Several years ago, I visited my dearest friend Deborah in Taos, New Mexico. After spending each day wandering in the crisp January air, we settled around the blue farm table in Deborah’s kitchen. Its worn wooden surface carried many layers of aqua-colored paint, applied seasonally by Deborah, a five-foot tall sprite with bright eyes, vibrant wit, and a flare for bringing people together.

One evening, women’s faces appeared at the door one by one as the sun set and the meal was prepared. As each arrived, there was a stomping of boots, setting aside coats, introductions and welcome, then settling into the circle around the blue table. Slowly, easily, we began to weave our stories together, tentative at first until the conversational fabric we wove grew stronger with time. No one monopolized the space as we shared the flow of listening and speaking. A genuine sense of curiosity filled the room, seemed to recognize the depth and sparkle of each other.

We talked about surface matters initially, such as our addresses and roles, then came life events, then we dove deeper, now connected by food and deep listening. The beauty of this shared safe space invited honesty and authenticity. Joys and hurts, deaths and divorce, successes and failures were blended with threads of sparkly mischief, questions, and laughter. The grandmother, the widow, one single, others married, the artist, the executive, the seeker, and the healer. We sat elbow to elbow around the blue table warmed by our conversation and good spicy tea. As we sipped and pondered aloud, decades of experiences were woven together in threads of conversation. A collection of women, most unknown to each other when the meal began, now joyfully created a tapestry with the sacred art of conversation.

Deborah’s hands holding one of Ginto’s mugs

Hands of all shapes encircled earthen mugs; each mug as unique as the hands that held them. These pieces of clay artwork were fashioned by Deborah’s husband, Ginto, in the adjoining casita of their centuries-old adobe compound. The conversation flowed easily, sometimes punctuated with nuggets of laughter and shimmering wisdom that prompted nodding heads, deep sighs, and quiet reflection. The blue table became a canvas for women’s voices, earthen mugs, and the soft movement of hands; two gnarled, some speckled with age spots, rings, no rings, all elements of a tableau. Stories and lives, textured and flawed, wise and real woven together.

Deborah and I often have discussed that evening, what we fondly call The Blue Table Dialogue. Her eyes are now blinded by glaucoma, and Ginto left this life three years ago. That evening stays with me, even 15 years later. It has inspired a conversation-and-listening practice that continues to enrich my life. That evening and others like it are shimmering memories, threads in my personal tapestry, equally rich even without the blue table.

I invite you to find your own blue table and seek sacred conversation. Begin with just one other person, together setting an intention to both listen and boldly share. Then, try again with two or three more, knowing that not everyone is capable of listening, a vital ingredient. Even so, keep going. Create a sharing place for rich and playful conversation, a collection of stories, hands cradling mugs, the words flowing easily, and notice in doing so how your own blue table dialogue can enrich your life.

Elizabeth Bayer is a graduate of Green Lotus’s 200-hour and 300-hour yoga teacher-training programs. She is a noted lecturer, workshop leader, and author of two non-fiction books dealing with self-discovery – her 2003 memoir Wednesdays at the Fluff 'n' Fold and 2016's Yoga Expression Spirit in which she chronicles the three pillars of her life. In 2020, Elizabeth and her husband founded the Annandale Art and Textile Center, the non-profit home of the Heart of the Lakes Weavers, a vocational-weaving program employing individuals with social and developmental disabilities.

Insight & Inspiration