PATRICIA MCBEE: The following are abbreviated from the "Friends Journal" Article. See article for more expanded ideas.) - Retirement: Retirement may be the practice most accessible to contemporary Friends. Our meetings for worship are times of retirement. Walks in the woods or sitting by the ocean can be times of retirement, as can retreats extended over several days. Thomas Kelly wrote that we can be in contact with “an amazing sanctuary of the soul, a holy place, a divine center.” Times of retirement are the times when we pull back from the chatter and busyness of our outward lives, enter that amazing sanctuary, and allow our inner wisdom, the Inward Teacher, to rise up in us. https://www.durhamfriendsmeeting.org/?p=4409 and https://www.friendsjournal.org/quaker-spiritual-disciplines-hard-times/ Prayer: For me, prayer is entering into relationship with the Other. If retirement is a time of going inward and contacting the Inward Teacher, prayer is entering into relationship with that which is beyond and outside.https://www.friendsjournal.org/quaker-spiritual-disciplines-hard-times/ Living the Cross: This term will sound entirely foreign to many contemporary unprogrammed Friends, and too Christocentric for some, yet the practice it represents is often found among us, even among those whose spirituality is not based in the Christian concept of the Cross.“Living in the Cross” is to put our own will aside, and to submit to the guidance discovered through retirement and prayer. It means not to turn away from the suffering world, but to face even the suffering that we are powerless to alleviate. It means to allow the Light to shine into our dark spots and show us the way—and to follow that way even when we are tempted to take an easier path. https://www.friendsjournal.org/quaker-spiritual-disciplines-hard-times/ Keeping Low: Here is another term that is foreign to our vocabularies, but we know the discipline and sometimes practice it.To keep low is not to put ourselves above others but to know our own need to be reformed each day. To keep low is to be teachable and open to the workings of the Spirit—both in times of retirement, and in the lessons that come in our outward lives. To keep low is to be taught by everyone we meet: children, bus drivers, the folks who disagree with us in meeting for business, government officials. We know this practice. It is at the core of Quaker business process. https://www.friendsjournal.org/quaker-spiritual-disciplines-hard-times/ - Discernment: First generation Quaker Isaac Penington wrote in a letter, “It is not the great and main thing to be found doing, but to be found doing aright, from the teachings and from the right spirit. . . . A little praying from God’s spirit in that which is true and pure is better than thousands of vehement desires in one’s own will and after the flesh.” "Spiritual Retirement for Busy People" by Patricia McBee. https://www.friendsjournal.org/quaker-spiritual-disciplines-hard-times/ https://www.friendsjournal.org/quaker-spiritual-disciplines-hard-times/