This was lead by Laura Mayo, the Senior Minister of Covenant Church and is active in Houston interfaith work.

March 7, 2026

Begin with breathing and quiet, with the intent to focus on beginnings and endings. In March, in Houston, we let go of winter and we welcome spring.

Begin by breathing, not trying to control your breath. Simply breath by softening your belly and relax your shoulders. Bring your attention to your breath. Focus on breathing in and breathing out.

Bring your awareness to your body - attend to the sensation of breath coming in and then leaving your body. What sensations are you feeling? Is there tingling? Pulsing? Settle into the rhythm of your breath, however it is. Don’t try to control or shape it. Simply be and breathe.

Now see if you can become aware of the very beginning of the inhale, the middle, and the end of the inhale. Do the same with the exhale: note the very beginning, the middle, and end of each exhale.

See if you can become aware of that moment of transformation when the inhale becomes the exhale, when the exhale becomes the inhale. Relax. Let the breath breathe itself. Then you might notice that little gap, that pause, at the end of the exhale — maybe it’s just a nanosecond. Bring your attention fully and completely there. How does focusing here feel to you? Do you find yourself anxious or relieved? Is there a tendency to want to control the breath, to micromanage it in some way?

Just let yourself rest in the gap. Rest in the pause. And breathe. Continue to draw your attention to the beginning, middle, and end of each inhale and exhale.

As you continue to breathe, consider endings:

How do you meet endings? Most of us have developed habits about the way in which we meet endings. Are you aware of your habits? Without any judgment or criticism, take a look to see what your relationship to endings is. When you go to a party, or you go to a conference: Do you have a tendency to leave emotionally or mentally before the party or conference is over? Or, maybe you’re the one in the parking lot waving goodbye to everybody as they depart. Or, maybe you find some way of protecting yourself, isolating in some way, pulling back into a kind of protective stance. Or, perhaps you become ambivalent or indifferent about endings — maybe endings are very emotional for you. Maybe you get sad or scared. Always from a place of curiosity, consider your practices, your habits with endings.

When you end a relationship, how do you do it? Do you try to shift it into some other form of relationship so that it will continue? Do you end it with a text? How do you say goodbye in the afternoon when you leave your work — do you say goodbye to your colleagues? When a friend is sick and dying, do you go visit them?

How do you meet endings? What are your patterns? Are you happy with the way you meet endings? You don’t have to be wedded to your old way of doing it. You have the freedom to change it.

When an ending comes, what happens in your body? Do you get tight, contracted? Does your chest open, ready to meet new possibilities? What’s the emotional experience? Does it bring about anxiety, fear, and sadness? Does it bring hope and excitement? And what happens in your mind when endings come? Do you have remembering thoughts or planning thoughts? How do you meet this experience?

Consider these questions as you breathe.

Now, transition to walking into the nature preserve. Look for visible signs of beginnings and endings as you walk and consider your reaction to both beginnings and endings.