Just like at Valpo, the Grünewald Guild has a walking labyrinth outside, just beyond their central building and right next to the river. Anyone can use it at any point of the day, or night even. I actually heard from someone that they went out to walk it at night and stargaze. We use it during our final Vespers service of each program week too; to meditate on all the things we’ve learned from the week, to center ourselves and find a few minutes of peace and quiet inside our busy bodies.

This last week, I started to really pay attention to how the labyrinth walk made me feel in the moment. It’s a triple-spiral, which can mean a lot of things to people depending on their spiritualities, but as you move through the labyrinth, you pass by the spirals you already walked. I’ve been doing a lot of personal discernment lately, and it got me thinking about just my life’s journey thus far. It’s only about two decades worth of memories, but I can see so many different sides of myself when I look back, just like how the spirals loop back to themselves. But I’m not becoming an entirely new person every time I move on or take a new turn, I just add more to my story. My passions and interests, talents, quirks, and experiences all stay with me. They walk with me, even if my path itself is twisting around and around in a dizzying spiral. 

In another of our weekly Vespers activities, we have made our own labyrinths by tracing the shape into a small disk of clay. It’s up to the artist however they want it to look, and each person’s ends up looking a little bit different from their neighbor’s. Sometimes we’ll draw inspiration from one another, sometimes give it a gentle effort but not too much, and other times people think completely outside the box and make their labyrinth into a cube. When these clay labyrinths dry, you can trace your finger through the path either you or someone else made. It’s a way of sharing our stories and paths with each other.

As I’m finishing out my internship here at the Guild with only one week left, I’m looking back on the memories I’ve made with the people and the land around me. Some experiences have opened new doors for me that I’d like to keep open as I come back to Valpo. Others have shown me interesting perspectives and walks of life that add to my understanding of the world and how I engage with it. I think I’ll be visiting our labyrinth at Valpo a lot more often next year.

Blessings,

Gabby Unzicker

Grünewald Guild Intern