What’s Lighting Me Up (January 25, 2025)

It’s been A WEEK — anyone with any sort of empathy has had to take a deep breath and shield their hearts before looking at the news. And in this part of the world, we’ve also bundle up in a few extra layers before leaving the house. I don’t mind the cold, but it does get exhausting! So, in a week like this, what has been lighting me up, lighting my way, and warming my soul?

A close family member has been pondering some life and career transitions, and so last week I offered to be an accountability partner for a read of my favourite book on Christian spirituality and discernment, Wilkie Au and Noreen Cannnon Au’s The Discerning Heart (2006). It’s a book I’ve referenced over and over again here on the blog (it even inspired a full series!). Re-reading the introduction this week was a reminder of just formative its message and approach were for me at a critical juncture in my life, not to mention a hot bath for my chilled and aching soul. At one point, it referenced Deuteronomy 30.14, “The Word is very near to you; it is in your mouth and in your heart.” It reminded me of my favourite line from the Orthodox invocation of the Holy Spirit that describes the Spirit as “everywhere present and filling all things.” It was a wonderful boon to be reminded that goodness, truth, and beauty are never far away, even in the bleakest of times, that as they put it, “The whole world is the vocabulary of God” (Hello, Logos theology!). I really look forward to working through the book again over the next few weeks.

My life tends to be fairly solitary, but I had the chance to spend time with a couple friends this week, including one I hadn’t seen in a few months. And whether we were talking about the world and its horrors or having a needful distraction from them, it was really wonderful. Socialization and friendship — this is hardly a new or revolutionary insight, but so much of life is not about learning new things but about being reminded of what we already know to be true.

It’s been a fairly average week in my reading life, which is to say generally good, with a couple great experiences and a couple disappointments. The best book I read this week was Sally Rooney’s 2018 novel Normal People, which I admit I’d been procrastinating reading. It has a polarizing main character, so won’t be for everyone, but what it did was pretty brilliant. In other news, my hunt for the wily and elusive good cozy mystery finally paid off in the form of The Windsor Knot by SJ Bennett (2021), in which Her Majesty the Queen (of blessed memory) is the amateur detective. It’s a silly but fun premise — but it’s a cozy so of course it’s a silly premise — and very effective in the way she harnessed her decades of experience in diplomacy to guide her detection efforts.

On the music front, Victoria Canal’s album Slowly, It Dawns (which I mentioned last week) has been my main listen, but it’s facing stiff competition with some strong albums released yesterday, including Max McNown’s country-inspired debut “Night Driving” and FKA Twigs’s “Eusexua.”

So what’s lighting you up this week?