Why Inner Work Needs A Vessel

EPISODE

In this third episode of my Winter’s Edge Soul Care series, we explore the art of vesting—the creation of a safe, patient container where deep inner work can unfold in its own time. Drawing from Francis Weller, I reflect on how grief, sorrow, and other tender emotions require a holding space shaped by attention, devotion, silence, and trust. I share personal stories from my Mormon past, early experiences with queer community, and the importance of becoming vessels of kindness and healing for ourselves and one another. This episode teaches why not all work should be shared too soon—and how letting something “cook” protects what is sacred. Part Three invites you to slow down, trust timing, and tend what is moving in the hallways of your soul with care.

SUMMARY

This episode opens with reflection and memory—Alexander revisits handwritten notes found in his holiday décor boxes and the quiet wisdom they offered at just the right moment. From there, he shares a formative story from his early adulthood: performing in musical theater at Irvine Valley College just before his Mormon mission, encountering openly gay artists for the first time, and unknowingly standing at the threshold of his future self. A recent conversation with a loved one who also carries Mormon roots becomes the bridge into today’s teaching.

Part Three of the Winter’s Edge Soul Care series focuses on the art of vesting, a central concept in Francis Weller’s In the Absence of the Ordinary. Vesting refers to the creation of a secure container—a holding space where deep psychic and emotional work can take place safely. Alexander emphasizes that such vessels are not fixed or singular; they shift with seasons of life and may take the form of therapy, community, solitude, living space, spiritual practice, or even the soul itself.

The teaching explores how inner work asks for time, attention, and devotion, especially when grief, loss, anger, or sorrow move through the “hallways of the soul.” Silence and solitude are offered not as punishment, but as places of hospitality—entered gently, in small and sustainable ways. Alexander also reflects on the importance of outer work: sharing wisely with those who can listen without judgment or advice, and honoring the right timing for disclosure.

A key insight from Weller’s text anchors the episode: work in progress must sometimes remain sealed, protected from premature exposure. Sharing too soon can dilute or spoil what is still ripening. Alexander connects this to modern life’s pressure to overshare, offering a countercultural invitation to let grief, creativity, and healing mature for the sake of the soul—not the ego.

The episode closes with tenderness and realism: grief may never fully disappear, and that is not a failure. Love leaves a long imprint. This teaching encourages patience, trust, and reverence for the slow, continuous building of the vessel that can hold a meaningful life.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Vesting Creates the Container for Change
  Deep inner work requires a holding space—a vessel—where emotions and experiences can be tended safely over time.

• The Vessel Is Not One Thing
  A vessel may be therapy, community, solitude, living space, spiritual practice, or the soul itself. It shifts with seasons of life.

• Timing Matters
  Not all seasons allow for deep psychic work. Trust where you are and know that the right time will find you.

• Silence and Solitude Can Become Hospitable
  Inner work often asks us to befriend quiet slowly, gently, and in small doses rather than forcing stillness.

• Share Wisely, Not Prematurely
  Exposing insights, grief, or creative work too soon can weaken it. Some things need to simmer, ripen, and mature in secrecy.

• Seal the Mouth, Protect the Work
  Let what is “cooking” in the vessel become what it longs to be—for the sake of the soul, not performance or validation.

• Grief Deepens Us
  Ongoing grief is not a problem to solve but a sacred process that refines, deepens, and shapes us across a lifetime.

• This Is Part Three of Seven
  The series continues next with Part Four: Restraint, exploring patience, pacing, and intentional limitation as soul care.