The Center to Awaken Kindness offers Spiritual Self-Care courses, programs, and resources. Each is designed to encourage the exploration of life as a prayer-filled sacramental journey. Share a bit of kindness with self and others each day.
What We Do
 
Penny Taylor and Bill Ressl create Spiritual Self-Care tools that invite the Spirit grounded deep within to open a new reality for those struggling with life’s transitions and challenges. In the tradition of Jesus the Christ that is grounded in the Protestant Principle, that raises awareness of the expression of the Spiritual Community that transcends every particular church, and Catholic Substance, that recognizes the concrete embodiment of the Spiritual Presence here and now, the role of the Center to Awaken Kindness is to create and provide tools that encourage inner and relational new realities.
 
Everything we design is in the service of awakening love and kindness in the world. Our educational online courses, programs, prayer books, journals, and other resources utilize historic paths of transformation known through Lectio Divina, Musica Divina, Visio Divina, and walking a labyrinth. Each is designed to strengthen renewal of self and the world through the practice of recognizing the sacramental reality that exists all around.

Our Mission
 
The mission of the Center to Awaken Kindness is to bring the gifts of the Spirit alive in the world through Spiritual Self-Care tools.
We see that the need to awaken, nurture, and empower kindness individually and in the world is more important than ever. Our teachings and product designs are the creative spiritual response of Bill Ressl and Penny Taylor – rooted in the Christian prophetic tradition that strives toward a renewal grounded in listening love that supports the emergence of a new reality here and now. We're grounded in a kindness that is made visible through the love of Jesus Christ in the world. It is a love that is not grounded in a Jesus of institutional definitions, but a personal participation with the Spiritual Presence manifesting as a New Reality here and now. We encourage you to reflect on and define your personal theology of kindness (your God talk) and make it visible in the world (your God walk).
Foundational Theoretical Frame
 
There is much discussion in understandings of mindfulness related to the importance of emptiness and nothingness. Many strive to become empty and feel nothingness. We value that fundamental foundation but through our research have also come to recognize that historically that is only the beginning - not the end in itself. Deep within emptiness, meaninglessness, and nothingness a Sacred Somethingness can be discovered. This Sacred Somethingness fills us with renewal - a new reality emerges that fuels a new sense of being deep within that nurtures emptiness into a participatory fullness, meaninglessness into an intentional purpose, and nothingness into a dynamic vitality.

We have discovered that exploring life as an art quilt opens a path toward deeper awareness of being able to begin to become aware of the Sacred Somethingness that has always been a part of the human journey - especially in times of emptiness, meaninglessness, and nothingness. Self-reflection that dives deep in mindful practices toward emptiness and nothingness can open the Sacred Somethingness deep within supporting the journey of making life a physical representation of that Sacred Somethingness here and now – life as prayer.
Through the imagery of the art quilt called life the participation of the Sacred Somethingness through life becomes visible. Often when we think of a quilt we imagine a physical item stitched by hand or machine. Such a quilt often tells a story of their creator. A quilter takes three pieces of fabric (top, batting, and backing) and uses a thread to connect them - and in the case of a sewing machine two threads (a top thread and a bobbin thread). The art quilt of life is very much the same. The creator of the art quilt of life, the Sacred Somethingness, sews the fabrics of life together – the balance of past, present, and future expressions of reality made visible through our life experiences (top layer) and meaning making practices (the backing). The batting, the center fabric between the other two layers, is the presence of the Sacred Somethingness deep within – the Spiritual Presence that is ever present but rarely visible. The two threads that create the stitch are the time and space of life. Moment by moment the art quilt of life is stitched together creating a visual reminder and legacy of the story that is life. Self-reflection assists in bringing awareness to the reality of our participation in the story that becomes the personal art quilt of life.
 
Join us on the journey of turning emptiness into a participatory fullness, meaninglessness into an intentional purpose, and nothingness into a dynamic vitality. Discover the art quilt of life through the integration of historic Spiritual Self-Care practices of walking a labyrinth, Christian mindful methods, and contemporary processes grounded in theology and clinical theory.
A-FACT ... Foundational Methodology

The A-FACT process was first defined by Penny Taylor in her PhD dissertation at the Chicago Theological Seminary: She Reached Out In Faith: A Pastoral Theology Interpretation of Anxiety (2015). A-FACT is grounded in her pastoral theological ethnographic focus on Veronica from the Bible defined through an integrative paradigm grounded in the thought of systematic theology of Paul Tillich, Murray Bowen's family systems thinking, and various Liberation Theologians. Over the years, Penny and Bill have refined and expanded the integrative paradigm through additional theological constructs, neo-Jungian thought, and theories from clinical social work.
Examining transformative processes from various historic methodologies, the A-FACT Process is a powerful tool supporting re-newal. It is a five step interactive system that includes:
 
+ Reflecting on one’s story of life (Awareness).
+ Being guided by the Spirit to see the possible (Freedom).
+ Enhancing the practice of living a devotionally grounded prayer-filled mindful existence (Acceptance).
+ Living into life as prayer (Courage).
+ Reframing life spiritually to discover life as prayer, to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might” Deuteronomy 6:5 (Transformation).

The A-FACT Process is the foundational methodology utilized by the Center to Awaken Kindness.

Explore all our offerings including online education, prayer books, journals, home & lifestyle products, and mindful labyrinth videos - and most of all be a living embodiment of love and kindness in the world.