Most of us don’t remember choosing to be born. The vulnerability of infancy and childhood forced us to discover we had many needs and desires and inevitably experienced unhappiness. And maybe everything mostly went fine growing up. We were fortunate to have a loving family and understanding and supportive friends. Yet there was still an unanticipated deficit of meaning in life maybe driven by toxic cultural and religious factors. Or perhaps there was some kind of spiritual opening or spontaneous awakening experience that pushed us beyond the life we had previously known.
In short, life can be delightful, surprising, and transformative as well as difficult, painful and challenging. Having wise, compassionate person trained as a spiritual director can be very helpful companion to explore the blessings and to process and heal the challenges in one’s life; to grow and develop, and to find new meaning and direction. Especially helpful is a spiritual companion who believes affirming and guiding responses can arise from the inside rather than be imposed from the outside.
UU Framework
Unitarian Universalism asserts that each person can know an inner Source of Guidance that grounds the inherent worth and dignity of all living beings. We leave this source unnamed, though some may recognize it as God, Goddess, Jehovah, Allah, Spirit of Life, Spirit of Love, Nature, Reason, Evolution, Intuition, the Oversoul, Atman, Brahman, or some other name from an inherited tradition. However named or unnamed, this Source of Guidance can be known and experienced directly by individuals. From birth, everyone has been in intimate, unconditional relationship with it, with or without a name or a tradition.
Using Mindfulness Meditation
Mindfulness meditation techniques can be very helpful in preparing the mind to be in relationship with this Source of Guidance. The development of mental focus can calm the mind and open the capacity for connection to Source. The development of insight can help discriminate what is coming from that Source and what is the creation of ego pretending to be that Source. Mindfulness meditation’s special capacity reveals the delusions of the egoic self at work craving what it doesn’t have and rejecting what it does.
Integration and Action
Discerning and following this inward Source of Guidance can be difficult, with many opportunities for confusion and self-deception. Although only the recipient can fully understand the guidance, processing it with a spiritual companion can help integrate it into daily life and action. This supportive relationship can foster both inner and outward transformation.
Therapy addresses specific mental health challenges through the process of evaluation, diagnosis and developing a treatment strategy. Coaching is goal oriented support to achieve specific measurable ends outlined in the beginning of the work. Spiritual companionship focuses on developing a connection to one’s inner sense of feeling, knowing, and guidance that can arise through one’s connection to the Spirit of Life and Love. There isn’t a symptom to be treated or a goal to be achieved. Through developing an inward connection to what is beyond the self, growth and development can happen that can change one’s life and become a source of inner and outer transformation.
Neither believing in God/Goddess/Allah or any other supernatural deity nor rejection of such belief is necessary for this kind of growth and development. Nor is a formal or informal spiritual practice required. What is important for individual work is a willingness to explore the interior experience of one’s body/mind system, the felt experience of being alive and embodied, interacting with the world through the five senses and the mind. What is important in addition in group work is to explore one’s personal experience and make connections with others through shared experience, while honoring the mysteries of the differences in experience, seeking unity while striving to appreciate diversity.
Most often sessions are one hour and happen on a monthly basis. Participants usually sign up for a ten session year that goes from September through June with a July and August break.
Using meditations, readings, and self-generated questions, we explore your inner landscape to find inner perceptions and messages that open up your inner life. There is no set agenda or curriculum to work through. The inner work is unique for each person as is the path of inner investigation and discovery. Although each session may have different content, common themes and threads are revealed that I assist you in noticing and investigating. You are always the final arbiter of the meaning and messages that arise from within, even when you experience confusion and lack of clarity. The fog often lifts through multiple sessions together and individual effort and exploration between sessions.
Group sessions (typically 4-6 people) and last 1.5-2 hours depending on the desire of the group. They have more formality that leans into Buddhist practices. They begin by taking refuge in the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha followed a short period of silence.
Instead of one-to-one work that happens in an individual session, one participant in the group brings an inner personal concern to the group. After a short pause to listen inwardly for a response, each group member then has the opportunity, if moved inwardly, to respond with a message that arises for them to the person presenting the concern. The group members are discovering and exploring the experience of opening to spontaneous inward changes in awareness that are supported by the energy of being together in community and the individual concern. After everyone has had a chance to respond, the original presenter responds to what has been shared and offers gratitude. The segment concludes with a short loving-kindness expression for the presenter and the group led by the group leader.
Depending on the size of the group, several presenters, but usually not every group member (depending on the group size and the length of the session), has an opportunity to share a concern.
The session ends with a metta meditation for the presenters, the group and for the benefit of all beings.
As a lifelong Unitarian Universalist, who entered seminary in 1986 and was ordained in 1992, serving three Unitarian Universalist congregations over the span of 33 years, ministry has been the driving force in my life. In parallel with service as a UU minister, I started daily vipassana/insight Buddhist mindfulness meditation in 1984. I have attended 9-14 day meditation retreats (longest 9 weeks) regularly over that time period. I am deeply shaped and informed by both western and eastern approaches to religion and spiritual practice.
Spiritual Direction came from the Jesuit tradition of Catholicism. I have adapted it as “spiritual companionship” to fit both Unitarian Universalism and Buddhism. I worried about whether this would be cultural misappropriation until I discovered a Japanese Jesuit who had already done that adaptation himself. To find out more about him, follow this link.
My trust is our capacity to develop an inward connection to a greater reality that is beyond us as individuals. The nature of that reality is mysterious but the experience in a human form is possible. My role as a spiritual companion is to help the person or people I work with develop that inward connection independently of me and gain the fruits of identification with that greater reality.
I completed the two year Spiritual Direction Certification and Formation program of The Leadership Institute for Growth, Healing, and Transformation (LIGHT) at Meadville Lombard Theological School in 2026. I also have done and continue to do a great deal of study of both Buddhism and Unitarian Universalism. And I’ve developed a little wisdom, compassion and insight in daily meditation practice and service as a UU minister. This link will take you to a part of my website that describes my work.
Spiritual Directors who are Unitarian Universalist Ministers Association members agree to request $150 for individual sessions and $50 for group sessions. If that is a comfortable amount for you, given sessions are typically monthly, that would be fine for me too. And if that amount is a problem, I’d be happy to discuss an amount that fits your ability to support this ministry.
Please use the contact tab for my web site as it cuts down on the amount of spam I get. If you don’t get a response within two days, try sam{-dot-}trumbore{-at-}gmail{-dot-}com with “spiritual companionship request” in the subject line. Thanks!