Sacred Chores
I often find repetitive physical work to be a kind of meditation. So I wanted to share with you a sacred moment I had recently. The trees near me are finally done dropping their leaves, which means I couldn't continue to put off the raking of the yard. I told myself I would wait until all the leaves were down. Now the work needed to get done if I wanted any kind of lawn in the spring, and I had to do it before all the plants under those leaves died. Since this is a job that I do only once every year, I decided to make it into a simple little sacred moment. My Ritual: I smudged my rake saying, "May this tool become an extension of my hand and follow the directions of my desire." (This is my stock request when purifying a tool that isn't one of my usual ritual tools.) I smudged myself saying, "May this work bring strength to my body, focus to my mind, and peace to my spirit." That's all it took. I then spent half the day raking leaves. I spent tim...