Introducing The Interior Path
On the rooms of the soul, and what is coming to The Cloister this fall. For our paid community: you can reserve your spot now.
We walk inward, not to leave the world behind, but to return to it with greater courage and love.
— from The Cloister Path
Dear fellow pilgrim,
A tender rain has fallen over night, feeding the dried out gardens.
All summer Chuck and I have been quietly preparing what is coming to The Cloister this fall—something I have been genuinely excited to share with you before we leave to Germany:
The Cloister Path, which will hold the life of The Cloister together in the coming year, and the return of the Little School of Spiritual Formation, opening this fall with a small cohort.
And yet each time I sat down to write this letter, something in me hesitated.
Just as the air felt heavy, almost too hot to bear, one question kept lingering:
Can we really invite people onto an interior path while the world is burning, literally and metaphorically?
Isn’t turning inward a kind of spiritual shortcut—a way of stepping out of the fire instead of helping to extinguish it?
But deep inside, a small voice was holding firm:
The interior path is not an escape route, it whispered gently. It is the journey to the deeper self—from which wisdom, courage, and moral clarity spring.
Still, the exterior noise is so quick to outrun our interior concern.
We feel urged to leap into action before we even could ask for direction from the deep well of discernment.
In my hesitation, I took a little book off my shelf: Parker J. Palmer’s Let Your Life Speak.
And right there, Parker was bridging my longing and my hesitation, reminding us of what the wise teachers of every generation have known all along:
When we travel far enough on the inner journey—past the ego and toward the true self—we do not end up lost in ourselves. Instead, we keep “returning to the world, bearing more gracefully the responsibilities that come with being human.” (Let Your Life Speak, p. 73)
So here we have it, dear friend.
We start by walking inside ourselves—only to return to the world better equipped to answer its call.
We go in, in order to love out.
And so let me finally tell you what Chuck and I have been quietly preparing.
Save the dates
July 26 — Early access to the Little School of Spiritual Formation opens for our paid and founding community
August 15 — Little School enrollment opens for all
Labor Day weekend —The Cloister Path opens its gates again
September 15 — Little School enrollment closes
September 19 — Founders’ Retreat with Hildegard of Bingen, for our founding companions and the new Little School cohort (10 am CT, zoom)
The Cloister Path 2026-27: Exploring Inner Rooms
If you have ever wondered what kind of “Cloister” our Cloister Notes refer to: we are not a religious institution. We chose the word because we have always been drawn to monastic places:
Places to retreat from the noisy world, to find hospitality and belonging for our spiritual pilgrimage, and to nurture both our intellectual and spiritual longing.
Honestly, I did not quite know what I was doing when I began writing Cloister Notes regularly almost three years ago, other than writing from one weary pilgrim’s heart to another.
But this year, Chuck and I sat down and asked whether there might be a path spacious enough to hold what we are already doing here—and what we would still love to bring to this Cloister.
And thus, The Cloister Path was born.
The Cloister Path invites you onto an interior journey. It gathers what already lives here—our Midweek Blessings, seasonal contemplations, retreats, conversations, and Moral Monday live calls—into one deeper movement.
And each annual cycle, the Cloister Path illuminates the inner journey through a different theme.
A few years ago, we bought a small book by the German Benedictine abbot Johannes Eckert called Wohne bei dir selbst—Dwell with Yourself.
Here, the author suggests what the monastery offers us: an outer architecture for our inner landscape.
Thus, the monastery’s floor plan becomes a way of moving through the many rooms in which a life is formed.
A cell for solitude.
A chapel for prayer.
A refectory for nourishment and community.
A library for study and wisdom.
An infirmary for suffering and healing.
A kitchen for work and hospitality.
A garden for tending what grows.
And a cloister walk connecting one room to another, returning us again and again to the center.
All summer, Chuck and I have been preparing something that has slowly sprung up, almost of its own will, out of this old monastic blueprint. Something that feels like a long-awaited homecoming.
And we hope you will feel the same, too.
So dear friend, here is our invitation:
Join us on the Cloister Path beginning this fall: Walk with us through the rooms of the monastery and experience how it helps us illuminate your interior path.
From the gate through the heart of the house and out again: one room each month, each an invitation to walk further into ourselves and return with more to give.
Perhaps there are rooms within us we know very well.
Perhaps there are others we have not entered for years.
And perhaps there are even rooms whose existence we do not yet know.
This is the path we hope to walk with you come fall.
Not one more program added to an already crowded life.
Not more material to consume.
But a way of exploring the landscape of our own souls—and, from there, returning more fully to the lives we have been given.
Ways of entering in
There is a place on this path at whatever depth your soul is asking for. These are not separate paths, but the same path walked further in.
All subscribers: At the beginning of each month, our Exploring Inner Rooms essay will go out to the whole Cloister community: an invitation to ponder what the Gate, the Cell, the Chapel, the Garden might mean within our own interior landscape and within the changing rhythm of the seasons.
Paid subscribers: Our sustaining companions are invited to enter further into each essay, e.g. into the spiritual and archetypal meaning of each room, as well as into our seasonal journeys over the year, and our monthly Moral Monday series, where we turn again toward the aching world.
Little School cohort: For those longing for a sustained year of deeper soul work, transformation, and guidance, the Little School of Spiritual Formation invites you into a small, committed circle—no more than twelve people. Companioned and facilitated by Chuck and me, we will accompany each other into translating the wisdom of the monastery into our own inner architecture.
The Little School at a glance
A nine-month guided journey of spiritual and existential formation · October–June
A place of belonging in a small, consistent cohort walking intentionally through each month
The monastery as our map, translating its wisdom into our own inner architecture
Contemplative practice and guided reflection for your own inner work
A small monthly Formation Circle online with even smaller break out groups for teaching, conversation, discernment, accompaniment, deep soul work and transformation
A schooling of the heart, facilitated by Chuck and me, sharing from our well of intellectual and contemplative traditions, and options for individual accompaniment as well
For all who long to know oneself and each other more deeply: with greater self-understanding, integration, discernment, and freedom to live from the deeper self.
How to become part of the journey
As subscribers to our Cloister Notes you are automatically receiving the introduction to each monastic rooms and thus become part of the Cloister Path.
As a paid subscribers you are invited to enter each room more deeply receiving the whole monthly essay.
For all who long for deeper transformation and personal accompaniment The Little School of Spiritual Formation invites you into a guided experience of formation, transformation, and connection.
Below our sustaining subscribers will find the early invitation to join the first circle. General Enrollment starts Aug 15 depending on availability.
Early Access: Reserve your spot for The Little School
