The Wrestle and Settle of Solitude By Lauren Rhoades

The Wrestle and Settle of Solitude  By Lauren Rhoades

Article originally published in Relentless Pursuit (Grab a copy here!)

Based off an interview with Jeremy Fowler and Roe Dodgen, taking a deeper look at silence and solitude

PDF Road Map Guide To Silence and Solitude


Selah’s call to our souls

It’s getting harder to hear the voice of God. There are so many considerations that compete for our attention. He’s still there, though, the same complex Being who installed a shepherd in the palace and inspired prophets to illustrate His stories of love. The One who passes by in whispers also sends thunder from His storehouses. The Word from the beginning is here today.

Solitude carves out space for Selah, a marker used in the Psalms as a time to stop and listen, to exhale. He invites us there to bring us back to Himself and to our own souls. He knows how much we need room to breathe. To pause and look back at the events of our lives and realize, sometimes with surprise, surely the Lord was in this place. (Genesis 28:16)

It takes time to slow down enough for our souls to show themselves. Parker Palmer suggests envisioning our souls as wild animals who shyly reveal themselves only when given space and time to do so of their own accord. They can’t be forced into view but rather have to sense safety before they peek their heads out of their hiding places.

Every time I slow down with Him, I wonder why I waited to come back again. Culture keeps preaching its message of finding the fullness of life all on our own. Quiet, solitude, and stillness wage war on that lie, pastoring us with reminders that life lives with the One who created and sustains it. If Jesus often needed to steal away to reconnect with the Father and be replenished for His work (Mark 3), how much more do we? He invites us into reunion, revealing, and rescue every day; let’s take hold of His outstretched hand and join Him there.

An extended coming away

In these pages, He’s inviting us to learn from Jeremy Fowler, a doctoral-level clinical trauma psychologist in private practice and with Veterans Affairs, and Roe Dodgen, a trauma-informed spiritual director. Jeremy and Roe were interviewed by Courtney Kendall, founder of this magazine, in early September 2024. 

Jeremy and Roe have pursued graduate level studies in spiritual formation. They describe how this education taught them the necessity of engaging your own story first, allowing God to open your heart and start to heal your wounds, when entering a care-based profession. 

These studies involved a number of two-day retreats spent in solitude, times to teach their hearts how to settle into stillness with the Lord, as well as an invitation to take part in twenty-one days in solitude near the end of the program. Both Jeremy and Roe chose to accept this invitation.

If you’re anything like me, your initial response to the idea of twenty-one days is a sense of dread. God has trained me over the past several years to endure, then enjoy, two days on my own, but I always look forward to coming back to a noisier communal life. And to escaping the thoughts in my own brain, if I’m honest. 

As Roe puts it, “You have a cauldron [internally]…going away to be alone with God is going to stir the pot, most likely.” In her retreat experience, she described her emotional world as being turned upside-down, with intense experiences of anxiety and fear. In her past article entitled "Slowing Down," featured in the Every Little Seed, Slow Down Issue, she said about solitude, “I wasn’t quite sure how my dark friend ’loneliness’ would show up. Slowing down often brings the parts of our fragmented selves to the surface. I did not know how I was going to conquer this fear alone. For as long as I can remember, ‘on my own’ often meant ‘loneliness’ would be close by, tormenting me with thoughts of inadequacy and shame.” 

Engaging with these sorts of thoughts is exactly what most of us are avoiding when we turn our faces from solitude.

She also says, “We have defenses that can keep [the pot-stirring] from happening,” meaning we guard ourselves from wrestling with these thoughts. How often we train ourselves to run from the unsettling.

Jeremy describes his retreat as a time of both realizing he had avoided his internal world and stepping into an unfolding of his defenses. He acknowledges, “I don’t know that I ever got to a point where I was completely defenseless,” and said the experience caused him to question, “What will happen if I’m not really defended like I normally am? Will something bad happen? Will somebody hurt me? Am I safe?”

Aren’t those questions we all wonder about, whether we’re in solitude or not? 

Solitude, especially extended retreats of this sort, often involves the unearthing of historical pain, trauma, and difficult emotions. For example, Jeremy’s alcoholic, often absent father passed away a year prior to his retreat, and “there’s an ocean of feelings. Even if he hadn’t passed, there still would be an ocean for me.” Roe’s retreat was a time of realizing and confronting the abandonment she experienced from both her parents, plus the mental health issues that had been present but undealt with in her mother. 

Losses, torments, and heartbreaks like these are often suppressed, intentionally or subconsciously. It can feel impossible to continually notice them and still function, so we bury them. In doing so, we bury parts of ourselves. Thankfully, our God is in the business of excavation, of pulling up paved-over places to expose the good, rich dirt and stirring of new plants underneath. 

During a retreat, God digs up these stories and hurts in sections or layers. He is invitational, not forceful, as He recognizes our limits with intimate awareness. Jeremy said, “There was a lot of discovering the story I hadn’t told.” Roe added in her past article, “Hope and courage kept drawing me into the stories that were bubbling up.”

Because of the intensity of extended solitude, it is vital to have guardrails in place if you choose to engage in it. The retreats in which these two took part involved daily meetings with a facilitator trained in psychology and spiritual direction. The therapist who worked with both described the retreat experience to Jeremy as “People fall together. They don’t fall apart.” Having a wise guide can help discern between these outcomes and redirect if needed.

What solitude has to give and teach us

God knows what we need and works through solitude to commune with and care for us.

Communion: John Mark Comer, in Ruthless Elimination of Hurry says, “In the chronic problem of human beings’ felt experience of distance from God, God isn’t usually the culprit. God is omnipresent—there is no place God is not. And no time God isn’t present either. Could it be that…we are the ones who are absent, not God?”

He continues, ”If the problem is more our absence than His, more about our distraction than His disconnection, then the solution is fairly simple: create an environment for attention and connection to God.”

What God gives us, most importantly, through solitude is a place for reattachment through presence and an awareness of where our souls are in relation to Him. An anchoring in this moment, rather than the multitude of other minutes where our minds may wander. A noticing of each heartbeat and every breath, a reminder we were made to live right here. A space to pray, as guided by Ted Loder, “O God, gather me to be with You as You are with me.” 

Love: Emily P. Freeman, author and podcaster, describes solitude as “sitting in the Presence of divine love on purpose.” We can sit with a Being who does not simply behave lovingly in certain moments, as we humans are prone to do, but rather emanates love from every fiber of His being. He wants us to experience love the way it was designed. 

“We are so accustomed to being shamed or condemned in the unfinished parts of ourselves that it is hard to believe that there is a place where all of who we are - the good, the bad, and the ugly - will be handled with love and gentleness. Solitude is just such a place, but it takes time to learn to trust it,” says Ruth Haley Barton in Invitation to Solitude and Silence.

Love is what often summons me to solitude. I feel the unkindness of this world, from myself or others, and it draws me back to His gentle, accepting welcome. Stepping towards God fills us with rivers of His love, helping free us from expecting others to provide what only He can.

Realizations: Ruth describes a metaphor given to her by a spiritual director about how her current state was similar to a shaken jar of river water—and how her next, necessary step was settling down long enough for the murkiness to clear. To be in a place where, as she shares, “We don’t have to do anything but show up and trust the spiritual law of gravity that says, Be still, and the knowing will come.” We all need space for this gravity and its clear water clarity to emerge. 

Without the retreat, Jeremy says, “I think I would have largely lived a pretty avoidant life. I don't know that I would have known that. I would have been very productive. I would have probably been successful, but I probably would have been very empty. And I definitely would have been afraid of anything that was going on inside.” 

Within the retreat, he felt called to ask, “What story do I need to tell, and where are [or were] You in that?” The time away gave him a foundational understanding of his story, including the need to allow created, creative defenses, such as a tendency to be more extroverted to avoid negative self-talk, to be stripped away.

Healing: Pain in our brains shows up differently than other physical pain—it may manifest as anxiety, depression, a tendency towards anger or violence, or other mental health outcomes which result from inflammatory damage to neural connections. We may have learned to look at our physical pains with compassion and our mental pains with judgment. 

Solitude allows the Lord room to work on the wounds that underlie our mental pains, moving towards healing of both the wound and the accompanying self-judgment.

One way in which the Lord may facilitate this healing is through the gift of dreams and prophetic pictures. For example, Roe experienced a closeness with a poorly treated animal throughout her retreat and a vivid image from God of wanting to free her from a comparable emotional state. God has given me images of floating peacefully rather than furiously treading water and of allowing parts of myself which I’ve hidden away in shame to escape the steel cage where they’ve been trapped. He works through pictures such as these to help us visualize how deeply and personally He sees each of us.

Rest: Emily P. Freeman shares that choosing stillness is a choice to allow ourselves to be willing to waste time because solitude can feel unproductive; it’s a decision to just accept what comes instead of trying to gain or learn something. This is exceptionally difficult for those of us who think about productivity basically as a personality trait, right?! 

Back to Ruth again, she shares how solitude allows us to step into the “realm where the spiritual life happens at God’s initiative rather than the pushing and forcing that often characterizes my effort.”

We can step away from the noise, productivity, pushing, and frenetic pace and move towards stillness through solitude. It’s the gift of Sabbath magnified and multiplied. During his retreat, “I recovered somehow in a way I didn’t know I needed to,” said Jeremy. It’s a way we set down all our doing and let ourselves be held together by the One who holds it all. (Colossians 1:17)

Current posture towards solitude

Before deciding how we may practically engage with solitude, let’s pause to consider our current attitudes about it. Solitude rationally has many benefits, but it may also face some resistance. It seems we regularly encounter this resistance with practices designed to bring us closer to the Lord. (Or maybe that’s just me? I keep wanting this to be different, aka easier, and it keeps staying the same!) 

Ruth suggests considering these questions in Invitation to Solitude and Silence:

•When have you noticed resistance (pushing you away from solitude) and desire (pulling you towards solitude) functioning within you?

•Do you notice any fear or anxiety these days about the experience of solitude?

Emily P. Freeman released several episodes on solitude and quiet in September 2024 - #334, 335, and 337 of The Next Right Thing. She suggests asking ourselves the following questions:

•What thoughts and feelings do you have about the idea of silence today, right now?

•Where do you avoid being alone with yourself?

•Can you think of the last time you craved silence?

Before deciding how or whether to take steps toward solitude, let’s set this down to write or walk or simply sit and think about these questions. Let’s ask God for the wisdom to know ourselves better in this. Then, let’s wait for His answers, whether that’s two minutes or two weeks from now. Come back when you have a sense of how He’s speaking to you here.

Moments away in the everyday 

Matthew 6:6 (Message) - Here’s what I want you to do: find a quiet, secluded place…just be there as simply and honestly as you can manage. The focus will shift from you to God, and you will begin to sense His grace. 

Solitude, and its frequency, duration, or details, looks different for all of us. The magic isn’t in the method though because solitude isn’t the point in and of itself. It is to be with God, shifting focus to Him and sensing His grace. Relinquishing control over our longings and our lives so they may be reshaped by the Potter who lives with the dust of us always on His hands.

There are a myriad of ways we may make ourselves available to Him through solitude—here are simply a few for consideration.

Written words: Jeremy spends time in the Word and journaling, including sketching, to integrate the parts of his brain while coming back to the more vulnerable parts of himself. “If I’m not doing that on a regular basis, I really have a hard time trusting God and believing that He’s good…I can go back to old stories that I’ve carried at different parts of my life.”

Guided prayers and meditations: Listen to or read words written by others, such as the Psalms, Lectio 365 or Abide apps, the book Every Moment Holy, or the Pause app by Wild at Heart, among others.

Quiet rituals: Emily P. Freeman suggests practicing small rituals such as standing or sitting in silence while coffee brews or tea steeps, driving with the radio off instead of playing music or podcasts, and going for walks without a device; these allow us to actually be in solitude when we’re alone instead of filling the emptiness with other inputs. 

Sit in silence: Simply set a timer for a few minutes (two, five, 10, 20) and sit in silence, trusting the spiritual weight of gravity to help our souls settle.

Escape to nature: Spend quiet moments simply observing input from your senses and letting beauty do her calming work. I have a favorite rock next to a fast-flowing river at a local park which I count as a sacred space, and God often gives me little reminders of His presence (such as butterflies) when I’m there.

See the Road Map for a beautiful visual with additional suggestions.

A day (or a few) away

A regular cadence of days dedicated to time with the Lord can be a vital lifeline. Ruth Haley Barton, in her book Invitation to Retreat, states, “The purpose of retreat is always twofold: to become more deeply grounded in God as the ultimate orienting reality of our lives, and to return to the life God has given us with renewed strength, vitality, and clarity about how we are called to be in God for the world.” 

There is not one “right” way to engage in a solitude retreat—there are so many options, including number of days, location, whether the time is guided or not, etc. If this sort of time away is new, it may be helpful to look for retreat centers or churches nearby that offer guided options. This can reduce the decision-making effort around the retreat and allow us to more fully focus on God instead of logistics. Also, guides or discussion partners can help us process and make sense of what we learn or feel during our time away.

If choosing to do a non-guided retreat, it may be helpful to bring a written retreat guide or prepare questions with a friend or advisor in advance. The book mentioned above is a beautiful resource intended to both provide preparatory support and act as a thoughtful companion when on retreat. A few of the questions she suggests considering when away are:

•Does the way I’m living day to day correspond to the deepest desire of my heart? 

•Am I ordering my days around the purposes God has for me, and saying the courageous no's that allow me to put first things first? 

•What are those first things, and are there any changes that need to be made so I can live the life God has for me? 

As much as possible, limit other sources of input, and listen to your body. Rest when you feel the pull towards it, especially if it’s more often than usual. While this may feel unproductive, it’s helpful (and humbling) to remember the Lord doesn’t actually need us to be awake to do His work.

However you choose to practice a retreat, ask others to pray for you, especially while you’re away. As mentioned by Roe and Jeremy above, difficult things may surface when we’re still, and we may feel as if we’re battling through unseen storms. In the midst of strong winds, Father, help us to remember as in these lyrics by Bethel Music, “You make me brave / You make me brave / You call me out beyond the shore into the waves. You make me brave / You make me brave / No fear can hinder now the love that made a way.”

Ongoing invitations

While these are intentional practices, sometimes it’s also as simple as seeing moments like middle-of-the-night wakefulness as thin spaces where we can crawl into communion. The best thing each of us can do is to ask Him what is right for us for right now and to increase our awareness of His invitations. Then, continue asking over time as this will change in different seasons and happenings of our lives.

What remains true no matter how we come away with Him; what’s most true is that He desires to love us there. Jeremy said, “I think the longing for God’s love is oceanic….Eternity makes so much sense because we have so much longing to be really, truly known and loved.” 

Friends, let’s push back on the ever-present demands and distractions of the world, set aside some space to float in the wide, expansive ocean of His love, and spend a stretch of solitude with the One who calls us beloved. Let’s let ourselves believe and know we’re all the way known and all the way loved. Selah.

Article originally published in Relentless Pursuit (Grab a copy here!)
PDF Road Map Guide To Silence and Solitude