🌿 Monday Meditation: Dream Me, God
Dear Becoming Ones,
I build in public, and my work is auto-ethnographic. I have had many teachers — Melissa Browning, Gloria Anzaldúa, Gilles Deleuze, Augustine, and many others — who have taught me to think, write, and feel my way toward truth. For years, I wrote about theology. Now, I’m practicing theology by turning to story as repair.
I am learning to shorten the distance between myself and myself, and then to shorten the distance between myself and others. This takes time. This is the work.
Today’s Monday Meditation is framed by wonder — and by the work of returning to wonder, for ourselves first, and then for others. Learning not to abandon ourselves is our life’s work. Day by day.
Paz,
—RCE+
“You dreamed me, God,
practicing walking upright and learning to kneel down —
more beautiful than I am now,
happier than I dare to be,
freer than our country allows.”
— Dorothee Sölle
Today is a day to wonder.
To lean into the slow unfurling of the self,
to become attuned to what trembles and breathes within us
as the world accelerates its collapse.
We hold the center not by force, but by fidelity —
by holding ourselves as a source of Truth.
We are the dream of God and the dream of our ancestors,
dreamed into this trembling moment
to remember that wonder is not an escape from the world,
but a turning toward it —
and toward the wonderous you that is always becoming.
Lately, I’ve been playing with Legos.
Tiny, colorful prayers in plastic form.
My partner noticed how much joy they brought me
and, for my birthday, gathered a small community
to gift me several sets —
each one a tactile reminder that joy, too, is communal.
I’m building a small cat.
I’ve gotten stuck.
The pieces lie scattered across the table,
half-assembled, half-dreaming.
And yet I can feel it —
the cat wants to become.
The Legos are calling to me,
inviting me to return to the table,
to keep building, keep tending,
keep listening for what wants to take shape.
This is my morning prayer:
to join the cat and the typewriter in my office,
to remember that creation is slow work.
Dorothee Sölle’s prayer Dream Me, God holds me in this moment.
It reminds me that I am not waiting for God to fix the world —
I am part of God’s dream to repair it.
I am the acorn that has become an oak tree,
planted in exile, learning how to come home to himself.
Rooted now in ritual —
Monday’s meditation preparing Friday’s sabbath meal,
which in turn prepares Saturday’s rest —
I am slowly choreographing a rhythm of repair
through breath, meal, and return.
This rhythm helps me heal
from external and internal violences alike,
from the slow drip of empire into my bones.
The acorn was mishandled, yes —
by others, and by himself —
but still, the oak grows.
I remember the dreams of the Black Panther —
those midnight visitations from the ancestors.
I once thought the Panther came only to protect me.
Now I know he came to teach me —
to embody an ethical masculinity that is
tender, grounded, and powerful.
Michael McRay once said during our Somatic Intensive,
“If I could be a Black Nuzzling Panther, I’d be good.”
And something in me stirred.
Yes. That’s it.
That’s the Wild Twin Martin Shaw speaks of —
the creature within us that knows how to love,
how to protect, how to move with grace and precision.
The Wild Twin is the part of us that refuses to forget
that wonder is a way home.
So today, I turn to wonder.
I turn to myself.
I turn to the unfinished Lego cat on the table,
the acorn-turned-oak,
the nuzzling panther asleep inside me.
I turn to the God who still dreams me more beautiful,
more courageous,
more whole than I am now.
May we remember to compost the bullshit,
to hold our center,
and to be faithful —
in the small, tender, wondrous things.
🕯️ Poco a poco.
🐾 Field Guide to Wonder
Build Something Small
Create with your hands this week — a Lego creature, a meal, a collage, a note for someone you love. Building is a form of prayer. It reminds us that becoming is often incremental, piece by piece, click by click.
Attune to Your Wild Twin
As Martin Shaw writes, the Wild Twin is the one who remembers you — who knows your scent, your laughter, your calling. Spend time each morning asking: What does my Wild Twin long for today? Listen for its nudges — in music, in your breath, in how you move through the world.
Practice the Turn to Wonder
When confusion or judgment arise, pause. Ask, What is this moment inviting me to wonder about? This simple turn — from certainty to curiosity — is a radical act of self- and world-tending.
Root in Ritual
Choose one daily gesture that becomes sacred through repetition — lighting a candle, washing your hands slowly, stepping outside to breathe the air. Ritual roots us in the present and readies us for joy.
🌬️ Ritual Exhale
Breathe.
Place your hand on your chest and whisper:
I am the dream of God and the ancestors.
Let that truth ripple through your body.
You are already becoming what the world most needs.