Come as you are.
This is a place to notice, name, nurture, and flourish. We provide contemplative, compassionate listening sessions where you can slow down and give voice to what feels tender, tangled, or unfinished. Our role is not to diagnose, but to listen with care and respect, trusting that your own insight can emerge when there is space for it. We help you make that space.
We are professionally certified, IFS and trauma-informed, compassion-based spiritual directors. Through contemplative listening, we invite honest reflection and deep interior awareness. We accompany you as you explore identity and the longings of your soul. All of you belongs here.
Our offerings
There is no one-size-fits-all when it comes to spiritual formation and personal growth. If your needs are more nuanced, we can craft an offering with you, just for you.
One-on-one sessions
These sessions are typically one hour long. Some people choose to meet monthly, while others come more often, depending on what feels supportive in their season of life. There is no set expectation or pace. This is a space of care, shaped around your needs.
Groups and Retreats
As the "spiritual pillar" of mental health, we offer small groups and retreats that gather online or in person. These gatherings offer an experiential and nurturing way to support the mind-body-soul wellbeing of your faith, community, or business cohort.
Michelle Copithorne (she/her)
Sandra McDonald (she/her)
Meet Michelle
I am a spiritual director and patient listener. It is my joy to reflect back to you the Wisdom you already hold, and to name the Goodness in you that may be hidden from your own view. We can seek this out together.
...and Sandra
I am a spiritual director and compassionate listener. My heartwork is to “sit on the rim of the well of darkness and fish for fallen light with patience”. What thrums with hope in you, maybe buried by wound or heartache? We can discover this together.
Testimonials
I have such gratitude for all you are able to see and reflect back to me from the deep listening you provide.
J.K.
To be listened to, to be heard, and to be valued for who you've said you are -- what an awesome gift!
Anon
I am consistently touched by your kindness & respect, and always amazed by your ability to listen and hear, and in the case of groups, to hold all that is said and respond to it in a way that is appropriate. Wow!
Anon
I appreciated the validation and the exploration of a concept that was new to me. I was astonished that I wasn’t alone in my sense of lostness. You two are brilliant about what you do! You offer us opportunity to explore the richness of a deep, fulfilled life.
M.G.K
Talking to you feels like sitting beside a deep, still lake.
M.H
This group has changed everything for me. I have been stuck in my grief for years, and now I can breathe.
K.
Still Lake Listening gently remind me of where my soul's home is when I have lost my way. When I haven't fully lost my way but may have taken a few wrong turns, they kindly lead me back, open the door, and invite me back in. Such skilled guides!
M.K.
One of the most impactful and beneficial retreats I have ever participated in.
B.W.
You two are a force to be reckoned with...you unstopped the stream…my bucket is full.
P.E.
Thank you for leading me to find a visual to represent some deep longing, and in a way that did not compromise my own Christian faith and belief system. That is a difficult one to do, and you both were very respectful, filled with compassion and gratitude, and able to nurture me.
S.B.
You two are the real deal! You’re not a$$holes!
K.
Still Lake Listening's Michelle and Sandra are brilliant facilitators who gently and respectfully honour each person's journey.
M.K.
Loved the setting for sharing in the circle. It felt safe and both [Michelle and Sandra] did an amazing job holding space for everyone. Thank you!
W.N.
Thank you for your compassion and understanding. For always seeing what's in need of acknowledgement. I am so very grateful for your wisdom, kindness and generosity.
J.K.
What is our process?
Spiritual direction begins with simple, open questions that invite you to go deeper. Though the questions may seem ordinary, the answers that arise in you are extraordinary and can re-shape how you understand yourself and your life.
Sessions are typically one hour long, once per month. Through spacious questions and reflective listening, we help you hear and attend the deep currents of your own soul.
What kinds of topics do we explore?
You don’t need to arrive with a clear agenda. Many people come simply sensing that something is stirring, burdensome, or “off” in some way. Here are some of the themes we often explore together:
Listening for the truest self within you.
When we slow down and listen inwardly, we often discover deeper layers of who we are—beneath expectations, roles, and old stories. Spiritual direction creates space to explore:
- The deeper self / true self
- Life transitions and changing seasons
- Personal stories that have shaped us
- Longings, desires, and callings
- Healing from wounds that have shaped identity
- Clarifying values, purpose, and direction
Tending your relationship with the Sacred.
Sometimes we long to explore perplexing questions or experiences of the sacred. Spiritual direction is a place for:
- Becoming curious about, and nurturing our inner landscape
- Exploring our experiences of God, the Divine, or Sacred Reality
- Questions of faith, doubt, and belief
- Prayer, contemplation, and spiritual practices
- Navigating seasons of spiritual dryness or distance
- Discernment and listening for guidance
Honouring the wisdom of your body.
Our bodies help bring our awareness to places where we hurt, feel strong, and long for wellbeing. In spiritual direction, we:
- Sit with difficult or complex emotions and the ways they live in our bodies
- Practice compassion toward ourselves
- Deepen awareness of the whole body’s connection to our spirituality
- Practice slowing down and simply being present
- Notice inner voices, “parts,” or sensations that are asking for care and healing
- Integrate our inner life with embodied living
Exploring how we live and love with others.
Our spiritual lives are interconnected with how we relate to others and the world around us. Spiritual direction invites reflection on:
- Relationships and connection
- Boundaries, compassion, and forgiveness
- Belonging, loneliness, and community
- Showing up authentically with others
- Living our values in the world
- Unburdening around trauma and broken family/religious systems
Book your free consultation
“In everyone’s life, there is a great need for a…soul friend. In this love, you are understood as you are without mask or pretension. The superficial and functional lies and half-truths of social acquaintance fall away. You can be as you really are. Love allows understanding to dawn, and...where you are understood you are at home.”
~ John O’Donohue
FAQ
A spiritual director is a trained companion who listens with you for the deeper movements of your spiritual life. While many names are used for this kind of practice such as Compassionate Listener, Soul Companion, Anam Cara, Soul Friend, or Guide, the heart of the work is the same. It is a relationship grounded in attentive presence, thoughtful questions, and deep respect for your own inner wisdom.
Spiritual direction is not therapy, teaching, or advice giving. It is a space to reflect on your experience of faith, doubt, longing, transition, and meaning. The director’s role is to walk alongside you, helping you notice where you feel drawn, stirred, challenged, or invited.
At its core, spiritual direction is shared listening. You bring your life as it is. The director offers steady, compassionate attention as you explore what is unfolding within you.
Still Lake Listening is not affiliated with any religious group, organization, or denomination. We understand that spirituality is personal and may be expressed in many different ways.
For some, spirituality is connected to faith in God. For others, it is a sense of meaning, connection, conscience, or inner depth. We are drawn to the idea that we are not human beings having a spiritual experience, but spiritual beings having a human experience. Spirituality, then, is not separate from daily life. It is woven into how we love, question, struggle, grow, and belong.
We also resonate with the understanding that spirituality is an ever-deepening capacity to embrace life with justice, compassion, curiosity, awe, wonder, serenity, and humility. For us, it begins by turning inward with compassion so that we can turn outward with the same.
Many of the people we sit with do not identify with organized religion or with a traditionally defined spirituality.
Still Lake Listening is not affiliated with any religious group, organization, or denomination. We honor that spirituality looks different for each person. For some, it is connected to God or a sacred tradition. For others, it may be a sense of meaning, interconnection, wonder, conscience, or the Mystery at the heart of being alive.
Across traditions and languages, people have used many names for what feels ultimate or sacred: God, Allah, Great Spirit, Source, Spirit, Creator, Divine Mother, Holy One, Energy, Ground of Being, the Beyond, Original Love. And some prefer no name at all.
If you relate to none of these but find yourself curious, questioning, or seeking to live with greater compassion, justice, awe, and humility, spiritual direction may still be for you. This is a space to explore what feels true in your own experience.
We listen. Without judgment. We welcome your sexual orientation, gender identity, and family structure. We welcome your religious or non-religious tradition, race, ethnicity, and ability. We welcome you, just as you are – whether you believe in God, don’t believe in God, or are just trying to figure things out.
Information shared in Still Lake Listening sessions is confidential. It will not be discussed or released to anyone, except in cases where there is clear evidence of risk of serious harm to self or others.
We also practice “secondary confidentiality”: if we happen to meet you in a public space, we will not breach your confidence by greeting you. Furthermore, we do not typically refer back to what has been explored in previous sessions, trusting that what is happening and alive in you right now may be the place where you are best served.
In a diligent effort to maintain perspective, and for our own personal growth as listeners, we meet with other professional spiritual directors for supervision. If part of your session invites growth in us, we may share that in broad terms. In this case, we will never identify you by name; no specific information will ever be disclosed when you contact us.
Duty to Report
Spiritual directors maintain the confidentiality and the privacy of the spiritual directee by addressing legal regulations requiring disclosure to proper authorities, including, but not limited to, child abuse, elder abuse, and physical harm to self and others.
If you have any questions or reservations about our confidentiality policy, we welcome a conversation.