Relational People

As a relational people, we recognize that communication is key to building good connections with others. We are constantly communicating with those around us—that is the beauty of being relational. During the months of May, June, and July, we are exploring outreach and how to communicate the message. Let us hear what Tammy our associate director has to say about this.

by Tammy Townsend Denny, Associate Director

I once heard someone say that effective communication is 80% listening and only 20% speaking or writing words. When I imagine those listening spaces where I can be fully present with God, self, and others, I often think of quiet moments of contemplation where I can engage my entire being in peaceful moments, listening for the movement of the Spirit. 

Yet, that is not typically how most of us live our lives. Take, for example, Servant of God Dorothy Day, the co-founder of the Catholic Worker Movement.  

James Lang, in the Commonweal magazine article “Love Means Answering the Mail: Dorothy Day on retreat”, writes about a year-long retreat Day had planned for herself in 1943. “She dreamed of space, light, and freedom from… endless distractions,” he explains. 

Lang goes on to write of Day, “She had created the conditions in which she could free her mind to write and pray to her soul’s content. And she hated it” [emphasis added].   

In her retreat diary, Day wrote, “My mind like an idiot wanders, converses, debates, argues, flounders. If I get in 15 minutes of honest to God praying I’m doing well.” 

Day came to realize that it is in the distractions of daily living that she most experienced God’s love. “Her distractions called her to the works of mercy and love, and she never stopped heeding that call,” writes Lang. She ended her retreat after six months. 

Maybe our most meaningful connections, deepest listening, and most effective communication with God, self, and others come not when the conditions are perfect, but rather when everything is wonderfully imperfect and chaotic.  

What do you hear in your distractions?