Vinita Hampton Wright - Daily Inspiration for Women

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The Peace of Wild Things from New Collected Poems by Wendell Berry. Copyright 2012 Wendell Berry. Used by permission of Counterpoint.

The Grasses and Who Makes These Changes? are from The Essential Rumi. Copyright 1995 by Coleman Barks. Permission granted by Coleman Barks.

Unless otherwise indicated all Scripture quotations contained herein are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright 1993 and 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture passages cited as New Jerusalem Bible translation are taken from The New Jerusalem Bible 1985 by Darton, Longman & Todd Ltd and Doubleday, a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc.

Scripture passages cited as New International Version translation are taken from Holy Bible, New International Version. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.

The NIV and New International Version trademarks are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by the International Bible Society. Use of either trademark requires the permission of the International Bible Society.

Cover art credit: From top to bottom, iStockphoto.com/Ale-ks, iStockphoto.com/belchonock, iStockphoto.com/small_frog, iStockphoto.com/wrangel.

eBook ISBN: 978-0-8294-4042-3

Based on the print edition: 978-0-8294-4041-6

Library of Congress Control Number: 2013950592

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Women keep buying devotional books because devotional books meet a specific kind of need. Often we are too busy to dip into a book for thirty minutes to start our day. We are driving kids to school, going to work, caring for elderly parents or grandparents, doing creative work inside and outside the home, and managing multiple projects. We need a few well-placed words that meet us where we live. We are hungry for wisdom and encouragement, but wed rather not have to do all the searching ourselves.

We also dont need light, feel-good readings that dont really urge us to reflect and tackle our lives with courage and integrity. We need help with our anxiety, frustration, anger, and desire. We want honest, searching words that might sting but that will help us move forward.

Heres another thing: our lives dont unfold according to a calendar year. We live day by day, but we also live by seasons. Not surprisingly, a womans seasons often reflect the physical, cyclical seasons of the earth. We are intimately acquainted with the birthing and open-endedness that is spring, the blooming and high activity that is summer, the relinquishment and slowing down that is autumn, and the dormant difficult growthand quiet recollectioncalled winter.

So this womans book of inspiration is organized by seasons, beginning in spring and ending in winter. It does not start in Januarybut you, reader, may start wherever you want. This is a page-a-day book, but the choice of day is entirely up to you. You dont have to begin or end at a certain time and on a certain page.

An added bonus of this material is the careful selection of authors. Four women have offered their gifts to youeach woman took a season and unfolded her wisdom around it. Spring and Summer come to us from , who technically is a senior (also a mom and grandma) but whose extensive retreat work spans the globe.

So, you grasp in your hands (whether print book or e-book) the collective wisdom and wonder of writers chosen especially for this task. Not only have we written from the truth of our own lives, but also we have gleaned our favorite quotes from writers, teachers, saints, and mystics.

Use this book as your needs require. Start anywhere, linger where you need to linger, dwell with joy and intention in your particular season of lifebut taste often and deeply of the other seasons, too.

Vinita Hampton Wright

Ginny Kubitz Moyer

In some places, spring arrives quickly. Flowers burst into bloom, and by early April its warm enough for sandals and shorts.

In other places, spring comes slowly, playing a tantalizing game of hide-and-seek between storms and snow.

However it arrives, spring is always something to celebrate. The cold of winter has relaxed its grip, and the warmth invites us to venture out of our homes and savor the new life we glimpse in flowerbeds and tree branches and fields.

Are you feeling eager for a fresh beginning? Spring offers that in abundance. Its a period of possibility, Gods gentle reminder that there will always be another chance to make a new start.

March 1

It is always spring in the soul united to God.

St. John Vianney

What does it mean to be united to God?

There are plenty of days when a layer of somethinglethargy, despair, stressmakes me feel distant from God. But just as spring always follows winter, I have found that if I give it time and pray, that barrier always melts away, like frost on a field when the sun comes up. There is a gradual thaw, and I am once again able to feel the warmth of the creator God, a presence that has been there all along.

When have you felt particularly close to God? Relive that experience in Gods presence, knowing that God takes as much joy in it as you do.

March 2

Who has seen the wind?

Neither I nor you;

But when the leaves hang trembling,

The wind is passing through.

Christina Rossetti, Who Has Seen the Wind?

In the San Francisco Bay area, we get a lot of stiff breezes. The wind is unseen but so constant, so strong, that it has a presence you dont often forget. It ruffles my hair, scatters papers and leaves, andif Im particularly mindfulmakes me think of the Holy Spirit.

In the same way, we dont see the Spirit, but evidence of the Spirit rustles through so many of our encounters with others. Anytime we see acts of charity, faith, zeal, and wisdom, and when we find people using their unique gifts and talents to do extraordinary things for others, we know that the Spirit is passing by.

Reflect on your last few days. Where did you see the Holy Spirit at work in those around you?

March 3

My beloved speaks and says to me:

Arise, my love, my fair one,

and come away;

for now the winter is past,

the rain is over and gone.

The flowers appear on the earth;