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It is impossible to diagram a typical session, but there is a flow that occurs in spiritual direction.
The setting: two people in a quiet, private space perhaps with a li| candle on a table or some other item that represents the presence of the Holy Spirit. In the first visit, you and the director will spend some time getting to know each other. The director may ask you to tell them about your spiritual journey, sometimes called your river story. This is the flow of your life. The good the bad and the ugly of it all. Other questions may be, “Tell me what brings you in?” “Tell me what you are hoping for from our relationship?”
“Tell me something about your present life situation?” There are many possibilities and each director have their way of getting you to tell your sacred story. Many directors start with silence asking you (the directee) to, when you are ready, to start talking about the reason you are seeking spiritual direction. You may want someone you can check in with each month as you live out your spiritual practices. It could be a life situation you want to explore.
Don’t think that you will be talking about “spiritual things” all the time. God is in all things. Where the action is in your life is where God is most involved with you. That is where you are making choices that are forming your life, what you are becoming as a person.
Generally speaking, this is what you can expect:
• A person willing to walk alongside you on your spiritual journey. This person can walk with you in silence or dialogue, in
peaceful times or terrible times. The point is presence.
• A companion who will listen attentively and reflect back to you what you are experiencing and discovering. They will listen
for places in your story that have deep emotion or significance to you.
• Confidentiality—what you talk about in your time with the spiritual director will go no further.
• Encouragement and hope; an effective spiritual director always carries hope for you and gently nudges you toward the
wisdom and grace God is already pouring into your life.
• Reverence and respect for the spiritual movement in your life. A wise spiritual director recognizes that God speaks to
people in many different ways. The spiritual companion listens to you describe your experience as it makes sense to you, in
words and phrases that are meaningful to you. Although he or she may help you connect your experience with spiritual
concepts such as grace or the movement of the Holy Spirit, there’s no attempt to rewrite your experience to be anything
other than what it is.
• A person wise enough to understand when you need help that is different from spiritual direction. An attentive spiritual
director will notice if you appear to be physically, emotionally, or mentally ill and will encourage you to get the support you
need. In other words, a spiritual director recognizes that they are not your social worker or psychiatrist and will not try to
fill those roles.
• A person with whom you are safe to talk about your interior life in all its complexity and unfolding beauty.
All of this may not happen in one session but may occur over many sessions. Spiritual directors are trained to be patient and not attached to a particular outcome for you. We want you to set the pace and make your own choices. It is for that reason that a great many spiritual directors do not like the term “direction.” As spiritual directors, we are not in charge. God is. The mystery we call God is the true director and we recognize that you and God have more to say about your spiritual path than we do. Directors are always at the service of God and you (in that order).
Adapted form an article by Thomas Heart