The Valley of the Unvowed

a dispersed community of unchurched contemplatives dedicated to embodiment, presence, and place

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The Valley is a resource and sanctuary for those beholden to the ordinary callings of days: for those numberless others who are moved by goodness, and who participate gently and intentionally in caring for and contributing to the animate beauty of our world.

We locate the sacred in the purity of our attention, relationality, embodiment, and participation in our more-than-human home.

The Valley and its brethren recognize seasonality and uncertainty, illness and grief, and the mutable beauty of creative cycles. We make no promises of liberation, salvation, enlightenment, or healing. We anchor a deepening peace.

You are here, and that is enough.
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The Devotions of the Valley

I
Devotion to the Mystery

We open ourselves to unknowing, and refrain from claims of authority and pretensions to absolute truth.

II
Devotion to Embodiment

We honor the wisdom of the soma, treating physical expression, touch, and sensory pleasure with dignity and respect. We hold the body as inherently sacred.

III
Devotion to Interbeing

We understand consciousness as inherently relational, emerging in reciprocal kinships with the land, its beings, and each other.

IV
Devotion to Silence

We value silence as a living intelligence, cultivating periods free from entertainment and speech so our perception can deepen and ease.

V
Devotion to Care

We recognize goodness and beauty as necessary nourishments. We create and care for spaces of tenderness, openness, and peace.

VI
Devotion to Right Livelihood

We seek and practice forms of creativity and craft that express dignity, interiority, and care. Our work is the realization of love.

VII
Devotion to Withnessing

We practice compassion in being with and companioning ourselves and others. We honor this world as home.

VIII
Devotion to Rest

We recognize rest as essential. Solitude, retreat, darkness and sleep are valuable in their own right.

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The native inhabitants to the Valley include outsider artists, botanical caregivers, independent scholars, spiritual refugees, radical contemplatives, unsung poets, reluctant intuitives, would-be monks, peripatetic wanderers, and all those who practice depth and tender connection through the overlapping rings of our lives.

solvitur ambulando.