Karen Matuska

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I started seeing a spiritual director in my 20s. I was active in my church, looking to go to seminary, but I had not resolved a painful period in my spiritual journey where I had experienced God's silence. I had gone from assuming that I would be a pastor in my adolescence to finding myself without anything that I understood as faith at all. I had tried atheism but found myself still strongly attracted to church life and feeling a pull to go to seminary. I was not one to reach out for help, but while trying to fill out my seminary application I knew I needed something, so I talked to my pastor. That meeting my pastor told me about spiritual direction and at the time I really didn't understand what he said it was. I tried explaining to my husband what spiritual direction is and he said, "Oh, so like a cosmic Onstar?" I called the spiritual director my pastor referred me to and thus started my practice of receiving spiritual direction.

Since then I have regularly met with spiritual directors, finding a new one each time I moved. For the most part there is little to say about the meetings, but like all spiritual practices I can tell a difference when I have missed a session. There have been a few times when a radical shift has happened because of spiritual direction, like the relief of being able to share a deep shame or a break-through in my discernment process. There was even one spiritual director I talked to only once (it wasn't a good fit for practical reasons) and found from our 5-minute phone call that I was given what I needed most at that moment: hope.

I see spiritual direction as one of the most underutilized ministries available to people. Many go through periods of spiritual and faith confusion and do not know there are people who are trained to walk with them, not to convert and persuade, but simply be with them. With all the benefits of the "spiritual, but not religious" movement, there has been the consequence that people are less likely to meet in any spiritual group like a church where such conversations could happen regularly, leaving many isolated. Many who are active members in faith communities also find they are lacking opportunities to have conversations that deepen their personal spiritual growth. At the same time, we are facing new challenges in our world, like constant news of threats to our safety, the increased social isolation and lack of communities, increased political (and other) divisions, increased job insecurity at most economic levels, increased pressures to "be happy" and fulfilled with competing demands of how to achieve that, and more people looking for work to be fulfilling. Spiritual direction is a way to address these and many other issues in your life that allows for wholeness, integrity, community, growth in relationship to God, and greater meaning.

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I have degrees in Sociology, Mental Health Counseling and a Master of Divinity. I trained to be a spiritual director through Benet Hill's Benedictine Spiritual Formation Program in Black Forest, CO (2015). I did further training through Centered Life's Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) program in Colorado Springs. I am a member of Spiritual Directors International and I abide by their ethical guidelines. I have served a Lutheran pastor, hospice and hospital chaplain, spiritual director and mental health counselor.  Currently I work in private practice as a mental health counselor (LPCC) and spiritual director. I live in Colorado Springs with my husband, Tres, our three dogs and our cat.