Estimated read: 7 minutes
My spiritual journey started before I had words to describe what I was seeking. It continued with a curiosity that persisted and gently remained an open tab in my brain, until I went inward. There I met the parts of myself that needed attention and healing. I have such gratitude for the courage and strength to go back in, time and time again.
That sort of work does not have a finish. It takes shape, and it evolves.
I have had many teachers along the way. Some in books. Some in classrooms. They all met me where I was. That is what a good teacher does. One of them found me right in the middle. Wide awake and wondering what the second half of life would look like.
Peace Pilgrim answered that question without knowing my name.
The woman who walked
Her name was Mildred Lisette Norman, and she lived from 1908 to 1981. On January 1, 1953, she began walking across America with nothing in her pockets but a prayer for world peace (Friends of Peace Pilgrim, 1982). No money. No plan. She walked until someone offered shelter and fasted until someone offered food. By 1964 she had walked more than 25,000 miles, and then she stopped counting. She kept going until the day she died.
People described her as having a peaceful heart and a warrior spirit. That stopped me in my tracks.
“When you find peace within yourself, you become the kind of person who can live at peace with others.” Peace Pilgrim
The years nobody sees
What I recognized in her was the long preparation. The years nobody sees. The quiet inner work you do before you ever step out the door. She did not just decide to walk one day. She spent fifteen years getting ready (Friends of Peace Pilgrim, 1982). Stripping away everything that was not essential. Finding out who she actually was without all the noise.
Peace Pilgrim took her first step at 44.
Erikson had a word for this
The psychologist Erik Erikson mapped human life as a series of stages, each with its own central challenge. In midlife, he said, the challenge is generativity versus stagnation (Erikson, 1950). Generativity is the drive to create, to nurture, to give something that will outlast us. Stagnation is what happens when we stop growing and turn inward in a way that closes us off.
Later researchers found that generativity is not just an idea. It shows up in what people actually do and in the stories they tell about their own lives, stories full of care, commitment, and giving back (McAdams & de St. Aubin, 1992).
That is Peace Pilgrim. And that is what I am building here at Gracewell. Every stage of life hands us a question, and answering it honestly takes courage. For me, it also takes faith.
Faith grows up with us
The theologian and developmental psychologist James Fowler interviewed hundreds of people about their faith and found that it tends to move through stages too (Fowler, 1981). Faith often starts with what we are given by family and community. For many people it goes through a season of questioning, sometimes a painful one. And for some, it opens into something wider: a faith that can hold paradox, honor other traditions, and live comfortably with mystery.
I recognized my own story in his. My grandmother’s garden. The long doubt. The chapel bells. Seminary. A faith that grew up as I did. My faith today does not look like my faith at 12, and it should not. Faith that never changes may never have been tested.
It is never too late
If you are in the middle of your life and wondering whether it is too late to find your calling, please hear me: it is not.
Peace Pilgrim was 44. Erikson says midlife is exactly when the call to give back gets loud. Fowler says faith can keep maturing across our whole lives. And my own life says the same. I left a full time job to build this. I am a nurse, a minister, a mother, and a beginner all at once.
I feel like I am right on time. This is my coming out. And Diana Ross is singing loudly in the background.
A practice for the middle
Ask yourself three questions this week:
1. What have I been preparing for, quietly, that nobody sees yet?
2. What would I create or give if I knew it would outlast me?
3. Where is my faith asking to grow up?
Write your answers down. Keep them somewhere you will see them. That is your first step.
This essay closes the first chapter of the Believe Series on the Believe path at The Gracewell Studio. Return to the Believe path for the Ten Doorways and the reading list, or begin again with Where It All Began.
A Blessing for the One Who Thinks It Is Too Late
May you know that your preparation was never wasted. May you find the courage to take your first step, at any age. May your faith grow up with you, and carry you further than you imagined. Go gracefully. 🤍
About the Author
Rev. Kristina Soto, RN, BSN Registered Nurse · Quality Management · Interfaith Minister · Usui Ryoho Reiki Master · Founder, The Gracewell Studio
Kristina is a Registered Nurse with nearly two decades of clinical experience, including more than ten years in quality management and performance improvement, and now in case management. She is an ordained Interfaith Minister through One Spirit Learning Alliance, a Usui Ryoho Reiki Master, a Shamanic Reiki Practitioner, a NYC Marriage Officiant, and the founder of The Gracewell Studio, where artful living meets well-being. Read more about Kristina.
References
Erikson, E. H. (1950). Childhood and society. W. W. Norton.
Fowler, J. W. (1981). Stages of faith: The psychology of human development and the quest for meaning. Harper & Row.
Friends of Peace Pilgrim. (1982). Peace Pilgrim: Her life and work in her own words. Ocean Tree Books. https://www.peacepilgrim.org/
McAdams, D. P., & de St. Aubin, E. (1992). A theory of generativity and its assessment through self-report, behavioral acts, and narrative themes in autobiography. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 62(6), 1003-1015. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.62.6.1003
