Jena Botte
Jena Botte came from Oregon for Winter term 2006 to learn more about the Religious Society of Friends and how it fits with her interest in Zen Buddhism. Before coming to Pendle Hill she held a variety of internships and apprentice positions - farmer, library assistant and time in a Zen monastery, where she met former student Alison Krieger and learned about Pendle Hill. She was a Spirit Centered Service Scholar at Pendle Hill.
"I find days rich and varied, within a consistent framework of community intentions of morning meeting for worship, shared meals three times a day, and 9pm epilogue. As a Spirit-Centered Service Scholar working with the Hospitality Team, I typically have a stretched schedule (few hours here and there throughout the day, typically early mornings and afternoons) Fridays through Sundays."
During the week, my day looks something like:
- 7:00am - Rise
- 7:30am - Breakfast
- 8:30am - Meeting for Worship
- 9:30am - Varies: Class time (three mornings a week), course "homework" or Wednesday Work Morning or late rise!
- 12:30pm - Lunch
- 1:00pm - Daily Job (wash pots)
- 1:30pm - Varies: Service-Center Scholars meeting or Hospitality meeting or rest/exercise/meditation/laundry/course "homework"
- 6:00pm - Dinner
- 7:30pm - Community Meeting or Guest Speaker (Forum) or small group work or shared movie or reading or socialize at Common Room table.
- 11pm - typical bedtime
What I enjoy most and find most rewarding:
- Meeting and living with interesting, loving, and spiritually-oriented people
- Laughter and tears moving freely through me
- Meeting for Worship
- Beginning a relationship with Quaker practice
- Vegetarian meals made with (as much as possible) local and organic ingredients... and love.
- Gospel choir led by Niyonu
- Cardinal birds (we don't have cardinals in Oregon)
- Our brief-but deep!-visit of snow
- Sap buckets around sugar maples (another something we don’t see in Oregon)
- The bamboo around the Springhouse
- Silent Wednesday afternoons and part of dinner
- 24-hour access to craft studio and library (and peanut butter)
- My ever-evolving awareness of Light, of the Divine, of Love
- Spiritually-rich, emotionally-nurturing, terribly fun friendships (lucky me!)
"I am taking three full-term courses and no short-term courses. In a sentence, my experience with learning here is the cliche 'I get out of it what I put into it.' It has been up to me how deeply I want to delve into the reading and reflection and personal growth around the topics. Committing to showing up to class and fully participating has been my minimal expectation. Outside of class, there are many enriching ways to further engage in the class learning - some of which I have embraced (discussions, journaling), some not as much (additional, supplemental readings). I have experienced my classes as a perfect balance of whole class listening and questioning, small group and partner sharing, and individual reflection and reading time. Other class participants freely share their experiences and ask questions that I hadn't thought to ask. What a gift! The dynamics between us all have been rich and inspiring.
