Because pilgrimage can be such a shift in your life, it is tempting to want the experience to last forever. But this mountaintop experience is not sustainable. Instead, we must search for how to conclude this journey and go back to the valleys of our everyday lives: "The valley of love and delight" from "Simple Gifts."

The big challenge is to recognize that your journey is drawing to a close. Often, this will happen naturally, but just as often we find ourselves clinging to the experience. We must let the natural cycle of our journeys guide us to conclusion.

Sometimes this happens with a presentation to a community (such as in a Bat Mitzvah) or in concluding a physical journey (summitting the last mountain of a hike or reaching the shrine at the end of a religious pilgrimage).

Remember that your pilgrimage might conclude naturally before you reach the physical goal you set for yourself. The internal goal is the more important goal.

It is helpful to use ritual to bring your pilgrimage to conclusion. But it is just an important to conclude your journey internally--you have to recognize your pilgrimage is over and begin the process of reintegrating yourself back into your everyday life.

Though the Appalachian Trail has a very specific physical beginning and end, I always told myself that I would only hike until my journey was over--no matter where that was. And I found that my hike felt like it was over when I was 200 miles from the end.

I had just joined my parents, brother, extended family, and girlfriend for Thanksgiving, and as my girlfriend dropped me off at the trail, but heart sunk. I plodded down the trail as dusk fell, stopped at a campsite, set up camp, and fell into sobbing.

I cried and cried, not realizing that my hike had naturally ended, and then out of the darkness a man walked into my camp. He began to set up his tent, talking incessantly, and then looked me in the eyes and said, "You know your hike is going to end, don't you?"

This moment helped me realize that my pilgrimage was over and the last 200 miles of hiking were only a denoument, to help me tie up loose ends and begin to figure out how to reintegrate my new self into everyday life.

Previous | Next


Naming Your Journey | Blessing By Community | Simplicity | Being Renamed | Building Community | Moment of Grace | Search for Conclusion | Reintegration