than ready to be retrieved. It has prevailed and evolved across the ages. It may have gone underground but in the right environment it can flourish again – and evolve to new levels of consciousness. It is ready to reconnect with us and our enterprises. Building a Monastery without walls in the Market Place is about nurturing and honouring the Soul in our enterprises and Corporates; it’s about reforming or transforming people and structures. This new level of reconnection and soul integration won’t look like pious sessions in Church. It will be real, alive and gutsy. Life and religion will reform and restructure each other… and all the details of life, even in the Marketplace will be blessed, hold meaning and be cause for genuine joy, excellence and abundance.
Humanity’s current transitioning to a new level of spiritual awareness finds its roots in the Soul’s journeys across the ages. Once a privileged few enjoyed the riches of the mystical journey – in isolation from life behind the Monastery walls. Now we can have it all in the Monastery of Life without walls! And we have the distilled beauty, riches and wisdom of the ages to light the way forward.
For more information see www.noelenekelly.com.au
