Walking the labyrinth at St. Mary’s Convent
Last month I took my friend Zach to visit one of my favorite spots: St. Mary’s Convent in Sewanee, Tennessee. Housing a small but vibrant community of Episcopal nuns, the convent perches on a ridge with a stunning view between two mountain ridges. One of the convent’s many attractions — which include its forested seclusion, its serene prayer services, its delicious community breakfasts and the spirited fellowship of the sisters themselves — is its outdoor labyrinth.
In April of last year, I attended a labyrinth workshop at the convent. During the workshop, the presenter pointed out that people often incorrectly use the words labyrinth and maze interchangeably. He explained that in a labyrinth, unlike a maze, you cannot get lost. There is only one entrance and one path, and there are no dead ends or wrong turns. Once you enter a labyrinth, you are guided directly to the center, from which you simply retrace your steps and end where you began.
As Zach and I prepared to walk the labyrinth at St. Mary’s, we paused to read the informational plaque near the entrance, which encourages visitors to “take [their] own inward journey, finding a peaceful place of balance and center.” Zach asked me to go first. The path is lined with chunky, light gray gravel and bordered by dark green boxwoods. Aside from birdsong, the one noticeable sound as we walked was the gritting of the stones under our shoes. A young, sturdy beech tree stands in the center of the labyrinth, its lower branches reaching out across the inner folds of the path, as though offering a benediction.
Almost immediately after beginning my journey in the labyrinth, this thought came to me: You cannot get lost. At first, I found the thought reassuring. I heard in it an echo of the common saying, “You are right where you need to be.” But in the back of my mind, the constantly churning, skeptical part, a question arose: If I cannot get lost, does that mean it doesn’t matter what I do? That I should simply do as I please, following the “you do you” mantra of contemporary culture? That didn’t sit quite right. But in the labyrinth, my goal was not to settle intellectual questions, but to (as far as possible) still the mind. To be present. To listen. So I held loosely that encouraging yet unsettling thought: You cannot get lost.
Reflecting on the labyrinth now, a few weeks after my visit with Zach, I realized what in retrospect seems obvious: When you’re in the labyrinth, you can’t get lost, but once you leave the labyrinth, you can. For the past 15 years or so, I’ve been on a journey of active spiritual seeking that has included many years of work in 12-step recovery programs, intensive group therapy and more than a decade of daily meditation. During this time I have learned and adopted a set of practices that I can trust to guide me to my center again and again. I just have to stay on the path.
The Community of St. Mary, Southern Province, is a women’s Benedictine community within the Episcopal Church that expresses its way of life through care for the body, the soul and the Earth. For more information, you can visit their website at communityofstmarysouth.org.