Unwrapping Beloved’s Gift, Co-Creating Soul’s Song

Book excerpt: “I think the best way you could describe this text is, as put it in the Introduction, ‘a meditative map.’ I know for certain that I did not grasp everything and also that I could return to it over the years and read it again and again, always finding something new, or something that had before remained unseen due to my own place in my own unique spiritual journey” (Lauren Sapala, writer, blogger, and coach). “One day, unexpected and unhoped for, the world we had thought irretrievably lost may be returned to us” (I. Zaleski 2006). It began with reading John O’Donohue’s Anam Cara. I remembered I had once known such a friend and reached out to reconnect. Love opened the door, hope kept it open, and faith gave me the courage to walk through. These words summarized my subsequent spiritual journey as I awakened to deep friendship with a human beloved as well as with Divine Beloved. This book has two purposes: to describe an inner spiritual journey inspired by deep friendship and to offer that description as a meditative map for others. Isaura Barrera identifies five way stations that trace the path carved out by the song of love, hope, and faith evoked by her renewed friendship. Each station is presented descriptively rather than prescriptively as an invitation to others on similar journeys. Reflections at each station are linked to scriptural passages, highlighting connections between deep friendship with a human beloved and deep friendship with Divine Beloved.