What do you think?
Rate this book
Decision Making & Spiritual Discernment: The Sacred Art of Finding Your Way
Stay spiritually grounded and open to divine wisdom as you shape your life. "To make wise decisions, we need the aid of that wise and loving Spirit whose wisdom and light exceed our own. With the Spirit illuminating the complexities of our decisions, we can see and understand more about ourselves and our choices."
―from the Introduction Spiritual discernment is the traditional name for listening and responding to divine guidance. In this book you will approach decision making as an active participant, a co-creator with God in shaping your life. Drawing on twenty-five years of experience as a psychologist and fifteen years as a spiritual director, Nancy L. Bieber presents three essential aspects of Spirit-led decision With gentle encouragement, Bieber shows how to weave these themes together to discover the best path for you. Each chapter is enriched by practical spiritual exercises to help you understand yourself and your specific situation, as well as to strengthen spiritual discernment as a daily way of life. An appendix includes a detailed guide for using the book in group study.
―from the Introduction Spiritual discernment is the traditional name for listening and responding to divine guidance. In this book you will approach decision making as an active participant, a co-creator with God in shaping your life. Drawing on twenty-five years of experience as a psychologist and fifteen years as a spiritual director, Nancy L. Bieber presents three essential aspects of Spirit-led decision With gentle encouragement, Bieber shows how to weave these themes together to discover the best path for you. Each chapter is enriched by practical spiritual exercises to help you understand yourself and your specific situation, as well as to strengthen spiritual discernment as a daily way of life. An appendix includes a detailed guide for using the book in group study.
- GenresNonfictionSpirituality
208 pages, Paperback
First published October 8, 2010
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
October 6, 2016
well, I don't know! first of all, I don't know why I bought this book. I was at our annual regional quaker gathering, aka yearly meeting annual sessions. I generally buy a book at the bookstore every year (otherwise, I buy very few new books). this summer, I looked through the bookstore and nothing really caught my eye. then I went to a lecture by activist george lakey, who gave a great great presentation, and I went up to the bookstore to check out his book, viking economics. I decided against buying it, because I really don't feel like reading a whole book about scandinavian economic and social policies. I'm already on board with using taxes to pay for social welfare instead of military spending. but I was in an inspired, buying mood and I picked up my bright abyss, which I read earlier in "spiritual september" (which is still going on because some library deadlines meant that non-spiritual books had to be inserted into the mix last month, and I still have three more books on the spiritual september pile). and then I picked up this book.
first of all, I don't really have an issue with decision making. knock wood. my ex-husband never met a decision he didn't agonize over and second guess, but I don't feel like I *make* a lot of decisions. when I switched jobs over a year ago I had two offers, one for the government contracting firm I now work for, and one for a woman who made really fancy designer curtains. and it was a no-brainer. the curtain job probably would have paid more, it was closer, it was an all female office, but it would have required more time commitment, and most glaringly, it's just not my thing to work supporting $10000 window treatments. no matter how much money I had, I wouldn't be paying that much for curtains. now, it's possible that at this job we will get a contract for the DOD or something, and I will be helping people get jobs involved with the military, which I'm not a fan of. but it just wasn't hard.
I don't know. my thing about decisions is, base choices on your morality and ethics, which should limit things, which makes it easier, and follow your heart. I feel like I'm in good communication with the universe, which is what some people might call god or spirit or whatever, and that it often directs me.
in fact, I had a sign from the universe while I was reading this book. I saw on facebook, for the second time, a post about leonard cohen's new album, "you want it darker". I love the title and there was a link, so I went to amazon and listened to a clip from the title song and loved it and paid $1.29 and bought it. and listened to it many many times on repeat, as is my wont. there is a word in the chorus, "hineni" that I didn't understand, I looked up the lyrics, it's from the bible, natch, it means "here I am", in a spiritual sense, a sort of, "you wanted me, boss?" or, as cohen translates it in the song "I'm ready, my lord". (amazing song, by the way, I haven't explored any of the rest of the album, but it's a fantastic song about the darkness of the world and faith in the face of that).
so later that evening, having listened to the song dozens of times while I was cleaning and sitting at the computer, I pick up this book, finish a chapter, turn the page, and there it is, as the epigraph to the new chapter, "hineni". that, folks, is what passes for a sign in my world. that seems like a pretty significant synchronicity to me, especially since the word itself is spiritually meaningful.
but I didn't come across anything immediately momentous in the book. I have, in fact, slightly negative feelings towards the book, but I will keep it on my shelf because 1) the sign and 2) the oddness of me, a person who feels decisions are pretty easy and make themselves for the most part, someone who has an out of the ordinary ease with decision making, selecting this, as a second book in a circumstance where I generally only buy one. oh, and also, before I started reading it, but when I knew I would be reading it soon, a friend from my quaker meeting held it up during a report he was giving on annual session at the first meeting for business I'd been to in a year.
so the universe is telling me, pay attention to this book. I have this book for a reason. I am a little nervous that the reason is because I will have a big difficult decision coming up. who wants that?
but the book itself...the author is a quaker and a christian (I am the former but not the latter), but wrote the book for a general spiritual audience. I would have preferred something more quaker-specific, but that's really a small quibble. I didn't find it particularly insightful, which is not surprising, because as I've said, this is an area I don't struggle with in general, so I'm not in need of insight. as I was reading I got this feeling where I felt, look, this woman is older and wiser than I, I can't just claim to be beyond all this - and yet, it seemed pretty elementary to me.
her main deal was, be attentive, be willing, be responsive (to god/spirit/light/the universe/your higher power/whatever) and let these three attitudes feed into each other like a braid as you go about making decisions. I didn't disagree with anything she said. we're both quaker, we understand the quaker practices of spiritual discernment. there wasn't much new or surprising for me. for someone not versed in quaker spiritual discernment, I am sure the book is a lot more eye opening and transformative. I don't have any quarrel with her message, it's mostly the way she delivered it and its lack of utility to me personally.
to me the book felt...corny. I found it corny. she was very big on exercises, it's not good reading the book and not practicing any of the exercises at the end of each section, she says. and they were a lot of things like guided meditations or calming your breath - very meditation oriented stuff. I think meditation is great, beneficial...I just don't get along with it. I dislike it, I resist it, I'm not even good at sitting in quaker meeting without daydreaming. I don't have much self-discipline in that area. plus she wants you to do a lot of mind-body connecting, which again, I'm in favor of theoretically, primarily by incorporating gestures into your little meditating exercises. she is forever wanting you to do something like say "loving god, here I am" and then make hand gestures of willingness. look, I make up rituals when I feel I need to, other people may find them corny. but that's just it. if I need a little ritual, I'm going to diy. I'm not going to say her words, even substituting something less corny for "loving god". I'm not going to do the gestures she suggests. and she's not that specific, she leaves it open, but it still comes out corny.
I have sort of a quarrel with this sort of earnest lifestyle in general. it lacks an edginess I feel I need. I am an environmentalist, I feel very connected to nature, but I am turned off by people who change their name to turtle mossforest and make big eyes talking about mother earth. I might find their name poetic, I myself use the concept of gaia or earth as our mother, but something about the way they go about it is unattractive to me. I see this in a lot of "spiritual" types. just this...lack of edge. I don't know! everything's about love and positivity and energy and I AGREE WITH ALL THAT but I don't want any part of that scene.
there was also this attitude towards god that didn't sit quite right with me. she kept saying stuff like, we need god to help us! we can't do it alone! this...subservience. I agree that we see very little of what's going on, that as humans we are extremely limited, that we aren't independent, we're very interwoven with each other, other beings, the planet, and the universe (in both my sense and the astronomical sense). and yet, having been raised atheist, I just don't have this kind of...it feels like groveling. I can cheerfully accept that I am not at all running the show and I gladly submit to the universe and what it wants from me as best I can discern that. but I'm not going to run around all "my god is an awesome god!". I will bow, absolutely, but I'm not going to be all, "loving god, I need your help all the time!" I'm not that kind of kid.
another thing that bugged me, besides it's general lack of utility to me and the corniness and reliance on practices I don't enjoy, was the window I got into her life. that also rubbed me the wrong way. oh, look, her entire family gathers at a cabin every november for a reunion. wow, I'm glad everyone in your family is privileged enough to swing that, they can all take the time off and afford to travel there. and then they are all close enough to sit in a sharing circle and check in about their year. that's nice. oh, let me hear about your extensive garden and the way you and your husband walk it hand in hand on a summer evening, pointing things out to one another. there was just this general vibe of look at my perfect life. she used examples from "friends" who were having less perfect lives with divorce and job loss, etc. but it just gave it this feeling for me of, well, I have plenty of time to get up in the morning and do some gestures to my loving god and walk around making decisions in my garden before I have my cup of tea. it seemed privileged.
there were a couple of things I liked. one was she talked about trail angels, people who help people walking the AT or the PCT by leaving food or water at shelters or driving them to town to resupply and back to the trail, or inviting them for dinner and a shower, and she pointed out that we can be trail angels for one another just in life. I liked that concept. a couple of things like that.
but in general I didn't find the language or exercises comfortable, I felt excluded by privilege, I felt I didn't really need the book and didn't benefit from reading it BUT I also feel the book is in my life for a reason to be revealed later (or maybe not, maybe the concept of trail angels will nudge me to do something for someone else that the universe wants me to do and I won't even realize what it is).
first of all, I don't really have an issue with decision making. knock wood. my ex-husband never met a decision he didn't agonize over and second guess, but I don't feel like I *make* a lot of decisions. when I switched jobs over a year ago I had two offers, one for the government contracting firm I now work for, and one for a woman who made really fancy designer curtains. and it was a no-brainer. the curtain job probably would have paid more, it was closer, it was an all female office, but it would have required more time commitment, and most glaringly, it's just not my thing to work supporting $10000 window treatments. no matter how much money I had, I wouldn't be paying that much for curtains. now, it's possible that at this job we will get a contract for the DOD or something, and I will be helping people get jobs involved with the military, which I'm not a fan of. but it just wasn't hard.
I don't know. my thing about decisions is, base choices on your morality and ethics, which should limit things, which makes it easier, and follow your heart. I feel like I'm in good communication with the universe, which is what some people might call god or spirit or whatever, and that it often directs me.
in fact, I had a sign from the universe while I was reading this book. I saw on facebook, for the second time, a post about leonard cohen's new album, "you want it darker". I love the title and there was a link, so I went to amazon and listened to a clip from the title song and loved it and paid $1.29 and bought it. and listened to it many many times on repeat, as is my wont. there is a word in the chorus, "hineni" that I didn't understand, I looked up the lyrics, it's from the bible, natch, it means "here I am", in a spiritual sense, a sort of, "you wanted me, boss?" or, as cohen translates it in the song "I'm ready, my lord". (amazing song, by the way, I haven't explored any of the rest of the album, but it's a fantastic song about the darkness of the world and faith in the face of that).
so later that evening, having listened to the song dozens of times while I was cleaning and sitting at the computer, I pick up this book, finish a chapter, turn the page, and there it is, as the epigraph to the new chapter, "hineni". that, folks, is what passes for a sign in my world. that seems like a pretty significant synchronicity to me, especially since the word itself is spiritually meaningful.
but I didn't come across anything immediately momentous in the book. I have, in fact, slightly negative feelings towards the book, but I will keep it on my shelf because 1) the sign and 2) the oddness of me, a person who feels decisions are pretty easy and make themselves for the most part, someone who has an out of the ordinary ease with decision making, selecting this, as a second book in a circumstance where I generally only buy one. oh, and also, before I started reading it, but when I knew I would be reading it soon, a friend from my quaker meeting held it up during a report he was giving on annual session at the first meeting for business I'd been to in a year.
so the universe is telling me, pay attention to this book. I have this book for a reason. I am a little nervous that the reason is because I will have a big difficult decision coming up. who wants that?
but the book itself...the author is a quaker and a christian (I am the former but not the latter), but wrote the book for a general spiritual audience. I would have preferred something more quaker-specific, but that's really a small quibble. I didn't find it particularly insightful, which is not surprising, because as I've said, this is an area I don't struggle with in general, so I'm not in need of insight. as I was reading I got this feeling where I felt, look, this woman is older and wiser than I, I can't just claim to be beyond all this - and yet, it seemed pretty elementary to me.
her main deal was, be attentive, be willing, be responsive (to god/spirit/light/the universe/your higher power/whatever) and let these three attitudes feed into each other like a braid as you go about making decisions. I didn't disagree with anything she said. we're both quaker, we understand the quaker practices of spiritual discernment. there wasn't much new or surprising for me. for someone not versed in quaker spiritual discernment, I am sure the book is a lot more eye opening and transformative. I don't have any quarrel with her message, it's mostly the way she delivered it and its lack of utility to me personally.
to me the book felt...corny. I found it corny. she was very big on exercises, it's not good reading the book and not practicing any of the exercises at the end of each section, she says. and they were a lot of things like guided meditations or calming your breath - very meditation oriented stuff. I think meditation is great, beneficial...I just don't get along with it. I dislike it, I resist it, I'm not even good at sitting in quaker meeting without daydreaming. I don't have much self-discipline in that area. plus she wants you to do a lot of mind-body connecting, which again, I'm in favor of theoretically, primarily by incorporating gestures into your little meditating exercises. she is forever wanting you to do something like say "loving god, here I am" and then make hand gestures of willingness. look, I make up rituals when I feel I need to, other people may find them corny. but that's just it. if I need a little ritual, I'm going to diy. I'm not going to say her words, even substituting something less corny for "loving god". I'm not going to do the gestures she suggests. and she's not that specific, she leaves it open, but it still comes out corny.
I have sort of a quarrel with this sort of earnest lifestyle in general. it lacks an edginess I feel I need. I am an environmentalist, I feel very connected to nature, but I am turned off by people who change their name to turtle mossforest and make big eyes talking about mother earth. I might find their name poetic, I myself use the concept of gaia or earth as our mother, but something about the way they go about it is unattractive to me. I see this in a lot of "spiritual" types. just this...lack of edge. I don't know! everything's about love and positivity and energy and I AGREE WITH ALL THAT but I don't want any part of that scene.
there was also this attitude towards god that didn't sit quite right with me. she kept saying stuff like, we need god to help us! we can't do it alone! this...subservience. I agree that we see very little of what's going on, that as humans we are extremely limited, that we aren't independent, we're very interwoven with each other, other beings, the planet, and the universe (in both my sense and the astronomical sense). and yet, having been raised atheist, I just don't have this kind of...it feels like groveling. I can cheerfully accept that I am not at all running the show and I gladly submit to the universe and what it wants from me as best I can discern that. but I'm not going to run around all "my god is an awesome god!". I will bow, absolutely, but I'm not going to be all, "loving god, I need your help all the time!" I'm not that kind of kid.
another thing that bugged me, besides it's general lack of utility to me and the corniness and reliance on practices I don't enjoy, was the window I got into her life. that also rubbed me the wrong way. oh, look, her entire family gathers at a cabin every november for a reunion. wow, I'm glad everyone in your family is privileged enough to swing that, they can all take the time off and afford to travel there. and then they are all close enough to sit in a sharing circle and check in about their year. that's nice. oh, let me hear about your extensive garden and the way you and your husband walk it hand in hand on a summer evening, pointing things out to one another. there was just this general vibe of look at my perfect life. she used examples from "friends" who were having less perfect lives with divorce and job loss, etc. but it just gave it this feeling for me of, well, I have plenty of time to get up in the morning and do some gestures to my loving god and walk around making decisions in my garden before I have my cup of tea. it seemed privileged.
there were a couple of things I liked. one was she talked about trail angels, people who help people walking the AT or the PCT by leaving food or water at shelters or driving them to town to resupply and back to the trail, or inviting them for dinner and a shower, and she pointed out that we can be trail angels for one another just in life. I liked that concept. a couple of things like that.
but in general I didn't find the language or exercises comfortable, I felt excluded by privilege, I felt I didn't really need the book and didn't benefit from reading it BUT I also feel the book is in my life for a reason to be revealed later (or maybe not, maybe the concept of trail angels will nudge me to do something for someone else that the universe wants me to do and I won't even realize what it is).
December 17, 2022
If you are relatively new to your spiritual path, I think this book could be very beneficial. It is Christian centered, although the author is Quaker, so it’s at least not fundamentalist in its approach. If you feel as if your intermediate to advanced on your spiritual journey and you’ve already deconstructed some beliefs you were raised with, then this book will just be a mediocre read with some good reminders and perhaps some new approaches to discernment. I feel a better title for this book would have been “Christian approaches to answering life’s basic questions.”
Good book, good information, just not great.
Good book, good information, just not great.
May 26, 2018
This book proposes a good framework for developing spiritual discernment. The interweaving of stories, scripture, and literature make for a fully developed process. Some of the exercises are more helpful than others and at times I think the author is trying to accomplish too much and loses sight of the goal. Overall it is a good guide and can serve anyone in need of guidance or discernment.
December 28, 2020
Took me 2 or 3 years to read, because it’s a bit boring, but if you are patient with the exercises & concepts, I think parts of this one will stay with you.
February 6, 2014
Really good book, especially if read with Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership by Ruth Barton. Together, these books give some framework to group discernment, and individual discernment both as a process, and a practice. If you are looking to have a better process for walking with God in the big and small decisions of life, it's a helpful way to begin.
Moreover, the part I liked most was her many examples at the end of each chapter at how to practice becoming Attentive, Willing, and Responsive (her three braids of discernment) in life.
Moreover, the part I liked most was her many examples at the end of each chapter at how to practice becoming Attentive, Willing, and Responsive (her three braids of discernment) in life.
January 11, 2012
The book had a logical progression; each section had several exercises to help one make practical application of the material. There is an index of all the exercises at the back of the book. However, it would have been more helpful if the author listed them as they apply to a particular practice or skill, instead of alphabetically. The book includes a very nice bibliography for further reading.
February 24, 2012
I have read a lot of books on vocation and this is one of my favourites. It's a good mix of practical and inspiring, from an established researcher and practitioner. I recommend it.
Read
October 22, 2012loved it will need to read it again in a few years!!
March 15, 2014
One of better books on decision making that I have read.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews